Lindle had never considered how quickly it took a person to fall before. He assumed he would have time to think about the experience as it happened, but before he knew it, everyone had already fallen almost halfway down the cliff, the ground rushing up as if to hit him. That thought triggered the reflexes Madam Holly had drilled into him, and Lindle sent aura points rushing up to his head to activate [Flow], and the world slowed down. There, now Lindle had time to think about falling to his potential death.

  That thought was a lot less terrifying than it would have been just a few moments ago, the emotional muting portion of the technique no doubt, but at least it let him look at the situation a lot more objectively. If Lindle could activate a reflexive technique mid-fall, then Dorothea definitely could as well. Still, he should get some eyes on the situation. It took a serious draw on his Dex stat to make his eyes shift to look to his side fast enough, but the kitsune mage entered his sight right before a wave of a subtle distortion pushed out from her to cover the entire group.

  Their descent suddenly slowed, accompanied by a lurching sensation in the bottom of Lindle’s stomach. Thalia and Humphrey flailed as they steadied themselves. Lindle found that his experience with Madam Holly’s high mobility techniques applied well here, allowing him to right himself with the same movements he had practiced with [Primeval Climber], though he didn’t waste the aura to activate the technique outright. On his shoulder, Notwick had just resorted to closing their eyes and gripping onto him tightly with their paws.

  The more experienced adventurers weren’t disoriented, arming themselves with weapons and readying spells, though Rosato and Chip definitely didn’t look as thrilled as Dorothea did, who was whooping in excitement as she fell.

  “Woooo!”

  Theodore, of course, had no discernible reaction through their mask, though as Lindle watched the four of them, his head shifted towards Lindle, their body moving in real-time even to Lindle’s subjective timeframe. They tilted their head in what looked like curiosity before Dorothea regained Lindle’s attention.

  With a fanged grin, she lifted up a palm, cast another spell, and announced its name for everyone’s benefit. “[Ice Spire]!” A massive block of ice vaguely in the shape of a cylinder the size of a mammoth appeared in front of her and was hurtled toward the ground. She then raised her wand and pointed it at the falling ice and cast another spell with a flick. “[Shatter]!”

  The ice, quite appropriately, shattered, splintering into several large chunks that hammered into the frozen lake below. Two unlucky Speartalons at the front of the horde were crushed instantly, and a few chunks slammed against the Spear Tyrant’s back, staggering it. Instead of targeting the undead, the vast majority of the ice chunks landed in such a way that they formed a very linear, small forest, or a pseudo fence, that separated the Tyrant from the rest of the undead. Dorothea then spread her hands, and a tugging force pulled Lindle and his friends away from the older adventurers, their respective landing zones now on either side of the aftereffects of her spell combo.

  Lindle pulled a big bottle of alchemist’s fire from his pouch, pumping mana into it through the Alzmeymical Gloves, as he and his friends prepared to add to the opening barrage. Humphrey nocked an arrow that looked to be made out of the same material as the antlers on his head, though it was actually made from the antlers of a Windsworn Elk. He and Lindle both aimed for the middle of the undead pack, as Lindle threw the bottle aided by [Throw], Humphrey let the arrow loose a moment later.

  The explosion that appeared in the middle of the undead was stronger than Lindle’s old creations by an order of magnitude, not only enhanced by his gloves and his [Alchemical Bomber] feat but also by how much he had simply just improved on his alchemy now that he had been studying and practicing for several months aided by steadily improving Dexterity and Intelligence stats. That, in turn, compounded even more with his new [Craft Mastering] skill that scaled on that improved skill. Altogether, his potions had gotten very, very dangerous.

  He was sure that the Speartalons also didn’t appreciate the well-timed arrow that landed right afterward, a burst of wind spreading the sticky flames farther as well as scattering all the skeletons and zombies that hadn’t been caught directly by the flames like leaves.

  Another explosion to his right told Lindle that one of the older adventurers had employed a similar strategy, most likely Chip. A quick glance confirmed that the cleric had summoned a large flaming log to crash into the Spear Tyrant, but Lindle quickly turned his attention back forward. He had to focus on their part of the battle.

  The four of them landed by a collection of tall ice shards, Lindle placing a hand on Notwick's back to keep them steady before they all moved to take advantage of the undead’s vulnerable states.

  Lindle’s alchemist fire had consumed a few Speartalons, but the rest of them were recovering quickly. Especially the ones closest to their landing zone, since Lindle hadn’t wanted to cover their location with flames. He didn’t have to worry about that though, Thalia was taking care of that for them, raising Lotus Thorn at the nearest Speartalon.

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  “[Fungal Lock]!”

  A sudden sprouting of mushrooms and fungal matter covered the skeleton, binding its limbs before it could rush her. Lindle quickly stepped forward and activated [Repelling Knuckle], hitting it in the face with a burst of force and aura. The already tied-up skeleton was flung away helplessly into some further away undead.

