Chapter 249 - Charge (1/2)
Li watched the battle unfold before him from a rather neutral position. He floated above a gathering of roots and leaves wreathed in green energy, taking a high vantage point to see where everything was happening. He saw as Tia surged forwards with an interesting mix of chaotic energy created from childlike glee and raging battle fervor.
With the widest smile plastered on her face, she dived deeper and deeper into the purple mist, her tiny feet almost barely touching the ground as they stepped past stone to stone, each step having so much force in it that they sent her gliding across the air like she was flying.
The rattle of bones and the groan of zombies filled the choking air, and were Tia any regular human fighter, then certainly she would have felt the terror of the scenery around her. The mist that seemed to get thicker and thicker, swirling and moving as if having a mind of its own, settling and thickening around all living intruders. And in that haze, there were countless threats. Unfeeling undead whose dead limbs felt no compassion, no mercy, only an instinctive d.e.s.i.r.e to bring down the living.
But Tia was no regular human. She was a dragon, and a dragon merged with Li's own strength. She shredded through the mist like a whirlwind of unbound violence. With each step she took forward, her claws flashed, her tail whipped, and her wings batted, sending clouds of shattered bone and pulverized zombie flesh sputtering from the air.
”Careful, Tia!” said Li as he kept up from a fair distance behind her, wanting to see how she would handle the situation relatively on her own. ”Conserve your energy. The undead mist grows stronger and stronger as you travel further in – wasting mana and skills on these lesser enemies is a bad idea.”
”Okay, papa!” shouted Tia as she took a brief pause and breath. She ducked under hulking swipe from a zombie brute before moving again. This time with more controlled agility, leaping up and tearing off the zombie's head with one quick and clean motion instead of tearing it apart excessively.
”Good, good,” said Li. He checked on the others.
Old Thane was in front of Li, the same childlike glee on Tia emanating from him as well. He laughed as he wrapped his brick-like hands around a zombie aarakowa's head and squeezed, splattering the rotted skull like a watermelon.
”Gods, lad!” said Old Thane. ”It does do good for mine health to have some exercise now and then!”
”Careful, old man,” said Li. ”If gardening gets your back stiff, I don't know what all this moving's going to do.”
”Nonsense, lad.” Old Thane grunted as he took a step back, sensing that a Skeletal Pillar had risen from the ground in front of him. The pillar was an amalgamation of several skeletons and zombies attached together with tendons and sinews like string, and its shambling mass lashed out at the old man with dozens of limbs.
”This body of mine was never meant to work the earth. But this – this, it remembers well.”
He shot out his left arm in a flurry of punches, casting the Brawler subclass skill [Jab Rain]. His arm began to blur as punch after punch came out in succession, and as he moved into the Skeletal Pillar, his hardened fist began to carve out rapid chunks from it with the same efficiency and explosive force as a machinegun.
Meanwhile, Zagan trotted behind the old man with an easy walking pace. Occasionally, he would turn his head towards an undead that slipped past Old Thane's range and loose a glare infused with cursed energy that disintegrated any lesser undead that happened to fall victim to it.
The demon did not grant the old man any strength, and Li could understand why. The old man wanted to fight, and he wanted to fight with his own strength for now.
And besides, it was not like the old man was any weakling. He was nearing level 60 – the peak of human strength – but as Li observed, old age in this world affected mortals by severely deteriorating their stats, locking them out of the stat requirements for the higher level skills.
Even so, Li could estimate that Old Thane was still around level 40 at base combat capacity, which was still leaps and bounds above almost every other human. However, even he could not match the ferocity of the beastwomen.
Vilga and Sheela were ahead of Old Thane, standing right by Tia, actually, making sure that the dragon's sides were covered while she charged forward.
Vilga, despite being an impressive specimen of muscle easily comparable to any bodybuilder, moved with the grace of a world class gymnast and used her strength with a poise characteristic of a trained martial artist.
Li recognized she was a warrior primary with her first subclass being a brawler just like Old Thane. But where Thane relied on raw strength to weather blows and dish them out with his two subclasses of brawler and berserker, Vilga used equal parts agility and strength as brawler and monk, dancing across the rocky battlefield with compact punches, roundhouse kicks, and deadly throws all chained together by flourishing twirls.
Sheela was the most savage fighter. Her primary class was as an assassin, but she used her subclasses as hunter and blood shaman to be more like a frontline fighter. With blood pact sigils glowing all across her body in crimson gleam, she moved like a complete blur, disappearing and reappearing only to inflict devastatingly lethal single strikes.