[Ashborn-B1] 95 - Pillars (Patreon)

XCV

Pillars

Judith grimaced watching the beast try to stomp everything in the world below it into paste. Tirion danced between the tentacles and cleaved through multiple at a time, but there was only so much a single disciple could do. He would run out essence soon.

‘How the hell are we supposed to stop that thing?’

Duke’s performance wouldn’t damage it. It’d be a godsend if Leila could do more than leave a scratch without dying. And for herself, well, she was out of mana and too weak to walk on her own.

No matter how one looked at it, their situation was doomed.

We still have…a chance, Dorothy groaned.

‘We do?’

A mental image of Dorothy nodding appeared in her head.

Bring me to one of the pillars…I can tap into it.

Judith paused to make sure she heard correctly. “You’re going to tap into the pillar?” She was so confused she spoke out loud.

Her comment made Duke raise an eyebrow at her, but she ignored him.

Pillar is…light source. We can absorb it.

Judith turned in the direction of the closest pillar. The pillar’s energy had reduced because of the enemy’s assault. However, the power coursing through them was still potent. Potent enough that it made Judith shiver merely thinking of ‘tapping’ into it.

‘There’s no way.’ She’d spontaneously combust if she came within an inch of touching that thing.

Do you trust me? Dorothy asked.

And that made Judith bite her lip. Did she trust her? A question like that was inane. Dorothy was the only reason she was still alive. There was no such thing as not trusting her.

Which meant she must get to that pillar.

“Duke,” she said.

He was already looking at her.

“I need to get to one of the pillars.”

He blinked twice in quick succession, then spun to the structure in the distance. It wasn’t that far. However, in a battle like this with the state they were in, two hundred metres was the difference between life and death.

Duke lowered his flute. “What about Tirion?”

Judith was in no position to fight through the wave of enemies between her and the pillar. Garen would need to escort her. But taking him away from this fight would put more burden on Tirion, who’d need to stay here by himself and keep that monstrosity at bay.

…

Or did he?

Though Vyke was gone, the one he’d called Anetta was still in the battle, fighting Garen and his squad. Not once during this confrontation had she given the monstrous beast any kind of orders. Instead, she merely seemed to hover around the creature like a guardian beast to make sure it wasn’t outnumbered or anything else happened to it.

‘She cannot control it.’

And didn’t that make sense? Rituals allowed the casters to achieve things regular arts could never dream of. However, none of the disciples were over level-forty, so summoning a beast like this must’ve been the result of sacrificing dozen of lives. But even if they could summon it, no creature of this scale would fall under the control of a lower realm cultivator. They’d likely, they’d merely instilled a powerful suggestion in the creature not to assault one of their own. Other than that, there wasn’t much they could do.

Judith let the others in on her reasoning.

“It is strange that they didn’t send the beast into our army,” Duke said, forehead scrunched up into a maze.

If they had, the battle would’ve been over by now.

“But what will getting you to the pillar do?” Leila asked.

From the way Duke glanced at her, that’s what he was wondering, too.

“Don’t worry about that,” Judith said. “Just get me there and I’ll swing this battle in our favour.”

Neither of the two bought that, though that was likely because of how impossible this battle was looking.

Nothing but Caelia walking out that temple door would reassure anyone at this stage.

However, there was no better option. Duke headed for Tirion to make sure he began to retreat in their direction. Leila fetched Garen. Judith’s loyal second was in the heat of battle and making him aware of the plan was an ordeal in and of itself—they couldn’t exactly scream what they were planning for him to hear—but they managed.

Both sides of their frontline would be making their way back.

‘Good. Now we just need to—’

“Going so soon?”

Judith jerked and turned over her shoulder.

Pieces of flesh were stuck in the thorns of Aedan’s morningstar like she was offering a nice meal of skewered meat. All three of her copies brandished their weapon and scattered lines of blood in the air.

‘Vyke’s still not here.’ What had happened to him? Was he preparing another ritual? Her lips tutted. They weren’t surviving another one of these monstrosities showing up.

