Chương 22: A Mana Zone Situation

Elizabeth's jaw set.

"This situation is exactly why she gave it to me," she said.

"To use when it matters. It matters now." Silence hung for a heartbeat. Yara let out a sound that was half sigh, half growl.

"One chance," she said.

"You open, you link, and if Ivan can truly hurt him, we go in immediately. We hit the General as hard as we can, then we run. Marcus, if she drops, you go to her first. Gareth, stay glued to me. Leo, cover the tree line. Rys–" Rys bared her teeth.

"I'll keep them from bolting back into the yard. Go." Elizabeth's shoulders dropped a fraction. Her grip on the staff went white at the knuckles, but she planted the butt of it in the dirt between them and turned to Ivan.

"Ready, scribe?" she asked.

"Not even slightly," Ivan said.

"Go ahead." She gripped his forearm." [Mana Zone]," she said. The air thickened. Ivan felt it like pressure building behind his eyes; it was dense and heavy. Mana that had been distant background noise rushed closer, drawn into the space around Elizabeth's staff. Threads of faint light lifted from stones, from his own skin, from the very air, and coiled toward the ring at the top. The world within a circle about thirty meters across went a shade sharper. Outside that, everything looked slightly duller.

"Don't move too far from me," Elizabeth warned the group.

"If you step out of the field, you lose the boost and I lose track of you."

"Then how will I figh-" She squeezed Ivan's arm.

"Link," she said. He felt the channel snap into place. It wasn't dump‑everything‑into‑him raw. It was worse and better. Elizabeth went and opened a conduit from the Zone into her core, then set him on the far end of that line. Mana flowed through her, shaped by her Class, and then into him in a steady, surging river. Ivan flinched, letting out an odd sound. For the first time in his life, he felt overcharged.

"Oh," he said.

"This feels… great. What's this?" A tiny, more sensible part of his brain whispered that having this much power with no safety net was a very bad idea. The rest of him was too busy enjoying not scraping the bottom of the barrel for once.

"Don't enjoy it too much," Elizabeth said with a strained smile.

"You've got maybe a minute before I pass out or something important tears." He didn't waste it. He closed his eyes for half a second and reached back into ten years of scribbling. Old circuits rose up like they were written on the inside of his skull.

"Can you get us up?" he asked.

"Yes," she said.

"Hold on." Space folded. The ground dropped away under his boots without actually moving. One moment he stood at the trench. The next, he and Elizabeth stood ten meters up and a little to the side of where the General battled Slime and Dawn. A flat, invisible plane of bent space supported their feet. The wind hit his face. The field's shimmer followed them, keeping Yara and the others inside its edge.

"Don't step off," Elizabeth said.

"I'm not catching you."

"I'll appreciate it if you do," Ivan said. Ivan wasn't going to waste this chance. He'd made the best of this day already, but he'd try it one last time. Somewhere beyond the sheds, he heard Rys shouting in Old Vas and the answering stamp of many feet crashing through underbrush. At least the ones whose locks he'd cracked were running. That had to count for something. He rolled his shoulders and positioned himself for throwing. Then he raised his hand. Lightning began to rain down from the sky.

He traced [Lightning Spear] three times in rapid succession, fed each pattern with the greedy, roaring power now available, and hurled them down. The first spear struck a glob of Slime that had wrapped halfway around the General's leg. Electricity blew the ooze apart in sizzling chunks, and the blast knocked the man half a step off rhythm. The second spear cracked a glowing chain node on the General's chest. The third slammed into the ground at his feet and turned packed dirt into a glassy crater.

Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site. The General staggered. Just a step, but it was enough for Ivan to throw five more spears at his head. He dodged one and blocked two with his armor. The rest hit. His hair sizzled, and the sound he made was more snarl than grumble.

"You…!" The General's head snapped up.

"You damned bug!!" He kicked off the ground and shot toward Ivan. Elizabeth threw up a barrier on instinct, but Yara and Gareth were already moving. They caught him mid-air and brought their blades down on the weakened ward lines in his armor. Ivan felt the mana cost like a wrench. The Zone refilled him faster than he could have on his own, but it wasn't free. His nerves hummed.

"Lightning Mage? That wasn't too bad. More," Elizabeth said, eyes on the ground. Her hands moved, tugging at space itself. Slavers who tried to flee toward the trees found the distance stretching, their steps taking them nowhere. He listened. He swung his hand toward a tower where a mage had been charging a spell Ivan did not want finished and lobbed a tight cluster of [Fireball] s at its base, then shoved the blast with a couple of [Minor Force] bursts.

Overkill, maybe, but there were no prizes for efficient casting tonight. The explosion and shove knocked the structure sideways. It toppled out of the Zone and into the Slime. The ooze happily ate the debris, and the mage with it.

