Chương 13: The Battle's Bloody Conclusion

That 160 seconds drew on and felt like hours to Ethan. He could only stare at the gate and listen. He heard Hans casting a 'bronze protective barrier' enchantment in the Magicae language. He then heard Mia, Hans, Friedrich, and Pieter making noise and issuing taunts to the lizard-people claiming that they were the leaders of those inside the village and that the four of them alone were capable of defeating all of the lizard-people. Ethan heard the lizard-people roar with anger as they seemed to be swarming around those four people. Ethan looked around him to see that the knights and adventurers were almost as nervous as he was. Two minutes after Hans had cast the 'bronze protective barrier', Ethan heard Friedrich cast the same spell. Mia, Hans, Friedrich, and Pieter then continued to taunt and provoke the lizard-people. About 40 seconds after Friedrich had cast the second protective barrier the gates opened once more, and what Ethan saw surprised him. There were at least 500 bipedal reptilian monsters armed with clubs and spears, and armored in a brown cloth armor that only covered their torso swarming around Mia, Hans, Friedrich, and Pieter. What surprised Ethan about these lizard-people was the blue glow of mana within them. The glow of mana of these monsters was very bright; much, much brighter than even he or Mia glowed making Ethan think that there were at least 30 standard mana units within these monsters, but it was not evenly distributed around their entire bodies. The blue light was concentrated in a circular shape at the center of their chests which was about 10 centimeters in diameter. Without wasting much time to think about this, he immediately threw his explosive device as hard as he could at the center of a large group of about 35 lizard-people that were clumped together while swarming the four people who had gone outside. While Ethan threw that, the knights and adventurers who were present also threw their explosive devices similarly at other large groups of lizard-people at around the same time. A few moments later, Ethan learned exactly how terrifyingly effective his gunpowder devices were as they reached near the lizard-people. Just as the weapons were a couple of meters in the air and about to fall on the confused lizard-people, 26 almost simultaneous explosive blasts pierced the sound of battle, silencing everything else. The shockwave from the initial blasts knocked down many of the lizard-people, but the shrapnel delt even more damage. The pine wood that the boxes were made of splintered and became deadly projectiles, with the small pieces of wood embedding themselves in the flesh of the lizard-people who were now crying out in pain if they were not killed instantly. Unlike Friedrich's 'bronze protective barrier' spell which was still intact and protecting the four people inside, the cloth armor of the lizard-people stood no chance against this wooden shrapnel. In an instant, the vast majority of the lizard people present were either killed, or very badly injured. Those few lizard-people who could still wield their weapons attempted to regroup and get into a defensive formation, but it was too late for them. The knights and adventurers had already rushed out of the village and were already upon the lizard-people. It was at this point that Ethan turned away, not wanting to see the gore of this battle's conclusion, even if it looked very clear that the humans were going to easily win it. After less than a minute, he could no longer hear the lizard-people screaming in pain, but could only hear cheers and sounds of jubilation coming from the knights and adventurers, with the exception of one human who sounded to Ethan like he was begging Pieter and Mia for mercy, though Ethan didn't know what to make of that and really didn't want to look in the direction that the battle had gone down. Ethan felt sick thinking about all the death that he himself had caused in the battle. Even if he knew with his brain that that was the best possible result given the circumstances, and that the lizard-people were only there to hurt the innocent villagers, it didn't help him reconcile with it on an emotional level. With a pale and sweaty face, walked back inside of the alchemist's abandoned workshop wanting to be alone for a while. It wasn't long though before Mia walked in.