The person on the ground in front of him was a young woman, covered in severe burns, and now taking in shallow breaths. She had the plague on her, but Eric’s touch transferred the antiplague to her, and it receded from her body before sloughing off and withering away in a hiss of yellowish smoke.
Infected dungeon divers, Eric thought as he grabbed her wrist.
He found a symbol, as he expected, and then threw it to the ground.
Well, she was under the plague god’s control.
[A coordinated assault. Drake to draw you out and weaken you while burning resources, and then a ground ambusher.]
Eric nodded and scanned the environment for any more enemies, but saw nothing with his Reaper’s Flamesight. But, it seemed that the Trait had limitations—it couldn’t see people covered by a Skill like what Shannon had, something to turn them both invisible and undetectable. Eric knew that was the case, because he saw no footsteps anywhere nearby.
She must be a Stalker-type, Eric thought. With Fire Mage as one of her other Classes. Nasty combo.
He stood up and considered just leaving her there, but she wasn’t in her right mind. If he left her, she would probably get back home safely in time. He opted to instead reach into his storage dimension, grab rope, and tie her up. Then, he got her upright, and dragged her to a snow mound. Propping her up against it, he activated his earring to contact the Spymaster. “Persim, are you there?”
A few seconds of silence passed, then she came back, “What do you need, Eric?”
“I dealt with a drake controlled by our problem in Elyndor’s crust.”
“A drake? I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised.”
Eric stood up and crossed his arms as he looked at his assailant. “I was then ambushed by some type of Fire Mage, also under control of our hidden problem. I got her alive. My Skyknight escort and his Alicorn were killed by the drake, and I need a pickup for me and my prisoner.”
“Shit. Okay, where are you?”
Eric looked up at the sky and manifested Blackflame in his palm. “Go south of the city. I was five hours away by Alicorn.”
“Fucking…I’m scrambling the air force to find you and bring you back.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
***
Eric’s prisoner remained unconscious until the Skyknights found him thanks to his channeling of Blackflame—which he could keep up indefinitely given his mana regeneration rate. After getting mounted up with his prisoner in tow, who was still unconscious, he took a vial from the Skyknight and fed it to her. It was a sedative, to make sure she stayed unconscious, until they got back to the cells.
During the flight back, Eric went through his milestones:
[You have leveled up!]
[You have 5 level-ups to process.]
[Blackflame Arcanist 246, 247, 248, 249, 250.]
[Level 250 in Blackflame Arcanist reached! Gain access to a new Skill. You may equip your new Skill on your Loadout by spending one hour doing low-impact activities.]
[Level 250 in Blackflame Arcanist reached! Gain access to a new Trait.]
-----
New Skill:
Fireflight 1 - This Skill costs 1 Sigil for each minute of sustained use. The user gains the ability to fly at the same speed they are capable of moving at. Any momentum from Flashstep movement may be kept to accelerate, or not, as the user wills.
-----
New Trait:
Flickering Thoughts 1 - The user’s mind is difficult to trick, impair, or otherwise meddle with. Skills, Rotes, or other abilities that affect the user’s mind are 10% easier to resist.
-----
[Choose a Skill and Trait to increase. Then repeat this four times.]
All five into Bristling Bastion, then all five into Flickering Thoughts.
[Confirmed.]
[[Armored] Bristling Bastion is at Rank Sovereign 10. Maximum Rank achieved. Primordializing and resetting.]
-----
Skills:
[Armored] Bristling Bastion P1 - Enemies in the cloud have a [30%] miss chance when using anything hostile to the user. The user and allies within the cloud of ash have the mana cost of Rotes reduced by [61%].
-----
Traits:
Flickering Mind 6 - The user’s mental resistance bonus increases to [60%].
-----
I am so close to finishing out Bristling Bastion, Eric thought as he lowered his wrist.
[You are. Then, combining with Cinderscale Shroud, yes?]
That’s the plan.
Eric leaned back to enjoy the ride.
