In the distance I can hear about fifteen flashbangs go off meaning that Quincy’s group has started their fight against Bartrem and his men. Hopefully that goes well they have to deal with like 8 or 9 guys, but I think they will be fine, after all they have Adam. Wait no! Wrong person, I meant they have that Luther guy. Despite his appearance, I could sense his power literally sparkling at times (don’t know how he does that, probably has something to do with fire, but I digress) so I know they will be okay. Us on the other hand, I think we might have an easier time due to Elisa’s assasination spree earlier. However, we are fighting ghouls who can regenerate their bodies and the only way to kill them is to cut off their heads so I shouldn’t have to worry about accidentally killing them with my sword. Either way I see the three ghouls get sent flying in our direction and we engage in combat.

“You guys deal with the two grunts and try to distract Richter. When the time comes I’ll be sure to assassinate him in one fell swoop!” Elisa claims before she disappears with a flash of light.

“Wait, where are you going?” I try to ask before she vanishes.

“Well okay then, I guess she’s gone. In the meantime let’s just focus on these guys,” Remi announces.

The three ghouls in front of us are all carrying some form of ranged weapons. Richter has his compound bow, one ghoul has a crossbow, and the final ghoul has a bayonet.

“Whatever happens don’t lose sight of Richter, it’ll be troublesome to fight him if he starts to hide himself!” I tell everyone.

“Got it. I’ll keep an eye on him,” Nazuko responds.

The fight begins with Lilith and I charging ahead to engage the two ghouls closest to us. The ghoul with the crossbow shoots a bolt at Lilith, but it simply bounces off her shield and falls to the ground. She attempts to strike him with her longsword, but she misses as the ghoul takes a step back and jumps further into the swamp. The ghoul I’m facing proceeds to fire a bullet out of his bayonet, but I open a portal before it hits me and I send it towards Richter. The bullet hits him directly in the abdomen, but he barely flinches as the wound begins to quickly heal. Okay that’s not fair, he’s acting as if it barely hurt him at all. Although I’m starting to doubt the legitimacy of guns in this world considering how hard it is to kill people with them when aura exists. Since I avoided the ghoul’s shot I’m now within striking distance so the ghoul tries to stab me with his bayonet. I decided to use the same tactic I used in my duel with Lilith and manipulate space with telekinesis so the blade is pushed to my right side. So far I can only use telekinesis on objects that are within five feet of me. Not very impressive but it has it’s uses, like the time I made milk go up Nazuko’s nose while we were eating breakfast. The ghoul in front of me looks strangely confused as to why his bayonet was suddenly jerked to the left so I take advantage of his confusion by striking with a wind enhanced sword that cuts across his chest and sends him flying into a nearby tree. Suddenly there’s a flash of light that blinds everyone in the area similar to one of Ryder’s flashbangs. When our vision comes back we can see that the ghoul I just sent flying had his head cut off and is lying right next to his body with his blood starting to pollute the swamp.

“Whoa! Will did you do that,” Remi says astonished.

“No, I think it was Elisa. She’s the only one of us who has the power to control light,” I refute.

“I guess they don’t call her the ghost knight for nothing. Let’s just assume she’ll back us up when she sees an opportunity,” Azura claims.

It’s difficult to maneuver in a swamp so the terrain actually suits us at the moment since they can’t easily escape, but it is hard for us to advance as well. The ghoul with the crossbow starts to back away in fear, but Richter takes out his knife and stabs him in the back.

“Don’t get cold feet now weakling. If you even think about running away I’ll kill you before you even take one step. We ghouls are not supposed to cower in terror, we are the ones who are supposed to spread it,” Richter declares.

“Oh really, well, the ghouls I’ve killed in your outposts don’t affirm that ideal. They were shaking in their boots as they saw their allies' heads hit the floor,” Elisa’s voice says threateningly as it almost echoes throughout the swamp.

“What! You were the one who killed my men! Show yourself at once human. I’ll show you what it means to deal with a ghoul,” Richter threatens as he notches an arrow.

Suddenly a dart is shot from an unknown location and hits the crossbow ghoul right in his left arm. The ghoul’s left arm starts to swell up and we can see poison start to flood up his arm.

“S-S-Sir my arm it feels like it’s on fire!” the ghoul panics.

“Bear with the pain, soldier,” Richter says as he takes out his knife and cuts off the ghoul’s arm.

The ghoul screams out in pain as the poisoned arm falls into the swamp water and is now left defenseless with no way of quickly reloading his crossbow.

“Will, I’ll let you guys handle that one for now,” Elisa says from an unknown location.

