"Sam, cover us from the mages. We need to get that banner first!" Deacon shouted as his legs were already in motion by the time he made eye contact with the cadet wearing full-plate steel armor and carrying the large navy-blue banner on his back.
His boots hammered against the stained marble flooring, and his eyes already began analyzing the cadet in the lead – the fact that he was wielding a tower shield along with a one-handed steel mace gave it away that the guy was most definitely the tank of the group. Hence why he was now dubbing the cadet in front of him as "tank" as abbreviating "shield and mace guy" would bring a horrible image to his mind.
Deacon's hands didn't reach for Echoform Reliquary on his back; rather, it was already halfway out of his Spatial Sling Bag, pulling out a long steel handle. It was when he was less than ten feet away from tank did he fully pull out the Steel Greataxe from his Spatial Sling Bag – the very same one he'd got after killing the surprisingly quick warrior and earth mage duo that had tried to ambush him while he was just about to leave Floor Two – The Grasslands and head to the Meadowlands after getting the Floor Two and One Map downloaded onto his manaphone via the CFMT Tower.
"Shit," the tank muttered, freezing mid-stride as Deacon, Jass, and Sam closed the gap fast. The man's shield flickered to life, a sudden white glow rippling over its surface – an active class skill or an enchanted effect of his shield, the trio surmised as they could not recall a spell taught to them by any of the professors regarding a shield enhancement spell. Behind him, the two began to unleash a volley of spells toward the trio.
Deacon continued his charge towards the tank, barely avoiding a bolt of sizzling blue fire as he zigzagged through the volley of spells the mages spat at them, his greataxe gleaming in the dim light as he charged. Jass weaved nimbly through the blasts, glaive spinning in graceful arcs, closing in on the armored man. Sam raised his staff, conjuring a shimmering Manabarrier just in time to deflect a spray of jagged ice shards aimed at his front and a couple of the spells that were fired at Jass and Deacon that he was able to.
The tank's muscles tensed, bracing for Deacon's strike – but it never came. Jass's voice hissed through the chaos as she muttered a quick incantation and slammed her glaive down, gouging the ground beneath the man's feet. A jagged pit, barely four inches deep, suddenly appeared underneath him, swallowing his footing and throwing off his balance.
Seizing the moment, Deacon hooked the curved bottom blade of his greataxe around the far side of the man's tower shield and yanked hard, pulling both shield and wielder off-center with a violent jerk, catching the tank off guard yet again as his spell was seemingly bypassed by Deacon's superior strength.
Before the tank could recover his guard as his feet righted themselves back into a defensive stance, Jass drove her glaive through his raised right bicep, piercing the arm holding the steel mace.
The armored man snarled, trying to wrench his shield forward in a desperate swing to bash Jass with the side of the tower shield. But his sudden surge of force only played into Deacon's hands – with a powerful twist, Deacon fully wrenched the tower shield free from the man's grasp and sent it seven feet away and clattering across the stained marble-tiled hall.
Jass followed up Deacon's actions by yanking out her glaive from his right bicep, spinning her glaive, she then slammed the pommel into the man's throat, forcing a choking gasp to escape from him as his body hitched – his mace fell to the ground and both arms attempted to reach for his own neck.
But before she could press the advantage and fully take out the tank, an Earth Spear erupted from the floor, aiming straight to skewer her - one of the mages saw how in grave danger their teammate was and attempted to provide him a distraction to pull himself together and get away from both Jass and Deacon.
She stumbled back, narrowly avoiding the deadly spike, while Deacon zigzagged between the next couple of Earth Spears that attempted to skewer him and reached just close enough to the tank to deliver a brutal Spartan kick to the tank's chest and sending him crashing hard to the marble-tiled floor, creating spiderweb-like cracks on a couple of them on where he landed.
Sam's arms moved in a blur, as he cast a rapid series of Manashields that snapped into place just in time to collide with twice as many Earth Spears hurtling toward him. The spears struck the shimmering barriers with a cacophony of stone grinding against magic, sparks flying from the impacts.
One of the mages staggered, clutching their stomach as crimson blood seeped through their brown robes – courtesy of Sam's Wind Arrow moments ago, as they had taken a moment to attack Jass and Deacon instead of keeping their focus on him. The other mage grimaced, a patch of stone suddenly erupting from mid-thigh, a temporary solution as she had failed in blocking another Wind Arrow Sam had fired at her through the onslaught.
Sam gritted his teeth, keeping the shields steady, arms trembling from the strain. "A little help here would be nice!"
Deacon and Jass wasted no time. With the tank down, their focus snapped onto these two mages trying to overwhelm Sam's defenses.
Deacon's greataxe sliced through the air, spinning like a deadly boomerang toward the mage clutching their bleeding stomach. The greataxe's blade tore through her robes and flesh with incredible ease and sank deep into her thigh, stopping short of cleaving her left leg in two as the greataxe's blade got stuck on her femur bone. A howl of agony ripped from her throat, but before she could scream louder, Deacon's fist collided with her face, knocking her into a dazed silence.