***
Upon arriving at the citadel, Eric directed the Skyknight to land in the training field, and then met a heavy troop of guards alongside the Spymaster. “Got her here,” Eric said as he handed over the prisoner.
Persim nodded curtly, and gestured for Eric to follow her inside. He did so, and the two escorted the prisoner down to the cells which had seen Eric’s executing of traitors not too long ago. They chained the woman up, and then as they waited for her to rouse, Persim looked Eric over. “You look in good shape despite fighting a drake.”
Eric shrugged. “I am focused in my build.” He grabbed his Silence Node and activated it, and the sphere of black and white mana surged out from him. “It’s a benefit of being in The Paths in a prior timeline,” Eric added. “I was able to figure out what the most powerful Trait was at my disposal. Already got it past Primal and incorporated it.”
Persim shook her her head in seeming disbelief. “You are growing in power quickly.”
Eric shot a sidelong glance at her. “Darius reached level four-hundred by the time he was twenty-two. And he wasn’t going after the mega dungeon as hard as we are.”
“Fair point, but still, you’ve been here for such a short time, and already are what level?”
“Two-hundred and fifty,” Eric replied, feeling some pride at the statement.
Persim let out a whistle. “Depths below. I should consider going into the mega dungeon.”
“Get a good group to go with you,” Eric replied as he stood up straighter. “She’s coming to.”
The prisoner roused from her unconsciousness and pulled against the shackles that kept her pinned to the wall.
Persim said, “Try any Sigil or Rote, and you die. Cooperate, and you might live out your life in a labor camp.” A golden spark emanated from her, then pulsed to fill the area so that no lie could be told, and the truth was compelled.
Eric felt it, tickling at his mind, but thanks to his new Trait, knew he would have an easier time bypassing it.
Handy, he thought, for when the diplomatic meeting occurs and the Judge is present once more.
The woman’s blue eyes bored into Eric. “Where am I?” she asked.
“In a safe place,” Eric coyly replied. “You attacked me. Why?”
The woman looked up at the ceiling, then at her bindings. “I could break out of here right now.”
Eric held up Blackflame in his palm. “If you try, you die.”
The woman’s hands glowed crimson, and Eric unleashed a Blackflame Evocation at her skull, incinerating it to a crisp. As Persim turned and began speaking, Eric used Nothing’s Certain and Blacksteel Healing to restore her soul and body, respectfully. The woman took in a breath.
“What in the depths, Eric?” Persim whispered.
He looked over at her, leaned in, and whispered, “I’ll fill you in later.” Then he pulled back from Persim and walked up to the now-panicking and shaking woman. “Now then, you have seen the abyss of death, and know that we have the ability to bring you back from it. So, what will it be? Indescribable pain and being brought back to re-experience it? Or, talk, and be left alone?”
The woman immediately said, “Tersirin! I was hired by Tersirin’s council to kill the Blackflame wielding Summoned!”
Persim regained her composure and asked, “How did you know where he was?”
“A…voice…then I was flying…and then dropped off to hide…and finally I saw a drake die, and knew it was my time to attack.”
Interesting, Eric thought. The people the plague god controls seem to be in a fugue state.
“To be clear,” Eric said, “You are an assassin, sent by a city-state, to kill me?”
“Yes,” the woman replied as she focused her gaze on him. She was wide-eyed, terrified, like an animal readying for the slaughter who knew its end was nigh.
Eric looked at Persim. “Well, we got our answer.”
She nodded curtly and then looked back to the prisoner. “You’ll be kept under heavy guard. Level, Classes, and other important information. Now.”
The woman let out a sigh of relief, as if she knew her execution was stayed. “Pyromancer one-hundred and twenty, Assassin fifty-eight, Ash-Keeper fifty-one. Overall, two-hundred-twenty-nine.”
Eric knew that people like her existed. While the majority population of Elyndor maybe peaked in the low-one-hundreds, anyone who really dedicated themselves to their Class and tried their hardest to accelerate its growth through meeting milestones or venturing into dungeons could easily get up in levels. “How old are you?” Eric asked.
