WW Chapter 102: Battle for the Cellar (Patreon)

Yesterday's chapter.

Ezra very quickly learned why choke points were so important in battles. Of course, he’d always known that limiting the numbers of an enemy would be beneficial. In a few of the fights he’d been in before joining the army, at least those that escalated beyond petty scraps, he’d seen a guy get surrounded by two or even three others. The guys who got shoved to the ground and kicked like crazy were the ones that walked out with a lot worse than scraped knuckles and a bloody nose.

Now, though, Ezra was reminded that the greatest strength of the goblins was their numbers. Even when he was just an Initiate, and with barely any real experience besides, he could kill half a dozen goblins himself, so long as he had a couple other people nearby to keep him from being surrounded. That was with them swarming wildly, throwing as many numbers as they could, but still they couldn’t do anything to him. Here, trying to fight down the staircase, he and Darius could hold the line easily.

His axe cut down the goblins that skirted around the chained ones. Darius, with his ordinary blade glowing with aura, cut deeply into the chained ones’ skin. He had far less trouble with them than Ezra had, but it still took him a handful of strikes to fully force the creatures to a stop. Something Ezra hadn’t learned in their first fight against the chained ones was that, with so much metal on their bodies, the strange creatures were quite heavy, and though they weren’t especially fast, they could put together a good charge coming down the stairs.

With a grunt, Ezra stopped the first charge, his shield slamming against his shoulder as he took care of the smaller creatures swarming around the chained ones. The goblins fell with little issue, but their blood slicked the ground as their bodies created tripping hazards. Behind him, spears stabbed out at every opening, and Ezra’s fear started melting away, replaced by some measure of hope.

“Hold steady,” Darius commanded as he carved a swath through the chains of one body. Ezra chopped his axe into that exposed spine and toppled the chained one at that same moment.

No sooner had Darius spoken than another six arrows flew down the corridor. Now, Ezra’s armor held strong and kept the arrows from finding flesh. Darius blocked two of the shots, while the third hit his lower leg. He grunted in pain and stepped back as another volley fell towards the defenders.

“Archers, ready,” Darius breathed as the fight fell into a standstill for a moment. He leaned down and broke the shaft of the arrow, the head still lodged in his calf, as grunted, unintelligible commands echoed from the surface. Then, footsteps approached again, and Darius didn’t have to say anything to get the archers to peek around the corner and loosed two shots each.

“Oh shit,” one said, his eyes widening as he bolted back. The other did the same as a bright glow filled the stairway.

On instinct, Ezra lowered his head behind his shield as the Dragonkin’s fire breath blasted down into the basement. He and Darius served as the shields it smashed against, and Ezra’s armor quickly started to heat up in the blaze.

“What did you see?” Darius demanded as the flames continued on. He and Ezra both stepped back three paces as they stared at the two people who had gotten a glance up the stairs.

“There were two more of the ones with chains,” one said as he squinted against the heat. “Then the Dragonkin.”

Incoming enemies!

Jormun’s voice echoed through Ezra’s head, and it let him realize that he could hear the clicking of claws coming through the fire.

“Look out—!”

Ezra couldn’t finish the sentence as he threw himself forward with his shield held high. The Dragonkin wolf leapt, snarling, out of the flames. It immediately bore Ezra to the ground, claws scratching like mad. His shield was keeping its front legs from being able to tear his chest apart, but its back legs were already starting to tear through the carefully layered armor along his legs. It hadn’t reached his flesh yet, but obviously, the beast’s body was made to shred through everything in its way until it had reached its objective. Even armor as fine in quality as Ezra’s couldn’t hold up forever.

Fortunately, the wolf was still alone, and Telemachus’s spear sank into its neck just above the shoulder. The beast snarled as it jumped back, and Ezra scrambled to his feet. He hadn’t been injured, though most of his belly’s protective covering had been ripped away in just a few seconds. Darius tried to catch the wolf before it escaped, but it refused to commit. The flames coming down the stairway grew brighter and started spilling into the cellar. Just like that, the real Dragonkin entered the battle.

Its fire breath continued for another half second, starting to scorch several of the defenders who fell back with screams of pain. Then, Luna jumped forward with her shield held high. It flashed silver and blew all of the concentrated flames back at the two-meter-tall beast. It didn’t serve to injure the monster at all, but it had to close its eyes to protect itself.

Screams filled the small room, and a dozen curses went up behind him. Having already somewhat prepared for this, several of the defenders on the front lines turned and started to give commands.

“There’s one on each side!”