A holy blade stepped up in front of her.

“Milady!” Garen called from her rear, hurrying to her side. His armour was matted in so much blood that the white surface was no longer visible.

“I failed to kill her. My apologies.” His voice came out in a rush and he heaved for breath.

Judith tapped him softly on the arm—she couldn’t reach for his shoulder because it hurt. “You did better than me. Thank you.”

Pupils clouded over as he looked down on her. His helmet creaked near the mouth…but he swallowed whatever he wanted to say.

They turned back to Aedan. Behind her, a shadowy wave of Immortals spread like a swarm of insects.

Judith’s jaw set. Time to fight their way out of this.

Veins in my thighs pumped with blood. Darkness whirled inside my pupils. Within me, my soul vibrated in rhythm with Skul’s bubbling hunger.

Soul Resonance was the third skill the wraith had unlocked. The ability had no clear description, so I wasn’t sure what to expect.

Azure fires consumed my blade, making Gaje’s hundred eyes widen at the same time.

Because of the way I’d levelled my stats and all the buffs I had, the flames my summons or I produced didn’t bother me. Except for a warm touch on my skin, I barely knew they were there. Until now.

The light blazing from the sword burned the fat on my cheeks, and I had to keep the blade at maximum length from me.

‘Let’s see if you can phase through this.’

I launched and arrived in front of him in the same breath. This wasn’t just the speed from Saber’s fury; the agility from the flametalon he’d called into the world was ripping through me, too.

Flames rolled back over the flat of the sword as I swung. The very metal the blade was forged from sparked, and the first of the embers drifted a mere phalanx’s width away from the feathers in Gaje’s coat—

The blade cleaved the space in front of me and bisected the air.

My lips pressed into a line. ‘How can he shift that quickly?’ I was covering the distance in instants!

Fires changed direction, and I pulled my blade back into position.

‘Where’s he?’ My head swivelled, but there was nothing but an empty field around me—

Skul’s eyes whirled on a place near me.

—I shot forwards without confirming his hunch.

Gaje phased into the world while I was in the middle of my leap. Though I was coming from the blindside of a normal person, the Nightmare had no blindside.

He vanished and my blade tasted the air again.

I landed, feet digging through the grass and skirting to a halt. ‘Dammit.’ This would all be for nothing if he kept disappearing and running.

A bolt zipped past in the corner of my eyes. Skul whirled and caught the figure in his sight. Black Fang. Wielding a spear. He led three others in my direction.

Breath whistled past my lips. ‘If he was keen on running away from me…’

Skul reared and opened his jaw wide. The gesture caught the approaching off-guard enemies, who jerked and prepared for the soundwave to hit their ears…but Skul’s roar didn’t pass through the physical realm. It smashed into their spirits, made them tremble with a primordial fear take control of their faculties.

I was at the neck of the spear-wielder before his mind could fully register the recent sequence of events. The Black Fang, to his credit, managed to call on a defensive technique that turned his skin the colour of metal. But where the edge of my blade touched, the ‘metal’ turned lava red.

His head came off without any issue.

Following the momentum of my strike, I shot off to the right and pierced the throat of a girl covered in tiger fur clothing.

The earth exploded beside me. Skul swallowed the poor chap in his path whole. Then, without taking the time to chew his meal, he spun and killed the last of the reinforcements.

A snap of the wrist had my roots dragging the bodies off into a fiery realm from which there would be no escape.

The pulse travelling through my bond with Skul thumped so hard I could feel it in my throat. Voices and screams entered my ears, which I realised at once were mere echoes of what Skul was hearing. Our bond twisted and tightened. A film the colour of his fames coloured my world. And then, all at once, I was no longer seeing the mere physical bodies of the disciples arrayed in front of me, but what lied inside them—at the very core of their existence.

Liquid fires dripped down Skul’s fangs, and I licked my lips. I spun to the north, where the shocked faces of more reinforcements waited—

If Gaje wasn’t coming to me, I just had to force him to.