“Twenty-four,” she replied.
Eric nodded and walked away, down the corridor. Persim followed him, and a few queen’s guards filtered past them at Persim’s wave of command. The duo went into a separate room and Persim shut the door, then gestured to a chair. Once both were seated, she said, “You can bring people back from death?”
Eric nodded. “If they died within ten seconds, and the body is partially intact.”
Persim tented her hands and asked, “Why did you let the king die?”
The golden aura was still active, and Eric chose to try his ability to lie in it. A small lie, but still a half-truth. As the words formed in his mouth, he felt a pressure on his temples that vanished after a fraction of a second. “He was under Alp’s control, and his body was already frail and dying.”
He thought, Good, the partial truth worked. I wasn’t compelled.
Then, he continued, “Plus, the king didn’t owe me favors. Amber did. If she is on the throne, then my position is much stronger. Granted, knight-errant was an honor I didn’t expect or anticipate.”
Persim let out a slow breath. “Well…you’re not wrong. Richard was dying, we all could see that.” She stood up and walked over to him, standing over him. “You still positioned yourself to be in a very advantageous political position.”
Eric stood up, and she backed up to let him without issue. “You know why. War, Titan…the better positioned I am, the better off we all are.”
“Why choose Misty?”
That question caught Eric off guard. “What?”
“Why choose Misty Baxter? Amber is attracted to you: she said as much.”
Eric’s mental resistance slipped due to the sudden, out of nowhere question, and he blurted out, “Because I had options and needed to pick someone I loved and would help my plans.”
“Wouldn’t the future-Queen have been the perfect person for that, then?”
Eric couldn’t fault the logic, yet he didn’t really know Amber very well at all. He knew Misty from the now-extinct future timeline. He knew Xera from then, also, and Luciana—though it was brief. He had never really known Amber, because she was never much of a factor in the going-ons of Trok. “Maybe,” Eric replied. “But I knew practically nothing about the Queen in the other timeline.”
Persim nodded curtly. “Ah. Well, I suppose being prince consort would make travel difficult, as well.” She looked at the door. “Well, we have duties to attend to. The Allied Cities—”
“Just one of them,” Eric replied, not wanting to go to open war.
“Right, still, that’s one of two cities who want to see you punished for interrupting their trade. We have an assassin in our dungeon who can attest to the fact. I’m taking what we heard right to Queen Amber.”
“Don’t take us to war,” Eric said.
“Index forbid,” Persim replied. “We won’t. Or, rather, Trok won’t start a war if I have any say in the matter. But, sending a few messages to those cities, telling them in broad terms that we have proof of their attempted assassination…it might push them to a more cautious approach. Expect more people to come after you. I’m doubling your spy coverage.”
“Not for me,” Eric countered. “The other Summoned? Sure. Misty? Absolutely. But not me—I have a contingent Skill that will keep me from suffering a lethal blow. I was able to handle a drake all on my own.” He grimaced. “Well, almost. We lost a Skyknight.”
“A blow, to be sure,” Persim replied.
“Did he have a family?”
Persim shook her head. “No, the young man did not.” She opened the door and departed, heading to the left, deeper into the citadel.
Eric deactivated his Silence Node, went right, and headed to the stairs. He began typing on his bracer as he headed up and out, down the boulevards of the upper-city, and made his way toward the Summoned estate. He filled in all of his allies on what occurred.
Naomi replied, [We will all have to be more cautious. I’ll try to make some type of…emergency system that deploys when our spouses and others we hold valuable are threatened. I can incorporate it into their bracers.]
Eric typed back, [I’ll grab everyone’s Monster Parts, and take them to Mama K’s.]
[Sounds good,] Shannon replied.
