Space distorted around the torrent of flame, funneling and compressing it into an imperfect orb, sending it spinning away. It jettisoned needle-thin streams of energy at random as it tumbled through the air, carving through all obstacles and igniting even the dirt underfoot. A dozen more quickly joined it as Kallio fired blasts of flame with both palms, alternating arms tirelessly as he repeated the motion with almost mechanical precision. The Warlock didn't bother aiming at the flickering white ghost that was Master White, instead choosing to simply saturate the entire area with destruction. The man was airborne more often than not as he flung himself desperately through thin gaps in the assault, robe scorched and smoking from near misses.
The rolling hills on the outskirts of Verren had become a sea of emerald flame that pooled and ran like water. It flowed between, around, and finally up the scorched and shattered hills to lap at Kallio’s feet as he reabsorbed the mana gathered within to fuel his barrage further. The gems worn by both men flared with brilliant light while they devoured the ambient energy in the air and poured it directly into the two combatants' spells. Master White’s conjured projectiles shattered the earth where they were deflected by almost physical waves of flame that rose from the growing pool under the Warlock, aided and shaped by the Riftwalker's innate abilities.
“You'll soon perish if you allow the flames to continue to build. I have already revealed the essential mechanism of their propagation.”, Kallio called over the rolling thunder of the flechettes' impact as they blew apart the ground behind him, "As they devour physical matter it is converted into pure mana. If your mastery is as you say, allow the Seed to absorb them."
"I DON'T NEED YOUR PITY, AND I'M NOT FALLING FOR THAT!”, White roared as he blurred into view above the Warlock. His forearms and legs shone with brilliant white mana before he launched himself into a diving attack, rolling his body through the tendrils of emerald flame that rose to meet him, narrowly slipping through the gap. A lance of crackling white energy extended from his right hand and he speared it towards the Warlock with all his speed and momentum behind the blow.
Kallio’s burning gaze was disinterested as he leaned back, the staff in his right hand planted firmly into the pool of fire below him. Emerald flame swirled like water down a drain where the weapon touched the pool as Virax greedily devoured the mass of energy and converted it within his body. As the flickering lance descended the staff pulsed in response, causing the attack to bend weirdly and pass harmlessly to the Warlock's left. White detonated the weapon in response, forcing the Warlock to shield himself from the blast as he allowed the explosion to push him away before Kallio could launch a counterattack.
Master White flipped before he hit the ground, extinguishing the clawing flames below him with a pulse of mana from the Seed before his feet touched the earth. He panted heavily as his mangled right hand slowly began to stitch itself back together from the hastily overloaded attack, dark blood running thickly onto the ground only to sizzle and smoke from the residual heat.
“You'd be dead ten times if it wasn't for that Demon saving you.", White growled when his hand finally came back together with a wet crunching sound. He clenched it into a fist several times with a pained expression before reigniting the mana blade he had preferred from the start of the fight, its twin quickly appearing in White's left hand as he sunk into a ready stance and appeared to consider his next avenue of attack.
“I admit to a certain curiosity about these new Mana Arts you claimed to have honed in my absence.”, Kallio replied with contempt, "A pity you overestimated your ability. I will remind you when Dawn approaches. My servants approach. You have accomplished nothing but to shame your Council and provide me with another Seed.”
White glanced behind him at the setting Moon with a grim expression before turning back to the Warlock, “Aye, I'm starting to think Dvallin is the lying bastard you make him out to be. I'll give you that.”
White restored the flickering white armor that enfolded his forearms and legs before pushing the spell further, the panels of mana expanding to encompass his torso, biceps, and shoulders before finally sliding up over his head. The radiance began to swell, and Kallio was forced to channel mana into his eyes as the man's armor shone like a tiny sun, his light striking away the darkness from the sky. Kallio quickly found that even mana sight did not mitigate the blinding effects of the man's armor as it continued to grow in power.
