The Lone Wanderer-Chapter 333: Swarm

The hunters had expected some changes in their surroundings as they neared the Mirror Lake. It was the most mana-rich location on the entire planet, and that led to a cascade of additional consequences. The plant life in the surrounding area flourished, growing to downright titanic sizes.

While they were still a couple days away, Percy noticed the trees were already twice as tall as before, their trunks as wide as small huts. Even their crowns were larger, their canopies almost blanketing the sky above their heads, offering some respite from the intense sunlight. The scorching rays still managed to pierce through the gaps between the branches, reflected countless times against the smooth surfaces before reaching the ground, but the sight wasn’t as insufferable as before.

The bushes were more frequent and intrusive too, their dense foliage beginning to obstruct the group’s movement, slowing their travelling pace. It forced them to triple their caution, as it made it harder to protect themselves from an ambush predator.

Everyone understood the following days wouldn’t be a picnic.

There would be beasts at their destination. Many of them. Yellows and Greens. Maybe even large packs, all fighting for territory. This was easily the most contested region on Melodia: especially nearing the peak of the beast tide. It was why their people couldn’t establish a permanent presence in this place.

Suffice to say, they had prepared themselves for the brutal onslaught of monsters. They would have to fight every single day they remained there, struggling to carve out a sliver of space for themselves. To perfect their spells and grow strong enough to save their people.

But they hadn’t expected they would run into a different obstacle entirely.

“What the hell is going on?!” Percy asked.

He helped Sol push the Dance to its limits, shielding their body from the silver blizzard trying to rip their soul apart. It was impossible to see more than a couple metres ahead. All their senses were clogged: both mundane and magical. Mana Sense and Soul Vision included.

“Spectral fiends!” Doh exclaimed. freёnovelkiss-com

The Green-born expelled some of his own mana too, protecting himself and Latt from the creatures.

“Fiends? Down here?! You mean, they actually descend to the surface?!”

Percy had thought the fiends only roamed the vicinity of the planet like scavengers, waiting for a dying soul to feast on. They were quite dangerous for a disembodied soul: as he had found out the hard way: but not to a healthy one still living inside the protection of its body. Even if they lowered their defences, it would take a while for the fiends to do any serious damage.

On the other hand, the creatures themselves were a lot more vulnerable. Showing themselves to a Melodian was risky, as even the simplest soul spell could rip them apart.

“Usually not, unless somebody baits them. But they can’t resist the attraction of the Mirror Lake.” Doh explained. “Our ancestors have always encountered some in their expeditions. Not this many though! I have no idea what’s going on…”

Listening to the Green’s words, Percy grimaced. Fighting against the beasts would have been bad enough. Shielding themselves from the fiends while doing so would only make things worse.

Reducing the flow of mana to his eyes, he weakened Soul Vision to a more bearable level, trying to better discern their shapes. Many of them had clung to their makeshift barrier, gnawing it down slowly. Others whizzed by them at ridiculous speeds, their blurry trails barely visible. Some slammed violently into the shield, sending ripples through it.

Fine-tuning his ethereal sense some more, he was able to make out more details. They looked like overgrown bugs, their sizes ranging from tiny like pebbles, to as big as Sol’s fist. There were all sorts of different kinds, but they all carried some otherworldly features, distinguishing them from corporeal lifeforms.

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There was one of those spider-like fiends he’d absorbed right above his head, trying to dig through the barrier. An Argalios. It had over a dozen legs, bent in all sorts of unnatural directions.

Next, Sol pointed at some kind of cricket crawling near her right shoulder. It was as big as the tip of her thumb. It had three wings, rubbing them together. But no sound came out. At least, none that Percy could hear.

‘That’s a Synthetis. The one Rei had…’ she said, some sorrow seeping into her voice.

At any rate, this wasn’t the time to marvel at the creatures. Protecting themselves wouldn’t be hard in the short-term, but keeping this up for a month?

