Chapter Three Hundred and Seventy-Six. Something's happening here.

Chapter Three Hundred and Seventy-Six. Something's happening here.

They were within eight feet of the walls when the attack began.

Monsters rushed through the jagged opening in the wall while others poured over the wall itself. There were two different types, one was a quadrupedal creature covered in foot-long quills that promised pain, while the two-foot-long stinger on its tail and the horn on its head offered death. It was twelve feet long and six feet at the shoulders. Moving with an almost feline grace, these were the monsters that flowed over the wall. The second type was another example of insects serving as nightmare fuel. Bipedal with four arms, two of which ended in scythe-like chitin claws, the second set was somehow more disturbing, featuring two pairs of opposed digits on something that could, if you squinted and the lighting was just bad enough, be considered hands.

None of this was unexpected. After almost five years, Bob had become inured to the sight of the System's shenanigans when it came to monsters.

What was unexpected was the invisible wave of power that preceded the monsters.

He could feel some sort of power fill the air around them. It carried a sense of danger, and seemed to feel almost... sharp?

Despite the surprise, his friends responded to the assault with efficiency. Mike and Jack were always running their matrix manipulation as Beacon's and the monsters focused on them. There were enough monsters that some weren't pulled into Jack and Mike's field, but before they could move toward the backlines, Wayna and Elli stepped out, pulling them into combat and keeping them off the blasters.

A massive direwolf, Amanda's summons, crashed into one of the mantis monsters that Wayna had pulled. "Get em' Auruffra!" Amanda cheered.

Eddi echoed her call as Rexxy bit down on one of the quill beasts and lifted the monster off the ground, shaking her head like a dog.

Bob had Jake covering their rear right flank, while Trebor covered the left. He frowned as they each tore into a straggler.

Mike and Jack were each defending themselves from six monsters, which was an impressive feat, while Elli and Wayna were handling four each. Bailli and Dave were focusing their blast spells, and they'd already taken one of the monsters off of Mike, shifting their target to one of the quill beasts on Jack. They were handling the monsters, but it felt like they were both dealing less damage than they should while at the same time taking more.

He'd done the math. At level fifty-two, with tier ten attributes, the monsters should only be doing about ten percent more damage than they'd been dealing at level fifty, tier eight. Everyone joked about it, but normally Erick and Jessica had it pretty easy. They normally stacked effect over time heals on Mike and Jack, then dropped the occasional chained heal to top off Wayna and Elli, which also kept the summons healed.

The two healers were being pressed as they tossed out heal after heal without pause.

Bailli and Dave dropped another one of the mantis monsters that had been attacking Jack, while Bob's Eternal Servant raptor pack took out one of the ones that was tearing at Wayna. Harv had caged one of the quill beasts and was keeping it out of the fight.

The pressure in the air started to lessen, and as Jake and Trebor both finished off their opponents, he could tell that the mantis monster's scythes weren't cutting as deeply. The two huge UtahRaptors moved to pull another opponent from Wayna and Elli respectively, which allowed Eddi and Amanda to direct Rexy and Auruffra to reduce the pressure on Mike and Jack.

Bailli and Dave had done for eight of the monsters in the twelve seconds the battle had raged, and they further proved their power by taking out another pair in the next three seconds.

Wayna and Eli had finished their opponents, and turned their attention to the frontlines, only to find that Jack and Mike were wrapping up the last two, aided by a dozen summoned monsters.

As the last two monsters fell, the group took a step back from the wall.

"That was harder than it should have been," Jessica said, running a hand through her hair. "Mike, I don't think I've ever seen something hit you that hard," she shook her head. "Although it seemed to drop off as the fight went on."

"I think they had some sort of aura or something," Dave said thoughtfully. "There was this feeling they gave off, and as we took them out it lessened."

"I've seen something like that before," Bob said quietly. "Not exactly the same, but the Elloirial of the Eire, Naomeh, she had a sort of presence to her, although it felt different, and she definitely had control over it."

