Devourer

Chapter 154: Fiends

Arias had just enough time to get into formation when the attack hit. A swarm of giant bats each larger than a man descended from the skies in a cacophony of screeches. Arias raised his shield and readied his sword. Arias could see them approaching and all he could do was hope his compatriots could follow their training in a real fight.

His doubts were unfounded as he saw a wave of red bolts light up the night sky from behind him. Looks like the riflemen can follow their training. Each bolt carried a lot of power, from what Arias has heard the special crystal in the rifle along with special engravings on the inside of the barrel does most of the heavy lifting for the spell formation. When a bolt struck one of the bats a sizable chunk of flesh was blown off and they fell screeching to the ground.

The bats continued to charge heedless of their losses and the gunners fired again, dropping more of them. Now came the mages, Arias felt the familiar sensation of his hair standing on end when ether flooded the air around him. A magical barrier appeared around his formation and the bats slammed face-first into the barrier with a sickening crunch. The rifles fired again and the bolts cut down another group of bats.

This was the basic strategy that was devised by General Montis. The general knew the vampires would start the fight by throwing their chaff at the target to wear down their resources. So he devised this strategy to help reduce the effect of this. The rifles were extremely resource efficient so the general planned to use them to thin the herd rather than using expensive offensive spells or wasting the physical energy of the soldiers.

Arias stood there nervously as the odd hissing roar of the rifles behind him continued to sound out. His unit was doing great all things considered. The Zarimans on the other hand were doing a lot worse. He could see Zariman soldiers being torn to pieces by the bats. One group of bats had grasped some poor Zariman soldier. It looks like they were trying to draw and quarter the poor soul and when his limbs popped off Arias knew his assumption was correct.

It was a nerve-wracking position to be in. Tactically they couldn’t lower the barrier or they risked losing their combat effectiveness. The problem was that it was apparent the only safe locations were inside the formations of the Imperial Army. Some Zarimans had clued into this and were pounding on the edge of the barriers trying to get in.

Those didn’t last long since the glowing domes were priority targets for the bats and anyone standing close to a dome for too long would end up jumped by the bats. Unfortunately, that was exactly what was happening. Arias to his left and right, he saw the soldiers all grim-faced trying not to look at the poor souls trapped outside their little bubble of safety.

“Stand fast!” Captain Alexa shouted as if reading the minds of the soldiers.

“The faster we kill these creatures, the more lives we save!” Captain Alexa shouted and a chorus of assent echoed out from the soldiers with practised precision.

This went on for another half hour until Arias suddenly heard a large boom. He looked up to see a giant creature that vaguely resembled a bat. Unlike its smaller cousins this one looked far more dangerous and it was obviously already dead judging by its exposed ribcage.

“Varg Gheist! Focus Fire!” Captain Alexa shouted and immediately the red bolts began hammering into the Varg Gheist. Although this time the bolts did significantly less damage, many of the bolts merely crackled out of existence on contact with the beast's black hide. Damage was being done but it was slow going with these ones.

“Iron Sides!” Captain Alexa commanded and there was movement from behind Arias. The Iron Side was a special weapon that was a big meteal tube that fired a concentrated armor piercing ether bolt. It used specialized munitions made of Ether Crystals to power it. An expensive weapon to fire but brutally effective in its simplicity.

Arias watched as a blue ether projectile in the shape of a cone shot out from behind him and the cone punched right through the chest of the Var Gheist. The Var Gheist let out a roar of pain before another cone took out its head, splattering the barrier with its brain matter.

“Barrier failing!” Arias heard a voice shout and he looked around to see cracks were starting to appear on the barrier.

“Buff up!” Captain Alexa commanded, immediately the mages and priests sprang into action.

[Under Divine Flag] one priest intoned.

[Resist Negative] a mage said.

[Lion’s Valor] a knight shouted as his spell was followed by a lion’s roar.

[Forge Father's Blessing] the gruff voice of a dwarven ranger said.

[Pace of the Wind] another man shouted, this one must be an ex-adventurer. That was an adventurer spell.

[Gelimer's Retaliate] a feminine voice intoned releasing another adventurer spell.

Arias looked down at his hands to see his weapon, shield and armor all glowing with different effects. Arias could feel the strength in his body and his fear was gone thanks to all the buffs.

“All priests ready for breakthrough!” Captain Alexa commanded and Arias readied his sword. He jumped a little on his feet to pump himself up for the coming fight and then this odd silence washed over the troops. Then the combined shout of a hundred Divine Magic Casters.

DIVINE REJECTION!

