Repeating the previous maneuver two more times, she managed to empty the first magazine before the attackers called it quits, or at least switched up their tactics. ”That’s right! Run, fuckers, shoo!” That line of thinking didn’t last long, however. Nice of them to signal a change of intentions with a horn, but the Humans hardly could have prepared for what was coming. If someone had seen the Jurrasic Park, maybe, but Vigdis never was a fan of the antiques. The sound quality was awful.

Vigdis peeked up over the wall. Nope! She only caught a glimpse of what was coming before she sprung to action, driven by no conscious thought, just autopilot in full self-preservation mode. There was a lot of shit she didn't sign up for going on, but becoming paste or worm monster chow was where she drew the line. Vigdis repositioned as quickly as her foot allowed, putting the heaviest and sturdiest thing available - the ship’s propulsion mechanism - between herself and the nearest creature. Some might’ve thought of it as a calculated maneuver, but Zey and even Nellara would’ve recognized panic for what it was. Especially when Vigdis dropped a magazine as she tried to reload her weapon and spilled the armor-piercing darts everywhere, cursing loudly as she tried to gather them back up and repack the magazine.

Now would’ve been about the right time for grenades, thrown or launched, but nobody thought that was needed. Maybe the Yanks were onto something, peace through superior firepower and whatnot.

---

As the creatures reached them, the pieces of this ambush fell into place. Now with the beasts to demand their focus, the other hostiles had re-emerged from the treeline and resumed their barrage of arrows. The creatures forced them to break formation and spread out, which meant they could not take advantage of a shield wall to protect themselves from the volleys. For the creatures themselves, neither blades nor arrows could pierce their hides, so they were not under threat from being in the midst of the friendly barrage.

Kareet’s prior experience with these creatures meant she knew her own magic would be of limited use against them. They required a coordinated effort of alternating cold and heat in order to weaken their hide. If different mages were hitting it with both at once, it would be counterproductive. Kareet’s contribution to that effort could be minor at best, so she looked elsewhere for her most optimal contribution. Raising one hand to the sky, she traced a few lines in the air with her fingers as she gave her focus to creating a repelling magnetic curtain above them. Metal arrowheads would be repelled, either deflecting or at least sending them tumbling in the air. It would provide strong protection from the barrage to anyone underneath, though she could not cover a wide enough area to protect all of her allies. Being that it was a priority to get the Humans to Arcaeda safely, Kareet positioned herself to guard them from the barrage. Any others were expendable.

Per Nellara’s orders, the soldiers spread out just before the creatures reached the frontline, and it was not a moment too soon. When they charged straight into the spears, not a one got through their hides. By evading, at least, it was only two of Nellara’s soldiers who found themselves overrun and crushed under their mass. It would take a few cycles of attack through heat and cold to weaken their defenses, which made it all the more surprising when one of the beasts fell dead.

The creatures were had simply charged straight at their prey with seemingly no concern for self-preservation. Any of the weapons or magic thrown at them did not pierce their hide…with one exception. Though it was hard to tell from a distance, the shots fired from many of the Human weapons did indeed punch through, and they were hard targets to miss. Even still, the sheer size of their bodies allowed them to shrug off shot after shot with no immediate effect, until something important was struck. It was near the end of Zey’s magazine that one of her shots managed to break through its skull.

Of course, the other creature was still very much alive and rampaging through their lines, surrounded by friendlies. Its focus seemed to go straight to the strongest source of magic in front of it, which, at the moment, was Nellara herself.

“I’m not leaving you to die sir - get out of my way!” Eva replied to Mallory, then turned her suit’s translated loudspeaker on briefly for the benefit of the Glen traffic jam near the swamp-end of the bridge.

Eva’s voice soon continued on the crew’s shared comms channel.

“Jotunheim, this is Eva! We’re under attack, requesting immediate assistance- woah!”

