Merri & Riv vs. Babil
Vivian had left the Tower atop her beast, and like many of the others fighting on the ground level, Merri started to focus his attention to her, to no avail. Even his strongest attacks had little to no effect on the beast, and Merri still hesitated casting spells at Vivian. If not for the knowledge that against the Sage, he was powerless, then remembering that Vivian was a good person, once. He hoped she still was, somewhere in there, and that it was the beast that had her under its thralls and not the other way around.
His body still ached from the day previous; he had received healing, but he had not gotten the proper night’s sleep he might have otherwise preferred and his makeshift bed had been less than comfortable. Merri had not complained, though; the comfortable beds were for those who needed them most, and though the other defenders of the clinic had bid him to rest, he still slept lightly, an ear open to any sound of encroaching danger. So he was already not at his best when arriving at the Tower in the morning with a handful of those from the clinic -- three of whom were now dead.
Merri tried not to think about them, or Guy, or some of the patients at the clinic who had not survived the night. He would mourn them later. He would have to.
But Merri’s futile attempts at fighting the beast -- atop of his more successful efforts of the morning previous, when he fought against elementals and other beasts with his force from the clinics -- had nearly depleted him of his mana, and he took out an ether to replenish it. Yes, he had his rapier on hand, but he doubted it would do more than serve as a mere annoyance to the monster at best, if his spells were doing little to no good, and he doubted that being fodder would be useful past five seconds. To that end, he also took out a potion to help ease the injuries he had sustained in the morning, but he hadn’t the chance to drink it when an attack from behind knocked him to the ground, the potion bottle shattering on the broken pavement.
Merri rolled over to his back to see a giant golem construct above him, its arm lifted high for another attack. Luckily, Merri moved out of the way of it before it came crashing down, and he scurried to his feet to prepare for his counterattack.
He didn’t know what spells would be best against it, except for forbidden magicks, if he extrapolated from last night’s reports well enough. It absorbed holy, but there was no indication that it was immune to any elemental spells, and so, he began to dualcast Fira.
Were all the mages of this city insane? Rivalen was pretty sure that their beloved Sage had taken out a good chunk of them while in the Tower and yet in his view was one of the Councillors getting ready to do battle with — what was the name of that thing again? Rivalen forgot, a monster was a monster — dead either way. Merri’s rapier seemed laughable to the samurai, a thin needle poking at a stone but since he was casting there was clearly mana left in him.
Not a lost cause then, otherwise he would have been left there to meet his fate at the hands of the rock giant who had less sense of mercy than Riv (if possible). “Need a hand, Merri?”
Really, what was wrong with him? He didn’t need to look for a fight, clothes still torn and bloody from yesterday (what he would give for a warm bath) sticking to blossoming bruises and dried patches of dirt.
“Riv!” Merri cried with relief.
So he was not alone, then, with the rest of his team (his team -- it still felt strange to him) scattered about to deal with the large beast Vivian sat upon, or other monsters in the near vicinity. He just might come out of this alive after all, to see Ran again, to see all his friends again.