Eric got to the estate quickly enough, went to Naomi, and she transferred all of the Monster Parts to him. As Eric went down to the lower-city, he felt on-edge. One assassin had come after him, and more would doubtless pursue him and try to take his life. Thanks to the heavy snows of winter, most people who didn’t have to move about, weren’t. The streets were kept clear by sweepers, and only in between their patrols did a light dusting hit the ground.
Eric made it to the crevasse leading to the Twilight Depths Concourse, and went right to Mama K’s refinery. After some chat, catching up, and general politeness, Eric came away with a lot of Components. The moment they went into his storage dimension, they vanished—transported through some linked network to Naomi’s workshop. Thanks to his allies’ actions in the mega dungeon, they came away with a lot more Dark Elf and Spider Ashes than Eric anticipated.
-----
x1 Epic Component, x60 Peerless Component, x342 Remarkable Component
-----
Naomi’s words appeared on the bracer. [Bad news: contingent ‘safety spheres’ like what I had planned on are not viable. I’ll work on alternatives. Permission to earmark the Peerless, Epic, and one-hundred-and-two Remarkable Components?]
[Sure,] Shannon typed back.
Peter’s reply came through next. [Sounds good.]
Eric also answered in the affirmative. [We each get sixty Remarkable, then?]
[Yes,] Naomi replied. [I’ll put them into each of your storage dimensions.]
Eric nodded and looked up at Mama K, who had been staring at him with curiosity. “Thanks for the refining,” he said.
She leaned forward. “Communication that doesn’t require talking. Instant letter-writing. I knew Naomi was special: that’s an advanced type of Gear. Tier three.”
“I’m aware,” Eric replied.
“She should consider opening up a shop. I can get her a storefront.”
Eric smiled at that. “Maybe when she’s done revolutionizing Trok.” He bowed. “Thank you for your help.” He departed with a wave, and headed back to the Summoned estate. When he got back, he made for Naomi’s workshop, descended the ladder, and found her working on some massive, metal engine that looked like a car’s. It was easily twelve feet tall and quite long, covering the length of that side of the building. “Hey, can you help me out?”
Naomi looked back down at him, clothes covered in grease. “Sure,” she said as she climbed down from her perch, then walked up next to Eric and looked up at the machine. “Manafold engine. It’s going to power the whole rail network.”
“Why here?” Eric asked.
Naomi looked at him. “Well, I’ll have substations, of course, in other places. But, having a single node where I can shut down the whole operation keeps it in my control. Sure, I have to be alive for it to work at all…but if someone found a workaround, well, we have an actual physical ‘off’ switch. Always have backups and failsafes.” She frowned. “Even with three, my sister still died in our full-dive experiment. I’m not going any less than five failsafes for anything I design that isn’t bound to our DNA.” She tapped her bracer. “Like these. We die? They turn to sludge.”
Eric stopped her at that. “You all have died.”
Naomi rolled her eyes. “When a specific amount of time has passed without a heartbeat. I counted for near-death or partial-death experiences.” She walked over to a workbench that was clear of everything save for her mana-fueled power tools. “Now, what did you want?”
“I’ve got my Tier seven Dungeon Core, and my Components. I want to use them.”
Naomi nodded. “Alright. What did you want to use them on?”
Eric tapped both earrings he was wearing. “Can we use the Components on these?”
Naomi shook her head. “Nope. Those weren’t made by me. Communication devices are finicky and follow different rules: only the person who made the sets or added to the network can alter the devices.”
Eric frowned. “Well then, other mage-specific Gear would be useful. I just got a flight-based Skill—”
She looked at him with shock marred by envy. “What? Fucking lucky!” She stomped over to an armor mannequin and with a flash of light-blue, her armor appeared on it. “I’ve been trying to get flight for days on this thing!”
Eric frowned, then looked down at his left hand and his Sigils. “I wonder why Blackflame can enable flight, but your Makerspark can’t?”
Naomi crossed her arms. “I can only get it to hover.”
Eric offered his Components to her. “Well, maybe you just need more of this. How much has been going into the rail network versus your Skill-based Gear here?”
