SIS Book 1 Chapter 51: Gravity and Tide [First Draft]

"The plan's simple. Ger, you still focus on supporting Lyle. Sarah do that same, and don't force yourself to kill anyone, they may be evil and trying to kill us, but these Barbarians are still Humans. Just try to focus on supporting us indirectly, mostly Lyle," Daz ordered over the earpiece. The Barbarians were roughly five-hundred meters away from the wall, down the road towards the city at this point.

"I-I'll be fine," came Sarah's hesitant reply.

"No, no you won't. If you don't think you can kill, then don't bother. You will put us in jeopardy if you fuck things up due to hesitating. As I said, focus purely on supporting us. I haven't checked your Class in extensive detail, but buff us or affect the Barbarians negatively somehow, I dunno. Just don't push yourself beyond what you're capable of," Daz stated coldly, but objectively.

"I'll be fine, Daz! I can help just as mu-" Sarah's response was interrupted by her father, Ger.

"No daughter of mine will become a murderer. Just do as Daz says, okay, Sarah?" Ger said with little to no room for negotiations.

"But I-" Sarah's rebuttal suddenly stopped and she then said, "Okay, I understand," with a disgruntled and clearly unhappy tone.

'Ger must have turned his comm off to say something to her in private. Must be stressful having a daughter that wants to prove she can kill,' Daz thought to himself.

"What about me?" Heather asked curiously over the communication device. At this point, the Barbarians were only about thirty seconds away from Daz's group.

"Use your newly-upgraded fishing rod to redirect the Barbarians, duh. Unless you got something else with your merit points, you can't do much else. Though your redirection will be very useful," Daz hurriedly responded.

A soft "Mmm," was Heather's confirmation, and with that, Daz quickly told both Lyle and Crusher what they were going to do.

"Lyle, value your own safety over getting kills. If you can't kill, use a drug that can slow the enemies instead of a lethal one or poison. You did get some of the willing Citizens to buy you a few different types of chemicals, yeah?" Daz asked.

"Don't worry, my Lord, I'm more than capable of killing them, even if they're humans," Lyle replied swiftly with a cold look in his eyes.

"Mmm, okay. Crusher, you and I are going to-"

"-Clear a path for Rimmy to distract the boss for us?" Crusher interrupted with a wide grin on her face, displaying her muscular jawline perfectly.

"...Yeah. Well, guess I can trust you to kill these people since you seem so eager. Rimmy," Daz said as he turned to look at his best friend. In response, Rimmy tilted his head in Daz's direction. "You heard Crusher. We'll clear a path for you and make sure you can fight the boss undisturbed. Distract him as best as you can while we clear out the weaker ones, okay?" Daz finished.

By now, the Barbarians were within fifty-feet of Daz's group. Rimmy shook his head and stuck his arm out before he gave a big thumbs up, his body still facing the oncoming sea of people.

"Well, then, good luck to everyone, and let's get past this attack alive," Daz said to everyone via the comm. He then charged ahead with Rimmy and Crusher to meet the enemy while Lyle skulked behind them.

Og, the Barbarian Chieftain, narrowed his eyes and raise his war axe above his head once again and screamed at the top of his lungs in an attempt to both invigorate his men and to intimidate his opponents.

"HAHAHA, I LIKE MEN WITH SPIRIT!" Crusher yelled in response before she swung her sledgehammer to her right with a joyous expression. Upon hitting one of the Barbarians, a large runic circle made of energy appeared on the side of the hammer's head, the side that hadn't touched the man. 

"GAH!" he screamed as his ribcage snapped and his lungs collapsed under the weight of the weapon. Less than a second later, the force of the attack actually took him off his feet and sent him shooting through the crowd, knocking down several of his comrades, but not quite killing him yet. 

'That hammer is dangerous. She has to have been favoured by a God. There's no way she got an upgrade like that with the same amount of merit points or less than what Heather got...' Daz thought while he quickly used his Higher Identification on the weapon.

Gravity Sledge [B-Rank (Middle Tier)]

Description

A simple construction hammer that has been enchanted with a rune of gravity. It holds no particular connection to its Master as of yet.

Stats

Attack:500

Durability:999/1000

SkillsGravity Control

Gravity Control

Allows the host to increase or decrease the gravity of anything struck with the weapon.

'Fuck me that's a strong skill! I really need to browse the shop more thoroughly when I have time, assuming I survive this attack. It kinda sucks that there are pretty much billions of options...' Daz thought with a tinge of depression and jealousy before he swung his own weapon, Hamson, successfully cutting the shaft of an axe that was being swung towards his head, before the blade of Hamson slashed at the Barbarian's chest.

It split open, creating a fountain of blood, but Daz didn't have the time to marvel at the sight. Both he and Crusher were literally surrounded by Barbarians and it was taking their all to either, avoid taking too many hits while also killing, or disabling enough enemies to make reaching the leader easier.

Lyle was the least hurt of the three as he had carefully been injecting the Barbarians on the outskirts of the encirclement and he was getting assistance from both Ger, who was shooting any enemies that took notice of Lyle, in the head, and from Sarah, who was using her nature magic to hold the Barbarians in place.

Sarah's focus was split between keeping Lyle safe and helping ease the pressure on Daz and Crusher. Her forehead was sweating since her Worldforce was quickly draining and she was starting to feel faint, but the fight hadn't been going on for long so she had convinced herself to work as hard as possible to show that she could help.

Thus far, the automatic Balistea had been killing exactly one Barbarian per shot, which meant one per minute. While it was slow, it was a guaranteed kill every time. The accuracy of the deadly defensive weapon was putting even Ger's shooting skills to shame.

Heather was the only one who had done nothing and was only concentrating very heavily on Daz and Crusher, almost as if she was waiting for an opportunity.

Rimmy's body was getting chipped since dodging the crude attacks was a very difficult for him to do due to his size, and this genuinely pained Daz's heart considering he cared about his best friend a lot, but Rimmy had yet to voice his complaints and was still trying his best to push forward to the boss, so Daz swallowed his words and held back his tears as he watched Rimmy valiantly perform his role.

'It's getting too hard to deal with them at this point...I think it's time,' Daz thought to distract himself from Rimmy's struggles. "Heather, do it now!" Daz ordered through the comm.

"Mmm," was the quiet response he got from his earpiece. It was at that point, that the tide of the battle was changed.