Chapter 219: Never
Looking down the street he was passing on the way towards the next person he was going to save Donny saw there was a gargoyle dragging a silent person down the street. This wasn't the first time he had seen this and he usually still saved these people on the off chance they were alive but Donny could tell this one wasn't.
It was obvious with their guts spilling out that even if he was to get the best health potion in the world down their throat that they wouldn't make it. He was about to move on and save someone he actually could when he noticed the corpse the gargoyle was dragging had a nice sized bag and with them being dead they shouldn't have drank any of the potions yet.
Moving quickly Donny killed the gargoyle, grabbed the bag and continued towards the person he could actually save. He would look through the bag when he got the chance or if he couldn't, pass it on to one of his people back at their new base. They would know what to do on the off chance there was a high grade health potion inside.
Stopping the gargoyle that had the living person Donny saw that they were in pretty good shape with the only real injury being their arm was broken. This was a serious injury but it wouldn't stop a real warrior from fighting with their other arm. "Come on, there's a second base for people that got dragged away."
Donny saw they wanted to put a sling on their arm before they started moving so he helped them and said. "I don't have much time, come on." Once they got moving he asked. "How's the fight coming?" He'd been asking anyone who could speak since he had heard it had started to go bad because he wanted to know if it had turned around for them or if he needed to just keep his force hidden instead of trying to reinforce a broken army.
"Our only healer ran out of mana so I think we're done for now. They were about to close the hatches when I got grabbed." It seemed the fortress was about to go into turtle mode. This meant he would be done saving people pretty soon. "How long do you think the base will last like that?"
"It's surprisingly well made so I think they'll be able to last a few days if they leave it closed up the whole time. That being said they'll probably open it back up to continue the fight once everyone gets some rest." Donny was starting to get curious about this base. He hadn't actually gotten close enough to see what it looked like till now because he had been so busy saving people since he started.
He wondered how they had been able to make it with the Metal and earth mana being gone. It was probably done by some of the Temples higher ups to give them another foothold in the city other than the temple itself. He wondered if they had done it to have a place other than the temple to keep the people they couldn't really trust.
Everyone knew that you never really knew if someone was a Demon Worshiper's spy or not and he could understand why they hadn't wanted to let all the people from the Fighters guild plus all the other groups that didn't really have any other choice but to fight into their main headquarters.
"Could you estimate the amount of people left in the base?" Donny wanted to know how their numbers looked because it would give him a better idea of how much the people he saved would matter when he led them back to the fight. "There's like five hundred. We're starting to dwindle a little compared to the Demon Worshipers but we have three sets of people if we rotate so more than enough for the size of the fortress."
"And you said there's only one healer?" If that was true that person was probably more overworked than him. "Yeah I don't know how but the Demon Worshipers were able to tell if someone could use Life magic and they were targeted at the beginning of the fight."
Donny wasn't surprised by this because it made perfect sense to go after the healers first if you had someone on your side that could single them out. Donny knew there was a formation you could use to single people out based on their affinities and he wondered if this was how the Demon Worshipers had done it.
It was pretty obvious they had a high level formation master on their side so he wouldn't be surprised if they were still here doing things to help them win. It was possible that the formation master that had designed this grand formation had never been here and the way they were finding the Life mages was completely different though.
It was more likely to be a skill or something because usually formation masters were kept really safe so they wouldn't be anywhere near the actual battle. Either way, with only one healer and no good potions around Donny couldn't help but wonder if they really had an actual chance at winning this war.
He didn't want to count them out yet but the Demon Worshipers had destroyed the only place that could have changed this shortage at the beginning when they destroyed the guilds, specifically the Alchemist guild. There wasn't a group from the Life Domain here in the Metal Domain either so the few healers they had in the Fighters guild had been it.
Arriving back at the new base Donny saw they had gotten most of the wounded inside already and that there was a new smashed gargoyle on the pile of destroyed gargoyles. It seemed his group had been able to stop it before it got anyone but he wouldn't know till he went inside and counted.
"You can go inside. You can't carry anyone like that." Grabbing one of the passed out people Donny got them off the ground and up into the new safehouse. Seeing one of his people he asked. "Where should I put him?"
"In the back room on the floor." After doing so Donny took a second to sit down. He had been going since he had saved the first person nonstop and with the fact his group numbered over fifty it was an impressive number of people that he had saved but also a lot of running and while carrying someone most of the time on the way back it had worn him out.
Seeing someone carrying another person Donny asked. "Is there any food?" Stamina potions could keep you going but they didn't do much for your stomach, that was what rations were for. Sadly he hadn't seen any so it looked like they were stuck looking for actual food from the surrounding buildings.
"Yeah there's a bit, do you want me to get you some?" Donny nodded and said. "That would be nice?" Getting his bread and water Donny thanked them and asked. "Did that guy find his wife?" Donny had wanted to know how that had turned out but he hadn't seen the guy again since. "What guy?"
"The buff guy with the sword." Donny guessed there was a chance the guy hadn't made it here. And was about to get up to look around when another person came in and said. "We need help moving Peter." Peter was in the worst condition out of every person Donny had saved and none of them really even understood how he was still alive.
Donny wasn't going to leave him out in the alley way though so he said. "I'll be right there." He could understand why they didn't want to move him without at least three or more people because he had been hit by an unholy spell and his whole side seemed to be rotting away.
Donny was afraid if they weren't careful with him while they were moving him Peter's side would split open and his guts would fall out. That would definitely be the end of Peter if that happened because the low grade health potions they had couldn't heal something like that. Getting outside Donny saw that there would be five of them moving him into the house.
That was enough that they would be able to glide him up the stairs if they knew what they were doing. Getting one of the shoulder spaces Donny said. "On three. One, two, three." Lifting Peter up one of the People on the other side said. "It's too bad we don't have someone who can use Unholy magic on our side. They could probably leech this Unholy mana out before it ate through him."
"On our side for a day and never again." Donny couldn't help but say this. He was sure he wasn't the only person here who had wisely chosen to pretend they couldn't use Unholy magic for their whole life. "I've heard there are a few who have been able to resist the temptation." Donny would like to know if that was actually true or just something the Demon Lord had spread to make people think it was safe to get closer to him.
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