The forest almost seemed to end in front of them, Derb actually thought they just walked past the center until Walter walked in front of them and waved his hand, burning the trees in front of them. “Prepare yourself, this won’t be something you’ll live through if you don’t.” It was a huge patch of grass, mana core in the center. The core was perched on top of a tiny stump, the branches seemingly holding it in place. The edges of the branches closest to it were budding flowers. The forest seemed almost scared of it, no trees grew around it, leaving a large open plain in the middle of the woods. It looked absolutely beautiful.

Walter didn’t seem enthused. “Wait till I tell you to charge, if anyone runs I'll personally shoot you myself.” The old man ordered. He held out his hand, one of his students handing him a massive staff that towered over him. It was crudely carved out of wood and shaped like a cane, a lantern with a blue fire hanging from it. He walked forward, standing between them and the core, and muttered in a deep and indecipherable language. The lantern glew and swirled around gently, the fire inside changing different colors and slowly gaining strength. The chanting slowly became stronger and stronger, until the lantern exploded. The fire stayed in place, revolving and spinning while swirling around as if still hanging by the staff.

Until it dropped. Something he could only describe as a nuclear bomb set off as a shockwave brought everyone to their hands and knees. There was no sound made from the blast but the sound of trees rending and the ground unearthing made the world sound like a living hell. From the hellish heat blast he could only watch as Walter sat through it, completely calm and in front, almost as if protecting them from the spell he created. It continued for a full minute. The sound of trees and ground burning stopped about thirty seconds in, the spell simply went on to turn the ashes into ashes.

Once it was over and the smell of heat and fire no longer threatened to hurt him Derb took off his helmet, sweating all over. The scene he saw was terrifying. They must have walked about 20 miles into the forest to make it to the center. The blast Walter made cut through the other 20, showing the other side. Through it all was a giant 9 foot rut of blackened ash that created a road, terrifyingly barren of all life. It wasn’t until he looked closer that he realized the core and the tree stump were still in place, long and thick roots exposed to the air with no sign of damage. He moaned in fear, if that wasn’t enough to kill it then what the hell were the rest of them going to do?

“Charge! Hold them off while I recharge!” Walter said, gasping and full of sweat. Derb didn’t hesitate, he just put on his helmet and ran forward. Someone that strong could end him in a heartbeat, there was no need to deny him. His mind went fuzzy as he charged forward, he could barely hear the shouts behind him as he ran. Monster burst out of the ground in front of him, sludging forward without a care. There were so many that almost none of them were of the same species.

He unsheathed the sword and slammed it forward, decapitating some terrifying lizard monster. Something clamped down on his leg but he barely felt it through the armor. He could tell he was already poisoned but it didn’t faze him. He infused the sword with dark mana while he tore through a giant frog, feeding off it’s life. He almost swung again until he realized it went dark all of a sudden. He looked up just in time to see dozens of disgusting carapaced legs fall over him. For a second nothing but silence fell over the area, until a black ball of mana burst open the creature's stomach.

It wasn’t big enough to fully get the creature's body, since he only made enough to barely make a tennis ball, but it was enough for him to crawl out from under it. He shuddered as the slime and what he hoped wasn’t poison filled his armor. He guessed by the fact that no demons were nearing the spill that it was. He ran back towards the group, slashing and tearing through anything in his way. “How much time does he need!? They’re everywhere!” Derb shouted as he ripped some disgusting tick thing off the neck of his armor.

One of the peacekeepers ripped cleanly through six monsters at once, delicately sheathing the sword and looking back at him. “He needs only a bit more time, just try as hard as you can to hold them off while saving your strength.” Derb sighed, crushing the tick with dark-infused gauntlets and sapping its strength. He ran back into the fray and continued moving through the creatures, every swing taking a life and strengthening his. His mind felt terrified and confused, there were too many enemies, too many smells and sounds. It all combined to disorient him in the middle of battle.

At some point he didn’t even aim, any time he swung something was ripped clean in half so there was no trouble there. His eyes were wide open though, looking for any change in the wave of monsters, any hope that they might dwindle. Nothing actually changed until he heard someone shout in the familiar infused voice. “REGROUP, WE’RE READY.”.Derb ran back, Jumping past huge waves of monsters. He realized only then how far he was from the group. He made it back quickly enough, though, landing in a rolling crash into a tree not far from the rest.

He stood up and tried dusting himself off, only to remember he was still covered in disgusting sludge. “Uh, where are we on the plan?” He asked one of the panting warriors, who only shrugged his shoulders. He looked around, only 18 of the normal warriors survived the onslaught, Walter and all of the peacekeepers made it, however. They looked pretty bad, though. He ran over to them, wanting answers on why there were so many casualties. He didn’t get the chance, as Walter picked up a black metal staff and aimed it at the core, and all the monsters in the way.

The blast wasn’t as insane as before, but it was still enough to shake the ground he walked on. It was only a foot wide but every time Walter moved the staff the beam disintegrated through everything. It was mortifying to see monsters just… disappear, or fall apart. It only took one sweep to kill everything, he spent the rest of the time focusing down on the core. He couldn’t see through the orange beam but the way the fire just… bounced off the core when it tore clean through everything else was almost uncanny.