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Skavi was flailing his sword at a nearby bat in a panic. He was next to the wall and judging by what he could see the soldiers on the wall were getting the worst of it. His blade caught the bat in the chest and the bat fell to the ground. Right as the bat fell he heard a scream and he looked up to see another soldier being dragged off the wall by another bat. The soldier and the bat struggled before they both finally went over the wall. The bat was fine but the soldier’s body was twisted at unnatural angles after landing.

In his moment of reverie the bat in front of him started to thrash and it lunged at him. Skavi just barely had the time to raise his sword and drive it into the bat’s mouth. The bat screeched and Skavi thrust forward driving the sword down into the bat’s gullet.

At that moment Skavi heard the sound that resembled a giant boulder smashing into a giant glass window. He turned to see the barriers of the Imperial Army shatter and shards of ether shot out. Skavi instinctively covered his face and he heard the screeches of the bats and the screams of the soldiers. He gingerly opened his eyes to see the bat in front of him was now in two pieces, some piece of ether shrapnel must have cut the bat in half. He shifted his gaze to the side and saw the wall now had a red glowing gash in it.

When he looked back at the Imperials he saw the soldiers had begun to advance. Their front line locked in a neat shield wall as they advanced. Pikes appeared from behind the shield line as spells and projectiles shot out from behind the lines, shooting bats right out of the sky. Looking up Skavi noted the Imperials' superior anti air capabilities. In some capacity it almost looked like they were over compensating for their anti air capabilities. Whoever came up with these tactics must be an extremely flexible strategist.

Just when Skavi felt things were looking up he saw the Imperials suddenly focus fire on something. He looked up to see Varg Gheists descending from the sky. Immediately he saw a blue light and he turned to see the Imperials casting ritual magic. Then the next thing he knew he heard shrieks from above him. He looked up again to see the Varg Gheists thrashing as if they were struggling to maintain flight.

Then they all came crashing to the ground, some landed on badly on the walls and ended up rolling right off, breaking limbs on landing. Then the Imperial lines parted and released what Skavi assumed to be elite soldiers. He spotted dwarven rangers, the living armored soldiers he saw from earlier, spell blades and the famous red armored Wardens.

He saw the elite soldiers charge right at the Varg Gheists while the rest of the army continued to attack the chaff. He saw one Dwarven Ranger fire a bolt from his crossbow and the ensuing explosion blew a hole in its head. Then with a swift movement he hurled an axe at the Varg Gheist and axe buried itself deep into the hole in its head. Then the Ranger extended his arm, his gauntlet glowed and the axe shot out of the Var Gheist’s head ripped dead flesh along with it in a spray of black blood. The axe spun back towards the Ranger and it was neatly caught.

The Varg Gheist however was still not dead, that was the thing about necromantic constructs, they could take an unnatural amount of punishment. However, next a Spell Blade leapt in and with a wave of their sword the Varg Gheist had its body bathed in flame. This time the Varg Gheist went down even if with a bit of thrashing.

Skavi turned to the right and saw what looked to be an ex adventurer priestess wearing living armor channeling a divine spell. She hurled a crescent-shaped gold blade right at another Varg Gheist and this one really hurt considering their vulnerability to divine magic. Parts of the Varg Gheist turned to ash as the blade hit. When the Varg Gheist counter-charged her, she moved with uncanny agility as she easily dodged each attack before countering with another gold blade. This time the gold blade was a horizontal slash, the gold blade ended up hacking the Varg Gheist’s head off and it crashed to the ground dead. Or at least more dead than it was initially.

Overall the Imperials were beating the Vampires back, from what he was seeing it was obvious the Averlon Empire was far more capable militarily as compared to Zarima. Skavi knew if Zarima clashed with the Averlon Empire they would lose even without the intervention of the hives.

“DEATHFLAME WYVERNS!” a voice screamed atop the wall. Then he heard the alarm horn being blown. Skavi instinctively looked up at the sky, he couldn’t see anything in the night sky but then he heard the sound of the horn being ominously cut off. Then Skavi felt a rush of wind, then a crash. Skavi saw this skeletal wyvern had appeared. It was just bones, no flesh remained except for its tattered webbed wings. However, in its ribcage where its organs were there blazed a mass of black flame. Its eye sockets blazed with the same flame and when it opened its maw Skavi saw the flames were alight within as well. The Wyvern opened it and shot a jet of flame at a small group of Imperial Elites. Two within group were a spell blade and a priestess. The two of them raised a pair of magical barriers, one an iridescent blue and the other a yellow gold. The black flame smashed into the barrier and then barriers gave way almost instantly. The group was consumed by the black flames in an instant and their bodies turned to ash inside their armor and clothing. All that was left behind was a pile of armor and cloth.

