Calla Akeya quickly surveyed the situation, then gestured for her unit to follow the order.
"Did everyone hear that? Push the demons into the water!" she emphasized.
Lou Yumei formed a round spiritual shield and strode into the crowd, forcefully shoving the demons towards the Tainia river. Calla Kai joined her, lending his support by reinforcing the shield with his own spiritual energy.
Meanwhile, Marshall found himself at a loss of how to achieve the task with bow and arrows. Instead of trying to push the demons, he directed his attention to covering the backs of his unit.
Any demon that strayed from the crowd or snuck behind the two disciples pushing a shield, was taken down.
Lai Rylan and Calla Akeya barely needed any shielding, moving too fast for anyone to sneak behind them. Their blades blazed with nearly identical force of spiritual energy, golden flames rolling off them.
As the crowd of demons thickened, Marshall noticed something flickering at the corner of his eye.
A speedy little demon darted past his aim, escaping three squealing arrows. Its claws spread in gesture of a very aggressive hug, headed straight at him.
Marshall heart jumped and he twisted his body out of the small demon's path.
"Nuh-uh! Who are you trying to grab?"
He summoned another spiritual arrow, but the creature was flitting around like an annoying fly, and he missed again.
"Damn it!" he muttered.
Seeing it was not relenting, Marshall slammed his foot into the ground to erect a shield. But the creature threw him off his feet before the shield materialized.
He caught it only centimeters away from his face.
Foaming at the mouth, the demon chomped down on air, trying to bite his arm like a rabid dog.
The breath of the demon stank like rotten flesh, hot and disgusting.
"Ugh," Marshall scowled as he grappled with the frantic demon, his arms shaking with exertion.
"Cursed looking—ah! Why are you so strong?!"
The demon's teeth snapped fiercely, its red eyes ablaze. The intent to kill must have given its energy a boost.
"Get off!"
Finally, Marshall managed to get it far enough to kick it away. He put full force into it, sending it flying as far as he could.
The disciple scrambled up, drawing an arrow before the creature even landed. Somehow, it ended up barreling right at Wyn, who must have been on his way to help Marshall.
The snow deity shot Marshall a single glance, then posed himself to attack the demon mid-air.
A a burst of spiritual frost was unleashed, the impact sending the frenzied demon right into the river.
Marshall watched as the rapid current whisked it away, then looked back to Wyn, but the latter had already turned away.
He had stopped by the edge of the river, stiff as a statue.
The disciple ran to see what the snow deity had seen, halting as soon as he realized what was going on. His jaw dropped with a disbelieving scoff.
Another army of demons was swimming towards them, chortling and screeching in the distance as the river carried them closer.
"We have a problem!" Wyn announced, turning to alert everyone else.
The atmosphere shifted to one of forbidding anticipation as the others saw it too. They had barely cleared the area of the first wave, but the next one was about to hit.
"...what do we do now?" a flat voice asked, devoid of any reaction.
It's not that everyone had lost their confidence, but rather their minds had gone blank upon the unexpected turn of events. They had been using the current to their advantage until then, but now what? A horde of demon swimmers? Marshall wanted to laugh.
"Do not let demons cross onto the shore!" Wyn's voice echoed through the area. "Keep them in the water!"
A questioning shout hit them. "And then what? These guys look like they'll be able to swim against the current!"
Wyn fixed his gaze on the guard who had spoken, his expression leaving no space for bargaining. "I will stop the current."
A voice broke through the mumbling crowd with a question. "Stop the current? How do you intend to do that?"
"By freezing the river," Wyn responded calmly.
Upon hearing that, Marshall started chewing the inside of his cheek, trying to calculate the amount of spiritual energy necessary to pull off such a trick.
Wyn's specialty was snow, not ice. He might have been practicing the freezing skill, but how could a bucket of water be compared to a violent river? Moreover, it was the middle of summer.
Even for the winter deity, Lord Chioni himself, it would have cost a significant amount of spiritual energy to freeze the water now.
The snow deity knelt by the edge, stabbing Cheimon into the water. Waves of frost rolled from the blade into the water. The ice was beginning to spread, reaching further into the river.
"Woah," an impressed exhale left Marshall.
The disciple focused on steadying his breathing to keep his spiritual energy ready in case the snow deity would need an additional boost.
Unlike the thin, fragile layer of ice Marshall had seen in the bucket while Wyn practiced, this was unrelenting, freezing the harshest waves in place.
It appeared that Cheimon amplified Wyn's abilities by an incredible amount.
As the snow deity focused all his energy on the task, the three meter diameter around him turned frosty as well, covering the grass with white sheen. The people standing nearby took a few steps back and Marshall shuddered.
The thick ice eventually reached the other shore of the river, blocking demons from advancing any further.
A few demons hopped on the ice, trying to scramble towards the shore.
"It's not helping! The ice just created a path for the demons!"
As soon as Wyn noticed the demons crawling onto the ice, he sent a blast of spiritual energy, freezing half of the horde in place while the other half slipped back into the water.
His breath became heavy and uneven, rolling between gritted teeth in white clouds.