Chương 300: Chapter 299 - Special Delivery

Magic rained from the sky. Remnants of the palace's attack had scattered into hundreds of smaller bolts, each one snaking through the air, seeking targets. They streaked toward the fortress, toward the fighters in the air, toward anyone that wasn't a wizard. Below, Titanic unfolded his arms. It was the first time Alexander had seen the man move since the battle began. Both massive hands reached outward, palms up.

The nearest beams that had been angling toward the fortress changed trajectory, curving toward the giant. Skar'Vathos landed beside him on the roof, talons scrabbling across the concrete before the dragon skidded to a halt. Maximilian stood on its back, his golden eyes fixed on the sky. Dozens of barriers materialized in rapid succession, layers of shields catching any of the bolts Titanic's ability didn't reach. Alexander didn't have time to watch the outcome. Artensah redoubled his assault.

A black beam followed by three rapid bolts of fire, then a phantom strike that cracked against Alexander's ribs. The Exalted was pressing harder now, taking advantage of Alexander's divided attention, and subtly warping space, making it hard to maneuver. Above them, the beams raced closer.

"Annie, Jules," he subvocalized over the raid comms.

"On me." Julia reacted first. She broke off from the Exalted she'd been fighting without warning, reversing direction in a burst of speed that left the golden-robed wizard with a look of surprise on his face. Ice trailed behind her as she crossed the distance to Alexander in under a second. Annie spun through the air beside her own opponents, bladed arms forcing two highborn wizards backward as she carved between them. Her four wings beat hard, driving her forward with incredible speed.

She'd clearly worked hard the past month to improve her flight. Droney slipped in close, guiding the remaining drones into a tight formation overhead. Their shield-blades overlapped, forming a canopy of metal above the three of them. Not a second too soon. Alexander flooded the drones with Animachina, empowering each one as beams of magic smashed against them. Light flashed and metal groaned, as one drone after another buckled under the assault.

Metallokinesis pulsed as he tried to maintain the drones' structural integrity while holding them up. His reserves dipped further. Despite Caroline shattering the initial attack, the remaining magical beams, scattered as they were, possessed impressive power. Around them, Artensah and the other Exalted circled. The two surviving highborn flanked wide. Spells streaked in from every angle, the attacks deflected by Julia or caught on Annie's arms which had morphed into shields. Alexander glanced at Annie.

"Cannonball." She launched forward, leaving the safety of the drone umbrella without hesitation. Arms elongating into twin blades as she rocketed toward Artensah, swinging for the Exalted's torso. Artensah vanished. The blades cut empty air. Alexander swept his cybernetic hand left, seizing Annie with Metallokinesis and redirecting her momentum. She squealed as she accelerated faster than she'd probably ever moved before, straight toward the nearest highborn wizard.

The man barely had time to raise his staff an inch before Annie's blades intersected at his neck. His head separated from his body and tumbled through the air. Alexander clenched his fingers tight and pulled, yanking Annie back under cover a fraction of a second before two beams carved through the space she'd just occupied. To his right, a boulder the size of a car hurtled toward them. Julia met it with her fist. The stone cracked and exploded, fragments spraying past Alexander and Annie. Another boulder followed.

Julia punched through it. Then a third, each impact sending a resounding crack across the sky as the second Exalted conjured and launched them faster than most people could blink. Even as stone fragments peppered Alexander's armor and pinged off Annie's MetaMetal skin, Julia kept swinging. Punch after punch as the wizard switched to sending thick spikes of rock instead of large boulders. Artensah reappeared below, his signature immediately giving away his approach.

He muttered an incantation and glowing runes gathered around the head of the staff as he aimed it up at the three superhumans. Alexander reached into his storage ring and pulled the last surviving shield drone out. It appeared at his side, and a quick burst of Technopathy had it orienting itself downward as its shield snapped into existence. Just in time to catch the jet of white energy that fired from Artensah's staff. Julia and Annie continued defending, circling through the air around him.

The drain on his reserves lessened sharply as the palace's barrage finally slowed. Then a massive explosion echoed across the battlefield. Alexander turned. The peak of the mountain shattered. Rock and snow erupted upward and outward, the entire summit coming apart in a cloud of debris that rained across the sky. This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Despite the distance, he was able to pick out the details with his Electrokinesis-enhanced vision. The Empress was recovering. She raced backward through the air at the center of the debris, shields snapping back into place around her, the gemstone atop her staff glowing bright. Blood ran from her mouth, bright and stark against the pale skin, golden armor, and white gown. But she was already casting, the pages of her spellbook flipping rapidly back and forth. Caroline looked worse.

A massive gash ran up one side of her face from jaw to temple, the wound bleeding freely. Her arms were covered in hundreds of thin cuts, as though she'd been dragged through a field of razors. The white combat suit was shredded from the shoulders to the wrists. But she was the one pressing. Shockwave after shockwave erupted between them as Caroline closed the distance, each strike cracking the air with enough force to send debris shooting away from the fight. The Empress jabbed her staff forward.

