Defiance of the Fall

Chapter 89: The Final Four

As the days passed the fights got increasingly desperate. Zac had improved quite a bit over the last weeks enabling him to pick up some of slack. But the same thing couldn’t be said about the demons. He was surprised to hear that most of the demons that entered the incursion were actually level 75 already, stuck in the first bottleneck. Their current power was around a level 50, or a level 30 elite. This made Zac realize that levels were only a half-decent indicator for actual power.

The continuous battling was a crucible that let a few warriors push through their limits and improve their skills. There had even been a few warriors who gained a Dao-Seed in their desperation. A nondescript demoness gained the Seed of Tinder, and her fireballs suddenly created waves of death as the flames quickly spread into their surroundings. But it wasn’t enough.

Ogras was truly impressive, both in the number of his kills and his leadership. Over the weeks his role as the leader of the demons went from something born out of fear into willing submission. Unfortunately Ogras didn’t have the inhuman Endurance and Vitality of Zac, and as the fights got more intense the shorter amount of time he was able to keep going.

Initially the two split the fighting 50-50, giving both sufficient rest, but now Zac fought in 75 percent of the waves. In some waves he simply acted as a back-up to the tired Ogras, but the other waves he was forced to almost single-handedly carry.

Just in the last day Zac had been forced to activate the shield on eight of the waves, rapidly draining his crystal reserves. One of the waves he actually decimated with the offensive component after letting everyone rest for a full 59 minutes.

In a perfect world he would have done that in every single wave for half a day, but it, unfortunately, was impossible. The offensive attack took twelve hours to recharge and cost 2500 crystals to use. Even though he had a crystal mine to his name, the actual amount of crystals he had on him wasn’t too large, so he had to use the attack sparingly.

Zac was running quite low on crystals, even though Ogras reluctantly fished out a surprising amount of them a week ago. They were his private hoard he kept as long as possible. Zac regretted that he traded so many of them for Nexus Coins prematurely. He was afraid the whole wave would come in one go instead of the incremental way the wolves had, and splurged on the array and a few offensive options to be able to meet a storm of beasts.

Only afterward did he know that he was wrong, and Ogras was as surprised as he was. It was easy for him to sometimes see the Demons as some omniscient beings, but Ogras was only a youth from a D-Ranked world just like him. There were an endless amount of things he didn’t know the specifics of either.

Zac had even gone to buy back some of what he sold to Calrin, prepared to eat a loss. He was dismayed to learn that Calrin’s reasons for hiking up prices of herbs weren’t actually purely a business tactic. There apparently were restrictions put in place the moment the waves started and the protective shields of the shop were erected. The System stopped the trade of certain items, and crystals were one such thing.

Crystals were used in powering most powerful arrays and war machines, and Calrin said he believed the reason for the embargo was that the system didn’t want people to finish hard quests with money alone. It made sense, as the beast horde quest would become a joke if Zac had unlimited funds. He could just sit on top of the wall and watch as powerful arrays ripped the wolves to shreds. He had seen the terrible power of the arrays the one time he activated the offensive functions. The blasts left nothing alive of that wave.

He already had an advantage from possessing the mine and the knowledge of the demons. Without either the quest would be far harder, but still manageable. Unfortunately the restrictions on trade meant that Zac couldn’t just keep the array active for the last four hordes. His remaining crystals simply wouldn’t be enough.

“Just four more waves,” a voice said next to him as Zac stood on the wall. It was Ogras who looked uncommonly rested. Both he and Zac had taken it somewhat easily the last day even though the waves were getting quite extreme, which was partly why he had been forced to use the shield so much. The two could only assume the finale would be pretty bad from the escalation of difficulty.

Zac grunted in affirmation as he threw rocks at the stragglers of the wave below. These wolves were extremely thin and excelled in speed, so Zac only managed to hit them every ten throws or so. He could have gone down but these wolves were actually quite dangerous. Their claws were razor-sharp and together with their speed one of them actually managed to cut a wound on Zac’s throat before he managed to react. He had quickly climbed up the walls again after the scare.

If the wolves were a bit faster the wave would have been really calamitous. With their amazing speed and light frame they actually managed to run up most of the wall before being impeded by gravity. A few actually made it all the way, but they were quickly ganged up on before they could orient themselves and do any damage.

The rest had slowly been dealt with using quantity over quality. The monsters were too deft to target so the demons simply focus fired certain congested areas, pelting it with spells and arrows. A whole area with a radius of fifty meters quickly became a zone of death, and even these quick wolves couldn’t escape.

