After defeating the Deepclaw, Kai was operating in a reduced condition. He could still kill the average monsters easily, but was it actually a good use of his time to go off fighting them? Yet just sitting around felt wrong - Behemoth's Heart had a lot of work to do fully recovering him, but the incursion was still ongoing and he couldn't leave it alone.
That was why he had asked the elites to drop him off in front of a city facing a normal horde.
They left him in southeastern Krysal, in front of a city he barely knew. It had fallen fairly early in the revolution, so he never really fought there, and it hadn't developed any of the troublesome politics of other areas. Right now, whatever had become of it, this city was just another place that was in need of help, and he was there to help them.
Though Krainuun's plan to evacuate the eastern portion of Krysal had allegedly gone well, there had been some holdouts and stragglers, or some who even returned home when the incursion started late. Now they were too far east, poorly defended, and with a long stream of monsters pouring out of the Frontier toward them.
Kai hit the ground like a meteor, creating a crater outside city limits directly in the path of the monsters. He dropped down to one knee and focused on Legion Bite, extending its effect as far as he could. The first monsters arrived and had bites torn out of them, prompting even more to plunge in and try to attack him.
Behind his back, he could hear the people of the city cheering for him. Their heroic protector standing in the way of the wave of monsters... when actually Kai just planned to rest for a while.
This far out, thinned by other fighters, the monsters weren't really threats to him. The stream of monsters could have flooded over the damaged walls, but they weren't fast or strong enough to escape Legion Bite. All he needed to do was stay in their path and the horde would run directly into him to die. Since he wasn't pushing himself, Behemoth's Heart continued to restore him after the battle, and all the bites of the monsters filled his energy reserves.
Thankfully, the people of the city stopped cheering and got back to work. Some were trying to properly defend themselves while others did the sensible thing and retreated. Either way, Kai was giving them a new lease on life while he prepared for more strenuous actions.
Kai closed his eyes and let himself sway on his feet a little, losing that absolute focus that he'd been maintaining for so long. It wasn't sleep, but it felt good to relax for a moment.
When he sensed someone approaching, he groaned and had more trouble opening his eyes than he expected. It wasn't that he couldn't, just that he really didn't want to after finally resting. Yet he couldn't let someone potentially get hurt... except he knew those footsteps.
"Omilaena?" Somehow it was easy to open his eyes then to confirm.
She was walking toward him, offhandedly killing a few monsters on the way, but her casual pace was belied by the fact that she was utterly covered in monster guts. Kai had been using his own body to batter monsters during the early incursion and he wasn't that covered in their blood. In a strange way she looked good, with her dress plastered to her, but he realized how worn she was and concern overwhelmed everything else. Clearly she wasn't interested in-
"Hey there," Omilaena said from outside his range. "You wanna fuck?"
"I'm glad you're okay," Kai said with a wry chuckle, "but I really don't think so."
"Listen up, because you're not going to hear this often, but me neither. Too tired. Anyway, is that biting technique going to eat me?"
"I'm controlling them subconsciously, so I don't think they'll target you."
"Can you make them target me? Completely unrelated: can you make other kinds of mouths?"
"My techniques are usually flexible, but not that flexible."
"Shame. That's something to work on." Omilaena gave an exaggerated shrug. "I'm going to walk in now, and if I get bitten a little, well, that can be fun."
She sauntered into his range and, and he'd guessed, the spiritual mouths quested around her to target monsters instead. Despite all her playful lines, he suspected that she had told the truth when she said she was too tired. When she pressed herself against him, she was just imitating her usual seduction and it was more of a slump.
"I'm glad to see you." Kai wrapped an arm around her, holding her up. "Are you okay? I heard you took on a nation-destroyer on your own."
"And I don't want to again. I'm fucking exhausted. That..." She leaned against him more heavily and they shared the muck and grime for a while. It was messy, but the human connection felt more real for everything they'd been through. Even though he was exhausted too, Kai felt his body relax. If only Zae Zin Nim could have been there too.
"So why are you really here?" Kai eventually asked softly. "I doubt they'd teleport you across the continent just for emotional support."
"My whims are more important than the continent," Omilaena mumbled into his chest. "No, you're correct. I need to sleep, but I'm here to give you this first." She rummaged in her spatial satchel and, after a while, shoved a bloody sack toward him.
Kai's eyes went wide as he sensed the power of the monstrous core within. He pulled it out and consumed it, the raw power a sumptuous meal compared to the insubstantial bites of the monsters still dying around him. As he consumed the essence, Omilaena explained about the fight and he isolated the potential streams of power, eventually deciding to call the nation destroyer a Deathmaw.
