From her hiding spot in the lounge on the first floor, Kamila had been watching the fight from the beginning. Her feelings changed from awe to horror and back with each second.
‘Thank heavens Constable Ernas sent me away the moment the last phase of the plan started. Otherwise I would have just been just a burden for them. I always dreamt of becoming a Royal Constable one day, but if Lady Ernas is their standard, I’d rather remain behind my desk for life.’ She thought.
What Kamila was unaware of, was that Jirni was considered a monster even among the Royal Constables. They were mainly investigators, prosecutors, and interrogators. Most of them wouldn’t take part in a single fight their whole lives.
Jirni’s family, the Myrok Household, had a different philosophy on the matter. Regardless of the profession one of its members would choose, they would all be trained as assassins to get rid of bad apples whenever the Crown required their assistance.
While Jirni and Lith dealt with the first Carpenter, Tista and Dorian did their best to stop the second one from running away with the two hostages. While they had the advantage that the creature couldn’t use its hands unless it dropped Manohar and Mynna, the situation was still dire.
The trick of the second set of arms hidden in the creature’s sides had yet to be revealed, so they were still worried about its silent casting abilities. Tista had no Gatekeeper for close combat and even if she did, she wouldn’t know how to use it.
She had been an Awakened for less than a year. Her body was only slightly better than a normal human’s, she knew few true magic spells that she could use during combat, and had no Solus to help her plan ahead.
‘What a mess.’ She inwardly cursed. ‘I can’t use fire or lightning without risking injuring the hostages. If I use the marble in the floor, the house might collapse and darkness magic is so frigging slow. I’ll have to use water and spirit magic.’
Tista kept Life Vision active while accumulating a densely packed sphere of spirit magic. Her plan was to poison the creature as soon as it activated its vortex and then stall for time until it fainted due to the loss of one of its cores.
She had no idea how different a perfectly formed Carpenter was compared to the makeshift version she had previously slain. Tista cast a hail of ice spikes, all aimed at the creature’s legs and at the pavement.
The puppeteer had no troubles controlling the two Carpenters at once and hoped this duo would prove to be as fun as the other one. The creature dodged the spikes with the grace of a ballerina.
Tista’s attempts to avoid hitting the hostages made their trajectory obvious. Or so the puppeteer thought. Some of the spikes melted on impact, while others froze the water turning the floor into an extremely slippery surface composed of water and ice.
The Carpenter lost its footing as Dorian used an earth spell to make the stairs collapse and force the enemy to choose between releasing the hostages or going back to square one. The creature smirked in amusement at the trap and refused to fall.
A simple floating spell allowed it to walk on air unhindered by their efforts.
‘These guys are disappointing.’ The puppeteer thought. ‘They clearly don’t have any close combat ability, otherwise they’d try to exploit my alleged lack of arms. Or maybe they are just too scared I will use their “friends” as shields…’
Their train of thought was interrupted when the other Carpenter failed to kill either of its targets despite going all out.
‘Enough playing. Time to get out of here.’ The creature activated the vortex at full power and its best flying spell. Tista didn’t miss the opportunity and struck the enemy with all the spirit magic she had amassed up to that point.
The creature’s secondary core crumbled almost instantly, leaving the puppeteer as surprised as they were angry. One of their masterpieces was being beaten into submission, they couldn’t allow the other one to be lost too.
The Carpenter darted head first toward the balcony, with Tista in hot pursuit feeding poison to the vortex. The creature stopped abruptly, letting her come close enough to disrupt her flight spell and kicked her hard while she was unable to defend herself.
Dorian tried to catch her, but was struck along with Tista by powerful lightning that would have made him faint if not for the potion coursing through his veins. He swallowed down the pain along with all of his fears and kept moving.
Dorian broke her fall along with several of his ribs. Tista was a lithe girl, but the kick and her armor made her an enchanted cannonball. They both tumbled on the ground while the Carpenter flew away at an almost sub sonic speed, burning its lifespan to get to its destination before its core crumbled.
The sound of cracking bones broke the silence in the ballroom, reaching even Kamila’s hiding spot. It reminded her of when she was still a child, and her brother added wood to the fire. The contrast between her happy memory and the sight of her two companions lying on the floor made her shiver.
She waited, for a time that seemed to last an eternity, hoping to see at least one of them stand up.
‘Please, gods, let them be okay.’ She silently prayed with all the faith she could muster. ‘They are good people. Servants of the Kingdom trying to save lives. I’m just an analyst who can’t even lift a box full of paperwork. I can’t help them. I’m useless.’
The Carpenter unleashed five lightning bolts at Lith, and Kamila’s heart almost stopped. She could almost see his body sprawling on the floor in a seizure. Tears streamed down her face as he and Jirni blocked the spell, making her fear grow even stronger.
‘Please, save them.’ Kamila kept praying while a small pool of blood was leaking out the mouths of the two fallen mages. ‘I’m not even a mage, I’m just human. Monsters walk among us, please, don’t let them die. I don’t want to be alone again.’
Yet aside from the clash of bone and metal, no answer came to her pleas. Before she could realize what she was doing, Kamila was rushing towards her companions. The voice of her Drill Sergeant echoed in her ears, scolding her at every step.
‘You’re too slow, move that ass! Stumble as much as you want, you crippled maggot. You’ll fail them like you’ve failed everything else in your life and their deaths will be on you! Why the fuck aren’t you using cover?’
Sergeant Heartmann’s voice was cruel but helpful. She finally remembered that her dress was special. Kamila had never had an enchanted item aside from communicator amulets, so her memory lapse was understandable.
Yet she cursed herself while it shapeshifted to her uniform and she used the toppled tables to hide her movements. She reached Tista and Dorian, checking their vitals before administering healing potions to them.
‘If their bodies are too weakened, the healing process could kill them…’ Her brain stopped as the creature sent Jirni to the spikes-filled floor and cornered Lith with a three pronged attack.
What scared her the most wasn’t the flash of spells nor the splashes of blood. It was the savage smile of the three monsters amid the chaos. It made her feel like the last human on Mogar, forced to witness a battle between gods.
Well, Supreme Magus is now 1 year old. I missed my own anniversary by a full month and smth. Thanks to everyone who is still here. *Author’s bow.*
