"Oh Crap."

 

 

Standing there, covered in blood, Ryan looked down at the three dwarven prisoners. One passed out, one was quiet, and the last one, the priest, was just opening and closing his mouth like he was trying to scream, but nothing was coming out. That wasn't the problem.

 

That lone, lanky, hooded kid over by the detonator was the problem.

 

Ryan took a deep breath, looked at his axe, then up at the kid, "Looks like I'll have to do this the hard way." He didn't have the mana left for a bolt of Ice-7, but ordinary ice was possible, ~Should be simple enough.~ He fired off a bolt aimed at the kid's head.

 

The kid easily deflected it with a wave of his hand and a flickering shield of flame.

 

Ryan knew this was a problem and moved to close, except he miscalculated how slippery the gore covered ground was and wound up wobbling, stumbling, and climbing his way out of the slaughtered men. This gave the kid time to turn around and run for the detonator.

 

Ryan pulled back his axe, checked his targets, and let it fly. It hit just as the kid reached the detonator. With a grin visible from under the hood, the kid slammed down on the plunger.

 

Nothing happened.

 

The kid looked up at Ryan who just pointed. The kid followed Ryan's finger to where the axe landed. It had severed the cord connecting the detonator to the cask of dragons blood.

At that moment, the barricade broke outward.

 

It was the guards inside that were, formerly, making sure the dwarves stayed away from the explosives.

 

The guards were trying to flee. The kid looked at Ryan, looked over at the opening in the barricade, then broke into a run for the opening. Ryan pushed himself off the ground and started rushing to intercept. Clearly the kid could use fire magic, but he most likely didn't think he could hit the cask from his current angle. He'd need to get closer to set it off. Ryan dumped everything he had left into speed, knowing this was do or die.

 

The kid was closer, Ryan was faster, and as he closed the distance Ryan reached down to his thigh to pull out one of his hold-out knives. The two guards inside had managed to leave a hole in the barrier as they ran. Ryan pulled back the knife to take aim. The kid took off her cloak so she could move her arms more freely.

 

Her?

 

For a moment, it didn't register, that Ryan wasn't chasing after some young boy, but a girl. With the cloak removed, he could make out her flowing red hair. In that moment, he hesitated.

 

 

She didn't.

 

 

 

---

 

 

 

 

 

Freya was sitting next to the freshly uncovered body of Ryan.

 

 

 

The explosion had caused a landslide. The fire mage's body served as a shield from the detonation and landed on top of Ryan as the rocks came down. He was almost out of mana at the time, but had enough presence of mind to do his ice cocoon trick. It wasn't complete, however, and he was still knocked out cold.

 

If he had his helmet on, his auto doc would have squirted a healing potion into his mouth. Alas, that didn't happen. However, Olof explained what he knew about Ryan. Not having a better plan, they focused on digging him out in hopes that the chosen of the All-Father would be able to save those trapped in the mine. The three dwarven prisoners, Olof, and every child was brought here to dig. It took a little over an hour to find Ryan. The melting ice was a strong indicator where to find him.

 

Upon uncovering him, Freya was the one who found Ryan, who was face first in the rubble. With a tremble in her voice she shook his shoulder and whispered, "Please don't be dead."

 

"Okay. I won't be dead."

 

There was a pause as her eyes grew wide. With a shriek she called out, "HE'S ALIVE!"

 

The high priest was the first to come running over. With a face covered in grey rock dust and hands streaked with blood from digging, he grabbed Ryan and with a howl yanked him out from under the rock that still covered half his body. Ryan let out a yowl in pain as his arm was at an odd angle. The Clan leader came over with a healing potion and poured it down Ryan's throat. He swallowed it, half choking on it.

 

His eyes flared open as the haze he was in suddenly parted. He reflexively stuck his twisted arm out to get it in the right position for healing. Breaking his body and then healing it, over and over was something he had practiced with Aldelmo. He might have been a sadistic instructor, but he was twice as harsh on himself. He looked around, trying to take in the situation all at once.

 

Ryan's eyes became transfixed on the sloping pile of rubble where the entrance once was. He slid to his knees. He tried to put it aside. He tried to focus. He tried to assess the situation. He could not. There was only one thought in his head.

 

~You did it again.~

 

Someone was speaking. No. Multiple people were speaking. They were explaining things to him, but he couldn't comprehend it. Nothing was getting through. He couldn't get past what had happened. He flinched. He paused. He hesitated and now...

 

"I failed and everyone is going to die."

 

Ryan's head turned sharply to the side as a meaty hand backhanded him across the face.

 

"YOU WORTHLESS HALFLING!" The high priest shouted in his face, "Olof here told me that you were THE CHOSEN OF THE ALL-FATHER!" The priest's face was red with rage that was visible through the grey dust that covered him, "If I had not seen what you did here, I wouldn't have believed him!"

