33 Risen#re

The mammoth emerged from the flames, with its body still covered in small flames, the flames burned away the last hairs of the mammoth's thick coat of brown fur.

Without the thick coat of fur the beasts body looked several times smaller but also grotesque.

Its legs originally looked to be around the size of thick tree trunk that 5 people could form a circle around while holding hands, but with the layers of fur gone, it looked a lot smaller, and two people alone would be able to make a circle around it.

But other than that, its entire body was filled with ghastly scars from the burns, even the third grade creatures healing prowess were unable to get rid of the burns, and the mages puffed out their chests with pride knowing that they caused serious injuries to the third grade beast.

The mages who stood facing the charging beast watched nervously as the last of the flames went out, just as they were about to panic the order came from above for them to release the spells.

Fifty streams of fire converged to form a wave and as if reached the mammoth, it came to a halt roared wild, it looked almost afraid of the flames, and one couldn't blame it after the hell it just went through which creature wouldn't develop such a fear.

Even for a third-grade creature the experience was not easy to endure.

Then it opened it its maw wide, and began to suck in the flames, even if it was afraid of the flames, it still used its instinct to defend itself.

When the mammoth began to suck in the energy, Lirian smirked from above, "An unintelligent creature is always so predictable," he murmured while following the energy stream.

"Mages! Maintain the stream for as long as possible," he commanded.

"Warrior's and psychic's on my signal you attack," Lirian shouted, and began to countdown.

"3"

"2"

"1"

After saying one Lirian paused allowing the mammoth to begin eating the energy of the spell and that was all he needed.

"Attack!", he roared.

A sharp whistling sound filled the air, and the snapping of bows could be heard, arrows came raining down with psychic energy, wrapped around it, increasing its sharpness and fixing the aim of those arrows that were straying of course.

The first few volleys quickly landed and tore into the thick flesh of the beast and within seconds over a hundred arrows that looked like long black thorns filled its body, causing the first streams of blood to emerge.

The mammoth however made not a sound, but clearly it was in pain as its body shuddered, however, it kept its mouth open wide as is sucked in the flames.

The students however were shocked as they did not expect the attack to go so smoothly, they expected the mammoth to release a pulse of wind to deflect the arrows and lessen the impact of those that made it through.

Karen looked at Lirian as he focused his senses on the mammoth he showed, no surprise by the outrageous success of the attacks.

"How did you know that would work so well?" she asked with a shocked voice, from his reaction she knew that this was exactly as expected.

"Because the rules of the heavens must always be fair," Lirian said calmly facing the beast, Karen noticed that as he spoke he was flicking the hilt of his katana and with every flick it made a loud sound that echoed.

"The heavens must always be fair?" she asked with a dumb expression, like always she had no idea what he was saying.

"Mystic beasts are creatures that can cultivate with out learning any techniques, this however restricts their growth, they cannot chose how they grow stronger and it also makes it impossible for them to grow beyond the fourth grade," Lirian calmly explained, despite the heated battle taking place beneath him.

"Another benefit but also curse is their abilities, the beasts have innate spells that they can cast, they don't need to learn of create the spells but it comes to them naturally, it is here that they are cursed, for they cannot learn any new abilities, but most importantly they are incapable of casting multiple spells at once,"

Lirian pointed down at the mammoth "It's currently stuck absorbing the spells, this means that it can't deflect the attacks anymore, and without its protective fur, it's a lot easier to penetrate,"

"Also it has no choice but to continue devouring the spells, if it tries to deflect the weapons the flames will have a one way trip inside it, at that point, it will be severely injured from the inside, and that is exactly the situation, I hope to create," Lirian said with and ecstatic grin.

Karen could only marvel at his genius, truly not a single action was done without careful thought, and all of it came together to create a killing combo.

Down below the warriors finally reached the huge monstrosity and with there swords they began to hack at the legs of the mammoth, the archers quickly stopped firing as they reached the mammoth even with the psychics guidance they couldn't guarantee that no arrows would hit their allies.

The warriors quickly found that it wasn't so easy to cut into the flesh of the beast..

Even with their full strength they were struggling to cut more than a quarter of an inch into the meat and a strange mucus was being released from the mammoths body that dulled the edge of their blades, those that had psychic's reinforcing the sharpness of their swords were having a little more success but soon the mammoth began to stomp the ground.

The pressure sent them tumbling down and if not for the psychics that could use protective barriers to absorb the impacts many of them would have had their bodies broken to pieces.

Just then a spearman found an opening in the mammoths' feet, he weaved in between the other charging warriors, and looked at a weak point on the belly of the beast and raised his spear with all his might.

It curved through the air and the sound of flesh being ripped was clearly heard, the mammoth wailed, its body began to thrash around, and the man who pierced its belly was flung around like a rag doll as he clutched on to the shaft.

The warriors began to cheer at the sight of the gapping wound, the man who was being flung around was completely drenched in boiling hot blood, and eventually he couldn't hold on and went flying away leaving his spear in the beasts belly.

The man fell with a heavy thud but as one of the supporter mages came to grab him, she reassured everyone that he was fine just a few broken bones.

The warriors began to attack with renewed vigour and spearmen came to the front, their spears were far more effective against the huge beast, and slowly they began putting more holes in the beast's underbelly.

Some of the spearmen ran away causing many people to look at them angrily but then they began to charge back as they drew closer they jumped into the air and flung their spears with all their strength.

At least half the heads of most of the spears sunk in to the mammoths flesh, however to their surprise in all that time the mammoth didn't release its suction spell.

They could tell that they were hurting it, there attacks hadn't reached a lethal point yet but it this went on they were definitely going to be able to kill it, but as they looked at the mages, they could tell that they were all close to their limits.

Any second now they'd drop, already a dozen of the remaining mages had fallen unconscious and the other mages weren't stepping in because they couldn't, Lirian had ordered them to pass on all the energy they had to the fifty mages that were attacking.

Karen was watching beside Lirian, "It looks like that turned it into a porcupine," she joked around as she looked at the mammoth, she felt that they removed all its fur just so that they could perform a transplant with arrows and spears.

Karen wasn't one to joke around all that much but at that moment she felt the need to do so as she felt a vile aura growing around Lirian that made her stomach twist in pain.

As the thick pools of blood formed and the smell climbed up to the spot they were standing in she noticed the strange change in Lirian.

His breathing was rising rapidly and with every passing second she could see that he was fighting against an urge to jump into the fray.

But the hardest thing for her was that aura of his, it was so savage, and she was almost certain that she was experiencing blood lust, real unrestrained blood lust, and it completely suffocated her, hence she was trying to lighten up the mood.

At that moment she saw something suddenly fly forward, and as she followed it she saw a grappling hook wrap around a spear shaft, and in the next instant Lirian was gone from her side.