The Runic Alchemist

Damian and the others immediately fired projectile spells one after another toward the dark creatures, with little success in hitting them. Physical attacks barely affected these creatures, and they were too far for any fire spells to reach them quickly. Damian could have extended his mana threads through his runic circles, but the creatures were moving too fast to aim accurately.

He tried anyway and failed. Only when one of the creatures came closer did they finally manage to hit it with some of their fire spells. However, it wasn't enough. Realizing the situation, she let her two beasts attack the four breaking Threadripper's aura armor ignoring them. Damian abandoned his position at the edge of the wall and rushed to help the four under attack.

Tristan and Lysandrea followed closely behind. The worst had come to pass, and the others didn't matter as much now. The flying units remained a nuisance, but the situation here was more urgent.

Damian let Tristan and Lysandrea move ahead while he stayed behind everyone, specially Vidalia, who was the one dealing significant damage to Threadripper's armor. He took out his golem and connected it with seven mana threads. With a thick iron spear in hand, the golem charged forward alongside the other two.

Tristan and Lysandrea were surprised at first but quickly regained focus and started attacking the dark, shimmering creatures with fire spells and aura blades welcoming all the help that came.

Damian also used his black fire aura spell, enveloping the tip of his steel spear, which he had stolen from Faerunia, to attack the creatures. He hadn't expected much more than to slow them down, but to his surprise, his attacks were effective.

It turns out that aura enhances the force of your blows—the harder you hit, the stronger the effect. And his golem had strength.. His strikes landed successfully, damaging the strange creatures. Seeing this, the others supported him, creating opportunities for him to target the creatures' joints and weak points, crippling and destroying them one by one.

"Impossible! What the hell is that?!" Moondancer exclaimed as she landed a bit farther from where they had engaged her beasts, leaving Threadripper to his misery. Vidalia, though focused on her singular task, was still a spell master and had set numerous traps for Moondancer to engage with, which was why she had been hovering nearby, searching for a way in.

Damian could feel the power of Vidalia's traps just by sensing the overflowing mana around her.

Moondancer, from a few meters away, attacked them with her signature black javelins as they fought off the third creature, which had been trying to reach Vidalia. They all dodged in different directions, letting the javelins hit her own beast, though it didn't do much damage. Damian let the last creature go, trusting Vidalia's trap to deal with it, and rushed his golem toward Moondancer.

The golem, spear in hand, led the charge, with Tristan and Lysandrea staying on its side, using it as their main attacker.

Moondancer retaliated with hundreds of large, dark arrows aimed directly at them. But Damian was prepared. He activated the runic roll he had taken out earlier, gathering mana and ready to launch. It was another wormhole spell, but Damian had decreased its size to make it more efficient.

He opened one end just ahead of his golem using the mana thread to control it and the other end near Threadripper's body.

The dark arrows funneled into the wormhole, slowly but effectively transferring from one side to the other, hitting her own companion. Damian could sped up the wormhole movements by using more mana threads to pull it where it needed to be, he left only two connected to the golem's legs as it continued to charge forward which was simple enough action.

Seeing her arrows now harming Threadripper, Moondancer stopped throwing projectiles and instead conjured two massive dark blades in her hands before rushing at them.

Damian's golem clashed with Moondancer, but it lacked the physical superiority he had hoped for. Even as an Esper, her stats were on another level entirely. The golem, made of steel and iron, could barely keep up. Tristan and Lysandrea had switched to using aura blades, attacking alongside the golem, but the three of them combined still struggled to contend with her two enormous sword arms.

There was a skill to her blade technique but it was difficult to understand, with the sheer force behind each strike overwhelming them.

Damian's golem was the only one taking the hits directly, clashing with her blades even though it bent more and more out of shape with each exchange, while Tristan and Lysandrea looked for opportunities to attack her body. But Moondancer's shadow ability allowed her to conjure various defenses all over her body, leaving them little room for success.

However, Damian wasn't relying solely on his golem and spear. From a distance, behind Vidalia, he activated another runic roll, this one containing a powerful fire pillar rune and a high-intensity wind rune. Using his mana threads, he guided them toward the fight. When ready, he activated the fire pillar, sending a beam of flames toward Moondancer's conjured objects and her swords.

Since the spell was silent with him just whispering with little to no hand movements from distance it was also out of her mana sensing runic tool, she hadn't sensed it coming, and the flames successfully engulfed and burned her shadow creations.

Next, Damian activated the wind rune behind the fire pillar, feeding the flames with more oxygen, causing the fire to spread in a wide ring. It was beyond his control, but the results were clear—it amplified the spell's power, which was all that mattered. He had never tried this before.

Tristan and Lysandrea had backed off by this point, casting random spells at her body to keep Moondancer's attention. She could no longer send shadow objects toward them without Damian burning them to ash.

"No! What the hell are you doing…?!"

Tristan's scream startled Damian for a moment. He thought he had accidentally burned him, but Tristan wasn't looking at him—he was staring behind him. Damian turned back and saw Esme's aura sword piercing Vidalia's back, the sword was halfway through in. Blood poured from the wound, and then came the pain—blinding, agonizing pain that cut through everything making Damian's mind blank.

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