Fate Alchemist - A Regression Academy LitRPG

Wulf turned back to face the remaining demons in the harbour, but they didn't need him. The remaining Oroniths split up into groups and targeted the straggling fiends, and reinforcements were on their way.

They needed help at the wall. Wulf turned back toward the coast, then marched up the shore. Instead of climbing back inside the wall, he stayed on the outside, circling around the city. The soft sand of the shore made it difficult to climb out of the water, with it constantly slipping under his feet, but he made it.

As they climbed up the shore, Irmond asked, "What was that? Like, that explosion? How'd you do it?"

"It wasn't really an explosion," Wulf replied.

"But you've made similar explosions before," Kalee said.

"True, but this one was directly from a skill," Wulf said. "Not by messing with xerion. I upgraded [Deadline], which let me cause area damage if I defeated a target. Problem is, I think we're all out of poison. Right, Seith?"

"Correct," she replied. "At least in your daggers." She cleared her throat. "By the way, your mana is really glowing green. People are going to start asking questions."

"I'll tell them I'm taking on a jade aspect. My own little golem looks that way, anyway."

"At some point," Kalee said, "the world is going to find out what we are."

Wulf grimaced. "Yeah. When they do, we need to be strong enough that they can't try to control us or exploit us. If the world finds out now, we're done for."

"You don't think they'd listen to you?" Irmond asked.

"I think if I told them that we're from the future, well…" He cut himself off with a scoff. "To be honest, I'm not sure if too many people would actually believe us anymore. There isn't much we can predict, considering how much we've changed. But, say we could prove it. You think the other Orichalcums would just let us do what we wanted? Maybe they'd help us save the world out of necessity, but they'd enslave us and use us after. Or perhaps they'd tear us apart, trying to figure out what makes the Field work through us. People don't like what they don't understand."

"I think you might be being a bit cynical…" Seith said. "The name of Silent Wraith is going around. Nevermind the rumours that you're an Alchemist. And they're not wrong. They're going to ask questions sooner than later, but you're making a name for yourself. You've helped people, you've saved them."

"I'm not concerned about the average person," Wulf replied. "I'm concerned about the Orichalcums and the Rubies, and those who can't stand the thought of losing their power after the demons are gone."

"But do you think they're going to just…go away because you, like, didn't come from the future?" Irmond asked. "If what you say is true, and they're concerned about maintaining power in the chaos after the invasion…they won't be pleased no matter where you come from."

Kalee looked slightly torn. Finally, she said, "Remember, Wulf. You can let other people help you."

He sighed. "We can deal with this later. For the moment, we have a demon siege to handle."

He pulled himself up the shore and continued to circle around the outside of the wall. A wall of smoke crossed the green fields toward them, glowing orange at its bottom. Fifty or sixty fiends marched in ranks, keeping tight together as they approached the city. A swarm of smaller demons rushed past below.

And to make matters worse, the sky was falling. Streaks of light blazed through the night sky. For now, they were only small chunks of the moon, but they'd be getting larger as the night went on. Wulf wasn't sure what he could do if a massive asteroid fell on Centralis, and thankfully, it didn't look like the city was in the main path of destruction.

But if any Orichalcums were coming, they weren't going to help with the fiends. They'd be more focussed on preventing the mass destruction that the falling moon rocks were going to cause.

As best he could tell, the entire moon wasn't falling. Only a relatively small swath of stones that ejected out one side. By now, the moon was beginning to look like an enormous jellyfish, with its tail of debris stretching longer and longer behind it.

He had to deal with the demons as quickly as possible, so there'd still be time to help deal with the aftermath of the moon.

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The top of the wall swarmed with activity. Torches blazed bright, and city guards rushed back and forth. Iron-tier Ascendants prepared weapons. Rangers channelled their Skills into ballistae, and Pilots heaped rocks into catapults—rocks that would've been too big to otherwise lift.

Mages set the rocks alight with flame, or covered them in ice crystals, while Artificers stood at the ready with equipment to make repairs to the wall. A few Oroniths stood at the ready outside the wall—two Rubies, piloted by academy professors, and a group of Silvers.

They clustered around the main road into the city and the gate. Wagons and civilians on foot rushed in through the gate, trying to get to safety, but a large column of them still wound out far away from the wall. The demons were catching up.

"Got any neat Skills to take them all out again?" Irmond asked.

