NOVEL NEXT Chapter 150: Grim Reaper And Skyfire
Ren let out a scream that tore from his chest like a beast finally breaking free.
It was raw and furious, rising above the pounding of hooves and the beating of war drums.
He wasn't alone. The Ross and Underwood forces were around him, their collective voices rising in a wall of sound that echoed across the fields.
His father, Abram Ross, led the charge, the legendary blade Freedom in his grip. The whole army followed his lead, the wind tugging at his cloak as they rushed towards the barbarian horde pouring through the torn barrier.
Then the tide hit.
Knights and soldiers slammed into the barbarian ranks like a wave of flesh and blood.
Steel met bone, weapons sang as they cut through the air, and blood sprayed.
Freedom glowed faintly in Abram's grip as he carved through the first line of warriors. One Druid, snarling from atop her bear, swung down her axe at him.
He formed into lightning as the axe passed through him, reformed, and severed the woman from shoulder to hip.
Another came from behind him, and Abram spun, the backhand slash taking the Druid's head clean off.
The ground shook with the roar of wyverns as the aerial battle erupted overhead.
In the sky, the Underwood and Ross Knights capable of flight fought like beasts, matching the intensity of the barbarians.
Lord Underwood raged among them, their imbuements activating as the wyverns activated their own breath weapons turning the clouds into storms of fire and lightning.
Ren's vision blurred as he activated the first of his coins.
He vanished in a blink of nothing and appeared in the midst of a group of Druids attempting to summon a vine trap.
His sword slashed outward in a gleaming arc, and all three collapsed before they knew he was there.
Another blink. He was inside the left flank. Three more blinks, and Druids dropped like flies.
He kept blinking, his vision blurring, disappearing before an image fully settled. His eyes were red-rimmed, his breathing ragged. Tears burned at the edges, but he didn't stop. He couldn't stop.
Every time he blinked, another life was taken. Blood sprayed across his face. His armor was decorated in it.
"DARIUS!" He didn't know when the scream tore out of him, rising above the noise of the battle. His voice cracked as his blade pierced a barbarian's throat. "THIS IS FOR DARIUS!"
Their army fought with more intensity, the cries being echoed by the soldiers and Knights.
Memories of his brother began flashing through his mind as he fought. Darius teaching. Darius laughing. Darius fighting.
He blinked again, this time into a group of mounted Druids. The bear beneath one of them roared, slamming a paw toward him. Ren vanished and reappeared above, plunging his sword into the rider's skull. He landed hard, rolled, and blinked away again.
Every soul he took fed the storm inside of him. He grew closer and closer to the fourth rank.
His Divine Gift thrummed under his skin, Unfettered Enhancement igniting his reflexes, his muscles, his fury. He was a ghost, a reaper, a storm of blades.
He didn't see the faces. He didn't want to.
He screamed again, even as blood clogged his throat.
"YOU THINK THIS IS YOUR WAR? THIS IS YOUR GRAVE!"
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Far above, Thomas Underwood was a hammer from heaven.
His flaming warhammer caved in the chest of every wyverns he was able to get close to, their screams trailing behind them as they fell.
He blazed across the sky, a comet of fury, his armor scorched and cracked but still holding strong.
"Ross! On your left!" He called to a nearby Ross Knight as he slammed his warhammer into the head of a descending beast. The creature's skull shattered like glass. He turned, caught another by the wing with the hammer, sending it spiraling out of control.
This was life! This was what he'd always longed for! A battle he could stretch to the fullest. A battle where he could show his full glory! A battle just like the one he'd had with the Tidecallers. Oh, how he missed this.
But he could also sense it. The barbarians had seen the threat that he was.
Hordes of wyverns began circling, rallying to him like sharks around blood.
He turned, trying to fly out of their range but they followed, hot on his heels. The trap slowly closed and when he tried to get out, they activated their elemental breaths, pushing him back.
But he didn't fear. This was, after all, life. If he died, then, he died. His only regret was to not have fought alongside his son, Octavian.
He roared into the sky as the wyverns encircled him, every route closed off. Up. Down. Left. Right. Front. Back. There was no way out.
One by one, the wyvern's mouths opened, their chests glowing with elemental energies.
Fire. Lightning. Acid. Ice.
The pillars of elemental breaths struck Thomas all at once.
He screamed as the fire burned him. As the lightning fried him. As the venom ate away at what he was.
Then, he activated his final imbuement.
Black energy raced from him through the breaths to the wyverns and their riders. The moment it touched them, they all exploded into fire and meat, blood spraying like mist in the air.
A smile appeared on his face and his eyes closed as he plummeted from the sky, crashing into the ground, an impact crater forming beneath him. The shockwave knocked the surrounding men off their feet.
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Ren saw it all.
His breath caught. His vision blurred. Then, something inside him snapped. It wasn't loud. It wasn't hot.
It was cold.
He blinked.
He reappeared beside a group of Druids preparing another vine wave. He didn't scream this time. He didn't speak. His blade simply moved.
It was beautiful.
He blinked again. And again. And again.
Each time, a kill. Each time, a soul.
He didn't notice when his black coat tore at the sleeves. He didn't notice when a battle axe was sunk into his ribs. He just blinked, killed, absorbed, moved on.
He was beyond thought now. Only fury. Only pain.