With a mental shrug, Kallio shut his eyes, the perpetual green flame within his empty sockets winking out. He extended his senses out around himself, slowly integrating the ebb and swell of the emerald flames burning around him and across the terrain into his consciousness. A strange kind of awareness began to fill his mind, painting a very different picture of the battlefield before him. A dense ball of violent intent smeared the void outside of his flames, probing tendrils of white mana revealed suddenly as they slithered through the air toward him.
Flame leaped into the air to meet them as Kallio began to cycle mana through the gemstone in his circlet, each repetition further increasing the density of the mana within. He continued to feed the mana absorbed by the gem back into itself in an ever-strengthening loop as he slashed toward the smear of intent at the end of his perception. Flame surged forward according to his will, moving like a wave across the ground before it was blown apart by Master White’s counterspell.
“How long can you maintain that, I wonder?"
“I’d ask you the same thing, but the answer is probably long-winded and has a history lesson tacked onto the end.", Master White replied from directly behind the Warlock.
Virax reacted faster than Kallio but not quickly enough to intercept the overcharged beam of flickering energy that inverted the colors of reality for a moment as it fired. Emerald flame surged uselessly upwards to be vaporized by the incoming attack that struck the Warlock squarely in the back, blasting him out of his pool of fire and sending him plowing through a nearby hill in an explosion of debris. A pillar of light soon followed, striking down and blowing a massive crater into the ground where the hill had been only seconds before.
“Yeah, that would be one of those new Mana Arts I was talking about. I call it ‘Autonomous Mana Circuitry’. Don't know why you thought I'd stay inside the giant target. Here, the Seed can support some more too, it's very efficient.", White taunted from atop the hill Kallio had stood upon as chunks of earth rained loudly down around him.
Three more suits of armor manifested around the man as plants began to crackle and smoke from the sheer brilliance of the light that now filled the stretch of countryside. Shadows flew away into the distance behind Master White as the constructs ignited their mana blades and began to advance on the crater where the Warlock struggled to stand, a dark red orb slowly disintegrated into rubble in the air above him as chunks of the rare item fell to the ground destroyed. Kallio leaned heavily on the staff and levered himself up from the ground to face his enemy, visible only as four smears of violent white light through his mana senses.
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“Well struck. I admire the usefulness of your technique.", Kallio rasped as he was forced to absorb the entire contents of the gem upon his brow to begin regenerating the damage he had sustained. He stood straighter as the mana flooded through him and restored his strength, his body healing rapidly.
“No use begging, I warned you. Any last words before I put you down?"
Kallio turned his empty sockets towards the voice as the blinding constructs began to encircle him at the direction of their creator he replied, “You have my sincere apology Puppetmaster. Yours is an art for which I have great respect. Of all the Mana Constructs I have ever encountered, yours are the most advanced by far. Thius himself would be envious of this spell.”
"You keep talking about these people like I should know who they are. Thius…something to do with fire right? Seems like a lot of you old fuckers liked fire. Makes sense, you did just figure out banging rocks together back then.”, White continued to mock him as he completed his encirclement, "Anything actually important to say?”
Kallio let out a long breath as he held the Darkstaff loosely in his right hand, arm extended and weapon held vertically before him.
“Oversoul: Virax."
The weapon wavered in the air like a mirage before disappearing entirely, spiraling into Kallio’s palm only to vanish entirely in an instant. The Warlock's form began to shift as well, the edges of his body flickering and blurred as fire reignited in his eyes. It burned black and cold, casting no light as he regarded the constructs calmly, no longer hindered by their debilitating radiance. Master White’s eyes narrowed suspiciously as he directed the constructs to attack in unison with a mental command, springing away from the group of figures with all his speed.
The constructs vanished in a crack of parted air, a menagerie of conjured weapons descending towards him where he stood unarmed. The Warlock turned his head slightly to the left, the tiny movement somehow bringing him past the ring of constructs while the area he had occupied blew apart under their combined attack. Another slight shift of his weight took him even farther past the ring of enemies as Master White’s eyes widened in shock, his head beginning to turn to track Kallio when he squeezed through the space between them with a simple retraction of his fist. The Warlock’s feet were still firmly planted unmoving on the ground as the backhanded strike landed on the Puppetmaster, the man’s body compressing under the blow for a moment before it vanished with a pop, only to be replaced by one of the four armored constructs.
