Eli and Audrey were discussing what the newcomer had said and what that might mean for a few moments, then Eli went back to his spot at the center of the crater and meditated. Audrey joined Bethany, they nodded to each other and Bethany walked away. Now it was just Arinya and Audrey. Arinya was in her early twenties and looked her age, however, Audrey looked like an 18 or 19 year old, but she was only 14. Audrey wasn't going to be pushed around and she wanted to establish dominance right off the bat so she did her best impression of Bethany.
"Alright, after the next wave, we are going to have a talk. If I don't like your answers I'll kill you all myself," Audrey said with a hand on her hip. "I'm Audrey, let's get you guys inside, the next wave will start soon." She gestured for her to follow as they walked back to Tara and the rest of them.
Arinya was shocked when they got back and her mother and Tara were chatting like old friends, making jokes and just being relaxed with each other. However, she did not speak her thoughts for fear of messing up whatever plans her mother had cooked up. Tara and Audrey showed them how to jump over the wall, but most of them were not strong enough and had to have help. They showed them to a building with no furniture and told them to stay inside. The servants took the first floor and laid down to rest, the other three took the top floor and sat in a circle.
Eli and his team were all back in the crater and discussing options again for the next wave. All of them were distracted for different reasons though so they weren't getting anywhere. They collectively decided to just adapt as things changed since that seemed to be what most of their plans devolved into anyways. Audrey glanced back at the wall just as the wave was starting and saw Greyson and Arinya on opposite ends of the wall watching. She needed to make a good showing or they wouldn't follow her as a leader, Audrey was worried about Eli being the only reason people listened to her.
The next wave started just like the others, all the skeletons slowly marching forward. The zombies from the last wave were here again as well, but there were more than double the amount as last wave. At first, they thought that maybe there wasn't a new monster but just more of the previous, at least, that was until a massive pile of undead walked forward out of the haze. It was 10 feet tall and basically consisted of around 8 to 10 zombies sewn together. It was slow and uncoordinated but it was strong enough to knock down walls and its mouth spewed the toxic haze non-stop.
Being curious, Eli threw his usual size and weight cudgel at the large monster as hard as he could. At first it just looked like it was going to knock some of the bodies apart but when their magics reacted to each other, it exploded violently killing everything in a 30 foot circle around it. Wanting to try something he ran to Audrey before the fighting started and asked her if she wanted to try something extremely dangerous for him. Of course, she said yes, and he explained his plan. Shortly after he hugged her tight, thanked her, and she disappeared. If this worked it would greatly increase the strength and survivability of his friends.
Audrey was in a panic of excitement and fear. This experiment was dangerous and could easily kill her, but if she could make it work, her power would grow. On top of all of that, Eli would be so happy with her, and she really wanted him to be proud. Intellectually she knew that pleasing a father figure wasn't something she needed to do, but emotionally it wasn't something she could say no to. Audrey was going to make this work or die trying, she was going to use her connection to Eli to draw on his death magic and then use her stealth to sneak up to the big guys and make them explode. All while getting away fast enough to not get caught in the explosion or get discovered.
She vanished and snuck her way into the mass of monsters bearing down on them. The fighting kicked off again but there was only Tara, Cody, Stevens and Bethany fighting together. They took turns fighting with large amounts of magic while the others supported them and regenerated their magic. They had a nice rhythm going and were used to each other's abilities and knew how to compliment them with their own. None of them could see Eli, but his presence was felt while fighting, occasionally each of them would get an open spot where there were no monsters. Allowing them to catch their breath and get a bit of a mental rest so they could keep going.
Despite her initial hesitation, Audrey was able to fully draw out small portions of Eli's death magic, her soul didn't even fight against the foreign magic so she was able to use it to its maximum potential. She would cote a dagger in Eli's death magic and stab one of the giants, then push the magic in, pull her dagger out and run before it explodes. This was exciting and gave her a lot of confidence, not a single one of the new undead reached her group so far and she was getting better at it as time went by.
Eli was intentionally using more magic than he needed to, he really wanted to see what happened to a skill at level 10 and his smash skill had been close for awhile and now his light's purity skill was 9 as well. He decided to get creative with the skills to see what it would take to get them to 10, the best part was that it was fun. But, despite the fun, he began to get frustrated that all of his destruction was not getting him anywhere so he went overboard and dumped his frustration into a smash.
