The group were about to leave the den when they heard a commotion ahead of them. The group of skeletons had turned around and were coming back down the passageway towards them.
Bjorn, the muscular man, was standing among them. He'd been forced to come to the forefront instead of continuing to hide out of sight in the passageway.
He saw the Sarcevic Wolf had been destroyed and made some mutterings of surprise and vexation. He commanded the human skeletons to protect him while a troop of wolf skeletons dashed forwards to attack the trio.
Johan responded by bombarding them with icicles.
*Splash* *Splash* *Splash*
The icicles either missed or were blocked by jets of water; it was the same thing that had blocked Eva before. It had quite a powerful defensive effect, but Abbie also guessed it consumed quite a lot of Qi, otherwise Bjorn would've used it to protect these skeletons earlier. She smirked slightly. Now that he was starting to use it, it showed he was beginning to run out of skeletons.
However, he was running out of Qi herself so she had to be efficient with her barrier placement. She only used one barrier and blocked off the left side. Now the group just had to focus on their right and they wouldn't get flanked.
Several wolves tried to smash Abbie's barrier. Meanwhile, the others charged to the right of it. They dashed right towards Eva.
After fighting the skeleton of the Sarcevic Wolf, these regular wolves were just small fry. She froze the mouth of a wolf with a palm strike, then shattered the skull of another with a spinning backfist.
Bjorn tried to make the wolves avoid Eva, but Johan fired another volley of icicles. Water jets surrounded them and the wolves had to stop again. Then Eva closed the distance and attacked them when the jets disappeared.
After 2 more wolves got destroyed, the man realised his attack was fruitless. He pulled the wolves back into a defensive position and shouted to his teammate,
"Come back and help me down here! I can't take them by myself!"
"What?! And just let this guy attack from behind again? I nearly lost my hand last time!"
Johan fired more icicles while their opponent was distracted. However, Bjorn was still paying enough attention to react; water jets sprang up to block the projectiles. Then he shouted again,
"Let's break out of the den then. We can't fight like this!"
"I'll push this guy back. You bring your skeletons up."
Bjorn retreated back into the passageway and his skeletons began to follow him. Johan was about to attack them, but Abbie stopped him,
"Don't waste more Qi. Just let them retreat so we can get out of here and meet up with Isaac."
Eva agreed,
"Conserve your strength. We can launch a concerted attack once we get out."
Johan lowered his arm somewhat reluctantly. The three of them walked up the passageway behind the retreating skeletons. The moment they reached the exit, Abbie created a snow barrier and they ran in the opposite direction to the skeletons.
The wall shuddered as a rain of projectiles collided with it. Abbie was right; of course they'd be attacked the moment they left the den.
Once they reached a suitable distance, she dispelled the snow wall. It collapsed into a heap of snow on the ground, allowing them to get a look at the battlefield.
The two enemies were about fifty metres in front of them, while Isaac was to the enemies' right. Abbie noticed that the skeleton army was now much smaller in size – it couldn't really be called an army anymore.
Isaac noticed that the group had escaped and gave some crude hand signals. He basically gestured for them to attack towards the left.
Abbie, Johan and Eva listened to their captain. Eva pushed up towards the left flank of the skeletons, while the other two stayed back to support her. Meanwhile, Isaac activated his Snowshoe Anima and glided silently towards the enemies' rear.
He didn't go unnoticed. Langley was extremely wary of Isaac, so he fired 2 skulls the moment Isaac started moving. Isaac gave the skulls a wide berth; he moved far out to the right and avoided the slow-moving skulls. Then he continued forwards.
Skulls and icicles both had one thing in common: they couldn't hit Isaac. The Snowshoe Anima was too agile for him to be struck at long range and Langley quickly realised this.
He stopped wasting Qi and waited for Isaac to get closer before he started firing again. Isaac had to slow down and focus on evading, but he still didn't get hit.
Meanwhile, Eva was moving down the left flank unobstructed. Bjorn had positioned his skeletons in a defensive formation while he waited for Langley to kill that pesky twerp on the other side. Then they'd pincer attack this trio together. That was the plan, so he didn't attack and only sat behind his defences like a tortoise in its shell.
But was Eva's palm strong enough to break this shell? Not quite. She barrelled into the army and fought like she was possessed, but she quickly got surrounded. Bjorn used his Jet Cage Anima to minimise his casualties, while Eva began to accumulate wounds.
She quickly realised she wasn't making any progress and kicked out behind her. The skeleton was knocked back, creating an opportunity to escape the encirclement.
She took it. An agile leap brought her away from the skeletons and back towards safety. Then she glared at Bjorn, who had a mixture of smugness and disdain on his face. 'Three pathetic idiots who can't break my defences'; that's what his expression seemed to say.