Jass circled around the other, eyes sharp and cold. With a quick chant, she cast Gouge Ground beneath the second mage's feet. Similarily to what happened to the tank they had taken out mere seconds ago, the earth beneath the mage's feet suddenly disappeared, and a four-inch drop appeared in its place, disrupting her concentration as the call of gravity suddenly came upon her.
Seizing the moment of distraction that came across the mage, Sam doubled the mana of his next spell and cast Gust. The force slammed into the staggered mage, sending her crashing hard against the rough stone wall with a sickening thud.
Needless to say, her body went limp and fell into a non-blissful unconsciousness.
Deacon wiped blood from his knuckles, nodding toward Sam and Jass. "Nice shit."
"Phew," Sam exhaled, finally lowering his staff as the last of his Manashields faded into flickering wisps of light. He gave the crumpled mages a once-over, the heat of combat still rushing through his limbs. "Well… that was something."
"What happened?" Bonehead's voice echoed from deeper inside the hall, distant but sharp.
"We found a team just about to run past the door carrying a banner!" Deacon called back without taking his eyes off the downed fighters.
Jass and Sam didn't wait around for him, and they immediately darted toward the fallen mages, rifling through their satchels, belts, and cloak pockets without a care in the world. Jass pulled free a small pouch clinking with Mana Crystals, tossing it Sam's way. "Here," she muttered.
Sam caught it and continued his own sweep, finding a cluster of Mana and Health Crystals tucked into a leather loop along the belt. "They won't need most of these anymore," he muttered, tucking them into his Spatial Satchel.
Meanwhile, Deacon strode toward the downed tank, who was still face down, eyeing the navy-blue banner beneath his back. As he approached, Deacon noticed the man's fingers twitching slightly, and his eyes beginning to flutter open.
Without a second of hesitation, Deacon raised his right boot back and drove it straight into the man's face, and with a sickening crunch, the cadet let out a muffled grunt before falling limp again, slumping fully unconscious, blood spilling out from his broken nose.
"Stay down," Deacon muttered, crouching beside him and flipping open one of his belt pouches. Inside, he found the classic trio of Potions, a couple of Stamina Crystals, and a couple of golden coins. He pocketed two of the three potions and three Stamina Crystals.
No need to be greedy.
Then, with a small sigh, he uncorked the Health Potion he left beside the tank's head and tilted the bottle into the unconscious cadet's mouth, letting the liquid pour in slowly. The liquid glowed faintly within his body as it began to mend the worst of the injuries both he and Jass caused him. It was only then did he pour the contents of the knocking out potion down the tank's throat, giving him a slightly increased dosage as he was much larger compared to the average cadet.
Across the way, Jass was doing the same for the mage he'd downed. She held her by the collar to prop her up just enough, forcing the bitter contents of the potion down her throat. "It really is annoying to make sure we aren't killing anyone," she muttered under her breath. "I doubt anyone else would give us the same courtesy."
Sam glanced over his shoulder while slipping the last of the usable supplies into his sling bag, as he'd already made the mage he'd knocked out crush a Health Crystal and drink half the potion Bonehead had given them to keep them knocked out. "You never know, we haven't lost a fight while climbing yet," he said.
Deacon stood back up, his boot resting idly near the banner. "We're cadets," he said, rolling his shoulders. "Unless they try and do something actually life-threatening or something stupid like that one time on Floor One, then we should just knock them out," he said while giving a pointed look to Jass.
He reached down, yanked the banner off the unconscious man's back, and held it up.
Across the navy-blue fabric of the banner, embroidered in a garish orange color, was the word: Bluegrass. "The irony," he muttered, shaking his head while letting out a soft chuckle as he walked back toward the yawning double doors of the Great Hall, with the banner now slung over his shoulder, eyes flicking toward the corridor beyond.
Then, without a word, he unslung it off his shoulder, rolled his shoulders once, before then taking a spearman's throwing stance while taking in a deep breath.
Then with a single, powerful motion, he hurled the banner like a javelin down the hall. The large and heavy banner sailed clean through the air before hitting the ground with a loud thud, a good 280 meters down the passage, a couple of meters away from where Bonehead and Esmerelda stood, and crushing the torso of a dead reanimated ghoul.
Bonehead's voice rang out almost instantly, laced with mockery. "You missed me!"
"Unfortunately," Deacon called back flatly, not even bothering to glance over his shoulder as a wide smile overtook his face.
Jass, lips twitched into a smirk as she exchanged a wordless glance with him, giving a nod in response, as they walked over to the massive doors of the Great Hall, each grabbing one and pulling hard.
The heavy wooden doors groaned against the stained marble tiling for a couple of seconds before the Great Hall was sealed once again with a loud thud that echoed faintly down both sides of the hallway.
"Better to keep prying eyes from guessing which room our banner is in," Deacon said aloud to no one in particular before turning around and pointing toward the direction the other team had been sprinting in before they fought.
"I'm guessing their base might be that way," he said, tone casual but eyes already narrowing in thought. "And another team, the one where they took this banner from, is down the other way."
"Which means if we go down the direction they were heading in, we can take out the two people they have guarding their banner," Sam said as he hit the top of his staff against his right open palm.