Chapter 35

****Author's Note****

Hey, sorry for the late post. I had the scene in my head, and it took awhile to put it into the words that I wanted. Let me know how you like the spell effect at the end :)

****End Author's Note****

Chapter 35

Drew saw them well before he made it to the watchtower. The treetops were covered in crows, they sat by the hundreds, if not thousands, all perched on the branches. Except, once he got closer, he saw some glaring differences between the creatures that were blotting out the forested area, and what normal crows were. The glowing red eyes were the first thing that gave it away, these weren't normal black birds. The other major difference was size, they were the size of an eagle, which was freaking massive for a bird in general. It looked like mutated beasts finally found their way to his property, and just his luck, the walls and fences wouldn't mean shit to these things. No, all his wonderful defenses could just be flown over, as if they didn't exist at all.

The only good news, if it could even be considered good news, was that they hadn't attacked anyone yet. No, they seemed very interested in the rotting goblin corpses below. Which, wasn't like crows at all. If anything, they normally liked shiny things, stuff that was reflective or sparkled. Instead, they were staring down at the corpses like a vulture would, which made no sense, they were crows. Luckily, Drew had run into Spock and Robert on the way to the tower, and they were heading to round everyone up. The absolutely shitty news was, they as a community had very few ranged weapons. Arrows had a limited range, unless someone chose to become an archer, and his lever action guns were limited in what they could do against this kind of threat.

Honestly, he needed shotguns, and he did have a few, but he hadn't tested out whether they'd work yet. This was a very bad matchup for his community. Plus, due to the sheer quantity of them, he didn't want to start off the fireworks show until everyone rallied at the tower. This left him cautiously watching the birds while he waited for people to show up, full well knowing that people were likely going to be killed or injured in the fight to come. He really wanted to browse through his menus and check out his profession to see if it gave him any useful abilities to help deal with the situation in front of him, but he didn't dare take his eyes off the birds until other people got there.

Twenty minutes passed before everyone was present. The time it had taken to gather everyone was horrible, they needed to figure out a system to alert people much quicker. That same time frame had allowed more birds to gather too, some of the branches in the trees were literally bending from the combined weight of all the feathered animals on them, and several of the more curious crows had started to poke around at the corpses. He wasn't sure if they were looking for shiny things, or if it they were going to start picking at the rotting meat soon.

All of his skeleton archers were in the tower, Dickbag was on the ground with the living community members, and Scolder's pack was standing off to the side. Everyone was there, and it was time to come up with a game plan.

"I want Amber and myself up in the tower, along with two more people. If you're an archer and have a bow, or a caster, please line up and stand before me." Drew said

Luckily, it looked like a large majority of people had taken either of the ranged classes, but many of them didn't have bows, nor arrows. Why did they choose a class that they didn't have weapons for? Drew had no idea, but it made him slightly irritated. He handed out the remaining recurve bows and recurve crossbows to the community members, and provided them with arrows and bolts.

"Great, anyone that has a bow or crossbow listen up. The arrows and bolts that I gave you are limited, as in, that's all we have. So, make sure your shots count. Don't release an arrow or bolt unless you have a one hundred percent clear shot at the enemy. Archers on the ground will be either shooting over the wall, or picking them off as they come to us. Do NOT shoot other people, the last thing we need is someone getting an arrow in the ass right now."

"Casters, your mana bolt spell will automatically hit any critter you can see in your vision, unless they move really fast, or they dodge. Don't blow all your mana at once, this is going to be a fight of endurance due to their numbers. Make sure no one else is taking care of the beast that you’re targeting."

"Warriors, I need three groups of you. One on each side of our ranged team down here, and the last group near the base of the watchtower. Your ONLY job is to protect everyone else. I have several extra axes, and a couple of swords that I will hand out shortly. If you don't have a weapon at this point, I have several firearms available, however, I only want experienced people using them. If you shot your Papa's 30-06 a couple of times, you're not who I'm talking about. If you have several hunting seasons under your belt, and more range time than you can shake a stick at, you're the people I want to talk to. Everyone else, I want you to grab whatever makeshift weapon you can. A knife, a large stick, a brick or a cinderblock, hell a broom is okay at this point. Have something to swing when the bastards come swooping in."

"Lastly, minors! If you can walk, and talk, we have a job for you. You stick together with two of your friends, and if you see any of us go down, if you see any of us get hurt, grab us. Grab us, and drag us to the friendly looking lady standing over there in blue scrubs. She’s our healer. You will save people's lives today, work hard and fight through anything gross you see. Keep your heads down, and get the injured to safety. I also need three warrior volunteers, and one ranged volunteer to stay by Miranda, our healer. You may not level as much as the rest of us, but it's likely a slightly safer job. But it's also the most important job. If our healer gets hurt, we're all screwed. So, take it seriously. Any questions?" Drew finished.

Luckily, no one raised their hands. They were either too scared to question things right now, or too focused on their roles. Something that Drew was immensely happy for, because they didn't have a ton of time to fuck around and play twenty questions, especially with how many enemies there were. Drew sent the command to Dickbag to come grab a two-handed axe, and sent commands to Scolder's pack to jump in and pull down crows that came close to kids, or anyone undefended, which would hopefully save some lives and buy time for someone to help kill whatever the coyotes couldn't.