“I’m on the left. Come with me, Raharr!”

“Don’t forget about the stairway though!”

A battle on three fronts, then. Ezra couldn’t worry about what was behind him, though. Instead, he needed to focus on the Dragonkin before him. Telemachus swept his spear in a wide arc and cut into the wolf’s flank. It yelped in pain but rushed at him as Darius and Ezra squared their shields against the humanoid beast.

Where the creature Ezra called a wolf Dragonkin looked like a wolf with a longer, thicker tail and was covered with scales from head to toe, the humanoid Dragonkin didn’t strictly look like a person. Its body almost looked like it was covered in armor; the scales were thick and carefully interconnected across its chest, shoulders, belly, and legs. It didn’t wear any clothing and stood with a pronounced hunch. Its neck was longer than any person Ezra had ever seen, at least half a meter. Its hands both had four fingers, each one tipped with long, sharp claws, and it screeched in challenge as it threw itself at Darius.

The retired veteran didn’t hold back with his aura-infused attacks. His blade screamed through the air as it chopped at the attack descending towards him. Both his sword and his shield glowed with aura as he defended against the monster’s attacks. Coming in from the side, Ezra swung his axe forward, wind screaming in the cramped area and making a deafening noise. The weapon sank into the monster’s hip, but only a few centimeters. In response to the attack, its tail thrashed. Ezra braced against it. He was still sent tumbling.

“Fucking hell,” he grunted as he rolled to his feet. His inner world’s reserves hadn’t been even nearly replenished in the time they’d had to recover, but he had enough to at least use his weapon and do more damage than that. He drew on the inner tempest as he rushed back into battle.

Darius was holding strong, though he was being forced to retreat far more than anybody would have liked. Just a few meters away from the monster huddled the civilians. Its eyes darted hungrily towards the screaming innocents, but Darius refused to go down.

Instead, in a handful of seconds, a pattern of deep cuts was drawn along both of his ribs, then through his helmet and down his face. His helmet turned the blow enough to only blind one eye instead of ripping his skull apart. Even as Darius’s blood coated his body and streaked over a now-ruined eye, he held steady. His blade found an opening, and he stabbed deep into the Dragonkin’s belly. In response, one claw bounced against his shield uselessly, while the other went slightly too far and landed with a meaty slap against his side instead of piercing into his ribs.

It’s head, though, wasn’t blocked. 

From behind, Ezra saw that the Dragonkin snaked down to bite Darius’s head off. He darted forward and smashed his axe into the base of the monster’s neck. He cut through scales, the head of the axe lodging deep into the beast’s neck muscles. It still failed to cut through bone, though, and he only managed to knock its killing blow aside instead of landing one of his own.

Darius cried out in pain, but the fact that he could make noise at all was somewhat heartening. The Dragonkin’s tail snapped out towards Ezra again. It was blisteringly fast, faster than Ezra could have expected. However, having been caught unaware by that attack once, he was ready the second time.

With the wind steadying him, Ezra jumped high enough that he needed to hunch to keep his head from smashing into the ceiling. The tail whipped under his feet, and he fell with the axe held tight in his hand. The weapon fell into the Dragonkin’s back, the head of the weapon cutting into the deep wound Ezra had just scored. Again, the Dragonkin screamed loud enough to shake the room, though this time, it wasn’t rage but fear that colored its actions.

“The door!” Telemachus screamed as Ezra began to exult in his victory. “They’re coming down!”

Ezra realized in that second that the rest of the reinforcements were coming down the stairs and he had been too caught up in the fight against the Dragonkin to continue to defend the doors. It was necessary that he do so, but the stomping of heavy boots down the stairs was a terrifying reminder of the hundreds more enemies that remained.

“Hold it for fifteen seconds! That’s the most I need before I can join you!” Ezra screamed to nobody in particular. The Dragonkin was doomed to die soon, but he couldn’t leave it to bleed out when people were depending on him to keep the monsters away. It was still alive enough to be dangerous.

“I’ve got you, fucker,” Darius growled, and Ezra couldn’t see how it happened, but the man’s sword, glowing with aura, erupted from the top of the monster’s snake-like head.

Its screams died off at once, and its body went limp, falling to the ground. Ezra wanted to check on Darius, but didn’t even try to. Instead, he just turned and threw himself at the doorway, where two chained ones shoved into Telemachus as three orcs were coming from behind them with massive shields in their hands and spears already jabbing forward.

“We’ve killed your leader,” Ezra grunted, though he knew the goblinoids wouldn’t understand. “All the rest of you are just a formality.”