The Heroes made for an impressive show. I'd missed the Second Wave entirely, so I'd not gotten to see them in action then, though Strong and Shadow had spoken of how well they'd handled themselves, with Bard coordinating the attacks to keep them clearing the way, while Ren and Motoyasu had used their overwhelming power to keep destroying the enemy with single strikes.
The Third Wave, the first she'd been present for, she'd gotten to see only Bard in action, and only with the party she was part of, as the action on the ship had been out of her view. Naofumi had leapt on board, bringing Raphtalia and Filo against their advice, but regardless, they had won that battle handily…against the Boss, at any rate. Against Glass? Their victory was still there, but it had been by the skin of their teeth.
Now? She was seeing the Heroes working against a Boss, and they were glorious in action. With Bard's orders ringing in her head, she was able to keep herself out of harm's way, even dodging a wildly flailing flipper as it came at her, something she might not have been able to react to on her own. With his warning though, she dug Glomenthal into the creature's hide as she passed by him, the dark blade drinking deep with his blood.
And it wasn't like the others weren't doing just as well. Welts was keeping the ice sheet beneath us thick and strong, and still dishing out attacks whenever he could, the boost from being the 'Champion' of the Hero of the Sword serving him well as he leapt over a small spray of light particles from out of a small hole in the side of the enemy, and then hitting it with a bolt of dark magic in the same area.
Raphtalia, with her boost from Ser Naofumi, was doing mostly interference, using her 'Illusion Sword' to keep the enemy's eyes on her, slashing at it, doing little damage with the blade as it was, but giving it pain as she literally drove her blade into its eye at a time or two, causing it to cry out in anguish, before forcing her to leap away as it open its jaws wide and seemed to try to swallow her whole.
Rishia was, with the stat boosts from her Hero, quite the powerhouse. Her strikes could literally lift the whale from the ice for a moment, keeping it from getting its bearings, while dealing quite a bit of damage with just punches and kicks. Which, while not something she hadn't seen before, was an impressive sight, especially as she kicked the thing into the air, and then rushed underneath it, leaving impressions of her fist in its hide as she kept it up for a few seconds, before letting it drop once more.
And that was nothing on the Heroes themselves. Motoyasu was, if anything, even more impressive than his companion, his spear shifting rapidly between a dozen or more forms as he hammered the enemy, using his armor's special effect to keep his stats adjusting, moving with teleportation like speed one moment, then striking with a power that could break mountains the next.
Naofumi, mounted on Filo, was less dealing damage, and more preventing it, his shields more than once keeping people from harm, as he brought them to bear against the enemy's attacks, while also leveraging Filo's speed and power to strike the monster from odd angles. In a one-two punch, he coordinated with Rishia to send the monster upwards, just to pound it back down with a kick from the filolial, before darting away.
And Ser Ren? He was a sight to behold. He couldn't shift his stats like Motoyasu, and he wasn't mounted on a speedy animal like Naofumi, but he was still able to 'flash step' as Bard had called it, and laid into the enemy with a dozen strikes every second. While he didn't shift his weapon the way Motoyasu did, trying to find the perfect attack, and otherwise just keeping the thing off balance, the strikes he handed out with his blade in its most basic form showed enough power that he didn't need much.
To say nothing of all the damage we dealt. With Bard's 'overwatch', the knights and adventurers peppered the enemy with strikes. Arrows, stones, knives, spells, throwing stars, and a hundred other items impaled the thing, the size of it making it a bigger target, and the Bow Hero's directions keeping us from getting in each other's way. While weaker than the strikes of the Heroes, each attack did do some damage, and with so many of them, it added up quickly.
The stand outs were, of course, King Aultcray, who would loose a furious bolt of lightning, or even assist Welts with keeping the ice solid beneath us. Each attack of his filled the air with Mana, enough to frizz my tail, and make me wonder if the old man might forget himself, and target the demi-humans in the crowd, given his history of war against us. He never did, however, his eyes always on our true foe.
The other was L'arc. His scythe, a weapon that seemed almost as great as my own or Lucia's, tore through the flesh of our foe, striking it, before he would somehow 'leap again' in the air, maneuvering out of the way of either the enemy's strike, or creating an opening for others. Each attack seemed to leave long gashes in the whale's armored skin, and it only made the thing scream louder when he hit it.
With all this fire, it wasn't long, a few minutes at most, before Ser Ren was given the honor of the final blow, his sword shifting for the first time into one glowing with darkness, that he slashed upwards with, creating a column of black fire that rose into the heavens, almost to the holes in the sky, while the monster, giving a death howl, thrashed and moved, before its tail was served from its body, and the thing at last went still.
The silence that followed the thing flopping on the ice was palpable. We all stood there, staring at the thing's lifeless form, as if waiting for it to come back to life, daring it to try again, so we could smack it down once more. When it failed, a cheer went up from the knights and adventurers, and the three Heroes, getting together, stood on the creature's side, holding up their weapons in triumph.
