The Years of Apocalypse - A Time Loop Progression Fantasy

Mirian's levitation spell was countered as soon as she began to cast it. She was badly outnumbered, facing down at least two full squads of Praetorians, which meant they could dedicate specialists to countering any of her common spells. A second group would maintain shields while a third group pressed the attack.

The first Praetorian spells smashed against her shield, force blades sparking and fire splashing out. The room erupted into chaos as the non-combatants, including Izrif, all tried to flee in every direction at once.

Mirian retaliated with force detonation and chain lightning. The spells smashed apart tables and chairs and sent chunks of the stone floor flying, but the Praetorian shields held. As the Praetorians finished descending from the skylights, they formed two distinct groups. She'd become familiar with their tactics in previous cycles.

Mirian let loose a barrage of attack spells, spitting out fire and force blades, but even if she could break through two layers of shields, there were three more layers behind them. Nor could she focus on a single kind of attack because the Praetorians dedicated to counterspells would start countering repeat spells.

They were coordinating with each other using remote speech, which Mirian couldn't hear over the noise of explosions and thunder.

She did hear one thing though, in a brief lull of spells: "—using Luspire's shield—!"

In a moment, she remembered that the Praetorians had contingencies for fighting any archmage in Baracuel. Archmages were legally required to submit their spellbooks to the Praetorians. Of course they recognized the spell. Of course they'd developed a countermeasure.

The Praetorians had the initiative, the firepower, and the tactics. In a moment, she felt the prismatic shield being torn apart at the seams.

She had something they wouldn't expect though.

She'd been training with her father.

Mirian cast black shield, her father's own defensive spell. The shield first attempted to absorb and convert incoming energy into the arcane force, which Mirian could then use in her own spells. Energy that couldn't be converted to the arcane force was converted to light, which was then suppressed. It was more mana intensive and difficult to manage than Luspire's spell, but even as it burned more mana, it would be reclaiming enough energy to give her the edge on a battle of attrition.

As spells rained down on her, she spun the arcane energy off into force blast spells, not aimed at the Praetorians, but aimed at the ceiling. As chunks of stone and dust erupted, she cast an expanded zone of silence in the area to disrupt the communication spells, then started shooting out weaken and mental fog curses in quick succession against each of the Praetorians. Their orichalcum-based spell resistance would weaken the curses, but in a battle like this, reaction time was critical, and she needed every advantage.

Then, she used her father's spell siphon, the spell he'd used to great effect on her, targeting Trinea's spells first simply because she knew the woman's specialties and wands best. Her eyes widened as the shields around her were stripped and turned into arcane energy, then Mirian unleashed several force detonations that sent her crashing backward. There were already two people lying on the ground where she landed, either dead or unconscious from the crossfire.

Three more Praetorians arrived, levitating through the windows, and Mirian felt her black shield beginning to buckle under the strain. Someone countered her zone of silence, while lightning and fire exploded around her. It was nearly impossible to see.

If she stayed here, she would be overwhelmed as the rest of the squads arrived.

Mirian first needed an opening.

She kept her mind on black shield, but began to gather her mana. It was different here than in practice conditions, but it was the spell she knew best, the one that could reach the highest intensity.

She pointed Eclipse at the ceiling and cast greater lightning.

Thunder shook the room as a monstrous bolt cracked through the room. The pinnacle of the domed ceiling collapsed in a shower of stone as lightning splashed around the room. Mirian immediately cast levitation and took off, rising straight up. With the dust blocking her sight of the room, she cast detect life and began raining mixed energy spells down on anyone who looked like they might be an arcanist.

A series of collection spells swept up the dust and she saw the rubble and corpses below. Most of the dead were just the people who had happened to be in the room, but she saw at least two more dead Praetorians.

They spotted her above and Voran led the charge upward. They were using some sort of spell that seemed especially effective at destroying shields, and her black shield was getting hit hard.

Mirian switched to accelerated levitation to give her the edge in maneuverability. She sped over the towers and battlements of the Citadel. Spread out around Central Hill were also the Great Temples and some of the famous spires of the city. She dodged around as lightning, fire, and force blades burst through the sky.

