CH1008

There was only one alarm his god could have been talking about, the one given to the dryads after the sirens had moved in, in case any sort of emergency befell them, yet he hadn’t been prepared for it to actually see any use. It had been just in case, not ever actually meant to be pressed, and he felt his mind grow a mess as he worked out what to do.

He flew at a speed that would get him to Sachel’s home in seconds but as he went, he made sure to connect to the few others already up and about despite the early hour, screaming in their heads to go to the adventurer’s guild to get as many adventurers as could be gathered to help deal with a problem he could already guess at while at the same time demanding answers from his god.

<It’s a demon attack.> Myriad said, confirming Ben’s worst fears. <A big one too, I don’t know for sure how many there are but by the time I was called I could see a few hundred in the area.>

Hundreds… okay, no, that’s manageable. I can deal with that, Ben nodded, forcing himself to calm down. I am disgustingly powerful by this point; hundreds of demons are nothing compared to what I can do, which means my only priority is getting there as fast as I can.

He could feel the wind and what dust was in the air stinging his flesh from his speed, but he ignored it. He had only one priority, and it was getting to Sachel’s, ripping the door off its hinges in his hurry by the time he got there and making those inside jump, panic too fresh, even if they were somewhat safe.

Ben could recognize all of them, twenty dryads having made it there with a couple more stepping through once he arrived and, judging from what he was seeing, it made sense for them to be there. Ben was surely called as soon as they realized they were under attack, and with the time change between the two lands, it had to have still been dark when their village had been invaded. The ones who’d been first to get through were the ones who lived closest to Fontesh and among them he could see signs of attack, cuts that could only have been from claws and other injuries that spoke of magic but of the ones who made it through, nothing was immediately life-threatening.

On this side at least. Myriad, get Anailia to send Sonya this way and to get Thera back. She shouldn’t be too far, and I want to have some powerful healers on hand for whoever I send through. When you’re done that, directly call the demis to come help too.

He was trying to be rational about it but he’d gone into the dryads’ heads to see what he could expect, finding chaos had descended on them with the first screams waking up enough others to sound a proper alarm, their memories showing him one more thing. Where the missing one among them was.

Both the alarm and the gate away were kept in Fontesh’s house, and like it or not, it made sense why she wasn’t there. She was an awakened plant mage, a powerful fighting force for her village, who could protect her people while they escaped on top of fighting off the monsters bearing down on them. No, the unexplained absence was her daughter, Ben’s precious student, who was nowhere to be seen among them because the memories of the others revealed she’d slipped back through in the chaos.

Stupid girl, he privately cursed to himself, feeling his fear flood him all over again. What would make you do something dumb like that?

As her teacher, it was a lengthy conversation he was going to have to have with her once he found her but that would only be after they were all safe, with Ben instead focused on what he needed to do then, yelling out orders to the ones around him.

“The five strongest of you, stay here to make sure nothing that shouldn’t gets through the gate before more help arrives while the rest of you go into the streets. We can’t have this place filling so much that it would be difficult for more of you to get through, and when others start arriving to help, you can flag them down.”

He put all of the authority he could in his voice as he spoke, trying to force them to do as he said but not sticking around to see if they’d listen. They at least were safe, he now had different priorities as he rushed through that portal to the chaos beyond, finding weaker dryads trying to make their way into Fontesh’s home while he forced himself out.

Ralia guarded the door as others ran through, the woman in her snake form but recognizable as their eyes met, looking relieved to have him there but said no more as he ran out. From where he stood it was clear the village was filled with demons, already looking like the few hundred Myriad had promised and more beyond it but within the scope of his vision it seemed manageable as he stretched his senses and used the eyes of everyone he connected with to see more before materializing hundreds of hard metal balls and shot them out, instantly piercing skulls around him and leaving demon corpses to fall to the ground like wet sacks of meat, even as more ran in from the woods.

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That’s okay though, I can handle this much, he told himself as he ran, spending more of his mana to pick up every dryad he could see with an unawakened magic and moved them to Fontesh’s home faster than they could ever hope to run, ignoring the panic that caused in favour of pure efficiency. And I’m not alone either. We can all handle this.