Huemara turned around leaving the silence to stew. But it did not last long as a siren sounded loud enough to have pirates, mercenaries, and knights alike holding their ears in pain. They bled as their heads turned right and left trying to find out what was happening.
Unlike them, Jonas and his men had been covered in a layer of powerful mana by Clay to prevent them from feeling any of the adverse effects of the attack. All the saw was the pale faces of their enemies shivering in their spots.
Then it started.
The world broke, the fabric of reality cracked and splintered into pieces with a heart-wrenching roar from Clay. There was no warning to it, no sign it had really come. No lights or anything that could have prepared anyone for what it was.
Even covered by Clay's mana, Jonas felt blood run down his eyes just staring at the cracks in reality. He felt a distant pain in his entire body but ignored it. He had to look, witness what he was so close to bringing on everyone who stood as his enemy. The death and destruction that could have left this entire land a desolate and arid desert beyond cultivation.
Jonas gulped as he imagined what could have happened. And as such he feared what would have been his father if he had not been protected. And feared, even more, what the actual attack was, for all they suffered on the harbor's levels was nothing but the side effects of what the mage-no, Magus- had in store for them.
Only after a while did Jonas notice its most frightening aspect. There was no reaction in the natural world. The winds did not whip across the sea and land, the waters did not rise in mountainous waves. They were calm, like a sunny day without a hint of currents to make any changes. A perfect day if not for the calamity about to take place.
Then it happened. It started slowly but became obvious in moments. The cliffs to both sides of the harbor-a natural protection they had relied on for ages-began to wither and erode. They turned to free flying dust creating a storm of it in the scant moments it took for them to literally disappear.
Joans felt his stomach turn and his heart rise up to his throat. There was nothing but dust and two massive craters on each side of the harbor in the wake of the spell. No trees, minerals, animals, nothing survived. It all turned into thin air. Ashes blown into the wind.
He forced himself to tear his eyes away from it. It would not be good for his mental health to stare for any longer. But when he did, he found Ash and Gregor trying to keep Medulis up. The woman was hyperventilating and panicking like she had seen her death. She fought the two to jump into the water acting like a madwoman then the sane and level headed person she normally was.
Whatever Clay had done shook her beyond anything Jonas and the others could have done or experienced in their lifetimes.
"Take her to her room. She needs rest," Jonas ordered his two guards. They looked at him with solemn expressions, then nodded.
Gregor fireman carried her into the bowels of the ship with Ash following, consoling the woman the entire time. The soldiers stepped out of the way then quickly returned into position without a single expression for the entire time.
For a while, Jonas studied them. Even his guards had shown fear and awe at what happened, yet they stood stoically and unmoving. Quite unlike the mercenaries who were literally shaking in their massive boots. He made a note to ask Frezar why they did not react in any shape or form.
It was just unnatural.
He felt Huemara's energy again. He turned to look at the reaction of those that were on the harbor. He could not find a single person not sitting on their knees in abject terror, but even then they held to their weapons. They seemed resolved to die and at the very least take their pound of flesh in the process.
For a moment, Jonas saw his best chance of taking the city. But he knew he did not want to enter as a murdering conqueror. Instead, he hoped to enter as the benevolent ruler who let them live even though they stood against him. Just as he thought that he remembered to listen to what Hue was saying. He only caught the back end of it.
"-remember. This was a lesson for you to remember. At any given moment, the harbor and all of Petrous could have been nothing more than dust. A footnote in history no one will ever wish to remember unless of course, they are regaling my lieges achievements and successes. We will be back a year from today, this time from the land. We expect the gates to open and everyone who had a hand in this to kneel before the walls to accept his punishment willingly. Otherwise, we have done what we can to warn and inform."
With a wave, Hue's energy dispersed. He looked towards Jonas once he received a nod in approval. He ordered the men to change course. They had another harbor to reach within a timely manner.
The ships made an agile turn regardless of their hulking size. As if they were nothing but tiny fishing vessels. And began to speed up against the currents of the wind. In an hour they were out of sight of Petrous and were well on their way to PennyHarbor.
"Master," Clay said, as he caught Jonas staring out to where Petrous was in the distance. "There is something I wish to inform you."
Jonas turned to look at him. He felt numb from the irrational fear he had experienced already every time Clay took the initiative to do something.
"Yes, Clay."
"Well, not one thing but a few things, if you don't mind," Clay rubbed the back of his neck. Seeing Jonas nod, he let out a breath. "Okay, first and foremost. I am not human."
"What?" Not human what did he mean by that. He looked perfectly human.
"I-I am a descendant of a forgotten race. The Divladous. Or Divine Ones in the human tongue. We are what you'd describe as Seraphim, just not what humanity has painted us to be-"
And then Clay went on a tangent. Jonas after the many times he had spoken before with Clay instinctively shut out anything the man said as his mind turned a million times. He had conditioned himself to listen to anything important the man said and zone out the rest. Somehow that still occurred even though their images changed.
"-technically I am the son of a Seraphim and a mortal-did I mention they are immortal beings? Either way, mother was an elf, hence my affinity for mana. I seem to have taken much from my mother's side then my father's if you'd believe it. I would have thought immortal beings would have stronger characteristics I could inherit-"
Elf too?
"-he always said to choose a strong woman. It is paramount you do the same-"
"The second thing you wanted to tell me?" Jonas interrupted. Even if the man could blow an entire mountain up, it didn't mean he wasn't an inexcusable blabbermouth. The guy could go on for weeks!
"Oh yea," Clay smiled innocently. "We, as Seraphim, don't really understand this thing you guys call morality...you see, we view things differently from what I understand. You guys think about whether what you've done has consequences for those around you. We, on the other hand, view things like this if you can't prevent it from happening to you, then you are weak. Become stronger and they won't happen again.
For instance, me eroding the cliffs of the Harbor, if they had someone of my strength on the Path, I would not have been able to do what I did. Instead, the first attack to actually make it through our defenses would be the only fatal attack happening. All the others would fizzle out into nothing."
Clay seemed happy to have gotten that out of his chest. Jonas noticed the man loved to preach lessons on what he thinks he should be like. But each lesson was suspect at best in his eyes. The man didn't even blink when he said he was going to kill every single person that lives in and around the entire city of Petrous.
"And lastly, before I go back to sleep. I noticed you did not approve of my sentiment to remove all the men and women from the tiny city and harbor. So, I have decided that I will help locate pirate hideouts! I've also noticed you love to take their things, why I couldn't imagine, but it's your little quirk. I mean seriously, what is the point of taking on all that gold? It's just an unnecessary weight that will slow us down-"
Jonas didn't know whether to be flabbergasted at him calling Petrous-the city with walls over a hundred meters high-tiny or whether he found all that treasure and gold worthless. It only made it clear how differently they thought about things.
But, to be truthful, he couldn't care at the moment. He felt beyond giddy at the prospect of raiding pirates. The sheer amount of gold and treasure had him daydreaming for days on end.
He was going to swim in gold coins soon enough.