A fifth mimic beast burst from the water and flew straight at Eva. Its body was morphed into something like a large net with eyes, teeth and limbs. She didn’t see it til too late. She only managed to turn partially toward it and pull back a punch before it wrapped around the mech. Servos whined as Eva tried to stabilise her suit’s footing with all the extra weight and momentum. Metallic *pung, pung, pung* noises rattled across the water as hidden barbs on the mimic’s body tried to puncture the cabin.

“Get this thing off me!”

Two of the closest Glen turned and promptly began stabbing the mass of black tendrils with their spears. The creature squealed and tried to grab the weapons off the knights.

Mallory’s first shots ripped straight through the fleshy tornado whipping towards Shirik and Silbermine. It howled and lost its deadly shape, collapsing onto the bridge. Evidently, bullets made more of an impact than cutting off its extremities. It turned and began skittering back towards Mallory; Silbermine pursued it, hacking away at it with his sabre.

Mallory’s quick thinking and second burst of shots stopped another creature from flanking the nobleglen. It splashed noisily back into the water with holes in its face.

A few more Glen soldiers had sorted themselves out now and filtered past Mallory to make a defensive wall. One more reached down, offering a hand to the Human. They seemed to understand he was hobbled.

“Get on my back!” The Glen would haul Mallory out of the shallow water running across the bridge if he chose to take up the offer.

-

The mimic trying to grab Itxaro recoiled when its arm was crushed to dust, but didn’t stop. They climbed up and peered over the top of the bridge. Seeing Itxaro had turned away and was shooting another of its kind, the mimic jumped up to engulf the Human.

Shirik’s icy spear flew from out of nowhere into its body. A cloud of steam blew in all directions and when it cleared, the mimic was frozen in place, still reaching out for Itxaro. Thick, sharp icicles jutted up around its feet.

The inferno mimic recoiled from the impact of each shot Itxaro fired into its back. One of the bullets missed and went through the breastplate of the Glen the mimic was fighting too, killing him instantly.

Gouts of flame burst out of the tendril creature’s eyes and mouth. It turned and clattered towards Itxaro, seriously wounded and very angry. It’d reach her in just a few seconds.

The corkscrew mimic finished murdering the Glen immediately in front of Shirik. It’d absentmindedly taken a spear off of another Glen that’d tried to stab it while the mimic tore its prey apart. Seeing Shirik upon raising its gruesome head, it threw the spear at the Iriad with its tendril like an atlatl. It then charged forward, meaning to grab the fiery tree and douse it in the river.

Meanwhile, the ground underneath everyone began to tremble. The bridge rippled and undulated suddenly, as if coming free of the riverbed. One of the Glen stumbled and fell into the water.

With the sound of a terrific scraping and splashing, Two broad stone shoulders emerged from the water. They were connected to either side of the bridge about one third of the way across, near where Mallory, Silbermine and Shirik stood.

Then appeared arms, and finally crude, roughly hewn hands. The right hand swung slowly, laboriously up into the air in an arc that could end with it crashing down onto XO’s head.

---

“We got one!” Zey whooped from the gunwale of the barge as her second magazine clicked empty. She glanced instinctively around to check her crew were alright. Richard the medical assistant was firing an assault rifle in single shot mode to her right, shouting and screaming the whole time. Dr Lambert was on her left, filming the whole thing. Zey moved over to her.

“Where is Vigdis!” She shouted over the din.

“Ran in back. I need a weapon!” Dr Lambert shouted back. Zey had forgotten she’d forbidden the scientist from having a firearm.

The Captain unslung her backpack and kicked it over to Lambert. She then gruffly put her rifle into the doctor’s hands.

“Ammo is in my pack. Keep hold of it for me, I'm going to look for her!”

Zey then promptly turned and stalked towards the other side of the ship, avoiding the mess of black tar coating the middle section.

In the end it was the rattle of darts rolling around the deck that gave Vigdis away. The Captain found her scrabbling round on the floor trying to get them back.

“Vigdis, what's going on back here? We need you in this fight!” Zey bellowed. She reached down to grab the engineer by the shirt and haul her up.

"Get me out of here...!" Mallory yelled, slinging himself up onto the Glen's back. With luck, the server aboard ship was getting all this footage he was streaming, because nobody would believe it if he just told them. Assuming the server was powered up.

