It was too far for Ray to tell what Tower Node that was. Primordial Gauge just didn’t extend that far. Not a real issue, as far as Ray was concerned. It didn’t look like the Lostcaller could use the Tower Node.
Wouldn’t that be a sight—a monster of all things channelling the power of a Tower Node.
Ray turned to his right. The bridge was right there. Completely unguarded and undefended, as far as he could see. He could take it with ease.
No way was he turning his back on that thing, though.
Ray attacked. The monster was wise to his tricks now. Like before, he sought to trap it by using a couple of his constructs to hold it in place before causing another explosion right on its head. Hopefully, the next one would take care of something even more vital than its legs.
The problem was that the monster refused to let any attacks get close. It moved too fast, even quicker than the Spiritguard orbs could fly.
And if Ray tried to use a numbers superiority to trap the Lostcaller, it just sent out more of its flames to take the orbs out from range.
Ray even tried to shoot it from a distance with a draconic maw’s fiery breath using Primal Spiritcraft. But they just phased right through the monster. It was keeping a good chunk of its body intangible. Spiritual. Damn creature was way too smart.
Even worse, that was only for the first few moments. It took less than thirty seconds for the momentum to shift.
Again with the irrepressible barrage of black flames and lightning. Forget attacking, Ray was quickly left barely defending himself with cast after cast of Mottling Spiritguard. The hammering assault from the Lostcaller was depleting his True Mana reserves way too quickly.
Until a shining bolt of white light shot at the monster.
Ray got a bit of reprieve as Alice rushed over, covered in gleaming white light that sprayed bolts at random at the Lostcaller. Now the monster was on the defensive, using its flames to repel her attacks.
“I’m here just in time,” she yelled. “Don’t worry, I’ve got your back.”
Ray offered her a comradely nod. “Where’s your sister?”
Her answer was lost in the Death Rift Roar that made the world flicker again. A shadow of fear passed over Alice’s face, though it quickly turned to determined resolution.
“She’s right behind me,” she said, before rushing off to meet the monster head-on.
“Be careful,” Ray warned her, though he couldn’t tell how much she heard because the battle was already underway.
At least, by the looks of things, she wasn’t weak. Alice Felds held her ground against the Lostcaller, a monster that had to be several levels stronger than her.
Her blows were powerful, and so was her defence. The white light around her turned to shimmering plates of armour wherever the monster struck. That surefire protection allowed her to rain blows upon her adversary with heedless aggression. Impressively, she was beating back the Lostcaller for a little while.
Buthe monster’s black, sealing flames came into play all too soon.
Her glowing pieces of armour disappeared one by one. Every fiery black blast she blocked temporarily took away her protection. Even the light on her sword was sealed away after one interaction where she was momentarily awash with the dark fire.
Then it was the monster’s turn to hammer in. While Alice was able to block the majority of the Lostcaller’s physical attacks, she failed to see the spectral, half-invisible bolts.
Ray wanted to help but getting in between that fight was dangerous. For Alice, especially. He didn’t want to distract her, nor did he want to accidentally hit her. What a fucking conundrum.
Alice Felds was suddenly thrown back by one bolt striking her on the chest. Ray’s heart leaped into his mouth. He had seen enough.
Rushing forward, he sent several Spiritguard orbs circulating around her in a defensive formation. They would protect her while he took on the Lostcaller directly.
“I’ll create an opening,” Ray said. “You try to get in a direct hit, if you can.”
She didn’t argue. Ray himself had already pushed away the sad feeling that he alone wasn’t going to get all the Essence from this fight. The monster was just too powerful. Maybe he could win on his own, given enough time, but he wasn’t going to forcefully push away the only possible friend he had on the Second Floor.
Ray charged forth, but then halted as the monster shifted attention. It sent a veritable river of black flame and spectral lightning hurtling down the slope while it itself faced higher up.
Where a path of ice had formed to lead straight to the spire’s peak. Straight to the Tower Node.
Mary Felds was heading for the treasure that the Lostcaller was desperate to protect.
Ray wanted to scream at her for not prioritizing the monster, but maybe that was a good thing. Her unerring charge straight for the Lostcaller’s main priority had taken the heat off Ray and Alice. Which meant they ought to be able to get in behind and attack.
So, as the Lostcaller charged upslope after a rushing Mary Felds, Ray constructed a draconic maw to fire a compressed, fiery laser.
Meanwhile, Alice slashed her sword to send arcs of burning white light after their foe. They arced through the air pretty fast, even curving as they travelled like they had a bit of tracking power too. Ray had to wonder what in the world her class was.