Naomi looked at him, then her face went flush. “You…you sure?”
Eric nodded. “I can’t think of any Gear I need right now, and Body Enhancements can’t be affected by Components…I don’t think.”
“You’re right about that,” Naomi replied with a grin. “Thanks, Eric.”
“Speaking of Body Enhancements,” Eric said, “I have my Dungeon Core, and want to upgrade mine.”
“Whatcha thinking?”
Eric put a hand on his chin. “Well, I’ve got the Tarrasque Nervous System, my bones, my eyes, and my stomach—those are all not affected yet.”
“Hmm…bones could be neat.”
“If you can do it without cutting me open.”
“Strip.”
Eric did so, and handed Naomi the Dungeon Core. Without any muss or fuss, she shoved it against his chest, and then light-blue lightning crackled out from her palm, coursed over Eric’s body, and made him feel ticklish. Then, itchy, and that itchy feeling went into his skin, and down deep before vanishing.
-----
Steelbone Infusion (T7) {Regenerating} - Replaces the user's skeletal structure. This results in the user's bones becoming incredibly difficult to break.{Any breaks, fractures, or other damage to the skeletal system is mended over time}.
-----
Eric began putting his clothes and Gear back on. “Neat. I mean, I can heal myself, but—”
“You don’t understand that, then,” Naomi interrupted. “You might have a time where you can’t heal yourself. Perhaps you get knocked out. Having your bones back in shape is incredibly useful.”
“Well, I’ll be conscious—”
“You’re telling me there aren’t Skills that can knock you out?”
Eric scratched his head. “Well, there are. A good poison would do the trick. Granted, Neversick Slime protects us from anything that doesn’t cause instant-unconsciousness: and those poisons are few and far between.”
“But they exist,” Naomi replied. “And we don’t have a defense against it right now.”
Eric shook his head. “No, we don’t.” He grimaced. “And honestly we don’t have anything for mental defense—though I gained a Trait that seems like it goes in that direction.”
Naomi sighed and tapped her foot a few times. “I can’t make Gear for anything to do with mind stuff. We need Traits to block that. But poison? I’m sure there’s something like a universal anti-poison that can be turned into a Body Enhancement and then installed.”
“It exists,” Eric replied. “But it requires manticore venom. Good luck getting that.”
“How rare is it?”
“I think there’s a handful across the whole mountain range behind Tenebria.” Eric rubbed his left bicep, where he had been stabbed by one and almost died in his past timeline, despite his numerous anti-death abilities as an Exarch. “Just trust me…they’re tough sons of bitches. If we can get the venom? Great.”
Naomi’s eye glittered with something Eric couldn’t place. She said, “Oh, I’ll get my hands on that one way or another. You just wait.” She then pointed to the ladder. “Now, out! I want some me time.”
Eric acquiesced and clambered up the ladder, shut the trapdoor, and then went back into the main house.
***
The day and evening passed and Eric with the other Summoned and their spouses played their tabletop rpg before retiring. The next morning, the fifth of winter, the Summoned kitted themselves out and headed back to the Twilight Depths.
Eric slid down the rope and said, “Eighth,” as the floor prompt came up. As he slid down the rope the rest of the way, he entered a vast, purple-colored swamp. He was standing on top of a large dirt mound.
Peter had gotten down before him and was taking in the environment. “Fuck, it’s just a giant marsh.”
Shannon slid down a second later and her nose wrinkled. “Bleh. Smells horrid in here.”
Naomi came down last. She said nothing, but activated her futuristic-appearing power-armor, and then began hovering a good three feet above the dirt. “Well, at least I can stay out of the muck,” she said.
Shannon looked up at her. “Fucking lucky,” she grumbled as she activated her serpentine-dragon defensive form.
Eric chuckled and spent one of his twenty-five Sigils to activate Bristling Bastion, and then activated Cinderscale Shroud. Peter followed suit a moment later with his defensive augmentation, and the group, led by the hulking, armored man, set out into the swamp, following the trail of floating glowstones. Naomi hovered at the back, just trailing.
