33 Risen#re

All the mages that knew earth spells were tirelessly casting spells to soften the ground, then the mages that knew water spells would soak the softened ground.

But still the mammoth dashed forward, it massive body just slightly slowed by the constantly changing terrain, then the fire mages came forward and blew burning fire onto the muddy ground.

It was like making cement, but while they had success in slowing the mammoth for the first hour, it seemed that mammoth had learned from it's previous mistakes and knew how to counter quickly.

It built up its wind energies around its feet that were locked in the ground and released a pulse of wind that ripped through the hardened ground and in the next second it continued its mad dash forward.

That was all the coalition of 8 mages could manage, they stopped it for a mere 5 seconds, and in three seconds it made up the ground it had lost and continued it's charge, only to get caught up by the next group of mages.

It quickly broke free and continued, "It seems that this method has almost lost all effect," one of the girls in the group said glumly.

"It still beats the first method we were using," a boy from the group said in a strained voice, his face had dried up tear tracks, but no one blamed him, he'd lost three close friends to the mammoth.

"Yeah!" another boy shouted in agreement, and shot a resentful look at Tobias and Wentian, that rode their horse's in front of the group.

"Most of the deaths are their faults, I'll be telling my family about this when we get back," he cried out, letting them know that their friends unjust deaths wouldn't go without punishment.

It was true that their leaders were responsible for many of the deaths, first they tried to lead a charge against the creature, but it steam rolled over them, then when they realised it was hopeless, they forced students to take on the suicidal task of luring the mammoth away, it didn't take a genius to understand, that if someone was successful in luring it away, it would mean that they'd have a third-grade mystic beast chasing after them.

That was the equivalent of dying, it was a lose-lose situation, if you fail you die, and if you succeed, guess what? You also die.

"We just have to hold out for a few more minutes, didn't you guys notice that we just passed the old main base," one of the boys said while panting, but a relieved smile was on his face.

As they looked around they couldn't make out any familiarity with the place they were looking at, sure there was a waterfall, but the area around them was completely different from any thing else they passed so far.

Seeing their blank looks the boy chuckled, "Didn't you guys hear about the battle the commander had, it completely reshaped the area, and if you look back there," he pointed back excitedly, ", You might have noticed the blue portable toilets, that are completely abandoned."

Everything that couldn't be carried was left behind, after all the dimensional storages, were with Media and Tobias, and one of those discarded items was also the lovely table and chairs that belonged in the commander's tents.

Relief quickly flooded through their bodies as the realised that the boy was correct, and they were amazed by how much the place had changed due to the commander's battle.

"Don't breathe to easy yet, I heard that the ambush is a little ways ahead," he said quickly as they stopped a short distance ahead of the mammoth and began their next wave of stalling.

But something different happened this time as the spells were cast they noticed that their energy wasn't moving correctly, instead the wind in the entire area began to change as the mammoth threw back its head, making its fluffy clomps of long hair swing wildly around it, its mouth opened wide to reveal a ball of wind energy.

But contrary to their expectations it did not blast out the ball of energy but rather everything seemed to be attracted by the ball of wind energy in its mouth.

They noticed the ground all around them was being pulled towards the beast, and even the spells were being pulled up as well, as they noticed this many of them rejoiced, the beast was literally pulling all their spells into its mouth.

"Everyone shoot fire into it's mouth," a mage shouted, over the winds that was making it hard for him to stand straight, everyone quickly realised the opportunity, that this creatures strange ability gave them.

Until now harming it seemed impossible, just to get a simple shallow wound a warrior and psychic had to work together seamlessly, until this point they probably only gave it 7 shallow cuts, its body was simply to tough to cut with an ordinary weapon.

'It you can't kill it from the outside, kill it from the inside,' that was the current plan, but it wasn't exactly easy to do such a thing, but this was a golden opportunity.

They watched the tongues of flame heading straight for the mammoth's mouth, the pressure grew even stronger, causing many of them to clutch at the ground that was also being sucked up, to hold themselves down.

As the flames reached the mammoths mouth, under the eager gazes of everyone, the fire seemed to crumble into nothingness, only singeing the hairs at the front of the creature but doing no more.

At that point the mammoths strange spell came to an end, and released a large howl that shook their entire bodies.

At this scene the students began to run once more in horror, all the mages had done their best with those fire blasts, but that beasts innate spell broke all that fire down with complete ease.

At that point they saw someone in front of the group, as they looked at the person it was obvious that he wasn't from their group with a single glance.

The most obvious clues about that was that his breathing was perfectly normal, his clothes didn't have a healthy coating of sweat and most importantly, he didn't look like he was ready to shit himself, which was the look that everyone who saw the mammoths ability shared.

"Follow me!" he shouted and quickly turned around.

The students from the first exploration group felt themselves relax for the first time in hours, they had reached the backup, the growing anxiety in them lessened as they continued to run for their lives.

They soon found another person waiting for the them on the trial, telling them that they were getting closer, and it only served them to keep moving their tired legs forward.

They crossed almost a dozen people, each of them only served to provide more encouragement to keep moving, before they came up to a strangely decorated area in the forest.

The only word that they could think off, was decorated, because as they looked around they could see ropes wrapped around the trees in odd patterns, but they didn't get a chance to ask questions because those that came to fetch them quickly pulled them to the sides and guided them around the oddly decorated trees.

As they turned around to look at what was going on they saw, a few dozen mages launch a barrage of spells of at the mammoth, the mammoth came to a halt and used that same suction spell once again.

As soon as that happened they heard the commanders voice, "Retreat!" echoing from somewhere and the mages quickly followed his command getting out of the suction range of the spell.

No one seemed worried that the spells didn't harm the mammoth, that wasn't even their goal in the first place, they simply wanted to draw its attention away from the first exploration group.

The mages moved back in fixed lines, the quick retreat wasn't part of the plan, but seeing that they got the mammoth's attention all was well.

Although the students from the main base could feel the crushing life hierarchy difference, they couldn't bring themselves to feel as afraid as when they saw the rock drake, after all the mammoth was only 18 feet tall and 30 feet long, it didn't come close to the size of the rock drake, that caused tremors with every step it took.

The mages locked eyes with the beast and fell back behind the trees that had dozens of thick ropes all around them, it was mainly the ropes for fixing up the tents and all the extra rope that Lirian had bought.

The mammoth stomped the ground heavily, looking at the tiny creatures that were giving it the work out of its life and broke into a dash.

"Guide it into the first zone!" they heard Lirian voice once more, it echoed loudly, but couldn't find his location.

But then a single student pointed at the place in one of the tree's, where they saw a small sized boy with dazzling silver particles of light slowly gathering all around him, making him look like a second moon in the night sky.