In the dwarven capital, flames rose high in the sky as the western gate was destroyed, chaos sowed amongst the citizens as they ran for their lives as the Arcadian army poured in through the last of the city's defenses. Despite fighting a losing war, Frey and her brother Lest were still commanding what troops were left from the assault as they made their last stand in the narrow streets near the Loxaerion household.
"Take aim!" The older sister shouted to the row of soldiers in front of her armed with bolt action rifles. "Fire!"
Arcadian knights charged seemingly without fear despite their comrades falling one after the other for each barrage of bullets. As the knights in front were incapacitated, another would take their place in the charge and push the Akrapocalian defense back.
"Sis, we must fall back! There are too many of them!"
"And let them slaughter our people?! No, we'll finish them here and now!" She turned to the buildings above them and signaled by lowering her arm. "Now!"
As her hand went lower, the soldiers waiting on the rooftops dropped small barrels filled with gunpowder on the edges of the building they were in. With a bit of ingenuity, the barrels were prepared with a wick short enough to detonate as soon as it landed on the street.
"Take cover!"
One of them shouted from the rooftop and the troops below dived to the ground as multiple fiery explosions went off, scorching the sides of the building black.
"Gah! My leg!"
Lest screamed in pain as he tried to grab a piece of wooden debris that lodged itself inside his right thigh. The moment Frey noticed he was wounded she spared no time giving out orders.
"You two! Take him to the central square!"
"Yes ma'am!" From the twenty soldiers, two of them helped the lieutenant stand up as they dragged him into the inner parts of the city. "We are the last line of defense!" She raised her rifle with a bayonet attached to the end of the barrel as she shouted from atop of her lungs. "We will drive them back!"
The soldiers around her raised their weapons while also shouting a fierce battle cry. By using the barrels of gunpowder that Leona had brought them, they managed to get some ground back only for them to witness a single knight wobbling their way towards them.
'It's that thing again.' She clenched her teeth. 'We can't shoot at it otherwise it'll do the same thing again and without cover we'll just serve as living targets.'
Seeing the same knight who managed to take down most of their comrades by themselves made the remaining soldiers to hesitantly step back from formation. Without much ammo nor stamina, Frey was running out of options on how to deal with the unexpected foe.
"Everyone fall back! We'll need to use more explosives!"
From one of the rooftops a soldier shouted.
"Captain! Those were our last barrels!"
One of them that was in front of her lifted his rifle in order to shoot at the incoming knight but Frey quickly stopped him from doing so.
"If you shoot and don't kill, one of us will die!" She looked at the others. "Until you hear my orders, do not fire at that thing!"
"But captain, what are we supposed to do?!"
'The only way we could get out of this would be-'
She was racking her brain in order to find a solution but the moment she realized there was no way other than close quarters combat, she pulled out the saber from its sheath.
"If you see any other knight, shoot them. I'll take care of this myself."
"Captain!"
Despite learning swordsmanship from an esteemed teacher, it didn't prevent her from feeling fear, in fact, that was the first time she felt true fear in a long while. Sweat was quickly forming on her brow as the warmth began to drain from her body, leaving a bitter chill spread throughout her limbs.
However, as she raised her saber and began to charge at the knight, a fiery sphere of magic passed right beside her and exploded against her foe and engulfed them in a blazing inferno.
"Wha-!?"
"You shouldn't carelessly dive headfirst into danger, Captain Frey."
A male voice came from behind them and once they turned around they saw the eldest son of her employer's family. His normally messy blonde hair was combed back as he held the round rimmed glasses with his left middle finger while having his right white gloved hand extended out from casting a spell.
"Lord Cyrus?!"
"Captain, that thing is a mana slime." He walked up to the troops as some of the soldiers seemed to be relieved to see him there. "Though my magic will deal some damage to it, it won't die if the core is not destroyed."
"That… 'thing' is a slime?!"
When Frey looked back at where the knight was before being blown to pieces, an amalgamation of fleshy pieces of meat and dissolved armor was being knitted back in the general humanoid shape. She clicked her tongue as Cyrus stepped forward and adjusted his white glove.
"Let's take care of this you and I, Captain."
She nodded to him as she flexed her right leg with her saber in hand.
"Understood my lord."
