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37. Eternity Unveil
🕑 Added 2025-03-04 16:55:01 +0000 UTCI weaved through the rain of projectiles, my leathery wings taking minimal damage from their size was angering all the same.
I hissed from the sharp pain but kept on, my eyes and ears wide open on the chaos below.
However, I focused on those skeletal frost dragons above, oblivious to what was above them.
They were pretty rare, just below liches, and like them, they were intelligent. Well, they were far less intelligent, but compared to your average undead, they were clever bastards.
They were extremely dangerous for that alone, and then came their size and powers. But that hadn't stopped me from destroying any who wished to test my mettle.
This time, it was an ambush from me. The two crossbows attached to my chest that were controlled by Groot–who was a better shot–acted like inbuilt gunner turrets.
They fired four blank bolts with Life mana to the right shoulder bones. The dragon roared in pain, to both our delight, as the damaged wing seized up mid-flap.
I screeched at the same time, with my talons wide, gleaming with red and green. I slammed into the undead drake from above at full speed in its flailing fall.
My wingspan was slightly smaller, but my body was far bulkier and heavier; even if it were alive, it wouldn't change that. It only increased the damage as I rammed into its head, tearing it off along with half its neck in a dry snapping sound.
Like that, the eerie blue glow of its empty eye sockets was gone.
'They never look up.' I snorted with disdain as the frost drake's limp body plummeted to the ground, crushing a regiment of felguards. I landed moments later, as I couldn't risk crippling my flight, temporary as it may be.
And I did with a heavy slam at the edge from the heart of the chaos of battle, crushing another felguard. This time, it was under my weight.
Its armor of alien metal folded, bone shattered, and inside exploded from its every orifice as I stomped for good measure with a rumbling bellow.
The dwarf that would have lost his head lifted his head way up and stared dumbly at me from the slit of his tiny horned helmet. It lasted less than a fraction of a second before getting his bearings again.
"Than-thank ya, big guy!" He half stuttered in Common and went right back in. It was a milder reaction for the others around: humans, high elves, and more dwarves.
They stared at me with incredulousness, then relief and joy, before yelling a warcry chorus, swiftly engaging the demons and undead once more. You couldn't afford to be distracted.
And my presence seemed to encourage them and fuel their charge with greater fervor, and I wasn't going to take that from them. Better to die fighting with valor than in choking despair.
I did the same wordlessly, loudly bellowing again at the monsters facing us, saliva flying from my open muzzle at that. My fur was bristled, standing on it, and my fangs bared as I joined the onslaught, my claws wide open to maul any in my range.
But my first target was further away, and I wouldn't charge.
Glaring coldly at the infernal stomping toward us, I didn't wait any longer. I couldn't.
With a mental command, the underground plants burst into motion, and the golem was forced to the ground.
The thorny vines rapidly ripped apart the magical hold of its body as the smaller flaming rocks were flung on the opposite side. The quillboar thorns burned in the process, though.
It didn't kill the infernal–it was a construct, after all–but it was good enough to put it on hold. The smaller abominations in its vicinity and beyond weren't as lucky as my enforced plight.
It was crude, given that I couldn't manipulate several hundred plants simultaneously with perfect fine control in battle; I certainly wasn't skilled enough.
So I didn't focus on those above points, focusing on scale and power alone away from the direct frontline, uncaring for the damage it would cause the plants.
They would die either way, lest it be as purposeful as possible.
With my mana coursing through them from my foot pads, sharp thorns lashed, and roots whipped the ground, destabilizing it effectively. They were faster, stronger, and more resilient, after all.
It caused localized mayhem.
Felhounds were swallowed underground, ghouls were ripped apart, and the larger ones struggled to move and were maimed in the process to varying degrees.
It was only a tiny relief for the Alliance in that tiny part of the battle, however. Inconsequential, to be blunt, an army wasn't something my presence flipped the result on its head—not this one in particular.
But every second gained was a second for Malfurion to set up his trap. Alas, it was merely traps I was setting off as well; each was one-time use, and there were relatively few to what I would have preferred.
I preferred many things, but there was no point in whining.
It wasn't a tactic I was betting on anyway. I was a healer first, and my role was to provide support.
My paws shone a vibrant green and red as I produced shimmering spheres of similar radiance. They floated to desired targets like fireflies, healing allies, and wounded foes from a distance, or if they got in claw range from the mana in them.
Fel fed on Life, but food can be poisonous; it was easy to have devastating results when it was enthusiastically gulped and in my control. It wasn't a mindless life force to parasitize.
It may take time to kill, if at all, those were rather weak in potency, but again, the point was to gain time.
The occasional boots of Life mana stolen by demons did that perfectly. This made them flinch, recoil in pain, or be stunned, saving and giving the opening to their evisceration. Be it from me or a hammer infused with Holy Light.
