BTIV - Chapter 5

Wind rushed past Micah, pulling at his hair and whipping it back and forth as he flew toward the battlefield.  He reached up with his left hand, touching one of the Maarikava teeth mounted on the shoulder of his armor and poured mana into it.  A streamer of gold light jumped from the ivory spike and flew through the air toward where Esther, Eris and Leeka were attacking the first sand elemental to crest the edge of the sinkhole.

The golden light transformed, turning into a massive river kraken that swam through the air above their squad, swinging its huge tentacles in downward arcs that caught elementals and sent them flying back into the bottom of the pit where they would slam into the stone wall and scatter.  Most of the sand elementals would reform and resume the difficult climb back out of the pit, but at least one or two remained, unformed and unmoving after the force of the kraken’s blow.

Trevor and Drekt were both under much heavier attack.  Each of their formations had at least a dozen sand elemental assaulting their front lines.  Micah’s companions could easily defeat the monsters one on one, but the same couldn’t be said for the rest of the guild.  In most places, two or three melee fighters would gang up on one elemental, attacking to draw its attention and then drawing back as soon as the creature tried to retaliate, all while ranged attackers kept whittling away at the monster’s hit points.

Their strategy wasn’t as effective against the faceless beasts as it would have been against humans.  Often, a warrior would think that they were safe to attack a blind spot only for a limb or tentacle to erupt from the formless sand, knocking them back and injuring them, but that was where the teams of healers came in.

True healers were rare, and excluding Micah the Silver Wolves only had six amongst their ranks, but Micah made up for that deficit.  Their support and combat casters were all equipped with enchanted items that let them transform their excess mana into low level healing spells.

It wasn’t a terribly efficient usage of their magic.  Their mana didn’t sync properly with the wood type enchantments that Micah had invested into the amulets, but right now the focus was on making sure that the combat teams gained experience, contained the enemy and stayed alive.  The bulk of actually killing the monsters fell on Micah and his team’s shoulders.

Micah flew over the center of the sinkhole, casting Haste as he came to a stop.  Time seemed to slow as the spell increased his reflexes, and his eyes darted with impossible quickness over the clash and clamor of battle.

Then, he hurled his first Wind Blade eyes tracing the spell as it cut a line, as wide as his forearm, in one of the eight limbed sand elementals that had just tossed a warrior with a warhammer that had stepped up to fill in for an injured spearman.

Half of the creature fell to the ground, lifeless and inert sand, while one of its remaining four limbs hammered into the shield of a spear wielding woman, knocking her back a step.  He cast the spell a second time, watching the beast get bisected once again.  This time, it did not stand back up, drawing a cheer from the soldiers Micah had just assisted.

“Two fourth level spells,” he said quietly to himself, nodding as he launched a third Wind Blade at another target.  “Fairly expensive on the mana front, but not terribly surprising for a defensive monster in its mid thirties.”

On the other end of the battle line, Trevor thrust his spear into the chest of a Sand Elemental that had already suffered almost twenty quick stinging jabs from him.  His brother grunted, activating an ability of his martial art.  The monster’s torso exploded, showering the soldiers around him with now inert sand and drawing another cheer from his guild mates.

In the other squad, Drekt brought down another Elemental, smashing his cleaver through its sandy hide before ripping it sideways in a brutal blow that destroyed the monster’s structural integrity.  Already, Micah could feel the spirits of the guild lifting.  All of them had received training, delving into higher level dungeons had yielded enough levels that the battle today was difficult but not an absolute bloodbath, but the blessed were still green.

They had always fought with immediate support from Micah, Drekt or Trevor.  Today, even if their commanders were nearby, they were fighting on their own.  Nerves and doubts had made their grips weak and their breath shaky, but now, things were returning to normal.  It was clear that the enemy could be beaten, and that as long as they stuck with the battle plan, they would only have to face a handful of monsters at a time.  That was a fight that they could win.

Micah glanced down into the sinkhole and felt his face twist slightly.  Maybe it was for the best that the rank and file recruits couldn’t see what he could.  The sand around the stone ceiling of the dungeon roiled, an angry collection of snakelike tentacles and grasping limbs that quickly turned into more and more elementals.

