New Eden: Live to Play, Play to Live

Chapter 1019: The Last Of Them

Chapter 1019: The Last Of Them

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From below, the magma suddenly bubbled up violently before exploding upward, shooting tons of molten rock and drops of liquid lava into the air above the ledge and platform before it arced back toward the ground.

"Die!" the kobold sorcerer screamed, glaring at Kary.

Kary's confused face turned into a smile before her skin ignited.

"I've told you once before. You are not the most powerful fire user here. I guess I'll have to show instead of telling you."

Taking flight right before him, her skin entirely on fire, as her face turned expressionless, she lifted her head upward to the falling magma.

Below her, the rest of her party started looking at the incoming flaming debris with worry when Alex's voice snapped them back to attention.

"Forget the magma! Kary will deal with it. Focus on the front!" he shouted, pointing at the incoming kobolds.

It seemed there were two more for all of them they had killed already. The tides of scales and crude iron weapons came at them, hissing, growling, and spitting in rage, their eyes out of focus.

"They barely seem conscious," David remarked, giving them a pity-filled gaze.

"Then let's end their misery quickly," Jin-Sil replied, pulling out her new bow again.

She breathed in, trying to center herself. She wanted to use her new skill again, this time more accurately, so she needed to focus.

Once the kobolds had engaged upon the bridge that connected the ridge they were on to their settlement, she drew back her bowstring, breathed in, closed her eyes, and released her arrow.

"Queen's Lament: Song of Pain."

As the words escaped her lips and the mana surged within her, she reopened her eyes.

Again, time seemed to slow to a crawl as the mana erupted from her, creating a gust of wind that followed her arrow past the enemy line, and her mind separated from her body again, flying forward with it.

This time, though, she was ready.

As her body flew forward, she drew her bowstring again, hellbent on maximizing her forces while she could, shooting spectral arrows that seemed to flow at a normal pace in this suspended state, up until she was too close to the enemies to do it anymore.

The wind kept carrying her forward as she pulled her bow apart, slicing the first two enemies' throats open as she flew past them. She may not be an excellent swordswoman, but hitting virtually unmoving targets was far from complicated.

And now that she knew what her skill did, it was much easier to predict her path forward. Her blades swung in messy arcs and ungraceful strikes, but she needn't worry about it as long as she hit something vital on her targets, which she focused her entire attention on.

As the wind blew past the bridge, stopping halfway through the wave of incoming kobolds, she felt her body pull back and grinned as she witnessed the results on the way back. It was a carnage.

Kobolds flew off the bridge by the sheer force of her attacks, and enemies fell to their knees with gurgling noises as they clawed at their throats, now flowing profusely with crimson lifeblood.

As her mind settled back into her body, the grin on her astral projection had caught up to her face and made her look outright evil, as the kobolds writhed in pain, losing the last bits of their life within seconds of her attack.

Rì-Chu shivered in fear as he witnessed the carnage and noticed Jin-Sil's grin.

'I will never do anything to get on her bad side,' he promised himself mentally.

Alex didn't bother attacking the first kobolds that he ran by, knowing they wouldn't have the strength left in them to fight back as the last of their life escaped through their gaping throats.

Instead, his focus was already past the strike zone of Jin-Sil's new skill, where the rest of the kobolds were still lively and filled with rage as they trampled their falling brethren to run at the humans.

He could tell there was something wrong with them by the fact alone that they didn't mind stepping over their fallen allies, something they weren't doing in the tunnels earlier.

'Whatever this cruel sorcerer did, these kobolds are barely themselves anymore. Ending them is an act of mercy at this point.'

He was the first one back into a melee, soon joined by Jonathan, who was about the only one who could match his speed, although he preferred to stay behind Alexander.

As swords tried meeting his blade, there was no contest of strength between the blades, and Alex's sword drove through every kobold like an unstoppable force, wounding them gravely or killing them on the spot as he pushed further into the horde.

Jonathan followed closely behind, choosing hit-and-run tactics over direct confrontation, knowing he wouldn't win a contest of strength against most kobolds. But there was no way in hell they would ever catch his speed.

Soon, the others made it to the party, spells suddenly flying over the two that breached the front lines, and kobolds starting to rise from the floor, their gazes white and empty.

A full-on brawl erupted, and the victors-to-be were evident from the start. With arrows flying in from the back at a much quicker pace than before and gunshots exploding in the vast cavern, any flank attempt from the monsters failed at its inception, and the front liners' back stayed free of danger while the casters dealt wide area of death over their enemies.

Winston stood at the back, ensuring no kobold breached past him and into the vulnerable casters, and his shield held true.

The waves of kobolds quickly dried out, the seemingly unending flow reaching an end in the span of a few minutes, and Alex knew that was the end of it.

Scanning further inside the dungeon with his mana senses, all he could feel outside this cavern were now two signatures, albeit vastly stronger than the surrounding ones, further

ahead, and a monstrous presence right behind them.

Jumping back from the front, he ran behind Winston, looking toward the entrance.

He smiled as he saw the fight there unfold like he had expected.

'That poor kobold had no idea what he was in for. I almost pity him,' he thought as he chuckled.

He let his mana senses wash over his party, trying to determine how they were faring, and everyone seemed to be tired, but not exhausted. His confidence in their next fight was high.

'I can tell the dragon hasn't hatched. As long as we clean up his guardians fast, this will be a breeze.'