Deciding on a name was enough for now, because he could isolate a useful ability later. Right now, supporting Omilaena seemed more important, because despite her words, he thought there was more to it than just her exhaustion.
"Are you okay?" he asked quietly.
"I am, just..." Omilaena smiled wearily at him. "That was close. I honestly think I would have died if you and Zin Nim hadn't forced me to do so much Physique training."
"The strongest monsters each incursion are no joke. Normally it takes multiple elites to finish them off, and they take losses sometimes."
"Well, I'm glad it didn't get into Irun, but I also don't want to do that again." Omilaena finally pushed off a little, patting his shoulder. "Absorb that essence and get stronger, alright? We're going to need you soon enough."
"What are you going to do next?"
"I told you, sleep. But after that... I'll be helping out more in Irun. You probably heard that, despite my heroic, self-sacrificing, and humble efforts, the wall got broken anyway. Too many monsters have grouped into a central horde, so they'll need some help."
"I'll have to catch up to you later, then." Kai pulled her into a brief, messy kiss. "Probably just a few days."
"Yeah, hopefully. You'd better be more energetic then, because I will be." Omilaena playfully bumped her hip against him, then separated and headed out. He wanted to pick her up and tuck her into bed so she could sleep off that exhaustion, but they had higher priorities at the moment.
Just the brief visit from Omilaena made Kai feel better, and mentally was more refreshing than everything he was consuming from the monsters. It also made him more restless, however: he was tired of staying here and just defending the city passively. Unfortunately, his reserves were deep and it took a lot of weak monsters to restore them, so this was still the best place for him to be.
It was an hour later, when the stream of monsters was petering out, when he got another visitor: Zae Zin Nim. She appeared with an elite on the plain outside the city, looking much sharper and more alert than Omilaena had been, or Kai felt. At first she surveyed the city with stern disapproval, then she located him and smiled.
"Will those target me?" she asked, frowning at the effects of Legion Bite.
And so they repeated that conversation, albeit with fewer sexual implications. Zae Zin Nim also moved in without being harmed and soon relaxed against his chest, though more for affirmation than rest. She was angry that she'd missed Omilaena, especially since they likely wouldn't get another chance to be together before the end of the incursion. Kai stroked her hair to soothe her and had to admit that he was soothing himself as well.
"The others failed me in Krysal," she complained as she explained her front of the battle. "But what's worse is that so many are saying this is the fault of the revolution. They forget that the walls were initially destroyed before it, and we're just cleaning up the consequences."
"People aren't good at dealing with complex causes," Kai said with a shrug. "It's easier to find someone to blame."
"Well, this one is annoying. Thankfully, I will be spending more time fighting on the front lines."
"I know there are three different hordes, but are there a lot of problem areas?"
"So I'm told." Zae Zin Nim frowned as she looked over the horizon. "We didn't have a nation-destroyer on this front, but there are moderate numbers of higher rank monsters, the sort that would usually require crystalliers to handle. So I expect to be moved across Krysal many times."
"I probably will too. They said they might need me in Goralia once or twice, but Krysal is the big problem."
"Then it is a pity that we will likely be handling separate crises, because both of us would be overkill. And Omilaena will be in Irun."
"Not much longer now." Kai rubbed Zae Zin Nim's back encouragingly. "We just have to keep everything together for a few more days and we'll have survived the incursion."
He said that to comfort, and his wife did seem cheered. She was in better spirits as she lingered before she ventured off to her own assignments. With her gone, Kai was even more restless, but at least he felt that he'd mostly recovered... the problem was that he wasn't reassured by his own words.
It was only a few more days provided that everything went right. Deep inside him, he had a bad feeling that fate wouldn't let him off so easily.
Chapter 594: Students Scattered Through the Hordes
Kyridnyiam knew he wasn't supposed to say it, but so far, the incursion had been a blast.
Everyone on Deadwaste talked about the incursion as a huge problem, and yeah, there were a lot of monsters. He could imagine that being on the front lines would be a lot rougher. But from his position, deep into the Water Union, it had been a lot of fun.
The Earth Union had taken the brunt of the attack, but all the others were helping. For his squad, that meant that at one point they all coordinated to create a controlled flood, sweeping through a specific valley and wiping out a monstrous horde before it could hit an Earth Union city. Kyridnyiam had never seen such a collective use of elemental power and had been astonished just to be a part of it the entire time.
