—- Gauntlet of Silora —-
[gained physique : 215]
[gained mana : 215]
[gained defense : 215]
The satchel charge detonates.
The tree was engulfed in flames.
Hikari stretches her shoulders as the last of the load was emptied.
The leather frame for the satchel hold was weightless for her.
Rumble. Rumble.
Cracks appeared from the ground.
The Ent head emerges, the RazenHeir flames spreading from its head to its body.
It screeches in pain.
A bolt enchanted with both the blessing of Silora and wyvern frost pierces through its core.
The Ent let out its last deafening shriek.
Crunch. Hikari crushes its core and absorbs its energy.
She raises her arms and stretches.
The weight of the gauntlet didn't bother her so much anymore.
A hard day's work.
She looks around.
A dark eerie aura.
She was much closer to the ruined city now.
The black flames.
It's best to stay away from them as she had no idea how to deal with them.
But aside from the black flames, the city looked better than what she expected.
The walls were intact.
Left-over scaling equipment along every section.
The cannons on the battlements were left there.
They were too heavy and difficult to move.
It's not as though they would sell that well anyway.
Through the side of the city where she stood, there was a trough.
It looked like a dried out river that used to flow under the city.
The grating was closed.
No one had operated its gating mechanism.
Door shaped hopes carved into the iron grating.
The iron bars sawed through to create openings for looters.
Leftover hauling equipment along the sides of the dried river.
"The city was picked clean."
At least the raid expedition would have no trouble finding an insertion point for an infiltration squad.
There was a gatehouse for the steam tanks to roll through after perhaps blasting the gate down.
The Silora expedition would have to clear out the black flame first though.
She notices something.
From this distance, it appeared to be a knight in full plated armour.
The black flames about him makes it difficult to see.
"That's enough for today."
Hikari turns around and begins the march back to the raiding town.
She was not looking for another fight.
The countryside road was wide enough for her boots.
She stops at a farming patch.
It was covered in thorned bramble.
Incinerate.
A light burst of aether flame.
The flame spreads quickly, the patch of bramble disintegrates.
Nothing but barren ground underneath.
"Might as well."
She was half expecting not to find anything.
It was just her practicing a new trick she discovered.
Helps the advancing Silora expedition by clearing out the thorn bramble.
She's certainly clearing them out faster than a siege tank with a roller attached to its front.
It costs very little mana anyway.
Whoosh.
Whoosh.
The fields of bramble disappeared.
She pulses the earth.
Perhaps another cache.
She doesn't know how much the sword and musket would sell for, but it ought to be at least a few chunks of meat in her stew, perhaps a few bars of chocolate.
Whoosh.
There's something.
An abandoned tent and campfire.
A pair of wraiths sat before the campfire.
They vanished as Hikari took a step towards them.
The tent was a rugged mess as the thorns pierced it everywhere.
She peels it away.
A corpse with an Eon crystal in his hand.
That's a lot of harvesters for this pitiful amount of crystals.
Parties are often coming back with their sacks mostly empty.
Even a lot of the order's elite assassins are here.
They do a great job killing ghouls.
Eon's flames make quick work of them.
But aren't they supposed to be kidnapping the sheep to feed the titan?
And those large crates that they won't tell me about.
Has the boss been drinking too much wine?
Long live Eon. Hope I get to see the view from Carla before I return to the flesh.
"Another grunt."
Hikari learnt nothing more from the last crystals.
The cult of Eon was down here harvesting crystals.
The poor corpse had nothing worth looting either.
Just a basic pickaxe that miners everywhere use and a harvest sack with a hole punched into it.
Whoosh.
Whoosh.
She cleared more patches.
Nothing.
She kept marching.
She stopped.
A surge of energy from the ruined city.
She turns around.
The black flares flared.
She feels the mist deepen around her.
The ruined city was blurred again.
A deep red aura enshrouded her.
"Beans."
She feels a wave of mana sweep the ground below her boot.
She senses bodies materializing around her.
Ghouls crawl out of the ground.
Hikari holds the gauntlet close to her chest.
She was hungry but she was far from exhausting her fighting strength.
Hordes of ghouls appear out of the ground all across the farmlands.
They charged her.
Pulse.
Her gauntlet pulses with holy energy.
