Jack of All Trades, Master of All

Meinhard tossed his hands up, manipulating the air around him, creating currents that rushed toward the lava rocks flying from the volcanic crater. When contact was made, the meteor-like projectiles were deflected to the town’s surrounding area. Some even hit the monster horde straight on, causing massive casualties.

Still, this skill was no match for the one boulder the size of a house covered in a blazing inferno. It was going directly at Oxdale without no sign of slowing down.

As calm as ever, Meinhard retracted his hands and proceeded to perform his unique mana manipulation method. He brought his arm forward, creating a fireball between them. The principal continued to add mana to his skill, causing the fireball to get bigger and bigger, until it was almost as big as his entire body. Then, he stopped his mana flow and retracted his outstretched hand, shrinking the giant fireball in accordance.

That might sound like a lot of moves, but what Meinhard did only lasted three seconds. Only when in his hand was only a tiny grain of blazing fire did the principal throw it toward the falling lava rock. The projectile Meinhard had created tore through the air, undeterred by the pressure around the boulder. It penetrated the surface and made its way inside, stopping at the exact center of the rock and bursting out. An enormous explosion resounded in the sky above Oxdale. The shockwave of the lava boulder’s destruction came out in waves, crushing the people below. Some affected buildings quickly titled and collapsed.

The broken pieces spread out, raining upon the town. According to Meinhard's orders, the previously assigned Arcanists carried out their duties. They performed the same moves Meinhard did, creating currents and projectiles of wind to deflect the fragments. In addition, water skills were also utilized, making a reverse rain that flew upward to cool off the lava, limiting the damage of the falling fire.

From a distance, the scene of two screens of rain colliding with each other was a magnificent sight to behold. The people at the refugee points all stood and stared bewilderedly. Desperation quickly took hold of their eyes, realizing that they were no more than leaves on a river, powerless to resist the flow of fate. All they could do was pray that the Arcanists could hold the line.

The smaller pieces that had been slowed down and cooled off were still falling down. It was then that the remaining Arcanist put up a floating wall of earth and metal to catch these shards, minimizing as much impact damage on Oxdale infrastructure as possible. Though they had done all they could, their numerical disadvantage left some parts of the town unprotected and ruined.

The boulders hit their target, leaving holes and cracks in their way. Debris of wood and stone scattered everywhere, creating a screen of dust. People who were sheltering in the vicinity of these areas, seeing their houses being devastated, all knelt down and sobbed, praying for the nightmare to end.

The “end”, though, was far from sight, as the lava quickly rampaged its way down the side of the hill. Meinhard saw this and frowned. The temperature of this lava flow was too abnormal. The volcano was surrounded by mining stations, which also served as defenses against future eruptions by unleashing a huge amount of water and cold winds through a series of pipelines connected to the Artificer headquarters. Now, with all of that preparation, the flow of inferno still seemed unstoppable.

Meinhard used his skills and flew toward Blackpon. At the right distance, he stopped, feeling the wave of heat that turned his face red. He gave out a sigh of relief, seeing the cooling system was still doing its job of weakening the lava flow. Instead of turning solid again, the lava was somehow resisting the cooling mana and kept running downhill.

“It just gets weirder and weirder,” Meinhard quietly cursed while retracting his hand for his next actions.

Water gushed out from his palms, swirling around like snakes. At first, they were only the size of his palm, then grew larger until they were the size of a pillar. Afterward, the water slither rushed away, merging with each other, forming towering waves that charged at the flow of lava.

The steam immediately rose up like small pockets of clouds as the sizzling sound ran along the line of the two colliding forces. The lava's mana resistance property was weakened by Meinhard's unique power, and eventually, it was solidified, forming a hard surface that helped contain itself.

Meinhard landed quietly, his head covered in sweat. Fortunately, he was able to use Watermelon to increase the effectiveness of his water-type moves. Otherwise, the water just now would have done little facing the extreme heat intensity of the lava.

He pulled out a mana potion and gulped it down. Before it could take effect, though, the lava started slithering again, crawling up the dense blackened stone pile and continuing to drift toward Oxdale.

Other Arcanists rapidly appeared beside Meinhard. With a nod from their leader, they unleashed their own streams of water as well as erected walls to direct the lava in other directions. Nonetheless, their skills proved vastly underwhelming compared to those of Meinhard.

After a minute for his mana to recover, Meinhard flew up again. He continued to generate water currents to counter the tips of the blazing lava running straight at the town’s gates.

Inside the town, monsters had overrun the streets. They entered through doors that had been smashed by elephant-like monsters, or climbed over the now-ruined city walls. The military had fallen apart. Now, it was the private forces of houses and organizations that waged a head-on confrontation with the monsters.

Once again, the Warrior Guild’s force was stretched thin. The guild's four High Crusaders had to move nonstop to different hotspots, fighting to relieve the pressure. The mighty roars of Gaius' shield rang out from time to time, but instead of increasing morale, it only burdened the people’s hearts. Most of the Warrior Guild’s members knew how exhausting using that shield was. Should Gaius fall, chaos would take the day.

The Maester Guild, in response to the influx of the second wave of monsters, activated a series of toxic fumes. Yet, with rage and madness overflowing their veins, the attack didn’t seem to bother them one bit.

Jack also had the same problem when he realized the poisons were not working well at all. Still, he could use them to make monsters' wounds bleed out more, increasing their death rate and reducing their combat ability.

Since he couldn’t utilize the concoctions to finish them off, he had to rely almost on his fighting capability. Using mana at such a rate meant no regeneration could catch up. He had to take occasional rest, which resulted in some monsters finding their way to the west gates.

Still, this was all he could do, and had anyone learned of his deeds till this point would have surely been left in awe. The number of monster corpses lying around him was almost in the thousands, including the zombified ones. Though, Jack still felt it wasn’t enough, as if the worst was yet to come.

 

Meinhard's squad of Arcanists took turns stopping the flow of lava, as well as falling stones from the sky. But the flow of the blazing red liquid refused to be stopped. They just kept coming out time and time again until finally, a monstrous form emerged. It had no legs but, instead, tentacles swirling around the crater, its hands were long sharp claws, its eyes were that of a hellish red behind a screen of black smoke, and its body wore a robe made of lava. It was a creature walking straight out of hell.

Meinhard saw the lava stop flowing and looked up. When his eyes caught sight of the creature, his face contorted, and his pupils trembled with fear.

“Mutated Cavernwraith,” he shouted. "Withdraw. Now!”