Unbound

Chapter Seven Hundred And Twenty Six - 726

A light shone to the east, but it wasn't the dawn.

The sun stood in the morning sky, above even the mountains now—this was something else. Vess squinted into the light, flaring her Perception until the bright spot resolved into an army of golden warriors. Paladins, Priests, and Inquisitors marched in tight ranks, and they looked as if they had been dipped in sunlight. A cloud followed them, dust and debris rising in their wake, lit with the afterglow of their presence, like a storm cloud waiting to break.

Blessed by the Divine, she realized.

Vess stood on the field. The duke, her father, was beside her, and the grooms spread out at her back. There were 6,000 of them, a paltry number before the vast horde that assembled on the hills beyond. With her were the Eidolon Exults, Laur, Tzfell, and Archie. More soldiers lined the walls behind them, defending the city, but they were the vanguard. Their job—her job—was to keep the Hierocratic soldiers away from the walls and the people within.

Vess gripped her spear. Just about ready.

A call rippled down the line of the enemy, and a force of over a thousand split off from the horde. They started running, charging full speed from atop the hill.

Closer.

They needed to stretch the battle as long as they could so that Felix could be ready to face Amara. No one else stood a chance. This was her plan.

Closer.

The Paladins and Inquisitors apparently cared little for their Skills, for they summoned no Mana armor or shields or fire. They simply lifted their gleaming swords and pikes as their legs pumped and their shouts filled the air.

Closer.Now!

A group, a hundred strong, rose out of a gully in the fields, charging to meet the zealots. The soldiers shouted, surprised at how close they were, and the Priests among them quickly cast spells of fire and light. They burned across the farmland, tearing trenches into the dirt and obscuring Vess' vision with a flare of blinding radiance.

The ambush didn’t falter.

Conjured winds tore the cloaks from their backs, revealing pale waxy skin, chitinous armor, and eyes filled with necromantic light.

"Necromancy!" one of the Paladins shouted, but it was too late. The hundred Risen smashed into the zealots, bowling over many and slashing into the rest with their wickedly sharp blades. They were a furious blender of attacks, ignoring lopped off limbs and burning wounds with the stalwart constitution of the already dead. However, fire and sword backed by a Divine blessing was more than the Risen could handle. They were falling fast.

“Move!” The Risen all parted as one, and a massive hammer slammed into the earth. “Crushwave Surge!”

A wave spread outward, through the gap in the Risen and into the core of the redcloak battalion. The ground rippled and burst, exploding beneath the Paladins, Inquisitors, and Priests. Shards of hardened earth exploded from the ground, hurling the assembled warriors back and punching holes through plate mail and chain with little effort.

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A ten foot tall behemoth threw off his cloak, revealing Beef in his crystalline armor. His left hand lifted and the armor morphed into a bulging vanguard of needles and a voice comprised of many echoes shouted out. “Razorhail!”

A deluge of crystalline spikes the size of swords ripped into the hierocratic line, punching through Paladin and Priest in equal measure.

“Attack!” Beef commanded, and the Risen retaliated.

Swords and axes lifted and fell, and while their weren’t a match for the redcloak’s enhanced power, the Risen cared nothing for their lives. They tackled soldiers to the ground, pining them while a reaping hammer crushed their skulls, or trapped the legs of Paladins to prevent them from dodging the crystalline projectiles. All too quickly, the thousand Hierocratic soldiers were dead and their bodies lost their golden luster.

Beef gestured. “Hallow Rise.”

Paladins, Inquisitors, and Priests rose to their feet, replenishing his numbers back to a full hundred.

“Kill the heretics!”

More golden soldiers came in a rush, charging down the hill almost faster than Beef could Manage. Three battalions—three thousand more soldiers—this time spreading out as they flanked his position, looking to hem them in. Vess lowered herself.

"Get ready," she called.

In the distance, Beef hefted his hammer on his shoulder and laughed.

"You think this is enough?" he called. "This isn't enough. But you know what is?"

He pointed to the sky.

A swirling storm cloud swooped from the north, crackling with lightning, before it parted to reveal Pit in his immense Tyrant form. His four wings snapped wide open as he descended toward the advancing horde and his mantle raged, crackling off of his hide as if he were a storm himself. He hit the flanking line of Paladins with a screeching roar and shook the earth, golden-drenched soldiers tossed left and right before him. The Riposte in his mouth grew to thirty feet long and howled with wind and lightning as he brought it to bear, dragging his sword through the golden line and ripping Paladins, Priests, and Inquisitors asunder. They fell by the hundreds, screaming and shouting even as their lines started to fall apart, turning on itself as they sought to face this new challenge.

Now, Yin.

A mighty bellow rang out, so loud and sonorous that it vibrated the bellies of all who heard it. From the south came Yintarion, flying out from the cloud cover like a nightmare from her childhood.

“Dragon!” a Priest yelled.

Yin shone like a patch of the dawn sky given life, and was closely followed by a battalion of Dragoons arcing through the air in his wake.

“Prismatic Cyclone!” he called out.

A tornado of winds and light ripped from her Companion, tearing down through the redcloaks before tossing them into the air. Many were hurled away, crashing hundreds of strides distant in immobile heaps. Others were hurled back into the main force, their bodies like bombs that took out the legs of others. All the while, the Stunned and Blind Status Conditions afflicted those survivors, leaving them groping helplessly among the muck.

Open to attack.

"Dragoons," her father called. "Advance!"

“Warriors of Light!” cried a feminine voice in the distance. “Charge!”

Yintarion cried out to the heavens, and thunder split the sky. "Roar, Dragoons! Roar for blood and the death of gods!"

Vess leaped along with six thousand of her order, glaive held up and spinning with wind and lightning as she summoned her Galebound Glory. Alongside her, arcing through the air, the Dragoons summoned their own Spears, until the sky was populated by a suspended rain of tempest steel. The redcloaks shouted in a cavalcade of voices, summoning shields of light and suits of Mana armor.

Golden blessing or not, soon their spears would be soaked in blood.