“Wonder what we’re going to fight here?” Peter asked.
“No idea,” Eric replied. “But, swamps have all manner of creatures. Expect poison mist, diseases, and all types of nasty stuff.”
They walked through the mire and muck, and after passing a log that was partially submerged, Peter slipped down to chest deep. “Eww,” the man said as he held his hammer and shield above his shoulders. “Fucking gross! It slipped into my armor!”
Eric activated his heat vision but didn’t see anything that gave off a signature. “Well, we have to keep following the glowstones” he said. They were floating atop the murky bog, couched inside little nests of some type of swamp-dwelling bird.
“Yeah, I know,” Peter replied as he sloshed forward. His silver barriers popped into place around everyone, and the group followed after him. All except Naomi, who hovered above the surface. Peter began to say, “I think it’s just a shitty walk—” and was cut off as something yanked him under the surface of the bog.
Eric immediately activated Substitution Shield, and heard the hiss of the muck around him boiling from the Blackflame-based mana barrier. He reached around in front of him for Peter, and felt something hard. Grabbing it, he yanked up, but it didn’t want to budge.
Then, something grabbed Eric’s leg, and he was yanked down below the sludge as well. He had managed to snag a breath before going under, and was pulled to his left. Reaching down, he tried to grab whatever had clutched his leg, but he couldn’t feel it. Or, rather, he felt the pressure on his limb, but his hands found no purchase.
Then, it let go. The pressure was gone, and he was able to breach the surface. Looking around, he didn’t see his allies. “Naomi! Shannon!” Eric yelled out, but no one replied.
Okay, we’re split up, Eric thought. Part of the chamber, I assume.
His mana shield fluctuated and his reservoir dipped as something slammed into his left flank. Turning that way, he saw nothing.
Invisible, undetectable, tentacle-based swamp monster. Irritating.
Eric stood still and used Mana Channel, building up his reservoir to max, and sustaining it further to overfill it. The flow-over caused his spheres of blackflame to crystallize around him thanks to Burning Reservoir, and they floated in place. Once he had ten of them, he activated Blackflame Breath, pushing all of the orbs into the potent Rote as he spun in place.
The outpouring scorched away and solidified the mud as it dropped a few inches, all moisture drained from it in an instant. Blackflame Blaze ignited along the invisible creature, and all Eric could make out was a pile of tendrils: like a bush that was floating atop the muck and had some root structure expanding down, but had sinuous vine-whips that flailed about. He kept up his Rote, and within a few seconds the monster turned to ashes.
“Help!” Naomi shouted.
Eric turned, trying to find her, and spotted her a good two-hundred feet away. She was being grappled by the invisible creature, but still maintained her hover above the swamp. Dents and impact marks were left all over her mechanical suit of armor. Her MAB on her shoulder was firing down at the thing, and Eric saw the crackling energy cascade over it as it writhed in pain.
How did I not see her earlier? Eric thought.
[Seems to be that the chamber dragged each of you into an isolated encounter, and as you clear it, you can access the challenge of the ally most in need.]
Eric unleashed Blackflame Evocation from his grimoire at the place right below Naomi’s legs, igniting the monster. She looked sideways at him and said, “About time!”
Eric ignored her and moved closer as he kept firing off his Rote, and when he got within range, he used Blackflame Breath to stack up the Blackflame Blaze all the quicker. Within ten seconds, the monster was turned to Ashes, and Eric scanned for his next ally.
He saw Shannon, who was neck-deep, and seemed to be struggling to pull away from her monster. But then Peter blipped into place behind her, and he chopped down with his hammer-turned-sword. Shannon was able to get free, and then she fired off a mana-based bolt into the swamp while Peter kept chopping.
Eric made sure to tag the monster with a Blackflame Evocation, outlining its body, and the group took the thing down with ease. “Good job,” Eric said. “Anyone hurt?”