“Stand close. We’ll take turns maintaining the barrier. It should get easier once we all upgrade our boosting arts.” Doh said, walking next to Sol, dragging Latt with him.

Percy sighed, not looking forward to this.

At least, the beasts wouldn’t have it easy either. Their lack of a soul affinity might make them less appetizing to the fiends, but they wouldn’t be able to defend themselves. Hopefully there would be fewer enemies at the lake than they had expected.

***

“This… It’s not sustainable.” Latt groaned once the trio reached the lake.

Luckily, they hadn’t seen any beasts during the past couple of days, confirming Percy’s guess. However, the swarm of spectral fiends had only grown denser. By now, their shield was completely covered, forcing them to deactivate Soul Vision entirely to watch were they stepped. The mana combined with the buzzing creatures obscured their regular sight too, but at least they could see a couple feet past their noses.

If that wasn’t enough, the fiends were consuming their mana at a much scarier rate. Individually, they couldn’t do much, but a few hundred of them were certainly an issue. The only reason the trio hadn’t succumbed yet was because their boosting arts were easier to use than ever before, allowing them to barely keep up with the consumption.

But a single person was no longer enough to protect the group, so each had to pitch in for two thirds of the day. Suffice to say, they’d struggle to make it to the end of the week, let alone the month.

“Let me try something.” Percy said, sitting down.

Picking a smooth piece of bark from the dirt, he gathered some soul mana to his finger. Next, he poured the mana into the mirror-like surface, drawing an intricate rune. Of course, soul mana couldn’t normally interact with physical objects, but these trees had grown next to the Mirror Lake, soaking in its waters all year round, constantly breathing the air rich in soul mana. He was willing to bet their wood could absorb at least some of his mana.

And he was right.

It didn’t take him long to carve the controlled heat enchantment into the bark. Percy had studied those mainly for his cauldron, so he’d selected a variant that would work with pure mana. He hadn’t checked if this particular type would activate with soul mana alone, or what its effect might be.

As soon as he was done, he poured some more mana into it.

Sure enough, it seemed to do something.

The object still felt cool to his touch, but the fiends around it dispersed, clearly finding whatever it did unpleasant. He didn’t know if it was Sol’s flesh protecting her own soul from the effect, or if it just wasn’t potent enough to affect a sapient, but this might work.

“Help me gather more bark from the trees.” he told his companions, lighting up a spark of hope in their tired eyes.

Over the next several hours, the trio assisted Percy as he equipped all of them with runes. He would have forged a suit of armour for each of them if he had enough fused mana for it, but that wasn’t currently an option. They had to make do with a few pieces of bark embedded in their clothes.

“Much better!” Doh exclaimed after realizing how much easier it was to keep the fiends at bay.

It wasn’t perfect, because they still had to fuel the enchantments with mana, and there were several gaps between the runes. That said, it was twice as efficient as before, meaning that even Latt should be able to protect the group by himself.

“It’s just a proof of concept.” Percy shrugged. “Take your tent out. I bet we can fit even more enchantments on it.”

Sadly, the ambient mana wouldn’t just flow into the runes by itself without a mage’s will guiding it. And Percy didn’t know any runes that drew ambient mana from the environment. If he did, he could have made the enchantments self-sustainable. Especially here.

This wasn’t something he’d focused on in the past, because all his constructs required a lot more mana than they could get from the air around them. Many of them even required specific types, which weren’t that abundant normally. Thus, he’d always relied on his own reserves to fuel his enchantments.

He sighed.

‘Something to revisit in the future, I guess…’

A day later, the trio had finished fitting both their tent and their clothes with even more runes, cutting their consumption massively. Having protected themselves from the swarm, they could now focus on other matters.

The lack of visibility was still a problem, leaving them open to an attack. But the relative absence of beasts helped. They were sure there were plenty still around, but their senses should also be affected by the fiends, which worked in their favour.

Having dealt with the most pressing issues, the trio was finally free to explore the area some more, and to begin their training.

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