William didn't hurry to activate any trap at first. He just ran down the stairs while lots of shadows came out from the corridor. He heard lots of enraged shouts, all speaking about spotting him.
*Roar!*
Once his feet touched the ground, William turned into his fox mode. Three tails rose from his body, wiggling behind him, while he landed with a scary roar.
With such a roar, he announced his presence to all of the masters here. William could already see the hesitation over the faces of the forces belonging to the Vancouf family. As they hesitated like this, he used this chance to shout:
"If you worry about your lives, then run! Go into a safe spot and activate your protective arrays."
His shout came just at the right moment. Many of the Vancouf masters here didn't belong to either faction fighting right now for the leadership of the family. When they heard William's loud shout, coupled with the appearance of the monsters from all over the city, they started to run.
The monster got attracted here by William's roar, and he did that specifically for such a result. Not only that, the masters who belonged to Lara's faction also ran away, even before his shout.
He watched most of the masters running away, leaving behind only few and scattered ones behind. William didn't need to give them more time to decide, didn't even ask, as he marked all of them as his enemies.
As they dared to come at him, it was only fair for him to kill them first.
They were blocking his path in the city. And even if he had the ability to spare their lives, he'd end up wasting lots of precious time in doing so. Not to mention they weren't worth saving in his eyes.
Without even waiting for the rest of Vancouf family neutral masters to retreat far enough, William started his barrage of attacks over the ones who were still running towards him.
In fact, he didn't need to do anything towards them. He just lured the monsters from around and led them towards these scattered masters.
If they were together, banded and worked as a team, then they might have a chance in surviving this. But as William's shout came out of their expectations, and they didn't plan for such a large number of masters to run and abandon them, Richard's masters didn't know how to respond to such a sudden change.
When William came, bringing with him many of the scary Bubble monsters, these masters couldn't hold a candle against them. Even if there were many earth-based masters in their roster, they ended up dead in mere minutes.
William flashed, passed among them, while stacking up his technique. He already took out all the flying weapons he could control and kept luring the monsters all over the place.
In the next ten minutes, most of the forces on the ground got killed. By then tons of forces started to swarm the city from the stairs.
"Watch out!"
"He is coming… Agh!"
William just led the monsters around in an area that wasn't more than two kilometres away from the stairs. That led to a few of Richard's masters to evade the incoming slaughter, but that didn't matter.
He already sat his eyes over another target, a bigger one actually. Just as everyone thought William would start fleeing for his life, he didn't.
He took out something and wore it. It was the necklace that he bought long years ago from the Scorching Lands fort. This necklace was something that he didn't like to hold around for too long, fearing to grow used to its protection.
So, he kept storing it inside his ring for many years now. But in such a hectic battle, he knew that his life was hung with a thin thread. And that made him reuse it again.
As he wore it, he stored around fifty something attacks over his sword, flashed and went towards the direction that no one expected; the stairs!
Right now, hundreds of masters were jumping the stairs and landing on the ground with each passing minute. When William appeared, he didn't land his sword over the ground, but directly on the stairs.
*Boom!*
eaglesnovɐ1,сoМ A fierce explosion occurred, with an ear deafening booming sound that attracted more monsters over. William's hit didn't harm much of the stairs as he expected. Instead, only a shallow dent appeared there, as if he was toying with his sword and didn't hit it using his full power.
"Impressive solid defence indeed," William muttered in admiration before flashing again. He took the lives of those who were lucky enough to survive the hit, but not him.
The group of hundreds who just appeared ended up either severely wounded, killed by the explosion, or fell on the hands of William. Only those who were at high grade or at the pinnacle survived either of these attacks. And those who were fast in their response, moved fast away from William, managed to survive as well.
Yet William knew this was just the teaser opening of this grand battle. The number of forces showing up from the plateau area was still growing in size. William knew he'd be screwed if he stopped for a single moment here. Once he killed all the ones he could reach in the next half minute, he started to make a run for his life.
He didn't forget to flash and kill those of the Vancouf family who were blocking his path. Those idiots thought William made the greatest mistake ever when he turned to attack and kill the incoming masters. And so, they stopped running, and tried to surround and block any path of retreat for him.
Yet they all were met with a scary fox, aided by lots of much scarier monsters. Even if there were few in the high stage of the dark gold grade, they ended up dying under the hands of the monsters.
William was already experienced with this city and its lurking dangers. He knew how terrifying these monsters were when they'd attack in swarms like this. And that gave him an advantage over everyone else here.