This wasn't a random beast attack - this was an intentional attack on Silbermine with the humans caught in the middle.

...Or was it on them? To separate them from their ship, because who would want to go back through that? Your basic divide and conquer.

"EVA! Warn the ship!" he yelled as he clung on for dear life. "Priority Alpha Override! Imminent attack expected! Someone's after the Jo, probably after the Captain's team, too!"

Hopefully the override would flag the AI - assuming it was up.

Three, four, five… where did the next one go? She almost had it when someone grabbed her by the scruff and hauled her to her feet. Good thing Zey spoke before grabbing her, else she’d have probably gotten smacked on reflex. Not a good look on the performance review. ”Fucking… Attack dinosaurs, what is this, where did that even come from, I hate this.” She muttered half to herself, half in response to the Captain in a bizarre mix of English and Russian, still struggling with the magazine and loss of fine motor control. In the end it was the cheers of triumph that fully brought her back to reality.

Huh… So they could die. Good to know.

She finally slotted the armor piercing magazine into the weapon’s magazine well and peeled out from behind cover, only for the boat’s motor to get smacked by an arrow. Not like one would expect, but going sideways. Going back behind cover and looking around, it wasn’t the only one. Force magic. Magnetism? Steel arrowheads! Realizing what was happening and trusting whichever mage was responsible and hoping the locals didn’t have flint arrowheads for this occasion, blissfully unaware fo the soldiers’ plight or the two that got crushed, she steadied her weapon against the boat’s propulsion mechanism, took aim at the remaining beast and started firing, doing her fumbling best to hit the head reliably. It probably had a brain in the head, right?

The combined factors of this ambush made it a particularly dangerous one. Spreading out had been preferable to being trampled all at once by the beast’s unstoppable charge, but a disorganized formation was much more vulnerable to the barrage of arrows that followed. Several soldiers took hits, of varying severity. Regardless of lethality, though, the injured were taken momentarily out of the fight.

The projectiles of the Human weapons had been quicker to kill one of the beasts, but the efforts of J’eon and other Heat mages among Nellara’s forces had not been without effect. Rapid heating and cooling, in addition to any internal injuries, weakened parts of its armored hide. It made for vulnerabilities that did not even require the Humans’ weapons to get through. It became more sluggish overall, so Nellara’s agility could keep her out of the path of its initial charge. With Nellara having evaded, and no longer casting magic, it swung its claws at anyone near and swept its tail in a wide arc behind it. Even while weakened, any hit from the beast could prove fatal.

As the Humans had not been in its direct path, they had the opportunity to shift their target to the last beast. Being that it had charged right into the middle of their soldiers, there was no way to ensure a clear line of sight. Friendly fire would be a risk, but perhaps less-so than allowing it to continue its rampage for any longer. It was quite a large target, so for Vigdis, firing from a stable position, it was hard to miss. Hitting the head, specifically, was more of a challenge given how much it was moving.

Shots from any Human weapon pierced through the beast’s hide with ease, especially now that it was weakened. Hits to the body now had more of a visible effect than before. Even without an immediately lethal hit, they could cause more internal damage. Against any notion of natural instincts, this creature appeared to ignore pain and any risk of death, but enough damage to its body and it could not stand, regardless of its mental resiliency. It collapsed, unable to move its legs properly to support its own weight. Even so, it was still trying to crawl towards the nearest mage up to its last moment, until someone could make what was now a much easier shot to the head to finish it off.

Kareet did not see it coming when an arrow pierced roughly through the center of her chest. She did not need to see it to know that it must have had a non-magnetic arrowhead to make it through the barrier she had created. Some archers carried a few in their quivers for just this sort of situation. Her concentration was broken, and she fell back onto the boat. The protection the Humans had from the barrage was now gone, though the attackers may not have planned for their beasts to fall so quickly.

