Low-Fantasy Occultist

Despite witnessing the brutal execution of their leaders, the eight surviving mercenaries did not break and run. They knew that fleeing from a powerful mage was a death sentence, so they chose to make their final stand.

In a way, Nick could respect it. He would have preferred not to have to massacre them at all, but that had gone out the window the moment the attack started without a single word being exchanged.

“Up and at them, boys! Lock the circle!" a spearman bellowed, taking command.

The men slammed their shields together, forming an interlocking ring of steel. They braced their boots in the freezing mud, spears jutting like the quills of a cornered beast. Their auras, though individually unremarkable, synchronized into a humming barrier that felt far more resilient.

Still, they hadn’t learned anything if they thought he would allow them to dictate the pace.

"Break their footing," Nick ordered calmly, stepping aside to open a firing lane.

Rhea was already moving. Purple powder erupted from her sleeves, billowing into a cloud.

For a moment, nothing seemed to happen as the compound failed to penetrate the defensive skill, but then she threw a glass sphere into it, which shattered directly above the shield ring's center.

Suddenly, the mist rained down as droplets and began to eat away at the barrier. The construct flickered and groaned despite the men’s best efforts to reinforce it.

Not waiting for the skill to fail, Gaelen blurred forward and hurled two daggers with pinpoint accuracy, aiming at the narrow slits of the mercenaries' visors. The moment the weapons reached the barrier, they vanished in a burst of shadows, only to reappear behind it.

One blade found its mark, sinking into an eye socket. The soldier crumpled, and the shield wall faltered.

Nick suppressed a snort at Rhea’s annoyed expression. He was sure she’d have complained to her brother about wasting her potions if they hadn’t been in the middle of a fight to the death.

Since there was no need to prolong this any longer, he summoned wind pressure directly at the center of the faltering formation, creating a violent pull. The mercenaries were jerked forward, their armor betraying them as they stumbled off balance.

Gaelen capitalized instantly. His cursed blade flashed, and a dark crescent sheared through exposed necks and unarmored joints. He kept jumping all over the place, relying on Nick’s wind manipulation to deflect the desperate thrusts of the dying men. Within thirty seconds, the last spearman fell, his throat opened in a final smile.

He could have left one alive to interrogate, Nick sighed, but he hadn’t put much effort into that either. The entire ambush hadn’t lasted more than five minutes, and when your opponents were strong, you couldn’t easily offer mercy without risking taking damage yourself.

Then there was the fact that Gaelen’s emotional range was quite unstable whenever he wielded his cursed blade. Holding back wasn’t really possible for him, yet Nick couldn’t quite summon the will to tell him to stop using it.

A look at the shorn armor was all he needed to stay silent. It was enchanted steel, and the dagger had cut through it like tissue paper. For the moment, its usefulness outweighed its dangers.