He took a deep breath and extended his right hand, his crimson eyes seemed to glow as he chanted.
"Roaring thunder, decimate my enemy into nothingness, Thunderbolt!"
A blinding arc of lightning shot from his fingers and zapped the slime that was rebuilding itself, resulting in an explosion of steam. However, not even a second after releasing the spell, he felt faint and lost his balance.
"Dammit…!"
"Lord Cyrus!"
The soldiers quickly helped him before he could fall over.
"I'm alright, just a bit dizzy."
Once the steam cleared off, Frey noticed the slime was still alive, though much less threatening since it was a quivering puddle of fleshy bits in the middle of the scorched street.
'Despite his frail constitution he still decided to help.' She thought while looking at the young lord. 'I mustn't let him down.'
She carefully walked towards the slime, saber in hand. The fleshy bits seemed to have life of its own as it trembled with her approach, after quickly taking note of where the core was she raised her weapon in order to strike it.
"Die!" She swung the sword down but two fleshy bits grabbed the blade on both sides just before it hit the core. "Huh?!"
She attempted to pull the weapon out however its grip was much stronger than she thought and in a split second decision she jumped backwards just in time to evade a burst of fleshy spikes coming from the ground and walls on both sides that would have surely impaled her to death.
"Captain!"
Cyrus was still recovering from his lack of mana, however he knew just how dire the situation was.
"Tsk!" She pulled her rifle from the sling and quickly fired at the core only for the bullet to be deflected by her own saber. "What the-?!"
As the slime formed itself again it held the saber by the blade until it took the complete shape of a knight, reassembling the pieces of destroyed armor around it and throwing the weapon in the air before nimbly grabbing by the hilt.
The fact the soldiers now knew it was a slime made some hesitate and even slowly retreat as the knight approached. Frey was starting to lose hope as well but upon hearing the sound of glass shattering, she and all soldiers instinctively looked towards the noise which came from behind most of them.
"Do not falter! We will defeat this foe and drive them back!" Cyrus was holding what seemed to be another glass vial of light blue coloration, a mana potion. "Captain, assemble the troops and get ready to shoot at it once I cast a spell."
Seeing the glint of determination in his eyes ignited the fire of battle in her again. After taking a deep breath, she shouted from atop of her lungs.
"Formation!" Seemingly out of instinct, the soldiers moved forward, ten of them knelt down in front, five in each Frey's side and eight behind them, four in each side, everyone with rifles on hand. "Reload! Take aim!"
Cyrus stood just beside her as he began to chant.
"Roaring thunder, decimate my enemy into nothingness-"
"Fire!"
"-Thunderbolt!"
An arc of lightning struck the knight, destroying the fleshy slime and in a blink of an eye the shots fired from the rifles at the same time shredded the remaining armor to pieces. In that fleeting moment where there was nowhere else its core could hide Frey held her own rifle steady holding her breath until she pulled the trigger.
With incredible marksmanship the bullet nicked the core and it cracked once it fell on the scorched floor. The once quivering and trembling fleshy bits of slime ceased all movement as it began to liquify, turning into rotten darkened pieces of meat.
"We- we did it!"
One of the soldiers began to cheer and the rest just followed suit, raising their rifles in the air whilst shouting.
"Great work Captain…" Cyrus said while panting heavily. Casting spells was much more exhausting for him due his weak constitution. "We couldn't have done it without you."
Though despite winning a seemingly invincible foe, no words left Frey's mouth, in fact only after a while the soldiers began to wonder what was wrong with her.
"Captain?" One of them went around in front of her and only after doing so he realized there was a hole no bigger than a copper coin in her uniform around the lower right side of her ribcage. "Captain?!"
Once he looked at her face he realized something terrible had happened to her. While her left eye seemed to be normal in the sense that it was looking desperately towards the soldier, her right one had its sclera almost totally blackened with the eyeball itself twitching in ways not humanly possible.
"Ngh… r-run…!"
The same soldier fell backwards screaming in terror before he was decapitated by Frey's right arm that seemed to arc like a whip before it struck him.
"Everyone fall back!" Cyrus shouted which caused the rest of them to scatter in desperation. "Captain Frey!"
His voice fell on deaf ears as the former woman he knew turned her head around with a sound of cracking bones as she faintly whispered in pain.
"K-kill me… please…"