Elizabeth Alone

It hasn't been long since Alkadabuki left chasing after Doom as he fled into the desert. His compatriots remain behind, but the attack has stopped. The three of them are just waiting out there, they are just out of range of most of the forces in Saluma and what little can be lobbed at them, Belleza and Vox can protect against. Elizabeth is getting impatient. She feels like they’re taunting her, just standing there, just outside her grasp. Alkadabuki will come back soon and then it will be over. Doom is probably already dead, she tells herself, she just needs to wait for Alkadabuki to return.

After a bit she does see someone coming, but her elation changes to horror when the person is soon followed by others, quite a few others. It is a smaller army than the one that attacked Kia Marun earlier, but nevertheless it is an army of monsters. At the head of this army is Cara. Elizabeth panics, “is this a trap? Was Alkadabuki lured away so the city can be taken, but... Still Alkadabuki would return and easily retake the city, right?” she reasoned internally. This makes no sense to her and soon she realizes it doesn't matter. If they take the city she, Elizabeth, is fucked and she can't let that happen. She has to hold out, at least until Alkadabuki returns.

Cara joins up with the others and the army continues forward without her, attacking the walls, Elizabeth orders the soldiers to fight. The soldiers launch arrows and magical bolts at the monsters, but the fight isn't simple. Monsters are a lot more versatile than humans, some of the monsters fly up and harry the defenders as a number of the monsters begin to climb the outer walls. Elizabeth watches as a buff minotaur monster bounds up the walls near her and grabs an archer, tearing his head off like it was nothing. The minotaur turns and lunges towards another, but Elizabeth hits it with a flame bolt and it screams as it ignites.It Collapses to the ground and writhes as it dies. She does what she can to support the defenders on the walls. It doesn't help that the front gate isn't entirely repaired still and monsters are slipping inside through the unfinished gate. Defenders rush to the gate to stop the intrusion, but there is something else happening. The barbarian soldiers, Alkadabuki's men, seem in disarray. Elizabeth doesn't know enough to understand what’s wrong, but many of them are retreating from battle. She can't deal with this right now. She tries to focus instead on the battle, the majority of barbarians are still fighting and that will have to be enough. She hears the fleeing ones wailing in anguish, something about "the weasel has fallen," but she has no time to worry about that. Another monster has gotten onto the walls. This one is an undead, which normally isn't a problem, except it has managed to get right into a group of archers and they don't have much they can damage its physically resistant body with. She watches it stab its bony fingers into the chest of one archer and tear out his heart as another archer desperately stabs at it trying to get it to release. She moves to help, when more screaming comes from nearby and she turns to see a slime has been dropped by a flying monster onto a group of mages and it is greedily dragging them into it to be devoured as it merely absorbs their magical attacks. She watches as a female mage is pulled into the mass and struggles as if trapped in glass as her robes dissolve, leaving her naked and then soon after her skin begins dissolving as well as she lets out silent screams.

Elizabeth is breathing heavily, panic overwhelming her. Where is Alkadabuki, failing that where is Rio, he isn't still guarding the prison is he? He has to know they’re being attacked, right? She scrambles trying to remember what forces are even at her disposal. Pain lances through her as she collapses to her knees. Around her the screams of the dead and dying ring out, but all she can hear now is a sound coming from within. Is it the panic, the stress or just the right time? She doesn't know, but it is clear that she is going into labour, she feels her water break as pain hits her and she falls forward onto her hands, "not now... Not now," she mutters. She can't give birth in the middle of battle on the walls, she needs a trained healer, a comfortable place. She feels tears in her eyes.

"What did I do to deserve this, gods?" she asks aloud. "Why is everything going wrong for me?!" she screams to the heavens, before a burst of pain causes her to collapse face down. Everyone is to busy fighting and dying around her, no one is paying any attention to her. She rolls onto her back weakly and stares up at the light blue sky of Alms Amour, a peaceful happy sight contrasting with the awful events happening beneath it. She wants to scream some more, partly from pain, partly from rage and partly from fear, but she can't work up the energy to even scream.

She figures this is how she will die, "Elizabeth Culday, The Great Sun Mage, died from childbirth complications in the middle of a losing battle," she murmurs internally. The screaming around her goes quiet as a shadow seems to pass over the area and then the screaming starts again, but now it isn't the screams of **** it’s words.

"What the fuck is that thing?!" reaches her and similar declarations of awe, shock and terror. She can't lift herself to see and part of her doesn't care. She feels the baby coming and with a sudden realization she struggles, forcing herself to reach down and slide her panties off, leaving her lower body uncovered, she doesn't want to make this harder than it already is. She knows enough to push and she feels terrible pain as her cunt feels like it is tearing open with each push. Around her the world has gone silent, muted. She is focused only on the baby she is trying to push into this awful place. It feels like hours, but can't have been that long before she feels the baby slip out of her. She looks down and sees the bloody fruit of her loins. She reaches a hand out to the child and sees the child's eyes open. Their eyes are a glowing grey hue, similar to the ethereal flesh of its father. Regardless she smiles weakly down at her child and then suddenly there is a woman standing there. The woman Kneels down and takes the child in her arms. Elizabeth tries to scream at the woman to release her child, but she can't speak. The woman looks down at her and Elizabeth's eyes wander to the book strapped to the woman's waist and her breath catches in her throat and then the woman is gone with her baby and Elizabeth slips out of consciousness.