Chapter 280: Judith and Gray

Not able to keep this question to themselves, Therdul was the first to ask. To which Erik replied quite embarrassedly, "It's most likely due to me timing it badly and the cooldown. I'm not used to treating people mid-fight."

"What's the cooldown?" Therdul asked, everyone had the same question. Ilmadia had never bothered to learn the Tier 2 healing spell, as she wanted to focus on dealing damage. Plus with how little the Tier 1 healing did she had assumed it would be a waste of time. Now she felt dumb and already planned to learn it when she went online again. 

"Eight seconds." Erik replied and added after a slight paused, "And to cast it takes around two seconds. Which actually caused me to fail in healing you guys more than once." Erik admitted, not proud at the fact that he struggled to keep up during the fights. 

If it came to healing them after a fight, he was certain he would do much better than almost anyone. But during fights, he either forgot about someone, lost track of their health, or simply cast his spell at the wrong time. 

"Well, we need to figure out the best way for you to contribute." After a bit of reflection, Elizabeth said, "I think you should ignore everyone but Eldrian, Therdul, and Judith. Try to also keep their health above half. Though health isn't everything in the game, it should enable them to fight a bit longer."

Everyone agreed with this, but before they could hammer into more details their queue finally ended and they found themselves in a rocky outcrop. Recollecting themselves they quickly got into a rough formation, Zyviss splitting off to try and get a flank.

"Right, let's see how it goes. Who are we against?" Elizabeth asked after everyone got into position and they turned to face the group of four mages and four warriors. 

"Team Elements, each mage uses a specific element, and the warriors normally just try to keep people from the mages. They are all Tier 3," Ilamdia replied, having found the mages' dedication to just a single element admirable but dumb.

At this point having access to so few spells just didn't make much sense to her. It also usually came down to the Earth and Fire mage gaining them their victories, or even the warriors. Which was quite funny considering their bravado about magic needing to be pure and being above all else. 

"Right, they shouldn't be too hard to win against," Therdul said, everyone keeping an eye on their opponents who were slowly walking closer. Zyviss having disappeared behind some rocks, their opponents not even realizing that one of them had split apart from the rest.

"Alright, then let's go." Elizabeth nodded as she recognized this should be one of the easier fights they could get into. Rushing forward they quickly confirmed this, with Judith actually using a shield, she managed to make it to the warriors without taking any damage from the opponents' spells. 

The most dangerous was the earth mage, whose spells took the form of spikes and could even pierce through shields. Though her spells were easy to dodge if one kept an eye on them as she cast them. Judith's shield actually had an almost spearlike rock spike stuck inside of it by the time she reached the enemies. 

The fire mage was more of a bother, but shields did well to stop the flames from reaching you. And if you just ignored it and ran through the flames it didn't do much damage at all.

Wind and water were by far the most lackluster, the former just producing a gust of wind which could lead to one losing momentum and being sent back a few feet. Water was even worse as it simply splashed on a shield and did nothing more. 

Why the mages didn't even learn hybrid spells was beyond everyone, as it caused them to be far weaker than they would have otherwise. In fact, if everyone just used that earthen spike spell, then they could easily kill at least one enemy during the charge. Maybe two if the cooldown wasn't too long. 

As soon as Judith made it to the warriors she  promptly smashed her shield into one of them and then attacked wildly with Gray, her new greatsword. Normally at this point, her sword would shatter into pieces and the one she attacked would be sent flying. 

Now instead, the greatsword cut through its target's armor. While she failed to cut the person in half, he was sent flying with his innards slipping out. The person dying as he crashed into one of the mages. The crack echoing through the battlefield telling everyone that he broke his neck.

Quickly all of the opponents focused on Judith, her attack having caused them to nearly shit their pants. Unluckily for them, Judith was not alone, Therdul quickly tied up one of the other warriors. Eldrian used the other as a target for Volida, setting the poor man aflame. The last warrior was still climbing back up from the shield bash, an easy target for Ilmadia.

While the pain was certainly reduced, even more so than in the game, being set aflame still felt extremely uncomfortable. As such Eldrian's target quickly forgot where he was and what he was busy with. His entire focus just being on trying to kill the flames. Yet they refused to die. 

Interesting, I can still feel my connection to the flames.  Eldrian pondered as he tried to control them, aiming to get them to move into the man's armor. Even after three seconds the man had not taken much damage, but he was nearly going insane from the heat and burning sensation surrounding him. Suddenly Eldrian was left stumped as his practice target disappeared. 

"Agh, he forfeited." Eldrian clicked his tongue and turned to find another target, only to find the rest of his team looking at him in horror. "What, I haven't gotten to test it so far, so I thought this would be a good opportunity."

He explained without much thought, yet hearing his words the others looked at him in even more shock and horror. "Have you no heart!?" Nikki shouted, Judith instead quickly moved closer and swung her arm around Eldrian's shoulders. 

"That's what I am talking about. Make them remember the defeat!"

"Wait, what the hell happened. How did the fight end so quickly?" Eldrian asked as he struggled to escape from Judith. His nose acutely aware of her smell, not a nice feminine one. Rather a smell you would expect from someone soaked in blood. 

"This sword is really good." Judith swung the blade around with her free arm, "Normally I can't really pump any skills through my weapons. You don't understand how massive a difference this makes."

Hearing this Eldrian turned to the others for confirmation, only to see them shaking their heads in resignation. "It's true, she killed all the mages, along with the first warrior she clashed with," Therdul explained, feeling quite behind now that Judith was so strong. 

Zyviss was by far the most upset, he had gone through so much effort to flank their opponents. Finding a nice spot from where he could let loose, yet all that remained of the enemy by that time was the poor man Eldrian had set aflame. 

"So now what?" Therdul asked as everyone recollected themselves. Most of them could not believe how massive a difference getting a decent sword had made in Judith's strength. It more than doubled her offensive capabilities, maybe even quadrupling it considering she had to always hold herself back before. As such they all wanted a magic weapon now.

"Why don't we do a couple more fights?" Elizabeth proposed as she looked at the points they had gained. Due to them being higher ranked their point gain had been halved, but even so, four points was a good haul.

As such they did just that, constantly being surprised by Judith taking total control of the battlefield. This held as long as the majority of their opponents were melee-focused, when they faced a group of archers they were sorely defeated simply due to being outranged. 

Coming back from just such a defeat, everyone was quite upset. The team they had just faced called themselves Soaring Dragons, having a team of just archers. There was simply no way to safely approach them.

This team always focusing on one target at a time.  This resulted in an arrow always finding its mark, and if you managed to get close they would just run away. It was extremely frustrating to fight against, and the only thing they could think of to counter it was armor. Good armor. 

"That's so frustrating. How are we supposed to fight against that?" Judith complained, having actually used a shield, yet still ended up dying covered in arrows. Causing her to somehow doubt the shield. They hadn't lost without getting kills in return, but more than half the enemy had been alive by the end. 

Hearing her complain everyone didn't know what to say. In the past battles, she killed nearly everyone with a single strike. How was that fair? Though they understood how she felt as they also all died in a flurry of arrows. 

"Ilmadia, do you know any wind spells?" Erik asked, recalling the magic used by the team calling themselves Elements. 

"No, I know some hybrid spells including wind. But not any pure wind spells. They are basically useless, why?" She replied. 

"Because they might really work well against arrows. Remember how that wind mage had nearly sent Judith stumbling back?" 

"Oh, that might actually work!" Ilmadia replied with enthusiasm. "Let's end this for today, I want to try and get my hands on some wind spells." So the team quickly left Elizabeth's virtual home, not even bothering to wait for her to agree.