  Humphrey jumped up onto one of the ice blocks, not slipping off thanks to one of his techniques, before he called the name of another. “[Spinning Shot]!” The spinning arrow that flew from his bow bored through the ankle of the next closest Speartalon, crippling it and preventing it from getting off the ground.

  Now that they had cleared a space for themselves, Lindle spared a glance backward to assess how the Nine-tails half of the fight was going, ready to call to his friends to see if they needed to move. Fortunately, the Spear Tyrant seemed sufficiently occupied.

  The massive zombie was currently attempting to skewer Rosato with its oversized claws, the knight carefully reflecting its attacks away with his shield as he danced back and forth out of its range. Chip and Dorothea were running off to the side, moving in a semicircle around the Spear Tyrant as they released spell after spell into its flank. Theodore was following up behind Rosato, punishing the monster for each overextension with a flash of his daggers, a score of slash marks already dotting the back of its hands. His current strategy seemed to be to try and cut off one of its hands, which was smart. It was easier to give undead crippling injuries like that through their HP than most other monsters.

  All of that occurred in the span of only a couple of real seconds, [Flow] allowing Lindle to mentally match the pace their higher stats allowed them all to move at. Being able to keep track of higher-level fights happening around him was one of the tricks he’d need for the raid so he could know when to get out of the way.

  Reaching into his pouch again, Lindle threw out a smaller vial of alchemist’s fire, [Savant Toss] allowing him to add the force and aim of a focused overhand to a quick flick, blowing up a zombie.

  “Start moving!” He called to his friends as they started running to the left.

  The most important thing would be to prevent the undead from encircling them, so they moved along the ice fence Dorothea had made while they threw out more projectiles and spells. The undead, the majority of them now back on their feet, ran after them, the distance they all tried to build closing quickly due to the Speartalon’s long legs and the species’ focus on speed remaining even in undeath.

  Several of them pounced, Thalia hitting one with [Fungal Lock] midair and ducking out of the way as it tumbled to the ground.

  “Back into the ice!” Lindle shouted. They all backed into the ice shards for cover, Frostgreed’s scales becoming more solid as they got closer to the magically cold ice.

  Lindle took advantage of this by raising an arm coated in Frostgreed’s scales and allowing the skeleton to bite down, fangs unable to penetrate the ethereal white projection. On his shoulder, Notwick squeaked as they grew a long vine from their back, spiking it between the bones on the Talonspear's shoulder, and then they pulled, unbalancing it before it could raise its foot to attempt to disembowel Lindle.

  Lindle raised his other arm and hit it with a [Power Strike], causing it to release his arm. He activated [Primeval Climber] and pulled himself around the skeleton’s side, using his new increased leverage to move the skeleton between him and the ice before he hit it with [Repelling Knuckle], slamming it into the ice with enough force to cause cracks to form before it fell to the ground dead.

  “Are you alright?” He questioned Notwick.

  “Yes, sorry.” The hedgehog clung to his shoulder tightly. “It’s just all happening so fast.”

  Lindle climbed to the top of the ice shard, seeing a skeleton attempting to flank them and throwing another fire vial before it got too close. He charged it up with mana to make sure he got it in one shot. His offensive alchemical choices when it came to undead really were limited. Perhaps he should start looking into various forms of acid.

  Notwick turned their face towards Lindle, a strange look on their face. “Your thoughts… they feel weird through our bond.”

  Lindle hummed. “I suppose this is the first time you’ve been with me when I’ve used [Flow] in combat.” He leaped over the top of the ice shards to the other side of the pseudo-fence, Thalia and Humphrey following him as he quickly downed an aura potion, refilling his pool. The constant use of techniques while maintaining [Flow] was costly even for him.

  He pointed into the ice as the Talonspears weaved their way through the shards. “Tangle them!”

  Thalia took his cue. “Got it! [Grasping Patch]!” The sudden field of vines of thorns wrapped around both the shards and the skeleton, tangling the Talonspears together.

  Humphrey pulled out an artifact arrow, this one made from one of the Zmey’s fangs. He lined up three conventionally placed skeletons with an eager smile. “Oh, I gotta take advantage of this. [Penetrating Shot].” The enhanced arrow flew through each skull, half a moment passing before ice crystals bloomed inside each skull, causing them to shatter from the inside.

  Lindle followed up with another large potion bottle, the bunched-up miasma of the undead igniting wonderfully. He looked through the ice shards, watching to see if any had avoided the spell, but he couldn’t see any approaching the four of them.

  He let a small, satisfied grin cover his face. Between their planning and the extra power Lindle's artifacts had given them, they had taken down the entire pack unscathed.

  He turned his gaze back to check on the older adventurers again before Lindle’s eyes widened in shock, his smile disappearing. Several Speartalons covered in fungus, having broken free of their restraints, were rushing towards the fight between the Nine-tails and the Spear Tyrant.