WARNING!!! DEPICTION OF VIOLENCE, RAPE AND GORE! Read at your own risk!

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Chapter 33 Assault

We are gathered once again in the Cafeteria for assembly, approaching 10:30, last message spooked people. Monster challenge rating will reflect their levels. Was that supposed to me the creatures were on easy mode for us to kill, are you kidding me? Others got that impression too and began to panic. If so many died in the early stages of this disaster, what now?

We assembled to address that, not that I really wanted to, to be honest I do not know what to say to them to reassure them.

Just be yourself and say what comes natural, you always do good with that Scoot you inspire people, just go with the flow you always say right?

Yeah you re right Julie, Go with the flow, go with the flow, thanks sweetheart, it is good to have you in here after all haha.

Yeah well Cindy is not happy about it you know.

Short of her dieing and her getting resurrected, not sure what we can do about that

Scott do not even think that.

Sorry sweetheart slip of the tongue, was not intended like that....I really do not know a solution to this

Do not worry about that now, we will figure it out somehow.

With that we started the meeting, “I understand some folks are worried about the message and I am concerned too, but at this time what we do know is that no monsters will spawn within 5km of this place and any monsters that do come close, our Guards will take care of them.” I say to the crowd of people who gathered, not everyone showed up tho.

“These what if scenarios are not helping anyone, and until we know more there is no real reason to panic folks, you are safe here.” I say to them, seeing that all they want is encouragement and guidance. “We will be hiring 100 new guards. According to the captain we should be seeing them soon, more NPC's from the sounds of it, so that should help a lot around here.” I try to reassure them with numbers and strength. Since the NPC guards came many things changed, no more monsters approached the school and people could go outside again, so having more guards would make them happy, for now.

I give a few more encouraging words and even answer a few questions and the people are satisfied more or less, but enough to drive away the anxiety and fright they got from the message. We will start the training program tomorrow, for now I want to go test the creatures, and the best place I think is the mall. It is outside of our safe zone but the Goblins from what I remember were all low level under 10.

Would be perfect for these guys to gain experience and see how much improvement the creatures have.

So after talking to Rick, we decide at 11:30 to gather up and head out. 31 people now, Terry Williams and his group joins us wanting to do their part.

At 11:30 we assemble and head out taking all the vehicles with us. July and Cindy ride with me. It takes the better part of 35 minutes to get the to the mall, as a few intersections were clogged with cars along the way and we decided to move them, and clear a path so that if we need to come back fast we had a clear path.

Most of these guys were still level 1, Terry Williams was already level 18 but had not chosen a profession yet. They did not know about the party system so his group was an avg of level 6. We had collected the weapons back from the people and reissued some to Terry and his group after they formed their party. They added scopes and laser sights, since they had almost an hour to kill before we left to the Mall.

We arrived at the mall with no incidents and gather outside. Sheriff takes over here, gives the orders for a breach from all 4 directions and to meet in the middle.

Over the radio, all give the ok and ready signal when the Sheriff yells, “go go go”. Pulling the sliding glass doors open by hand, we enter.

We enter quickly, guns blazing as we see Goblins moving about, clearing each store as we pass by. Sure enough the Goblins were no match for the Phaser Rifles, AR's and AK's. A few were upstairs trying to shoot us with bows, but were quickly picked off. All was going well, until a a fireball erupted and 3 men were on fire, burning. We provided cover fire and drew back against the brick garden areas trying to put out the fires. We were caught off guard by the magic not anticipating it, since they never used it before from what I saw.

Multiple fireballs hit around us splashing us with fire damage. I peek out and see 4 Hobgoblins, waving staves and chanting, shooting fiery death from their hands similar to Cindy's, when suddenly Cindy and Julie both step forward, they are covered in Julie's Green Shield. A fireball splashes harmlessly off of it. Cindy counters with a fireball of her own, hitting the 4 Hobgoblins. With a break, everyone who can, begins firing their weapons into the gathering of goblins and hobgoblins behind the 4 mages.

Over the radio the others are pinned down as well by fireballs. “Retreat, I call out and over the radio” It was time to leave and tend to our wounded. Everything had gone as planned until we encountered magic. We could have probably pushed thru with Cindy and Julie, but the other 3 groups were being pinned down by the constant barrage.

Yeah magic is a bitch when it gets used against you. We will have to learn to counter it. We quickly retreat, many are wounded and burned, some had taken an arrow too, after the fireball barrage began, tho the arrows did not do much damage in most cases, they still hurt like hell. No one died which was a blessing to us.

Julie is administering heals, as best as she can and we decide to load up and treat the wounded back at the school with Doc's help. We arrive at the school quickly since our path was clear, the Goblins and Hobgoblins had not chased us outside the building. So no more got injured after our retreat.

As we unload many look down, defeat was seen in their faces. We will have to fix that. We need a good and decisive victory, we will retake the mall just for that. Now that we know they can do magic we have to counter it.

The wounded are taken to the nurses office and treated by Doc and Julie, using healing magic.I want to take Doc with us next time so he can gain levels as well and provide healing on the spot. Julie's shield is invaluable to us now. We need to get more like it somehow.

We have a meeting, Rick, Cortez and Foutz attend, Terry Williams shows up too, we do not mind. Julie is still helping to heal the wounded and Cindy is assisting.

“So what was your take on today's event Rick?”, I ask of him.

