novelraw Chapter 452 452: Seven Wounds in the Sky (1)
Chapter 452 452: Seven Wounds in the Sky (1)
The order went out through the Overmind Consciousness, which connected Reidar to all his summons.
Across Kingsgate, thousands of creatures changed direction, pulling away from the church safe houses they had been clearing and moving toward the seven portal locations.
The church could wait. They were too weak to do any meaningful damage regardless, especially now that they had opened portals that poured out monsters that killed everyone indiscriminately.
Besides, that was the worst they could do. But it was different for the portals and the monsters spawning from them.
Many elemental Demon-Lords took to the sky above Kingsgate, splitting into groups that each headed toward a different portal.
The sight of them sent the civilian population of Kingsgate into a new wave of panic, but there was nothing Reidar could do about that right now.
The Demon-Lords reached the eastern portal first. Around the same time they arrived, the first monsters started getting out of the portals.
These monsters were low level, so they weren't going to give Reidar any C.L.A.S.P. points, but they were still far stronger than any other average monster these survivors had ever seen or faced.
Of course, if one didn't consider the World Carver Behemoth, but that thing was big enough for the survivors to see it at kilometers of distance and to flee before that thing could do anything.
Reidar's summons descended on the monsters pouring through the rift like a hammer. Inferno Tyrants unleashed waves of fire that turned bony-plated creatures into ash.
Frost-Blight Sovereigns froze entire groups of monsters in place, and Storm-Wraith Archons called down lightning that chained between targets and fried them where they stood.
The portal's output slowed as the monsters on the other side pushed against the wall of elementally enhanced death that waited for them, but it didn't stop.
Portals didn't close on their own—they had to be shut down by destroying whatever made them on this side, or so Reidar understood.
Reidar reached for one of his Vorathid Abyssal Horrors and climbed onto its back as the creature grew to its full size. The insect's wings were beating hard, and it rose above the city; the ground fell away until Reidar could see the full scope of what was happening.
Kingsgate stretched below him. The settlement where his family was located sat at the southeastern edge, protected by barriers. The main city sprawled to the north and west, and across it, seven portals blazed like wounds in the sky.
At each portal, his summons were engaged in combat. The Death Knights had reached the central plaza portal and unleashed their Skeletal Warrior battalions. There were literally thousands of undead flooding the streets around the rifts and meeting the crossing monsters with blades and shields.
Of course, other summons were there too. The Primal Chimera-Colossi, for example, were basically playing Godzorra in the eastern district, stomping on the bony-plated creatures like they were stepping on particularly crunchy cockroaches. The monsters probably should have stayed on the other side of the portal.
But the western portal was in a really bad situation. The worst, actually.
It was the largest of the seven, and the creatures coming through it were stronger—level 520 and above, with a few reaching level 540.
Many were bipedal, armored, and fast, and they were already past the initial containment zone that his summons had set up.
Reidar was not going to have answers if he did not go search for them on the planet in question, and he had no intention of doing so. Then he mentally turned to his summons.
The Specter-Kings moved, shifting through shadows and appearing at the western portal within seconds.
The creatures that had broken through the containment zone met the Specter-Kings head-on. What followed was not a fight but an execution.
They didn't engage in traditional melee combat—there were no clashing weapons, no exchanged blows. Instead, the moment a Specter-King made contact with a monster, the creature simply ceased to exist in any meaningful way.
Dark tendrils of shadow wrapped around the armored bipedal monsters, and the creatures screamed quick sounds that ended as they were pulled into what appeared to be another dimension entirely.
Some vanished mid-stride, leaving only fading wisps of darkness where they had been. Others were consumed piece by piece, their bodies clearing into shadow before disappearing completely.
The Specter-Kings left no corpses, no blood, and no evidence that their victims had ever existed. The battlefield didn't become littered with the fallen—it simply became empty, one monster at a time, as the shadowy executioners moved through the enemy ranks like a wave of erasure. The only problem was that these ranks were never-ending.
Reidar directed his Abyssal Horror toward the eastern portal, the closest one to the settlement. If any of the portals posed an immediate threat to his family, it was this one.
As he flew, he reached out through the Overmind Consciousness to the Vorathid Abyssal Horrors that had been searching for Martha and Marcus earlier. He reassigned them to portal defense, sending hundreds of the massive insects to each of the seven locations.
Through the eyes of his summons, Reidar watched as Kingsgate turned into a battlefield. Survivors screamed and scattered through the streets, some seeking shelter in buildings while others froze in terror at the sight of both the portal monsters and his own creatures clashing overhead. Fires had broken out in three districts, and the air was thick with smoke, ash, and the smell of burning flesh.
The Aegis Phalanx forces weren't staying idle, and they actually sent troops to protect the survivors.