'It's Glass! She's the enemy that tried to kill us last time! Everyone keep your eyes open, she's got to be around here somewhere!' came a sudden voice in my head, and everyone paused mid celebration, their eyes going around. I even leapt into the air as high as I could, looking around, wondering where the enemy would come from, only to be shocked as a shimmering golden barrier appeared around the ship Lucia, Bard, and Therese were on. As if that wasn't enough the sudden sound of combat nearby erupted beside me, and I turned to find the Heroes being attacked by L'arc.
Or rather, he scattered them with a swing of his weapon and then just…stood there. Like, he wasn't readying for combat, or doing anything else. Instead he looked at the Heroes, and then walked over to the nearby flipper of the whale, stretching before he used his weapon to drag himself up onto it, crossing it over his legs, and staring at us each in turn, before pointing a finger towards Naofumi.
"I…I didn't want it to come to this, you know. You and those ladies, Raphtalia and Filo? You've been good to us, you've made us feel welcome in your little group, and when we requested to join you, without a moment of hesitation, you let us do so. You really are good people, you know that?" he said, causally, like he wasn't an enemy.
"Then why are you doing this? Why are you with Glass?!" demanded Raphtalia, her blade held at the ready, humming with power, but she didn't advance, not yet, as L'arc sighed and ran his fingers through his hair.
"It's not…it's not that easy. There are things going on, things that we don't understand ourselves, but we know one thing. Our world is in danger, and we have to do anything to protect it," he answered, sighing like he was having to search for the words.
"Then join with us, and help us beat back the Waves and we can protect the world," countered Motoyasu, and L'arc, rather shockingly, laughed, actually a deep and mirthful sound, as he slapped a leg, and then shook his head, he opened his mouth to say something, but before he could, a sudden blast of wind came from nowhere, pushing back everyone, save the Heroes and their parties. Even I was nearly blown away by it, until I stabbed Glomenthal into the ice, digging a deep rut into the frosty island before she stopped trying.
"When he said 'Our' world, he meant the one that he, myself, and Therese hail from. Not this place," said a feminine voice, and the woman, Glass, whom I recognized from the orb recording, descended, her dress, a kimono Bard had called it, flapping as she came down, holding her arms out to her sides, her fans open, and then snapping them closed as she got to the ground, landing beside L'arc, and looking to us.
The other Heroes tensed for a moment, but given she did nothing else, no one moved to attack. Glancing to the side I confirmed, as best I could, that the other Adventurers, Knights and King Aultcray were in at least uninjured, if not good, condition. Most were climbing to their feet, using their weapons to do so, but they didn't approach again. No one wanted to be the first to provoke a fight with someone able to do what this woman had just done.
"So, on that first night, if there's more than one 'modern world' it makes sense there's more than one fantasy," said Naofumi, as he held up his shield, sounding…trying to sound calm, but there was an edge to his voice that spoke of a lot of anger bubbling inside him, waiting to boil over.
"I…don't know about that. But we ARE from a world much like this one. In our world, we summoned Four Heroes to protect us from the Waves, but they've proven…less than adequate to the task," said L'arc with a sigh, his tone implying disappointment.
"It is said that, when all four Heroes of our world, or this one, fall, then that world will end. We will, cease to be, and this world will go on like nothing happened," he stared up into the holes in the sky on saying that, before turning towards us.
"I…I won't kill anyone here, if I can help it. But I can't leave, not until the Timer finishes counting down and the monsters that remain are at their strongest. If you want to make me go? Well, that's going to take a fight, and right now, you're up against someone who kicked your butt last time, if not for one of you cheating, and me. I don't think that's a fight you can win," he said, hefting his scythe up, as he stared us down, Glass coming to stand beside him.
"And don't think the Bow Hero will be able to pull that trick again. Therese's barrier blocks all magic, and no one on this world has the Will required to break it," proclaimed the woman, her hand, whether she realized it or not, going towards her abdomen, showing that Bard had really done a number on her.
Mind, she and he were right. Glass had taken on all Four Heroes, plus Raphtalia and Filo, and she hadn't even broken a sweat from their descriptions. Tanking every blow with disturbing ease. Bard had gotten around that by getting around the rules, but he was sealed, and I had little doubt she was speaking the truth that Bard and Lucia were out of action for the rest of this fight, regardless of what was going on within.
"Heh, you know, you're little speech reminded me of something from a story I read once," said Ren, stepping forward, shifting his sword back to its normal shape, and driving it into the ground, staring down the man named L'arc, who tilted his head, silently telling the boy…the Hero of the Sword, to continue.
"If your victory is so inevitable, then you won't mind if we try anyway!" and with that, he used his sacred weapon like a pole pulling it backwards and then letting it sling him forward, Naofumi and Motoyasu close behind, as they slammed into L'arc, the rest of us charging in afterwards, only for Glass to shift her fans, and slice into the ice before us, bringing the Heroes' companions to a halt as she hopped over them, and landed in front of us.
"Very well then, I promise that if you stay down, I won't keep you there, but if you force my hand, I will end you," she told us with a darkness passing over her eyes, only to block as Welts shot out a blast of flames from his staff, while Rishia, Raphtalia, and myself went forward, Filo coming up under the wizard to get him mobility, as two battles were joined.