It disintegrates the first wave.
She stands still, channeling her mana into the gauntlet.
It was the most efficient way to clear the ghouls.
Pulse.
Pulse.
The chattering sound of crystals on the ground.
Pulse.
Some of the ghouls were just frozen.
One pulse didn't kill them.
Pulse.
Pulse.
Three pulses, that's what it took to kill them.
The ground rumbles.
Golems emerged from the ground.
"Better run."
She bent her knees and leapt into the air.
The mist was thick.
It was the same feeling from when she went from the mouth of the elevator shaft towards the abandoned raiding town.
While midair, Hikari gathers mana in her gauntlet.
As she lands, she slammed her gauntlet into a golem ghoul.
The golem chores chatter as they drop to the ground.
A pity, that would have been a decent haul.
Not when she's been hounded by hordes of ghouls and golems.
Several floating eyes gather around her.
She has no time to deal with the slow moving eyes if she can't harvest their rune stones.
She leapt again.
Pulse.
The crystals chatters.
More floating eyes gather around her.
Their eyes locked onto her.
They weren't the slow hovering ones she had encountered so far.
They can actually keep pace with her in the air.
"They're following me."
She was marked.
Hordes of ghouls charged towards her in all directions.
She drawls her throwing daggers and hurls them in a volley, impaling the floating eyes.
The small ghouls are already onto her.
A faint mist around their bodies.
She pulses prematurely.
It slows the ghouls but did not kill them
Doesn't matter, she can't harvest their crystals anyway.
It buys her just enough time to get enough spring to leap again.
She glances down midair.
She was jumping over a massive horde.
Pulse.
She lands.
A massive horde of golems charging towards her.
She couldn't stop to clear some of the floating eyes chasing her.
She leaps into the air.
She draws her throwing daggers and lets go, the floating eyes running straight into the sharp metal objects in their path.
She lands.
More golems ahead.
The golems are onto her.
The pulse from her gauntlet can only slow them.
Not enough time.
She finds an opening and leaps.
Wraiths materialize around her.
Cloaked assassins.
They follow her mid air.
Aether flame gathering in her hand.
She releases her pulse, dispelling the wraiths.
She lands in the middle of ghouls.
The shockwave from her mass hitting the ground did not stun them.
They jump all over her.
A telekinetic blast throws them back.
It does little damage and it costs more mana than a gauntlet pulse.
Throwing ghouls against the ground using physical force does not stun them for long.
But it was enough for her legs to gather enough power to jump again.
How much further to the raiding camp?
She would find safety behind the walls and fight back after recovering her strength.
The thick walls as she remembers can withstand siege even if the barrier was snuffed.
The terrain below her boot had gotten rocky again.
She had left the farmlands.
She did not have the room to turn her head to check the ruined city.
Pulse.
Leap.
Pulse.
Leap.
The hordes were endless.
Pulse.
Leap.
There.
She caught sight of a stone formation cleared of ghouls.
"A grey salt formation."
Unlike the isolated stones she had seen, it was the largest concentration of grey salt she had seen.
From midair, she estimated that it covered the area of a town.
Wraiths gather around her.
Pulse.
She dispels them.
Thud.
She lands on the grey salt formation.
Wraiths land around her.
But their form fizzled.
They dissipated.
Hikari arrays her throwing daggers and pauses.
The floating eyes gather around her.
Marking her.
But not for long.
All at once, the daggers flew.
She had the space to mark each of them.
The eyes shrieked at once.
It would have caused the unprotected ear drums of a common infantry man to burst.
The grey salt around her blocks out the mist.
The ghouls stopped in their tracks as the mark on Hikari disappeared.
The closest one was right up to Hikari's boot.
But in the grey salt formation, the ghoul was blind as a bat.
It turned away harmlessly before she decided to stomp it.
In the distance, she could see the ruined city.
She had jumped far from it.
Her heart was pounding, but she had reached a safe spot.
The aura around the city swirled.
A sudden pulse.
Hikari felt like the mana in the air was being abruptly sucked away.
All at once, the endless hordes of ghouls and golems disintegrate.
It was quiet.
Hikari wandered deeper into the grey salt formation just to be safe.
A safe spot to rest finally.
She sat down and meditated.