Right before they reached the base Chronos cast [Gravity Knot] in front of them forcing the creatures that had leapt at them to be pulled towards the knot. And Lyla cast several [Verdict Pillar]'s in their immediate landing area killing everything there.
Leaping from his back she engaged the nearest beast while Chronos dropped down beside her and drove back several foxes that had tried to ambush her.
Wielding Echoforge he repeatedly used [Impact] to kill everything near him in one blow while forcing the countless beasts back.
Seeing Chronos buy her some time, Lyla dropped three [Lawbound Bulwark]'s around them securing the landing zone for the knights.
Chronos grunted as he had to step in front of her to stop a charging buffalo that was trying to interrupt her casting. Grabbing its horns with one hand he threw it back into the tide only to hear an explosion a moment later as its head was launched from its body.
He'd forgotten they could do that.
Then the beast tide's numbers seemed to double in his vision. Snarling he glared at several foxes nearby that were bleeding from their eyes. It might not mean much to black beasts, but they were sacrificing their lifespan to cast an illusion on Chronos.
The foxes might also be duplicated so instead of trying to hit them one at a time Chronos unleashed a [Wolf's Roar] in their direction.
They jumped but the wave of force was larger than they expected. As it struck them two of them disappeared immediately while the other two coughed up blood and died.
The beast tide went back to normal once more as a mace whisked past his head crushing the skull of a serpent that had tried to bite his throat. The illusion had hidden it from him.
"Thanks Lyla. How long before the knight's land?"
"Now." A voice came from behind him.
A group of knights charged past him through the gap in the bulwark forcing the beasts back and increasing the size of the safe zone.
"We just need to hold on for a little longer. There aren't many beasts left." The knight said.
Chronos looked up to see that most of the knights were holding onto the wall and shooting spells into the tide rather than landing amongst the tide of beasts. The only safe zone so far was the one he and Lyla had made and there were several knights waiting to land as they launched flying slashes at the beasts around them.
The bulwark on his left shattered as a deep worm tore through it. Its jaw bit down on Echoforge, nearly pulling it from his grasp.
He swung it at the ground, crushing the back half of the worm, then used an upward strike to knock back a buffalo before being forced to step back to avoid being bitten by two snakes.
He swung his hammer into the ground unleashing an impact that forced all of the creatures to retreat, and two knights stepped in front of him further expanding the safe zone.
Even with everything they had killed already they were still being outnumbered and pressured into a defensive position.
Having a moment of peace, he glanced around. Lyla had stepped back to treat the injured while the knights were forming a shield wall in front of them.
He had been right; it wasn't hard to kill the beasts of the wasteland but those sacrificial abilities of theirs made it easy to lose your life in the process. They seemed like the perfect creatures to turn into black beasts.
Once the first wave of knights was on the ground, they began marching forward making room for the next wave that was descending above them.
Pushing forward the forces on the ground continued to increase as they closed the distance to the cultists.
Boom! Aaah!
A scream came from the rear of the black beast tide as a bolt finally made it past the guard's protection.
Roar!
"And there are the abominations. I'd been wondering when they were going to make an appearance." Chronos thought to himself.
He could see nearly 200 figures charging in their direction from the cultists.
"Stand your ground. Prepare for collision." Shouted the lead knight.
Taking a stance like a batter, Chronos started charging Echoforge waiting for them to get close enough while preparing a spell to catch them off-guard.
When the abomination was close enough to strike him Chronos cast [Planar Cage] for one second blocking its strike. Dropping the cage, he swung a fully charged Echoforge enhanced by [Shatter] right into its chest.
An explosion of blood and flesh filled his vision as the abomination failed to defend against his attack.
However, the knights weren't having as easy of a time. They broke into groups of three-five to handle each abomination and several of them were injured as the abominations empowered their screams with miasma.
Cleaning the battlefield later was going to be a pain but Chronos didn't have time to think about that right now.
Lyla released multiple [Judgment Arrow]'s as Chronos charged at the closest abomination. The arrows pinned its arms to its side as the abomination tried to kill a pinned knight then Chronos's hammer slammed into its skull shattering it into a thousand pieces.
Grunting the knight stood up and said, "You two really know what you're doing don't you."
"We've fought them before. They're not too fast but they're strong and the only killing move they have is the scream. As long as you can interrupt the scream, they aren't hard to kill. I don't get why it takes five of you to handle one of them."
The knight gave him an incredulous look.
Not many of them were strong enough to block the abominations attacks and those that were had trouble keeping up with their speed.
Most of those in the Leybound Crucible Knights focused on understanding special construction methods, not combat. The only ones that were both fast enough and strong enough amongst the knights to handle them on their own were the combat specialists.
Nearby a knight threw down one of the magic trap spikes they carried on their waist trapping another abomination long enough for the other knights to take out several more spikes and reinforce the trap.
"Capturing them for later study? I'm not sure what you can learn from them at this point. We also tried that before but were told that it's pointless." Chronos said.
The knight snorted at him, "Forgive me but not all of us are combat geniuses that can understand how to fight and kill anything they meet within a few seconds."
Chronos watched him storm off to his position again as the knights reformed their lines and began pushing towards the cultists once more.
Lyla stood beside him gasping for air.
"You okay?" Chronos asked with concern.
He hadn't seen her get hit earlier but they had been fighting a lot of beasts and some of them were venomous enough to harm them if they managed to bite them.
"I'm just tired. I haven't cast that many spells in succession before."
That was true, even when they had fought armies in the past it was usually with assistance from others. They hadn't jumped into the middle of an army on their own until now.
Remembering that Gregory had been planning something similar at the start of the fight Chronos looked around for him but failed to find him until screams started coming from the cultists.
The knights hadn't reached them yet, but Chronos could see several weapons go flying with strings attached to their ends.
"Rest times over! Get on and I'll carry you into battle." Chronos transformed into a wolf.
With his bloodline advancing his wolf form had become larger and now he was large enough to ride.
Lyla hopped on his back and Chronos took off running as fast as he could, he didn't want to leave Gregory on his own for too long.
Leaping over the front lines he coated his claws in [Sever] and tore through the beasts in front of him while Lyla used her gavels and flame to keep those on the sides away.
With nothing to slow them down it only took them a few minutes to cross the distance between them and Gregory.
In front of them Gregory was deflecting several spells cast by priests while the rest of the cultists were running away. A small wagon was being dragged at the rear of the cultists as they did their best to escape.
"Go after them! Destroy the wagon!" Gregory yelled as he skewered one of the priests and held the rest back.
Growling Chronos kept chasing the fleeing cultists only to have several of them break away to stop him. Luckily, they underestimated how fast he was.
By the time they had erected barriers he was already ripping the throat out of the middle one while Lyla's gavels struck the other two.
Running past them Chronos howled at the wagon.
A wave of force left his mouth as [Wolf's Roar] activated and shattered the wagon momentarily revealing a blood-soaked idol before it too shattered.