The target was the creature that had shoulder charged the wall at the start and while its head had not struck the wall somehow, the force of the blow had disorientated it, and Tom let himself drop a metre leading with his spear, engaging a Power Blow while spending ten fate to help guarantee the strike.
As he dropped, he felt the creature’s fate pool resist his own, but it was too late for it. He had released his fate first and its pool was partially depleted presumably in the effort to survive its suicidal charge. The monster’s three points of fate negated half of one of Tom’s points, and the rest went to guarantee his strike. He infused the strike with a Power Blow. Physically he aligned his spear perfectly with the base of the neck where it joined the skull. The monster was looking down, which meant as he fell it couldn’t see him. Its tail flicked with nervous movements. Sweeping a chunk of metal resembling a sword back and forth over its top in order to stop or at least dissuade someone from doing what he had done. It was futile and for someone as versed in combat as Tom it was a simple matter of timing to circumvent the defences. He fell through the danger zone even as the sword swept away from the area he was falling through.
The half-hearted attempt might as well have not existed.
It was turning, and for a moment it dropped its head further. Its neck bent so it could look at something on the ground. It was like an earth animal offering its throat to a hungry apex predator. An invitation that would not be refused and his spear was perfectly positioned to take advantage even before the opportunity fully manifested. The tip slammed into the base of the skull. The angle its neck was on meant there were no defensive bones in his way. A flash of resistance, then Power Blow triggered, blasting through the small amount of bone in the way. The spear tip glowing with power and shards of bone slipped into the monster’s brain. The weapon twisted, tearing through brain matter and if it lacked a second brain, which his and Everlyn’s earlier success suggested was the case it was dead.
He immediately focused on pulling his spear back into the inventory.
Nothing happened.
It was stuck in the animal, negating his personal spatial storage. Then his feet hit the head, returning it to the tilted position, and the spear responded as his storage worked. He almost tumbled off the monster when it vanished from his hands. He scrambled for a moment, the electricity from his feet helping to support his balance. Then, without a weapon to encumber him, he could move freely. The dead body under him fell, but Tom was already moving. He leapt off the dying creature and sprinted toward his next victim, lightning crackling on his feet, boosting his movement speed.
This fearsome creature had stayed back because of the lack of space closer to the wall and used that long tail-like appendage to assault the wall.
It saw him flying toward it and reconsidered its position in the battle. It concluded that harassing the wall was less important than holding off the beast sprinting at it. A chain mace whipped toward him.
Tom smiled grimly and spent another ten points of fate and twisted his body. He got most of the way out of the trajectory of the chain, but there was no way to avoid it perfectly.
He grimaced when he saw the angles.
Fate could only do so much.
It clipped him. He felt the crushing pain on his hip and was thrown unceremoniously off course. He spun through the air. His spear appeared in his hands and used the butt to stablise his fall, and rolled when he struck the ground. Touch Heal burnt his remaining mana to fix the gash the mace had left.
With a curse, he pulled himself to his knees and discovered that he had fallen between the monster feet. Thick trunks of legs were slightly behind him and that massive blimp like belly covered in scales directly above him. He was underneath it. Tom tensed his body ready to spring.
He gasped.
And struggled to remain standing.
A tremendous weight was pressing down on him.
His entire body felt…
The spear was almost too heavy to hold, and his mind caught up to the body’s sensations. It was like gravity had abruptly increased. The creature above him groaned in distress. The chain mace crashed to the ground and out of the corner of his eyes he could see that tail struggling to lift it back up.
A gravity spell.
And it wasn’t a weak one, but the effect was worse for the heavy impractical anatomy above him. The leg to Tom’s left started to buckle.
It groaned again.
More calculations ran in his head. If that front main load bearing leg was buckling… Then the other legs would go… and then.
His eyes flicked up to the broad expense of flesh above him. That was tonnes of mass in a weight spell. Vitality of ten there would be no contest. Tom grounded his spear so that it pointed straight up and then launched himself into a roll to create as much space as possible.
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The heavy animal slammed into the ground next to Tom. The wind of its collapse buffeting him. His spear was gone, either broken or trapped within its mass.
Earth Sense turned on as he scrambled to assess the best options for him to pursue. Different options flashed in his mind: flee, attack, provoke or use his axe to chop down a leg. But he was mana less and had just lost his most useful weapon against these giant creatures. That meant he needed to curtail his usual approach.
Data from his spell flowed in. The creature that had landed on his spear no longer had an active heartbeat. Neither did the other monster next to him. The area was safe. Tom lay between the two large creatures in a pocket that was tight enough that it might even provide protection from being accidentally trod on. Earth Sense kept spreading out to establish a perimeter that could act to give him advanced warning of any approaching enemies. Then, except for shifting his position in case he needed to move quickly he did the smart thing. He waited, biding his time until his resources recovered.
Everything was still near him. He could feel blood hitting the ground in multiple spots and the sense of weight all over the place, but no trembling of movement or the throbbing of heart beats at least not giant ones. He could sense three other humans down amongst the beasts all of them more active than he was..
