The first wave of this siege was much like the last one. Enemy numbers had been much-reduced by the ocean itself, and then further weakened by the underwater traps Heluna and the other sailors had devised to harden their defenses. As such, they faced basically the same sort of army as before.

Water and Poison Elementals had handled the dangers and emerged from the surf undaunted. The shimmering orange-red Malum weathered the natural underwater hazards the best, their burly forms enduring the environment, and their gelatinous forms being unattractive to the sireneliana as food, but they had been clearly hammered hard by the underwater mines, their large forms making them easy prey for those traps. The other Conceptual that endured the dangers was the Tahul, who were semi-transparent ghostlike spirits. They could barely swim even by Infernal Horde standards, but their unusual jerky movements let them evade the traps with much more ease than their larger and more ponderous counterparts.

This time, though, there were captains among them. As the first elementals were emerging onto the beach, the heads of three giant Malum broke the surface a few yards farther out. Shortly after, two giant Tahul jittered their way out of the waves to join them as well.

Kaldalis easily fell back into the gameplay loop that he’d engaged in before. He charged into danger headfirst and abused every tool at his disposal to get out alive. Using Sweeping Strikes, he grabbed as many foes as he could, leaning on his combat experience to duck and weave through everything they threw at him. Once the whole siege wave was on him, he activated Jump, launching himself up the beach like a sand flea. The enemies were forced to run parallel to the town wall, letting Garyung and a few of the other tanks gather the monsters they wanted out of Kaldalis’s train like they were filling their plate at a buffet.

And then it was out into the ocean, switching to his fishing pole and diving back into the waves, dragging the monsters back out to sea. The Infernal Horde dropped behind him, and he circled and surfaced intermittently to watch the shore until the foes there were handled, and his friends were ready for another wave.

For their part, the tanks on the beach went as hard as they could. As usual, Garyung went above and beyond, grabbing the larger Malum Captains whenever he had the opportunity, while the other tanks collected as many foes as they could on every pass. Kaldalis feared that they might overload themselves and bring the whole system crashing down, but the assembled adventurers were pushing themselves to the limit to keep up. It seemed like every time Kaldalis went up, Ess was visibly chugging down an Ire Potion to keep her attack stat as high as possible, with Reno right beside her, always the first to engage with the next enemy once the tank established a hold of it. Everyone was working as hard as possible to keep the situation under control.

And for good reason. Despite Kaldalis’s wishes and warnings, the PCs weren’t alone on the beach.

Now that the siege was in full swing, it was apparent that the majority of the adventurers had gone to the jungle-side gate, presumably to be ready to handle another Abstract on that front. But it meant that the numbers on the beachside were thin. Either through necessity or Garyung’s abundance of confidence, the NPCs who had responded to the call to defend the town were fighting here, too.

Heluna was among them, fighting with the same effort and zeal as Reno and Ess.

Kaldalis wanted to object. He wanted to warn her away - or even order her away - but he knew that it would be a useless effort. He couldn’t stop for long enough to have a proper discussion with Garyung about the ethics and tactics of fielding the NPCs in battle without the entire Infernal Horde siege catching up to him halfway through. And he felt like his relationship with Heluna was still too new and undefined for him to predict her reaction if he tried to assert authority over her. Sure, she might obey him and back off to safety just for his peace of mind, but she also might think that his interest in her well-being was a show of romance, and fight all the harder to help him in return.

The only real option was to win.

Things went surprisingly smooth. The three Malum Captains were dealt with pretty quickly, with Garyung grabbing one every pass, and their abilities being known to the defenders, ample use of Kaia’s Flicker kept them all safe.

However, the Tahul Captains presented some interesting challenges for the defenders. The multicolored spirits had a telegraphed cone attack of rainbow light, and while that was only the Tank’s problem for the low-level versions, the Captains would spin wildly before using it, eventually blasting a random direction.

Kaldalis wanted to advise that a tank should handle the Tahul Captains alone, and let archers chip them down from a distance, but he couldn’t very well impart that advice on the run. Instead, Garyung handled it by pulling the mob away from the other tanking groups, and had everyone Flicker when the monster began to spin, and then run out, as the Spins happened on about half of Flicker’s cooldown. It was a risky strategy. If the timers didn’t line up, people would be in danger, and if someone flickered too soon, they might pop back in to a world of hurt. But it was working for now. And the random nature of the attack meant that even if something went wrong, it was possible that it wouldn’t hit anyone who couldn’t take it.

Until Kaldalis came back through the beach and he saw disaster strike right in front of him.

The first of the two Tahul Captains died, and Garyung seemed intent on pulling the next one to get all the big enemies out of the way before clearing the rest. Kaldalis was about to call out a warning to make sure that everyone’s Flicker cooldown would be lined up properly before fully engaging, but he held his tongue. He didn’t want to throw off everyone’s groove for such a sensitive strategy.

And then the monster started to spin right after Garyung established aggro on it. And the overachieving DPS were all right on top of the monster, too close to escape its range if it randomly faced them.

Ess, Reno, and Heluna were right there. Knowing the difference between tank defenses and DPS defenses, if any of them were in the blast, they were as good as dead. What was worse, Reno and Heluna were almost standing shoulder-to-shoulder. If one of them was the eventual target, they were both going to get killed.

Kaldalis activated Nyxlas’s Augment and used it on his Jump cooldown before intervening. There was a split second where Kaldalis had a choice. He could save only one of them. And there was only one correct choice.

He grabbed Heluna around the waist and leaped straight up, taking them both well above the reach of any attacks. She struggled in confusion for a moment before she realized it was Kaldalis and leaned comfortably into his grip. She said something, but it was lost to the roar of the wind around them as they rocketed up into the air from the enhanced jump.

Right below them, a blast of rainbow light smashed the sand.

Heluna was safe, but with them being targeted, it meant that Reno had been hit.

And died.

Kaldalis told himself it was the right choice. Reno would respawn in thirty minutes. Nothing had actually been lost so much as her dignity. And if he’d elected to protect either of the others, Heluna might be gone forever.

“Thanks, hun,” Heluna said at last, when they reached the apex of the jump, and the roar of wind was momentarily stilled.

Kaldalis held her close for a moment, trying not to think about how his decision was going to have consequences. He was going to have to be ready for a confrontation about his relationship with Heluna, and he was going to have to turn it into a confrontation about Reno’s unspoken expectations of him.

When they hit the sand again, Kaldalis didn’t have time for further conversation. Heluna gave him a quick peck on the cheek before rushing to rejoin the fight, and the remaining Invernal Horde forces that he had been kiting were nearly on top of him.

All he could really do was look down at Reno’s scorched body and give a sheepish shrug.

“Uh,” he managed. “Take it easy?”

And then he had to get back to work, running the monsters in circles to keep the whole seige from crashing down on their walls at once.