Earth's Greatest Magus

From atop of a cliff two miles away, Emery intently observed the battle that was taking place in the distance. 

There were fifty or so acolytes participating in the battle. Currently, they were fighting from behind a newly formed stone wall against a horde much larger than the one Emery had previously seen attacking the outpost.

There were several thousands of them, cramming the yellow sandy plains to such an extent that no more ground could be seen where they had congregated. Furthermore, Emery saw many stage 3 Abyss creatures in the midst of their ranks.

The long blonde hair captain Rayne was fighting fiercely. Her figure floated in the air as multicolored lights continuously shot out from the bow in her hand like a waterfall, while the runic arrows flew through the air at breakneck speed ending the life of any Abyss creature unlucky enough to be targeted.

One arrow would produce a massive explosion upon landing, instantly killing several Abyss creatures and torturing a dozen others in scorching flames. Another would spark brilliantly and discharge a storm of lightning, electrocuting and turning the Abyss creatures to scorch and ashes.

The female captain could even shoot an arrow that froze a large group of Abyss creatures in an instant, before she fired another arrow that shone brightly and illuminated an area upon impact. After the dome of light disappeared, the traces of Abyss creatures were no more to be seen.

Rayne continued to fight the Abyss creatures, and watching how ferocious she was, Emery couldn't help but feel awe of her powers.

She was flying in the air with the help of an orbiter by herself, but was gradually surrounded by dozens of stage 2 Abyss flying creatures that began to overwhelm her through sheer numbers. No one was able to reach her, as the other 50 or so acolytes were busy fighting the Abyss ground creatures from atop the walls.

It was at this moment that Emery realized there were actually no elite acolytes among the people fighting. They were all regular acolytes and most of them were only rank 8 acolytes with a few exceptions of rank 9.

Even though the whole situation looked very unusual, Emery understood that life came first above all. Thus, knowing those people were already one foot into the abyss itself, he quickly rode his own orbiter and shot into the sky towards Rayne who was still fighting.

By this time, the blonde girl had been swarmed by at least a hundred of those stage 2 Abyss flying creatures that had the appearance of a huge bee. Seeing the precarious situation, Emery swiftly cast one of his recently learned spells.

[Ash Blast]

A huge wave of black sands rapidly swept over half of the flying creatures. Immediately after, multiple explosions occurred within the sand tsunami, blasting the Abyss creatures trapped within it into bloody pieces that helplessly fell to the ground.

Half of the pressure Rayne was bearing was lifted by Emery's attack, but it wasn't over yet. Now free from the Abyss creatures that overwhelmed her, the blonde girl swiftly prepared her trump card.

Raising the tip of her arrow to the sky, Rayne chanted a string of words as prismatic lights began to envelop her bow and the drawn arrow. A few seconds later, she finally let go of her hand and the arrow shot out in a blinding light.

In the air, the arrow turned into a large, golden bird. It screeched loudly and killed all the remaining Abyss flying creatures in its path until eventually nothing was left in the air.

Now, there were only two figures visible in the air - Emery and Rayne.

Emery turned his gaze to Rayne and was about to ask what had happened. But then, he noticed the blonde girl's pupils were gray in color, while her expression was flat.

"Something is wrong."

As if answering his suspicion, Rayne swiftly drew her bow and shot an arrow at him.

Swissshhhh!

The distance between them was too close and the orbiter was moving too slowly, so Emery was forced to cast [Blink] to dodge the arrow. He glanced warily at the blonde girl and realized the latter was not after him.

Instead, she turned her attention to the battle taking place on the ground and started shooting more arrows, killing dozens of Abyss creatures in the process.

Emery quickly had his suspicions, so instead of approaching the girl again, he headed towards the walls where the fierce battle between humans and Abyss creatures was still going on.ᴘᴀɴᴅᴀ-ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ

Seeing the hordes of Abyss creatures crawling the walls, Emery once again focuses his core on casting another powerful tier 5 spell

[Seed Bomb]

A dozen small, dark green spheres appeared in the air and fell to the ground across the defensive line of the wall.

Kaboomm! Kaboomm! Kaboom!

With just that one attack, Emery managed to kill a few hundred stage 1 Crawlers, dozens of stage 2 Lurkers and a few stage 3 Ravagers. 

The sudden mass death of the Abyss creatures caused a halt to the chaos that was unfolding in front of the walls. It was as if peace had come to fruition.

The sight of destruction and hundreds of Abyss creatures dying at the same time also shocked the regular acolytes.

Under the gazes of everyone - humans and creatures alike, Emery made his way to the line of 50 acolytes. Taking a closer look at these people, he found one person wearing an elite acolyte uniform among them.

Emery looked at the man he knew was a member of Arcana's squad. His gaze was sharp as he said in a stern tone. "You will explain what happened here to me. Right Now!"

The display of destruction just now, as well as the tone Emery used, created an invisible atmosphere that pressed down on the elite acolyte. It didn't take long for the latter to bend under the pressure and begin to explain.

Apparently, Arcana had cast some kind of enchantment spell on Rayne, the captain of Squad 29. He then ordered her to stand guard here, while forcing all of Rayne's elite acolytes to come with him into an Abyss nest.

"That doesn't make sense!" Emery said, glaring at the acolyte who he thought was lying.

Arcana was the fourth-strongest acolyte sent to the planet. Why would he need more elite acolytes and leave even his own regular acolytes in such a place?

With another round of intimidation, the elite acolyte filled the missing gaps with more information.

It turned out that Arcana had found a particular Abyss nest that was several times larger than an ordinary one. With his powerful eye skills, Arcana lured the Abyss creatures within that Abyss nest to come out while he entered with the other elites.

"Commander, we are here just following our captain's order."

"Commander, please help our captain Rayne."

There was a mixed response from the two different squads.

As for Emery, he was currently on the brink of losing his temper. In fact, he really wanted to go straight into the Abyss nest and punish Arcana for deliberately endangering one of the captains and many others for his own personal gain.

It was no wonder that the current Rayne was like a guard dog that wouldn't stop killing whatever came rushing towards the walls. Emery was worried about leaving her like that, but he had no way of dispelling the spell Arcana had cast on her.

After considering the pros and cons of both actions, Emery decided that the punishment for the Arcana could be postponed until later. For now, he was going to help these people clean up the large horde of Abyss creatures.

"Follow my lead! We will finish off these creatures fast!"