Pickley Situation
Olive stared in horror at the tide of Goblins barreling towards her. Frozen in a stupor, she felt Summer's hand shake in hers.
What was she supposed to do?
Before she could act herself, she noticed something slip past her peripheral vision and charge towards the incoming onslaught of beasts.
Looking further to her left, Olive watched as various members of the escort team rushed forward.
She could see the shakiness in their steps, the uneasiness in their gait, tears shed from many of them as they knew today would be their last.
"Shields to the front!" Leon screamed at the top of his lungs.
But it didn't matter. In such an overwhelmingly hopeless situation, plans didn't matter. All that would remain, no matter the actions taken, is destruction.
"Wait! Listen!" Leon screamed above his comrades in arms, tears now swelling in his eyes.
Though they didn't listen. They didn't stop.
A man in his thirties with balding hair, mutton chops, and thick, hairy arms led the escort team's reckless charge.
He dove into the sea of writhing flesh, hoping to make a difference, but the Goblins outnumbered them far too severely.
Before the hairy man even received a chance to swing his sword, the Goblins collapsed all around him. They pulled violently at the man's arms and body: viscerally digging into his gut and ripping him down to the ground.
The Goblins devoured the man alive and it took only a matter of seconds.
Blood splashed around and dyed the faces of the feral monsters. His screams echoed in the jungle and before he could die, his followers behind him met a similar fate.
Ripped to shreds and torn apart, the men and women disappeared under the wave of flesh that toppled over them.
His mouth agape, Leon watched in horror and silence as the people he was tasked with protecting were brutalized indiscriminately.
"We have to run. . ." Leon muttered aloud. He spun around to see the still stiff Olive and Summer.
Accidentally catching his gaze, Olive broke free from the chains of fear that bound her. Gripping Summer's hand tightly, Olive turned away from the Goblin horde and began sprinting down the hill they came from!
"Wait!!" Leon yelled.
Leon charged after the girls, completely ignoring the rest of the escort team still frozen in place! It was due or die and Leon realized that fast!
Leon dug his hands into his pockets and swirled his mana. Suddenly, an iridescent golden glow erupted from his trousers.
Ripping his hands free, golden dust seeped from between Leon's fingertips. He raced after Olive and Summer – tumbling down the hill as fast as he could without crashing!
'WAIT!' Leon shouted to himself.
He tossed the |Fairy Dust| in front of himself and barged through it! Now coated in the magical sand, Leon's body began to glow with light!
He jumped into the air, down the hill he was descending, but before he crashed into the mud his body stabilized above the jungle floor.
Leon manipulated the strength of his |Fairy Dust|, making it as weak as he could so that the acceleration of falling continued, but he remained levitating in the air.
Barreling down the side of the hill like a bullet, Leon caught up to the running Olive and Summer. Pulling more golden sand from his pockets, he doused the two women in dust before manipulating his body skyward so as to not crash.
Moments later, Olive and Summer's feet lifted off of the ground causing the two to helplessly spin in the air – unused to the balance needed to hold themselves up while floating.
Leon, still dragging himself higher into the air, began to manipulate the |Fairy Dust| that soaked into the girl's bodies. Pulling them skyward along with him, they hovered underneath the canopy of vines that stretched from tree to tree.
Finally within ears' distance, Leon tossed a glare at the two girls.
"Why'd you run?!" He shouted.
"Fuck do you mean 'why'd we run?!' You were the one who told us to run!!" Olive fired back.
"I was talking to myself!!" Leon roared back.
"How the hell were we supposed to know that!!" Olive retorted.
"Everyone SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!" Summer screamed above the two bickering idiots.
"We need a plan!" Summer said sternly.
"A plan?" Leon scoffed. "And what exactly do you suggest we –"
While arguing within the sky, illuminated by the golden sheen of Leon's |Fairy Dust| and shouting loud enough for the god's in the heavens to hear, the Goblins naturally took notice.
Bulldozing over the remaining escort team, the Goblins attacked the base of the trees. Slamming their claws into the bark, the Goblins climbed the trees like mad professionals!
They raced up the jungle trees and made it to the thick layer of vines that stretched between them all, but before running across the thick vines, the Goblins suddenly halted on the trunks of the trees.
An arrow crafted of bone and dipped in some strange green liquid soared through the foliage of the jungle and erupted into the open air! The arrow masterfully weaved between leaf and vine, arriving from a blindspot unfortunately shared between all three levitating Awakened.
The jagged arrowhead tore into Summer's shoulder, piercing her flesh with enough force to send her spiraling through the air – towards the trunk of one of the jungle trees.