"I've got some things in mind," Wulf replied. He switched his grip on the short swords to hold them both upright, then pointed them forward. "My plan is to hold them off as long as we can, get all the civilians inside the wall. Then retreat inside ourselves. The demons will go for the gate, which suits us. When they break through, we hold them off long enough for reinforcements to arrive."

"Is no one else bothered that an army of nearly a hundred fiends somehow made it this far beyond the desert without anyone noticing?" Kalee asked. "The Scorchlands are still a months' walk away, at their pace. You couldn't get a hundred fiends to Centralis without someone sounding the alarm."

"We can worry about that when we take out the hundred-demon-army trying to destroy us," Wulf said.

"Wulf, we can't save every civilian," Seith said. "It'd be safer to get back inside the wall and defend it from inside."

"These are farmers," Wulf said. "Without them, the world goes hungry. We might win today, but you don't know how people get when there's mass starvation. You can't beat the demons if you have no food."

"Point taken."

He tightened his grip on the daggers. The other Oroniths seemed to realize the same thing, because they made a formation around the main road, protecting the travellers. Upon a signal from one of the Ruby Oroniths, the wall's defenses fired. A volley of catapult and trebuchet payloads roared overhead. A moment later, a storm of arrows and ballista bolts darkened the sky.

The enormous rocks paved channels through the hordes of small, human-sized demons running at the fiends' feet, or cracked against the fiends' skulls. The rocks didn't do much, especially against the Gold-tier fiends, but the ballista bolts were much more effective. They pierced deep into the fiends' skulls or chest carapaces, cracking them. A few fiends fell dead on the spot, and cheers rose up from the wall.

It didn't last. The fiends lowered their heads and charged, recognizing a target and moving faster. Wulf was pretty sure he heard the shout to 'fire at will,' but he might have been imagining it. His perception wasn't that good yet.

Stones and arrows flew overhead, now aiming to the sides of the Oroniths to avoid friendly fire. The first fiend of the column arrived, and Wulf sprinted forward. He wasn't part of the formation, so he could afford to take it down.

It was a High-Silver, same as him. He caught it across the chest with a sword, launching it flat on its back in an explosion of dust and dirt, then knelt on its chest and pierced its heart with the help of Kalee's gravitational enhancement.

"Kalee," he whispered. "We need to work together. I don't have anything to wipe them all out—we need to synchronize."

The only way out of this was by hitting the fiends hard, and hitting them lots. They needed to work together, moving as one.

As Wulf pulled them back from the first fiend, he stood up, getting out of harm's way. Once Wraith was stable, they both pulled their mana back from the dream-link, cutting the flow and holding it steady.

"On your mark," Wulf said. "You're the Mage."

She nodded, then counted down. "Three, two, one…now!"

They both released their mana back into their neck dream sockets, and it raced through the dream-link. Both of their links aimed for Wraith's main core. They swirled around, mixing, but ultimately, repelled from each other, failing to link.

They'd gotten close to linking before, but never long enough, and it usually took a few tries.

"You can't think about it…" Wulf breathed, thinking about what Dr. Arnau had told him during her office hours. You just have to feel the connection. There's no magic to it. There's nothing that the Field will just…tell you to do. It's up to you and your willingness to bond with your Mage—and them in turn, their willingness to bond back.

He held his mana back again, severing his control of the Oronith and allowing himself to look over at Kalee without turning Wraith's whole head. Wordlessly, they both released their mana, moving at the same time. It raced over to the core.

Wulf needed Kalee's hand in controlling the Wraith. He needed to know when she was going to use a spell, where she needed his arm to be, and where it was going to hit. If he couldn't do that, they wouldn't be efficient enough to fight through the coming horde.

Whispers seeped into his mind. They didn't belong to him. He'd felt it before, but only in vague glimpses. Kalee's past. Memories of childhood, of terror, of the first demon invasion, of finally losing her sight. Of feeling the Messenger brush past her leg at the end of the world, giving her a chance. She'd never given up, even if she'd never been the best, strongest, or most powerful Ascendant.

Wulf needed her help. He had to let her in.

He thought of her hand on his shoulder, of sitting next to her, of her warm head leaning on him, and focussed on that feeling.

And all he could do was hope she felt something back.

His mind twinged. The usual click of forming the connection stabilized, and their minds joined. Already, he could sense her picking targets, almost like his own mind—and then he realized that he was picking the same targets.

Now, he just had to hope the connection lasted through the battle.