As I watched them come through the hole in the wall, I had to admit they looked a lot more terrifying than I imagined. The Nagas were powerful looking creatures, the lower body of a snake and the upper muscular body of a man. They were ripped with muscles and dark scaled skin with varying patterns. Their yellow eyes seem to carry within it a chill and an extreme thirst for blood.

I was no where close to where the wall was breached, but I could see what was happening clearly even from such a considerable distance as from where I was standing. But one thing I noticed was how few the Nagas were in numbers, it was not as if I was ignoring the fact that there was considerable amount of humans and werewolves right behind the small force of Nagas.

From where I was standing I could see the vampires and dark elves close to the collapsed wall fall to the ground, but I couldn’t tell if they were dead or alive. Mars immediately took command as he led a small contingent of vampires and dark elves towards the Nagas. I had no idea how he was going to engage them, but I knew for a fact that this was a fight that no one could escape from.

Mars held a couple of stone spears in his hand as he shakily rose into the air. His ability to fly struck a chord of jealousy in me, but for now this was an advantage that could prove useful to us.

As mars advanced towards our enemies with his soldiers right behind him, I cracked my head trying figure out a way to render my help. But short of fighting directly with the Nagas I doubt that there was much I could do. I was drawn out of my thoughts by an intense feeling of nausea.

A fog very much unlike the one I had created to keep us safe came into existence. It was black as night and felt incredibly viscous, almost as if it was made from some sort of thick liquid. I felt my bones creaking and my heart pounding with intense pain. I couldn’t help but fall to my knees as I coughed out a surprising amount of blood with flecks of a black and incredibly bad smelling substance.

I couldn’t tell what it was, and I couldn’t really concentrate. My entire body was flexed tight as my muscles were pulled taut, but with such strain I felt like every piece and every inch of my body was being pulled apart from different directions.

I could hear the voices of both Xaseah and Soren, but I had already lost the ability of being able to make sense of their words. Everything was being drowned in a haze of dark fog and intense pain.

I couldn’t help the wisp of fear that reached out to clutch at my heart. Down to the depths of my very soul I was covered by a thick veil of fear, fear that was not entirely unfounded. I did not want to die, I felt that there was still a lot that I had not accomplished, a lot that I had not seen.

I had every intention of leaving this pit and going to the outside world. I wanted to wander the whole of Shearath and experience all of its beauty and splendor. I wanted to know what the sun looked like even though that was practically asking for death. I wanted to know if I had family, if they missed me, if they still remembered me even though I had forgotten them.

That did not seem really fair, but I did not really have a choice about what I could remember. But now here I was dying, I had to admit dying was incredibly surreal, it put a halo of things into perspective for me, but yet it showed me a lot of things I lacked, things I wanted, things I needed. My life, well the part of it that I could remember was not that long so I did not have as much regret as someone who would have lived a full life, but still I had some and right now they were all I could think about.

It felt annoying to me though, I was dying, why would my regrets spoil the experience for me. There was nothing I could do about, and I rather much die without regrets, I could not go through this torture ‘again’. I felt like I really needed a shield to block out everything that I did not want to get close to me. Though I wondered if such a shield existed that could block regret. It seemed stupid, but I felt I could weave such a shield into reality.

I drew deep and hard from my soul, I could feel a cool and equally hot feeling coming from the base of my spine as my fingers glowed the dark blue I had gotten so accustomed to for the past few months. I did not really know how I was able to write the weave for shield, but the next thing I knew was that I was taking a deep breath of relief as the feelings of nausea and pain disappeared.

My formerly dim eyes began to regain color to them as they were drawn to an intense sight that shook me to my very bones. Scores of vampires and dark elves were all collapsed in various positions, their skin completely pale and their bodies dried to a husk, almost as if they were all drained of every organ and blood within their body.

I shuddered as once more I felt the gripping chill of fright as it invaded my bones. A whole lot of them were still alive and slowly dying right in front of me. It was such a peculiar sight, and I doubted if I had seen something like this when I still had my memories.

