Impossible

Fate used this chance to inspect the state of the Mages.

He was glad to see only three dead, more than a fair trade-off for the thousands of imp bodies that littered the ground, riddled with arrows and bloody holes.

Although many of the humans' number were wounded in some manner.

Fate had a gash on his right thigh from a wayward sword, which he kept his Mage Reach on to stem the bleeding. It made putting weight on the leg painful, but not impossible.

Other than that, he was mostly covered in thin scratches and shallow cuts, his greatsword allowing him to keep distance between himself and the majority of foes.

Kravoss was unharmed, having taken flight shortly after the start of the battle to rain chaos from above.

Cait appeared unharmed, covered in blood that Fate sorely doubted was hers, though some of it was. Her horns' points were painted red, a remnant of when she headbutted an imp.

Pospo had a shallow stab wound on her flank, but was moving easily enough.

Other than the nicks that crisscrossed her body, Samantha had three cuts that Fate could spot, visible through the torn fabric of her clothes.

One was on her hip, another across her back, and the last along her left arm. The first two were only half an inch deep, but the last was over an inch in depth.

A thin veil of frost covered all three of the injuries, forming an artificial scab that kept her from bleeding out while simultaneously numbing the pain. A Spell, Fate concluded.

Gevum was unharmed, for the same reason as Kravoss. The two were lucky the imps hadn't brought long-range weapons.

Venden had it the worst of them, with a gash across his brow pouring blood into his right eye and a deep trench of blood across his stomach.

During the lull, he pulled out a vial of red liquid and downed it in one gulp, his injuries healing at a pace visible to the naked eye.

He shook his head with a disgusted expression on his face, the taste of the potion as bitter as cough medicine. When his wound sealed over, he pulled out a rag and doused it in water before cleaning his eye and forehead so he could see.

Throughout the city, he could hear the sound of clashing steel and pained screams that rang over even the constant beating of drums.

Countless imps had made it past the blockade of Mages here at the city gate. When most were restricted to only their swords and shields, the powerful effects of their Skills unusable, they weren't as effective as they could be.

But that tidbit of information set Fate's mind to work.

Why had only the imps here retreated? Why were the ones that had managed to get past only continuing deeper?

His thoughts were interrupted as their brief moment of calm came to an end.

A savage, drawn-out, guttural roar shook the hearts of those present, quickly echoed by hundreds more.

The drums' deafening volume lowered to a quiet thrum, as calm as the rested humans' hearts were before that roar had jostled them back into fight-or-flight mode.

Even now, the dust of the destroyed section of the wall had yet to settle, the thin cloud of dirt and debris having been renewed by the trampling feet of the imp soldiers.

Thump.

The war drums thumped, the sound of several heavy objects thudding against the ground synced to the sound.

Thump.

A haze of red infiltrated the dust around the opening in the wall, rendering the cloud, which was already crimson from the red skies above, a deep maroon.

Thump.

The heavy objects grew closer, every collision with the ground kicking up more dust for the cloud.

THUMP.

The cloud finally cleared, waved away by a black mace with a polearm as big as the user was and a head as big as Fate's.

The humans finally saw what they were up against, many breaking out in a cold sweat at the sight.

They were towering creatures, each over seven feet tall, and numbered at only seven. Their skin was as red as the faint haze that extended ten feet out from their skin, their eyes were a menacing yellow, and they were as muscular as some of the most hardcore bodybuilders.

Their arms were each as thick around as Fate's leg, and their legs were just as thick. Red horns with black bases glowed cherry red and extended from the sides of their heads like those of a bull.

Two smaller, thinner black horns extended out four inches from the sides of their heads underneath the larger horns, framing their disturbingly human faces.

Many had thick black goatees that drooped from their chins, and short black hair behind their horns, but lacked hair anywhere else from what could be seen.

The woman was the exception, with long raven locks that fell down her shoulders.

Their loincloths extended past their knees and were as long at the hips as their meaty hands, so the chances of seeing such an off-putting sight were slim when they were attacking.

Each loincloth held a piece of dark gray metal shaped like an inverted peace sign without the circle, the four points protruding from an upside-down triangle.

One point covered the area where their genitals and the other four provided some small protection for their abdomen.

Metal bracers covered their muscular forearms and part of the back of their hands, and were made of the same dark gray metal as the loincloths' metal fixture.

Only the singular woman among the creatures had anything else, and for her, it was just a large leather strip wound around her ample breasts.

Each of them had pointy, carnivorous teeth, perfect for tearing into human flesh.

Their weapons included swords as big as Fate's greatsword, the large black mace of the creature who dispersed the dust, and an executioner's axe.

The most unique of them was a log from a tree of light brown wood, bearing a leather-wrapped hilt in a divot carved directly in the center that Fate could hardly see from where he stood.

The female held this, and Fate could spot the dim glow of Imprints within the divot.

None of the creatures used more than one hand for their weapons, twirling and swinging them with bloodthirsty grins on their faces as if it was easy.

'The aesh?' Fate thought, eyes narrowing.

But that should have been impossible.