The writhing plants were unable to reach Ed's gallant figure try as they might. Inevitably, the tanky Shakh who seemed like an unbreakable wall was met with an unstoppable force.
"Gaaargh!" A painful roar was what followed. The dazzling sight was blinding yet clear. Ed's flames which seemed to have come to life hopped on over to Shakh's terrifying body seconds before contact.
It wasn't over though, the giant's bloodshot eyes did not fail to miss the axe that came from the ball of fire with a horizontal arc.
With a bang, the axe dug into Shakh's thick skull and red blood seeped out of the egregious wound like the start of a river.
"It hurts!" Shakh screamed out as he instinctively reached out to save its face. Ed was still clinging to the axe's handle adding his weight onto the axe head which was lodged in Shakh's skull. The pain was amplified with every second.
The thick woody vines reached out to help. They tugged at Ed's free arm ignoring the flames that burned its newly grown bark. But Ed didn't focus on anything other than attacking.
A tremendous force that moved the air around it came about as Ed's fist darted towards the giant's face. The vines could not afford to hold on as they simply broke apart under the heat and tension.
An audible crack then followed.
Shakh's face which had turned a mix of crispy brown and viscous red from the overbearing flames and the river of blood that come from its skull was further slighted as scattered shards of his skull dug into his brain. His entire body lost support and he fell to his knees.
Ed dropped slightly from his elevated position, axe in hand, while Shakh's giant and desecrated body fell next to him with a thud. The flames did not extinguish however and instead continued to melt the already dead orc.
Ed did not even spare him a glance. As far as the adventurers went, the orc in front of him could hardly compare to even the ones his anti-skeletons had fought.
For orc standards, Shakh was a tough opponent, yes. His tanky body might even be impervious to spells to a certain degree. The excessive flesh also automatically made it so blunt attacks would be nearly ineffective and pointed blades to leave mostly superficial wounds.
But to Ed, this didn't matter. The flames manipulated by him would almost seem to come to life, their offensive power was not something a fleshy body could easily contend with. The runes also had a clear flaw when faced with Ed's scorching hot flames.
The moment one of them was burned off his skin the entire array would either go haywire or not work altogether. Ed was interested in how an array could even be drawn onto a body so he had to give credit where credit was due. Still, who didn't like to boast a little?
"Looks like those runes were just for show" Ed spoke mockingly as he turned to face the elderly orc lady.
Lagakha was infuriated but she didn't let the heretic get to her. She, as a blessed of god, knew better than to engage in pointless verbal conflict. She was a mature woman.
"Get him!" She told the other orc warriors who had all along been frozen in place. In between the large writhing vines and the glaring flames, where exactly were they supposed to place?
Still, for their god, it was a privilege to die.
"Avenge him!" One of the orc warriors in the lead yelled to spur himself and the others forward. They were more or less 30 orcs, all armored and equipped, charging towards Ed.
'This grandma sure likes to delegate' Ed still had no complaints though. If all these orcs were willing to kindly offer him their consciousness then... who was he to intervene? While at it, it wouldn't be a bad idea to pick out a new body for Vorgarag.
Although… it would be troublesome if he were to accidentally break their bones or rupture some organs so maybe it would be better to postpone the matter.
'Hm… I could just try storing them' Ed had almost forgotten about that. In which case he wouldn't need to worry about breaking much.
In fact, it might even be a nice idea to only capture the orcs to perform similar experiments as he had with the skeletons. He for example did not know if the bodies would die without a consciousness. Was there a limit?
"Aaa-!" One of the orcs ran over with a battle cry but its head was cleanly sliced off its body. The others still plowed through though and Ed simply had to wave his weapon back and forth to harvest their heads as if harvesting wheat.
The blood spewed like fountains as the mindless drones continued to charge forward without too much regard for their own safety. Fanaticism was clearly evident in each of their eyes as they trudged through the bodies of their fallen comrades to try and even touch a single hair on Ed's body.
Ed had also not failed to realize the abnormal growth of the plants in the surrounding. Soon enough, a green dome started to form around him. The lively plants looked like a thicket of squirming worms coming at Ed from all directions.
The green tsunami threatened to consume him but Ed remained unfazed. In his eyes, the old lady's spell repertoire was not very varied. Her skills even seemed to be solely limited towards plant life which was a bizarre sight.
'Is it possible to have an affinity towards a pseudo-element?' He hadn't considered such a thought before but now it seemed entirely practical. As long as it became a new element it would be different from being simply earth and water.
Ed formed a dome. Why? His fire spells were rather limited. He only had two such spells that could qualify. One being namely, meteor rain. The old lady had kindly procured him shelter so why not take advantage of it?
Ed's chant was ominous and deep. Anyone that heard it would feel alarmed. But inside of a thick dome of earth and among the squirming plants, who was going to hear a thing?
The meteor rain spell was cast with evident success as Ed's earth mana and fire mana traveled through a small opening Ed created to form giant chunks of rock in the air space.
The rocks cast a shadow down on the green dome and on the direct surroundings of the small plaza such as the houses and cathedral.
The rocks then became lit with hell-raising wild flames. The rocks turned hot and red, almost as if they would turn into sloshing magma.
A clear whistling sound as if a bomb was dropping from the high skies resounded in the desolate ruin-like settlement. The bombs being of course thick chunks of molten rock.
The earth tremble- no, quaked! The earth quaked violently with rumbling vibrations under the deadly bombardment. Even Ed in his supposed safety felt nervous from the shocks that followed the landing of any given meteor.
His dome shook and cracks formed whenever a given meteor landed on it. The plant padding had likely come undone after the first few making the situation that much more precarious. Ed spent the rest of his earth mana on reinforcing the dome and waited until the spell had finally finished with its destruction.
Everything was silent.
Ed opened up a small hole on the dome by the side and the overpowering smell of dirt and smoke entered from the opening. He ignored it to the best of his abilities and looked into the hole.
The ground had caved and formed a crater. There were chunks of rocks and burning plants or bodies littering the surrounding. It was a sorry sight, like that of a disaster.
Realistically, the use of meteor rain had been rather excessive. Still, he was confident that all of the orcs in the settlement were not present at the moment as there were bound to be some guarding the captives. It didn't matter to give those that were present a quick death.
The dome came undone and burnt vines fell on Ed. He dusted them off and looked towards the cathedral. Part of its front entrance had collapsed perhaps a result of the tremors.
As for the old chieftess... Ed could not see much of her. He didn't know if her body had been so badly mangled or if she had somehow escaped. He was more inclined to believe she had escaped though.
'That's troublesome…' Assuming it was true of course.
The reason why he was inclined to believe it was though was due to the chieftess' age. Her spell repertoire might not be varied but her experience most certainly was. That's not to say she had seen meteors rain before but rather that she knew better than to stand around when hearing what could only be an enemy attack.
'Note to self, meteor rain has a long TTK' The spell was balanced though since shortening the time to kill implied less damage and destruction. The altitude was the sole determinant of this factor after all.
Ed looked up at the artificial night sky. The moon had not moved much closer to its peak meaning that not much time had passed.
'I should find the captives and explore the cathedral' Ed refocused his thoughts and gazed at the crumbled entrance of the weathered cathedral.
