“Cyäegha. A name, repeated endlessly from the Aether beyond. It whispers in the back of my mind, even as I returned to my weak and fragile body. Cyäegha, the dark that waits.”

Chapter 70

From his outstretched hand, the spell matrix flared green and sailed forward. The undead bird was biting and clawing at the glowing dome. Half its head was forced into the opening and its claws were relentless raking the stone, attempting to find its footing and force more power into its attack.

The glowing green spell spread out as it left Wil’s outstretched hand, like a fisherman casting a net out into the sea.

The web covered the entire monstrosity and all the undead clinging to its rotting flesh, in its sickly green glow.

When web reached the apex of its arc, the construct solidified and the sticky green net coalesced in the air, falling almost gently over the bird as it struggled to move forward onto the wall.

The web struck the flying undead, completely engulfing it in a viscous green substance that instantly adhered to its body. The undead lost its foot as its legs were trapped near its body, and it fell backwards.

Unable to fly it plummeted down below silently. It tried to shriek its rage, but the spell sealed its beak shut. It was unable to cry as it trashed and shook violently in its attempt to free itself.

It crashed heavily to the ground, trapping dozens of the undead riding it beneath its bulk. Many more were trapped under the webbing as well, unable to escape. When it struck the ground, it buried zombies and other marching undead under its massive weight.

Before he could celebrate, Wil saw his mage companion drop her shield and dash forward as well. A bright crimson flame hovered over her hand.

Leaping atop the battlement, she hurled the flame downwards, striking the struggling undead bird as it writhed on the ground, attempting to escape the sticky netting.

The spell engulfed the web in a bonfire of flames, completely obscuring the undead bird and anything unfortunate to be near it in a bright blaze.

The size of the fire caught Wil off-guard. He had read that the webbing was flammable, but it failed to mention that it burned like lamp oil. It made dry tinder look like damp forest undergrowth in comparison.

The webbing was soon burned away, but the damage to the undead had already been done. A smoldering burnt corpse twitched on the ground, the fire had taken this particular flying undead out of the fight.

His mage companion swaggered back towards him, a smug look on her face.

“Nice bit of casting you did there, but you need to remember to finish the job.” She said as she walked. Wil was about to respond when he saw a large, Rank 2 Ghoul leap from through the hole the bird had left in the barrier.

“Look out!” Wil screamed, but he could see that she would not be able to respond in time. The world seemed to slow to a crawl as he summoned his Mana.

He could see her slowly turn around to look behind her, as the large rotting undead ghouls sprang towards her, its sharp claws raised Its mouth was open in a piecing scream. Its putrid fangs ready to pierce her flesh and its decaying, blackened tongue already savoring the taste of living blood.

Without hesitation, Wil cast ‘misty step’, using his remaining Tier 2 spell in a desperate attempt to protect a person whose name he didn’t even know, a stranger. He drove his Mana to form the white mist around him as he focused all his concentration on the location behind her.

His Mana responded to his desperate need, His body rapidly turned to mist, and his vision narrowed. It felt as if the space between where he was, and where he wanted to go, shrank.

He took a single step forward as his sight turned completely white, as if he were in a deep fog. An eyeblink later, the fog cleared, and he was at his chosen destination, directly in the path of the howling ghoul.

The Ghoul reacted to his appearance quicker than Wil thought possible. It shifted its red eyes away from the mage behind him to stare directly at him.

With only a few feet of distance to separate them, Wil threw his hands up in the air, hurling all his remaining Mana into creating a shield in front of him. With a force nearly as strong at the attack Garman had given, the ghoul slammed into his shield.

With a yell, Wil forced the barrier to hold as he skidded backwards. The shield flared a brilliant white and the air filled with the smell of ozone.

The Ghoul was frenzied by the living human just in front of it. It could smell the scent of its sweet flesh, taste it on its tongue. It scratched and clawed at the white shield, desperate to close the distance.

The shield held, but Wil was pushed back again by the sheer strength of the Rank 2 ghoul. As a Rank 3, Wil should be able to overpower it, but the shield was draining his Mana. He would need to drop it completely to redirect his power to enhance his limbs if he wanted to compete in strength with the Ghoul.

Wil struggled to repel the undead when a bright blaze of crimson light flashed in the darkness. An intense heat seared the air next to his head before it engulfed the frenzied Ghoul’s face.

In an instant, the now headless Ghoul stumbled and fell heavily onto the ground, steam rising from the cauterized wound on its neck.

Shocked by the sudden attack, Wil dropped his shield and spun around. The mage he had shielded was standing there, her hand still raised as the Tier 2 spell matrix for ‘scorching ray’ faded.

“Thanks for the assist.” She said, lowering her hand.

“Same to you.” Wil replied, making his way back towards the clerics to resume their post of defending them.

The battle had devolved into an all-out brawl on top of the wall. The wards were failing along the mile’s length of fortification, and the large, flying undead were wreaking havoc on the defenders. Rank 1 undead would leap from the creature’s backs, falling amongst the defenders.

The large birds were wheeling and swooping down from above, biting with their black and rotten beaks, grasping the living with their claws to carry them over the wall, before dropping them to their deaths below.

From his position, Wil could see thousands, if not tens of thousands of undead were climbing the grey stone walls. An endless tide of death that the wards could never hope to repel. Everywhere he looked, men and women fought the undead horde.

The living held the advantage of having higher Ranks, but the undead were never ending. It was a war of attrition that the living was losing.

The Night was filled with the howling and screeching of the undead, the yells and furious cursing of the living, and the screams of the dying.

Wil and his mage companion, whose name he still hadn’t learned, threw up their barriers of Mana to protect the praying clerics behind them. They stood back-to-back, their shields sizzled and cracked as they repelled more of the undead.

It was chaos, worse than anything he had ever experienced before. Even Whitewater could not compare to what he was seeing. The horror of the undead as they killed and feasted, the screams of the still living as they were consumed alive.

And through it all, Wil could feel the divine presence of the goddess flowing through the Altar behind him. The sheer amount of divine mana he felt flowing through the clerics and the wards beneath his feet was more than equal to what he felt coming from the Lich.

He couldn’t understand why the wards were failing if so much power was available. It was almost as if the defenders wanted the wards to fail…

With that thought, Wil turned to look at the fortifications. He opened his mind’s eye, seeing the flow of divine mana as it left the altar through the wards below, before surging to a single point.

He pulled on his Mana, filling his body with the magic. The more he channeled, the better his vision became. He looked down the length of the fortifications to a subdued blue glow. Lines of power ran along the grey stone to this point.

Standing in the center of the azure light, suffused with a divine aura, stood an old woman. She was clutching a necklace, with the symbol of the goddess dangling from its length. She was deep in prayer, and Wil could feel the power she had.

She was connected to each of the altars, their power now belonged to her.

When he saw her, he connected the pieces, like a jigsaw puzzle whose picture he could finally see. This entire battle, the failing wards, the living slowly being driven back, it was a trap!