He looks at me and shakes his head “If not for those Fireballs it would have been a perfect operation. But magic, how do we go against that, plus we only have so many tear gas canisters so we could not use them on out initial assault?”

“We could just breach from one side and use Julie's shield as cover utilizing the tear gas then, minimizing their effectiveness...” Foutz begins.

I shake my head “Tho her shield is invaluable, it is not unlimited. It will only hold as long as she has mana.” I then continue,” we can make use of it, but we can not make it our only defense.”

“We will have to really pay attention, any of those creatures that has a staff needs to be dealt with as high priority.”” Rick says looking at us.

“I agree, we take them out first, switch targets as soon as seen, call them out. I think we can still do the 4 direction breach, it will keep them from concentrating their magic on one spot, as long as we focus fire their mages right away, now that we know they exist.” I say to them and we finalize our plans. We also spread the word for all to use their unused skill points, increase Dex and Vit for now, as both help with recovery and defense. Plus dex gives bonuses to shooting.

We break for the day and begin prepping for tomorrow, we will hit it again, the wounded should have recovered by then, best to get them back in action and get over the defeat as soon as possible. One thing we did notice is the experience earned had gone way down. Not even a third of what we had received before and that split between 6 people. However there were a lot of them, hundreds of them there, it looked like. On our initial breach we probably killed a little over a hundred of them between the four groups so levels were gained.

Night approaches, Julie is dead tired using up all her mana but everyone was healed up and resting, she said they would be ready for the morning. Another night of no intimacy, tho Cindy did please me orally after Julie had gone to sleep. I guess she wanted to have some alone time with me, if you know what I mean, as Julie and I were mentally connected and she felt left out, not that I mind at all, but I need to address it soon, it is bothering her badly, I can tell.

Morning arrives and we head for the showers and Cafeteria in quick succession. After breakfast we soon gather outside, no one looks eager, all wearing a grim expression. The wounds from yesterday may have been healed physically, but mentally they were still burning hot. We will extinguish those flames of defeat with a decisive victory today.

We head over to the mall, no encounters on the way. As before we make our breach, this time more slowly, more cautiously. With 32 people in 4 teams of 8, Doc is with Rick's team.

I led an 8 seven man team, Julie Cindy, Patterson, and 4 other Deputies with us. The Goblins try to put up resistance but fail miserable. A mage pops up, but is quickly suppressed. Cindy follows up with a fireball of her own down the corridor. Report of clear come from the other three teams as they make their marks on schedule. Last night we and laid out a final plan, rather I did and everyone agreed to it. We all reach the center at almost the exact same time. No Goblins or Hobgoblins were sighted, but there was one last store we had not gone into. The largest one in this Mall. It was an all purpose clothing, apparel, accessories,and shoes store. You name it, they had it, even had an escalator inside to go the second floor of its displays.

We quickly regroup holding the middle while the 3 teams go up top and clear those store as well, leaving this one last. After a few minutes all clear is given. We can hear noises coming from the Store, yelling and gurgling sounds as if they are talking and giving commands to one another. There are a lot in there,we can tell by the voices alone. Number mus be in the hundreds.

Over the radio we call for the breach, I have one canister of tear gas left and used it for here. Saved it to use against their main force. The Sheriff also has a few teargas canisters, he would use them upstairs. Everyone had gas masks from their riot gear, and spares were given to Cindy, Julie and me. Here we would simply use shock and awe tactics, throw canister let it take effect, then let Cindy throw a few fireballs into the store, then we start clearing them with the weapns moving forward in a tactical assault formation.

Julie would be Cindy's shield while she threw the fireballs causing confusion and terror. I told her she can only set off 4 Fireballs before pulling back an letting us take over, once we enter and begin shooting she could follow us in and then start throwing fireballs again at will.

The command to go was given, I let loose the canister and as predicted the Goblins had no defense for it causing mayhem in their midst. With eyes burning and gagging, they did not see Cindy step into the open and fire off her spells. As planned she stepped back and we rushed forward and shot anything that moved. The Goblins in total disarray have no where to retreat drop like flies left and right by the dozens. The hobgoblins with staves are high priorities and usually have a dozen bullets or holes from the beams in them before they can finish a spell. It was like shooting fish in a barrel now.

Upstairs they delayed their initial attack until I gave the go, and as a result the goblins and hobgoblins who went to help their brethren downstairs were caught off guard by the sudden tear gas assault and the spray of bullets and laser fire that followed.

After 25 min, we clear out the last remaining stronghold of the goblins and reach the back room, there were that many. The Storage area and the sight we find is beyond sickening and repulsive. The men and women gathered were feeling a rage never before seen or felt. Carcasses of humans were hung all over, mostly all male we could tell, gutted, blood everywhere. What was even more revolting and hurt us the most, were the dozens of females chained and bound naked. All were beaten and had cuts. Many had dried blood between their legs as if they had been excessively raped over and over. Some had a small bump on their belly showing they were pregnant.

Many were dead laying in their own waste. Many deputies had to pull off their masks to vomit at the gruesome scene, only to regret it when the smell of death hit them in force. All the females had vacant eyes, like they were dead inside already. We quickly secure the area and then approach the women who hunker down in fear at our approach., we let the female deputies, Cindy and Julie do the initial approach hoping that would ease them somehow. The Male officers go out into the store and quickly gather clothing, blankets and anything else they can find to cover these women, glad to be out of that room. We now have 42 female survivors if you can call them that. Death may have been kinder to them.

Now we fight back................................