CH222

“Um, is this really necessary?” Ben asked Ceselee as she ran, having thrown him over her shoulder when she saw he couldn’t keep up with the rest of the group.

“I’m not exactly a fan either but time is of the essence. You should really train your agility a bit, or at the worst you could have brought your bike.”

“There’s nothing I need agility for as a craftsman or enchanter. As for my bike… well hindsight’s twenty/twenty as they say, let’s not focus on that.”

Despite the danger they were all rushing towards, he got to see firsthand the rest of the guild giggle as they ran behind their leader. Everyone had met up at the guild quickly enough, but with the leviathans showing up days earlier than expected they had only around half of the adventurers they were expecting, meaning they’d need to work all the harder to protect the town as the people within began to evacuate.

“Honesty, what’s even the point of prophecy if it’s so inaccurate? Between this one being five days early and the gods having a freaking seventeen-year window, not seeing much point.”

“Looking at all possible futures and trying to determine the most likely one isn’t exactly easy you know, especially not for stuff like this. Ideally, the prophets would stick to predicting weather and harvest seasons, but they need to at least try and help divert disaster if they see it on the horizon. At the end of the day no matter how finicky it is, it’s better than nothing.”

After that Ceselee outlined the main goal for everyone as they ran, namely ensuring that the town was safe by leading away as many of the beasts as they could before truly going on the offensive, it all came down to how they did it.

“Thera, of all of us your magic should be the most powerful, I’m told they were spotted pretty far out still, do you think you could attack from a distance with enough power to get their attention?”

“I can’t guarantee my accuracy, but if I keep trying I should be able to manage.”

“Good.”

As soon as that was decided they arrived at the beach and Ceselee shouted at the other guild leaders what they would attempt, only stopping as she heard Ben swear by her ear.

“Ceselee, a bit of a problem,” He told her as he contorted himself to be able to stare into the sea. “There’s a bit more than the dozen we were expecting. I count twenty-three.”

She dropped him as she whipped her head to look for herself, trying to see the heads poking out of the water in the distance. “Are you sure? I only see a few so far.”

“I’m sure,” He said confidently as he picked himself up and grabbed her arm, pointing them out one by one and leaving her stomach to drop with things only getting worse with what he said next. “And I don’t think those are all juveniles either.”

“What?”

“Look at the heads of those four, it’s a bit hard to tell because they’re farther back than the rest, but if you ignore the perspective playing tricks on you it’s pretty clear the size is going to be around three times larger than the others.”

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