Beefcake and Robert were going to try to pull any aggro they could manage, and Spock and Mark were to jump in and pick enemies off of the tanks. His mom was staying on the ground, because she could target enemies much like a caster. Her curse spell was a lot like Drew's corruption, in that it was cast silently. Although, her curse had a small cast time to it. She was going to be on crowd control duty, hopefully slowing the birds down enough to either make them fall out of the sky, or make them easier to hit as they came in to attack. Dickbag was going to be below the tower and killing whatever birds he could, basically jumping between the community’s lines of defense. With every weapon handed out, Drew climbed back to the top of the tower where Amber was waiting for him.

"Ready to kill some birds?" She asked with a smile.

"No, honestly this feels overwhelming, there must be thousands out there. People are going to get hurt."

"We'll do the best that we can. I love you sweetheart."

"I love you too Boo Bear, please stay safe."

Drew focused on a bird.

[Crow (Grade - F) - lvl 8]

He swiped away the rest of the information, because honestly, after briefly scanning it, it gave him no new information outside of what he had already known. After inspecting several of the birds, it seemed like level nine was the highest that he managed to find. That wasn't good news, all of the newcomers were still level zero, so people would definitely get hurt. He was hoping that they would only be level four or five, but luck wasn't on his side this time. It was time to get started.

Drew threw out a couple casts of corruption and then nodded to his wife to begin firing. If he had more time, he would have sent out corruption to various levels of targets, testing to see which ones died, and if any managed to survive due to their increased levels. Time wasn't on his side however, so he sent out the casts to the lower leveled crows, and spread them out as best as he could. It would take time to begin seeing a payoff, but with his new [Corrupting Contagion] he was hoping it would help even the odds against his group. That added bonus of any target dying while under the effects would spread the effects to two nearby enemies was huge. In a battle of endurance like this was going to be, skills like this should be paramount to survival.

The arrows and mana bolts began flying, they'd hit their targets and the birds would drop out of the trees. Drew continued to throw out his upgrade corruption spell, trying to space out the placements. The only good news was the birds seemed to either be really confused on what was happening, or simply didn't care about their feathered friends. Was this the difference between beasts and monsters? No, that didn't seem right. Animals worked in groups before The System, so why shouldn't they now that they had become beasts?

Drew felt a pulse of mana and activated his mana sense skill. One of the birds he'd thrown a corruption at just bit the dust, it didn't even fall from the tree it was on, it just slumped over. Just as he felt the pulse and saw the bird die, two gaseous steams of green clouds burst from the corpse and shot towards two of the closest birds. One didn't notice in time, but the other was spooked by the movement and took off, trying to gain air and escape the cloud. No luck though, the green gas hit the bird and shot straight into its chest cavity, instantly sinking in. Niceeeeee. Both birds got hit by the effects! Drew began to feel other pulses and looked at his previous targets.

Some of the birds had died and dropped to the ground, and the contagion effect sometimes reached a new target, but sometimes didn't. So, there must have been a range cutoff then. Alright, new plan, aim for low level birds on the higher branches, but make sure the trees they were on had low hanging branches full of new targets as well. The one-sided fight continued for several minutes before the birds realized what was happening. That the humans, and former humans were the cause of all their friends dying. Funny thing about crows, they were incredibly smart for animals, they were one of the few animals that actively employed trickery to steal food from other animals. That was bad news bears for Drew and his community though, because now the black birds were fucking pissed.

How were they pissed? Well, when every single bird in every single tree nearby suddenly turns their head and looks directly at you...it's incredibly unnerving. It also let him know that they were all, very much aware of the human's activities now. Those first few minutes of crow slaughter were over, because once the birds began crowing, they leapt off their perches and took to the sky heading straight towards the community.

There was something scary about watching thousands of crows that were the size of eagles take flight at exactly the same time and head straight towards your location. Drew was pretty worried before the fight started, now? Now he was scared. He turned his head to check on his group, and saw several people leave their defense lines and run. The rest of them were either too scared to run, too afraid to think about running, or had stopped thinking altogether. His hands were shaking, and he saw many people below in the same situation. Fuck it, it was balls to the walls time!

He threw corruptions left and right, barely keeping an eye on his mana, as the murder swooped in on them. His right pointer finger shot forward as he unleashed a death toll, sending a screaming skull into the flocks that were approaching them. Unwilling to waste any time waiting to see the effects of the first cast, Drew sent out another, and then another, and another. His mana was quickly draining, but he wasn't looking at it any longer. He was too focused on throwing out as much power as possible, and hopefully scaring the birds off. Skulls blew through the skies as his casts shot forward, with each one ripping through countless ranks of birds before exploding into the enemy's backlines.