At the edge of his senses, a monster still moved and there were the sounds of bows and magic striking out.
Long seconds passed as his mana pools recovered. One of the moving creatures fell. His senses screaming about it. Then a second right at the edge. Beyond? Who knows, but for now he would recover. Once he was fighting fit he could worry about peripheral issues.
Still or at least within in his range there were still regularly crashes, snaps, twangs and explosions as the battle continued without him.
Then blessed silence descended.
No more rumbling growls between the monster, and no more excessive spells raining down. Even the sound of bows had dropped and at least according to his ears no screams or cries of pain, which would have occurred if the monster had successfully hurt anyone. They had won, but then that was expected given the circumstances and the weakness of this mini-wave of enemies and hopefully without deaths.
“Tom!” he heard Everlyn yell from the wall that was almost thirty metres away.
“I’m okay.” he shouted back, but was not sure it was loud enough. He waved his hands in the air and tentatively stood, keeping his critical areas out of line of sight for as long as possible. He didn’t want to suffer accidental friendly fire. Once his head had poked out and had a good view of the battlements, he relaxed as the sentries on the wall with bows at the ready, acknowledged him.
Legen, standing on top of a monster corpse a relatively short two full corpses away, nodded at him with respect. “Impressive kills.”
Tom nodded back unable to return the compliment as he didn’t know if Legen had successfully killed anything but the fact he had left the safety of the walls and emerged unhurt said something.
“Any one down there needs healing?” Michael yelled out.
Tom raised his hand.
Michael saw him. “Are you out of mana?”
Tom shook his head.
“You’re a healer. Do it yourself.”
“I’ve got mana left in the crystal, but none in my reserves.”
“Useless,” Michael grumbled with a grin and cast the spell on Tom. “And for future reference a couple of bruises and grazed knuckle does not need healing.”
Tom smirked. “But I feel a lot better now.”
“Anyone need actual healing?” Michael called out as he kept walking along the wall.
With a shrug, he skipped over the bodies and scrambled up to the wall. Using the giant monster as a partial step ladder meant he didn’t even have to use Remote Earth Manipulation to help him get up to the top of the wall.
He immediately glanced down into the courtyard.
There were no bodies.
Everly moved next to them. “No one here is going to die from a three metre fall and you were the only one idiotic enough to put themselves at risk of getting trampled.”
“Legen?”
“They fought sensibly didn’t end up under any of them.”
“Unlucky or lucky.” Tom shrugged as if that explained everything. “And it was fun.”
She rolled her eyes. “Idiotic.”
“Yeah. I’m not used to having support. I had enemies to kill, and I just reacted to the situation.”
“And you killed them.”
“Yep, two kills with my spear. Though the last monster fell on my weapon, so that’s embarrassing, considering I don’t have a spare.” Tom looked down at the creature in annoyance. “That’s a lot of harvesting to get it back.”
She patted his arm, consoling. “I’ll leave you to cut it up. Looks a bit bloody for me.”
“Wait.”
“Nope, I’m going scouting.”
“You’re still going and by yourself.”
She laughed. “Yes, by myself. Trust me, I’m hard to kill and even harder to see and we need to scout the surrounding area thoroughly in case there are secrets that can help with the event. And remember bubs, don’t be a doormat.”
“Hey.”
A throat cleared behind him. Tom knew it was Michael and didn’t bother turning around.
“Speaking of doormats, I was hoping you could stay on the wall and provide artillery support in case anything else attacks us.”
Tom looked at him darkly. “How much of my private conversation did you actually hear?”
“None.” Michael tried to look innocent. “Well some. You were talking pretty loud.”
“I’m not buying a skill to hide my conversations just to stop you from eavesdropping.”
“No need to get a skill. You just need to,” Michael’s voice got softer. “Stop projecting your voice so loud.”
“I wasn’t.”
Michael laughed and walked away.
“That man sneaks too much.”
Everlyn giggled. “He didn’t sneak. I think at one point he even coughed.”
“Doesn’t matter.” Then Tom saw Michael was almost to the courtyard. “Michael,” he yelled after him. “I haven’t agreed to it. If I’m doing this, I want my credits and my spear recovered.”
“You just sit up there on your bum, Tom. Keep your mana topped up and I’ll make sure you get your weapon back.”
“Credits?” he asked, but Michael was already too far away to hear. “He was definitely going to make sure he got credit as well.”
Tom focused primarily on continuing to develop his mana crystal. The more powerful it got the stronger it would be.
He missed his girlfriend, but he stayed on the wall doing his duty. There were two more lizard attacks, and in both cases they mobilised with Legen leading a group against them. Tom knew he could have easily soloed them. Use his pants to absorb a charge and do the tanking job better than what the other man could and then, while it recovered from running into an immoveable object he could use his spears to tear it apart.
Tom had the power to humble Legen’s full team by showing himself to be a better melee fighter than all of them combined. But he had no interest. Unlike on previous days, Tom refused to get involved and the rest of the team took them out.
Instead, he practised his throwing.
Boring.