Return of the Legendary Runesmith-Chapter 445 - 444- Battle began

The battle had begun.

The alarm rang across the academy grounds—sharp, relentless—and order followed chaos almost instantly. Students who had been outside their dorms were herded back inside, doors barred, wards flaring to life as instructors shouted commands down the corridors.

Ariana stepped out with several other instructors, weapons already in hand, expressions carved from experience rather than panic.

From the way they moved—swift, precise, without hesitation—it was clear they had been expecting this. With the recent surge in Acolyte sightings, an attack was never a question of if, only when.

Ariana adjusted the weight of the flail resting against her back, her silver hair catching the light as she turned slowly, listening. Steel clashed in the distance. Something heavy slammed into the ground, hard enough to make the earth tremble. Cries—both human and inhuman—rose from the forest, carried by the wind.

The worst part was not the noise itself.

It was that it came from every direction.

Her gaze shifted to the security chief stationed nearby. "What’s the situation, Phil?"

The young man with dark green hair stiffened and reported without delay, though his frown betrayed the tension beneath his discipline. "The Knight Commander is engaging the monsters in the north. The remaining three sides are being fortified by the soldiers as we speak."

Ariana nodded once. "And the traps?"

"They haven’t been triggered yet," said the surveillance chief, who had just returned from the watchtower, his breath slightly uneven.

That confirmed her suspicion. The traps were set closer to the academy itself than the outer defensive lines. The enemy hadn’t breached that far yet—but they were pressing in.

Ariana’s fingers tightened around the handle of her flail as she weighed the possibilities. Too close, and the traps would activate. Too far, and the soldiers would be forced to fight a prolonged engagement.

After a brief pause, she turned sharply toward Gilbert. "Deploy all the golems. At once."

The bespectacled man didn’t question the order. He nodded, already reaching for his keys, then exchanged a look with Rylie before both men hurried toward the administrative office to initiate the attack..

"What about flying monsters?" Norma asked, her voice tight as she scanned the darkening sky above the treeline.

Before Ariana could answer, the surveillance chief spoke up with confidence. "Archers are already in position at every major vantage point. Specialized bolts are ready. Anything that tries to take the air won’t get close."

Norma exhaled, some of the tension easing from her shoulders.

This wasn’t the same Runebound that had been caught off guard before—twice allowing ambushes to reach the campus itself. After those disasters, Ariana and the faculty had torn apart every failure, rebuilt every weakness, and rewritten their defenses from the ground up.

Layers upon layers of preparation now stood between the academy and annihilation.

And as the forest echoed with battle cries and the ground began to tremble with the awakening of golems, Ariana knew one thing for certain—

All of that preparation was about to be tested.

....

"Inhumane golems incoming!" one of the Acolytes cried as he continued hurling attacks from afar.

The monsters that had been busy locking the soldiers in combat suddenly stiffened. Heavy footsteps shook the ground, each thud echoing through the forest like a war drum.

From the darkness emerged golems standing nearly seven feet tall. Thick arms hung at their sides, sturdy legs drove them forward, and a single horizontal slit cut across their faceless plates.

Not all the monsters possessed the courage to face them. The smaller ones immediately retreated, scrambling for stones and spears as they shifted to ranged attacks. The larger beasts snarled instead, gripping their weapons tightly before charging ahead.

Then, all at once, the golems stopped.

The slit across their helmets flared to life, flooding the battlefield with blinding light. The night was torn apart by violence.

BOOOOOM.

Unified beams of searing heat erupted forward, striking monster after monster. Flesh burned away, muscles blackened and peeled, and bones were pierced and shattered under the relentless assault.

The soldiers could do nothing but stare. An entire wave of monsters was erased in seconds, reduced to ash without a single chance to retaliate.

When darkness finally reclaimed the sky, what remained were charred, statue-like figures standing frozen where living creatures had once been.

One of the soldiers slowly rose to his feet. He walked up to a golem and thumped its solid back, letting out a breath of relief.