"H-huh?" Elizabeth turned to him.

"Fire and Force too…?" Gareth stared up briefly between blocks.

"How is he doing that?!" he shouted.

"Ask later!" Yara snapped, slamming her sword into the General's side again. Ivan kept going. When he saw an opening, he dropped a [Fireball] straight onto the General's head. The man flinched more from the annoyance than the pain, but that was enough to throw his timing off. Ivan grimaced and threw more. He stopped counting after the third; at this point, his job was less about hurting him and more about destroying that armor. That'd help the knights a lot.

Ivan had fancier spells that might help more, but he didn't trust them here. Too many allies were on the ground. Without them keeping the General busy, the man would have leaped up and killed him already. Ivan kept switching from one enemy to the other. Fire to drive slavers away from the treeline and into the Slime's path, burning cloaks of Iron Chain Mages who wanted to meddle. Lightning to overload any visible ward node on the General's armor.

Small, sharp [Minor Force] bursts to knock loose footing when someone tried something brave in the wrong place. Every cast chewed mana. Every breath Elizabeth took pulled more in and handed it to him. The Slime shrank under the combined abuse but took a lot of Chain bodies with it. The yard emptied of anything that wanted to live. The General was no longer untouched. His armor smoked in a few places. One gauntlet hung a little loose where acid had eaten at the straps.

Blood stained his beard at the corner of his mouth. He still moved with lethal force.

"This is it," Elizabeth said through clenched teeth.

"I've got one more big pull in me." Ivan nodded. He set up one last circuit. [Chain Lightning], cut down to three jumps and pushed as hard as he dared.

"On my mark!" he called.

"Gareth, hit his sword. Yara, go for the neck." He didn't know if they heard him. He cast anyway. The bolt came down like a falling star. It hit the General's raised blade, turned it into a conductor, and ran straight through his arms and chest. With that much Mana packed into the spell, the half‑broken ward node on his armor blew out in a flash. For a heartbeat, all his protections went dark. Yara did not waste that moment. She stepped in and swung. Her blade carved across his exposed throat.

Metal gave, flesh opened, and his head did not quite come off but hung at an angle no living spine tolerated.

"What the–!" Yara swung again. The General dropped. His sword slipped from limp fingers and hit the ground point‑first, quivering. The Slime rolled toward the fresh meat on instinct. Elizabeth cursed, snapped a spatial fold up between it and the body like a glass wall, and let it smack harmlessly against warped space.

"Done," she gasped. She closed the Zone. Mana snapped back to normal. Ivan's borrowed river cut off. His own core screamed as the sudden vacuum registered. He swayed. Elizabeth's grip on his forearm tightened, but her legs finally gave out and the platform sagged faster than she meant it to. They hit dirt in a half‑controlled tumble. Ivan rolled once and came up sitting, rubbing the back of his head.

Elizabeth landed half on top of him, one hand braced against his chest, her knees awkwardly trapped between his legs and her face suddenly too close. They froze like that for one stupid second. Then Elizabeth blinked, went pink, and scrambled upright so fast her robe twisted around one knee. She yanked it straight and cleared her throat.

"Hope you aren't hurt…" System messages flashed in Ivan's vision. [You have slain a Human (Slaver) – Level 35!] [You have slain a Human (Slaver) – Level 33!] [You have slain a Human (Slaver) – Level 43!] [You have slain a Human (Slaver) – Level 46!] [You have slain a Human (Slaver) – Level 39!] … [You have assisted in slaying Iron Chain General (Swordsmaster) – Level 140] [Enormous EXP gained.] [Human (F) has leveled up!] [Human (F) has leveled up!] [Human (F) has leveled up!] …

[Human (F) has reached Level 47!] [Inscriber of Principles has leveled up!] [Inscriber of Principles has leveled up!] [Inscriber of Principles has leveled up!] … [Inscriber of Principles has reached level 47!] He didn't have the focus to read all of them. The numbers could wait. Yara stood over the General's corpse, chest heaving, blood on her sword and cheek. Gareth limped to her side, blade still ready in case the man had some last trick. He stayed down.

In the distance, between the trees, Leo's shout carried as he urged the last of the freed slaves farther into the dark. Gareth looked from the fallen General to Ivan, to Elizabeth, and back.

"That," he said roughly, "was not a Level fifteen." Ivan laughed once, hoarse and tired.

"Paperwork error," he said.

"It happens." Then his legs gave up, and he sat down hard before the dirt could come up to meet him on its own. Something flickered at the edge of his vision. [You have drawn the eyes of greater beings.] [Some are displeased. Some are amused. Some are… curious.]