Chapter 33: Selfish desire
The cohort of awakened raced at their full speed toward the steep walls of the crater, in haste to escape the hellhole. Nevertheless, none of them broke formation, even as they were still attacked by a few monsters here and there. Although the beasts weren’t numerous enough to cause the Cohort any real trouble, they were swiftly dealt with.
This way, no life was lost during the charge, and finally, the group reached the walls of the crater, getting bathed by the innate golden light of the sun that poured into the crater — at least the little that managed to pierce through to the bottom.
Drake, seeing this too, flew in with Kyvern and dismissed him as soon as they touched the ground.
In the next instant, he felt a sharp pain in his skull — a sensation as though a sledgehammer had struck him right in the head. It was the backlash from overusing Kyvern.
Still, Drake did his best to keep a clear mind and yelled at the awakened army as loud as he could as they reached the walls, "Keep to formation! The front of the line climbs first! Others protect the rear—"
Before Drake could even complete his sentence, the entire cohort was plunged into a daze and a disheartening dread.
A round of gasps erupted from the cohort as a single man tore out of formation and leapt onto the wall, digging his hands into the rocky holds and climbing up like a starving dog with meat presented before its gaze.
It was Kresha.
The greedy bastard was scaling the wall, not caring about any formation or about protecting others. That was all a sick joke to the conceited man.
And soon, his influence took its toll on the others. The thoughts of bravery, chivalry, and protecting their comrades quickly morphed into fear — the fear that had stood dominantly in all their hearts up till this moment, shrouded only by their forged courage. However, when presented with a way out, all that courage was torn apart.
And now, all that remained was the fear of death.
One after the other, like a mob, the cohort broke into a sprint toward the walls. Many even dropped their weapons to climb faster.
Others were knocked down and trampled upon as they weren’t fast enough to charge with the panicked horde of awakened.
It was a symphony of disaster and desperation. Even Drake had been forced to run alongside the crowd as they surged past him, with the fear of being pushed down and stepped on until he was rendered useless.
’Fuck you! Kresha!’ Drake cursed deep within as he jumped onto the wall, finding his handholds between two large rocks, grabbing them, and using his strength to lift himself upward.
The climb up was no easy task. With every inch he ascended, he felt someone grabbing onto his body, or others bumping into him roughly as they desperately tried to hold on and climb.
It wasn’t a vertically straight climb, but a steep, jagged ascent to the top — so slipping and falling onto the awakened below happened often. The two would tumble down to the cold, hard ground.
The fall, however, was no longer their only problem.
The horde of monsters had finally regrouped and were now at the bottom of the steep walls. Unfortunately, some awakened weren’t lucky enough to have climbed high before the horde arrived.
Those at the rear of the climb were the most misfortunate, as many goblin-like monsters leapt onto the walls and scaled them twice as fast as any awakened could.
This was a devastating setback to the cohort, as the goblin creatures began picking them off one after another. Several of the beasts targeted an awakened at a time, biting and tearing them apart until they eventually gave up and fell toward their gruesome doom.
That was surely a bad way to go down.
This caused even more hesitation within the cohort.
Drake, in particular, was among those in the middle of the climbing force. He wasn’t a good climber, and thanks to being shoved roughly by other awakened and slipping down a few feet, he was gradually falling behind.
’Shit! This is all that bastard’s fault,’ Drake thought, gnashing his teeth as he turned his gaze down for a second to check his situation with the impending doom below.
It was not looking good for him in any way.
Below him were just six awakened, being picked off one every few seconds. And soon, he knew, it would be him next.
’At this rate, I might actually die!’ Drake gnashed his teeth, cursing Kresha deep within. If only that bastard hadn’t rushed ahead earlier, many of them would have survived — they could’ve bought each other time and strategically reduced the number of lives lost.
Truly, he was a scum that deserved to die.
Drake let his gaze shift away from the goblins and up toward Kresha, who was far ahead of him, climbing quickly thanks to his wind talent.
If anyone would make it despite the fast-clinging goblins, it was him.
How convenient and...
What?!
"What the hell is he doing?!"
One of the awakened up ahead screamed at the top of his lungs, loud enough for everyone in the cohort to hear. All attention instantly turned upward.
It was at this moment they all came to realize their grimmest fate had just occurred.
The cohort, despite the oncoming death quickly crawling up from below, all halted their climb — as though something, maybe a monster or some kind of plague, awaited them up ahead.
Though it was no monster, nor a plague... It was their revered supposed leader, Kresha.
He had paused his climb up the wall and turned toward the roofing of the steep cavern, aiming his right hand at it.
That was why the cohort had suddenly stopped — as they all stared with stunned gazes at their imminent demise.
Many opened their mouths to scream, shout, or even try to plead with Kresha.
But it was far too late.
A gust of wind, so strong and vast that it deafened the entire cohort, erupted from Kresha’s palm — striking the tunnel’s roof with such devastating impact that it tore deeply through.
And then, the next thing that happened sealed their fates, as hundreds of large boulders began to plummet down onto the cohort.
"AHHHH!"
"GAAHAAYAK!"
Screams upon screams erupted from the awakened, and just as quickly as they came, they were silenced — snuffed out as the rocks smashed them into puddles of flesh and blood.
Drake’s eyes widened in horror as he watched the scene unfold. There were too many rocks to dodge, too many to destroy. There was nothing he could do but get buried.
And that was what occurred. Within seconds, the collapse was over. The entire cave section below had been destroyed, clogged to the brink, leaving no way in or out of the crater.
More than half of the cohort had been slaughtered.
Those who survived were only the ones lucky enough to have crossed beyond the line of impact and were close to Kresha.
The rest... had been crushed.
The sickening atmosphere lingered for a while longer, as many of the awakened froze where they were, unable to believe the scene that had just unfolded before their eyes.
Just like that, the leader of their cohort had not only stripped his team of the choice to escape, but had also rid them of their very existence — all out of his selfish desire to survive.