NOVEL NEXT Chapter 191: The Twin Boulderback Behemoths (2)
The raid soared above the burning Crimson Briar Patch on massive crows; the heat from below rose in waves that made the air shimmer.
Smoke billowed upward in thick columns, obscuring the Crimson Briar patch and spreading ashes into the valley.
Reidar led the raid, seated on his crow's broad back as the creature's wings beat powerful strokes.
Behind him, the entire raid followed. Each member rode their own rhino-sized crow. They had them thanks to Reidar, of course.
"There," Kara said, pointing down. "The trail continues through the forest."
They were big enough to be noticed easily, even more so from the sky.
Reidar looked down. Even from this height, the destruction was obvious. A path of flattened trees and crushed vegetation cut through the burning landscape like a scar. The trail was wide enough for a convoy of vehicles to pass through, marked by craters where impossibly heavy feet had struck the earth.
They flew over the inferno. Below, flames consumed everything. Occasionally, something moved through the fire—desperate creatures fleeing the conflagration. The raid ignored them, focused on their true prey.
The forest gave way to the open plains soon after. The trail of destruction continued across the grasslands, more obvious now without the forest to obscure it.
The massive bears the raid members summoned came out of the forest too.
Within seconds, the plains teemed with summoned creatures. Eight hundred bears barreled through the tall grass.
"Kara, do you see them?" Reidar asked.
The scout had already moved ahead, studying the ground. "Yes! They are Northeast."
The raid soared onward. Below, the bears charged through the grass, moving faster than their massive size suggested.
A shadow passed overhead. Reidar looked up to see a pair of flying monsters circling around them.
The creatures were drawn to the flying giant figures the humans were riding. Flying monsters were the reason Reidar couldn't fly to Creamont until that point, but with the proficiency high enough to share the skill and enough raid members, now they had a flying army of 200 units.
That allowed them to keep flying. The monsters dove.
Several people launched to intercept them. The massive birds shot upward, their riders prepared spells.
It didn't take much for them to get rid of the monsters.
"Keep moving," Reidar said. The raid pressed forward.
More flying creatures appeared as they advanced. All tried to feast on the raid. The crows and their riders killed them, and bodies began to litter the plains behind them.
The flying threats were sparse, and with 200 massive crows ridden by humans, none posed a danger.
They flew for ten minutes before Kara raised her fist.
"There!" she said. "Movement. Something big."
Reidar moved to the front and looked across the open ground.
The Twin Boulderback Behemoths were below there.
They were even bigger than their tracks had hinted. Each behemoth stood three stories tall, their bodies armored in overlapping slabs of basalt-gray stone, thick as castle walls and etched with deep fissures that pulsed with faint amber light.
The plates shifted and grated against each other with every step, sending clouds of dust and shards of fractured rock skittering across the ground.
Their limbs were pillars of solid granite, each footfall leaving craters in the scorched earth.
Where their stone shells met, jagged seams oozed a slow, viscous fluid that hardened into crystalline deposits, glinting like malformed diamonds along their spines and haunches. The sheer weight of them made the ground tremble, their silhouettes blotting out the sky as they cast long, jagged shadows across the battlefield.
The behemoths were feeding.
A pack of monsters tried to flee across the open ground. There were maybe a dozen of them, all with rust-colored hides marked with burns from the forest fire. They were desperate, but that didn't mean they would be able to escape the monsters, and that was just because their strides were far greater than the much smaller monsters.
The larger behemoth moved with surprising speed. Three monsters disappeared beneath its massive foot, crushed to pulp.
The smaller behemoth swept its tail in a wide arc. It caught two more monsters.
The remaining ones scattered, and yet they failed. Within thirty seconds, the entire group was dead. The behemoths stood among the corpses.
"Gods," someone whispered behind Reidar. "They're monsters."
Reidar studied the creatures. Their stone hides looked impenetrable. Physical attacks would be useless against armor that thick. But magic could work.
And they had numbers. The eight hundred bears below could occupy the behemoths, even if they were lower leveled, while the raid attacked from range with magic attacks.
"Everyone ready your skills," Reidar said. "Wind Barrage and Aqua Cannon are our best shot at killing these fuckers. They shouldn't be able to get us at this distance, but be careful of flying trees and giant boulders. Is that clear?"
"YES!"
The raid spread out. Hands rose, magic gathering as spells formed. Wind began to swirl around clenched fists. Water materialized from nothing, coalescing into spinning spheres of compressed liquid.
The bears then reached the creatures. They didn't like the intrusion but saw the bears as a great welcome since they had a lot of meat on.
The ground shook as eight hundred summoned bears crashed into the Twin Boulderback Behemoths. The colossal stone creatures roared. Massive paws swiped at the giants' legs, but it was of no use against the living rock.
The larger behemoth stomped, crushing three bears into shimmering motes of mana. The smaller one swung its crystal-studded tail, sending a dozen more flying.
Reidar watched from above. The bears were nothing but gnats to these titans, yet they served their purpose. They swarmed the behemoths, climbing over their stone hides, biting and clawing at joints, and keeping their arms still. The giants were distracted, enraged by the persistent nuisance.
Reidar raised his hand. Power gathered around him—wind and water mixing in preparation. Every raid member mirrored his stance, their spells ready to launch.
"On my mark," Reidar said. "Three... two... one..."
His hand fell.
"Fire!"
Elemental power surged forth as the crows swirled. Powerful, concentrated water currents crashed into the giants with the impact of cannons.
Blades of compressed air whirled, whistling through the air, and struck the giants with a deafening thud. Shards of rock and crystal flew as the barrage chipped away at their stone armor with a resounding crack.