Which made it strange when they actually called on him to help. There were a few tough monsters capable of swimming in the water that shrugged off attempts to crush or impale them, so they'd sent him out. So many of the Waterborn were so much more experienced and sophisticated than he was, Kyridnyiam forgot that he had more raw power.
When he leapt into the water himself, though, he took apart the monsters easily enough. That had finished off the attack and they had all praised him for it, and he wasn't too proud to admit that it felt amazing.
Now, with the Earth Union reporting that all was good, they were trying to figure out their next target. Kyridnyiam joined some of the Waterborn experts in creating a massive water spout that could launch their floating vessels high into the sky to get a clear look at the area around them. Now he soared along with the others, looking out on the world in awe.
He'd been a little higher on the Clanless, but that had been over the ocean, nothing like seeing Deadwaste spread out over him. From this height, Kyridnyiam could even see to the ocean, which glistened like sapphires in the distance.
"Hey," he asked, "what's that out there?"
.
..
.
Her hands hurt. It was a stupid thing to think, when monsters were pouring out of the Frontier and people were risking their lives, but Mariyay Hafkrir just kept thinking that her fingers ached.
She had worked them to the bone, or so she thought, and she hadn't imagined that the incursion could be worse. Now she found herself with a bone-deep weariness that she hadn't known before. Maybe it came from building and smashing barrier after barrier, which had been necessary to help the Irunians fend off the brunt of the attack.
Quinta had sent her out in front of the central horde, along with Kifaela, which showed how seriously the Irunians were taking this horde. One of their western cities was right in its path and needed to be defended, so she took that upon herself. Kifaela had gone out, taking on individual monsters, while Mariyay joined the Irunians on the walls defending those that got past her.
Blow after hand-aching blow.
Now came the aftermath, when someone like her was supposed to be necessary. Mariyay was proud of her performance: she had fused together her abilities to create barriers that became truly devastating when she exploded them outwards. But even her power combined with Kifaela hadn't been enough to prevent some of the walls from being overrun, and now, what they really needed...
And so, flexing her weary hands, Mariyay headed out toward the wall. She had wanted to be a warrior, and she had proved herself there. But if she didn't want to be a child, it was time to swallow her pride and help them repair the walls.
.
..
.
"Hey, good work back there." Bonto didn't hit Tori's shoulder the way he wanted to, but he beamed at her until she smiled back. "The city of New Laeneria is safe thanks to you!"
"Thanks to you as well," she said quietly. "I could never have managed if you hadn't held the gap against the horde."
"As much as I'd like to take all the credit, that wouldn't be fair." Bonto gave her such an exaggerated wink that she almost giggled. Dammit, that one was close. He'd get her next time. For now, though, he really did mean to encourage her. "I couldn't do shit against that turtle monster, and you just... I mean, you landed on it and it died!"
"I formed a spike of steel and crystal through its brain," Tori said somberly, like that was a normal thing to say. "I have been trying to use weapon formation in combat for some time and I am glad it was successful."
"Damn, Tori, you're scary sometimes."
"But I still need training, because it would not have worked on a monster faster than that turtle."
"Hey now, what did I say about being down on yourself? Don't do it!"
"Bonto..." Tori shook her head at him. "I am not depressed, merely realistic. You do not have to cheer me up."
"Just keeping up morale!" Bonto gave her another wink even though he knew it wouldn't work, just to put her off guard. "But I get why you're gloomy. We worked together pretty well, but I'm not the one you wanted to collaborate with. You wish you were paired with Ankrastor, right?"
"No, it makes more sense for Ankrastor to be stationed in Goralia, bec-"
"When I say 'collaborate' I mean in a more personal way, get it?"
Tori finally blushed and pushed him away. "Don't tease!"
"Aww, but I'm right, aren't I?" Bonto wanted to keep pushing, but he heard shouts from one of the Krysali watchtowers overhead.
It was Maggle, leaning against the side and staring out at something. The old former revolutionary was a bit odd, but he was a good man, and a fantastic drinking partner. If he was calling, he wouldn't be doing it for no reason. So Bonto made a crystal platform and floated up to join him and see what he was bitching about.
And when he did so, he saw the monsters on the horizon. A lot of them, more than the first wave of the incursion. Tori landed quietly beside him and made a soft sound. The three of them were the only calm ones, because the other Krysali on the platform were panicking.
"Uh..." Bonto glanced over at Maggle. "Isn't there normally just one wave? Is this supposed to happen?"
"Nope." Maggle pressed his lips together tightly. "This looks pretty fucked."
