Tereza shot arrow after arrow, each one detonating in wild flames, as the Aqua Jet sliced through waves of newborn ants, while Vesper’s bloody globes exploded and crushed large groups into nothing but piles of gore.
Vesper’s pack followed the ranged assault and began hunting the ants one at a time, ripping them apart before they could detonate, while Sprout planted its puppet’s massive form into the ground and forced roots to grow by feeding it bursts of spirit energy.
The roots spread rapidly around the group’s position and burst through the earth, raising a thick defensive wall around Maximus, Jane, Lennox, and Tereza.
Embi whirred overhead, sniping ants with weak fireballs; they barely did any damage, but it was enough to slow the swarm’s advance.
“Jane, protect the druid. I’m going in!” Lennox ordered as he vaulted over Sprout’s wall, diving into the center of the ants, spinning. Large silver chains erupted from his form as he spun, dragging ants toward him while unleashing sharp horizontal crescents of mana that sliced them apart, reducing them to dust.
Silex and Vesper joined him in the melee, clawing and snapping through the ants, some detonating on impact, but their barriers held firm.
Tereza, meanwhile, leapt onto Sprout’s root wall and continued her relentless barrage, at times loosing two arrows at once that split mid-flight in different directions, mowing down entire rows of ants.
***
Meanwhile, Maximus disassembled three skills into their bare formulas and glyphs, taking apart Solar Pyre, Lunar Flare, and Emerald Laser with methodical precision. I need to quicken my pace. That barrier autonomously converges mana into the exact points where attacks land, fueling each struck location with overwhelming amounts of mana that disperses the damage throughout the entire structure. I will need something that can overload a single impact point while simultaneously striking multiple areas and weakening its defenses at the same time. He thought to himself as he began constructing a new spell.
Hmmm… Oho, if I do this, and then layer in the properties of three flame-like energies and then weave in the concentrated penetrative force of a laser… Hmmm. It could work, but I still need something else to disrupt the mana flow. He scrolled through the list of his skills and paused, a zealous smile spreading across his face. This is it! And I should be able to tap into the properties of that other skill if I merge two skills from the same origin into one and then add just a bit of flair. “Hahaha, I got it!” He laughed loudly, making Jane twitch and glance back at him.
Maximus, fully engrossed in his creation, continued waving his hands through the air, looking every bit like a madman on the verge of a breakthrough. The skill creation failed a dozen times before the system finally issued a warning.
Alert: Skill creation above B-Tier is forbidden on the First Plane; the laws cannot contain such skills.
Skill creation can be approved, but the skill must remain at B-Tier, which means its strength will be heavily reduced.
What a lousy rule you’ve got there, stifling my genius before it can truly shine. So be it, Astrae! Don’t say that old Maximus was not cooperative. Or rather, Aurelius. He smiled, a look of ancient, predatory brilliance flashed that didn’t belong on the young face of Maximus, for if there was one thing old Aurelius loved, it was the creation of new spells and the breaking of absolute rules and laws imposed upon him, and right now he was forging something even he had never accomplished before, something entirely focused on nature’s wrathful and scorching side.
Skill Unlocked: [Verdant Starstream (B)]
Alert: Unexpected action detected. A feat greatly above the users’ level had been accomplished.
Battle Tokens earned: 4000
Verdant Starstream (B) – Call forth the unified wrath of the fundamental forces. Summon the flames of Luna, Sol, and Mother Nature herself. The three flames envelop your body, creating a shifting barrier of pale haze, searing solar heat, and thorned vines that root you in place. The barrier will hold for 10 seconds while you charge the stream.
Once the beam is charged, the barrier fades while roots bind you firmly in place, stabilizing your form as three beams weave together into a spiraling triple helix of flame. As the stream strikes its target, each beam diverges at the final millisecond, forming a triangulated point of impact that deals triple damage while ignoring a portion of the target’s defenses and devouring its energy, fueling its own spiraling intensity.
The attack sets the target ablaze and applies the Organic Inferno debuff. The target’s life force is converted into a self-sustaining green flame. Every 30 seconds, the target loses 0.5% of its maximum health. The target’s own vitality fuels this effect and cannot be removed by conventional magic or purification. Only a skill beyond this one's rank, the death of the caster, or the total consumption of the target will extinguish the Starstream’s hunger.
If the target is aligned with darkness or is a corrupted being, the damage dealt is doubled.
The skill costs 1000 Spirit and can be channeled for up to 1 minute, or as long as the caster’s focus and body endure, and carries a cooldown of 7 days.
The power of pure natural punishment is not to be wielded lightly.
“I am ready. This will be the first time I use this skill. Please move out of the way, and Jane, if you have any resource restoration spells, I will require them in a moment!” he shouted.
Sprout sensed his intent and lowered a section of the root wall while Tereza vaulted lightly to the ground.
“Red, I got you! Holy Ground, Sanctified Flame.” The entire area erupted in brilliant light while a small, candle-like flame flickered to life above Maximus’s head, forcing his seed to draw in the surrounding spirit energy at double the rate just as he began casting Verdant Starstream.