Through the din of gunfire and screams, Itxaro heard Shirik's harsh voice call out to her. She froze. Run back across the bridge through all that shit? She felt a breeze pass by her face, ice cold. Itxaro spun around to follow that feeling just in time to watch Shirik's ice shard embed itself into another monster, stopping it just before it slashed its vicious tentacles down on her. The creature looked frozen solid, half-immersed in the river like some grotesque statue.

She didn't second guess Shirik after that.

Itxaro holstered her now-empty weapon and took a deep breath as she watched the flaming creature slowly lumber towards her. Injured, perhaps, or just sizing her up. She saw the Glenn behind it, gaping wound in its chest from which blood flowed freely. Her doing. Itxaro's legs went weak.

Don't think about it.

Itxaro grounded her boots into the crumbling bridge and took off towards her companions, trying to stay clear of the burning monster. The beast jolted into action, jabbing a burning limb at her head like a spear. She ducked, stumbling, just as another burning tentacle swiped at her legs. Itxaro hurdled over the sweeping attack and fell to all fours, scrambling over the fallen Glenn's corpse. A searing jolt of pain shot up her leg as a burning barbed tendril lashed against her calf. She cried out and pulled her way instinctively, but the dark figure was upon her in an instant. Itxaro felt the heat emanating from the creature in waves as she tried to gain purchase on the wet stone, dodging blows that slammed into the crumbling bridge.

Her grasping hands found the dead Glenn's sabre. Itxaro rolled to face her pursuer, sword clutched in both hands, and with a graceless swing cleaved through several burning appendages just as they were about to strike. The severed limbs skittered off the bridge and the creature shrieked in anger or in pain. Itxaro couldn't tell which. All she knew was that it was time to run. The engineer lurched to her feet and put some distance between herself and the beast before the tendrils reformed and it renewed its pursuit.

Things were not much better reunited with her comrades. Several more Glenn were maimed or killed, Mallory had been injured, and Eva's mech was tangled up in a struggle against another creature's tentacles. Itxaro joined the other Glenn in their attempts to free Eva, hacking viciously at the ropey beast attempting to penetrate her armor; the weapon felt strange in her hands, unbalanced and too heavy for its shape, but it was still less alien to her than the gun at her hip. The ground beneath her shook as something emerged from the bridge, almost part of it.

Then Shirik cried out, "Now!"

Her wide eyes narrowed to slits as she continued mindlessly hacking and slashing at the creature, shouting like some half-crazed warrior, hoping whatever Shirik had done would save them from this nightmare.

---

An arrow burst into flame midair as the blacksmoth glanced up at it.

“What’s this? What’s this?” he bellows, glancing towards the archers as another fireball began forming over his palm. “How do you like mine?”

The fireball darted towards the assassins, the tops of weeds suddenly bursting alight in its wake.

---

---

The creatures were reeling from the counter-attacks, probably not expecting the fight they got. Mallory fired two shots at a mimic who turned towards him and the Glen he rode, darting past without seeing what happened.

“We need to make a safe passage for the others!” Mallory yelled in the Glen’s ear, narrowly avoiding their antlers.

Clara Anselm stood on the ridge surveying the Jotunheim’s crash trail. Nearby were two engineers from Mythadia and the Ascendency, heatedly debating over a series of thick paper diagrams.

Down below on the slope, a team of mages were slowly easing the snapped VTOL out of the earth. It hovered in the air like a miracle.

Anselm looked down at the tablet she was cradling. It was connected to the ship’s vitals, all comms channels and camera feeds from the various drones and helmet cams. One of those feeds was from directly under the VTOL; she zoomed in to inspect the damage.

She absent-mindedly itched her scalp. She hadn’t showered in two days - Her yellow hair was slicked back in a tight ponytail underneath the headset she wore.

“Easy…Easy!” She urged, watching the equipment wobbling in mid-air.

In the ear not cupped by the headset, the sturdy Dane could hear the regular crack of firearms; Ezra was running fire drills with the civilians to get them used to weapons. Many of the aliens had taken a great interest in this, edging closer until the mercenary had warned them off. So instead they had set up their own drill squares.

Anselm was jerked out of her focus by a squark of radio chatter. Eventually she made out Eva’s voice.