He began launching Wind Blades at the climbers, thinning their numbers before they reached the top of the pit where they would have been able to overwhelm the defenders through their numbers.  The guild had managed to kill five or six of the elementals, but that was barely a start.  For every dead monster, twenty more clambered out of the dungeon, intent on fighting their way to freedom so that they could mindlessly slaughter their way into the nearby city of Red Sands.

The spells cut climbing elementals apart.  More often than not they reformed after the first attack, the larger clump of sand sprouting legs and continuing its climb.  The second attack finished all but the strongest of the monsters with only a handful surviving to meet a third Wind Blade.

No matter how hard he pushed himself, a trickle of elementals made it past Micah’s onslaught to assault the battle lines, but that was enough to test their guild’s resources.  After about fifteen minutes of fighting, Micah was breathing heavily, his mana well below half in all three pools.  Trevor and Drekt both sported a number of cuts and bruises, and Eris had managed to break a leg when she didn’t dodge quickly enough, but the rest of the guild were looking much more ragged.

Dozens of blessed lay on makeshift beds being tended to by healers, their armor torn by heavy blows.  Shields lay discarded after they had been pounded into scrap metal despite the enchantments that were meant to keep them light and durable.  At the end of the day they were made from common material and without serious mana input from their wielders, there was no way that they could survive protracted attacks from monsters above level thirty.

Still, the fruits of their labor were apparent to Micah as he stood in the air above the gaping pit. Only 10 or 15 elementals remained.  Quietly, he refreshed Flight, his eyes dancing over the bottom of the hole as if searching for something.  Then, he spotted it.

Near the outside of the pit, sand, slightly darker than its surroundings, was flowing on its own in a stream up the side of the hole.  At first it was hard to notice, but then, once Micah spotted the movement it was impossible to avoid it.  Almost the entire wall leading up to Squad C, where Leeka, Esther and Eris were positioned, was made from the strange tan material, creeping stealthily upward.  Tons of it.  Enough sand for twenty elementals was hissing up the steady incline toward the unaware defenders.

“Got you,” he whispered to himself, spinning in the air and rocketing toward his target.

“Squad C!” Micah bellowed, drawing his arm back with the spear still in it.  “Abandon your fights and withdraw thirty paces.  Focus on defense as you move, NOW”

He didn’t wait to see their response, instead throwing the spear with all of his strength into the wall of sand.  It zipped through the air with a thunderous crack as it compressed sound itself before demolishing the embankment and leaving a massive crater that kicked almost a ton of sand into the air.  The tenuous edge of the pit collapsed in on itself, rushing downward to fill the gap created by Micah’s titanic strike.

Almost immediately, wind that originated nowhere began to whip the floating dust into a malevolent whirlwind.  He ignored it, mouthing the words to Binding Vines as he stood in the empty air, his back ramrod straight with his hands clasped behind his back.

Micah closed his eyes, observing Esther and Leeka leading the retreat through the eyes of his river kraken as its ghostly main tentacles slapped the two remaining sand elementals backward into the growing storm.  Several of its smaller appendages reached out, picking up the slow and injured from the collapsing sand embankment.

The spell finished, and hundreds of roots leapt from the ground, flailing through the air and disrupting the tempest before burying themselves back in the embankment, trapping almost a ton worth of the dark sand before it could take to the air.  More importantly, a flex of one of the vines flung MIcah’s spear back to him.

His right hand whipped out, catching the spear by its haft and spinning it once before he opened his eyes.  Micah exhaled, extending his left palm out before him as he dropped into a half crouch with his spear held high, waiting for his chance to strike.

The storm darkened, the howling wind creating a noise that was halfway between a storm and an injured beast.  A pair of red, malevolent eyes popped open in the center of the storm, glaring directly at Micah.

Good.  He had its attention.  No one else in the guild was ready to fight a level 60 boss.  Usually the Blacksand was around level 40, but months alone in the dungeon consuming the lower level monsters had done wonders for its power level.  Of course, it had been the entity to break the seal on the dungeon.  That meant of all the elementals, the Blacksand had absorbed the greatest portion of the sand dune that had hidden the dungeon.

As powerful as the other elementals were, without the overly evolved dungeon boss, they wouldn’t have been able to do much more than destroy the outskirts of Red Sands and rampage in some of the poorer districts for a couple of hours.  The provincial guard were managing to hold the line until Blacksand scoured the flesh from their bones and knocked a hole in the barrier with one attack.