“Tch, if that’s how you guys want to play it then fine by me,” Richter says as he attempts to escape into the trees.

“Ryder stop him!” Nazuko yells.

Ryder shoots a cannon ball at Richter to stop him from escaping, but he responds by shooting the cannon ball with an arrow so it explodes. He uses the smoke from the explosion to escape and hide inside the trees.

“Well that’s just great. Maybe using explosives wasn’t the best idea,” I sigh.

“Nah he would have escaped either way. Plus there’s never a bad time for explosives,” Ryder exclaims.

“Okay just stay focused guys, we don’t know when or where his attacks will come from. We have to focus on pinpointing his location,” I tell everyone.

Suddenly an arrow is shot from behind us and I barely manage to block it with my sword. Ow, the force of the arrow is enough to push me back a foot or two. I redirect another arrow away from us with a portal and it ends up hitting the crossbow ghoul in the dick. He screams for a good 10 seconds before passing out due to the pain. To finish him off I kick the downed ghoul into a portal to who knows where, but I’m sure he’ll be fine. A few more arrows start to come from different directions at different angles causing us to dodge around frantically.

“Gah, this is so annoying!” Remi yells as she rolls to the side to avoid a volley of arrows.

“I know! We have to do something about this. Remi, send your wolf to track him down with his scent,” I command.

“Okay, got it” she responds.

Remi summons her wolf and it begins to run in the direction of the ghoul pelting us with arrows. We all follow closely avoiding arrows that are coming at us in every direction. Ryder blocks one arrow heading for Azura with his large cannon. After a good minute the wolf starts to bark in the direction of a large tree and starts to run towards it.

“He’s there huh, alright guys he’s hiding in that tree,” Remi announces.

“Let’s get him!” Nazuko declares.

“Guys this guy is too skilled for us to fight while holding back. If we are going to win then we have to at least fight him with the intent to kill,” Azura mentions.

“She’s right I don’t know how much longer we can deflect these arrows without one of us getting injured,” Lilith agrees.

“Fine, but if the chance arises to incapacitate him we’re going with that option,” I reluctantly agree.

I charge forward and chop down the tree with one swing of my sword and as it falls we can see Richter jump straight into the air proceeding to shoot more arrows at us. Ryder assists by shooting him with his flintlock pistol causing the ghoul’s aim to go awry. Nazuko quickly runs up the falling tree and tries to go for the decapitation, however her small blade only manages to cut part of Richter’s shoulder and a few inches into his neck. He proceeds to knock her away with a swipe of his knife and shoots an arrow right at her. She blocks it, but the force of the arrow sends her flying back at us. I try to catch Nazuko, but she’s moving so fast she flies into me and we tumble on the ground into the water.

“Ugh, that hurt. But Will, at least you make a nice cushion,” Nazuko says as she gets out of the water now soaking wet.

“Don’t get used to it,” I respond.

“You annoying pests, I’ll be happy to feed on your entrails as soon as you’re all dead,” Richter says as the cut on his neck starts to heal.

“You won’t get the chance,” Elisa says as she appears and attempts to finish the job.

Richter barely manages to avoid death by intercepting the blade with his hand causing his pinky and ring fingers to fall off.

“Tch, you vixen,” he curses right before he kicks her away and jumps into the water.

“Shoot! We won’t be able to track him with his scent anymore,” Remi tells us.

“Time for a bit of blast fishing then,” Ryder says as he sends tons of explosives into the water.

A few seconds later we witness a ton of explosions go off throughout the swamp sending anything and everything that resided in the water into the air. Frogs, fish, alligators, the disembodied head of the bayonet ghoul, and finally Richter with a very angry look on his face.

“Argh, do you fools go around blowing up things wherever you go!” he yells in anger.

“Pretty much,” Ryder says nonchalantly.

“Screw you Eco-Terrorists, take this,” he says as he takes a ton of arrows from his quiver and nocks them.

The next second we see about 50 to a 100 arrows flying in our direction and he uses wind to cause them to come at us from every imaginable direction and angle.

“Guys I can’t make enough portals to catch all those arrows!” I inform.

“Don’t worry I got this!” Lilith assures us.

She sheathes her sword and holds her shield to the air. I can feel her aura rise and we are quickly covered in a 360 degree barrier that extends from her shield. I can hear the clank of the arrows as they come into contact with Liliths ability. However we seem to have lost track of Richter and have fallen back into our old situation. Remi’s wolf can’t track him anymore, so we need to find a new way of dealing with this. I need to come up with a way to track him down. There’s got to be some way. I can tell he uses wind every time he fires off his arrows, that’s why they have so much force attached. Since I have an affinity for wind I might be able to sense the changes in wind pressure whenever an arrow is fired off.

