Monstrous Compendium Ch5 bit – Bystanders

Agil hacked the wings off an incautious psiwasp, and wished he had time to gawk. He’d kept up with the other clearers; he’d seen Klein in action plenty of times. But the samurai was outdoing himself today, slicing almost as fast as Asuna could stab. And as for Kirito-

One-hand no-shield style. Plain longsword. Anybody else would have dumped steel for something special by now.

Except Kirito didn’t need enchanted weapons. Darkfire limned his hands and blade, sparking and burning with every strike.

Asuna’s blows carried ice and lightning. One Moonsword Agil had heard about in the Valiant Blades guild had red flames, and Yulier in the Army was said to have moonlit rainbows. As far as Agil had been able to winkle out of Argo, the special effects didn’t matter. The power was always the same. Wild magic, pulled straight from the fabric of the universe, eager to heal or kill. Magic that didn’t run out.

Moonswords? Are damn scary.

But scary as Kirito was, those two were still in trouble. Though they might not be able to see it yet. Agil was back here out of the main fight for a reason.

We’re whittling the nest down. But it’s still spawning warriors every minute, even though it’s on fire. As long as we’re fighting to keep the warriors from killing the captives, we can’t get in and help them. And those two are good, but they can’t take a field boss all on their own. Pollista doesn’t hit them much, but she hits harder than they can hit her, and her warriors keep soaking up everyone else’s distance attacks. They can’t kill her fast enough. We’re going to run out of healing magic–

“Hey.”

Scruffy wolf, was Agil’s first startled thought, taking in the guy in dark blue and leather armor who’d just sauntered up to him, while the other two in his small party hung back with Lady Stheno. Wild spiky black hair, violet eyes, a lazy grin that had just a hint of sharp teeth in it….