NOVEL SIMPLE Chapter 213: Husks
The horde of mindless husks doesn’t seem very deterred by the wall I had created in front of them, slamming right up into the heightened ground en masse and piling up on top of each other to start to create a ramp of bodies. While the growing number of defenders can probably handle it for now, I decide to lend them a hand. Pointing my sword to one end of the line, channeling my magic into it and releasing a blast ray of light, completely burning up the husks that it comes into contact with. I blast the entire raised line with my beam of destruction, quickly racking up a body count in the thousands and earning myself a lot of cheering from the forces down below. My lightray does cause some minor fires on the forest floor and in the top of trees but that is a small price to pay. There’s plenty of water mages in the area to put out a forest fire anyway if it does start to cause a threat. Besides, the fires are also passively cutting down on the enemies who are assaulting. It’s a good thing! I promise!
From my birds eye view I see that Gamma herself is also cutting down on the enemywith her bombs and her swords. When she’s swinging her swords enthusiastically she almost starts to resemble a purple tornado of metal, which… pretty much reflects her personality.
We continue fighting on this side of the battlefield for a while against the approaching horde while I occasionally fly higher to see if other parts of the front don’t need our attention more. From the looks of it, it seems that Sam’s group has held the line on their side really well, managing to push the enemy back from the river. As for the rest, it seems that our focus here is still warranted.
Although I am starting to notice the distinct lack of more powerful diabolic forces. Apart from the single demon that Gamma shot when we arrived, it’s been terribly quiet, even though Gamma said that there would definitely be more of them and it’s not like I see any fighting across the battleline either. Another distinct lack in the current fight are those flyers that chased us out of the area last time.
I decide to set that thought aside for the moment as there’s still fighting going on down below although I do keep a keen eye on my surroundings to make sure we don’t get snook up upon by a group of them at once.
Ten minutes go by and while the fighting does continue to some extent, the intensity of the attacks has clearly diminished to next to nothing with only a couple of stragglers still heading out of the forest but which easily get picked off by archers or mages alike.
I swoop down and regroup with Gamma, though I do keep my angelic form up for the moment as something inside of me tells me not to let my form drop just yet.
Gamma seems a bit uneasy too, holding tight to one of her pistols and a sword in her other hand while the soldiers and adventurers around us start to cheer at their apparent victory.
“Amicia, can you detect anything nearby? Anything particularly foul?” Gamma asks.
I shake my head. “Not really. But I have the gut feeling something isn’t right. This is a bit too easy, isn’t it?”
Gamma nods. “Yeah, that’s what I was thinking too.” She looks down and prods the half-charred body of one of the husks with her boot. “Should we hook up with the others and continue on for a counter attack?”
I look around me, an eerie quiet has set in on the forest floor now that all enemies have died. Even the cheering soldiers have stopped doing so, probably noticing our lack of enthusiasm.
“Is something wrong?” One of the adventurers walks over towards us. The middle aged looking man has a somewhat younger looking mage cautiously walking behind him. Both her and the guy are wearing equipment adorned with a symbol of Crystal’s guild.
“I don’t know. But I don’t think the fighting is over just yet.” I reply. “Could you tell the others not to abandon the lines just yet?”
The woman who stands behind him nods and quickly runs over to some soldiers and adventurers behind her to spread the word.
“Looks like she’s ahead of me.” He chuckles. “But we will do as you ask.”
But before the guy can turn around to join his friend an outright deafening extremely high pitched shriek makes all of us immediately cover our ears in pain. Gamma and I manage to keep standing up straight but the others around us are all forced on their knees.
The shriek continues for a good thirty seconds before it finally stops, leaving only confusion in its wake together with a ringing noise in my ears.
“What was that?” Gamma asks as she tries to physically shake off the effects of the shriek by shaking her head.
The people around me are also trying to get back on their feet but they don’t get the opportunity to, as this time some kind of forcewave accompanied with purple miasma manages to even knock me prone.
“What the shit?!” Gamma exclaims as she’s laying on her back next to me, quickly trying to scramble to her feet. The air around us now filled with the foulness brought along by the purple wave of miasma. Streaks of purple wrongness are still visible everywhere we can see but particularly concentrated on the forest floor and especially near the bodies of the slain.
My brain immediately skips the theorycrafting phase as I start shouting orders at the confused and knocked over people nearby. “Quickly! Try to destroy as many bodies as you can!”
As soon as I say that I already see the fingers start to move off the husk that Gamma had prodded with her foot just a minute earlier. I strike it down by calling a beam of fire and light down from the heavens.
Gamma joins me immediately in an attempt to stop bodies from getting up but the other defenders aren’t much help. The screech and subsequent blast had a way bigger effect on them than it did on the two of us. There were only a few people who were just about to get back on their feet, but far from being in any capacity to help us. Many of them probably didn’t even hear me say anything.
In response I build up some mana in my body before releasing it in the area around me, blue light enveloping the defenders as I heal them in an attempt to get them on their feet faster.
“Amicia, leave them. Look to the front!” Gamma calls for my attention. She’s not even paying attention anymore to the husks slowly clawing towards her.
In the distance I see what she’s shouting about. Answering the question I had earlier about the more powerful diabolic forces as a group of them is bolting straight towards us, armed with purple weapons. Their red skin, horned appearance look exactly like the devils you would see depicted in books on Earth. Luckily it seems these ones aren’t armed with the bolts we had encountered earlier.
Gamma takes two pistols from her jacket and fires them both at once at the leading devil, hitting him directly in the middle of his head. A screech resounds as the hulking body crashes on the floor and starts to dissipate in a cloud of purple ash. The other devils don’t even flinch as they jump over their comrade.
Instead of reloading Gamma just drops her pistols and takes the second set from her jacket, losing another volley. This time the devils in the lead block her shots with their shields. “Tsk.” She utters, grabbing yet another pair of pistols. “Amicia, could you go and distract them so I have a better shot?”
“What about the husks?” I kick away one of the crawling husks that was pretty much touching my sabaton, sending it flying against a tree with a loud thud.
“Let the rest take care of those. If those big guys get into the defensive line while we are still recovering, it’s going to cause a lot more shit than what these zombos can do.” Gamma shoots one of her pistols again, this time not aiming for their heads but towards their legs. She at least manages to tumble one of the front shield bearers like that, but the shot isn’t fatal. “At least it seems they are gunning directly for the two of us so we can use that to our advantage.”
I give Gamma a nod and brace myself in the forest ground. With force I push off and flap my wings at the same time to give me a little boost to propel myself in the direction of the devils. As Gamma said AoE spells aren’t that effective, it’s time to let my sword do some of the talking for once. -Let the melee begin…-