I activate the protective artifact and jump out of the shelter, heading for the next one, closer to the group, which was being taken seriously by three werewolves at once, and the masters were directing some of their efforts at them, keeping their heads down.
Don! DON! Don!
As I ran across the small room, I was about to be hit by three spells, but they were absorbed by the artifact's transfigured shields. A table that caught my eye immediately flew into a wide line of wizards and was thrown aside, and then the furniture turned into a cloud of splinters, but while my view was blocked for a few seconds, I managed to run to a wide metal mesh of wrought-iron strips.
One of the werewolves spotted me and immediately charged at me. A quick swing of my hand made one of the debris on the ground tremble, and a moment later a piece of metal blew off part of the beast's skull, but it kept coming at me, foaming at the mouth. Another swing, and three more pieces of iron cage slammed into its powerful neck and legs, and the beast stumbled, fell forward, and rolled across the floor for a moment, silent and dying.
I didn't even look at it, instead unleashing an oversaturated Conflringo at the enemy mages. The silver shield disappeared in the flash and the ensuing wave of flame that enveloped the hemisphere. Five seals fell from his sleeve, flying for a few seconds as the flames died down, and a magical circle erupted beneath one of the werewolves, from which several branching bolts of lightning shot upward, incinerating the beast. The last one, which had hesitated for a moment, was struck by three avadas at once.
At this point, this beast was the last — the others were dealt with without casualties, but a barrage of spells came our way, and we had to hide until the volley stopped, until the "windows" appeared.
In the short time the spells came, I sat down on the stone floor behind the column and put a seal on my cheek and collarbone to stop the bleeding — the volley had split one of the floor slabs, and I was hit by the shards. Then I covered my eyes and called out to a low level earth spirit, who did not immediately respond — he didn't like this place, he didn't want to move here.
The seal I sent to the dying werewolf's body flashed the color of lush grass, and in one fell swoop it transferred all the power and magic it had gathered to the spirit, thus completing the contract, and then I gave it a task, and the spirit set out to do it.
Each of its elements is irreplaceable, and if you know how to use them, develop your imagination, even such an inert element as earth can surprise you. Like now, when the enemy discovered the work of the Spirit and began to scream, trying to break through the thick sheet of metal and stone that closed the door behind them, so that they had only one way out of this hall — through us.
But who would let them go now? Magic and life force spirit were received with excess, so the barrier mages will not break through, well, except for "Hellfire", but it is not a toy, and more or less reasonable people would never use it closer than fifty meters away from themselves, to escape in case of emergency.
While the mages were distracted and the stream of spells turned into rare blows, the attacking forces began to stir: the Protego shields flared, and the mages most talented in transfiguration began to work behind them. In a matter of minutes, the hastily constructed barricades of rubble were transformed into stone walls with broad bases and small iron wheels.
A few waves of wands and the walls behind which the mages and wizards were hiding moved forward. I even thought for a moment that they would succeed, but alas, there were many fools in this place at first, but there were none left.
Unfortunately, I couldn't see their faces, even through the spiritual plane, because these guys use artifact masks that distort even the characteristic imprint of personal magic beyond recognition, but a couple of mages were clearly not distracted and were watching the situation.
A pair of powerful Reductors slammed into the ground, leaving impressive craters in which the moving mini-fortresses were stuck, and then began to pound on the fortifications themselves.
Parity was once again established: the attacking forces were constantly shielding and trying to repair their wheeled mini-fortresses, while the local hosts, cleverly shielding themselves from a possible counterattack, were constantly inflicting significant damage on them. It turned out that it was time for a tug-of-war, or endurance test, and since there were no fools left, it was clear to everyone who was going to win. At one point I even heard loud voices shouting taunts and insults in our direction.
I recognized one of the voices, not right away, but pretty quickly. No one forgot me, by the way, and as soon as I tried to get out to attack, I was attacked, and even my shields were burned through pretty quickly: I made a thick smoke and then hung a shield in it, so it wasn't clear if I was in the smoke or not. Anyway, my shield was blown away in a few seconds, overloading it with something very energy-intensive. But a few seconds isn't instantaneous or for one hit, so I started to prepare.
If I hadn't been here, I would have used either a higher spiritual or elemental shield, or I could have just used a spiritual spear like in Japan, but why reveal such trump cards? I'm not in danger of dying, and neither are the people, if they don't get stupid, and then we'll break this "nut" slowly.