His community started cheering as the casters joined in and threw mana bolts out and tore the chests out of the black birds, Beefcake roared and brought his huge sword to bear, the archers let loose their arrows and bolts, and the birds fell from the sky like raindrops on a humid April day. Birds exploded as spells and crossbow bolts hit them, the feathers turning into black snow that drifted down to the ground below, chunks of meat were like hail, falling with such force that wet 'THUNKS!" could be heard throughout the battlefield.

But then they arrived. They flew over the walls like they didn't exist, and divebombed into his backlines, as a small swarm came straight for him, his skeletal archers and Amber. Drew grabbed his wife in both hands and ran. He threw her over his shoulders as he jumped from the tower to the ground below, hauling ass to the ranged line. He made it there before most of the birds had, he dropped his wife and turned to face his enemies. His finger shot forward as another skull propelled from his fingertip into the endless wave of black coming towards him. He pulled a hatchet from his inventory with his left hand as he sent another death toll out.

The birds crashed into his lines, and people screamed. Some birds came beak first, trying to stab through peoples' skin, others came talon first, clawing and ripping through peoples' skin and clothing like a hot knife through butter. He felt Scolder's group and the rest of his boars start pulling their weight. He felt Dickbag swinging his two-handed axe and smashing enemies to the ground, not from his attribute points in strength, but just from the weight of the axe crashing into the birds’ backs. He saw Freya jump and grab a crow that had been flying straight towards Amber, and then watched as the shepherd tore it to shreds. He lifted his axe and started swinging as the birds came close, while still using his finger to send out the skulls. He heard Freya howl and use her ability to buff everyone's health, stamina, and mana regen.

But most of all, he felt it. He felt the death all around him. The chill, like a cool breeze being blown down his neck from a god of frost and ice. He felt the gore, he felt the rot set into the dead, that sickly-sweet smell that stuck to the back of his throat and refused to leave. He could taste the blood in the air, that metallic iron and copper flavor that left a sour tang on his tongue. He heard the screams. The screams of his people, his friends, his family as they were mauled, echoing through his ears and into his brain. His body kept moving, it kept swinging this weapon, it kept casting the screaming skulls into the enemy ranks, but his mind was completely detached from the motions his body was going through.

He felt the talons scrape against his skin, he felt the beak of a crow ram into his thigh, but his brain wouldn't process the pain. It was too busy processing everything else, it was too busy absorbing what he felt from the environment around him. Death.

Death was everywhere. He could feel it, reaching out to him, calling for him. Not to join in death, but to use it. He closed his eyes, he felt them. He felt the souls around him. The souls of the living, the souls of the dead. The souls of his enemies, and those of his friends. He reached forward in his mental landscape and accepted the hand extended towards him. The hand of the dead, the hand of the dead souls.

He felt an immense, and overwhelming pressure upon his shoulders, and opened his eyes. The pressure burst forth, pushing past him, pushing past everything, and everyone nearby. The ground began to whiten, frost accumulated upon the grass, over the bodies of the dead crows, and over those of his people. The air chilled to the atmosphere of a frozen tundra. Ice formed around him, and then outwards. The ice pulled the moisture from the air, the blood from the air, and used it to continue forming outwards from him. He was standing in a frozen wasteland, with splotches of red ice speckled among the white. The birds fell from the sky in droves as their feather and wings froze over. They hit the icy ground and struggled to get up, their wings unresponsive to the commands of their brains.

Amber stood next to him, eyes wide, scanning the distance surrounding them. His friends, his family, the people he needed to protect, all turned their heads, examining their new frozen battlefield. The ice and frost didn't touch them, they felt the chill, they were shivering, but they weren't frozen stiff, they weren't falling, their bodies remained responsive. Ice covered the ground, snow flurries blew through the air, snow lay upon the branches of the trees and the watchtower, and the ground was littered with half-frozen crows that struggled to stand up, struggled as they slipped on the ice, struggled as their allies pushed and pulled at each other to gain traction as their wings were frozen open.

He felt the chill hand of death reach out to him once more, he saw it in the blackness of his own mind. A blackened hand, shriveled to the point the skin should have fallen off eons ago, with long pointed nails. But it wasn't the touch of death coming to get him, it was Death itself reaching forward in a sign of friendship. He once again grabbed the hand and shook it firmly. He felt his mana core drain, and completely bottom out, as blue flames pushed forth from his core and into his surroundings. He saw the blue flames, he felt them, he knew what they were made of. Souls. They were so cold, so frigid that they could no longer remain as ice, and combusted into flame when sprung from his body.

The ring of flames reached his people and passed by them, leaving them completely unharmed. But then the flames hit the struggling crows. They attached to the birds like a spark from flint hitting dry tinder. The screams from the crows echoed throughout the killing field, as the azure wave of flames flared up. Drew's body collapsed from the drought in his mana core, he crumpled like a wet paper napkin upon the ground, Amber quickly ran to him and lifted him up.

It was over in less than a minute. A single minute. That was the difference between the promise of death to his friends and family as the enemies wore them down, to the now ice-covered field with smoldering corpses being turned to ash. Just sixty seconds, and the entire landscape within five hundred yards of him had changed. It was less time than most people took to get dressed in the morning, and yet now all that remained was ice and ash.