Chapter 29:
As the creature rose out of the depths, it formed an extremely dramatic tableau. With myself to the left of it with Boone, and Mia somewhat to the right. It was shadowed and dark beneath the lip of the rising platform, but there was enough light from my [Dawnslight] ball and the ambient light of the Runeslight from above that I started to see the outline of massive, coiled muscles and a mishmash of parts. Something, perhaps fear or misplaced courage, perhaps the writhing ball of angry essence that was taking space within my head, kept me standing right where I was.
“Arcadia, this doesn't seem like the wisest place to stand.” Boone said, taking a couple of nervous steps back as the floor continued to rise not fifteen feet away from us. Closer. Let us Rage the voice replied, and the effect the anger had on me was potent and heady. I felt myself strain to move forward, to rush headlong into the dark. Boone even clamped his teeth into my trousers leg and tried to pull me away when I didn't respond to his urging. I felt myself activate all my transformation abilities together for the first time, including the latest from the Taurus Constellation; And despite their disparate nature, they began to make sense.
Boone was forced off of my trousers in a rather poor way, as my unenchanted clothing didn't survive the latest changes to my body, as with the sound of ripping cloth and popping leather stitches, my trousers and boots were destroyed in the transformation of my legs, accompanied by the FlashFire roar of blue Foxfire.
I rocked on my footing as my legs and feet changed, my whole body position moving with it. My legs became longer, digitigrade, and furred in bright pink, coarse hair. I looked down in the half second of change to see my feet warp and combine and shift, before the Foxfire that covered my transformations covered the limbs, and almost instantly my legs ended in steel-shod hooves that rang dully against the stone. My head felt heavy as well, and reaching up I felt the odd and distinctive curve of horns emerge from the sides of my head, under my hair, and curl to show their deadly points above and forward of my eye-line like a bulls’ would.
The rush of new information being stuffed inside my skull had been Dulles this time, or perhaps I was just getting used to having my long term memory rewritten. But as I looked for the artificial instincts and sensations I needed to use these new limbs, I found the edges to be almost seamlessly integrated with the previously rough edges of the others. Clearly, they were meant to be parts of a whole. Now, my balance was undisturbed by the change in mass and height, as my powerful tail automatically corrected for me. The hooves felt as natural to me as my own feet had a moment before. Somehow, I didn't even mind that everything including my smallclothes below my waist had shredded and I had just ruined my boots. Blue Foxfire curled around my hooves, claws, and the feathers riding my tail as it swayed back and forth. It felt powerful, intoxicating. It felt alien and perfectly right all at the same time, and I could feel that long kindled ember of Rage burn with a righteous fury.
The voice inside of me rejoiced. Yes! Do you feel it? Feed it. Release me. Let me Rage! A twisted and predatory grin stretched itself across my face as I looked over to my sister, seeing her now with black streaks marring her white hair, and thick motes of shadow and light boiling around her. The only non-monochrome thing about her were her gilded and multi-coloured wings, which flickered and danced with a restless energy. She looked at me, briefly, and I saw that the golden irises of her black eyes were shining with their own inner light now. She looked beautiful, deadly, terrifying. She looked like something whose first words to you were ‘Be Not Afraid’.
I grinned a savage grin at her with teeth that didn't quite fit my mouth anymore, and she returned it with a pearly white grin with two many points, her Foxkin ears pointed and playful. She was letting her love of fighting overtake her again. I would be worried - if I wasn't lost in the throws of similar feelings myself. What a pair we had become. Boone whined and yelled at me to move back, but I barely heard the words. A rumbling growl escaped my lips as the fetid odour of wild animals, old straw, and older blood hit me in a wave. I hadn't actively used my Predator senses Ability yet, but when I had activated everything else it had come online as well, and the wave of new senses was intoxicating and disgusting all at once. A wave of powerful scents and musk that hit me square in my now supernaturally sharp sense of smell, and was almost enough to overpower whatever had a hold of my mind, forcing me to shake my head and stumble back a step.