"I’m glad these things are on our side."

Elsewhere on the battlefield, the outcome was no different. The golems moved with flawless precision, bound to obey only Ariana or Gilbert. There was no room for error, no chance of friendly fire.

Within minutes, hundreds of monsters had been reduced to cinders. The remaining Acolytes could only shrink back into the shadows, hiding and waiting for further orders, knowing resistance was meaningless.

....

Abraham levitated high above the battlefield, his cloak stirring gently as he watched everything unfold with a cold, calculating gaze.

Those golems... they don’t belong to this world.

The realization settled heavily in his mind. The material they were made from was unfamiliar, and the craftsmanship even more so. This world simply did not possess the means to produce so many identical golems, let alone ones that operated without any living pilot. Their sheer firepower alone defied common sense.

Only recently had Abraham learned a deeper truth. There were other worlds, worlds where Darkness had once reigned supreme.

And now, that human... Adrian. Somehow, he was connected to them.

A slow, ferocious grin spread across Abraham’s face. One by one, magic circles bloomed behind him, layered and precise, radiating chilling intent as he muttered under his breath,

"I would love to have my way with that little head of yours, Adrian. But for now..."

Before the archers below could loose a single arrow, the air itself screamed. Hundreds of ice spikes erupted forward, tearing through the sky toward the academy. Each spike was at least three feet tall, their sharpened tips gleaming as they descended like a frozen rain of death.

...

"INCOMING!!" the surveillance chief screamed as he saw the rain of ice lances tearing through the sky toward them.

If they landed, there was a real chance the students would be caught in it.

Ariana snarled. She lunged forward without hesitation, the mace atop her flail coming undone as mana surged around her like a raging storm.

The others instinctively retreated, eyes wide as they watched their strongest pillar leap high into the air. There wasn’t even a flicker of fear on her face as the frozen lances closed in.

With a guttural cry, Ariana slammed her mace into the ground.

The earth answered.

A colossal figure erupted upward, stone and mana tearing free from the soil. Its massive frame rose in an instant, completely casting the academy into shadow. Thick arms spread wide, forming an unyielding barrier.

Then it braced itself.

CRACKLE. CRACKLE.

One ice lance after another smashed into the construct, exploding into shards upon impact. Frozen fragments scattered in all directions, unable to pierce its hardened form.

The few angles it couldn’t cover were immediately sealed. The other instructors stepped forward as one, unleashing spell after spell in retaliation, their magic tearing through the remaining lances before they could descend any further.

Once everything finally settled, only a handful of soldiers lay injured. No lives were lost, and not a single building had suffered damage.

Ariana huffed softly as she released her spell, allowing it to return to its origin. Her gaze lifted, locking onto the levitating figure above the battlefield.

Abraham smirked. "She’s grown strong," he muttered to himself. "But tonight, every shred of hope will be crushed beneath the overwhelming might of my Lord."

Ariana’s eyes widened. Not because of his words—she couldn’t hear him from this distance—but because of what appeared around the bastard.

Figures emerged one by one, massive silhouettes taking shape against the night sky. They were far too large to be mistaken for anything else.

More than ten of them hovered above the academy.

The same creatures that had given Duke Nolan such a brutal battle during the contest.

"Dragons..." Ariana breathed, her voice trembling.

No one had expected the Acolytes to gather such ancient beings in so short a time. There was no one who could easily command creatures of that caliber. Dragons were beings of absolute dominance.

For the first time, doubt crept into Ariana’s heart. She wondered if all their preparations... would truly be enough.

Just when Abraham was about to commence the onslaught, every single being on the surface or in the air, froze.

A presence, severely more intense compared to all those dragons collectively approached them.

The ground rumbled. My professors fell to the ground as if an earthquake had hit them.

Meanwhile, Ariana was only praying that what she was hoping would come true.

This creature...might be here to help.

....

A/N:- Thanks for reading. Please let me know if you have been enjoying the story so far