Estara could’ve dismissed one of the wounds dealt but knew she needed to let them handle it and save her valuable, no-action-required protection for later. She could distribute twice her [Priestess] levels plus one, in lots, on willing subjects, per day. She’d expended 7/17, and the minimum was 2 for involving 2 people. It would only get harder to deal with the less of it she had. There were designated wound bearers for the nastier possibilities, but she preferred avoiding such a thing.

  At some point, she had to let people suffer. Even die. That was the burden of the power she had, to know and to cancel death.

  Fighting continued as spellcasting went through its motions. The greater group shifted to surround the three now trying to shield their spellcasters. Even the idiot Dirtboy had gained enough sense to get defensive.

  The surge of extra men didn’t help. The aura held against their weapons and became a source of building anxiety.

  Big Nose was definitely going for Estara by appearances, and doing something to heighten his speed, as if anxious to avoid counters. She had to fight down the trepidation in her gut. The situation was among the most uncertain she’d faced. An inevitable moment, though. She’d lie awake in bed, staring up at the ceiling, envisioning much the same time and again. She’d asked Jeeves, Dax, Lucky, and others for advice.

  Invariably, the key was said to be sticking with decided-on general tactics. They shifted based on the situation, but the logic and principles didn’t. The worst thing was always to hesitate, they said. To not be decisive. Dax quoted, ‘Graveyards are filled with warriors who blinked.’

  So she didn’t. She reached out and squeezed for every inch forward to victory, deliberately rejecting all her doubts by necessity.

  Seraphiel stepped back instead of continuing her swordplay, dropping a ‘lightbomb’ as everyone had started calling them — an AoE light-based magical nuke. The aura protected them all once again, though the brightness was something of a distraction as the guards shielded their eyes. The two mages completely resisted any effects at all.

  The experiments of the crew all failed, and before anything else happened — before the Resemblants could get their spells in — Big Nose’s spell resolved, his gauntleted hand casting out and firing a black ray of energy at Estara, unavoidably striking her in her head in an instant.

  “Hrraaah!” he called in a vicious, nonverbal cry, as though victory was now at his hand.

  It was a complex, multi-faceted spell, one she could sense absolutely through her Fate ability because it was harming a mortal. She felt a Major Wound threaten her, on top of a secondary resistance to avoid disabling due to pain, with a minimum duration of five seconds unless the wound was also resisted by two levels or more. It was nothing that she could afford right then, and the opportunity to slip past Big Nose’s protections was too good to pass up.

  She utilized [Reapportion Fate] through her Measuring Rod, and traded her fate with his, expending her daily special.

  No protection could save him from Fate. Wide-eyed gleeful victory became horror as the black energy scoured his brain and he screamed in agony, falling to his knees with his hands shaking out in front of him.

  Dart could be heard to bellow in amusement, even bloodied all over his body while still engaged in melee. “Ha! How ‘bout them apples, you punk ass bitch?! Nobody fucks with our witch, goomba!” In truth, he was frustrated because his taunts weren’t working on the wizards. Estara had gotten good at tuning him out in combat as his words were exceptionally distracting. But there had been something about apples. She really didn’t want to know.

  The spells from the Resemblants dropped. One was an AoE heal to assist the recently wounded, and the other was a protective reinforcement on Estara.

  Ah. Well. I guess it makes sense…

  Wound negations were a sudden screen to the growing pain of her burning skin. Instead of being like lying in a fire, she just felt as if she was sunburned. Or perhaps brought to a simmer in oil.

  Estara’s spell resolved, and a massive phantom hand — well-manicured — materialized and immediately enclosed itself around Sleepy The Wizard. His spell was ruined as his arms and hands were pinned. He yelped in indignant protest though his protective aura crackled and held against the crushing pressure. Estara slammed him down into the ground for good measure.

  There was a momentary pause as everyone waited for the enemy spell information to come. Come it did.

  “Five-Fold Refuge,” Jeeves related to all. “Absolute protection from mental effects, physical wounding, magical wounding, dispels, and sense disabling. The duration isn’t clear. Any physical attacks from them are restrained and ineffective; magic can be used, as seen. But the greater weakness is the link. Cutting damage to the cords can separate a member. If all cords are cut, the spell ends. If not, it will regenerate and reconnect one cord per five seconds.”

  “Yes!” Estara called mentally. “We can use that! Sever the cords! Separate the mages as the priorities!”

  Warcries resounded as their forces pressed in to bring blades to bear. It was no easy feat — the enemy group had packed inward to protect themselves already, and the shield bearers knew exactly what they were doing and tried to block such attempts. Even worse, the cords weren’t mere strings to be snapped. Indirect cuts that were scored seemed only to fray it. Each of the link sections was perhaps as tough as a combatant unto themselves.

