Chapter 594 Rescuing a Friend

As Marcus suggested that they evacuate the people of Loursend into the Ocean Bluff Temple, everyone looked at him like he was crazy.

Dungeons and safety were far from synonymous with each other, and no sane person would ever think about trying to cram over a million people into one.

Monsters and beast spawned throughout the dungeon, and even just on the first layer most people would be putting their lives on the line to enter the place.

“Marcus you cannot be serious about trying something like that. It would be impossible to protect everyone if we sent them into such a dangerous place, and you are basing it on a wild assumption you are not sure of.” Gwyneira said, definitely not onboard with this plan.

Still, Marcus explained his points about why he thought the dungeon might be safe, doing his best to point out that it was their only option.

“If we do nothing, they will all die. I know that maybe even thousands of people will die in the dungeon at the hands of the beasts and monsters in there, but that is a far cry from over a million. If it does not work, well then, they were damned from the start anyway and there was nothing we could do. As we speak that monster has already put itself back together and is heading towards Loursend. At best if we continue to slow it down, we might have three days until it reaches the city. But before then there are also the settlements in between here and there. If we act quickly, we can save as many people as possible until our reinforcements arrive.”

With determination in his eyes Marcus pushed his plan.

He knew it sounded absurd, but if stuffing people into a dungeon would keep them safe from a calamity they had no chance against, why would they not at least try.

Quickly the others got on board, since they had no better ideas and it beat doing nothing.

“Very well, we will try your plan, but I will have to be the one to go to Loursend. I am the only one with the authority to order the people to evacuate into the dungeon, and even then, I am sure to get a large amount push back.” Gwyneira said, feeling that she was about to have quite the headache.

Nodding his head, Marcus agreed with her and then looked towards Retharin and Asher, before saying, “Could I ask the two of you to keep it slowed down as much as you can. Just try not to do anything rash. Stay out of its way and just pepper it with attack where you can.”

As he said this though, the Sword Savant laughed and everyone looked at him oddly for doing so.

“Ah it just dawned on me that all of us have been taking orders from someone who is level fifty-two. It is odd for the weakest among us to be relaying the orders.”.

Thinking about this, it certainly was unusual for these level eighty entries to be taking orders from someone much weaker than them.

Still, they could not deny that while Marcus was the weakest, in a way he had the highest status of all of them as a great spirit, and maybe because of this and his perseverance even in the wake of overwhelming odds they had been following what he said.

Of course, at certain points all of them had taken charge for a bit, but Marcus was certainly dominating most of their strategy meetings.

In fact, maybe it was his weakness and need to think cleverly to win, which neither Gwyneira, Retharin, or the Sword Savant had to do in a long time that made him the better strategist out of all of them.

“Hey if any of you all want to take charge, feel free to. I am just doing my best to keep as many people alive as possible and keep my home from falling apart.” Marcus said.

Luckily none of the others cared to dispute his plan any longer, and Retharin asked, “What is it you will be doing in the meantime then?”

Smiling, Marcus said, “I will continue doing what I can to help all of you.”

…

‘Why am I always given these assignments?’

Sighing Clarisa looked at the large group of people that were moving slowly down the road.

This was the last group of people to have left the town, and she had been tasked with guarding them.

As the youngest knight in Trostenwald, she was always given the worst and least desirable assignments, especially because the other knights were envious of her.

Even though she had started out as the lowest leveled one, she was still the strongest due to her exemplary training and mithril weapons and armor.

The other had all still just had their standard equipment which was enchanted bronze, and had never had the ability to save up the money to buy mithril.

This led to her current situation of begin left behind with the last group and being put in the most danger.

Just a couple of days ago the baronet who was the viceroy of the town had received an emergency communication that everyone in Trostenwald who did not wish to die a violent death should escape towards Loursend as fast as possible.

Normally this would have been an impossible journey to make quickly during the winter, but a huge dragon had shown up and cleared the road of all the ice and snow that had piled up on it.

