Chapter 42: Mutants Attack
It started slow.
One or two slipping through the meat grinder of arrows, bolts, and fire. They darted and weaved through the killing field, their twisted bodies moving in ways that made them hard targets.
Then one made it to the base of the wall. A lean, panther-like thing with bone spines jutting from its back. It dug its claws into the stone, finding purchase where there shouldn't have been any, and started climbing like it was made for it.
"Knock it down!" someone bellowed from further along the wall.
Three guards rushed the battlements, spears jabbing down. The beast hissed an awful, wet sound and lashed out. One guard's spear went flying, another got his hand shredded. The third drove his point down between its eyes, the steel bursting out the back of its skull. It went limp, sliding back into the chaos below.
That was the first.
Then there were ten.
The line in the field started to crumble. Bodies, human and beast alike, littered the grass. More creatures began breaking through the ranged fire, sprinting for the wall with terrifying speed.
One vaulted over the corpse of another and was halfway up before an arrow punched through its jaw. Another, a lizard-like brute with scales thick as plate, took a ballista bolt through the shoulder and still kept climbing.
"Push them back!" Freya barked, her sword flashing as a smaller, dog-faced thing scrambled up near our position. She met it at the top, her blade cleaving straight down through skull and neck. Blood sprayed across the stone, hot and metallic in the air. She kicked the twitching corpse back down without missing a beat.
I caught one of my own, a mangy wolf-thing whose breath smelled like something had died in its mouth twice. It lunged for my throat. I sidestepped, swung my sword in a brutal arc, and split it from shoulder to hip. Its guts spilled in a steaming heap, the stench making me gag even as I shoved it over the edge.
Everywhere I looked, it was the same. Steel slamming into flesh. Arrows snapping through the air. The thud of heavy bodies hitting the ground below or in some cases, the sickening sound of them landing on people.
One guard screamed as a horned beast leapt the last few feet, tackling him to the battlement. It drove its horns into his chest, pinning him to the wall. Before it could tear into his throat, Freya was there, hacking its head clean off with a single, vicious stroke. The man coughed blood but lived, barely.
"Get him to the healer!" she shouted, already turning back to face another climber.
I kicked another beast in the face, sending it tumbling back down to be trampled by its own kind. My sword arm was already slick with blood, some theirs, some mine from shallow cuts I hadn't even noticed until now.
The air was thick with it. Blood, smoke, the stink of magic. The noise was constant, a chaotic mix of roars, screams, and the crash of steel on bone.
And still they came.
The system timer ticked in the corner of my vision, cold and uncaring.
61:42:18… 17… 16.
Thirty hours of this.
A roar split the air, louder, deeper, wrong.
It rolled over the wall like thunder, shaking dust loose from the stone.
Heads turned. Even the magic fire paused mid-flight for a fraction of a second.
And then it came into view.
The others had been beasts, twisted, dangerous, but still recognizably animal. This one was something else. Twelve feet tall, thick as an ogre, with plates of bone like jagged armor and a mouth big enough to bite a man in half. It charged right through the burning wreck of another monster, shoving corpses aside like they were nothing.
The ground shook with every step it took toward the wall.
"Get the siege-killer down!" someone screamed from a few towers over.
Three ballista bolts fired almost in unison. One lodged in its shoulder, another in its chest. The third? It caught the damned thing in its teeth, bit down, and spat the splintered shaft aside like it was trash.
By the time it reached the wall, arrows were bouncing off those bone plates uselessly. The thing didn't climb. it leapt. Its claws slammed into the battlement, stone cracking under the impact. Two guards went flying backward from the shockwave alone.
Freya didn't hesitate, she darted forward, sword raised, aiming for its eyes. But the beast swung first, one massive arm scything through the air. She barely got her blade up in time, the blow sending her skidding backward on her heels.
"Freya!" I shouted, moving in, my own sword feeling like a toothpick compared to this thing.
A guard to my left screamed, the beast's other hand had closed around his torso. Bones crunched. Blood sprayed. It started to pull him toward its mouth.
I didn't think, just moved. I lunged in under its arm and slashed at the exposed joint where the bone plating thinned. My blade bit deep. Not deep enough to kill, but enough to make it drop the soldier. The man hit the ground hard, clutching his crushed ribs, but he was alive.
The thing's gaze locked on me. That mouth stretched wide in something that might have been a grin or just hunger.
"Oh, fuck me…" I muttered.
It swung again. I ducked, but not fast enough, its claws tore through my shoulder guard, leaving three burning lines of pain. I stumbled back, tasting copper.
Freya was back on it a second later, her blade flashing toward its eye. This time she connected. The beast howled, jerking away, streaming from the ruined socket.
Before it could recover, a cluster of fireballs slammed into its side. The heat seared my face as the bone plating cracked and blackened. Mages from further down the wall were hurling everything they had.
"Push it off!" someone yelled.
Half a dozen spears jabbed into its midsection. Another fireball. A bolt of lightning that made the air stink of ozone. Finally, with a roar that shook my teeth, the monster toppled backward, crashing into the horde below and crushing a dozen smaller beasts under its bulk.
I barely had time to breathe before another wave hit the wall.
A horned creature scrambled up beside me, jaws snapping. I jammed my sword into its mouth and kicked it back, nearly losing my grip on the hilt.
To my right, a soldier went down with a spider-like thing on his chest, its fangs plunging toward his face. I sprinted over, booted the thing hard enough to hear its legs snap, then stabbed it through the thorax until it stopped moving. The man gasped out a thanks before scrambling to his feet.
Further down, a pair of guards were dragged halfway over the wall by a scaled brute. One lost his grip and disappeared into the chaos below, his scream cut short. The other was saved when Freya barreled in, hacking the creature's arm clean off and shoving the guard back to safety.
Everywhere I looked was carnage. Close calls, blood, and too many bodies to count.
The timer in my vision ticked on, indifferent.
61:25:54… 53… 52.
And this was only the beginning.