Chương 145: Chapter 143: Ward

Still, their shield wall was no slouch either. They didn't threaten us with massive damage, but whenever we ground a Templar down to where a couple clear strikes would have finished them, a Priest in the back raised its blow, the warrior flared black from the inside, and whatever damage we'd spent the last minute carving into it was gone, the monster standing fresh as if the fight had only just begun. Not to mention, whenever this happened, they seemed to get stronger, too.

That part didn't last long — a handful of seconds at best — but by then we'd been driven back a step. And the Priest was already chanting up the next one. We were pouring damage into a wall that healed itself before we could break it, and all of us knew that a fight you couldn't end was a fight that would eventually end you.

I kept trying to find gaps in the ward their backline was putting up, but both my arrows and the ones created by the Wild Hunt had shattered on the magical barrier, regardless of the direction my attacks came from, and thus, I was burning through mana with nothing to show for it.

"They're still untouchable!" Alysanna called from the far flank, her bowstring snapping twice more to no better effect than mine.

"Magic isn't working, either," Cyrus said, falling back behind a pillar with Leona from the opposing magical barrage. Because the Priests were attacking, too, and the beams of pale light coming from their hands were hitting way harder than the blades of the Templars.

"Stop wasting mana on them," Alice said.

"Pressure the melee until something gives." We had no choice but to keep grinding, although I knew that time was not on our side. If we didn't do something about the Priests soon, we'd have to either retreat where we came from, or risk losing the fight. I turned my focus back on the melee enemies, but I didn't give up on probing the backline's defenses, either. From time to time, a Wild Hunt arrow split from my shot, probing their defenses, and that's when it happened.

One of them hit the Priest standing farthest to the back, and to my surprise, it took almost five percent off its health pool.

"Clean hit on a Priest," I called.

"What did you do?" Cyrus asked. It was a randomly timed shot, so I couldn't be sure, and it didn't stagger the cast of the empowering spell it'd just finished on one of the Templars, either. Wait.

"Not sure, but let me try something!" I said. Another Priest, the one nearest to our flank, raised its bowl toward the Templar Verdugo had nearly split in half, and I shot. My arrow had once again hit a barrier, dealing no damage, but then I saw it. Just a moment after impact, the barrier slightly changed for about two seconds before solidifying again. It was barely noticeable, nothing more than a miniscule variance in the way it shimmered, but it was certainly there.

"There's a window," I shouted as I sent a Web Trap out to catch a Templar that flanked Rafael.

"Time it right. Right after they start casting to buff the melee, there's a two second interval where the barrier breaks."

"You're sure?" Rafael, over the grinding crash of his shield against an obsidian rim.

"I'm sure." The proof came on the next cast. A Priest two ranks back lifted its bowl toward a Templar Diego had nearly put down, and I counted it this time — the surge of smoke, the dark running down its arms — and loosed the second before the wall would thin. The arrow that would have shattered a heartbeat earlier punched clean through the Priest's chest, and the Wild Hunt split off a second shaft that curved over the rank and buried itself in the same wound.

The Priest staggered, bled black down its robes, but still finished standing the Templar up, the ward already closed around it.

"Window confirmed!" I called.

"Two seconds, after the very start of every buff. Ranged, on the casts with me. Everyone else, keep the wall busy so they have to keep healing it!" With Alysanna, Cyrus, Somnus, and Leona, we could melt the Priests fast enough if we started using skills. The problem was making sure we weren't spending those skills into a barrier.

"Call the casts," Alice said, ducking under a macuahuitl swing and driving her blade into the Templar's shield arm.

"Everyone else, keep them hurt enough that the Priests have to react."

"Left side low!" Verdugo shouted. He had a Templar pinned against the edge of the formation, axe biting into its shield again and again. Alice and Redcap were helping him force it out of line, turning the thing just enough that it couldn't keep its shield locked with the others. The moment its health dropped into the last quarter, the nearest Priest raised its bowl.

"Left Priest!" I was already drawing as the bowl started to smoke. The first second was useless. I held the arrow back, watching the shimmer around the Priest instead of the creature itself. The barrier flexed, the dark smoke ran down its arm, and then the ward thinned. Now!" My arrow hit first, punching into the Priest's shoulder. Alysanna's followed half a breath later, sinking into its throat.

Cyrus fired a narrow spear of flame that struck the same wound, and Somnus's shadow bolt wrapped around the impact like black wire. The priest was still standing, although the damage was significant. Still, the Templar Verdugo had nearly finished flared from the inside, wounds closing in pulses of dark light. It stepped forward fresh, and its shield slammed into Verdugo's chest hard enough to push him back two steps.

"That's it," Cyrus called.

"Repeat the cycle." The Templars pressed harder after that. Every heal came with that short burst of strength, and because we were deliberately pushing them low to force the Priests to cast, the frontline had to absorb empowered counterattacks again and again. Denxy caught one on his shield and skidded back, boots scraping across the polished stone. Rafael took a hit to the shoulder that lit his health bar yellow before Carmen's heal brought it back up.