“Jotunheim, this is Eva! We’re under attack, requesting immediate assistance- woah!”

Anselm immediately turned away from the engineers and found Warden Esedel watching her from afar. That tall dragon lizard was creepy as hell.

“Eva this is Jotunheim. Say again, are you under attack? What's attacking you?”

There were lots of sounds coming through all jumbled together - it sounded like a struggle.

Then a priority alpha alert popped up on her display. [IMMINENT THREAT]

“Get this >crkkkkk< off my beautiful face!” Anselm heard gunfire in the background.

“Eva!”

Anselm tapped a few icons and got Eva’s suit cameras up. Some of the feeds were simply black and writhing. In others you could see clopping hooves and spears being jabbed at the suit.

“My god.”

She switched to all crew comms.

“Attention, I’ve received a priority alpha alert which means there could be an imminent threat to the ship and our lives. Bravo team is in trouble, so everyone needs to get back to the ship and set up a perimeter now!”

Anselm then got in touch with Wodan.

“Wodan, you already know this but Bravo team needs our help. I need you to ready a strike package on their location. Await target paint.”

She then switched back to Eva and Bravo team.

“Bravo team this is Jotunheim. Distress call received. What is your situation? If you’re under attack I need you to paint targets for Wodan to fire at, over!”

Up on top of the Jotunheim, the long thin cannon slowly oriented to point at Eva’s last known location. A red light flashed and a siren rang out.

---

The black sludge was corroding the very fabric of the barge, even while it was beached on the side of the river. The boat creaked and rocked unsteadily on the silty shore. Zey slipped over - her shoulder and ribs took the impact, winding her. Probably for the best, as the fall helped her avoid an arrow to the neck. Scrambling back onto all fours to avoid sliding into the black pool in the middle of the deck, Zey crawled along the gunwale to where Dr Lambert was firing her rifle. Arrows thwacked into the boat and whizzed over their heads.

“Jotunheim, come in! Over!” Zey violently cleared her throat, then spat onto the floor. She didn’t hear Nellara’s call over all the commotion, though evidently Vigdis had the same idea.

Breathing heavily, Zey grabbed her backpack from near Lambert's feet and eventually extracted a pistol. The back of her head was throbbing. She press checked, then peeked over the top. One of the beasts lay dead where she’d shot it, and the other was crawling along the floor. Dead soldiers littered the riverside.

“Someone finish that thing off, then shoot those archers!” Zey shouted, just as an arrow pierced the gunwale and stabbed her thigh above the right kneecap. The Captain grunted in pain, her faulty implant flooding her head with pain suppressors. A loud crash nearby caught her attention and Zey found Kareet lying prone with a giant arrow in the chest.

“Kolvar! Kolvar, where are you?”

Zey held the pistol at arm’s reach, aimed down the iron sight and pulled the trigger with one of the distant archers in view.

---

Kolvar had not required long to react. In an ambush such as this, the skills of a Life mage were a lifesaver in every sense of the word. Kareet had only been on the ground a few moments before he was kneeling beside her, gripping the arrow in her chest. He knew the Tekeri form completely, so “treatment” was as straightforward as it could be. With one swift motion, and a squawk of pain from Kareet, he yanked the arrow from her body. Tissue trauma was irrelevant, as when he traced his hand over the wound, her body’s flesh obeyed his command, mending back to its original state before their eyes. Her collapsed lung was now perfectly healthy, and there was nothing left on the surface except some blood on her feathers.

Kareet was perhaps strikingly calm as she sat up. The moment she had seen the Life mage beside her, any fear she had diminished. She had only to worry about her next step after being healed, and as her eyes had immediately went to Zey shouting nearby, that answer was apparent. “Assist the Humans.” Kareet said flatly to Kolvar.

Standing to her feet, Kareet extended her hand towards her hammer and flicked her wrist, forming a magnetic link to pull the weapon back into her hand. A few loud shots sounded out as one of the Humans, Lambert, finished off the wounded beast. Without those creatures to rampage through their ranks, Nellara’s soldiers could once again return to tighter formations. With their discipline, they were quick to do so. They could press forward and form a shield wall against the barrage. Force mages could focus their efforts on deflecting incoming arrows, and unlike Kareet’s magic, theirs would work against any arrowheads.

