Chapter 296: Being Noble
PAULINE POV
Gripping her staff tightly, Pauline glanced nervously at the others. The Yumboes, as small as they were, stood ready to aid with their wind magic. Pauline couldn’t understand their bravery. Her own heart was pounding so hard that it felt like it was going to burst out at any second. Pauline, no, everyone could hear the distant calls of the stone partridges and the unsettling growls of the Booas. They were near.
’Kenzo got bit in the shoulder,’ Pauline noted. ’I will need to cover him. And since he’s in pain, Akihiko might be thrown off too. He’s going to be thinking of his friend.’ Inhale, exhale. ’Remember, you matter here.’
The fourth wave was coming and it was going to happen at the same location. The beginning of the wave was signalled by the sound of wings flapping. Everyone was too slow for a vocal call out.
Stone partridges burst from the trees. The three bird creatures moved with surprising speed. Pauline couldn’t react to them at all.
But while Pauline could not, the Yumboes as well as Akihiko and Kenzo could. Their physical stats were high enough to see clearly and thus react. Kenzo and Akihiko, swords gleaming in the dying light, charged forward. Their strikes cracked the stone shells and sent them reeling back. When the creatures recovered and readied to strike, Kenzo and Akihiko raised their wands and unleashed spells.
"Fire Ball! Fire Ball!"
Wands were short and stout. Even collectively, Akihiko and Kenzo’s spells were ineffective. However, with the Yumboes and their wind magic, the three stone birds were crashed back into the woodlands. Whether they were killed was impossible to tell, especially from the following moment.
Two Booas jumped in their place. That was when the staff wielders, when Pauline and Sylvia, were supposed to act.
"Here they come!" Sylvia shouted. All this time, she had been prepping for this, four magic circles glowing in front of her. "Pauline, on my mark!"
Pauline nodded, raising her staff. As the first of the hyenas closed in, Sylvia’s circles flared to life. "Now!"