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Of Arms and Arcane: Chapter 191
🕑 Added 2025-02-02 11:06:03 +0000 UTCThe high-pitched dings of swords striking the defensive array on the keep’s door continue as three other mages and I, who are versed in array magic, spend mana and concentration on maintaining the defensive array.
As for the other mages, they had gone to the turrets on the upper levels of the keep to support the troops by raining down spells on the intruders at the front and back gates. But at the rate we were going, we were going to run out of mana before the two berserk knights hacking away at the keep’s door ran out of whatever was powering their monstrous strength that could take on defensive arrays.
“Dad, at this rate, I don’t think we can hold out.” I shouted at Dad as I saw him come out of his office holding a large ornate amulet.
“Luke, send a message to the mages above to stay away until we say it is safe. But before that, take off your glove,” Dad said as he pulled a needle out of the ornate amulet.
“What's that?” I asked Dad while taking off my glove and eyeing the needle.
“This is the control amulet for the Last Stand array for this room. I will need a drop of all of your blood to exclude you as one of the array’s targets.” Dad announced to me and the three other mages. He then leaned into me and whispered, “You may need to use ‘that’, there is no holding back if we want to live.”
Understanding what Dad was talking about, I nodded. It seems like Pirmal Aura will be having its debut appearance.
When a drop of all our blood was collected and dripped into a hole in the array control amulet, Dad told the mages to get to an advantageous position to support as Dad and I readied ourselves.
The seconds passed as the mana crystal powering the door’s defensive array grew ever dimmer as it struggled to maintain power for a defensive array that was not only being drained with every blow but degraded at the same time. Now that I am seeing the degradation of the array firsthand, I can hardly blame the fort’s gates for falling so fast due to there being no mage on standby to at least slow down the damage to the defensive arrays.
As for how the arrays actually got damaged, I doubt any aura-powered knight can do that, even if they had the will and a can-do attitude, which means that all that destructive power most likely comes from those glowing swords those few knights were whooping our asses with.
Just as I thought if I could get my hands on one of those swords if I managed to get out of this alive, the array gave out before the mana crystal was drained of power, and we heard the reverberating DONG of the enemy’s sword hitting the keep’s heavy metal door.
Impact after impact rained upon the metal door until finally, like an old-fashioned can opener, the tip of a sword punctured the six-inch-thick metal door and started prying it apart.
As a delaying action, one of the mages sent a stream of fire through the created hole, but from the shimmer on the surface of the berserk knight's armor I saw when the flames abated, I could tell that their armor's enchantment nullified the flames.
It seems that this will require more force to penetrate that armor. As the two berserk knights took turns widening the gap in the metal door, I timed the instances between blows and jabbed my spear out of the hole they made. However, the hole was too obvious an attack vector, allowing them to dodge out of the way of the spear easily and almost had my spear cut off.
I decided then to save my strength and just wait for them to get through the door before I do anything.
They soon managed to cut their way down the door and cut the bolt holding it closed. At that moment, there was silence for a few tense seconds before one of the berserk knights kicked the door open while the other charged in. The berserk knight who kicked down the door followed shortly after.
When both knights were well beyond the keep’s entrance, Dad held up the array control and released his mana into it. The moment he did that, the floor and walls lit up with the magical lines, forming multiple arrays. From the floor, blue translucent chains of mana and tentacles of earth rose up to restrain the two berserk knights.
As the two knights tried and failed to dodge the forest of mana chains and earth tentacles, the arrays on the walls started to glow brighter, each with the color of a different element. But despite being bound by physical and magical means, the two berserk knights powered forward as they thrashed, hacked, and slashed away at the array’s restraints like they were wild beasts tearing through a hunter’s net.
But their advance was swiftly put to a stop when the arrays on the walls started pelting the two knights with different elemental spells. This forced them to stand their ground and use their glowing swords to cut down the incoming spells, but as they stood their ground, the restraints that they had been ripping away and powering through started piling up on their bodies, making it harder for them to move.
While this was going on, we just stood ready to spring into action. We could have shot our own spells or charged in and tried to cut down the berserk knights, but that would have been counterproductive to the Last Stand array due to us having different mana signatures from the array. Had I cast a spell to try and blow up the berserk knight, my spell would have hit the restraints first, damaging the restraints binding the two knights, and if I had charged into melee, I would have been caught in friendly fire from the arrays. Despite giving our blood to the array control amulet to recognize us as friendly, that just meant that the arrays would not target us. We could very much be affected by splash damage.
A few seconds into the bombardment, the two knights failed to cut down quite a few spells, and I could see the enchantments on their armor start to sputter and fail. But before that happened, one of the berserk knights seemed to have an idea.
“Cover me!” one of them shouted to the other. Disregarding his defense, he stabbed his sword into the cobblestone floor and dragged his glowing sword through the floor as he slowly advanced toward us. The other knight did not hesitate to jump in front of the knight dragging his sword, cutting down spells, and putting his body in the way of the other knight.
Around five paces in, the floor array started to flicker, and as I poured mana into my eyes and looked at the floor array, I could see the floor array unraveling with every step they took. I am sure the other mages with me saw the same thing as we started to panic and dropped to the floor to connect to the array and try and repair it. “Dad! Make the array target the rear knight!”
Dad shook his head. “It does not have that function. Prepare yourself. It looks like we really are going to have to fight for our lives.”