Roots burst from the ground, binding his ursine legs and shaping into a thorned barrier around him as a pale white haze descended from above, followed by a surge of blazing light that swirled around his body and condensed inches in front of the staff he gripped tightly.
Three fireballs began circling each other in a tight orbit, pale white, verdant green, and crimson-gold. “It’s almost time, Silex, Vesper, Lennox. Move!” Maximus shouted.
Silex and Vesper sprinted toward opposite ends of the massive chamber while Lennox leapt back beside Tereza, who covered their retreat by cutting down any ant that drew too close. The ant queen truly seemed to have an endless supply of children.
Whirrrrrrr
Woosh
The three flames exploded forward, twisting into one another into a triple helix. The sound that followed was unlike anything any of them had ever heard: the roar of rushing winds fused with the crackle of an unstoppable forest fire, merging into one incomprehensible surge as it tore toward the ant queen and slammed into the barrier.
In its wake, the air and the ground rippled, leaving an enormous trail of scorched earth and dead ants that drifted into ash.
As the beam launched, the barrier surrounding Maximus faded, leaving behind flickers of flame dancing across his form and roots binding his lower, still-transformed ursine body to the ground as they stabilized him.
He frowned and shifted his arms into lupine, tightening his grip on the staff, which started to crack from the overwhelming force as his spirit energy drained to a mere 100, allowing Jane’s spell to begin restoring him fast.
Sweat dripped heavily to the ground as veins bulged and slithered across his temples and fur-covered arms.
Jane stepped back as waves of heat rippled off Maximus to either side, making it painful to even approach him, her eyes trembling as she watched his strained form, barely holding itself together as the spell devoured everything it could from him.
Vesper and Silex stood off to the side, maws open as they stared in stunned silence, while Lennox dropped to one knee, exhausted, a faint smile breaking across his face as tears welled in his eyes. “Could this be my lucky break?” he muttered, while Tereza ignored him completely, her gaze locked on the barrier, her eyes shining with raw amazement.
Embi landed atop Maximus’s crimson head and began absorbing the excess heat while further amplifying the intensity of the flames.
Meanwhile, the barrier had taken the full force of the triple helix. The three beams began burrowing into it at three distinct points on a microscopic level, drilling forward like a divine auger.
The barrier surged with immense mana, even forcing the ant queen to spit out the corpse she had been chewing on as she poured more power into it, desperately reinforcing the point of impact, but the more mana that converged there, the more it dispersed outward from the wound as the beam continued its relentless advance.
Crack
Shatter
Not even thirty seconds in, the barrier shattered like it was made of glass, massive fragments crashing to the ground and detonating into waves of wild mana, while the beam powered through and struck the ant queen in the abdomen.
The ant’s armor held for a brief moment before the triple helix drilled through it, carving straight through her abdomen and erupting out the other side, and continuing through the back wall, all while igniting the queen’s enormous body in translucent, living green flames.
The flames themselves were barely visible across her massive frame, yet they continued to burn and slowly devour her from within.
Maximus fell to his knees as the beam pierced the queen, and the spell finally collapsed.
His furred hands reverted to normal while his clothes were drenched in sweat as though he had been submerged until this very moment.
He clutched his staff and summoned a handful of Cinder Seeds, swallowing hard as his hands trembled. Some seeds slipped from his grasp and struck the ground, instantly sprouting into blooming flowers, forcing a sharp gasp from him.
Jane rushed to his side and cast Restoration, easing his strain slightly. “Red, holy shit… That was insane!” she laughed almost manically. “Do you see this?” She pointed with her staff, making him slowly lift his head.
Along the path where the beam had passed, the ground was split from end to end, leaving a deep trench from which grass and flowers rapidly bloomed, carving a singular path of life through land that moments before had been utterly barren.
Maximus’s heart trembled as his vision blurred. The spell of my people… Lawful destruction that breathes life back into lands corrupted and taken from the Mother Tree…
Elves back on Veridiyum had been wardens of natural order, bringing down the Mother’s wrath upon those who defiled life, while restoring the land in the same breath. And now he had done the same, the very thing he had dreamed of since he was a young half-elf, the very thing he had been told he would never achieve. Even after mastering mortal and godly magic and creating new spells, he had never once been able to truly wield the power of purifying life.
“Maximus, wake up! This isn’t over! Rest fast and join us, Tereza, Jane, throw the bombs, then follow with more poison, and keep moving; she’s about to attack!” Lennox shouted, his resolve reignited after witnessing Maximus’s power.
Vesper sprinted toward Maximus, tossing him onto his back before nudging Jane urgently. “Boss, tell her to get on; I’ve got a bad feeling!” Vesper snarled, panic creeping into his voice.
“Jane, get on; it’s not safe,” Maximus muttered.
Jane hesitated for just a moment, forcing Sprout to lash out with vines, grabbing her and flinging her onto Vesper’s back like a sack of potatoes before slingshotting itself toward Silex just as the ant queen let out a bloodcurdling scream and unleashed a wide, cone-shaped breath of acid laced with dark emerald poison.
Vesper ignited a crimson barrier around himself, shielding the two clinging to his back, and lunged forward just as the wave of death crashed down exactly where they had been standing moments before.