Chapter 98: Tank and DPS

I staggered backwards. So did Lena. We would’ve been way too slow, I’m sure, because the air we’d occupied contorted, as though the space itself was turning into a blade.

It didn’t matter, because Albie held her ground.

Her Iron gleamed between us and the creature. It buckled, but it held, and in one smooth motion, following the curve of her fingers, it became a spear and lanced out at the shadow.

Her Iron changed too fast for me to follow its shifts, much less its movement.

It wasn’t fast enough to catch the shadow.

It wasn’t so much like it dodged as like it was never in the space Albie’s spear intersected with.

When it flashed forward again, Albie’s shield was ready for it. The Iron absorbed one blow after another, attacks I couldn’t see clearly, not like it was swinging its arms or even moving what seemed to be its body at all, just an exertion of pressure on the space between us. Only the thrashing shadows hinted at the shape of its attacks.

I fumbled with my phone and manifested Iron of my own, running off Water. I turned it to mercury just long enough for it to droop at the edges, then changed it back, switched to Air, and flung the crude shield in the direction of the shadow.

It wasn’t much of a barrier, and I didn’t know exactly where to put it, but it was one more thing for the creature to keep track of.

Maybe it helped, because the next time Albie lanced out, her blow pierced a shadow. One of the creature’s arms twitched. For an instant, I thought I saw a wave of simple triangles ripple across its body.

Then the shadows on the floor began to writhe, and I had no time to pay attention to what the creature itself looked like.

“Keep backing up,” Miguel said in my ear. “You’re a good distance from Donica and Zhizhi. Don’t let it get close, but don’t let them get too far, either. We don’t know if this is the only one.”

I don’t know why he couldn’t have said something encouraging for once.

I bit back the comment and backpedaled. Lena matched step with me and Albie followed a few feet in our wake.

The creature still didn’t seem to move, but its shadows stretched toward us and I caught glimpses of its attacks distorting the air. Albie managed to intercept one and jabbed it into a shelf. Another crash as the whole thing went flying. I realized how much force both she and the creature had to be flinging around.

I tried not to think about what would happen if it managed to land a hit on one of us.

Lena slammed her palms together and, for an instant, Wood appeared in the air between us and the creature. Two flicks of her thumb and the flame that consumed the Wood burst outwards, leaving only ash in its wake.

I didn’t think she got anywhere close to the thrashing shadows, but she gave the creature one more thing to avoid.

For a second.

Trouble was, it seemed to notice her for the first time.

I flung my crude Iron shield between them. I saw two halves of it fly into the shelf on the other side of the aisle, cleanly bisected.

Albie’s Iron caught the blow before it hit Lena. That meant she wasn’t protecting herself, though, and I scrambled to, calling Stone with Air.

I was too slow, but she wasn’t. She released her first Iron and parried the distortion with a second piece. My Stone smashed into the thrashing shadow and for just a second, it seemed pinned.

That was plenty of time for Albie to stab down into it and reform her shield.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Another wave of triangles on the creature.

I was pretty sure a predator would back off after a couple of injuries like that. So either it was a mindless construct, or it had real malice behind it, because instead of retreating, it redoubled its attacks.

Taking a cue from Albie, I dropped my Stone and conjured a second piece, waving it blindly in the air between us. I only knew if I’d hit something when I felt resistance, and I didn’t think I was doing any damage, but it seemed to be disrupting the thing’s attacks.

I didn’t know if that mattered, because nothing disrupted Albie’s.

Her Iron spun and it was a sword, thrust and it was a spear, slammed and it was a hammer. Every time the creature twitched a shadow in our direction, it was a shield again.

I was just starting to understand why Albie said she wasn’t in any danger when the creature changed tactics.

Its shadows withdrew, then all thrust out at once. Not at us, not at the wall of steel that was Albie and my and Lena’s crude efforts to help. At the shelf on our right.

Albie and I both realized what was about to happen. We both slammed the objects we’d conjured into the shelf. It tipped, shifted, and the effort of trying to hold it back made me gasp. My Stone shattered and Albie’s Iron bent, but the shelf didn’t slam into us, or into Donica and Zhizhi further down the aisle.

Lena tried to exploit the gap, exploding another Wood with triple Fire right in front of the creature itself.

Nothing seemed to happen.

“It reacts to attacks against the shadow, not the thing you’re thinking of as the body,” Erin said in our ears.

“Shit,” Lena bit out. “Sorry.”

I didn’t know if she was apologizing for aiming at the wrong target or for cursing in front of Albie.

“We’ll get it next time,” I said.

I think she nodded, but I didn’t dare glance to check.

But we didn’t get it next time.

The shadows whipped back towards us. Between my clumsy Stone and Albie’s dancing Iron, we batted them back. So what? Even her attempts to strike the shadows were too slow, and the creature seemed to realize it.

Lena tried another blast, closer this time, right in the middle of the writhing mass, but between setting her Wood aflame and pouring two more units in to burst it, she gave the shadows time to flicker away.

“It doesn’t seem like we’re getting anywhere,” I said.

“It’s fast,” Albie said. “They’re usually dumber than this.”

“You still don’t think you’re in any danger, kiddo?” Lena asked.

Albie shook her head. “I think it can hit me, but I’ve got a lot of HP.”

Just in case we’d had any ambiguity about whether that would protect us.

For a while.

“So do I.” I swallowed. “I’ll draw its fire.”

“Yours won’t come back,” Albie said.

“I also can’t hit the damn thing,” I said. “You two can.”

“Don’t run out,” Albie said.

“Not planning on it,” I said.

We bashed away another wave of attacks.

“If you can put it in a predictable place, and Miss Albie can pen it up for an instant,” Erin said, “perhaps Lena can burn it?”

I risked a glance at Lena and saw her nod back at me.

“I’m down for that,” she said.

Albie drew in a deep breath. She whispered, “I’ll trust you.”

No way in hell we were going to fail after that.

I stepped forward.

The shadow flickered. I tried to block it, and from the way my Stone shattered, I must’ve managed to intercept at least one lashing distortion. I couldn’t do anything about the others. They drove me to my knees. The air burst from my lungs. Pain blossomed up from my knees and my stomach.

Worth.

Albie’s gleaming spears stabbed in front of me, thrust and discarded one after another, moving at angles I couldn’t hope to replicate. Three, four, five, six. The shadows, overextended, thrashed between them. Somehow, they managed to dodge, but each twitch clumped them closer together.

I managed to drag my hand up and conjured more Stone. I let go and it crashed down atop the shadows, driving them low, cracking. I called more.

Albie conjured a seventh Iron spear, and this one jabbed straight into the center of the massing darkness.

“Now!” Erin shouted. At least, I was pretty sure that was what she was saying. Her voice sounded so compressed I could barely make it out.

Not that Lena needed any prompting. She slammed her palms downwards, once, twice, thrice. Her flames exploded in the center of Albie’s spears. She kept conjuring, kept tripling, and the last I saw of the shadows before they were consumed was aimless twitching.

The creature never cried out.

Somehow, I thought that was even creepier than if it had screamed.

When the flames faded, I let myself exhale. I heard Lena gasp down a breath and stretched my hand out to squeeze her shoulder.

I almost touched her. I felt the heat of her wing brush my fingertips. She started to smile.

Then the space between us twisted, and the shadow twitched over her, and she hurtled back into the shelf.