Along with that this dragon began ferrying the sick and old to the city while everyone else was loaded up into carts and began racing towards the Loursend.

It was certainly all very confusing and astounding, but the baronet had told everyone that this dragon was the guardian of the kingdom. Though he had only just been informed of this himself.

Naturally some people were skeptical and nervous as it was a big and scary dragon, but their actions showed that they really wanted to help the people here. Though they were still not sure what they were running from.

At least until she saw two slimy looking tendrils coming out of the forest and heading straight for her group.

She had no idea what they were, but they were quickly making their way towards the people who were sluggishly moving down the road.

Jumping into action she quickly chanted a tier three lighting magic spell and unleashed her magic.

“Lightning Bind.”

Sending out three spinning rings of lightning, she aimed them around one of the tendrils and halted its movements.

Then she drew her two swords, launched forward, and began slicing through it.

The tendril began to bubble and sizzle from the electricity, and it released a foul smell as it burned.

Yet as she sliced through it, she found the thing started to grow back and tried to wrap around her.

She swiftly jumped back, but the other one had moved behind her and lashed at her.

In an instant it connected with her armor and latched onto her scale mail.

It began spreading out and was soon to get inside her armor, but she charged up her two swords and sliced through the tendril.

This managed to sever the thing and the lingering residue was destroyed by her electrical discharges.

However, the two tendrils had now surrounded her, and it seemed that the damage she had done to them had already recovered.

That was when she saw that two more had appeared out of the woods and were heading towards the people who had begun to panic.

Clicking her tongue, Clarisa activated the enchantments on her sword while chanting another spell.

“Lightning Strider.”

Shooting forward with a burst of speed she launched herself in between these tendrils and the people and began a bling offensive of lightning.

Unfortunately, she did not stand much of a chance, and after six seconds of defending against these four tendrils one of them grabbed ahold of her arm.

She tried blowing it back again with her magic, but the second it touched her she felt completely drained.

It was like her entire being was being sucked away, and in just a second, she felt on the verge of collapse.

The other tendrils then began attacking people and three more people were grabbed.

Sadly, for them, unlike Clarisa who had a generally high level at level thirty-one, they were all still in the single digits and died instantly.

And it seemed that she would be soon to follow, as the tendril pulled her in without her being able to offer up any resistance.

But right before she was to be consumed, a bolt of lighting rained down from the sky and destroyed the tendril that had her in its grasp.

The other tendrils were soon hit as well, though the people that were released from them were now only dried up corpses.

Then dropping down from the sky was a figure that looked oddly familiar to Clarisa, and she watched them command what looked like impossibly strong magic.

A massive beam of light shot out of this figure and mowed down these tendrils and the woods around them.

It was truly something to see and was an overwhelming power that would normally only be heard about in story books.

Turning around after seeing that the coast was clear for now this, figured faced Clarisa whose eyes went wide in astonishment as she recognized who it was.

“Clarisa, are you oaky?” Marcus said as he dropped down and used his spirit healing on her.

He had been keeping ahead of the farthest-reaching tendrils of the Doomsday Worm and trying to slow them down. However, four had managed to slip by him and had attacked the remaining people in Trostenwald.

Now there were three people that had died, and his friend had gotten injured.

‘Damn it. I should have fought harder, and this would not have happened.’ Marcus thought.

Clarisa was a pretty close friend for him, and while he had not seen her in a while, he counted her among those that were important to him.

“Irene, what are you doing here?” Clarisa said with heavy breaths.

She had all of her mana and stamina drained out of her and had probably even lost a couple years off her life.

Smiling, he looked down at his weakened friend, and said, “I came to help when I heard there was trouble. Now let me take you somewhere safe.”

After saying this Marcus looked back at the approaching tendrils that had increased in numbers and were hurrying towards them.

Grimacing, he could tell that they was no way he could protect all of these people here that were still a good distance from Loursend until they made it to the city.

‘I suppose it is time for one of those hard decisions that sometime have to be made. Now who am I going to save and who will I have to let die.’