Still, the elusive wolves took time to kill, and some still were running about below the wall even as the summoning of the next wave approached, every so often trying to scale the fortifications. The portals in the distance pulsated, which signaled the next wave’s arrival.

Soon the 717th wave was approaching. These wolves looked quite normal, apart from the fact they were completely white, making them look albino. But instead of the red eyes that usually accompanied that condition even their eyes were without any color, making them look blind. The only exception to the monochromatic color scheme was a perfect black circle in their foreheads.

They trotted toward the wall in a uniform speed, not heedlessly charging like most of the waves did. When they were a few hundred meters they suddenly stopped and let out a synchronized howl toward the defenders.

The sound pierced into Zac’s ears and he immediately got woozy. He forcefully refocused his mind and looked at the surroundings, and saw most of the demons hunkered over. Many bled from their eyes or ears as well, a testament to the penetrating power of the howl.

“Mental attack,” Ogras hoarsely said, his eyes a bit red from the impact. He glanced at Zac who seemed completely unperturbed by the assault. “Jeez, just how high is your Intelligence? Such a synchronized attack didn’t even affect you.”

Zac ignored the comment as usual. Ogras tried to dig out some information about Zac’s class and attributes every so often through innocuous comments. Zac didn’t trust himself to weave a believable net of lies and then keep track of it, and could only stoically ignore the remarks. He instead focused on the psychic wolves in the distance, and suddenly his eyes turned into a needlepoint.

“DOWN!” Zac roared on top of his lungs, and most demons immediately threw themselves at the ground. Over the past weeks most learned to trust Zac’s nose for danger, and wouldn’t hesitate to follow his commands. However, a few were still dazed by the mental attack, and they paid dearly for it.

Another earth-shattering howl somehow created an enormous shockwave that pushed toward the fortifications with lightning-quick speed. In just over a second it closed the distance to the wall, ripping the straggler wolves from the last wave to shreds on the way. The wave slammed into the wall with a tremendous impact and the only thing stopping the demons from falling off was the protruding wall on the inner side of the wall walk. Multiple cracks ran along the fortifications, and some parts even completely crumbled.

The few demons who hadn’t reacted in time met miserable ends as well. Some at least managed to activate one type of defense or another, such as stone skin or a magic shield. But the defenses quickly shattered as the demons were thrown off the wall into the distance, their life, and death unknown. The demons who hadn’t even erected defenses immediately turned to mangled pieces of flesh and bones that splattered their teammates.

“Fucking imbeciles” Ogras muttered as he shook off a piece of brain matter that had fallen on his legs. He had been the first to throw himself to the floor, his survival skills simply impeccable as always.

“We can’t let them shoot off another blast like that, the wall will completely crumble,” he continued as he turned toward Zac.

The shaking from the impact quickly subsided and Zac hesitantly looked up over the wall. The wolves simply stood rooted at the same position as before, their white eyes staring at him. Not one of them took a single step forward, and they seemed to be waiting for something.

Zac guessed that it took some time to charge a blast of that power, but he didn’t want to find out how long. This race of wolves clearly preferred ranged attacks, and if they were left alone they would quickly turn the whole wall into rubble.

He didn’t dare erect the shield as well, as he wasn’t sure that it could even withstand such a concentrated attack. It was one thing for it to defend against a multitude of claws and bites, but to withstand the concentrated power of hundreds of fused attacks at once? Zac felt doubtful. Even if it held it would take a massive amount of crystals just to defend against an attack of that magnitude, and Zac might find himself without the use of the fortifications against the next three waves.

“We need to go,” Zac simply said and got ready to jump over the wall.

“What the fuck, are you crazy?” Ogras immediately said, clearly unwilling to brave such an army.

Zac only ignored him and jumped down, creating a thud as he landed. At least there were no wolves of the last wave remaining standing after the blast wave. He unhesitantly charged straight for the ranks of the psychic wolves. As he started running he heard an exasperated “Goddamnit” and a lighter thud behind him.

With a wry smile, he kept running and took out a huge boulder from his pouch. It weighed a few hundred kilos and looked like something a catapult should throw rather than a human. Zac launched it straight into the middle of the pack with a resounding roar, wanting to disrupt their rhythm.

A shimmering shield actually winked into existence in front of the group, and the boulder slammed into it with a terrifying force. The shield wobbled and flickered from the impact, but it barely held true. But just as the stone helplessly fell to the ground a black javelin slammed into the very same spot, cracking the shield with a snap. As the large shield broke and many wolves let out a pained yelp.

The wolves’ magical defenses were down and an opening was created. One human and a demon rushed inside, each creating a storm of blood.