Then another Wyvern landed, and then another, and then another. Soon there were almost a dozen of these hellish skeletal constructs around the area. The Imperials immediately retreated behind another barrier. The red bolts from the rear line continued to hit the Deathflame Wyverns but the bolts just bounced off their skeletal frames. The only spells that seemed to do anything were the Divine Magic offensive spells and even those had a limited effect.

The black flames then shot out in a wave at the groups of Imperial soldiers. By now the field of battle was just dominated by the Deathflame Wyverns. The remaining lesser Vampire flyers were mostly thinned out but knowing Vampire tactics more were on the way.

How were they ever supposed to beat the Vampires? This was the early stage of the battle, the worst was yet to come…

When that thought crossed his mind fate seemed to answer in the most direct manner possible. The humanoids were never supposed to be able to beat the Black Crusade. But a Hive? A Hive that existed in the ancient world? That was a different story. From the ground emerged large white creatures. These were some of the creatures that were posted beyond the wall. When they first appeared beyond the wall a few hours ago they smashed the zombie hordes back like a boulder hitting a pile of rats.

They had a shape that vaguely resemble centaurs. It had a quadrupedal lower half and humanoid torso. The body seemed anatomically similar to a feline body but its legs were far more muscular. Its front feet also had three toes that were tipped with three large claws. Its torso was vaguely humanoid and its arms ended with crab-like claws that had sharp serrated tips allowing it to gore, slash, stab and crush. It also had a tail that was as long as its body that was tipped with a long stinger.

The creatures emerged and without any further ceremony simply charged the Deathflame Wyverns. In typical Hive fashion they just obeyed the commands given to them. If Skavi had to guess what that command was it was probably a simple kill command. Skavi recalls someone calling them Maleficence Fiends, whatever they were, they were quite good at following orders. He watched slack jawed as Fiend charged right through the blast of black fire and simply tackled the wyvern with enough force to send both of them smashing into the wall.

There was enough force from the impact to knock him slightly off balance. When he regained his bearings he saw the body of the wyvern being thrown out of the dust cloud only to go sprawling onto the ruined cobblestones. Then the Fiend leapt out of the dust cloud and pounced right onto the wyvern. The wyvern only had time for one screeching howl before its head was smashed into the cobblestone by one of the Fiend’s crab-like claws.

In the books the stories of the ancients were always romanticized to an extent. Somehow in Skavi’s mind the ancients always seemed elegant. This however was far from elegant, the Fiend smashed its claws into the head of the Wyvern repeatedly. Each blow shook the ground and for all intents and purposes, it looked like a wild animal mauling another wild animal.

No elegance, just pure simple brutality, a brawl in the desert heat and it didn’t take long before the Fiend had reduced the Wyvern’s skeletal head to powder.

Skavi then watched as the Fiend simply got off the corpse of the wyvern before charging at another wyvern that was fighting a Fiend. The two Fiends ganged up on the wyvern and this time one of them simply held onto its tail while the other grabbed its head. The two then pulled and they ripped the head clean off the wyvern.

This pattern continued until everything that was hostile has basically been pummeled into either pulped flesh or white powder. The Fiends then stilled and looked to the sky as if waiting for the next wave.

These Deathflame Wyverns seemed insurmountable when Skavi first encountered them but these Maleficence Fiends just beat them so easily. Most of the Fiends were doused with that black flame at a certain point and yet all of them looked more or less unscathed.

As Skavi scanned the surroundings he noticed the fighting had stopped. It looks like the Vampires didn’t want to send anything else against these Fiends. However, instead of a victory cheer from the defenders everyone just stared silently at the silent and still figures of the Fiends. They continued to look at the sky as if daring some other foe to come and test their mettle. They just stood there like ivory statues, their white gleaming armor shining under the moonlight.

After a short time as one all the Fiends turned away from the sky and walked towards the tunnels they emerged from. Without so much a sound or look of acknowledgement these horrors just went back underground.

Skavi looked down at the ground beneath him and felt the cold gnawing fear in the back of his mind. Many thoughts swam in his head, the old stories of ancients, his thoughts of the future, the safety of his father, the comfort he felt that his mother would be safe from the Vampires. But one thought rang louder than all the rest, it was a thought born of primal fear. The realization that the Great Beast held all their lives in its hands. They lived because the Great Beast allowed it and they would die when he commands it.

That single thought rang in his mind, echoing out into the darkest recesses of his mind as he looked downt at the ground beneath him.

What else is down there?