I was lost in my own world and was still reeling from the intense shock of another near death experience before I heard Soren’s voice in my head.

“Save them!!”

He spoke with such urgency that I could not help but be jolted out of the stupor I now found myself ln. But even then I still had no idea how to save them. I silently posed this question to Soren, who I might add was surprisingly, or not so surprisingly absent. His reply however made me take notice of something that was blatantly staring me right in the face.

“Look at your arm!” his tone of urgency was even more intense this time, but it was enough driving force for me to whip my head to my arm so fast I though I was going to wring it off.

My left arm was glowing, that much was established. But what really drew my attention was the rune I had no memory of weaving. I was pretty sure this was the rune for (shield). I did not remember weaving it, but it was quite obviously what saved my life. Without much time to spare, I went around inscribing the rune on the body of every vampire and dark elf in my path.

“Are you stupid? Its going to take forever if you do it one at a time, not to mention they would all be dead by then.”

Unlike our previous conversations where Soren’s criticism of me would only end making me angry and frustrated, this time I was panicked and in a frenzy.

I had no idea what method to use to quickly weave the (shield) rune on every single vampire and dark elf here. Granted this was just a small part of our forces, but the fact that the leaders were also on the ground and dying slowly made for an impressive amount of pressure on me. With Soren being the only person I could turn to for guidance at this point in time, I had no choice but to ask him.

“How?”

My voice was still shaky and my nervousness was so palpable that I was sure to have infected people with it, that is, if any of my allies were not slowly dying at my feet at this very moment.

Soren’s voice seemed to have dropped in intensity as he began to give me an explanation I have never heard or even imagined before.

“The art of weaving is not as straight forward as you think it is Kael. True weaving is powered by emotion and built on intention. You have to feel your runes and weave them with the intention you have in mind. In other words if you want it bad enough, you have to will it into existence. There’s great power in the mysteries of will power, harness it and there’s little in this world that you would not he able to achieve.

Focus.”

His words reverberated through my entire body and deep within the deepest corner of my soul. I did not have the time to ponder on the profoundness of his words, so I just chose to act instead.

I placed my hands on the ground and pushed with all of my might. The dark blue glow grew so intense it was almost midnight black, I felt a rapid drain of both my mental and soul energy as the rune for (shield) appeared beneath me.

But this rune was bigger than anything I have ever done by a wide margin. It was tens of meters long and wide. It stretched to accommodate and cover the fallen bodies of all the vampires and dark elves in my immediate vicinity.

And as the weave came into existence I gave it my all and willed another rune into existence, it was not as large as the first but it was big enough for what I had in mind. (Repel) was weaved over the previous rune in deep flowing script. And just like Soren had said, I poured all of my intentions, emotions and will into the runes.

The feeling was so intense that I felt like i was being sucked into the weaves themselves. My skin was pulled taught against my bones, my heart began to beat faster almost to the point of being considered alive. Blood began to seep from the corner of my eye lids, nose and ears. I could not see it, but as it dropped unto the runes beneath me, that dark blue color of my soul power gave an even deeper glow with smudges of red intertwined within it. I felt a stronger pull and I could not help but cough out thick globs of blood as this weaving began to take a toll on me.

I could feel myself begin to loose consciousness, but I forced myself to open my eyes and watched as the black fog that had spread to cover most of the battlefield began roil and shift as it was gathered around a pale blue dome that stretched for almost a thousand meters around, covering and nullifying the spread of the black fog.

Even more peculiar was the fact was that I could see vestiges of it floating up and out of the bodies of the vampire and dark elves around me, the fog gathered forming another layer over the blue dome obscuring the view of everyone both inside and outside the dome.

By now most of the vampires and dark elves were already on their feet and getting their body back under their control. However countless others were still unmoving, I knew then that they were all dead and I was to late to save them.

