"Begone!" the Pontiff thundered as a single wave of raw force ripped outward from the dais, a tidal blast of compressed air and holy power that tore through the Inner Sanctum like a hurricane and blasted everything and everyone not behind him, backwards.
Deacon, reacting on instinct, slammed both short swords into the marble tiling and dropped low. The impact jarred his arms up to the shoulders as he locked his grip – seconds before the immense, continuous blast of force from the Pontiff slammed into him, trying to hurl him backward.
The marble around him fractured and split apart, spiderwebs of white and gold energy crawling through the ground as the gust roared over him, causing his boots to skid and dig into the bloodied, cracked marble flooring while the gashes across his armor widened, and the tears in his cloak widened as it billowed harshly. His muscles screamed as he dug his heels in, refusing to let go.
Cracking open his shut eyelids, he could see that others weren't as fast-acting as he was, as hundreds of undead soldiers from the Undead Kingdom and cadets were sent flying backwards, crashing into pillars and walls at the entrance of the Inner Sanctum.
Shit! Deacon shouted mentally as he felt the bodies of tens of people crash into his own and some trying to grab onto him, but failing due to the prolonged blast, and causing Deacon's grip on his own blades to waver with every armored body that crashed into to him, due to him just having reached the end of the frontline just seconds before the blast.
How much mana does the old fuck have? Deacon shouted to himself as the wind howled in his ears, trying to push him back. Not twenty seconds later, the continuous blasts cast by the Pontiff finally ceased, and a heavy silence fell over the Inner Sanctum before being interrupted by thunderous thudding just behind Deacon.
Deacon exhaled slowly, lifting his head from behind crossed arms and looking around while ignoring the shards of marble that dinged against the plates of his armor and ground. He saw that the Inner Sanctum had changed.
The once-open expanse of the hall was now divided in two.
Fourteen colossal beams of gold descended from the ceiling from fourteen marble trapdoors and slammed into the marble floor in a perfect arc that split the room in two; separating the majority of the undead army and cadets from the Pontiff, General Obi, the paladins, and the scant few cadets and soldiers of the undead army that managed to remain grounded during the blast from the Pontiff.
As the priests who had flooded the balconies during the blast raised their palms toward the beams, they drew the golden daggers from their waists. In one fluid, resolute motion, each drove the blade straight into their own heart. Seconds after the thirty-third priest fell, the fourteen colossal beams of gold flared to life, forming a lattice of holy mana that crackled and sparked with every passing second.
"The hell? Was that a ritual?" Deacon's eyes widened. He watched, stunned, as the beams formed into what looked like a holy electric fence. His answer came seconds later when one of the zombie brutes slammed against it, and the instant its body brushed the barrier, its rotted flesh ignited, and began disintegrating into glowing motes that vanished before touching the floor – not even able to let out a scream as it was being disintegrated.
Deacon's stomach sank.
"Fuck," he hissed, snapping his head around, searching for his Party members – or anyone else he knew who could handle themselves.
At his nine o'clock, Deacon spotted Esmerelda crouched behind a half-collapsed column, the lower half of her body encased in rock that pinned her in place. At his two o'clock, Gael had his greatsword buried deep into the ground, using it to brace himself against the blast – unlike Jass, who had been sent flying after taking a flurry of blows from the General's halberd, Gael was charging forward to deliver a heavy overhead swing aimed at the General's right arm just moments before the Pontiff teleported his paladins and the General away.
Deacon's stomach twisted as he could not see the other members of the Ravenlight Party. And it wasn't until he heard Sam's shouting from behind him that he located Jass, Sam, and Bonehead gathered together and staring at him and Esmerelda.
Fuck, fuck, fuck…
He looked back toward the dais and saw that encircled by the golden cage of paladins, stood the Pontiff, with his robes burned and torn, right shoulder bleeding from the arrow fired by Valorie. His left arm trembled as it gripped the staff, but his eyes, those sunken pits of molten gold, were fixed on Deacon, and the twenty or so cadets and soldiers of the undead army who were quick enough to ground themselves from his blast.
"Gael!" Deacon roared over the deafening hum of holy energy, the sound of his voice raw and gravel-edged as the Pontiff's voice began to rise again and recite another sermon, aka another self-righteous tirade that he immediately began to ignore. "Help me cover Esmerelda! Formation Y!"
Saying his piece, Deacon ripped both short swords free from the cracked marble and recast Flame Armament, setting his blades ablaze once more. Twin trails of fire followed in his wake as he sprinted across the fractured floor toward Esmerelda – unknowingly drawing the Pontiff's gaze to him, the only one within the inner ring who had immediately begun to move.
"Got it!" Gael shouted back as he got out of his kneel and wrenched his hulking steel of a greatsword from out of the ground with a sharp twist and broke into a run, his heavy armor ringing with every step as he rushed to meet up with Deacon and converge with Esmerelda to get into formation.
"Move my Lions!" the Pontiff shouted just before the air within the Inner Sanctum began to buzz with so much pressure and static that it began to burn Deacon's lungs.
All across the Inner Sanctum, on both sides of the holy lattice, beacons of light erupted from the marble tiles in rapid succession, some appearing exactly where some soldiers and cadets stood, others in between.
