Chapter 258: Null Fiends

The caravan didn’t actually need to head into Willow’s Front as he had originally believed. In fact, they didn’t even get within the smaller walls surrounding the town. Instead, only a few wagons ended going through the inspection guards and unloading their goods. While the rest of them continued on their way to Aspinith, the next town on their route.

So far they had not run into many other problems. Other than the occasional group of monsters, it was quite peaceful. Even the monsters weren’t that disruptive. The mages took care of them before they even managed to get close, so it wasn’t like any of the warriors were tiring themselves out fighting monsters either.

And since Julius was technically a ‘warrior’ that meant he was also left to observe the mages having their fun.

Even though he was okay with keeping his abilities quiet for the time being, he couldn’t help but want to stretch his legs a little bit. The cooking was helping him stay somewhat busy, but he didn’t know what else to do in the meantime.

In the end, he decided to use his free time reading from the small collection of books he had tucked away in his storage ring. It wasn’t as exciting, but he hadn’t read in a while so it was an unexpected treat nonetheless.

***

“Everyone get ready,” George called out suddenly.

Julius looked up to see everyone getting up swiftly. The man’s tone was different than usual. This time it felt more urgent.

Thus, Julius closed the book he was reading softly and put it away into his ring before looking at where George was focusing his attention. It wasn’t like Julius hadn’t noticed them, but he didn’t think there was anything out of the ordinary.

Sure it was quite a crowd of monsters, but it wasn’t like something their caravan hadn’t dealt with many times at this point.

“What’s wrong?” Stephanie asked, also noticing George’s tone.

“A group of Null Fiends are approaching fast,” he said while getting out of the wagon. Stephanie’s face turned a bit more anxious but her voice didn’t waver.

“How many and how strong?”

“A few dozen and all Tier 3 except for one who is probably Tier 4,” George said, his eyes not leaving the direction where he sensed the monsters.

“Null Fiends approaching from the south!” Matt suddenly hollered out for the entire Caravan to hear.

“What the hell are Null Fiends?” He asked Beck who was preparing his armor for the first time since he met the man.

“You don’t know what Null Fiends are? I thought you grew up around Blumand?” The man asked, confused.

“No, I have no clue. What are they?”

The man put on the last piece of his armor and explained. “They are some of the more dangerous monsters that roam this region. They are powerful for their tier and have the annoying ability to absorb mana. So the only effective way to deal with them is to either overwhelm their absorption or to fight them with swords.”

“So, can they absorb everything made with mana?” He asked.

“No, but if you attack them with a pure mana attack like most of our mages do, they will simply absorb it and use it to empower their attacks. The best option is to use physical-based attacks. They can still absorb some mana if the attack uses mana but their ability to do so will be heavily limited,” Beck quickly explained before hopping out of the wagon.

“Warriors are the best option to fight them. Otherwise, we will just waste a lot of mana,” Stephanie said to him while also getting out of the wagon.

Julius hopped out, following the two of them. “What kind of attacks do they have?”

“They have a pretty simple but powerful attack that uses plain blasts of mana. They are also pretty beefy on top of their mana absorption. But there are several variations of them, so don’t expect all of them to be the same. They might have a healer or assassin in their midst so be mindful,” she advised him.

Julius was about to ask another question but was distracted by the monsters who made their way over the hill.

Fiends was a proper name for what he saw. Tall humanoid creatures covered in glowing red runes. Their faces looked more akin to reptiles and even from this distance, looked distinctly menacing.

He heard Rolus giving directions to various teams from where he was. “I want all mages to focus on supporting our warriors. Don’t bother wasting your mana to attack them unless you have the proper spell to do so, it will just give them more mana to attack us with.”

“I will focus on drawing the Tier 4 away from the battle and deal with it so that you don’t have to worry about being collateral. While I am, stay together with your teammates as much as possible. If you don’t have a team, then stay with the group I placed you with. But remember that the most important goal is to keep the others in the caravan safe. Is that understood?”

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

A resounding yell of affirmatives rang throughout the caravan before they all collectively went to meet the incoming monsters before they could reach the wagons.

Julius kept up with the others. Beck was bearing a shield in one arm as he easily led their group in front with Matt and Aaron a step behind him.

It would seem I will be getting a chance to stretch my legs, after all, he thought giddily.

***