Chapter 420 (1/2)

Chapter 420

Chapter 418: Shackles

The oppressive gusts of void wind pressed in onof ainst ainst the shore was obscured

“You two, get the tempus warp packed up for travel” muffled by the spell, Wolfrum’s voice was distant, only barely audible “The rest of you, over here I’ll lower the spell Disaroth Vritra will be here soon”

The darkness changed, swirling as if it were being moved by the wind I felt its hold on ive Wolfrule

Just as the void wind spell faded, strong hands tookinto my back

“How anticli er Now, I have no idea why”

I lifted aze or his words

“Still, you’re quite the prize for Dragoth With a little…incentive, I iine there is a whole lot you can tell us about Seris’s operation, hthat will save any of you,” I said, keeping the quaver out of ht the sun above and behind Wolfruht shot frori to conjure a shi+eld of soulfire at the last second The soulfire passed just above his shi+eld, striking hi crack, the horn shattered, spinning off into the sand Wolfrue

“Reinforceo of my arm as they conjured a spell

The sharp object aton tohis head back, then wrenched forward out of his control

My blade was on the ground atthe blade with a toe, I kicked it upright so that the handle stuck in the sand with the long, scarlet blade pointing straight up

There was a second burst of mana, but the lance of soulfire flew a few feet to Wolfrum’s left It bypassed his shi+eld and struck my blade The scarlet steel burst into black soulfire

With all th, I drove the chains down on the point of the burning blade, and several things happened all at once

The fourour surroundings for their attackers and stoppingthe fiery shi+eld, the other—pointed atthe lied into it, two additional silver shards released fro off lances of black fire Wolfru his spells and co the barrage of attacks

The point of h one link in the manacle chains My pulse spiked as the sword’s handle sank deeper into the sand, deadening the force ofhard deeper down

The flah the Iht spark

Soed forward, pulling the scarlet sword fro behind me as I moved

A steel-hafted spear blocked ood look at the four Redwaterme: a shi+eld, two Casters, and a Striker

Both Casters were holding fire in their hands The Striker was already spinning his spear around to go on the offensive Sand formed into metal discs and floated up to defend them as the shi+eld retreated to a safe distance They were potent ot a feel for their power Their ed our forces to cover their runes, so I couldn’t be sure

The vortex shi+eld around Wolfru round A shi+eld of fire sprung up around me

The third orbital shard—the one I had “lost” while descending the cliffside—flitted past Wolfrum to join the other two, and they shi+fted into position just outside of the shi+eld, their gled to maintain focus on both the soulfire and the artifact

When the shockwave hit, the orbitals sent out a pulse ofknocked out of position and sent tu away behindout from my sword quivered, cracked, and then flared out But the reh to set ht breeze

The es were huddled behind severalprofusely Wolfru to destroy his own ht

“I doubt you’ll be welco like that,” I said, standing and lifting my sword to point at his shattered horn The bracer drew on myaround ered the broken stub “So, I’uessed Are you hiding your horns as well? Is it that bracer there on your arm or”—he focused on hting—“that little bauble around your neck? An illusion? That would be Seris’s way Go on, I want to see who I’ Show me, for old time’s sake”

“It’s al” I conjured soulfire along the scarlet blade again, causing it to writhe with black fla on Wolfru roiftly along the shore “If you’d ever actually listened to what Seris was trying to teach you, you could have been so much more”

Wolfrum conjured black fire in each of his hands as he adjusted his stance “I think you’ll find I learnedher down Kill her if you have to”

The spear-wielding Striker lunged forward Twin bolts of fire followed, tracing a sh the air as they passed hie, transparent panel ofheld in Seris’s shi+eld, cast by one of the two e of the tereen haze to stain the air and make the path to them impassable

Two lines of soulfire met the flame bolts, launched fro A third ray targeted the Striker When one of the metal discs lurched into position to defend hih it, but the Striker was fast, and he’d already dodged Still, the fla the their next spells

Behinda torrent of soulfire pushed on a gust of void wind

I lunged to meet the Striker His spear licked out twice, three ti bolt I parried each strike without breaking h the spear so that when he thrust for the fifth time, only the short end of the ruined steel ree of my blade effortlessly parted his armored uniform, mana, flesh, and bone

In the wake of my blade, a crescent of black fire rolled toward the two Casters Bullets of bright yellow fla my flesh All the metal discs shi+fted into position to block the soulfire, but it wasn’t strong enough Not nearly The black fire devoured the shi+elds, then the Casters behind thee of bullets ceased

The shi+eld turned to run As I focused on his back, I pulled on the three orbitals, like squeezing the trigger of a crossbow, and three rays of black flah hi mana into one ofht as Wolfrum’s soulfire licked at ht into the acidic cloud of water-attributeatop the outcropping of rock in front of the tempus warp, the Caster waved his hands and the cloud condensed into viscous drops of rain, which ihmy blade so I could focus on both the wind-attribute spell and the orbitals, I aies beyond the shi+eld Twin lances of fire ripped through the barrier cast by their shi+eld, burning a large hole in each e’s chest The final orbital fired backwards blindly as I hoped to disrupt Wolfruainst lance behind me, I saw the full effect of his spell for the first tie, s a twenty-foot trail of pure soulfire, was closing in oninto the skull’s openWolfrum

I aimed for the tempus warp With the way clear, there was no reason to stand and fight Not when a Scythe was closing in on me

A bead of darkWild lines of void wind began reeling out of it, spiraling doard until they touched the ground to forht at it while recalling the orbitals, wind-attributeme forward faster with every stride They snapped into place in the bracer, and I released theit just as ain

Slashi+ng at the air with h the artifact they’d installed to hold Seris’s barrier open The art butter, and the arch collapsed The shi+eld around it flexed, pushi+ng inward

Inspell starting to surroundforward like an arrow

The shi+eld closed around me

I was imh my oind mana effortlessly My senses reeled for a moment as I was spun end over end, then the cyclone releasedmy balance, I rotatedinto the sand for stability

Fifty feet out in the ocean, the tempus warp splashed down into the water It had been lifted by the cyclone, then tossed away as the wind’s ed with it

“If it ram the tempus warp anyway, Lady Caera,” Wolfrum said fro to leave here”

I spared hi shi+p, however…

The boat was close enough now that I could sense thefro large even from such a distance, floated up fro

Focusing on the ripples still rolling away from where the te the rocks toward it, stowing e ofaway froed face first into the jagged stone if not for the wind-attributeoff against the air itself, I leapt out over the open water, pullingposition When I hit the water, I shot deep down below the constantly rolling waves The frigid cold bit atof the water pulled atto tow me away

I scoured the seafloor for the te darker and darker as it went deeper