That was probably all that saved me.
Arcadia, Snap out of it! Boone yelled into my mind as part of the shadows under the rising floor lunged forward and tried to cut me in two. An enormous Eagle head, it's beak big enough to swallow my whole torso, shot out from the darkness and tried to snap down on me. Its feathers were cream with bloody edges, and its eyes were wide and bright yellow. I could see right down its gullet as its head shot through the space I had been in a moment before and snapped down with an audible crack and a wave of horrid, offal scented air.
My stumble back turned into a pivot almost automatically and I brought my tail around in a riposte, the blue flames popping against the beak in a subdued explosion that somehow didn't burn or impede me, and drove the head away. Rage! Release me! I drove down the voice, not ready to deal with yet another voice trying to manipulate my mind. The Lion had been bad enough.
The platform raised enough for light to flood the space, and I finally saw the whole form of the Chimera. It was massive. A moving wall of conjoined creatures that had no place in nature. It felt like looking at a reflection of what I was becoming, but where my form seemed to be growing to fit together, this was a monstrous amalgamation that had no place in this world. The voice from the gem forming inside my mind roared in defiance at the very idea that it could be likened to the Monster from below.
It had the massive body of a lion, but one that had been built for a much bigger world. Ten feet at the shoulder and as wise as a car. One of its heads was a shaggy maned lion's head that emerged into the light with lips pulled back over massive white teeth. But it's shoulders were so exceptionally wide because it had more than just one head. On its left it has the massively oversized head of an eagle, to which we had already become acquainted. The front paws of the lion were replaced with the massive, scaly talons of the eagle as well, sharp claws carving lines in the stone. On the right it had the black furred and red eyed head of a massive goat, which breathed a cloud of dark smoke and fiery embers from its mouth. Like the front paws, it's rear legs were those of an oversized goat, with solid hooves and a powerful looking kick. Raised over its heads and swaying in a parody of my own - and damn the reality of that statement, mine was just better - was a snakes’ body and head that connected to the lion body in a parody of a tail. Heavy chains were clamped around all of its necks and paws, holding it in place, but even as I stood there, transfixed, the cuffs of those chains cracked open and fell to the floor with massive, weighty thumps.
The Chimera stood there and looked with all its heads at the released cuffs, seemingly in confusion at its sudden release from its bonds, before it turned all four heads towards us with malevolence in its gaze. I had a brief moment where I thought to [Identify] it, and I may have paled a little at the result:
Variant Chimera: Wood 11 [BOSS]
It would be difficult for any of my attacks to overpower its strength, and it would have a huge amount of health. The most I would be able to do would be to harry and distract it while Mia did damage with hit and run tactics. Even with the Shining Spear - a Wood 5 enchanted weapon - along with my Wood 3 Foxfire, and my Body Attribute of 2, the best I could manage was an effective attack of Wood 10, and I wasn't exactly good with a spear - I knew just about enough to stick the sharp bit in the bad guy. Mia, on the other hand, looked to be able to hurt it, but would struggle to get close. That, at least, I could help with.
There was a moment of tension as the four of us eyed one another and took each others’ measure, before it roared and all hell broke loose. We were all seemingly released from its spell and it came at the three of us like a tidal wave of muscle.
The raised platform filled the room, with only solid stone columns holding up what has formally been the floor, and so it didn't offer any real hindrance to the movement of the creature. It was fast as well, and I was forced to dive out of the way as it came for me with both the eagle and snake head, it's massive talons leading the charge and trying to snatch me out of the air. I even had to dissipate and re-summon my tail to stop it being caught, which cost a chunk of essence I couldn't really afford to lose.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
The eagle Head I already knew was fast, and so leapt to the side at the first movement of the head in my direction, but I leapt directly into the path of the snake, as a single creature effectively managed to pincer me in-between itself.
