2104 Fairy Queen (Part 2)
"Bye, Linnea." A right hook caught her on the rebound and almost ripped her head off her neck.
Anela Linnea was a traitor and a self-righteous person but she was a good judge of character. Lith had no desire to waste his time with her and remembered who she was only because of her shared past with Nana.
Until that moment, Tista had had trouble facing a superior opponent, but now Linnea was in a much worse situation. Lith's core was stronger, his body weighed tons, and he moved so quickly that she didn't have the time to cast her spells.
The Headmistress bounced off the enchanted walls like a pinball before crashing into the floor and creating a crater. She was bleeding from her mouth, ears, and eyes while her whole body seemed to have been broken into pieces.
'I can't fall like this. Even if I fail my mission, I refuse to let Verhen win without even casting a single-' As light fusion cleared her blurred vision, Linnea realized that after bidding her goodbye Lith had really left the room.
"Come back here! I'm not finished yet!" She yelled at the top of her lungs in humiliation, timing her words so that they wouldn't interrupt Invigoration.
"Actually, you are." A petite figure stood in front of her, covered in a golden armor and wielding a hammer more suitable for crafting than fighting.
"How dares Verhen send a child to fight me?" Linnea roared in outrage.
The Headmistress could see with Life Vision that the fabled Golden Knight had a red core and a feeble life force. If not for her equipment, she would have been invisible.
The Fury moved in a downward arc, way faster than Linnea had predicted and what her broken body could follow. The Forgemastering hammer crushed her skull open but Solus didn't stop hitting until the Headmistress' body disappeared.
Even though Solus had just a blue core and lacked speed, her human form had the strength of a Divine Beast. Linnea had failed to understand the threat that Solus posed due to the cloaking rings she wore.
Lith had left soon after his arrival not only because Phloria couldn't afford to wait but also because he knew that Solus could deal with an opponent like Linnea as long as he created an opening for her.
"I'm not that short, you asshole." Solus grumbled at the sparks of light left behind by the Unwavering Loyalty array.
"Dammit!" Tista slammed her fist against a wall in anger. "Even with the help of the Demons and Sunder, I wasn't even remotely her match."
"I get that you are pissed off, but you did the best that you could against a superior opponent in a tough situation. Even though you didn't win, you have discovered a new bloodline ability and even taken the first step toward the violet core." Solus pointed at her friend's double colored aura.
"I know, but it doesn't make having my ass handed to me any less unpleasant." Tista sighed deeply. "Now let's get rid of this thing."
She adjusted the Monocle on her eye socket and focused on the node of runes in front of her. Tista didn't have to worry about being discovered anymore but the exhaustion from the battle made her task much harder than before.
One wrong move and Zehnma's array field would have gone for good. To make matters worse, all of the Forgotten had reached the deep violet whereas Tista and the Demons were running on fumes.
She could only hope that Solus would be enough to stall them in the case one or more of the Forgotten arrived.
'Why didn't Lith bring all the Demons to six eyes before leaving?' Tista asked.
'Because there are hundreds of them and one of him. Even if Lith run out of Invigoration, it wouldn't be enough to create an army of violet cored Demons.' Solus replied while sending the shadows toward the Forgotten to act as decoys while she kept guard.
Needing more finesse than speed, Tista used Origin Flames to unravel the final node one rune at a time. The procedure seemed to last an eternity to her, but the city arrays were actually losing power with a speed visible to the naked eye.
'Gods, no!' Xoola thought while charging toward the city entrance where human soldiers, Forgotten, and Thrud's Emperor Beasts were giving their all to keep Zehnma from being stormed.
'Gods, yes!' Phloria thought while weaving spells that used other elements from ice and darkness in preparation for the final assault.
"Stop them at all costs!" The Fenrir yelled while conjuring several arrays that followed her around thanks to her bloodline ability, Elemental Flow. "It's only a matter of time before reinforcements arrive from the Gate and the city hall."
"Second squad, mass Disarray!" Phloria yelled in her communication earpiece. "Don't let the Divine Beast reach the outer walls or our advantage will be lost."
Elemental Flow not only allowed a mage to overcome the arrays' limitation of being stuck in the place they had been cast, but it also allowed the mage to turn them on and off at will.
She could recognize a full set of elemental sealing arrays and even a gravity formation. Xoola could use them to keep her enemies from using anything but Spirit Magic while her allies would have no such problem.
Along with the gravity array, it would have been enough to stop Phloria's troops' advance and squash like a bug the Royal army that was surrounding Zehnma. While the human soldiers climbed the walls, the fake mages had kept themselves right outside the magical formations, waiting for them to weaken before joining the siege.
The Awakened squadron followed Phloria's orders, unleashing a barrage of Disarray spells on the Fenrir.
Xoola could keep her spells from exploding by focusing her willpower to negate the enemies' but while she had to split her focus on the seven formations, the Awakened only had to target one each.
Even with the help of her bloodline ability, the Fenrir had to give her all just to take one step forward.
"My eyes are down here." Phloria's voice forced Xoola to lower her gaze just in time to see a small female darting toward her followed by a volley of tier five spells. A Raging Sun exploded in front of the Fenrir's eyes, outside the area of effect of her elemental sealing arrays.
The distance lessened the damage, but the air became so hot that Xoola had trouble breathing and the flash had blinded her Life Vision. She didn't see Phloria Spirit Blink right in front of her muzzle and pierce with Reaver through her eye until the cross-guard struck at her cornea.
'If only there weren't those arrays, I would have released everything I have stored inside my blade right inside this asshole.' Phloria thought while activating the tier five Spirit Spell, Breakdown.
It conjured an elemental emerald sphere that hit Xoola from point blank range, without giving her the opportunity to dodge. Breakdown enveloped its target before imploding on itself.
The Fenrir was about 20 meters (66') high at the withers and over 52 (171') long, but not even the tail escaped from the spell in which Phloria had poured all of her mana.
