Chương 379: (372) 5.68. Safety

"Okay, this coma isn't really his fault." Vin gasped for air as he woke up to the sound of Scule's voice, though his gasp quickly morphed into a violent coughing fit as his damaged throat struggled to work right. Shia was already at his side casting Renewal on him, and he nodded his thanks with watering eyes as the soothing life mana seeped into his throat and repaired it.

"Talk about a dramatic entrance," Shia chuckled, carefully sweeping her spell over the whole length of his throat.

"Plummeting through the sky and hitting the ground hard enough to scare us, only to reveal you've got a severed hand still in the middle of choking you out. Am I right to assume that this hand belongs to…"

"Yeah," Vin said, coughing one last time.

"It's the ranker king's right hand."

"Wow," Scule whistled.

"Talk about making an enemy. I hope you didn't have any plans to return to this fragment anytime soon."

"Thanks for saving me guys," Vin said, uncorking one of his mana potions and downing the foul-tasting liquid. Bill had in fact managed to slightly improve upon the flavor of spoiled mint, but now they tasted like burnt grass. As mana began refilling his core, he leaned back and sighed.

"How did you get the hand off me anyway?"

"How else?" Scule asked, holding up one of his daggers still tipped with a pinkish-liquid.

"Extreme muscle relaxant. Basically a stronger version of what I stabbed the elite snake monster with back during the battle for wave two. And a good thing too, that hand did not want to let go. It still almost wasn't enough."

"The ranker king's strength attribute has to be truly ridiculous," Shia said, nodding along.

"I'm glad you managed to get away. What happened with the missing Earthers?"

"I managed to distract the ranker king long enough that Lumel got to them, but she still nearly got skewered," Vin admitted, shivering at the memory of the ranker king's sword slowly sliding into her chest before she'd managed to stop it with her magic.

"That was far too close for my liking."

"Well, the good news is things have gone swimmingly over here on our end," Shia said, patting him on the shoulder as she stood up.

"Scule and I managed to fend off the rankers guarding the orc town long enough for them all to meet up with the beastkin before we made our escape and met up with the group ourselves. We had to knock out a squad or two, but Alka was more than capable of besting the patrolling rankers."

"I don't doubt it," Vin chuckled, accepting Shia's hand as she pulled him to his feet. It was only then he realized they were on their own, and he blinked, looking around.

"Where is everyone?"

"Alka, Grunch, and Emrelda kept the group moving forward while we worked on you," Scule explained, hopping onto his shoulder.

"We were confident we could get you up and on your feet in no time, and we didn't want to hold everyone up. But if you're ready, we should probably try and meet back up with them. Especially before a raging ranker king decides to come and enact vengeance on you for stealing his favorite hand."

"Yeah, that's a good idea," Vin decided, cracking his neck and silently thanking the Gods for inventing healing magic one last time.

"Let's go!" Low on mana and without his divine boon, Vin kept a wary eye on his surroundings as they ran along the edge of the fragment. The last thing he wanted was to suddenly find himself trapped between bubbling lava on his right and a swarm of battle-hungry rankers on his left. Thankfully, as they were running in the wake of the group, whenever they did pass the occasional squad of rankers, it was only after Alka had already gone through them.

That meant that each one they passed was already lying unconscious on the ground, their weapons either claimed by some of the orcs and beastkin or tossed directly into the lava of the fragment beside them. It wasn't until they crossed over into the beastkins' fragment and found themselves running with the goblins' giant metal wall on their right that they finally spotted the crowd. Alka had gathered everyone in one large group right up against the wall and was currently standing guard with Grunch beside her.

Emrelda was nowhere to be seen, but seeing as she was a master of illusion and invisibility magic, that didn't mean much.

"There you are!" Alka shouted, laughing as they jogged over to her.

"Man, a severed hand clutched around your throat? Talk about hardcore!"

"Was that truly the hand of the ranker king?" Grunch asked, staring at him in awe.

"Did you kill him?"

"That depends on if a fall from the heavens is truly enough to kill the man," Vin admitted.

"Actually, one second." At this point, while still far lower than he would have liked, Vin had recovered enough mana that he was comfortable casting the occasional spell. Adjusting his runic formation, he cast a fragment-wide, specialized Sense Soul, wincing when his fears were confirmed.

"Yep, that confirms it. The ranker king is still alive. He's still at the keep, at the very least, which is better than detecting him sprinting our way."

"He's probably receiving aid for his missing hand," Shia pointed out.

"Doubtful. Most likely he is engaged in combat," Grunch said, letting out a deep, booming laugh at the thought.

"The council of eleven wouldn't pass up on an opportunity as ripe as this. This is probably the only chance they'll ever have of actually defeating the ranker king." Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

"For people who talk so much about honor, doesn't anyone else think it's kinda weird that their first reaction to learning their king has been maimed is to attack him?" Scule asked, looking between everyone.

"Just seems rather rude if you ask me."

"Regardless of if it's rude or not, it's the perfect opportunity for us," Emrelda said, suddenly appearing beside them and making everyone other than Alka jump.