He sat down and meditated, deciding that sending his precious demons to the poison was something he had no choice but to do. He cursed at the fact that he no longer had a backup evacuation plan, if shit hit the fan he no longer had a bunch of convenient demons to hide behind. He summoned everyone, even the goblins. “All of you are going to protect the rest of them, if any of them die it should mean all of you went first.” They all nodded but he could see the fear in the goblin’s eyes, looking at each other unsurely. He smothered the guilt, the people came first.

He was still angry about how easily someone died. He didn’t really expect something on this level. Honestly, he’d rather take on a group of orcs than four times as many small monsters. His sword wasn’t built for them and now that he wasn’t constantly killing he could feel the poison filling his body. It never really went away, but it only started making him feel dizzy now. The beam finally went down by the time he stored enough mana into his gauntlets for one more shot. It saved him before and he was sure it’d save him again…

Once again they were called out to fight and he made sure to waste no time. He noticed the core and its branches had taken damage, blackened and singed as if they had been put under a broiler for a minute. It wasn’t a lot of damage but at least it was progress… He made up his mind. Instead of fighting with the monsters, he ran right through, ignoring the rising bumps of earth and flesh. The monsters this time were bigger but just as numerous, absolutely terrifying. Thirty seconds was all it took to get him to the core, the last time the old man needed around 20 minutes to recharge so he knew he had time.

He leaped as high as he could, activating snake eyes and slowing time to a stop. The monsters had already come out but they hadn’t been fast enough to stop him. In a raging and dark spinning slash, he brought the sword down on the center of the core with as much momentum and strength he could garner. The shockwave entered his hands like a goddamn earthquake. He almost stopped out of pure agony but he realized every monster near him had him focused dead center.

He dodged a colorful bird and used the core to hop backwards into the air, horrified at what he saw. It wasn’t just the ones near him. He could see the group, along with his demons with perfect clarity thanks to his snake eyes. They all looked confused as the demons ran back towards the core, back to him. As he came back down he decapitated a snake slightly larger than an anaconda, swiftly deflecting a spear that came from another snake-human hybrid. He span, slowly bringing out the sword in the final moment to slash through three demons at once, running through the moment he found an opening.

The demons were becoming more human now, both in size and figure. He jumped and stomped his boot onto one of their faces bringing them down as he leaped into the air once more. The demons only got denser, however, and in a moment of pure panic, he unloaded all the dark mana in his gauntlets in a burst instead of a charged ball. The effect was immediate. The shotgun-like blast covered everything within 20 feet in front of him, everything in front of him started decaying, rotting at a disgusting speed as the smell of rot filled the air.

He could feel the presence of something in the air, desperately trying to enter the world. He didn’t have the mana to take it in so he thought about just letting it be… until he didn’t. He breathed mana into it just enough for it to start the transformation, letting it take in the rest through ambient mana as he ran. He could hear a shrill scream behind him as the rotted carcasses were suddenly swallowed up by the demon, forming it into a disgusting and writhing amorphous wreck of different monsters.

He winced as it tried to form a connection with him, the first that’s tried to do so. He absolutely refused, of course, and cut it off at the source. The scream was agonizing, it’s writhing, massive arms started picking up anything around it and dropping their crushed carcasses into its center, eating the object. Derb prayed that it wouldn’t be a problem later and ran, the monsters no longer focused on him and instead on the horrifying monster he summoned. Theys till swiped at him every now and then but by the time he made it back to the group most of them were near the core, battling nonstop with the abomination he summoned.

“What did you do, black knight?” One of the peacekeepers ordered, cleaning his long blade with a white handkerchief. His eyes were calm but aware, eyeing him down to see if he could be trusted. He immediately relented. “I-i uh… thought I'd help with fighting the core but the moment I did every monster focused me down while I ran. I had to summon a rogue demon to escape, it’s not under my control but it’s fighting everything over there.” He pointed back to the swarming mass of demons and didn’t notice the slap come down to the back of his head.

It was Walter, “Precocious brat! If I thought any of you would be able to deal damage to it then I'd have just sent a hundred while I sat in my house and carried my little girl!” He got slapped again, neither were actually painful and he didn’t fail to see the massive grin on his face. He walked back and sat down on a rock, slowly sipping from a blue mana vial. “Good job leading them away, how long do you think that demon of yours can keep them there?” A thunderous cry resonated around the area, the demon seemed to have grown bigger, and more dangerous.

Derb shrugged, “It might not be poison resistant so uh… 10 minutes? It might be longer.” The old man’s grin only got wider, “Not bad, not bad. We might be able to finish it in one go.” He stood up, propping himself up against the black staff in his hand. He chugged the rest of the vial and walked slowly in front of them all. He tapped the staff on the floor and sighed ethereally, as the floor around them went black. He brought the staff up and waved it in a circle in the air. Forming a tiny wisp of flame in the air. He chanted in a deep tone, flying the small will-o-wisp into the center of the group of monsters.

Derb had called the last explosion a nuclear blast, only because he hadn’t seen this one.