This would be a good time to throw out a funny line, or even a half-assed effort at funny, just to make everyone relax. Keep them together and doing their best. But staring at all those monsters, it didn't seem funny to Bonto at all.
.
..
.
Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.
From what Untariin of Kartiis had seen, Goralia still had its equivalents of nobles and crystalliers. It was a better, fairer nation than Krysal, but it had its own problems. Actually spending time in one of their southern cities was driving that home for him.
Razzagah Lantrian himself was a decent man, a lot more understanding of warriors than the average merchant without training. That was a huge difference from the arrogant merchants back home too. But plenty of others were nothing like that, and now they were clashing. He hated to even listen to it, but monsters hadn't gotten this far south yet, so there was nothing else to do.
"The defenses aren't even half built!" another merchant was objecting. "In this state, they're just a waste of money!"
"We're still on pace," Razzagah told him with a minimum of patience. "If there aren't supply issues, we'll finish by the time the horde arrives."
"I'm doing my part with the supplies! The problem is labor, and you just won't listen!"
According to the grand plan, decided by people more important than Untariin, the Goralian hordes would be split up. Some would be allowed to push deeper south, which was where Untariin and the others would come in to reinforce the weakened main defenders. He had been looking forward to that, and he thought that a precise attack would be a good match for his abilities.
So far, however, the merchants were being obnoxious. With no monsters in front of them, they didn't seem to really believe that they would be attacked, so they weren't pulling the defenses together. Razzagah was doing his best, but they might be behind schedule.
"A few elite hunters could do this instantly," the merchant argued. "You have connections, you were riding with them. Just get them here!"
"That isn't possible," Razzagah said. "They're needed at the Frontier itself."
"What could possibly be more important th-"
Untariin slapped the merchant across the face. Not hard, but the man stared at him as if he couldn't comprehend what had happened. Somewhere else at a different time, that might have been a crime, but in the middle of the incursion as an outsider, Untariin didn't have time for that.
"You can't imagine what they're dealing with," Untariin told the objecting merchants. "But imagine what will happen to your city if you don't finish those barriers."
"This is absurd! You can't just str-"
"How are you going to stand up to monster hordes if you can't stand up to one person slapping you? Go."
The merchants stared in shock before scurrying away, hopefully to actually do their job. Razzagah stared at him as well, with a sort of rueful admiration. Untariin just shrugged and sat back down.
The monsters couldn't get here soon enough, as far as he was concerned.
.
..
.
Ankrastor of the Undertow loved Goralia more than he felt he could admit out loud, and that love had multiplied after fighting alongside them. Not only did he have a chance to fight at the edge of the Goralian Frontier, he was defending Monskon City, the very place where Kai had been born.
He couldn't say it, but the defense had lived up to his expectations. Instead of a society where most people were powerless and led by elemental warriors, leading up to great princes and princesses, practically everyone in the city was a partial hunter. They had countless people who could contribute to the defenses, and when the monsters had reached the walls, ordinary citizens had even hurled rocks down.
So Ankrastor felt privileged to play his part, serving as a strike force alongside Aglahai. Rallia was a great leader, taking out some monsters with her own arrows but knowing when to send him out. There had been a giant monster at the end, one that shrugged off even her arrows, and Ankrastor had taken it on directly, cooking it from the inside in order to save the city.
If he wanted to stay here, would they let him? He had a feeling that they would, even if there weren't too many foreigners on the streets. Goralians tended to be open to everyone once they showed their quality, and Ankrastor had demonstrated his in front of everyone.
Just when he was beginning to imagine that future, and what life he might build for himself in Goralia, Ankrastor heard a shout from the wall. He shot upward on a wave of flame to land beside Rallia, starting to ask before he saw the monsters coming toward them.
"Secondary wave?" he speculated. "But they're coming from the west... could the hordes have destroyed another city?"
"They could also have been diverted," Rallia said grimly. "There's no time to find answers, and they don't really matter, because they'll eat us all the same. A lot of our hunters are run down... do you have more fire in your quiver, so to speak?"
"Plenty more, but I don't know if I have enough for... that many."
"Did Kai plan to come back with more reinforcements?"
"No, it's just us." Ankrastor took a deep breath as he realized this was his time, even more than the previous wave of the incursion. The Goralian way wasn't winning with overwhelming power, it was fighting even when the odds were against him.
Looking out at all those monsters, it seemed it was time for him to find out if he deserved to be there.
