More undead were emerging from the water, retching and gargling as they trod upon the sands. The militia men pulled back, too dumbstruck with fear to attack. One or two drowned men wouldn't have been too daunting. Now there was more than ten.
Luna was unconcerned. She jumped back as a pair of the corpses loped toward her, leaving sodden trails in their wake. She twisted and weaved her hand, unleashing a hail of finger-sized ice darts that shredded chunks from the incoming drowned men.
Yet they pressed toward her, growling and drooling vast quantities of black water. She ducked a swing from a clawed hand and countered with a punch, obliterating the jaw of the nearest undead. He staggered, growled, and threw a harsh swing her way. Luna lifted her arms to block, but the blow still swept her off her feet and catapulted her a few meters backward. Her balance and agility, augmented by her burning qi, allowed her to flip through the air and land with a skid on one heel.
Her eyes focused on the two corpses, to see that their movement had grown even stiffer and slower. Frost spread from where her blades of ice had penetrated them, earning a chuckle from her. "How unfortunate for you lot." Creatures utterly sodden with water, magic or otherwise, had easy and logical weaknesses to exploit.
As more of the undead came her way, four in total, Luna swept her hands out and unleashed a cloud of frosty fog from her fingertips. A simple freezing spell, by the standards of her world. And it rather swiftly froze the moisture dripping from the drowned men, expanding ice that proceeded to shred chunks of their flesh away. Soon they had been rendered stiff, struggling to move even partially. She smirked at her handiwork, while the so-called guardians of the village were left dumbstruck.
Luna lunged forward, her body alight with her own power, and shattered the frozen corpses in a flurry of punches.
Another of the shamblers came at her from the dark, swinging a rusted cutlass at her. Luna raised her arms to block as she pulled away, the tip grazing her forearm and drawing blood. And, to her side, she could see a second drowned man vomiting a spew of acidic black water her way. She jumped back, the strength in her legs kicking up thick clouds of sand, while the liquid struck a nearby stone and dissolved it into sludge.
Helsen, meanwhile, leapt high and struck an emerging group of drowned men with an explosive burst of air. Chunks or rotten flesh and a surge of water raced skyward from the force of the blast, an entire crowd wiped out in one fell swoop. He landed neatly on his feet and looked out to see, scanning the surrounding waves. And whatever he sensed made him freeze in place, his eyes widening.
Another cloud of frozen fog flew from Luna's hands, catching the nearest walking corpse and freezing him solid. The zombie didn't flail about any longer, but stared straight ahead with empty sockets, its limbs frozen stiffly in front of it. A hard kick shattered it from the waist up.
The last of the corpses lurched at her side, a hissing and gargling noise rising from the flayed flesh of his throat. A hard blow sent her tumbling across the sands, the young arcanist skidding awkwardly to a halt. Her vision shook, and she noticed a chunk of her HP had been knocked away. It would have been far worse if her qi wasn't actively making her tougher. She raised a hand and took aim, just as the waterlogged ghoul raced her way with uncanny quickness.
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“Foolish,” Luna said, narrowing her eyes. The audacity of these things to think they could attack her and get away with it. Oh how far she had fallen, where lowly undead thought to bother her.
Luna’s aura grew brighter as her anger swelled, power surging to greater heights inside her. She lifted a hand, taking aim and drawing on a particularly strong pyromancy committed to her memory. A focused stream of fire exploded from her hand, the roar of the explosion drowning out all other sounds. It struck the figure, washed over him, and the sheer heat of it flash-fried the water in his body into steam. The glow of the flame died down soon after, and the drowned man had been reduced to a blackened husk, stiffly steaming in place. He collapsed into a pile of ash, blown away in the wind.
One of the nearby militia members watched in shock, nearly dropping his pike. "By the Divines," he murmured. "Knew that girl was an arcanist, but to see her do that..." He swallowed, sweat beading on his brow.
Luna smirked, her hands resting on her hips. Her mind briefly wandered to the distant past, to a rainslick city where the local gangsters were left awestruck by the potential of their newest recruit. A moment in time that taught a future emperor how to relish in the sensation of his own power.
It was so good to feel superior to others.
She turned toward the coast, watching as the last of the ghouls fell apart at Helsen's feet. The arcanist was slowly panting for breath, his aura burning white around him. It had likely been some time since he had to draw out so much qi in one go. He still seemed troubled, his brow furrowed. He glanced sharply to the men of the militia. "Keep back," he warned. "Something much bigger is on the way."
Captain Harvia, distinguished by his ragged beard and the silver cloak on his left shoulder, took a hesitant step back. "What do you mean? What should we be expecting?"
"I'm not sure. Anything dead in the waters of the Mire can be reborn, which means there's an entire ocean of potential horrors out there. All I know is that whatever's coming is massive. And likely something your weapons can't harm." He hissed through clenched teeth. "Should I fall, I need you to get the other villagers to safety. And ideally, with my flare in the sky, reinforcements won't be far behind."
Harvia nodded grimly and grew tense, then motioned his soldiers back into formation. "Understood. Stay safe, Arcanist."
Luna tapped her mana sense, only to feel a chill race down the length of her spine. Just as Helsen warned, something with a huge energy reading was coming their way at speed. A great mass began to disturb the water, forming rapidly into a hemisphere that had white foam churning around the edges. A great beast, whatever it was. And judging by the slick sweat shining on Helsen's face, he seemed uncertain that he could beat it.
"Luna," he said, not looking away from the incoming shape. The mass of surging water was growing bigger by the second, and was already larger than her family home. "Go and run back to your family. This is far too dangerous for you."
And Luna considered complying with that demand. She wasn't suicidal, after all. Yet she didn't move. Not for Helsen's sake, or any foolish thoughts of heroism. She only lingered because of pure curiosity, needing to learn more about the beasts of the Mire. She needed to see with her own two eyes, learning things beyond what she could hear from campfire tales.
A powerful tremor rocked the shore, the landfall of the incoming monster kicking up a surge of water and sand. The massive wave parted, slowly revealing great purple scales that were encrusted with barnacles and draped in tattered sea weed. The segmented, chitinous shell gleamed in the moonlight, revealing a pair of razor sharp pincers. Then, swiftly, it scuttled onto the sand on eight angular legs that punched deep into the earth. Much like the drowned men, this creature bore eyes radiating a silver light that poked from a hollow in the shell.
Even from where she stood, Luna could see a few cracks in the monster's outer shell, which seemed to continuously bleed streams of steaming black water. It scanned about from side to side, foam oozing from his sloping wedge-shaped head, as the two feelers atop his head twitched and swished about. His eyes locked on Luna, the ashen-haired girl taking an uncertain step back.
Helsen grit his teeth and took a nervous step back, his pupils narrowing into pinpricks. He had clearly seen such abominations in the past, and the sight of it left him gripped with a crushing dread. "Dire crayfish!”