The armor was blown away as though struck by a falling mountain, spellframe unraveling under the force of the impact to dissolve into a glitter of white mana that slowly vanished into the air. Kallio remained stationary and retracted his arm, warping away with the movement to reappear a few dozen feet away facing the group of constructs now positioned defensively around their conjuror. Master White grimaced in anger as Kallio calmly regarded him over the distance between them.
“I will repay your respect, I call this technique an ‘Oversoul’.”, Kallio’s voice warbled weirdly through the air, changing in volume and pitch seemingly at random, “Its primary function is to temporarily merge Demon and Warlock. It is primarily an offensive skill that rewards vast amounts of killing potential at the cost of the user's life force.”
“...but you’re already dead.”
“Correct, this is the exact technique that cost me my life. Since my reawakening I have found that it no longer damages me in such a way, a costly and regretful revelation I assure you.”, Kallio tilted his head and shifted a bit closer with the movement, “I would have simply killed myself to avert the side-effects that cost me…and by extension Atemu, much suffering.”
“Ward Release: Level Zero!”, Master White shouted suddenly, a spellframe dissolving away from his choker as Kallio watched with interest.
“I will not allow you to flee if that is what you were attempting. This area is currently under the influence of the Oversoul, any attempt to leave will bring us both back to this location.”
White gritted his teeth and quickly reformed the destroyed construct, the four puppets dashing away towards the Warlock as he summoned another set of armor to cover himself and launched himself to attack as well. Kallio struck out with his right hand, skeletal fingers tipped with black fire as he impacted the first construct before it had truly begun to accelerate. The armor yielded under the blow, sheared in half as it was blown away in two separate directions. Ribbonlike strands of mana extended from the arms and legs of the constructs before they threw themselves through the air at inhuman speed, spinning as the ribbons of mana tore through the air and dissolved the broken ground beneath them as they hurtled towards their target. Kallio shifted his left foot outwards, dirt exploding under him in a long furrow away from his foot as his form rippled like a disturbed reflection, the constructs passing through him harmlessly only to slam violently into the ground as though crushed by a great weight.
Kallio lifted his right leg for a violent stomp, appearing above the first construct with the motion and crushing it swiftly, motes of white light exploding away from the crater left by the impact. He ducked under twin beams of light fired from two more constructs, appearing above the second downed suit of armor and finishing it with a blast of dark fire that consumed both the armor and a large chunk of the earth below it. The constructs rapidly rematerialized in formation with the remaining two as Master White brought up the rear, amassing a huge amount of mana with the Seed at his throat while he attempted to buy more time for whatever he was planning. Kallio flickered in and out of sight through repeating beams of light, crackling bolts of brilliant lighting, and clouds of flechettes that all failed to intercept the Warlock as he rapidly crossed the distance to the group.
A single strike blew apart three constructs as Kallio’s clawed hand appeared to smear through the air without any regard for the intervening distance between the three targets. White continued to gather and compress mana in his choker, recycling it similarly to Kallio’s previous technique. The man did not move a single inch as Kallio’s skeletal claw swept into him, yielding only faint resistance before he vanished, the construct that replaced him shredded as though struck by many blades and sent spraying away in a glow of energy. Kallio’s gaze swept to the right, witnessing White throw both hands into the air, an enormous pillar of white energy blasting away into the sky above them.
The beam traveled upwards rapidly, slowly condensing into an orb as it ascended. When it was just a dot in the sky it ballooned outwards, becoming a slowly expanding ring that grew and grew, swelling to a massive size as something stirred in the center of the forming Gate. Energy condensed in the middle of the ring, a brilliant point of negative light that suddenly diffused to fill the ring with an impenetrable white light that shattered as glass as a metallic prow exploded through.
A titanic airship thundered through the gate, mana cannons alight with power, promising total annihilation as the huge triangular craft stabilized itself in the air and blotted out the stars above them while Master White began to laugh.
“Ah, I’d been wondering what happened to that.”