 

The priest grabbed Ryan by the shoulder and yanked to cause Ryan's head to roll back around so he could back hand him the other direction, "The people are still alive in there! We can hear them Digging! But with that many in there, they only got HOURS!" The priest grabbed Ryan by the neck and shook him violently, "We wasted a whole hour digging you out! Now I don't care if you are the chosen of the All-Father or NOT!" He stabbed a finger in Ryan's face, "YOU are the best hope we got! You are going to pull it together! You are going to stop WHINING! You are going to pull off some sort of miracle and YOU are going to figure out a way to save everyone!"

 

The Priest took a deep breath to yell as loud as he could in Ryan's face.

 

"RIGHT!"

 

"NOW!"

 

 

There was a long period of silence as the words from the priest echoed off the cliff and the other nearby mountains, fading away into the distance.

 

 

Ryan slowly lifted one hand.

 

Ryan slapped himself across the face knocking his head the other direction.

 

Everyone looked a little surprised

 

"Grumpy's right." Ryan shook his head a bit and started to pull himself to his feet, "Pull it together, man." He slapped himself several more times, lightly, but in quick succession, "Who the fuck are you? Giving up just because a mountain blew up?"

 

He reached in side a pouch to pull out a potion to drink. As he popped off the top with his thumb and brought it to his lips, he realized the potion was smashed and nothing was inside it. He eyed the priest through the neck of the bottle before tossing it to the side, "Someone give me a sitrep, stat!"

 

Everyone stared at him. A few muttered, "Huh?"

 

Ryan staggered down the rubble to get a better view of the situation, "I need a situation report, NOW!" He rubbed his face to wipe away the grime and blood then started slapping the back of his hand into the other to punctuate each word, "I need our assets, liabilities, progress made, and any possible solutions!" He staggered a bit then rubbed the side of his head, "If I'm gonna pull off a miracle, I need to know what we got to work with!"

 

He pointed at the clan leader, "You! Do we have any more of that explosive dragons blood crap?"

 

The Clan leader shook his head, "One small cask that they missed." He gestured to the former entrance to the mine, "They used most of it sealing everyone in."

 

Ryan clapped his hands together, "Get it." He looked at the priest, "Mana potions! I need everything you got!"

 

The priest scowled, "Were dwarves, you idiot! Mana potions don't work for us! All we have is a dozen odd healing potions!"

 

Ryan nodded, "Right. Any chance you have any construction equipment? Steam shovel?"

 

Olof blinked, "What's a steam shovel?"

 

Ryan nodded, "That's a no."  He looked at the priest, "Go get everything you got." He turned back to the collapsed entrance and addressed Olof, "There had to be air shafts. Any chance any of those are open?

 

Olof shook his head, "That's why it was abandoned. We had mined the thing out and it had become unstable. The air shafts collapsed a decade ago."

 

Ryan nodded, "How about a drill? You guys got any drills?"

 

The Forge master thought for a bit, "Might have a few strong rock drills, but if you are thinking about drilling an air hole to buy us time, there's no way it'll be enough for that many people."

 

Ryan pointed at him, "Get it. I got a plan. I just... have no idea where I'm gonna get the juice."

 

Since he had been resting for an hour, he had recovered some mana. Not nearly enough to pull off what he was thinking of, but enough to do some sensory magic. He walked over to the mountain and got as close to the blast as he could. He held out his hand and sent mist into the cracks and pushed it through the rock. He closed his eyes to feel it's progress and tried to determine just how far he would have to do.

 

Going through solid rock wasn't going to work. There wasn't enough time. However, if he could drill a hole through the much more loose rockfall, fill it with dragons blood or ice-7, he could blow open a tunnel and fill it with ice, then melt the ice inside to clear out a tunnel. It wouldn't be very stable, but it could work, if he had enough mana. He could just brute force a tunnel through.

 

If he had another entire cylinder of liquid mana.

 

It wasn't a matter of feasibility. It was a matter of energy. He did not have enough to even try. He finally felt the mist reach the other side. Sixty feet. He could sense the people on the other side, they were trying to dig their way out. He could feel their rising terror and fear.

 

Wait.

 

He could LITERALLY feel their rising terror and fear.

 

He closed his eyes tighter and opened his mind to this sensation. He could feel their pain and suffering. He could feel their hopelessness. He could sense the terror and all the other negative emotions as they seemed to be accumulating in the mine as a tangible force.

 

Much like what he felt when he tried to absorb the heart of the demonic assassin.

 

There was mana here.

 

All the mana he could ever need.

 

 

 

 

Demonic Mana.