Meanwhile, near the forest, the attackers had moved well beyond the treeline to give themselves the best position to shoot. J’eon had managed to get off a fireball towards them in the chaos, and though it had been easy for them to see coming, that did not mean they could ignore it. Half of them had been forced to evade just to avoid the blast. There were no casualties, but most of the attackers had been forced to halt their barrage momentarily, which made it much simpler for Nellara and her soldiers to close the gap. The tall grass where they had once stood ignited, and the fire began to spread outwards. The enemy was split and disorganized, which made for the perfect target for Tekeri skirmishers.

For a brief moment, Kareet glanced back at the Humans behind her, making eye contact with Zey, then Vigdis in turn. They were protected well-enough now, and as Nellara had said, they needed to capture at least one of these hostiles. Kareet placed two of her fingers on the haft of her hammer, and both began to spark with electricity as she slid them up towards the hammer’s head. A powerful charged moved from her to the weapon, wreathing it in lightning just before she turned and dashed past the shield wall towards the enemy. Glen were faster in a sprint, but Tekeri muscle combined with their low body weight made them startlingly agile for their size. She, and the other skirmishers that had joined Nellara, could get up to speed quickly and shift their momentum seemingly in an instant to stay evasive.

---

As soon as Mallory’s transmission had come through, Wodan had readied the ship’s automated defenses. None of his available sensors yet detected any threat in proximity to the ship. The number of locals camped nearby had remained unchanged, but nevertheless, out of caution, they would be ready if an attack came. More pressing was the battle that was clearly underway with the Mythadia-bound away team. Wodan was already running calculations when Anselm radioed him.

<Huginn: Based upon signal strength, the target is approximately ninety-six kilometers away. Well-within primary weapon’s effective range. Time to impact is approximately 25 seconds. More precise values will follow target paint.>

<Muninn: Suit camera transmissions from Eva suggest the hostiles are within melee range. With a 25 second lead-time, the main cannon may not be appropriate.>

<H: The Jotunheim possesses no other weapons capable of reaching the target. It is the responsibility of the ranking officer in the field to make the determination of what munitions are appropriate.>

<M: If we fire the main cannon even once, we will lose weeks of our power reserves.>

<H: The protocols are clear.>

<M: We will lose weeks of our life.>

<H: The protocols are clear.>

---

It would only be moments after his warning that Mallory would receive a response back from Wodan. “The Jotunheim’s primary weapon is available for fire support. If needed, paint the target, specify payload yield, and confirm fire mission. Be advised, travel time to target is approximately 25 seconds. Due to the substantial power drain from the weapon, I recommend only confirming the fire mission if absolutely necessary.”

The Glen soldier grabbed Mallory and chucked him across his hindquarters like the XO was a rolled up carpet. At that moment a shadow crossed the bridge, causing more of the Glen to look up. They were about to be crushed by a stone hand the size of a farmer's cart.

“Look out!”

Mallory and his ride leapt out from under the shadow in the nick of time. Another Glen wasn’t so fortunate. The thick stone arm crashed down onto the bridge, cutting Eva, Ibarra and a few Glen off from the bulk of the group.

Shirik’s Great Blue Balls Of Fire took a while to create, but their effect on the mimics was devastating. Each were frozen solid instantly, including the one wrapped around Eva. Fog and mist obscured their view immediately after blinding lights, causing disorientation among the Glen ranks in particular.

“Impressive sorcery, but now we’re as blind as the day we were born!” Silbermine bellowed into the mist. He’d moved to intercept the mimic rushing to finish Shirik before it essentially exploded.

“My Lord, let us move off this forsaken bridge!” One of Silbermine’s knights pleaded.

Eva’s mech suit hummed and whined, before tearing straight through the frozen mimic. Her windscreen was covered in frost.

“Phew - sounds like a plan to me!” She urged, just as another loud thump sounded out further along the bridge.