And from each beacon, the Paladins of Azul appeared, teleporting into various formations as the marble tiles beneath their feet grayed out, marking the exact places they'd emerged from. However, the Pontiff did not stop there, as above his raised staff, fully formed Holy Bolts stood at the ready.
Deacon barely skidded to a stop before the first volley began streaking through the air like shooting stars.
"Move!" Deacon shouted at those who were still dumbfoundedly staring at the Holy Bolts that were descending upon them.
Lunging across the cracked floor as half a dozen golden bolts detonated where he'd been a heartbeat before, Deacon drove himself forward, curling into a roll and kicking out of it without pause. With barely a thought after Deacon analyzed his surroundings, his flame-wreathed blades tore through the lower abdomens of the paladins rushing to intercept him, and like a hot knife to butter, Deacon's flame-wreathed dual short swords cleanly cleaved through them without slowing him down.
Uncaring of the smoke trailing from his tattered cloak, Deacon surged forward, keeping his eyes locked onto Esmerelda and nothing else – uncaring of the chaos around him as he deemed anything not getting to his pinned friend and Party member as irrelevant.
Across the battlefield, as Deacon charged toward Esmerelda, the chaos unfolding around him bled into the reignited roars of war: clashing steel, barrages of spells, and shouting. The undead army and cadets who'd been thrown back near the entrance were clawing to regain order –half of them scrambling to their feet while the rest were already clashing with the newly materialized paladins that had reappeared from beams of golden light along with the General as his halberd began cutting through bodies in wide arcs.
"Fuck," Deacon hissed under his breath, his jaw tightening as he surged more mana into his core and activated Undying Flame, immediately drying up all the moisture around him within a five-meter radius and causing the flames wreathing his blades to rise in intensity.
As a hundred equations whirled through the vast circle that was developing within his mind, Deacon's focus narrowed as he reformatted the formula for Flame Mine and reprogrammed it to adapt for external use of his foot and his footwork.
As the final script of the spell clicked into place and a surge of heat rippled around the soles of his feet, Deacon sucked in a breath as the spell took shape.
Within the same motion, he cast Ignis beneath the soles of his boots, causing twin eruptions of flame beneath his feet that began propelling him forward with bursts of pressure and heat that shattered the tiles beneath his feet.
"Flame Art: Flame Steps," Deacon cast as a deep exhale burst past his teeth, and steam began to roll out of his mouth as he shot forward like a streak of light with his flame-wreathed dual short swords in hand.
The paladins standing between him and Esmerelda barely had time to raise their shields before Deacon was among them, his movements a blur that left trails of fire in his wake as the same strange energy from before rushed through him.
Even as tens of paladins got in his path, Deacon did not stop – he couldn't stop; neither he nor Gael were close enough to Esmerelda.
As he cleaved through another paladin's neck, Deacon's eyes locked onto Esmerelda; she was crouched behind an earthen dome, four paladins hammering at it from different sides with holy-infused longswords and maces.
Because of her choice of barrier, Esmerelda couldn't see where the attacks were coming from. Every time the paladins cracked a section open, she was forced to seal it before they could push through. If she tried to strike back, the others would take advantage of the gap and cut her down. So, she held the barrier up and tanked each blow head-on while repairing the damage inflicted upon it, waiting for either Deacon or Gael to reach her. Unlike when she could sense life while they were tunneling into Dawn's Breath, she didn't have the focus to spare to pinpoint her attackers now.
"Esme, hit the deck!" Deacon bellowed, his voice cutting above the chaos and through a crack in her earthen dome barrier.
The moment Deacon's words reached her, Esmerelda threw herself to the floor while the earthen dome barrier around her crumbled to the ground almost instantly.
As the longswords and maces of the paladins were raised once again above their heads in perfect synchronicity, Deacon surged his mana through his core once more and expanded the area Undying Flame covered and supercharged the eruption beneath the soles of his boots.
Echoform Reliquary shifted mid-swing, transforming from its dual short sword form into its broadsword one. The three-foot blade reignited with Flame Armament as Deacon crossed above Esmerelda's downed form and unleashed a streak of crimson fire that split the air as he swung.
The heads of all four paladins shot up into the air, severed in perfect unison as their weapons clattered harmlessly against the marble beside Esmerelda. Their bodies crumpled a second later, still standing for a breath before collapsing into the spreading pool of blood.
Deacon landed in a sliding crouch beside Esmerelda, his boots dragging sparks across the fractured tile as smoke curled from his shoulders.
"Take a breather before joining," he said to Esmerelda, as he scrambled to push himself upright and raised up his broadsword to guard Esmerelda from the paladins quickly converging on them both.
However, before the three paladins could move any further, a shadow loomed behind them, and a large figure charged out of the smoke with their massive greatsword, which was wound up behind them.
Gael's greatsword came down in a wide, brutal swing that cleaved the heads of all three paladins before they even realized the reason why Deacon was lowering his blade.
"About time," Deacon said as he helped Esmerelda back onto her feet.
"Dickhead," Gael muttered, his voice muffled behind his dented helm as he stepped into position beside him, resting his greatsword atop his shoulder.