The undead, in their majority, had their touched parts turned to grey ash, though, stridently screaming as always at any contact. But the Light did the same, targeting the Shadow part that played a role in their motions. Or I guessed, and my assumptions were limited.
I couldn't appreciate their dying howls amid the noise, and the falling green meteorite was just the loudest of the bunch.
As always, battles were loud and extreme. And I have to abhor them for that very reason, among many more.
It was particularly intense now, with both sides throwing heavy artillery, spells from ice to fire from mages, priests, and warlocks, lightning bolts from griffin shamanic riders, cannons, and trebuchets throwing corpses under a hail of bullets.
But I didn't care. My heart was pounding in my chest louder, and it was all I heard beyond the muffled shout as I healed and avoided letting my primal desire to rush onward take hold.
By the ancestors, I wanted to let it go and do exactly that: rush and maul. My body screamed to destroy those unholy horrors, but I knew better, and that would be my death sentence.
I became a bloodwing bat and took to the sky again, and the agonizing process was repeated. Land, heal, kill, heal, retreat, and fly to land again somewhere else in need. And at the fifth relocation, something quickly became irrefutable evidence.
"We're slowly being overwhelmed…' I grimly realized as we lost more and more ground against the literal flood of the Legion and Scourge—the first beyond all else. The corpses were reducing faster than we were culling them.
We were holding for the measure that it was an illusion.
The demons were being summoned without end, one was killed, and ten seemed to fucking pop out of nowhere as replacements. It was Archimonde's doing; it couldn't be anyone else, and I wouldn't fly up to see.
I healed a knight there, shot a bolt in a doomguard's open maw with my crossbow while I impaled another demon with a free paw here, and shifted a wall of vines holding the hundreds of freaks for a few more instant.
Then, I went to the sky as a bat for three seconds to reposition. It was tedious, a rinse-and-repeat process with minor variations.
Frustratingly, that only was that, and it had mediocre results at best. It was hopeless, and the tide never shifted once in our favor. It wasn't like I came to familiarize myself with it.
It only worsened as we progressively reached the Alliance base, with our backpedaling becoming faster and messier with every fallen soldier.
The initial semblance of resistance had dwindled to nothing long ago. We weren't a front of three forces working as one anymore–I doubted it would have changed much and why it wasn't done as I wasn't alone–but it ensured we weren't crushed at once.
I could do much more, but it was only the beginning. I needed to conserve my energy, and it would be asinine, beyond useless, and suicidal.
Continually healing everyone in my vicinity to full health would rapidly suck me dry and sap my focus.
Switching to the offensive to eliminate critical targets, like the infuriating dreadlord who was always out of range or the cowardly lich who constantly teleported, wasn't an option.
It would get me meticulously ripped apart by sheer numbers alone, exactly like what happened to Ursoc so long ago.
I was mighty yet powerless.
I despised this reality as much as I physically could, but the fact remained unchanged. I couldn't do anything beyond never truly engaging and keeping alive as many fighters as I reasonably could.
I wouldn't sacrifice myself for them or become a martyr for anyone.
Ultimately, after what felt like an eternity, the retreat was accomplished, but it wasn't anywhere close to a resounding success.
It was a catastrophic affair, as panic was settling in. Knowing death was coming and facing it were different things.
But the Alliance fought on regardless until the last of the large, rough, heavy wooden gates were closed with a heavy clack.
The demons and undead that had slipped in were destroyed. I saw Lionheart, glowing like a miniature sun, rush at them, hollering about the Light and heretics, but there was only a little satisfaction in my heart.
Everyone behind would die; that was an irrefutable fact. Not everyone managed to get back here fast enough. Many more would share that fate from the sight of the rapidly breaking walls.
But it wasn't time to waste time mourning and feeling guilty; everyone in the Alliance was ready to die for more to live. I didn't share that sentiment with them, but I recognized it.
The enchantment slapped onto them would steal minutes at best from the Burning Legion ground force. And thanks the Bear Lords, the sky was 'calmer.'
A product of the crude–likely, they were made in haste–magical towers spewing Arcane beams and the comparatively weak aerial force to the ground-bound one.
But infernals were always present; their number might be finite, but their ravages weren't, and they were ongoing.
"Ah! Furbolg, what a relief to have you here. Lady Jaina wishes to speak to you!" My ears snapped behind, and my head followed, my eyes meeting that of the paladin I recognized as Halford Wyrmbane.
"Is the escape plan ready then?" I asked as we walked at running speed to wherever he needed me to go.
If the answer was veering too negative, I was going to flee right then. My skin was already crawling in response to the demon lord's approach. It was both too fast and too slow, and the wait was agonizing.
It always was the worst part.
The bastard was playing with us.
