Chapter 37

Note: Thanks to Alex for beta reading this!

I paced along the side of the room as the light flared. Another group of halflings vanished.

“Let’s go!” Kassie shouted. “On the circle.”

I stared out at the halflings watching me. They were staring at me with hope. Shock. Awe, even. I nodded to them, trying not to look worried, but my monster girls were dying. The halflings were still choking the tunnels.

Until every last one of them was out of here, this could go so badly.

“Hurry, hurry,” Kassie shouted. “Let’s go. No, no, you can go on the next one. That’s enough.”

The light flared and the group vanished.

I drew in a deep breath, gripping my spear. Gaiste died. The last of my arachnes killed. Sulanga’s dungeon was too close to the city. Too damned close.

Ms. Rosa Trueno screamed her fury at the sky, her thigh throbbing from the arrow embedded in her.

The air rippled from her shout and slammed into another of the damned hippogriffs, knocking her out of the sky. The numbers were thinning, but it didn’t feel fast enough for the teacher. They were losing too many monster girls. The arachnes were gone, and the other monster girls were flying higher and higher to pick them off.

Skamianiela and Vielmi breathed another wave of their petrifying breath into the air, striking a phoenix. She turned to stone and dropped like a brick out of the sky. Vielmi jumped to the right, but Skamianiela wasn’t as fast.

The stone phoenix struck Skamianiela and carried her off the side of the building. Pink hair whipped around Skamianiela’s face as she plunged to her death. Ms. Trueno winced as the scream cut off with a loud crunch and a burst of rock.

On the other roof, Baaghi leaped into the air and bit a hippogriff in the leg. She screamed as the rakshasa pulled her out of the sky. Feathers burst from the enemy’s wings and ripped into Baaghi’s body. A dozen teal missiles buried into her chest and stomach. They landed on the roof, the hippogriff slamming on her back. Baaghi collapsed on her side.

Bhaaloo was there and snapped her jaws down on the hippogriff’s head, crushing her skull. She vanished. A moment later, Baaghi disappeared, too. Ms. Trueno shouted in fury at the sky, missing a thunderbird.

A ball of fire struck Bhaaloo in the back as Hagane stood on the roof in a fighting stance. A firewhirl hurtling for her. Above in the skies, a whirlwind surged for Lana Fulmine. Ms. Trueno sucked in breaths, fear pumping through her veins.

She knew they wouldn’t win. But was it enough to buy Leo time to evacuate the dungeon?

Screaming, Bhaaloo vanished in a burst of motes, the flames burning across her body guttered out.

Then the firewhirl engulfed Hagane.

She slashed at the flames as her body grew hotter and hotter, but her blades did nothing to the fire. They were ethereal. Plasma. The heat poured into her body. She was made of metal. She drank it in. The pain grew in her. She screamed as she could do nothing against the fire burning around her.

Hagane melted and died.

Garnet laughed as the thunderbird crashed to the street below, struck down by Dark Succubus Naughty Garnet’s mighty Penetrator.

Enemy monster girls surged at her. Two hippogriffs and a pair of phoenixes closed in on her. Fireballs and razor arrows hissed through the air at the little succubus. Her scarlet wings flapped, black pigtails streaming behind her.

She climbed fast, her wings pumping away. She beat at the sky as she rose higher and higher. She climbed towards the heavens, weaving, dodging. She had to do something or she was dead. Her head whipped around as a ball of fire crackled by.

There, on the streets, was something amazing.

Garnet dove for the ground, sending, “I got something for you, big sis!”

“I see you,” Crystal thought back and slid to a stop. “Yuki-onna, get ready!”

The two hippogriffs and two phoenixes chased after Crystal’s bratty little sister. She formed her ice dagger, her three yuki-onna doing the same around her. They raised their shards of ice as Garnet dove for the ground. Her wings flared wide.