Fate Alchemist - A Regression Academy LitRPG

Mana sparks rained down from the ceiling of the Left Spear's cockpit. The floor cracked, and clouds of dust shot up, choking Stigand Horic.

He'd been the Pilot of the Left Spear of Clegghold for five years now, but it'd mostly been a ceremonial role. No one was ever going to attack Clegghold, with it being nestled deep in the mountains of Istalis, far from the coast or any of the Confederacy's borders. He'd been invited to parties, been introduced to a great many Ascendants, and of course, had the opportunity to train with some of the Confederacy's finest instructors.

But now, gravity pulled his body against his harness, making him slump forward as he and the Left Spear lay face-first in the muddy, snowy pass just outside Clegghold. Outside, stone boomed and clacked, fiends bellowed, and civilians screamed.

Woldric, his brother, called, "Sti! Can you hear me? Get us up! Get up!" His brother was their Mage, and hung from the slot just beside—albeit without a golem. "They're coming! They'll crush us!"

Groaning, Stigand pushed the Left Spear up. He heaved with effort. Stone cracked, and he shouted. Pain seared his bones, and his ribs clicked awkwardly. Something was broken. The limbs struggled. His communication construct wasn't working, but even if it was, their Ranger and Artificer were both dead. There was no way they'd survived two hits like that.

Stigand's vision swam. Mud and dirt sloughed off the cockpit visor. The glass cracked, and all the sheets of parchment throughout the cockpit spewed out mindless warnings about body and limb integrity.

He hoisted up the Oronith's spear, then shook their shattered shield off their arm. Ahead of them stood two fiends. They were about the same height as an Oronith, and the Field assessed them as High-Silvers. Too strong for a single Oronith to handle.

But the Swords of Clegghold, the three Oroniths in the center of the lake, were all busy with their own fiends…four more fiends had them surrounded. Already, they'd destroyed one of the Swords. It lay half-submerged in the lake, its enormous stone body unmoving.

Beside him, the shattered form of the Right Spear stood headless, unmoving. A fiend had ripped its head and shield arm right off, and the Oronith done for.

A tiny, good-humoured voice at the back of his mind told him, Good riddance, those four were always annoying, but he shut the voice down. This wasn't how he wanted to settle their little petty competitions.

The Right Spear was gone.

Besides, after today, nothing was getting settled. He was going to die. The two fiends approached.

They matched the descriptions of the fiends he'd heard from the first wave, but these were much stronger than the reports had indicated. And weren't their wings supposed to be completely skeletal? Because these guys' wings had the beginnings of a sinew mesh stretching across them. The cracks in their horned crowns glowed orange with magma, and in the light spring snowfall that had just begun, it turned to steam. Nevermind the clouds of smoke rolling off their bodies, a massive smokey, deathly beacon.

And he didn't even want to think about the smaller demons marauding through the streets of Clegghold. He shuddered, and so did the Left Spear.

He would normally have given his spear a cocky twirl, but today, he simply gripped it with two hands and resumed a fighting stance.

"I don't want to go, brother," he whispered. "Not yet."

"Me neither. But do you wanna back down?"

"I…can't."

"Neither can I."

No one was coming. They were doomed. But maybe they could die with just a little bit of dignity…

Both fiends charged together, bounding forward. One wielded nothing but claws, but the other held a burning, chain whip. Its links glowed orange and steamed as the fiend flailed it around. With each circle, it cleaved up a section of dirt and cast debris into the air.

Stigand held out his spear, awaiting an impact, perhaps something that would spell their doom, but nothing came. A great boom resounded through the canyon, and a dark shape blurred in front of the visor. Streaks of magenta dream-link mana blurred past—the signature colour of a dream-link strained to its very maximum.

The first fiend hollered, then reeled to the side, struck by an enormous impact. It spun and landed on all fours.

The other fiend stopped and turned, assessing the new threat.

Stigand blinked. A new Oronith stood in front of him, its panels glistening with melted snow and mud in the dim night light. The Left Spear's mana-lights shone bright across those sloping, robe-shaped panels and glinted off the obsidian helmet plume and daggers.

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"The Silent Wraith…" Woldric breathed.

They'd tried to activate the Wraith a few times since it'd been discovered, and even on a dare—a competition between the Right Spear and the Left, but neither crews had been able to do it.

For a moment, a surge of jealousy poured through him, but he caught himself.

"Yes!" he yelled. "Kick their asses, whoever you are! Send them back to hell!"

~ ~ ~

Wulf hadn't stopped to think about whether it was a good idea to charge right into battle, but there was no time to back out now. He'd sprinted across the city, jumping over buildings and stepping on the broadest streets, aiming right for the closest pair of fiends.