Chapter 595: The Horde's Treasures
Zae Zin Nim fought against the incursion with a scowl, considering her failings as a wife. Ordinarily, that was an unpleasant accusation cast on her from the outside, but this concern came from within. Her marital relationship was far more wonderful than she had anticipated, which meant that she needed to be correspondingly wonderful, and she had fallen short.
How could she have failed to consider gifts? Omilaena had obtained an extremely powerful monster core for their husband, an extraordinary gift that would benefit all of them. Though Zae Zin Nim believed that she would have retrieved a core if she had encountered such a dangerous monster, she had fought many others and extracted none of their cores.
On top of that, it sounded as though Kai had been a pillar of support for Omilaena, serving another critical role as a spouse. By the time Zae Zin Nim arrived, she hadn't been able to do the same, and Kai no longer needed assistance. Unacceptable.
She vaulted over the lines of the pseudo-crystalliers trying to defend some other Frontier city, aiming for the hulking giants within the horde. All the others could be taken down by crystal shards, but the giants had tough skin that the crystal edges failed to pierce. More importantly, they might have useful monster cores.
When she arrived, Zae Zin Nim plunged her hand directly into the monster's chest. It was humanoid and it proved to have its core in the usual place, so she tore out the core, leaving the monster's body to collapse. This process was somewhat disgusting, but she had changed into a short-sleeved robe for this very purpose.
Jumping from one to the next, she eliminated all five giants on the battlefield, then placed all of their cores into a sack. They were moderately large, but she doubted that they would actually form a useful essence for Kai, not given how easy they had been to defeat. Another disappointment.
Still, she placed the sack of cores into her spatial bracelet alongside the others that she had found potentially worthy. It pleased her to think that she was being a good wife by gifting her husband bags of monster guts. None of her adolescent instructors would ever have advised her to do such a thing, and indeed they would have been horrified, which pleased her as well.
None of the other monsters had any potential, so Zae Zin Nim annihilated swaths of them with qi in order to help the defenders. She noted that the defenders made no effort to retrieve the monster cores, which were ordinarily valuable, and then realized that was actually quite reasonable. For one, they were busy surviving against the onslaught. For another, there were so many monsters that the value of cores would plummet in the time after the incursion. Only those that could be used as materials, or in Kai's case as essence, might be worth extracting at a time like this.
Realizing that her mind was wandering, Zae Zin Nim decided that it was time to move on from this battlefield. The only positive of such a wide-spread disaster was that the Frontier elites were everywhere, transporting themselves and others to the most critical locations. Zae Zin Nim flew until she spotted one and got him to transport her to the south, where the monster horde had pushed unfortunately deep.
From high in the air, she could see several points of conflict: the city, a vanguard to the east, and a mess to the north. It looked like someone had moved east from the city and set up a defensive point, blunting the flood of monsters with a fort of steel and crystal. There was also a group fleeing to the north, drawing off some of the monsters. Despite both of these mitigating factors, the break in the Frontier wall had concentrated so many monsters that there were still plenty that reached the city walls.
Only one monster attracted her attention: a large scorpion that appeared to be releasing blobs of poison against the defenders on the walls. Very promising.
Zae Zin Nim dropped toward the scorpion at full speed and was sad when she instantly broke its back. The monster's dying flailing tried to stab her with the tail, but she ripped it off. Unfortunately, size didn't always correlate to strength, and this one had been a great disappointment.
The monster core was too weak to be worth bothering with, but Zae Zin Nim placed the tail into her spatial bracelet. At least she might have a gift for Omi - new poisons always cheered up her wife.
Defenders on the walls were shouting approval at her, but Zae Zin Nim didn't recognize anyone and didn't remember this particular city. She extended her hand to them, because that was what she was expected to do, while thinking about how to leave. Technically she could have remained to help them defend, but they'd have to handle things themselves, especially while there were more interesting places for her to go.
One leap took her over the horde to the vanguard fortification. It was cleverly constructed, crystalline beams being used as a lattice to move rocks into place, creating a fortress without exhausting crystal cultivation. There were metallic pieces armoring the weak points as well, and that led Zae Zin Nim to look at the top, where she saw the reason for the fortress.
There she recognized two of her husband's students: Tori Quondan and Bonto Birtaegali. It seemed that Tori had raised the knife-like defensive structure using her powers, and many monsters broke themselves on it. Bonto was brawling in front, trying to stop armored monsters who might shatter the crystals, while Tori and a few other defenders took down those who climbed up the side.
With a wave of her hand, Zae Zin Nim incinerated a broad swath of the monsters around their fortification, just so there would be time to talk. Some of the defenders cheered, while Bonto saw her and cheerfully clambered up the side to stand beside Tori.