The shockwave from that ability going off obliterated a couple hundred monsters and killed almost a thousand more. He didn't remember there being a shockwave like that before, so it must have leveled, or putting an emotion into the skill made it stronger. He didn't feel frustrated anymore so his best guess was that emotions could be used as a power, at least for him with his soul so exposed to the world. But this also made him dangerous since he could accidentally hurt people if he gets too emotional.
He was going to need to train himself hard after this event to gain some control and more power. Eli was still feeling the pressure of the system to get stronger, this event was a good example, this enemy was too strong for how early they are in the system. If they were higher level and could think more tactically and had some tricky abilities, it would be devastating. The amount of enemies and the inclusion of the haze felt more like a finale to Eli then the easy intro stuff they should be dealing with.
Using the spy version of his life skill, which had become his favorite version lately, he overheard everything the newcomers had said about the north having trouble with this event and one city falling with its lord abandoning it. The only reason his team was doing so well was because he was destroying over half of them before they even reached his friends. He felt that if he wanted to, he could use his will skill and simply crush everything, but there was a cost to that skill not discussed in the system windows. Every time he used it he felt a little less himself, like he was being diluted by adding a nothingness to his soul. He knew Audrey had noticed it too since she was also very hesitant to use it.
Will skills were a trump card, a 'break glass in emergency' type of thing. He did feel like he recovered but it took days to recover from a small use. It wasn't like regenerating magic, it was more about rediscovering the bits of yourself you sacrificed for access to that power. This was similar to how his emotions could power his abilities, but the emotions were sacrificed. When his seal broke and his emotions were crazy and power was literally tearing itself out of him, instead of letting his emotions escape and letting the power go, he held onto it. He wanted those emotions of regret and guilt to stay inside him, he deserved it and more importantly Bethany deserved it. He feared the emotionless killer he could become if he let go of how he felt about those around him.
Bethany was very vexing to him, he did like her, his feelings for her grew everyday, but he loved Tara. Making it even worse, when Tara would be distant, Bethany was always right there giving him attention, making him feel better about whatever was going on. Then when Tara was close and attentive, Bethany would back off and give him space. It's almost like they are taking turns helping him with emotions, he doubted that Tara was aware of how thought out Bethany's actions were, but he knew Bethany was doing it because she was appreciative and wanted to be something to him. But no matter how much he tried to figure it out he couldn't figure out her endgame, which was a cause for much frustration since he wanted to trust her.
Using that frustration in another ability he destroyed another large mass of monsters. He felt better afterwards but now he was even more worried about how this would play out long term. Using his emotions would have to be another trump card because he didn't want to get carried away with it. There was a freeing feeling that came with it after the emotions were discarded that he thought could become addictive. He was hopelessly lost in his emotions now and he understood Bethany's coddling him most of the time, he needed an adult with experience controlling their emotions to help guide him through it. So he blinked to Bethany's side, completely wrecked the monsters she was fighting and gave her a big hug, picking her up off the ground.
"Thank you for everything that you do for me and for our friends," Eli said sincerely.
She wrapped her legs around him, pulled up his mask and kissed him very passionately. "You know how to repay me," she said with just as much sincerity.
"I won't let you down," Eli said as he wrapped his arms around her tighter and dodged an axe thrown by Tara.
Bethany put both hands on his cheeks and wiped one of his tears away, "I know you won't."
Eli set her down and caught the next axe that was thrown in mid air just behind Bethany's head shocking both women. He then walked up to Tara and did the same thing but he opened their connection so she could feel how much he loved her. Tara teared up and returned the hug and kiss. He thanked her as well and moved on to Stevens and Cody, giving them hugs and thanking them. After he finished with Cody, Audrey appeared in front of him, coming out of her invisibility ability. She held out her arms wide with a big smile on her face. He picked her up in a big hug and kissed her forehead.
"I'm very proud of you Audrey," Eli said to her when their eyes met. "I don't really know what your feelings towards me are but I would like, for now, for you to be my little sister. That's what I want to call you and that's how I want to introduce you to other people. I've never had a family before so I think I've earned the right to choose my family now. How does that sound?" Eli asked with a hopeful expression.
Audrey looked very conflicted for a few seconds before she answered, "That will work… for now." They both shed a tear and then she stepped away from him, pulled up her hood, and disappeared.