In total, there were six, and all were High-Silver equivalents. That had to be because of their size.

No matter. He'd do what he could.

The Wraith held its short swords with a reverse grip. Wulf had to admit, he hadn't exactly studied closely the part of the Weavers' manual that discussed what to do with the scissors in a separated form. The Weavers' scissors could split apart, allowing the user to use them as swords.

Thankfully, he had studied it a little bit. Wraith was holding them in a correct position—a reverse grip.

"Alright, explain that!" Kalee exclaimed. "Why'd you punch him when you had fancy obsidian swords?"

"Habit!" Wulf called back. "I'll stick them in his gut next time!"

"You'd better!"

"Kalee, gravity, now!" Irmond shouted through their communication construct.

The two fiends, now both closer to the Silent Wraith than the Left Spear, turned to face him. They stood in the mountain pass just outside Clegghold's gate. There was nothing but a road, and Wulf could fight as he pleased without worrying about demolishing a city.

The fiend with the chain swung it. Wulf raised his swords to intercept, but the chain wrapped around them, tightening around the translucent blades. One cracked. Sparks erupted out, and Wulf ripped the daggers free.

Kalee triggered a spell skill, driving both fiends to the ground, and Wulf spun around, then drove both daggers into the back of the claw-wielding fiend. It screeched, pinned down by Kalee's ability, and now bleeding out. He ripped the swords out and plunged them down again, piercing its carapace and shattering its wings.

The beast fell still, but the other chain-wielding fiend was pushing up against the pressure of Kalee's spell.

"I can't hold it for long!" Kalee shouted. "It's too strong."

Wulf had an opportunity to take out one fiend now, though. Just one more plunge of the swords, and it'd stop moving.

"Wulf…" Seith warned.

"Hold on! Either we take one out, or we have to deal with two at once, and they'll take us out!" He drove the swords down at the same, using the footing the manual had described. The swords pierced the back of the demon once more. Columns of smoke spewed out at a greater velocity, and orange fire leaked from within it.

He dragged the swords up, then gave them a flick, slicing all the way to the fiend's shoulders. It stopped moving entirely.

"It's free from my spell!" Kalee exclaimed.

Before Wulf could turn to face the threat, an impact struck them in the side. Wraith lurched to the side, Wulf shook in the harness, and his head impacted the interior of his golem's helmet. Specks of light whirled in front of his eyes, but he had the wit to plant his feet down. They dragged through the mud, scoring massive trenches in the ground—but ultimately resisting the demon's pushing.

It swung its chain around and pulled it taught around Wraith's neck. Stone cracked and melted, and Wulf's golem, attached to him and bound by the dream link, constricted on his own throat.

His eyes watered, and he reached up, trying to grab at his throat, but even if he could get a grip on the glowing chain, he couldn't control the fingers enough to hold it.

Then the pressure abated.

The Left Spear drove its spear into the fiend's flank, pushing it to the side. It let go of its chain and howled with pain and rage.

"Kalee, can you help me split its skull?" Wulf asked. "Two blades, holding them upside down. Can you use a spell to pull them down into the fiend's head and destroy it?"

"Got it," she said.

"Seith, Irmond, are you guys alright?" he asked.

"I'm fine," Irmond said. "But you better make this quick. The Oroniths on the lake are getting beaten pretty badly."

"Just doing a damage assessment," Seith replied. "But I'm alive."

"Hold on tight, then," Wulf said.

Shouting with exertion, he pushed Wraith to a sprint, then pushed up and jumped through the air. He wouldn't have managed the maneuver in Emerald Vanguard, but Wraith was built for this. It was nimble. A sheet tried to warn him that the mana-pulse drivers were unavailable, and that the maneuver was ill-advised, but he ignored it.

He raised both daggers and aimed them for the top of the reeling fiend's skull. Kalee triggered a skill, and a circle appeared beneath his arms. Gravity doubled on just his arms, dragging them down.

The daggers slammed into the top of the fiend's head and pierced its skull. More cracks ran up the blade, and vibrations surged through Wulf's arms, but the fiend dropped dead instantly, sloughing off his swords, limp.

Wulf turned, panting. "Damage report, Seith?"

"Our neck is in a fragile state. Overall body integrity is about fifty percent, and I'm rerouting a rune-line to keep your arms functional," she replied.

"Understood." He turned to face the city—and the skirmish at the center of the lake. "We've got another party to crash."

"Can you give me a moment?" Seith asked.

"Can't do that," Wulf replied. "They need us over there. You have whatever time it take for us to get over there."

He cast one last glance at the Left Spear, gave the other Oronith a nod, then sprinted down the main thoroughfare toward the next battle.