Eva didn't like that one bit. She jumped right back into the fray, but didn't let herself get surrounded this time. Whenever she noticed skeletons getting behind her, she would back off and choose a new point of attack. Even if Bjorn could save some skeletons with his Jet Cage Anima, he couldn't protect all of them from Eva. Many were damaged or destroyed, and Bjorn shouted,
"What are you doing?! Either finish him quickly or come and help me!"
Isaac had been fighting with a conservative style. He'd seen Eva's group had the upper hand and decided to stall for time until they broke through. Langley had been bombarding him with ranged attacks, but none of them could touch them hem of Isaac's coat; he was slippery like an eel and agile like a cat.
When Bjorn told him to 'hurry up', Langley's frustration exploded,
"Fuck! I'd like to see you try and kill this bastard! Actually, scratch that, you'd struggle to survive against him!"
"Oh yeah? Why don't we switch then!"
Bjorn immediately replied, incensed. However, after his momentary outburst, Langley calmed down,
"Now's not the time to argue. I can't catch this fucker, so I'll help you out."
Langley turned to fire a skull in Eva's direction. In this moment, he committed a grave sin: he turned his back to Isaac.
Isaac immediately turned the Snowshoe Anima to the max and darted forwards. The Anima was silent, so Langley didn't even hear him coming. He might've lost his head then and there if Bjorn didn't shout,
"Behind!"
Langley snapped around just to see a sword heading towards him. He ducked, and the blade sailed above his head. He prepared himself to dodge the next attack, but there wasn't one. Isaac flew past him towards Bjorn. Bjorn panicked and activated his Jet cage Anima.
Torrents of water sprung up around Isaac's feet, but he was too quick. Isaac was long gone by the time the jets were fully formed.
Just as he was 2 metres away from his target, Bjorn stepped into a throng of skeletons. Isaac did his best to veer left, but his control wasn't very good at such a high speed. He crashed into the wave of skeletons, obliterating 4 of them and crashing into Bjorn. The two tumbled through the snow together, but Isaac was the first to his feet. His sword darted towards Bjorn, but the muscular man raised an arm in defence.
Isaac's blade cut through flesh and bone. The arm successfully blocked his sword, but it was left hanging from a string afterwards. Bjorn screamed in agony and missed the opportunity to launch a counterattack. He was still focused on his arm when a left uppercut connected with his jaw.
He was sent sprawling into the snow again and Isaac was right on him. His sword cleanly landed on the side of Bjorn's neck and... stopped?
Isaac glared at Bjorn with an intense killing intent in his eyes, and Bjorn shuddered under the weight of that gaze. He felt the cold sword placed against his neck and the small trail of blood trickling from where it was placed. He closed his eyes in despair. He knew his life would end here.
Suddenly the sword was withdrawn.
*Thwack*
Isaac struck Bjorn with the hilt of his sword and knocked him out, then called to Eva,
"Get over here and secure him!"
Then Isaac went racing towards Langley, who had already begun to escape. The furry hood of his coat flapped behind him as he fled at great speed, riding the crest of an icy wave. The ice carried him at an almost unbelievable speed for a Rank 1 Anima and Isaac was completely unable to close the distance. In fact, Langley began to pull away.
He avoided the forest – presumably because he wasn't agile enough to weave between the trees – and ploughed through a row of bushes like a bulldozer. He continued to wreck all the foliage in his way as he escaped towards the nearby path.
Isaac followed him, but only for a short distance. Chasing any further would be fruitless – merely a waste of time.
He spun around in a neat semicircle and headed back towards where the others were.
Bjorn was collapsed on the floor, unconscious. Abbie and Johan stood either side of him like bodyguards while Eva was nowhere to be seen. She'd returned to the den to retrieve their bags.
Isaac took another look at Bjorn and a slight sense of bloodlust filled him. He'd never killed a man – not in real life anyway – so he didn't know why he felt so drawn to the idea of murdering Bjorn. Anyway, he shook his head and dispelled those thoughts.
Isaac was ruthless when he wanted to be ruthless (which was most of the time), but sometimes being merciful would yield greater benefits. He knew this, so he didn't kill Bjorn.
They all waited for Eva to return with a bag, which she promptly pulled some rope out of. Johan took the rope and tied Bjorn up tightly.
"Why didn't you kill him?"
That was the question on everybody's lips, but Eva asked it first.
"Three reasons: extortion, insurance and reward. He's probably set his will to destroy his Anima as soon as he dies. This way we can try torturing him to make him hand over his Anima. As for insurance, his ally escaped. He could become a hidden danger for us in the future or he could keep attacking the villages after we leave, so it's better to exterminate him now. Holding this man hostage means he's more likely to attack us, giving us another chance to kill him.
"Finally, reward. The sect might want to interrogate him and ask why he's been attacking sect villages. They should give us an extra reward for bringing him in alive."
Everyone's expressions brightened at the mention of an extra reward. They tacitly agreed with Isaac's decision and Johan kicked Bjorn awake. They had some more questions for him instead.