All of this was costing her valuable mana. She needed to start getting it back.

Mirian targeted another Praetorian, first using soul-coated lightning to rip apart the shields, then landed a soul shred curse. The Praetorian started screaming in pain. They started to drop from the sky, but another Praetorian caught them with lift person. Mirian switched to mana siphon, tearing off pieces of the man's soul for her mana.

More attack spells erupted from all around, and Mirian dove down, then circled around one of the battlements, sending out fire bursts. The black shield and accelerated levitation were too costly a defense against so many attackers. The Praetorians primarily used wands, with thin spellbooks as backups, which meant they had limited utility spells. They'd be less effective against spells they hadn't planned for, and Atrah Xidi was not known to use illusions.

Mirian cast total camouflage and greater illusionary army, enhanced so the illusions also radiated infrared light. She sent the illusionary copies of herself scattering out in different directions as she used a normal levitation closer to the ground, casting another broad zone of silence to suppress their ability to coordinate.

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The spells flying through the air above told her the trick was working. It took a great deal of focus for her to have her illusions pretend to cast flashy fire and lightning spells, but focus wasn't mana. As the Praetorians flew around trying to find the real Mirian, they were draining their own mana with levitation and combat spells. As long as she stuck to casting spells that couldn't be seen, she would have the advantage. In the plazas and streets next to the Citadel, crowds were running about, either fleeing or pointing and watching.

When a Praetorian flew directly above her, she used a soul-coated force pull to drag him down so that he smashed head-first into the stone wall of one of the temples. Another, she repeated her tactic of using the soul shred curse followed by mana siphon, using that mana to maintain the illusions until the Praetorian's aura was completely drained and her soul in such a sorry state she might not even live.

Three more Praetorians fell as she slipped between the streets. Then, her zone of silence was countered, and finally a suppress light spell targeting her illusions revealed she'd left the sky. Mirian used the mana she'd been siphoning to fortify her black shield as she dismissed her camouflage spell and rose into the sky again. She used soul-coated greater chain lightning, filling the skies above Central Hill with crackling bolts. Two more Praetorians fell, but their spell resistance combined with layered shields meant the attack was far less effective than it should have been.

She kept low to the streets, weaving between buildings as the Praetorians retaliated, then circled around the back of one of the spires and ascended, once again dismissing her black shield for total camouflage as soon as she was out of sight.

This time, the Praetorians were wise to her trick. She didn't know what detection spell they were using, but as soon as she circled back around, now a hundred feet up, they spotted her and renewed the assault. Mirian ducked back behind the spire as force and fire spells smashed into it, sending cracks through the building. Debris rained down on the nearby Great Temple of Eintocarst. She renewed her shield and her curse attacks, but the Praetorians were layering their shields more heavily now, and she was running low on the soul energy she needed. Her curses were poorly formed, and they weren't sticking.

There were still twenty Praetorians. As they closed in on her with a tight aerial formation, Mirian saw Voran in the center of the formation and her fury reignited. She turned and attacked the spire itself with earthshaker, the same spell that had been used in the artillery shells hitting Bainrose Castle.

With a grinding rumble, the top of the spire began to crumble down.

"Scatter!" Voran cried out. The mages levitated in different directions as the building collapsed down towards them. Most of them made it, but several didn't. Those caught as the top half of the tower crashed down towards Eintocarst's temple had their shields utterly shattered and were crushed out of the sky. Screams erupted from below as Central Hill shook from the destruction.

Mirian redoubled her assault, using the chaos to give herself time to unleash another fully powered greater lightning. Thunder echoed across the city as she followed up with a barrage of fireballs that streaked above the terrified crowds below. Three more Praetorians fell out of the sky, but then they reformed, shields layered again.

"Keep her pinned! And hit your bloody counters!" one of the squad captains shouted as Mirian's shield began to get hammered from every side. There were just too many of them, and the attack had become unrelenting. Despite her efforts to use Gaius's tactics, she was burning through far too much mana.

Then I'll fucking take you with me, she decided, and charged towards the formation, aiming right for the center.

Then, one of the Praetorian's flesh turned black and he fell out of the sky. Then a second. Then a third.