"Thank you for your assistance," Tori said with an Irunian bow.
"You seem to have this under control," Zae Zin Nim said. "Have there been any highly dangerous monsters here?"
"No, not beyond that ones you see."
"That is a pity."
Her comment made Tori look at her strangely, but at that point Bonto climbed up beside them, laughing. "That's cultivators for you, eh? Always looking for a challenge, right?"
"...yes," Zae Zin Nim said.
"There was a large armored creature that went further south, toward Wontiir," Tori said. "We attempted to engage the beast, and I wasn't able to damage its armor, so we only diverted it."
"But it will take a while to get to the next city," Bonto pointed out. "We could really use your help here. You saw those people to the north getting overrun, right?"
That was irritating, but Zae Zin Nim accepted that she couldn't go after the other monster just yet. She needed to get to what mattered to her without completely abandoning other responsibilities, so she considered the situation briefly and then nodded as she decided on her solution.
"I am entrusting this task to the two of you," she told them. "You need to bring back those who foolishly evacuated and lead them all in a united defense."
"Uh, it's a bit late for that," Bonto said. "They ran before the gates closed, and the ground in between is covered with the horde. Running is their only shot at survival."
"We would also struggle to leave this position." Tori lowered her eyes apologetically. "I fear we are not as mobile as you are, and cannot treat these monsters as equally trivial."
"Use this." Zae Zin Nim pulled a large wooden platform from her spatial bracelet, a vessel that the Brightwind Sect used to transport lower tier cultivators. "You can use it to rescue the foolish evacuees, then as a platform to help defend the city. Tori, is it acceptable if I destroy your structure to buy you time?"
"I... of course. It was only temporary."
Zae Zin Nim nodded and then gestured impatiently for them to climb onto the platform. While Tori and Bonto helped the other defenders get on board, Zae Zin Nim considered the fortress, which was a jumble of spikes and razor edges. The bonds were relatively weak by her standards, so she could use it for more destructive force once the others were clear.
As soon as the flying platform pulled away, Zae Zin Nim leapt into the air and prepared herself. She focused her qi into a single concussive palm strike and brought it down against the spiked platform as she landed.
It exploded in all directions, sending the shattering fortress into the monstrous hordes. Even the stones could serve as lethal obstacles at high speed, and the crystals became lethal skewers. In seconds, a massive circle of monsters between the three defensive points had been annihilated, leaving a hole on the battlefield.
Which made it easy for her to land in the empty space and consider the region one more time. The city wall defenders had been given a reprieve, and the students now had a vessel to rescue the fools who had run off. With the horde weakened and their forces combined, it seemed likely that they would be able to continue to defend this position.
Meaning that she could leave them. Zae Zin Nim turned away toward the south, seeking monsters threatening enough to be a gift for her spouses. She would serve as a decent defender of Krysal, but she would be a better wife.
Chapter 596: A Different Sort of Frontier City
As Kai transitioned to the second phase of the incursion, his personal risk decreased, but his tension increased. There were no more monsters as dangerous as the Deepclaw, so he wasn't challenged on a personal level. But he couldn't be everywhere at once, and Krysal falling apart tore at him.
He arrived at one of the evacuated eastern cities and immediately understood the problem: the defenders who had been intended to thin out the monsters had been surrounded by the unexpectedly large hordes and trapped there. Now they looked in bad shape, trying to hold the damaged city on all sides, without hope of reinforcement.
Until he arrived, anyway: Kai circled the city, breathing out a wall of Baleful Breath.
Technically Krysal had performed better than anyone had expected, since many had predicted it would fold without crystalliers. The core of the new army was tough, with powerful Physiques built in the mines and then further refined, so they hadn't experienced as many losses as expected in the normal fighting. So far, according to Gunjin, the strongest monsters had been handled by elites.
But in between there was a problem, a tier of monsters too strong for the average Krysali but too numerous for the elites to handle. Those were where Kai had to admit the new Krysal fell short, lacking the highest tier crystalliers who had played this role in the past.
With his wall of fire supporting them, Kai judged that these defenders would manage well enough. Since they were cheering instead of begging for help, Kai turned away and began flying at top speed toward his next rendezvous point.
That isolated group would be fine after his help, since he judged that they had a pretty balanced group. They had a whole squad of new crystal shielders to hold back monsters, and their ex-crystalliers had done a good job of keeping them alive, so their defenses weren't bad. Since they also had a full squad of acid cultivators, they could finish off the remaining monsters and survive the incursion.