Corral blocked two Templars at once, tower shield planted, while Talion kept swearing under his breath and healing him through the gaps. And healing and buffing wasn't the only thing the Priests did, either. Pale beams shot from their hands in thin, straight lines. One clipped Diego across the side and took a third of his health in a single hit. Another struck a pillar behind Leona and carved a smoking groove through the stone, and I hoped that the place would still stand after the fight was over.

The casters started using the columns for cover, stepping out only when a healing cast began, and the whole fight turned into a rhythm of keeping the pressure up, and surviving between the bursts.

"Middle Priest!" Alysanna shouted. This one lifted its bowl toward the Templar hammering Denxy's shield.

"Hold," I said. The ward shimmered.

"Now!" Alysanna used Piercing Shot. I used my own. Cyrus and Leona timed their spells together, fire and arcane light crossing the gap in the same heartbeat, while Somnus's shadow hit low and spread upward through the Priest's robes. This time, the heal seemed weaker than before, restoring roughly half the amount as previous casts, which made it likely that the weaker the Priests were, the less power they had over the Templars.

"That one!" Alice called.

"Keep that one low!" Denxy understood immediately. He shifted his shield, took the next blow at an angle, and bashed the Templar back into the line before it could retreat. Redcap slipped in from the side, spear flashing under the shield rim, and stabbed through the creature's knee. The Templar dropped just enough for Alice to reach its neck. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

Lightning Blade cracked through the hall, and the damage had triggered the healing cycle once again, giving us another opportunity at the previous Priest. Another round of abilities had almost completely finished the job, and the caster didn't even finish the empowerment this time, giving our melee players a chance to finally finish the first Templar. It collapsed, armor and body turning into ash and black dust before vanishing across the floor. One gone.

"Don't get excited," Cyrus warned. Nobody did, but the energy shifted anyway. The wall had broken once, and that made Verdugo go at the others with twice as much enthusiasm as before. He slammed into the left side with Raging Slash, forcing two Templars to raise their shields against him. Mano Roja appeared behind one of them from the shadows, dagger flashing into the back of its knee before he vanished again.

Scale mirrored him from the other side, and suddenly the Templars had to rotate their formation to avoid getting cut apart from behind. That rotation gave us a good angle, and my shot, along with Alysanna's, slipped through the gap between two shields, hitting the wounded middle Priest as it began to cast again.

My Withering Light, Alysanna's Black Arrow, the same ability I'd seen Lorrando use a couple of times, Cyrus's Flame Lance, Leona's Windcutter, and Somnus's Umbral Spear struck so close together that the impacts blended into one burst of black, gold and red. The Priest jerked backward, its bowl flying from its hand. Whatever liquid had been inside spilled across the floor, smoking as it hit the stone.

The Templar it had been trying to heal did not recover, and Denxy bashed down on it with Thousand-Ton Shield while Redcap finished it with a spear through the mask. Every Templar in the hall froze for a fraction of a second. Their shields dipped, their heads turning toward the falling Priest, and the remaining three Priests let out the same harsh chant at the same time.

"They don't like that," Talion said.

"No," Carmen replied, already healing Rafael.

"They really don't." The next pale beams came faster. One hit Corral's shield and exploded outward, washing over him in white-yellow light. Talion caught him with a heal before the damage finished ticking, but the Guardian's health still dropped into orange. Another beam lanced toward me, and I used Quick Step to slide behind a pillar, feeling the heat of it pass where my ribs had been a moment earlier.

"They're speeding up," Cyrus said. The second phase of the fight became messier. The Templars stopped holding the clean shield wall and started attacking in pairs, trying to create openings for the Priests' beams. That made them more dangerous, but also easier to isolate. Adaptive moved from the rear, stepping in when two Templars tried to circle wide, and his sword intercepted one strike while Redcap took the other.

Diego stayed near the casters, exactly where Cyrus had told him to be, and caught a Templar that slipped through with a shoulder charge that bought Leona enough time to retreat. We kept forcing the heals out, and each time, the same rule held true. The Priests were untouchable until they began feeding power into the melee. The second Priest fell after three windows; Alysanna got the last hit with a clean arrow through the center of its bat mask, but she did not waste time celebrating.

She was already turning back toward the melee engagement, breathing hard, face pale in the torchlight but eyes sharp. Whatever Cyrus and his group were doing as training had clearly worked on her. What happened next was a surprise to all of us. The remaining priests started faking casts. The bowl rose, smoke gathered, the barrier shimmered, and half our ranged line fired into nothing as the ward hardened again before the window opened.

"Feints," Somnus said.

