Chapter 175: Flail

Jadis wasted no time. Jay and Syd rushed to cover the northern approach as Kerr dashed towards them with a mob of bone thieves hot on her heels. In a flash she could see that Kerr had taken out several of the bony demons with her powerful arrow shots before turning tail, but there were still dozens of them silently charging towards their group.

The traps Aila had laid on either side of the valley started about two thirds of the way in, which meant that Jadis’ team wouldn’t have many of the traps to help in the fight since they were about in the middle of the narrow pathway. Many of the traps had been triggered by the twisted wretches anyway, so there was no use relying too heavily on the preparations they had made. Eir had said it would take a full minute to heal Dys’ broken arm and Jadis didn’t doubt it. A lot could happen in a minute’s time, so Jadis didn’t bother wasting time, she just moved to the best position she could while activating her Mirror Shine spell to make sure the demons focused on her as much as possible.

As Syd took up position in the center of the lane with her lance held at the ready, Thea rushed in front of her with her shield raised and spear set on the top edge. There was no outward sign, but Jadis knew the woman had activated her Brace for Impact skill in preparation for taking the bone thief charge head on. Jay took up the spot to the left of Syd, while without being asked Bridget covered the right flank with her flail.

Jadis had to appreciate the orc’s professionalism at that moment. She didn’t panic or complain or question her duty. She simply moved to cover the open side to the best of her ability.

Kerr slipped past Thea and Syd to enter the backline just as a ghostly force bolt from Aila shot out hit the first bone thief to get into range. The quadrupedal amalgamation of stolen bones that had been mashed together into the shape of a four-headed wolf had its front half blasted into bits by Aila’s spell, causing the squirming mass of dark tentacles within to spill out as the body tumbled forward and was almost immediately trampled to death by the horde charging right behind it.

Aila was able to destroy two more demons with her force bolts in just as many seconds before the wave of bone demons hit them.

The initial crash was chaos. The only way Jadis was able to keep track of everything that happened was because Dys was further back, still being healed by Eir. Even with that distanced perspective and her other two sight lines, it was still a jumble of bones, weapons, and moving bodies that was nigh on impossible to track.

The leading edge of the bone thieves crashed against Thea’s shield like they’d run headlong into a rock. Thea’s skill reinforced her so greatly that she didn’t even budge when a five-armed demon half-again as tall as her slammed into her. For the demon’s part, it barely seemed to notice the obstacle that the shieldsworn presented as it instead focused on the darkly shining target that Syd presented just behind her. Working together with Thea, Syd thrust her lance into the center mass of the bone demon, skewering the abomination. Before she could do anything further with the now dead creature, Thea suddenly knocked the bone thief backwards with a powerful shield bash, the move no doubt empowered by her skill Sheildsworn Shield Bash. Clearing the corpse from her weapon, the demon was immediately replaced by a new enemy who was treated to much of the same as the first.

To the left, the demons who spread out to envelop their formation ran into leading edge of the traps Aila had laid. Translucent spikes and chains that came in multiple different sizes and shapes appeared as the traps were triggered. The bone thieves were slowed and crippled, if not outright killed, as they ran into the traps which greatly helped to thin their numbers. But the fearless and relentless demons were unaffected by paltry concerns like morale. Those that fell to the traps became steppingstones for the ones coming from behind to get to their prey.

It was simply unfortunate for the demons that their intended prey was Jay.

With a powerful overhead swing, Jay crushed the first bone thief to reach her into a shower of splintered skeletons and demonic goo. As she raised her club to take on the next demon, another ghostly force bolt blasted the incoming derangement into pieces, giving Jay time to change her footing and knock the third demon away with enough force to send it crashing against the far stone wall of the cliffside.

On the right, Dys saw Bridget make use of her unusual weapon and, while there were many different life-threatening issues to focus her attention on, she had to admit that what she saw of the orc’s weaponized lantern was impressive.

With the reach of a polearm, Bridget would swing the now glowing lantern at her opponents with devastating force. The hinge on which the flail head pivoted gave each blow from the weapon greater force and bits of bone and demon went flying each time the lantern struck. More interestingly, whenever the lit lantern hit a demon, it let out a burst of scorching flame like a small explosion. It was hard to tell exactly how much extra damage the fire-effect was having on the bone thieves’ skeletal carapaces, but it was at least visually impressive. Bridget wasn’t just relying on brute force and fiery explosions, either. She used the reach of her flail to target arms and legs, tripping up opponents with her surprisingly precise attacks. Even so, Jadis would have been concerned that the orc would have been overwhelmed by the numbers coming for her on the right flank if it weren’t for the fact that she had support.

The twang of Kerr’s bow was a constant companion to the staccato beat of Bridget’s flail. At nearly point-blank range, the archer loosed her arrows into the bone thieves, the shafts burying themselves up to the fletching in each demon she struck. Some bony demons would die from a single shot, the arrow piercing its hidden core, while others would ignore the missiles that had been shot into them as if they weren’t even there. Unfortunately, Kerr could only guess at where the true body of the demon lay within the bony shell, which hindered her effectiveness against the enemy.

A loud clunk to Dys’ right caught her attention as she noticed what Sabina was doing for the first time since the bone thieves had engaged them. She had apparently managed to carry her double-sized crossbow with her when they’d retreated off of the hill and she had just then racked the arming mechanism back and loaded a bolt. Before firing, she turned to look at Dys and gave her a small wave.