Some other groups hadn't been so lucky. The acid cultivators had done better than expected, but they couldn't fight without support, and Kai had seen groups of them take heavy losses when they weren't defended. In other places, ex-slaves and ex-crystalliers had failed to collaborate properly, leading positions that should have held to collapse.
He hoped that in the future this would teach them to work together, but in the present, he was furious about their failure cascading to all the city-states around them.
As he swept up toward the next position, Kai saw that the fortress had one of the great crystals of Yulthens, which was sending down a beam that devastated the approaching horde. Unfortunately, it was currently under assault by a flock of flying monsters, and the defenders weren't keeping up.
As Kai arrived he used Void Gaze: he only bound the monsters in place until he flew past, but with their flying disrupted followed by the shockwave of his passing, the flying horde practically exploded. Kai put them out of his mind and focused on the next inter-city fortress, which looked like it had survived its own horde.
The defenders weren't in good shape, though, and when he landed on top of the fortress he saw that Gorndron of Granitecrest was bandaging a wound across his shoulder.
"I'm not a real fighter," the man complained to Kai. "The fact that I'm having to take a hand is a sign of how much of a clusterfuck this is."
"You're the only fighter these people have," Kai told him. "What's the situation?"
"The northeastern evacuation went smoothly, but apparently the horde hit Teraklis and it was bad. I don't know the situation, so I'm going to send you in."
"Fine." Kai looked away from him and soon spotted the Windborn woman who handled a lot of the teleportation aside from Gunjin. Their transportation specialists were usually working alongside coordinators like Gorndron, so they usually served as rendezvous points.
As he prepared to be taken to Teraklis, Kai tried not to worry about what he might find. Teraklis occupied a strange place in his mind, filled with both positive and negative memories. It had been a fairer city-state than many, and during the revolution he had been able to take it out of the fighting without killing a single person.
Upon his return, he'd discovered that the agreements signed back then had actually stuck - he wasn't sure whether it was real cooperation between factions or fear of his vengeance. The problem was, in the middle of that scheme he'd had several dalliances with local women, which led to problems in the modern day. Presumably they had bigger problems now, since the incursion was still rolling over the continent, but the reminder of his youthful follies bothered him.
When he arrived, the assault on Teraklis didn't look as bad as many others. There was a carpet of monsters, certainly, but the rocky terrain and defenses of the city seemed to have held. He didn't see any particularly strong monsters... but he also didn't see any strong defenders. Years ago there had been an older pair of crystalliers, where were they now?
On his way in, Kai flew low over the monstrous hordes, letting his shockwaves take out more of them. As he landed on the walls, he launched a few Manticore's Spines from his back to kill the armored monsters that might be trouble for the defenders. But unlike so many cities he'd arrived to defend, the soldiers didn't cheer, they looked panicked.
"Get to the center!" one of them cried, pointing backward. "We almost lost them!"
"It's going to hatch!" another soldier insisted.
"Don't worry about us, save them!"
Kai didn't have time to sort through all the contradictory shouts: the one thing that was clear was that they thought the real problem was within Teraklis itself, at the Mercantile Hall. He remembered the location clearly, though it looked as though it had been remodeled somewhat.
As he flew there, Kai checked the city for monsters, but only confirmed his initial impression: the defenses had held. Throughout the city, he observed untrained people doing their part: carrying food and water to the soldiers, clearing out rubble, and otherwise assisting in the defense of the city. He saw a good mix of former slaves and merchants, working together, so at least the peace here had held.
Yet something was rotten in the heart of it all. When Kai reached the Mercantile Hall, he finally got a whiff of monstrous power, but the stranger thing was that there was a ring of fighters around the center.
"There's a monster in there!" one of them shouted when she saw Kai. "Kill it before it hatches!"
"He won't let us!" another person yelled, which wasn't exactly helpful.
No one got in his path as he strode forward, past the ragged defenders... until he reached the door. Kai found his way blocked by the middle-aged man he remembered, a crystallier who had tried to treat the workers fairly and had reluctantly stood up to Kai to defend Teraklis.
<
Name: ???
Total Power: 256
Crystal Cultivation: 16,500 (142)
Acid Cultivation: 425 (25)
Physique Level: F-9 (48)
Soul Level: 4 (16)
Crystal Dantian (+25)
>
In the years that had passed he'd reached over 250 Power, which was a good increase for a crystallier. Kai was even more impressed when he saw that little of it had come from qi crystals: he'd learned a degree of acid cultivation and built a strong Crystal Dantian based on Omilaena's model.