My hooves struck the ground with a bang, and I leapt, claws out, to strike at the eyes of the eagle, trying to deflect it, while a blue flame covered piece of stone was propelled by Boone at the snake head. I managed to tear out a few feathers and burn a few more, the Foxfire sticking to and burning into its feathery covering, but I couldn't do anything more damaging in my reaction. The rock missed the first time but spun back around to try again.
I managed a quick look at Mia just in time to see her flicker and suddenly be twenty feet away as the goat head breathed a cone of fire at her, but she began running back at the body of the Chimera with one knife of shadow, and one that seemed to gleam like sunlight. The beast turned to bring its claws to bare on her, but as I was now near it's goat legs I slammed my own new hoof down, and the ground rumbled beneath me as I fed essence into the [Rolling Thunder] Ability. I yelled out the name of the skill as I did so, my rough voice from the injury in the Trial of Courage making the skill name and avalanche of rocks in my mouth, and a wave of shaking stone and Foxfire spread out from me. The blast of upturned earth and hot fire caused the Chimera to wobble as its footing became unsure and allowed Mia to rush in and strike at its flank. I saw that when she struck with the shadow blade, a secondary light blade struck behind it, and when she struck with the light blade, a shadow one followed similarly. It appeared she’d unlocked some form of light based attacks and some kind of additive damage Talent. I was amazingly curious, but I couldn't spend more time than that to observe, as the Snake came at me again, a flash of fangs and green scales and I was forced to duck it's attack, before swatting at its neck with my own tail, thankfully still infused with the original charge of Foxfire. Unlike my sling stones that could only handle one infusion before exploding, my natural weapons worked much better with the energy, and could hold a charge now for three attacks, with the latest upgrade, before the energy was drained from the Infusion and it had to be reapplied. While the snake was batted away, however, and Boone kept the eagle and lion head at bay with his telekinesis and shields, that left me open to the claws, and one of the eagle talons raked my furred leg, cutting a long and shallow gash down my leg.
It was painful, and dropped my already low health, but it activated [resilience] and all of my Attributes were boosted by 12% now that it had leveled. My health was now below one hundred, however, and I was starting to feel the injuries and exhaustion from the last trial. Even the hour we had spent in the dark recovering had only allowed me to regenerate thirty health from stuffing my face with food from my Bag.
The damage, though, made the voice in my mind Roar, and the gem forming in the centre of my Constellations began to suck in so much Essence from the environment that I could practically feel it as a physical force. We Rage. Join me. Show them our Fury together!
I could feel energy pouring off of me in waves as I fought, and my skin was beginning to glow. A quick look at Mia told me she was going through something similar, but her own transition, whatever was happening, was equal parts light and Shadow, which rolled through her visible skin in liquid waves. She looked like a monochrome lava lamp from my old world.
Whatever was happening to me, it was starting to hurt, and not in a way that was physical. It felt like my spinning core was starting to melt and reform into something completely differently shaped. There were a lot of times I had hated this worlds’ cultural secrecy about the process of forming a class. I would love to know what was normal, I would love to know if the pain was intentional or just because my body didn't match the age of my soul. I would be ecstatic if I didn't have to worry that something was going horribly wrong.
While I was distracted with the feelings going on in my soul, Mia managed to use a combination of talents and Abilities to boost an attack to such a degree that her blades - all four of them - sank to the hilts into the neck of the goat, and a spray of blood and Lava - or something that looked remarkably similar - poured from the hole, while the goat screamed with a voice like a woman in agony before seeming to go limp.
This caused the Chimera as a whole to scream and lash out, and it caught me in the chest with one hoofed leg. I managed to turn and catch most of the blow by crossing my armoured arm over my chest just as it hit, but the blow was so heavy I felt and heard my arm break, though it protected my ribs. My health fell below 50, and while my Attributes rose by a total of 22%, I was launched ten feet and came down in a tumble and a scream as my broken arm twisted and the bones ground against the flesh.