With a loud chonk sound, Sabina fired the heavy crossbow. The bolt sailed through the air with an audible whistle for the half second it took to hit the bone thief that was climbing over top of one of its fallen brethren to get at Bridget. To Jadis’ shock, the bolt didn’t just pierce into the demon like one of Kerr’s arrows, it crunched into the skeletal shell, leaving a large hole in the main body of the demon as the missile continued through it and out the other side.

“That’s some fucking crossbow,” Dys said between gritted teeth as Eir knitted her elbow back together.

“Thanks!” Sabina shouted as she strained to reload the device. “It might be too strong though! Hard to pull back!”

Jadis decided she would need to introduce Sabina to the idea of a winch, but that was a task for later.

As well as everyone worked together, the overwhelming numbers of the bone thieves meant taking hits was inevitable. With her heavy plate armor, Jay and Syd were able to take those hits with little issue. Even the large, club-like arms of the bigger skeletal demons couldn’t deal direct damage to Jadis’ selves, not with how thick her armor was, but Thea and Bridget were in greater danger. Thea focused almost exclusively on defense, using her shield to block incoming attacks and only rarely making use of her spear to trip or shove against demons. She still took some hits, regardless of her impressive defensive capabilities, and her scale armor wasn’t anywhere near as robust as Jadis’ plate.

Bridget took several blows as well, her hodgepodge armor weathering the hits well. Still, every attack that slammed or sliced against the orc made Jadis cringe as she was extremely aware of just how low level the lantern warrior was compared to everyone else on the front line. One solid hit was all it would take to take the orc out of the fight. Or worse.

Getting to her feet, Dys got into a sprinter’s stance as Eir maneuvered around her to keep healing her arm. Checking her status sheet, she could see she was almost back to full health and the mobility in her right arm had almost completely returned.

“Right flank! Get ready to swing in!” Dys shouted for Bridget’s sake while also letting everyone else know what was about to happen.

In the second that Jadis’ health reached max, Dys lunged forward in an arcing charge around the right side of the formation. Holding her axe across her body, she triggered her Knight’s Daring Charge before crashing bodily into mass of demons on the right side. Using her strength and momentum, she carried the demons forward several yards, sweeping them into a tangled pile of flailing limbs that crashed together against the demons towards the center.

Several of the bone thieves immediately latched onto Dys, wrapping their skeletal hands and arms around her as they tried to grapple and strangle her, but the purpose of her charge had been achieved. With the remaining demons piled up together, Jay, Syd, Thea, and Bridget were able to rain down blows on the momentarily disabled enemies. With more careful blasts of arcane magic from Aila and Kerr joining in with her axes, what was left of the bony mob was quickly put down in a brawling melee.

“Shit, everyone okay?” Dys panted as she pulled herself out of the crushed and oozing mess of fallen demons.

There was a chorus of words affirming that everyone had come through the battle intact, along with a few questions about Dys’ health–and sanity—that Jadis brushed off since she was none the worse for wear.

“Well,” Jay heaved a sigh before turning to look at a heavily panting Bridget. “I guess that’s one way of testing out your combat capabilities. Are you alright?”

“Fine!” Bridget responded a little louder than was necessary. After swallowing and taking a deep breath, she repeated more softly, “Fine, actually. I, uh, took a few hits that bruised me, might need a healer, and I think I pissed myself, but yeah. Doing alright.”

After a few more breaths, she quickly looked up at Jay and waved one hand back and forth.

“I’m joking about the pissing myself part. I, uh, didn’t do that.”

“Even if you did, I don’t think we’d hold it against you,” Jay laughed as her two other selves walked closer along with the rest of her teammates. “You did a fantastic job in that fight. Especially considering the unexpected circumstances. If you still want a spot on the team after all this, I think we’re all in agreement that it’s yours.”

As the others nodded their agreement with Jay’s words, Bridget took her helmet off and looked around the group with wide eyes.

“Before I answer, I’ve gotta ask. Is every fight like this with you lot?”

“No,” Aila answered immediately. “Most are far more reasonable.”

After a few seconds, she continued.

“But unexpectedly intense moments like this one happen often enough that you’ll get used to it.”

“Or you’ll run screaming for cover,” Kerr sniggered off to one side.

“Well then,” Bridget shrugged. Then, with a small smirk on her lips, she shook her lantern flail and made the fire on it flare up. “I’m here to burn as bright and hard as I can! Count me in!”

Jadis had to roll her eyes at the bad pun, but she readily welcomed the orc into the fold. As the others congratulated Bridget with warm words and pats on the back, a bit of movement caught Syd’s eye.

From the angle that she stood at, Syd watched as Noll approached from the southern side of the valley. She had no idea where he’d been during that whole fight; she’d not seen him before that moment. He came to a stop a few yards away, arms folded across his broad chest as she watched their group with what Jadis interpreted as a grumpy look on his wolf-like face.

“Alright, now for the unpleasant part,” Jay announced. “Let’s see about collecting our bounties.”

Jay and Syd and all the rest got to work on the distasteful but necessary task of cutting the cyclopean eyes of the demons from their bodies to turn them in for silver coins back at Far Felsen. Dys, however, approached the older therion. Coming to a stop next to Noll, she crossed her arms in a mimicry of the man and waited. She knew it was only a matter of time. Her teacher absolutely had something to say about the way she’d handled that fight.

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