No Step On Slime

Chapter 19: Air Raid Tempest

I didn't want to say the civvie evacuation was messy, but it was unbearably slow. Everyone was on foot, and the streets were congested for the first half-hour.

Shuna and Rigur were directing the townspeople into the woods, where an established temporary camp was set up away from the fighting. I had been running supplies from the town to the camp, mostly provisions such as food and canvas to build the tents.

Believe it or not, I could actually get to a good jogging speed when hauling a wagon. I'd say it was around twenty miles per hour? The only thing that slowed me down were the roads, which were still half-complete, and I also remained cautious so I didn't accidentally throw a wheel by hitting it on a large rock.

Rimuru had organized all of the able-bodied fighters of Tempest to prepare for battle and had even called assistance from Dwargon to help. At least fifty of the prestigious Pegasus Knights had arrived to reinforce Tempest.

I wasn't there to witness the firing shots of the battle, as I was returning from the temporary camp with the wagon. But I was immediately alerted to the fighting when I heard a few explosions in the distance.

"Crap... that doesn't sound good."

I hurried to the town. The cart behind me jumped into the air at times as it hit bumps and rocks into the road.

Thankfully, everything still seemed intact. The only difference was that there was a massive flying monster floating near Tempest.

Wait.

"So that's Charybdis?" I thought out loud. It was bigger than I had expected... and was creepy as hell, with its one eye. There were two massive wings to its right and left, but I didn't know what it was looking to accomplish with that. The damn thing seemed to be barely gliding.

Explosions broke out all along its surface, most likely from Rimuru and the gang attacking the monster.

Clouds of dust were kicked up, from what I presumed were the little creatures that were escorting it attacking our guys on the ground. 

It seems like they'll need assistance... shit like medical supplies and weapons. There's no way nobody would get hurt in all that.

Medical supplies, medical supplies, where were they... aha! Rimuru awhile back notified me of the location of some of the storage houses for whenever Tempest needed to stockpile supplies, and there were some here. I filled the wagon behind me with bandages, potions, and grabbed a few spare weapons in case.

On my way out of the town, the sky flashed red for a moment. I blinked to ensure it wasn't my vision that was going bad.

The damn monster was firing a fucking laser beam at some airborne target.

That made me run a little faster.

Rimuru and a few others had set up camp on a hill overlooking the town. He probably wanted to ensure that Charybdis didn't damage the town in any way, by supervising it as he fought.

I could see the humanoid slime standing on the ground, observing the monster. I needed to get to him to ask a few things before he took off again for another attack run.

"Rim!" I yelled. "You've got a good lead on its abilities?"

"Yes," he said. "I've had to use a lot of my stronger attacks against it. But Charybdis has an anti-magic force-field around him that weakens magical attacks."

"Can't you get close-up for melee attacks?" I asked.

"Not a lot can. The scales on it can shed off to attack anyone who was nearby."