Chapter 47: Earth Magic?
I didn't think. I just moved.
The breach in the wall was a jagged, smoking wound in Edelmere's defenses, wide enough for a damn wagon to pass through without touching the sides. The edges still hissed from where the fireball had melted the stone like wax. As I pushed through, the heat licked at my skin, the stench of charred rock mixing with the rancid stink of dead beasts and burning fur.
Outside was chaos.
Dozens of creatures tore across the open ground, black-furred wolves with teeth like jagged glass, hulking boar things with tusks stained red, long-limbed horrors that looked like someone had tried to combine a bear and a spider and decided to skip the "making it not nightmare fuel" part.
Soldiers and adventurers were locked in brutal, up-close fights. Steel sank into flesh. Claws sank into armor. Screams and roars tangled in the air until it was impossible to tell who was winning.
I didn't care.
I shoved through the melee, ducking under a swipe from something with too many arms, feeling the wind of its claws pass over my head. My acceleration loop flared to life, Ki surging through my legs. The world blurred, every heartbeat like a hammer pounding in my ears.
A soldier stumbled into my path, blood spurting from a torn-open neck. His sword clattered to the dirt before he did. I snatched it up without breaking stride, its blade already slick with something's innards.
The first beast I hit was a wolf, if you could still call it that. Its head came off in one swing, the cut clean but the wound anything but. Hot blood sprayed across my face and chest, some getting into my mouth. It was thick, metallic, and disgusting, but I didn't spit it out.
The second came at me before the first had even hit the ground. Big cat. All muscle. All teeth. I sidestepped, slammed my boot into its ribs, and felt the crack travel up my leg. As it staggered, I drove the sword into the space between its shoulder blades and pushed until the hilt was warm against my hand.
I pulled free, and something else, some tusked monstrosity, hit me from the side. I rolled with it, coming up on one knee and lashing out. My blade bit into its front leg, almost severing it. It screamed, high-pitched and inhuman, before I finished it with a thrust up under the jaw.
The ground here was mud and gore, the two mixing until the difference didn't matter. Every step was a wet squelch. The air was so thick with blood it felt like I was breathing through it.
Through it all, I was scanning. Searching. Freya had to be here somewhere.
A flash of silver caught my eye, a sword, longer and cleaner than anything else in sight. I pushed toward it, cutting down another wolf on the way, its head hanging by a strip of skin before I kicked it free.
When I got close, I saw it wasn't just a sword. It was her sword. Still clutched in her hand.
She was there.
On the ground.
Pinned beneath the dead weight of some massive boar-beast, its tusks buried in the dirt like it had tried to gore her even as it died.
Her eyes were open. She was breathing.
"Freya!"
Her head jerked toward me, just enough to let me know she heard.
I didn't think. I grabbed the boar thing by its matted, blood-soaked hide and heaved. It was like trying to lift a boulder wrapped in razor wire. My muscles screamed, my Ki-enhanced strength burning through me like fire, but the carcass moved. Just enough for her to wriggle free.
The moment she was out, another shadow fell over us. A lion, black as the big one in the distance, but smaller, leapt at me, jaws wide. I brought the sword up and it bit down on steel instead of my throat. Its teeth scraped sparks off the blade. I twisted, pushed, and split its skull open from mouth to nape.
Freya was already on her feet, blood running down her face, her silver armor streaked with red and black. She didn't say thank you. She didn't need to.
"You're late," she growled, gripping her sword in both hands.
"Yeah, well," I panted, stepping beside her, "traffic was a bitch."
More beasts were coming, three, maybe four dozen and behind them, at the treeline, that massive lion still waited, the hooded figure on its back watching like they had all the time in the world.
Didn't matter.
Right now, it was just us and what was in front of us.
And I was ready to kill every last one of them.
Freya and I didn't wait for them to reach us. We charged.
The first wolf came in low, jaws snapping for my calf. I stepped in, let it think it had me, then brought my boot up under its jaw so hard I felt bone shatter. It went limp before it even hit the ground. Freya's sword sang beside me, one, two, three strikes, each ending in a spray of red mist and a thud.
But for every one we dropped, two more came from the treeline.
A boar-beast slammed into my side, the impact rattling my ribs like a sack of loose stones. My sword slipped from my grip as I stumbled, so I grabbed its tusk with one hand and its ear with the other, planting my feet. I wrenched with everything I had, felt the cartilage tear, then smashed my forehead into its snout. The crunch was ugly and wet. It squealed in rage and pain before Freya's blade opened its neck from ear to ear.