Arcadia! Boone yelled in my brain, panicked at seeing me fly. He unleashed a barrage of telekinetic attacks against the Chimera, sharp edged stones and rocks, and bones taken from its own cage. They swarmed it like sparrows, only doing light damage but harassing it to great effect. He raced over to me and started trying to check if I was okay. I rolled myself over with a cry of pain, but managed to get my knees under me.
My arm was useless, and my trusty catapult was smashed. That hurt, like losing an old friend. But the metal was torn from the leather and the Runes had been marred. It was possibly all that was currently holding my arm together, so I didn't dare touch it. I tried to put it out of my mind. Couldn't use it anyway with a broken arm. But for right now, Mia was fighting it alone now, and though she could hold her own against it with its attention split, with five or six avenues of attack, she was being quickly driven into a corner, even despite the attacks Boone was still raining down on it.
“I'm okay, Buddy. Help Mia, I'll figure something out.” I placed my hand on his back to heave myself to my feet, and felt a pulse from the Gem so strong it drove me back to my knees. It is time. Release me.
“Arcadia, what's happening?” Boone wheezed, as he was driven down to the floor by the same force that was burning through me.
“Who are you? What do you want? I cried at the voice in my head. It was so angry, so hot, that it drove the air from my lungs.
We are you. You are us. We are Behemoth! Release us and let us Fight!
“Are you my Class?”
We are your Soul! Mia screamed in sudden pain and I saw the Lion bite down on her Armour, piercing the reinforced leather and crushing her shoulder even as she stabbed it in the eyes and face with two daggers, one real and one an echo. Blood poured down the tawny fur of the Lion, but the Eagle was ready to snap at my sister and I realised I was out of time. “Do it! Fight, Help! Save my sister!” I didn't care - I wasn't letting it have Mia. I'd do anything, give up anything, to keep her safe. I took the Gem in a mental grasp and cracked it, releasing whatever had been building inside.
[WARNING] Your four Constellations are combining with your Soul to form a Unique Class: Primal Behemoth. This is a Transmutation based class. This is a Primal Essence based class. Due to your high Affinity for Primal magic and its untapped nature, you may absorb your Affinity to strengthen your Class Abilities. Do you wish to Proceed?
Make it stronger? Yes, please. I agreed instantly, even as Mia jammed a blade into the lion heads’ eye. It roared and released her, tossing her against the wall where she scrambled to find cover even as the Chimera pursued, clawing at anything it could reach while I was frozen there.
Affinity for Primal Magic has been Absorbed into Primal Behemoth Class Skills. Analysing available Attributes, Skills, and Talents…Generated. Beginning Transformation.
My world shifted in almost the same way it did when I moved my viewpoint to Boones’ when we were children. In a wash of blue fire, I was suddenly looking from a different viewpoint. Much higher, but also slung forwards, like I always was with Boone. My arm didn't hurt; I looked down and saw that my arms weren't my arms, nor were they Boones’ Vulpine paws. They looked like they were halfway between human hands and large cat paws, but they were massive, with huge clawed fingers that carved furrows into the stone. The were also covered in bright pink fur the same color as my hair, with a layer of green scales beneath.
Where am I? I feel strange. I can't see I heard Boones' voice in my head, but it sounded closer to me now, as though we were right next to one another. With a thought I shared my vision with him. This is new…
We Are Behemoth! The voice roared, but it was my voice, and it felt like my thoughts, and Boones’ thoughts, together, but so much louder. Mia screamed again and there was no longer time to think. Whatever this was, it could wait to figure out - I could feel there were notifications to read but I could look at them later. Right now, whatever body this was felt strong, and it knew how to fight. I opened my mouth and my roar shook the ceiling, before I leapt for the creature trying to savage my big sister.
Class Skill: Avatar Transformation: Behemoth, created. Primal Behemoth class breaks through the first Gate.