Amber and I stood in the middle of the roof with Deception behind us, while faint screams echoed in the distance.
"I don't mean to question your plan, but I'm still trying to wrap my mind around how this is all going to work?" Amber shifted her weight, and a gun handle peeked out from under her waistband.
I took a deep inhale. "So basically, these things are attracted to souls, and Arnold can make fake souls. So he's going to make a bunch of these fake souls, so these creatures are drawn to this building. While their attention is focused on the souls, I'll stab and disable them with my channeling weapon, ending them, and you guys will protect me as I so."
"Hmm," Amber said, and I could almost see her mind. "That could work."
I let my gaze wander to Arnold, who was playing with the channeling weapon he held in his hand, while his dolls stood over him protectively. Their shadows stretched the length of the building.
"But," Amber continued. "How are we going to handle it if a couple all show up at once. I barely got away from two of them before having to barricade myself inside. They can easily swarm and overwhelm us."
"I agree with this new girl, it isn't a good idea to try and attract all of them at once. I'm glad you joined our team, new girl."Arnold said and paused when two more of his dolls joined us on the rocky flat roof. Their landing caused the roof to tremble slightly under our feet. "So to avoid them all coming at once, let's steadily increase the power of the attraction."
Amber's eyes sparked with excitement. "That's actually a brilliant idea! We'll first start with less appealing bait, i.e., less souls to draw the soulless creatures that are the closest to us first. Then we will increase the amount of souls to make coming to us more appealing, so the souls that are further away will be drawn here. We can finish them off in waves!"
"Exactly," Arnold said.
"Yeah, that sounds great!" I said, pretending I knew exactly what they were talking about.
"Okay, so here's what we're going to do, "Amber said and looked to me. "I'm going to protect you, make sure you aren't grabbed, while Arnold's creations stand along the building's perimeter to intercept any of the soulless coming up the side of the building, and hold them off."
Immediately, Arnold's dolls moved to stand at each of the building's corners, except for the section of the roof closest to Arnold and his perch.
Deception made a noise of fear and moved closer to me as one of the dolls got closer to him, until my dragon was practically on top of Amber and me.
"I'm going to make ten for now, and then wait," Arnold said, and the clay man took Arnold off his shoulders and lowered him to the ground.
With the hand not holding the channeling weapon on the stone building, Arnold splayed his fingers across the red bricks. I watched while ten or so tinny monsters, around the size of cats, began to boil out of the stone. They were red like the brick building we stood on, and were unique from each other, small, and far from having a human shape.
They had horns of varying numbers of beady white eyes and horns sprouting from their heads. Some had spikes growing out of their slim, rat-sized body.
"I can't wait to release them on my mortal enemies in my class once this is all done," Arnold said, gazing down at his creations. "But if this plan fails and we get eaten by zombies, that's fine. That's number three on my list of ways I would like to die," Arnold smiled.
Before I could wonder what was number one and two, the sound of twigs snapping filled my ears, and a pale hand reached up and snatched one of the tiny creatures and dragged it over the side of the building and out of sight.
There was a series of high-pitched shrieks while Arnold's creation fought for its unnatural life, the a distinct single crunch followed by booming.
In the next second, Amber had snaked her arm around my middle and dragged me away from the side of the building. At least she tried. We ended up running into Deception, who was still almost pressed to our backs; he was so close.
Over my shoulders, I heard the heavy steps behind me, and Arnold's doll propelled itself into my vision and reached over the side of the building. It grabbed a flailing, soulless man dressed in ragged clothes and dangled him by one of its arms. It began to stab it repeatedly with a silver sword, with a large crystal ball at the end. I saw that clear, round orb swirled with black mist.
The thing shrieked and, with each stab, reached towards the clay man and clawed at the space separating them. But with each stab, it began to weaken until it was barely moving. And that's when Amber let go of me, and I stumbled forward and knelt beside the creature. I stared the thing in its cloudy eyes before I planted my channeling spear between its shoulders with a crunching sound.
I had no sooner done this than I heard a commotion going on behind me. I whirled around to see two more of those things dragging themselves onto the building's roof.
One of Arnold's dolls was able to intercept the first dead woman in the capital's uniform with bright red hair, but not the second with dirty blonde hair, and she was soon speeding towards Amber and me.
"Amber stepped in front of me, and I watched in amazement while the thing reached towards her throat, as if to grab her by it. But at the last second, she twisted her body and propelled herself into the air, and barely avoided its outstretched hand. She came down on its neck with the back of her elbow and brought her entire weight down upon its neck.
There was a shattering sound, the soulless women collapsed under Amber, and Amber landed on top of her.
"Violet!" she screamed, and I dove forward and quickly disposed of the soulless women. Before running towards the other soulless in the clay man's grip and quickly ending it too.
"Arnold! Increase the soul count by five!" Amber yelled. "It's working!"
"Wait!" I said and doubled forward and propped my arms on top of my legs. "Slow down, I need a break!" A drop of sweat rolled down my face and splattered on the brick beneath my feet.
"What!? We just started, and you're tired already!?" Amber roared.
I jerked my head up, startled by the tone of her voice. I straightened and turned, and looked over my shoulder just in time to see her standing up from the crumbled body she had been on top of. Her eyes had a wild, untamed look to them, and her hair had slipped out of its ponytail even more, and now more than half of it hung down her back.
"Well, Amber. I just came back from Purgatory after 400 years. I killed my father to raise an army of the dead, I had an evil mind controller invade my mind, and I haven't slept since all of that began. So yeah, I need a break! It's starting to all catch up to me!"
"I have a list of my own!" Amber growled before taking a deep breath before saying, "I'm sorry, I have a bit of a temper sometimes, especially if I'm running on no sleep and have been fighting for the past couple of hours! But, unless I can no longer fight and you can no longer stab, we are going to keep going. Understood? People are dying and getting hurt!"
Suddenly, the ground beneath my feet began to tremble, and I looked down at my feet numbly.
"Um, either I'm so tired that this roof is shaking or it's actually shaking, which can't be a good sign."
"No, it's shaking," Arnold said, and I noticed he hadn't moved from his spot since the beginning of the attack. "Darn, I didn't want to die from falling from a roof," he said just before the roof caved in, and we all plummeted downwards.