Mirian whirled.

When she'd fought Gaius on the plateau, she'd known he was holding back. She hadn't realized just how much.

He flew towards them now, his own black shield glimmering with edges of light as the Praetorians redirected their spells toward him, but it didn't slow him. From his hand, black lines flashed through the sky, skewering two more Praetorians. They plummeted to the ground. Then, Mirian watched as a dozen bindings formed across the souls of the remaining Praetorians all at once. Their souls burned, trying to repel the intrusion, but unlike Mirian's curses, these stuck fast.

Their attacks became desperate, with every kind of spell swarming the arch-necromancer. Gaius didn't flinch or deviate his course. He arrived in front of Mirian, siphoning or stopping every spell that came at him, and it seemed effortless.

"Retreat and regroup! Emergency procedure seven—" one of the captains shouted, but that was when Gaius attacked.

He targeted the squad captain first, and Mirian watched as the curse around the man dug into his soul. With detect life, those bindings appeared black to her, and they sliced through his bright soul. There was an eruption of shadow, and his soul shattered.

It happened so fast, but time seemed to stretch for Mirian so that she saw every detail. The shadowy explosion released new necromantic bindings that lashed out like chains, wrapping around the nearest Praetorians. It became a chain reaction, with each soul fueling new shadowy tendrils that spread again. It was like a detonation of shadows, expanding lines of black energy writhing through the air like they were possessed by some beast. They ripped through the Praetorians, and ten of them fell from the air.

That left two. Gaius smashed one of them with another black line, leaving only Voran.

"Atroxcidi," he croaked.

More curses formed around the First Praetorian, and Mirian watched as his aura was drained completely. His levitation spell failed, but her father's spell kept him aloft.

"I've been waiting for this," Gaius said, voice like a knife.

"It wasn't—personal."

"Is that what you tell yourself to sleep better? Unfortunately, for me, it very, very much was."

Voran drew his pistol.

Gaius shook his head, and his gray eyes flashed dangerously. "Oh no. You don't get the easy way out of this. You will feel a fraction of what I felt." Voran's pistol went flying, and as the curses writhed around his soul, Voran began to scream.

Mirian levitated to her father's side, watching, jaw clenched. The fire of rage that had consumed her was fading, and she was disturbed to find that she enjoyed watching Voran contort with pain in the air. She still saw that face, mottled in shadow, watching her as she stood before the corpse of her mother. It was older now, with the first creases of age, but with the memory curse gone, all she could feel when she looked at him was hatred.

When at last, Voran's charred corpse fell from the sky to the streets below, Mirian watched it, and her anger had calmed back down to a simmer. She looked around Alkazaria. There was all sorts of shouting down below. People running, people praying. Corpses lying in the street from where stray spells had hit them, or crushed beneath the debris. The First Spire was shattered, and the roof of the Temple of Eintocarst had collapsed too. There was damage all along the Citadel, and several houses were on fire.

"I just want her back," Mirian told the wind.

"Me too," her father said.

She gave him a faint smile. "Thanks for coming."

"How could I not?" He looked around, taking in the smoke and dust that now shrouded Central Hill. "What now?"

"I don't particularly want to deal with this mess. It'll all go away in a few days anyways. Next cycle, I'll use a different set of tactics. Let's leave."

"Where to?"

"Arriroba. There's someone there I'd like you to meet."

"Your… adoptive parents?"

She could tell he wanted to call them something else. "No, they're in Florin on vacation. It's what they do any time they come into even a little money." She looked around one last time. There was some leyline data she hadn't recorded, the piles of schematics still in her room, and plenty of other things to do here—but they could wait. She'd already recorded the dig sites on her soulbound spellbook's map of the city and most of the truly time consuming stuff. She flew east.

"I should have asked his name," Mirian said as they levitated over the Citadel.

"Hmm?"

"The acolyte who warned me. He was loyal, and brave. But I never asked his name. Hmm. I suppose there is one thing I need to do before I leave the city. I have some questions for the High Priest of Carkavakom."

They descended towards the seventh temple, on the opposite side of the Citadel.

Behind them, the fires continued to burn.