"Behind you!" she barked.
I spun, and claws raked across my chest. Leather tore, flesh burned. I rammed my fist into its throat, but another hit me from the left. Then another from the right. I went down under the weight, two wolves, one cat-thing, teeth and claws flashing. I brought my knees up, shoved the wolves off with a roar, but the cat stayed on me, snapping at my face. I got my hands on its jaws and pushed. My arms screamed. My vision blurred. The jaws didn't stop coming.
Then they did.
Freya's sword came down through the top of its skull, splitting it to the nose. She yanked the blade free, blood pouring down the flat of the steel and onto my chest as she hauled me to my feet.
We barely had time to breathe.
They were all around us now, twenty, thirty, maybe more, circling, their eyes glowing in the growing gloom. The ground under us was slick, churned to a paste of mud, blood, and fur. The air stank of rot and iron. My chest rose and fell in ragged bursts, and every muscle in my body was on fire.
One charged. Then another. Then all of them.
We moved without thinking. Back to back. My stolen sword hacking in tight, brutal arcs. Freya's silver blade flashing, her armor streaked with black gore. Every swing landed. Every thrust found something soft. But it wasn't enough.
A wolf lunged and I sidestepped, but its claws still tore across my thigh. Another caught my shoulder. My grip on the sword faltered. Something slammed into my back, hard and I went to one knee. Freya's grunt told me she'd taken a hit too.
They were pressing in now, a wall of black fur and snarling teeth. The circle was closing. I could see the whites of their eyes, the blood glistening on their teeth. One leapt. I cut it in half midair, but another hit me from behind before the first half had hit the ground. My vision went white.
Freya staggered into me, breath ragged, blood running down her cheek. "We can't hold this!"
She was right. Every step we took back just tightened the noose. There was no clear path. No gap to break through. It was a wall of death, and it was closing in.
I gritted my teeth, blood dripping from my chin. My arms were lead. My breath burned. My knees felt like they'd give at any second.
We weren't going to last much longer.
And I think we both knew it.
Freya's voice cut through the growls and the clash of steel.
"Buy me time!"
I split the skull of the beast in front of me and turned just enough to glare at her. "Then get on with whatever the fuck you're planning!"
No more talking. I spun back to the creatures and dragged every drop of Ki I could muster into my limbs. My veins felt like they were burning from the inside. Acceleration Loop, on. Strength Enhancement, on. My body screamed, my muscles swelling under the strain like they'd tear right through my skin.
The next wolf lunged, and I met it midair with a sideways slash that tore it in half from shoulder to hip. Before the halves hit the ground, I pivoted and crushed a boar's skull under my heel. Another came in from the side, too close for the sword, so I dropped the blade into my off-hand, slammed my fist up under its jaw, and ripped its throat out with my bare hand.
Blood sprayed across my face, hot and stinking.
Another pounced, its claws grazed my ribs before I rammed the point of my sword into its gut, yanking it out just in time to turn and crush the windpipe of the one coming from behind. I wasn't fighting clean anymore. This was kill-or-be-eaten, and I was not about to get chewed on.
But the rush was fading fast. My vision swam at the edges. My legs trembled even as I moved. I'd burned too much too quickly, my body was about to cash in the bill.
"Kaizen!"
Her voice again, closer this time. I turned just enough to see her, sweat running down her pale face, her eyes burning with focus. She grabbed my arm and yanked me toward her until our hips pressed together, side to side. I could feel the heat of her armor through the blood and grime between us.
"Earth Magic: Rising Earth Pillar!!!" she roared.
She dropped to her knees and slammed both palms flat into the ground. The earth beneath us vibrated, hard.
A massive, brownish magic circle flared into existence around us, the runes and geometric shapes twisting and pulsing like they were alive. I didn't understand a damn thing about it, but I knew one thing, it was powerful.
The ground under our feet exploded upward.
A pillar of solid stone and packed earth shot from the center of the circle, carrying us with it like a goddamn slingshot. It rocketed up fifteen feet in the blink of an eye, then tilted forward. My stomach lurched as the whole thing leaned toward the city, hurling us through the air.
The wall and the chaos below shrank beneath us. I heard the roars and snarls fading, replaced by the whistling of the wind past my ears. We were flying, no, falling, straight toward the inner streets.
I clung to the sword in my hand and braced for impact.
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