"I noticed," I muttered. The Priest raised its bowl again, but I didn't shoot this time, and neither did Alysanna. Cyrus held his spell as well, but Leona fired too early, and her wind blade broke against the barrier. The Priest's head turned toward her, and a counter-beam shot out of its free hand. Mano Roja appeared in front of the Arcanist and dragged her sideways. The beam missed them both by a hair, and carved through the pillar behind them.

"Thank you," Leona looked at the smoking line in the stone.

"Don't mention it, hermana."

"Focus," Alice warned them. The third Priest's real cast came a heartbeat later, feeding power into the Templar Rafael and Verdugo had nearly finished. This time we waited until the smoke touched the warrior's armor.

"Now!" I called. We hit together. The Priest's ward thinned, and the barrage tore into it. The third Priest didn't survive the barrage. It had already been worn thin over two windows, and this time we caught it clean, and the ward never reformed after that. The Priest folded over its own bowl, the clay tumbling from its grip and shattering on the steps, and the dark that spilled out of it ran smoking into the channels and downhill, reminding us what the indents on the ground were supposed to be used for.

The Templar it had been keeping alive faltered for the first time all fight. Verdugo took its head before it could remember how to defend itself, and it came apart into ash and black dust the way the others had, scattering across the flagstones and gone. That left one Priest with its designated Templars, and a handful of others with no one left to mend them.

"Last caster!" I called.

"Burn it down, then the wall's just a wall!" The final Priest had watched its brothers die one at a time, and it had clearly decided not to give us another opportunity.

It stopped feinting, and instead planted itself at the back of the hall, raised its bowl in both hands above its head, and did not level it at any Templar at all — it simply held it there while the smoke pouring off the clay stopped rising and began to gather, folding in on itself into a dense, churning knot of black that grew brighter and denser with every second. Three sigils bloomed in the air over the floor of the hall, and settled over three of us.

Marked for Sacrifice: Alysanna Marked for Sacrifice: Leona Marked for Sacrifice: Mano Roja"That's a Hunt mark," Verdugo barked.

"The cat did this! It picks targets and then it kills them! Get clear, get clear!" But there was no clear to get to. Alysanna tried to break for a pillar and the sigil slid with her, hanging over her head like it was nailed to the air above her skull. Leona froze where she stood. Mano Roja went to vanish into stealth and the mark dragged him back out of it, refusing to be shaken off. Whatever the Priest was building, it had already chosen who it was for. Its hands came down.

I loosed at it the same instant, and so did everyone with a clear line, but the impacts did not make the goblin Priest falter — the gathered knot of black tore loose and dropped onto the three marked targets all at once, a column of pure dark slamming down out of nothing with a sound like the echo of cries coming from down below. I saw three health bars on the raid interface plunge in a single unbroken line, straight down, with nothing between them and the bottom but the half-second it took the spell to finish.

Denxy moved before I did.

"Gravity Pull!" The skill closed around all three of them at once and wrenched, hauling Alysanna, Leona and Mano Roja off their feet and dragging them across the hall into a tight tangle at his boots, together, into one small patch of stone where one specific spell could cover all three.

"Cheat Death!" Desirae's circle flared gold beneath them in the same breath, and the column of dark came down on top of it. Their bars hit zero; all three at once. They should have ended there, but the gold held, refusing to let go, each of them frozen on the other side of death by a single stubborn point of life while the black poured over the circle and broke against it and finally, slowly, drained away into nothing.

And the Priest, having spent everything it had into that one killing stroke, stood at the back of the hall with no ward, no smoke, and nothing left to defend itself.

"It's open! Now!" We did not give it the chance the others had gotten. Arrow of Ash & Flames took it through the eye of its mask, a double Flame Lance from our casters burned a hole through its center, Alice crossed the hall in a streak of lightning and opened it from shoulder to hip, and the last Blood Priest of Xibalba came apart over the ruin of its bowl and did not rise. The Templars died fast after that.

Without a single Priest left to stand them back up, they were only damage sponges, outnumbered and surrounded, and we put them down one after another with grim efficiency, each one bursting into ash and black dust as it fell until there was nothing left standing in the High Temple but the eighteen of us, Lune, and the steady, indifferent torches on the walls.

"That's twice," Leona said, staring at the spot where the dark had been. Her voice wasn't quite steady.

"Twice now this place has tried to put me in the ground."

"And twice it has failed, hermana." Mano Roja reached down and pulled her to her feet.

"Stop keeping count. It is bad for morale."

"That was a split second combo," I told Denxy and Desirae.

"You've done this many times?" Denxy let out a laugh.

"Not once," he said.

"Got the skill yesterday evening. I'm just glad Desirae knew the next step."

"I'm always three steps ahead of you, tin can," the Cleric blinked, then turned serious.

"That was real good." The Guardian nodded.

"Real good, indeed."

"Thank you, guys!" Alysanna said.

"Don't lean on that again," Desirae warned.

"Cheat Death is gone for a long while now. I hope the boss isn't up next."

"One way to figure out," I said.