So why was he facing off against all the other defenders?
"Kai Clanless..." The man stared at him in shock, then shook himself and moved to block his path. "Don't kill her. I can't stop you, but..."
"I just arrived," Kai told him. "What happened?"
"There was a monster, a far greater threat than anyone expected. My wife and I took it out, but..." As the man trailed off, his eyes flickered back into the room behind him.
With a firm grip on the old crystallier's shoulder, Kai used his overwhelming strength to move him aside and entered the room. It was somewhat dark, which no longer impeded him: he saw that the man's wife lay face down on a messy sheet. She was still lean and strong for her age, but there was an ugly mass growing from her back.
"The monster launched its eggs," the husband explained. "They would... burrow into soldiers' bodies, then spawn out. We lost almost a dozen people that way before we managed to intercept the eggs. We thought we could kill it together, but at the end..."
Now Kai could discern the details: the mass was a slug-like "egg" with several tentacles that seemed to pierce the wife's back. She was trying to resist, channeling her qi into Physique, but it was burrowing deeper into her.
<
Name: ???
Total Power: 270
Crystal Cultivation: 14,100 (135)
Acid Cultivation: 650 (35)
Physique Level: F-9 (50)
Soul Level: 5 (25)
Crystal Dantian (+25)
Monstrous Spawn - IV (delta)
>
Kai could see it on a spiritual level as well - apparently the monstrous spawn had burrowed in enough that it had a connection to her soul. With more instinctive senses he could feel its hunger, wanting to convert her flesh into more monsters. If they were based on her strength, that could be a problem.
"Why haven't you attacked the mass?" Kai asked.
"When I cut it, that hurt her too." The husband looked nervously behind him. "The others say that it's hopeless, that leaving her alive will just create more of them. But I can't..."
"Alright, let me try something."
Striding in, Kai bent down beside the woman and the pulsing spawn. She looked barely conscious, locked in a mortal struggle that she was clearly losing. There was no time to waste, Kai only saw one potential solution: consuming the monster in an instant. If their bodies were already so merged that this would kill her, then it was truly hopeless anyway, and the longer he delayed the worse it got.
With no time to rearrange monstrous essence, Kai focused on Legion Bite. This would need to be a focused use of it like never before, consuming the egg without eating the woman. The hunger within him wanted both... but it could discern different types of prey.
Kai took a deep breath, then took a thousand bites at once.
The monstrous spawn vanished into the spiritual mouths, all of it vanishing in a flash. He didn't stop the bites at the woman's skin, making sure he consumed the tentacles as well. Kai could taste human flesh and blood in his mouth, but not much.
After a cry of pain, the woman sagged, her back bloody... but she opened her eyes. Her husband rushed to her, grasping her hand in disbelief. Kai didn't have time for their reunion, he just focused his spiritual senses and confirmed that he couldn't find any trace of the monstrous spawn.
"Glad you two are still alive," Kai said with a smile. "Can you handle the defense from here?"
"I have to stay with her," the husband started, but Kai cut him off by tossing one of Juray's potions toward him.
"This should put your wife back together. The monster is gone and I'll handle the others, but I need you to defend Teraklis. There are too many places I need to defend for me to stop here."
The man nodded grimly and helped his wife swallow the potion. On his way out, Kai glowered at the gathered fighters and pushed them all to get back to defending the city. He was fairly sure that he'd gotten through to them, considering his role in the city's history, and once recovered the couple could take care of themselves.
As he flew toward the next rendezvous point, Kai thought back to the couple... he still didn't even know their names. If they'd met at a different time of life, they might have become friends. Zae Zin Nim might not be wild about it, but he could even imagine having a couples' dinner with them. But he was already stretched so thin, he had no more time for more relationships, not with the entire continent at stake.
While still in midair, Kai sensed something flying toward him. Not an attack, a human woman. He instinctively reached out, grabbing her by the neck when she intercepted him and driving her down to the ground.
Then he hesitated, as he realized he'd grabbed Nirka.
"I needed to reach you," she said tersely. She gripped the hand at her neck, but he didn't see fear in her eyes, just urgency. "There's a problem."
"What is it?" Kai asked as he let go and pulled her up. "Where have you been?"
"I was contacted by the most radical faction of former slaves. I actually agree with them about some things, and we were working together, but..." Nirka shook her head. "I had to come tell you. As soon as the incursion is over, they're planning a slaughter of crystalliers. It might have already started."