"The sorcerers should be ready soon," Halford replied. I was certain there was a frown on his face behind his winged helmet. If there was more doubt or worry, I couldn't really tell by smell alone.
We didn't exchange any more words until he split away, and I was left to my own devices. Finding the sea princess was only a matter of smell.
She was on the side far from anyone else, with her gilded staff in hand, the crystalline tip shining as Arcane mana coiled around her, though she wasn't the greatest source.
Every mage was working in tandem, and their energies were coursing through the ground—a mass teleportation. I had no clue how it was done, but I knew it was what was planned to be done.
"Ohto, we will need your-!" But she was interrupted as the ground shook, nearly stumbling, and the dry snap of the earth echoed across the outpost.
Then, all at once, every tower, wall, and building, be they magical or for regular ranged weaponry, as if the wall suddenly crumbled to sand, the tens of thousands of the Burning Legion and their Scourge slaves came all at once like a tidal wave.
"Shit!" I let out, my eyes locking with Jaina's wide ones with evident panic over her features as she swore something in Common, but it vanished soon after. It remained the same. She just wasn't acting on it.
Yet just as quickly, a domineering presence beyond any I had ever felt exploded forward, and facing us from the atomized barricade was Archimonde himself.
A far too handsome face for a heinous creature of dark blue skin, he had a gloating smirk as he leisurely walked toward us.
The grass died at every step of his hooved feet as the ground turned a pale grey. Each step left larger hoof prints as the demon lord grew to a size dwarfing even me in seconds.
His burning green eyes were onto my glowering ones, staring into my soul, then that of the sorceress to shift right back to me until we were barely ten meters away.
The sheer rancid presence of that monster, the energies he oozed, was enough to make me vomit and retch—collapse on the spot and convulse.
It was foul, ancient, and despicable, anathema to my very biology, and it tried to take my mana from me. It was violating and utterly revolting.
Archimonde was forcing it on me; it wasn't a passive result, and Groot was equally repulsed, his armor over my fur growing thicker in response.
But I didn't let that eredar win. I abhorred and despised this demon's very existence, and as much as I felt my heart constrict and blood leak from my nose from my dying sinuses. I didn't relent.
I glared, growled, and would fight to my very end, inflicting as much pain as possible. For now, I held my ground and pushed myself before the small human sorceress. If she dies, I die.
I also realized something at that moment—an obvious fact of reality I had always been aware of, but only now did it hammer itself.
This was power…
We were minuscule insects to be crushed in front of it, and he was one of many. And he was also an ant to a much greater being. This wasn't even true power.
But it might as well be here. We never had a chance to fight back, and experiencing it firsthand was incomparable to simply acknowledging it in my head minutes ago.
"You dare bare your fangs at me? Hah! Pitiful mut, you are truly the dumb animal that bested my general… what a bizarre beast you are. Bah, you would make for an entertaining circus pet to train. Or an ornamental trinket can be made of your tortured soul if you don't survive. Perhaps a reagent even. I can decide later." He spoke softly in Darnassian, and I felt revulsion and anger like never before, but I was scared in equal amounts.
It was raw, primal fear, but I didn't act blindly. Be that as it may, I was barely holding on. I was huffing loudly and pawing at the ground at the manifestation of Fel before, which made Mannoroth seem utterly feeble.
Groot was preparing what we needed with my mental command—shifting the spores into two thin wooden balls instead of their small bolt casing.
However, I noticed a smell of relief in Jaina amidst the thick mist of terror and dread of her tetanized form, which changed everything.
It was a hope I needed to keep; I was sure that Archimonde could feel the spell and counter it. I just had to make sure he didn't if his arrogance stopped blinding his judgment.
I was going to blind him.
"And you, it is very brave to stand against me and not cower, little human, even with that bear. If only your countrymen had been as bol-" She cut his mocking tirade short, amplifying her voice with magic to drown his venomous one that made my blood boil.
It made everyone I grew to despise and hate appear utterly infantile and petty.
"Is talking all you demons do?" It was sharp and to the point. If I had lesser ears, I wouldn't have noticed the tremor at the end.
But the result was the same. The demon lord's face instantly became a rictus of anger, and it was the perfect opportunity.
"Close your eyes!" I shouted at the maximum I could and shot all of my lunar remaining fungus spores at the piece of demonic shit's mug turning the world into pure blue light, blinding me even through my eyelids.
Archimonde roared in outrage and surprise, but Jaina had caught on, and I heard her tap the but of her staff on the ground. I let the Arcane energy of her magic, along with that of the others, carry me in its current.
Comments
Asura
All caught up thanks for all the chapter’s 👋🔥
Mika Willems
He would definitely "see" it for sure.
TITOO
Archimonde would see to that XD.
Bat
Solar Flare!
Mika Willems
Flashbang to the face, ouch! Op, please nerf.