Shannon groaned aloud. “I got squeezed hard.”
Eric used a Blacksteel Healing on each of his allies, and then started to say, “Well, that was pretty easy—” and was gripped by something invisible once more. But, this time, his allies stayed within line of sight, and he was fully encompassed from ankle to torso. It squeezed down, and Eric let out a cry of pain as the crushing force was strong enough to drain all of his mana away down to nothing thanks to his shield. And, it also completely destroyed his Bristling Bastion, and the knockback seemed to have no effect. The reactive bolts viewed it as one attack, so only one retaliatory impact struck the monster.
It was so fast, so immediate, that Eric couldn’t even use Mana Channel to counter the crush to keep his shield going.
Flashstep auto-activated, but he couldn’t move, and instead he had to use Substitution Shield’s once-per-activation teleport effect. He appeared fifty feet back, and saw his clone stay put in the monster’s invisible grip.
You fucker, Eric thought.
He had enough mana trickling in from the one active burn that he was able to use Blackflame Breath, and for good measure, a Blackmana Beam for a Sigil—down to twenty-two. The beam of energy tore through the invisible creature while the torrent of breath covered the thing.
That brought the outline into view: it was some type of blob with pseudopods that constricted around the ash clone but didn’t seem to know that it was not a target worth attacking. With a visible foe, Peter’s weapon blazed with silver and crimson light, and he began chopping into it. Shannon’s cylinder on her crossbow rotated, and she fired off a drill-tip explosive bolt which vanished, then exploded inside the thing. Naomi’s MAB was firing off lightning blasts, but those seemed to do little.
“It’s a plant!” Naomi said. “That explains why electricity does practically nothing.”
Eric’s stacks on the thing were high, and he knew that it was only a matter of time before they won. But, Peter was grappled by something from behind, and the invisible foe lifted him into the air and squeezed—Eric could see the armor crunching inward.
Why didn’t his redirect work on me earlier? he thought.
[It’s not active. You can’t see it, but the silver bubble is gone.]
Fucking dungeon, countering our Skills to make it more of a challenge.
[Only mega dungeons have this behavior.]
It’s still bullshit!
Peter’s body exploded with a brass-colored light as one of his Resonator Class Skills was used, reflecting damage suffered, and he was dropped into the muck of the swamp. The silvery bubbles appeared around everyone, and Peter shouted, “Eric! AOE!”
Eric obliged, using another Sigil—down to twenty-two—and used Erupting Cinderstorm. The bead of Blackflame surged out right above Peter, then detonated. The area then rained more Blackflame in droplets, that hit the ground and then erupted skyward.
The AOE revealed the outlines of three more of the monsters, and they were all within reach by this point. One snagged Naomi from the air and slammed her down into the surface of the muck before shoving her under. Another went for Shannon, but she dodged it.
Eric’s reaction and nervous system was able to kick in, and he avoided the strike as well. “Shannon! Infinite feedback each one!”
She managed to fire off a series of shots within the span of a second, tagging each foe with Netherdark and setting off the loop. At that point, the conclusion was foregone. Eric knew that they would win, he just had to keep everyone alive.
Eric dove into the muck and managed to find Naomi thanks to his heat vision. He grabbed her, felt the tendril that was squeezing her midsection, and used Blackflame Evocation to burn it. He managed to burn it off from the main mass, and dragged her up to breach the surface, where she gasped for air.
Peter was hard at work, sword elongated with some Skill as it left behind shimmering trails of silver and brass, as it cut into the flaming bodies and sliced through tendrils.
Eric felt an incoming blow and dodged it, dragging Naomi with him, as he got out of reach of the monster. Turning back to face it, he used another breath on it and seared it to a crisp, rejuvenating himself and his allies.
After a tense ten seconds of fighting, the conclusion came to fruition, and the monsters all lay slain, with spheres of ashes floating atop the mire.
“That sucked,” Naomi said as she spat out mud.
Next Chapter >