His mouth began to silently form the words to Explosive Thicket as he dodged a tentacle of wind and midnight sand.  As the wind picked up, mana infused the particles of dirt, darkening them until they hummed with energy as they buzzed up and down the attacking appendage like a saw.

Another two attacks came, one from below and Micah’s left.  He jerked to the right only for a spear of jet black rock to launch itself from the middle of the tornado, slamming into the center of his chest.  Briefly, he felt a moment of regret for not activating Foresight, after all the spell had a short duration and the had been fighting for almost fifteen minutes, but then he was sent flying.

The attack didn’t deal enough damage to penetrate the Maarikava armor.  Blacksand was strong enough to actually threaten him if Micah weren’t careful, but only when it used both of its elements together.  On their own, wind and earth could hurt him, but they weren’t enough to deal critical injuries.

Despite the twinge in his ribs, he finished casting Explosive Thicket, and a crown of thorns and plants erupted from the top of the storm.  The wind quieted almost immediately, the flow of mana powering it disrupted by the force of Micah’s attack.

As the dark sand fell away, it revealed a giant.  Darksand’s true form was a massive sand elemental, a lumpy facsimile of a human that stood almost 20 paces tall.  Unfortunately for the titan, the top of its head was replaced with hundreds of spikes, all exploding from inside its body.

Micah began casting Explosive Thicket a second time as the dungeon boss took a wobbling step in his direction. An outer layer of its sandy skin blew off into the air and began whirling around it again, creating its trademark sandstorm that would conceal its true body while scouring flesh down to the bone in a matter of seconds.

Unfortunately for the monster, Micah didn’t need to see it.  All through its body were scraps of plant matter left behind by the earlier attack from Binding Vines.  Each and every one of them a valid target for Explosive Thicket.

The second spell went off with a thump.  This time the windstorm slowed but did not stop entirely, and Micah began to calmly fly away from his quarry, his mouthing forming the words for another attack.

It slashed helplessly at him, a scimitar of whirring sand and tornado winds that could have crippled a luoca, but it simply didn’t have the range.  Micah floated backward as his spell erupted a third time destroying the monster’s right knee.

This time, its veil of wind and sand fell as the creature tumbled down to its hands and knees.  A fourth Explosive Thicket erupted from its back, the sharpened roots tearing the creature apart from the inside only to create a pattern of spikes that resembled a porcupine.

The fifth Explosive Thicket was more than it could take.  Micah detonated scraps of plant matter in its neck, severing its damaged head entirely.  The giant dissolved into formless sand, partially refilling the giant pit as the mana animating its humanoid form dispersed.

Micah took one more look over the battlefield.  Trevor and Drekt were each finishing off a sand elemental, but their battles were well in hand.  Likewise, Esther and Leeka were tearing apart an elemental that was held firm in the grasp of the floating river kraken while a healer tended to Eris’ leg.

The only battle that was even slightly touch and go involved a half dozen melee warriors surrounding the final sand elemental, poking it with spears and nicking away at it with axes all while casters and archers harassed and damaged it more.  Micah kept his attention on the fight for almost twenty seconds, ready to cast Wind Blade at a moment’s notice until he was satisfied that the struggle was well in hand.

Finally, he turned back to the three riders, pushing Flight to its limit.  An eyeblink later he was landing in front of the startled officials.

“What in the name of the Sixteen was that!”  General Hura blurted out.  “Honestly, what’s your level boy?  How did Pereston let you escape from that hellhole without snaring you into that cult that they call their royal knights?”

“They tried,” Micah replied with a chuckle.  “I leveled most of a fortress and killed a couple members of the knights.  I think at this point, they’ve given up on trying.  If not?  Well, they know where to find me.  I haven’t exactly been hiding.”

Countess Messna leaned forward her saddle, a predatory gleam in her eyes as she gazed down at him.

“Micah Silver, I don’t suppose you’re single?”  She asked, her expression decidedly sharklike.  “If I were fifteen years younger, I’d be asking for myself, but alas, time passes despite our best efforts.  I do however have a daughter that is about to come of age.”

Micah smiled back weakly, a dull headache that had nothing to do with mana usage building in the back of his head.