Where the Goblins were waiting.
"SUMMER!!!" Olive screamed radically, her vocal chords shattering underneath the stress.
At the same time, Leon watched in another frozen stupor. He just couldn't believe it. An arrow? A fucking arrow!?!?!
They were at the dojo! The center of the jungle! The safest part of it! At least – that's how it had always been, but for some reason today everything changed.
The year-long pattern of summoning more people had changed!
The year-long pattern of stronger monsters staying in the outskirts had changed!
The year-long pattern of a false sense of safety had changed!
Everything came crashing down in one fell swoop!
'Is this how I die?' Leon asked himself.
While zoned out and thinking to himself, Leon caught sight of a glimmer in his vision. Immediately feeling restless, Leon swung himself to the side. Moments later, another arrow soared through the air and glided past Leon's body!
Present again, Leon absorbed his surroundings in an instant. Summer was moments away from slamming into a tree – an amalgamation of flesh and teeth eagerly waiting for her. Olive still hovered in front of him, trying to helplessly swim through the air as if it were water – unfortunately for her, that wasn't how Leon's |Fairy Dust| worked.
Leon burned his mana and froze Summer in the air! Some of the Goblins preemptively jumped off the trunk towards Summer, but as she stopped in mid air, the reckless Goblins plummeted to their deaths below!
Still rapidly depleting his mana, though, Leon pulled Summer towards them. At the same time, Leon began to manipulate himself and Olive even higher above the foliage!
Summer, now unconscious from the green liquid, floated through the air towards Olive and Leon above. Her helpless body trudged on, limp and stiff from the toxin.
"I can't hold us for much longer!" Leon shouted to Olive.
"WHAT?!" Olive screamed in panic.
"I've only been here a few months!" Leon argued through grit teeth, "I'm not a Neophyte yet! I don't have the mana for this shit!"
Leon's vision grew hazy and his head started to throb. His muscles tightened and he suddenly felt queasy.
'Don't let go, don't let go, don't let go, don't let go. . . .' Leon repeated the mantra in his head – the entirety of his focus now solely on keeping them in the air.
Recognizing their harrowing situation, Olive looked at Summer's still approaching limp body with wet eyes.
'Do I love her?' Olive asked herself.
'I don't have time to second-guess!!'
"Get me close to her!" Olive shouted above the wild shrieks around them.
Leon's eyes were currently rolling behind his head, but his instincts caught wind of Olive's request and through sheer strength of will, Olive slowly started levitating towards Summer's body.
Olive pulled a blade from her waistband and slashed open Summer's shirt. Ripping her clothes off, Summer's bare body was now exposed to the cold air of the jungle – but this time, Olive didn't have time to ogle at Summer's breasts.
No! This time, Olive brought the tip of her dagger to her forefinger and applied pressure. Cutting her index finger open, blood exploded from the wound and dripped down onto the sea of writhing arms and legs on the jungle floor.
With her own blood, Olive drew circles on Summer's body. A large circle encompassed her profile, from her collarbone to her v-line. Two sub-circles surrounded her breasts and a third, even smaller circle encased her stomach.
On each of Summer's breasts, Olive depicted Cain's Circle and her Circle respectively.
In the center circle, around Summer's belly button, Olive drew the Circle that bound them. Over the course of minutes, Olive covered Summer's body in various lines and geometric patterns – all similarly used to accentuate the four Circles drawn across Summer.
Suddenly, the golden sheen that encapsulated herself and Summer began to wane. In addition, the sound of gurgling simultaneously entered Olive's ears.
Throwing her head back, Olive caught sight of Leon's deteriorating condition. His skin turned deathly pale! His eyes had long ago rolled back leaving only the whites visible! And at his lips, Olive saw the man frothing his own saliva!
Olive knew she had a few seconds at most.
She slammed her hands onto Summer's naked body and tilted her head forward. Closing her eyes, she felt the mana inside of her burst at the seams.
Olive's mana exploded from her chest and moved through her body to her arms. Then, it was sucked viciously into the Summoning Circle drawn on Summer's body.
A brilliant blue light ignited from Olive's blood and drowned out the jungle's vines and trees. With her forehead pressed against Summer's stomach, Olive distinctly felt Summer's breathing wane.
After only a few moments, Summer's breath faltered entirely and her heart ceased to beat.
The blue light died and as it did so, so too did the golden sheen that caressed them. Now plummeting hundreds of feet down, Olive felt the wind attack her in resistance to her descent.
"Hey." Then a voice she recognized sung in her ear.
"You've got yourself in quite the pickle here, huh?"