"Maybe it's a tier ten thing?" Jack suggested. "They had that whole thing where under tier ten we were mortals, and over was ascendant, I think."

"It was," Bob nodded. "The King of Greenwold has something like this going on, although not nearly as strong, so I don't know that it's locked by tier, or if it's just a specific skill that we haven't seen before."Follow current novels at novelhall.com)

"Regardless, it means that the more of them there are, the stronger the aura is," Amanda added. "We can take a few more, but if we run into two groups, we'll need to find a place to bottleneck them."

"One nice thing about urban warfare," Mike said grimly. "There's always a choke point right around the corner."

"I'm getting really sick of these damn quills," Wayna muttered as she winced, pulling another quill from her cheek.

"Babe, why would you try to bite one?" Eddi asked.

"If I hadn't it might have gotten to Bailli," Wayna replied.

Eddi shook his head. Rexxy had already been leaning down to snap it up.

She murmured softly to Laura, telling her that everything was going to be alright. Her daughter was in shock, having seen Hoada, her father and Lara's husband, torn apart by the monsters as he stood against the monsters, buying them time to get to the temple.

When the words had appeared in the blue squares, there had been a great deal of confusion. The gods had never communicated so directly, normally working in more subtle ways, showing their pleasure or displeasure in a manner that could often only be interpreted years later. The words could not be denied, nor could the numbers that grew smaller moment by moment. The entire city had been thrown into chaos as fear ran through the people of Meluben.

But people must live, so after a few days, life had continued, although a dark cloud covered their thoughts.

When the final day arrived, and the numbers disappeared, they were told they would be hidden away in a timeless slumber.

Lara had felt some sort of shift from the moment she'd seen the box, and the next when a new one had appeared.

New Quest!

The planet you inhabit suffered an unexpected surge of mana, causing the Dungeons to overflow before the tide dissipated.

Your species does not currently possess the power to survive. Flee to the nearest temple.

She'd heard screaming coming from all around her and had picked up Laura, holding Hauda's hand as they rushed toward the temple.

Now, she was waiting.

She helped Laura say a prayer to the Queen of Storms, begging the goddess to save them, but she was afraid.

It was dark in the temple, with lamps further in, but this close to the entrance, it was expected that sunlight would have illuminated the space.

She clutched Laura more tightly as she heard new sounds, the roars of some terrible beast faint, but powerful. She couldn't help herself, placing her ear to the stone in an effort to understand what horrible monster was adding to their troubles.

She frowned. She heard something. It almost sounded like voices, but they were too high pitched and the sounds were too quick and fluid, almost like birdsong.

Then the block of stone disappeared.

Lara was staring at the block, paying much more attention to her ear than her eyes, so she saw the block disappear. It didn't break, and it wasn't pulled out, or up, it simply vanished.

With a cry, she folded her body around Laura, unable to keep herself from watching the entrance as the monsters poured in.

She blinked. The figures that moved into the temple didn't look like the monsters outside. They looked a little bit like Uldarians, although they were taller and thinner.

There were twelve of them, and she watched as they arranged themselves, two of them not leaving the front of the entrance, moving shields to block the blows of a dozen monsters that crowded around them, having finally found a way to enter the temple and slate their unholy hunger.

Another pair stepped back slightly, clearly ready to reinforce the first two.

Then one of the figures closest to her, only a few feet away, spoke, and she found she could actually understand the words.

"Harv, keep an area of effect repair going around the entrance! Eddi, Amanda, keep Rexxy and Auruffra just outside! Dave, start casting that ritual!"

The figure turned to another, nearly as close.

"Bailli, show them why Erick calls you his Storm Princess."

Lara gasped as the second figure hurled lightning toward the entrance, with more lightning sparking around its form.

The closest figure turned and looked down at her.

Lara was surprised to see that it looked quite a bit like an Uldarian, although it had a shock of pale yellow fur on its head.

"It's going to be alright," the figure said. "We're adventurers, and we're here to help."