“Hey just so you know I can’t keep this up forever, we have about a minute left until the spell runs out, maybe more if I don’t choose to cover every angle,” Lilith informs us as arrows continue to pelt her barrier nonstop.

Damn, I might be able to assist Lilith by covering half of the barrier with a portal, but I can’t concentrate on that and tracking down Richter at the same time.

Allow me to assist you.

“Assist me in what way?” I question.

Outsource the mental calculations needed to maintain the portal to me. Just channel the necessary magical energy needed and I can handle the rest.

“That’s perfect, thanks Mythril,”

“Reduce your barrier to cover half of us. Let me handle one side, I’ll cover it with a portal,” I tell Lilith.

“Okay!” she says as she lowers the back half of the barrier.

I channel the magical energy to create the portal and let Mythril handle the rest. I proceed to close my eyes and put my hand on the ground. Focus. Single out the most relevant changes in air pressure. Sense the magical energy being outputted. It’s like I’m a human barometer, the only difference being that there is added radar functionality. With each arrow fired I can feel it, it’s difficult to determine the cause, so I cast away the information of everything that isn’t an arrow. A few more seconds and I continue to hone in on the source.

“Ah hah! I’ve got it. Ryder, fire an explosive about 69 feet away, 45 degrees southwest. I’ll let you handle the calculation for trajectory, but he’s about 15 feet above the ground in a tree,” I tell him.

“Nice! I got this,” Ryder says as he fires a cannon ball according to my information.

A few seconds later we hear the explosion go off along with the screams of a ghoul.

“Yeah you got him!” Azura exclaims.

“Heh, he can’t hide from us now,” I smirk.

I can definitely feel him moving about now.

“50 feet, 34 degrees, northwest, 35 feet, 63 degrees, northeast”

I proceed to tell Ryder everytime Richter moves to a new location. He must be panicking since we now have a way of determining his location. With every cannon ball that hits him, he’s moving closer. If I were him I’d be pissed that my guerilla tactics are no longer working. About 3 bombs later and he’s finally right in front of us.

“Curse you pests, how did you manage to find out where I hid,” he orders.

“Everytime you fire an arrow, I can feel it. There’s no way you can hide from us now,” I say as I try to intimidate him.

“Fine I don’t need to hide to deal with you guys,” he decides.

We all charge at him in order to take him down once and for all. We assault him with persistent attacks, while a few hit, he manages to dodge the most vital strikes. Archers tend to be quick and agile, but not as quick as those from the thief warclass. I try to strike for his legs and he jumps on top of me into the air. In response, Nazuko jumps off of Remi to try and strike him.

“Hey don’t use me as a footstool!” Remi yells.

“Sorry, but you were the closest one,” Nazuko says without remorse.

“Alright round two buddy,” she says as she swings her short sword at him.

She doesn’t get the decapitation, but her sword ends up cutting his bowstring rendering his weapon useless.

“Nice job Nazuko! We pretty much have this in the bag now,” I exclaim.

“Umu! Praise me more Will! Aren’t I your favorite,” Nazuko says, all excited.

“Aaaaand it's over now,” I say as I drop her on the floor.

“D-Don’t think this is over you fools I still have my knife. Wait? Where's my knife?” Richter wonders checking his person.

“Oh?! do you mean this knife?” Elisa says as she holds out Richter’s knife in her hand.

Before Richter has the chance to move Elisa knocks him out with a sleep dart and ties him to a nearby tree.

“Okay I’ve got this handled from here. You guys go meet up with Warren’s party,” Elisa commands.

“Wait? Don’t you mean Quincy’s party?” I ask.

“No, I mean Warren’s party. Quincy doesn’t seem to be leading it at the moment if you’ve noticed,” Elisa says.

“Oh she’s right,” Lilith said as she acknowledged her comment.

“Man Quincy sucks. He’s not even the leader of his own party. I feel bad for him. Everyone’s just dragging him along without his consent. Oh well too bad for him,” I say without caring.

“Okay we’ll go meet up with Warren’s party then,” Azura says.

Alright it’s time to meet up with Quincy’s group. Hopefully they haven’t done anything too bad while we were gone. We walk in the direction of where we thought Bartrem headed and suddenly we can hear the sounds of a man screaming.

“Remi was that you?” Nazuko asks.

“No you idiot! Do I sound like a man to you?” Remi retorts.

“Come on guys stop bickering! We have to find out what that screaming is. Someone could be in danger,” Azura claims.

We rush in the direction of the screams only to find something horrible.