Precipice (IV)

Minotaurs rampaged across the battlefield, smashing through shields and magic barriers like wrecking balls.

Currently, the majority of hunters fighting had no formation—the entire assembly was enthralled in the chaos, scattered across the raging battlefield. It was difficult to even make sense of the situation much less regroup with allies.

Or at least, that was the case for the stragglers.

The situation was not completely hopeless; there were a few people radiating auas too brilliant to go unnoticed even in the turmoil. The therianthropes naturally took note of the humans emitting such powerful waves of preternatural power and began charging at them to no avail.

The three members of Onslaught had assumed a simple formation, spurred on in the heat of the moment and based on nothing more than the thought given to their respective classes.

Angelica stood shoulder to shoulder with Shaw at the front, her rapier—Cinis Cantata—already drawn, its blade wreathed in a curtain of resplendent flames that danced and shimmered with deadly grace. Arden's Warhammer, too, pulsed with power, glowing from the surge of energy flooding his aura.

As Cyril took in the pummeled bodies and smoking corpses strewn across the ground before them, a good portion of the tension he'd been carrying finally eased from his shoulders.

The large arc of scorched earth carved into the ground ahead was likely the source of that earlier explosion. Although it was meant to drive them back, the rampaging beasts had no qualms about charging through the blazing wall of fire.

One in particular, stood out more than the rest at nearly eight feet tall, with an articulated frame comprised of a mix between both man and monster. The lower half was like that of a horses', with powerful hooves and muscular legs, coated in a sheen of dark fur, while the upper half—which appeared to be melded together with its counterpart—was a grey-skinned human torso wielding a large metal pole, tapered at both ends and doubling as a lance.

The monster's roar was loud enough to lull even the clamor of battle, and even more fearsome than that was the head on charge the creature had initiated. Its hoofed legs clattered ruthlessly against the ground as the monster darted across the battlefield like a ballistic missile.

Friend or foe, that designation didn't matter, everything in its path would get blown away all the same.

Angelica lifted her Rapier and dropped into a low stance, angling the blade's tip as soon as she heard the vengeful cry of the lance wielding centaur howling past the flames. Shrieks and screams erupted as the centaur hammered its way forward, clearing the way for its allies and knocking over all in its path.

Even after witnessing such brutality, the girl didn't falter.

"If you would—Percy, Arden." Angelica called out, giving a quick nod as she glanced back at the wind magician behind her.

A storm of fierce gales gathered around Percy's open palm. He compressed the swirling winds into a tight sphere and hurled it forward the moment Angelica launched herself ahead. As it reached her back, the sphere erupted, expanding into a burst of force that propelled her forward at a frightening speed.

She closed the distance in an instant—just as the centaur breached the wall of flames.

Her sudden appearance caught the creature off guard, but it didn't relent. Giving another roar, it swung the massive iron lance overhead and brought it crashing down with tremendous force.

Although powerful, the brute's swing lacked finesse, making it easy to evade. Angelica sidestepped the monstrous blow with grace, spinning on her heel as she wound up for the finisher.

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With a flurry of blazing thrusts—too fast for the creature to react—she dismantled the centaur's forelimbs, each strike searing through flesh and bone. Unbalanced, the beast tumbled forward, collapsing straight into the final thrust of her blade.

She surged ahead and drove her rapier through its skull, the compressed flames wreathing her weapon erupting in a fiery blast that shattered its head in a brilliant explosion of light and gore.

"OOOAHHH!!"

Angelica's attack had completely obliterated the centaur's torso, and in the brief moment of respite she secured whilst airborne, she made eye contact with Cyril for the first time since his arrival.

The relief surfacing in her expression wasn't meant to last, as soon as they made eye contact her lips parted. Angelica gave a forceful shout—louder than anything Cyril had ever heard her say before.

"Cyril get back!"

He obeyed instinctively and leapt off the ground right before the devastation took hold.

A heartbeat later, something crashed into the ground, unleashing powerful seismic waves undulating everywhere. Arden's massive Warhammer cratered the point of impact and sent a wave of dust and debris propagating outward, pushing everything back and leaving the area feeling unstable.

By the time the tremors subsided, only the members of Onslaught were standing at ground zero, everything else was temporarily obscured from view—veiled by the rising plumes of smoke and dust.

After heeding Angelica's last-minute warning, Cyril had found refuge on a nearby oak tree, which somehow managed to remain rooted against the seismic tremors Arden had unleashed.

He dropped down to ruptured patch of land and began sprinting towards the only ones visible in the aftermath. "What—what's going on? Why are there therianthropes here?" Cyril asked as he came to a stop.

"Took you long enough man." Arden plopped to one knee and braced his body against the giant Warhammer. He wasn't in a particularly dire condition, but the breathless gasps coming from him clearly meant that he wasn't at his best at the moment.

"I'm fine..." Arden raised a hand to dismiss his concerns. "This usually happens when I push my skill too far, I just need to catch my breath."

"Okay, if you say so." Cyril tore his gaze away from the huffing striker and settled it on the other two, wordlessly reiterating his earlier question.

"Are you two alright?" he asked, scanning Percy and Angelica in turn.

"More or less," Angelica replied, wiping the sweat from her forehead. "I just didn't expect the monsters inside a proxy dungeon to be this fierce."

"She's right." seconded Percy "I think you've realized this as well Cyril, but something is clearly off about this place. We were supposed to face goblins, not Therianthropes, they weren't supposed to be inside this dungeon. "

"I'm aware. The boss has already been defeated too, so none of this is really adding up."

"We entered the dungeon ahead of you and found all the goblins already massacred. Not long after, someone cast a flame spell that gave away our position—and that's when the horde of therianthropes came down on us. That was about an hour ago."

"An hour? Is time passing faster here?"

"Yeah, seems like the grid can't keep it open for much longer, so I'm afraid we don't have a lot of time here. At this rate, I'm not even sure if scarecrow is going to show up at all."

"Time is passing faster now?" Angelica asked from the side. The conversation was still well above her expertise, but that was one detail she couldn't let slip by.

"Yes," Cyril replied. "The closer a gate is to closing, the more out of sync it becomes with our dimension, which usually causes time to pass faster. This dungeon doesn't have a core either, so there's nothing anyone can do about it from the outside."

"Oh, I see. Then what are we to do, Cyril? Do you have a plan?" she asked, turning toward him expectantly. Cyril noticed the others doing the same—and smiled to himself.

"Oh, so I'm the leader now?"

"Well, you did catch on pretty quick during the final assessment. The least we could do is hear you out." Arden said as he rose to his feet, slanting the giant weapon across his shoulder once again.

"Hmm...well for now, we've driven those guys back, but that won't be enough. Percy, if what you said is true and someone really did give away your position, it means there are impostors in this party— Scarecrow's agents."

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