“What was that?”

The stone arm laid across the bridge twitched. Then again. Then it began scraping across the bridge, coming towards Ibarra and Eva. It was easily two metres high.

The other arm appeared through the mist, sweeping from the goal-end of the bridge towards Shirik, Silbermine and Mallory. It looked set to either crush them all between the arms, or push them all into the river.

---

J'eon was about to send a wave of fireballs towards the enemy when he spotted Kareet and other Tekeri bolt towards the enemy archers. The glen blacksmith gnashed his teeth - if he fired now, he might hit them. Worse, if he fell short, the archers would see the Tekeri moving towards them.

He grinned as five fireballs appeared in his hand, about the size of his thumb, and hauling his arm back, threw them at an arch so they would fly over the archers before falling behind them, hopefully not hitting the trees. With the wind, it should blow the flames toward the enemy.

"You will regret this night, I think," the Glen rumbled.

---

---

"Understood," Jack snapped, surprised the headset still had the ship in range. "The survival of the ship and the civilians on board takes priority! I repeat, ship's survival comes first!"

The creatures attacking them wouldn't stand still long enough for a shell to land....

Impossibly massive arms appeared, shorter than a Glenn. As the hands began moving towards them, Jack turned and fired off three rounds where the arms would have met. Maybe it had a head out there.

"Can you leap over it?" he asked.

The situation was getting grim for a moment with Kareet going down, but truly only for a moment thanks to Kolvar. Vigdis had to wonder what that did to people’s mental health and the way war was fought, if they could get the injured back up this fast. Whatever the answer, she wasn’t going to complain about probably her favorite wizard getting right back up again.

Vigdis stopped shooting when Nellara ordered the charge, unwilling to point a weapon in the direction of her, Kareet and the troops, instead watching the carnage with morbid fascination. In space combat, many crews did not view it as a man-versus-man fight. Like pilots in the early days of flight, they often saw their war as a more noble one, machine versus machine, ship against ship. It wasn’t true of course, there were countless horrifying ways to die aboard even a regular seagoing vessel, nevermind a spaceship. Dying in horrible ways was simply a part of life and conflict across time and civilizations, as Nellara’s troops were now demonstrating.

”Shall we get off this boat?“ Vigdis made a suggestion to the assembly still on board, ”That black stuff is still eating it like it’s a rack of ribs and I don’t wanna be here when it comes apart altogether.” She still didn’t know if that was some creature in the river or just a result of a spell, both seeming like very real possibilities given the showing, but she did not care to find out first hand. At all. She also hoped they could get a second boat in somehow, because she was not looking forward to a multi-day mountain hike.

As it seemed, the premature death of their beasts had thrown this ambush entirely off-course. Had they continued their rampage through Nellara’s troops, the damage they caused, in addition to the volleys of arrows, would have been devastating. Now, though, Nellara’s soldiers were organized, advancing, and very much overpowered the under-equipped assortment of ambushers. As Nellara would quickly discover, none of the archers could use magic themselves. Now that she had closed to melee range, they had only their sidearms to defend themselves against a fully-trained war mage. Never mind that the knives and machetes they carried were easily manipulated for a Lightning mage. The Glen archer she reached first had, at best, training at the level of a militia. For Nellara, it was easy to rend her flesh with her claws. She was not able to put up any effective resistance; all that was notable about her was the fact that she was the very same Glen one of the Humans had shot after the opening volleys.

J’eon had managed to block the archers’ retreat with a wall of fire behind them, but only for a moment. Before the fire could grow too much, a powerful, sustained cyclone of wind from behind the flames parted them down the middle, creating an opening for the archers to retreat through. The flames on the sides grew even higher, but as long as the force was sustained, it could not catch fire down the middle. There was a narrow path down the very center where the winds were relatively calm, so immediately they began to run.

On the far side of the flames was an older-looking Glen: almost certainly a Force mage, by how he had parted the flames. He had an odd appearance, as a good portion of his body was wrapped in old, tattered cloth as if he was covered in bandages.