Land of the Blades

25. Erosion

Shirou held Caster in his arms and jumped to the closest ship to the ground, which wasn't the one where Rider was, but was a good step towards her. The rest did as Caster had told them, those with weapons started to look for opportunities to disperse the Lunarians, while the unarmed ones went back to the school to look for their swords. I firmly held the spear that had been entrusted to me and followed Sensei as he approached those two big Lunarians. They looked a bit like Shiro's huge form, but they were way smaller than him, yet bigger than the old fashioned Lunarian we were so accustomed to see.

I wondered whether Alexi would become berserker after seeing them, or would be too obsessed recording their data to lose his mind. He was, after all, the only one who was still inside the school, after we had "asked" him to take care of the puppy and the Admirabilis when we crossed paths on our way out. One of the new type of Lunarian, which I will dub as Generals, was carrying a Vajra in each hand, while the other one had knuckle brasses. I was sure that the knowledge I had of those weapons came from the part of Shirou's soul that was within me.

Once we were close enough, Sensei tried to disperse them again by shattering tiny bits of himself and throwing them against the Generals. They were rather quick, though, and managed to avoid the attack for the most part, the one who was carrying the vajras lost an arm. He was pretty determined, as even after losing a limb he didn't seem bothered by it, instead he held his second weapon with his teeth. Then I saw Sensei readying himself to attack once again, breaking even more parts of himself.

—STOP! —I yelled, and he froze, his face was showing traces of surprise—, I'll deal with them, there is no reason for you to keep hurting yourself.

—Phos...

I stood in front of him, unsure of why I was being so overprotective of him suddenly. After deliberating it with myself for a few seconds, I arrived to the simplistic conclusion that while I was still mad at him, I didn't want him to be hurt. The Lunarian generals jumped to attack me almost immediately, and I replied in kind, blocking the first one with the spear, and then pushing its head against the chest of the second one. He managed to block and repel it, making me lost my balance and leaving me open to an attack. The first one took advantage of it and tried to punch me with his knuckles. Just before he could, I remembered the spear wasn't my only weapon, and I pierced him straight through his chest by shooting alloy through the heel of my shoe. That wasn't enough to dissipate him, but was enough to stop him for an instant.

—I'll leave it to you —I murmured, as Ghost jumped from behind me and used his scythe to decapitate the Lunarian, and he become dust after a second.

The other General stood still for a moment, his face not moving at all, but I was sure he was surprised. Ghost had been able to hide his presence even from the enemy, but I was sure he would be behind me. Before the Lunarian could recover, Ghost and I went to the offensive, dodging the arrows that flew against us every so often and parrying the attacks the General launched. We had him cornered and about to be dispatched, but he was still able to block every attack that would finish him.

I finally saw an opening and tried to pierce his chest with the spear, but there was a loud explosion and the earth shook vigorously, making me lose my target. I still pierced him in the shoulder of his remaining arm, but the blast pushed me away from him, and threw the spear away from my hands. When I stopped rolling in the ground, I looked up and realized that the cannons had started shooting again, this time in several directions. The field in front of me was covered in smoke, and I started to worry about my brothers. As Caster had suggested, dispersing was the best strategy for this situation, but these attacks were in another league compared with the arrows of the Lunarians.

I snapped out of my thoughts and saw a ship approaching us, aiming its frontal cannons right at me. I wasn't too worried until I realized Ghost was lying at my side, still unaware of the danger that was looming over us. Immediately I let the alloy flow out of my body, trying to create a shield around both of me and Ghost, but I was sure of two things; there wasn't enough time to cover us entirely, and even if I was able to do so, my alloy couldn't stand even one shoot from it. Just as I saw a cannonball being shoot against us, something black surrounded and protected us from the attack. The explosion was still strong enough to throw us away, tumbling and rolling in the ground with enough force to start chipping parts of me.