"I just got back from our village and have reclaimed our Light Mages we left behind to continue the façade that my people were still there. We have everyone at this point. It is time to leave these lands behind us."

"You heard the furry lady, Vin, can you go tell your goblin friend we're ready?" Alka asked.

"I'll be right back," he said, running over to the wall and using his boots to run directly up it. It wasn't nearly as fast as flying over the wall with Redirect Gravity, but he was in no shape to waste mana at the moment. It only took him a minute of looking down from the top of the wall to spot Garni on the other side, tapping at the base of the wall here and there as she inspected something he couldn't see.

Resisting the urge to see if activating Beyond the Veil would show him the secrets she was peering at, he jogged along the wall toward her.

"Garni!" he shouted, running halfway down the wall and waving at her.

"We're ready for you!"

"Hurray!" she shouted, grinning up at him and waving one of her strange tools.

"Show me where to open it!" Vin led her back to where the gathering of orcs and beastkin were on his side before dropping down next to her. He was more than a little curious as to how she was going to open a hole in the wall, and he blinked as he realized she was holding up something that looked like a flickering torch.

"Golem beacon," she explained, scurrying up onto the shoulders of her golem and keeping the torch held high above her head.

"As a wall goblin, I get special privileges." Vin didn't have to waste his breath asking exactly what a golem beacon did, as the effect was obvious enough. Dozens and dozens of golems were quickly approaching them from all directions, some still with angrily complaining goblins hanging off their shoulders.

"Why the beacon?!" one shouted, shaking a wrench in their direction as their golem joined ranks with all the others.

"Why the ugly?!" Garni shouted back, earning a round of high-pitched laughter from the other goblins as the first one turned red and lowered his wrench in shame.

"Might want to stand back," Garni informed him, gesturing for Vin to get out of the way. Once he was clear, she directed her golem up to the wall and dragged her beacon along it, using the beacon like a brush to paint a large, ten-foot-wide rectangle with the help of her personal golem. The moment she was done, the area she'd drawn around suddenly wavered and changed, and the flat, unmarred metal wall was suddenly transformed into that of a wall formed from metal bricks.

"Remove!" she ordered the golems as she hopped down and joined Vin off to the side. Immediately, the gathered golems did just that, walking up to the wall and placing their hands on the metal bricks. To Vin's shock, the bricks stuck to their hands as if magnetized, and each one was easily pulled free from the wall as if there wasn't even any mortar holding it in place.

The ranks of golems worked efficiently and tirelessly, creating a neat pile of bricks as they went, and in less than a minute there was a giant hole in the bottom of the wall, just as Garni promised.

"Come on!" Shia ordered, heading through first and giving Garni a warm smile before beginning to shepherd the orcs and beastkin through.

"All together, let's go!" While Shia kept everyone contained and grouped together within the safety of the goblins' territory, Vin felt Garni reach up and tug on his golem arm.

"Your end of the deal?" she asked, grinning excitedly up at him.

"As soon as everyone is safely through and the wall's back in place, I'll let you take a look," he agreed, trying not to laugh as Garni did all but a little jig in place at the prospect of getting to analyze the superior golem technology. He had to make sure she didn't do any sort of permanent damage to it, but so long as they didn't have adamantine, he figured he was okay.

It took a couple of minutes for the two and a half thousand refuges to flood through the twenty-foot wide hole Garni had made, and Vin spent that entire time watching one orc and beastkin after another stare at the goblins in shock when they first laid eyes on the members of the smaller race. The goblins who owned the golems Garni had commandeered were standing off to the side, waving and laughing at everyone who walked by.

Just as Vin was wondering if he should ask Garni if her people were going to be a problem, Lumel appeared in a flash of purple with three Earthers in tow.

"Lumel!" he shouted, running over to meet her. Ignoring the Earthers for now, he wrapped her into a big hug, earning a startled squeak from the pulmon as he squeezed her and pulled her close.

"I was so worried! How is your chest? Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," she stammered, her face going flush as she looked around.

"Vin, all these people—" He silenced her with a kiss, which she happily melted into after a moment, her stiffened body embracing him in return. After a few seconds, he pulled back, giving her a sheepish smile.

"Sorry," he said, switching to her native language.

"I didn't mean to do something to make you uncomfortable, but last I saw you there was a sword sticking out of your chest. I thought…"

"You're fine, I get it," she smiled, laying a cool hand on his cheek even as her own burned a darker purple in her own unique blush.

"I'm glad you managed to get away from the ranker king. Not that I ever had any doubts!"

"It's definitely a story to tell," he chuckled, wondering how on Earth he was going to explain what happened without worrying her.

"You didn't have any issues transporting the Earthers? Do you need healing?"

"I already drank a potion, so I'm good on that front. I am low on mana from all the repeated warps, but no, things went smoothly enough," she confirmed.

"Though at this point, I think you need to explain to them what's going on. They only stayed with me because I promised them you'd answer their questions once we all got to safety."

"That's fair," he said, giving her one last quick hug before turning to the three missing Earthers from the fifth wave. For their part, all three of them were staring at him with something between confusion and relief on their faces, and he sighed as he mentally prepared himself for the usual speech. No rest for the weary.