A portal opened between them. Caroline blurred. Even with his senses pushed to their limits, Alexander could barely track her as she evaded the portal, cutting sideways so fast she left an afterimage. Another portal snapped open in front of her, making her change direction again. Then another, and another, each one cutting off her approach, forcing her to zigzag through a swarm of holes in space. Then she reacted too slowly.

Caroline vanished into one of the portals, and a fraction of a second later the mountain exploded as she exited the other end and slammed into the slope. A crater bloomed around the point of impact, sending rock and dirt and snow erupting in every direction. But Alexander's attention was drawn higher, as something caught his eye. Where the mountain's peak had been, where two Tier 3s had sheared through a hundred meters of solid rock, a cloud of snow and stone was beginning to move. Slowly at first.

Snow cascading over broken rock, pulling more with it. Stone grinding against stone. The mass grew as it descended, collecting everything in its path. An avalanche. Alexander glanced down at the fortress. Maximilian and Titanic had survived the barrage, no worse for wear, though the fortress itself had clearly taken a lot of hits despite their efforts.

"Auggy, we're making a break for the fortress. There's an avalanche heading your way. Droney calculates it's about 127 seconds out."

"Copy."

"And I need a portal as close to the palace as you can make it."

"What—""No questions." To his credit, Augustus began spinning up the portal a second later. Talia's voice cut over the comms.

"Ground team, begin an organized retreat back to the courtyard." Murmurs of agreement followed.

"Annie, Jules," Alexander said, reaching out with Metallokinesis to seize the surviving drones.

"I need you to cover me on the way down. Buy me some time." Julia's answer was to rocket toward the golden-robed wizard.

"It better be important," Annie growled, carving through a bolt of fire from the last remaining highborn.

"Super important. I'll explain later." Metallokinesis pulsed. All the blade-drones went streaming down around him, past the shield drone with its nearly depleted barrier, and straight at Artensah. The Exalted swept the beam from left to right as he fell back. Drones exploded as the attack carved through their metal shells with little resistance. Alexander was already racing down toward the fortress. One mental thread pulled the shield drone back into the ring, while the other seized Droney with Metallokinesis.

Artensah appeared to his right. Alexander felt the signature before he saw the wizard, heard the first syllable of an incantation forming. Julia hit him before the spell could finish. She slammed into Artensah's shield at full speed, sending the Exalted tumbling through the air. Ice spikes materialized in her wake, dozens of them chasing the wizard across the sky as he raced to recover. Alexander ignored them. The fortress was growing rapidly below.

He could see Augustus on the roof, wand spinning, the edges of a portal beginning to form. A portal tore open ahead of him. The other Exalted stepped through, wand in one hand, staff in the other. He flicked his free hand and a boulder materialized out of nothing, already hurtling forward. Alexander cut to the side. The boulder screamed past, close enough that the displaced air buffeted him sideways. A stone spike followed. Faster, and aimed directly at his face. He threw up his cybernetic hand.

The spike shattered against his palm, spraying stone and dust into his face, forcing him to close his eyes. His other mental thread was already compensating. Droney's sensors fed targeting data through the bond. Alexander thrust out his gauntleted hand and fired a lightning bolt along the drone's projected vector. The Exalted deflected it with his staff, the bolt skidding off an angled barrier. His mouth was already moving, forming the words of another spell. Too slow.

Alexander was past him before the incantation finished, juking left then right as follow-up attacks chased him down the slope. A bolt of fire shot past him, unraveling as it went. A phantom strike glanced off his shoulder. Before the wizard could pursue, Annie swept across the sky toward him, swinging a massive hammer. Below, the army was in disarray. Portals were going up everywhere, and people were fighting each other to get in. Others were taking to the air or fleeing on foot.

Alexander pulled up next to Augustus a few seconds later, Metallokinesis working hard to fight his momentum.

"98 seconds."

"It's good to see you, too, Alex," Augustus said, his hand continuing to weave the wand in a circular motion. Alexander clapped the older man on the shoulder.

"You have no idea just how good." Titanic and Skar'Vathos crossed the roof. Maximilian climbed down, barriers appearing underfoot with each step.

"Is this delay necessary, Rooke?" Alexander grinned.

"It is not strictly necessary, no. But it will make me feel better and maybe hurt the Empire." He jabbed a thumb toward the mountain where the avalanche was still picking up speed.

"Any way you can slow that?" Maximilian studied the avalanche.

"Raelene?"

"Talia, do you have the data?" Raelene asked over the comms. Alexander could sense both of them below, on opposite sides of the fortress.

"It's a deep slab avalanche. Based on Droney's projections, it will hit the fortress at 128 kilometers per hour," Talia said.

"From the visuals, I'd estimate it to be approaching fifteen million tons of mass."

"You might be able to delay it by up to thirty seconds by redirecting the head of the avalanche, Max. But it will break through after that, and you need to make it back to the gateway before it reaches the fortress." Maximilian narrowed his eyes at Alexander.

"This better be worth it, Rooke." Then the Dragon Lord turned, and climbed back up the back of Skar'Vathos. The dragon beat its wings and launched itself into the air, heading toward the slope. Augustus stepped back.

"Portal's up."

"Thanks, Auggy," Alexander said, heading for the inky black surface.

"I won't be long. Just need to make a special delivery."