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  Estara quickly jerked the telekinetic hand holding Sleepy upward to expose the cords, which extended themselves as needed in the connection two directions despite the increased distance.

  Bob managed a perfect severance on one side, and of three men on the other making the effort, one finally cut it in half. The protective aura around Sleepy vanished like smoke.

  A shield guard was fighting doggedly against all comers, keeping fighters from getting to Big Nose. He was finally overwhelmed, his connection to another guard and to Dirtboy severed, with his aura vanishing.

  Big Nose finally had one side cut by the diligent expertise of Seraphiel and Dart in grappling a shield guard, but they couldn’t do everything. On the other side, the men failed completely due to Dirtboy’s fierce defense of that particular flank.

  Very briefly, only one link held — that between Big Nose and Dirtboy. But the regeneration triggered, reconnecting Big Nose to one guard, wasting the efforts of Seraphiel and Dart so recently.

  The damage aura ticked again, and most just took the baleful burns on the chin over the healing power of a Resemblant seconds before. Three men had been outside of the radius, though, and they cried out as they took Major Wounds. Estara allowed it without expending her ability, knowing they’d get healed next.

  Sleepy was panicking and struggling with the mystical hand’s vise-like grip, knowing all his protections were down. He was chanting something, getting around his inability to move around by trying some spell without somatic components.

  Estara had no intention of letting him get it off. The use of her existing spell was much faster, so she squeezed as hard as she could with the full strength of the spell.

  There was a brief, cut-off cry and then his breath was taken. A split moment of pressure more and a hideous crack could be heard as his chest cavity was caved in, and blood fully spurted out of his mouth while he writhed.

  Shit. I-I think I killed him. It stunned her for a second, in horror. She watched the man convulse, emit a weak, wet moan, and spit more blood, his face a purple rictus. His eyes bled and seemed more pronounced, and she wondered how close they’d come to popping out.

  Like a giant. Like a child with a toad. I didn’t even realize my own strength. I didn’t need to squeeze so hard…

  “Snap out of it, Estara!” Jeeves called into her head. “Keep fighting!”

  “Yeah.” That was all she replied as she peeled her eyes away and swallowed down bile.

  The rest of the battle had turned into a vicious dogfight. Both guards got swarmed with Samanthian rogues flanking them. The regenerated cord got severed again and this time, they attacked that guard as the weakest link. Under a hail of stabbing blades, both of them went down, though certainly not without a fight. Freed of the aura, they could counterattack, though the situation of being outnumbered made a casualty impossible.

  Meanwhile, Dirtboy fought like a vicious, cornered rat, and narrowly kept Bob from cutting his cord connected to Big Nose.

  When the agonized wizard finally came to from his debilitation, he neglected to cast a spell, perhaps knowing that would doom him by then. Instead, he threw a potion directly down, which smashed and instantly exploded into a massive, obscuring black cloud.

  Shouts of confusion became fits of coughing. It was clearly acrid. Estara tried to hold her breath. She hoped to see their enemies by the glow of their auras, but it was useless. She couldn’t even see her own hand.

  “We can’t let them escape,” Seraphiel offered calmly in a group mind sending. “Too much information leaks that way. Better that no one leaves this alive.”

  Agreement from the group was quick and unanimous.

  Of course, it’s all agreed.

  Estara went through the motions of casting a Dispel, for the lack of a hard counter. The smoke wouldn’t be banished with a Light-based darkness-clearing type spell, she was sure. It would need to be some sort of ‘clean air’ effect, and they didn’t have that.

  Dispel was a comparison and could fail, though it had a bonus if you targeted it against something persistent instead of trying an ‘everything and the kitchen sink’ approach, which made it very random in its removals. She’d also managed to get the skill Rogue’s Luck not long ago, following in the footsteps of her mother and learning the tricks of the gambling trade from Lucky. She pumped that into the Dispel, crossed her fingers, and tried not to breathe in as she spoke the incantation.

  The smoke cleared!

  Men shouted and pointed to reveal their enemy some distance away, close to the vicinity of the ‘neutral party’ giant who was the cause of all the ruckus. He still had his hands up and was still simply watching everything curiously, as if he cared nothing for the danger but just wanted to be out of the way.

  Big Nose was apparently not running at all. He was turned toward them with abject hatred painted on his face, casting a spell entirely ready to drop in the time it took to confuse the lot of them. Some oily tattoo on his wrist flowed off and empowered the spell, interlacing with the mana.

  They would not be able to respond in time, and most — including Estara — had their wound negations eaten through by the damage aura.

  No!

  Told ya it was a disturbing analogy.

  Next Chapter...

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