I couldn’t help the deep sense of loss I felt at that moment, it seems like every day that passes makes me form deeper bonds and connections with this people. Regardless of how I saw it, I was stuck with them so loving and caring for them was something inevitable. Maybe seeing them lying there on the ground dead, never to rise again left me with such a deep ache I felt like dying that instant.

I felt tears mingle in with my blood as it fell on top of the rune. The dome above me gave a dull pulse as it flashed dimly. Then the black fog that had clung around its entire frame began to move back in the direction it came from with even greater speed.

It was a really strange thing to watch, the fog flowed into our midst when it was first used against us, but this time as it was repeled it shot towards its casters like it was some sort of arrow shot from a pressured bow string. It was rapidly approaching the Nagas, werewolves and humans who had taken the opportunity to move closer when we were all under the attack of that fog, from where I was standing I could see someone garbed in a shiny black armor rapidly moving his hands up and down as the fog rapidly dispersed before it got to their group of people.

Of course even with all of his efforts, he was not able to completely disperse the entire black fog due to the speed at which it was moving. Their entire first line was reduced to a pile of dust in seconds Including the person who was rapidly moving his hands. As soon as he died the fog suddenly disappeared.

I took my hands off my runes and fell back in exhaustion, I felt someone catch me and helped me back to my feet. I turned and saw it was actually Xaseah with her gun still slung over her shoulder, I could not read the look on her face as her gaze was anywhere else but on me. I might hate the guts on this lady, but at the moment I was grateful for her help.

The dome began to peel and fade away like the plaster of an old house, the only reason I was able to make a weave like this was because I had to push myself way past my limit. Even my emotions were not stable enough during the process of maintaining its effects. It was why I was hit so hard by grief, I felt remorse for the deaths around me, but not to the point of actually crying. Even now my emotions were all over the place and I found it really hard to concentrate on anything but the burning anger I was currently feeling.

“Good job brother, but its not over yet.” I heard Soren’s voice, but this time he was right beside me. I could not muster the strength to ask him were he was for the entire duration of the fogs attack.

I turned my gaze to the Nagas that had stopped advancing, while the dome was still visible it was also rapidly deteriorating and quite visibly too. It seems the deaths of their comrades and the fact that the dome was still standing created some sort of deterrence and stopped them from advancing.

If I was in their shoes, I would be careful. I had no ideas what other trump cards my enemies had so I wouldn’t be careless especially when they had the numbers advantage over me. But speaking of numbers I could not help but notice again how few in numbers our enemies actually were.

Of course it did not make them any less dangerous, but no matter how I looked at it they were to few in numbers to really cause any damage to us. It was not probable that they would have such few people come face us even though they had the advantage of magic on their side. This was nothing less than suicide.

“Formations at the ready!” Mars's voice resounded through the air as he gathered what was left of their forces. They all arranged themselves in a neat and orderly fashion in front of me with their weapons prepared for engagement. Even with my exhaustion I thought they looked really cool.

Mars walked around the ranks and files keeping his gaze on the Nagas who were still very much an unspoken threat. Then he flew shakily into the air until he was above me, then he dropped down to his knees bowing before me. Then he said.

“What are your orders my lord.”

Such deference and regard would seem really pleasing to any other idiot who had my position. But from where I was standing the Nagas could see us clearly, Mars bowing showed them who was in charge here, it gave them a target to aim for. I could not help but frown, even after I save his life Mars was still trying to play games and politics with me.

I felt disgusted, but there was nothing I could really do about it for the moment. I felt Soren growl beside me, I felt his annoyance through our bond and I knew how very much he would have loved to tear Mars to pieces at that very moment. But we had work to do.

At this moment there was only one order I was capable of giving, we were way past the point of no return. There was no version of this scenario where a lot of people don’t end up dead on both sides. But regardless I was determined to make sure I completely wipe out my opponents.

Of course they could have set a trap somewhere for us, considering their numbers don’t add up. But I was done being calculative, I just wanted to rip them apart. I raised my weakened voice as best as I could and let out a bellow I made sure my soldiers and our enemies would never for get.

“CHARGE!!!!”.