But their attacks failed to land. The monster was a combination of too fast and too intelligent with its spontaneous phasing.
And then Mary had reached The Tower Node.
A brilliant illumination made everything too difficult to see. Ray was forced to squint his eyes against the blinding glare. At the same time, the Lostcaller ripped out an ear-rending howl, a cry so full of dismay that even Ray’s heart quailed on hearing its anguish.
That anguish led to desperation. A desperation manifesting in a form of an attack Ray hadn’t seen yet from the monster.
Lighting and flames erupted around the monster’s claws. So dark, they looked like they were carved out of nothingness. An instant later, the Lostcaller dug both arms into the spire’s surface. All its power rushed underground as it started doing something, and the whole spire began shaking.
“Not good,” Alice yelled as she trembled and quaked her way upslope.
Ray was spared the tremors as he was able to take flight, but that didn’t really help. Mostly because the monster had gained too much distance. He wasn’t able to reach it in time.
Not before the spire shattered.
Cracks spread under the surface with the speed of a lightning bolt. The entire side of the spire broke under the Lostcaller’s assault. Burst of black flame and dark lightning spurted out from fissures all over the spire’s side. In seconds, entire chunks were falling off.
“Landslide!” Ray yelled.
This really wasn’t good. Being airborne meant he was able to evade the worst of the landslide. But with the way his wings’ elevation worked, Ray was tumbling down the side of the spire along with the chunks of its surface crumbling and crashing downslope.
He tried protecting himself as best as he could. Impervious Shell wasn’t going to work on such an unstable surface, but summoning a dozen Spiritguard orbs did help. They warded off the worst of the debris and protected him from getting his head smashed in. For someone who ought to have revelled in chaos, Ray was definitely having trouble keeping up.
Things eventually stopped rumbling, however. When the side of the spire finally settled down, allowing Ray the opportunity to climb back up, he didn’t get a move on as quickly as he should have.
Mostly because the spire had shattered open.
It turned out the whole, ginormous structure was some sort of egg. What the Lostcaller had done was break apart the shell to reveal some kind of pulsating flesh underneath, seeping out a pinkish liquid that roiled down the side of the broken spire like magma.
Ray couldn’t tell what it was, but it was huge. At least half again as tall as the spire he had just climbed.
The hell was that thing? All he could think of was that the Growth Mana that this whole spire had to be made of had somehow grown into an actual living being underneath. Insane.
The bigger issue was that the Lostcaller itself was turning its attention back up to the peak, and it was too far from Ray now. There was no way he would reach it, not before it reached Mary. She had encased her location in ice. A giant cold prism surrounded her and the Tower Node, but Ray had serious doubts it would be enough.
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His fears were proven moments later when the Lostcaller rushed up the slope and hammered straight into the prism.
It was too big, of course. Mary had been smart enough. But the Lostcaller just pushed its arms inside using Spirit Phase, which was enough, because it then unleashed its flames and lightning within Mary’s prism.
Ray might not have exactly liked Mary, but he wasn’t cruel enough to let her die. He was already flying upslope over the broken ground as well as he could.
It was going to take too long, though. The monster had broken the side of the spire in such a way that Ray’s ascent was heavily stymied because of a lack of surface to elevate himself off of. He was forced to seek out the specific spots where he could climb higher. Even when he flew to the other side of the spire, he just found it shattered apart like the rest of it.
Which was bad because the Lostcaller had destroyed Mary’s barricade and was now about to assault her directly. She was still too focused on the Tower Node, where a line of blinding light had her connected to the Node. If Ray had to guess, she couldn’t even move.
A perfectly vulnerable state for the monster to pounce and kill her.
If not for her sister, that was.
Where Ray was still stuck downslope, Alice was somehow able to make her way up there. That was actually frustrating. He had wings for crying out loud. Why was he only ambling to where he actually needed to be.
The next few moments made Ray completely forget about his annoyance.
He stared as the monster got in close, ready to strike down Mary Felds. A part of him still hoped that she’d be able to break free from whatever was going on between her and the Tower Node. That at the last moment, Mary would rally and survive against the Lostcaller.
But it never happened. What did happen, however, was the fact that Mary’s sister reached her just in time.
With a scream, Alice Felds threw herself to the top of the spire, white light speeding her along with whatever strange skill she was using. Her attack from behind simply phased through the monster. But when the Lostcaller rose into the air on wings of writhing flesh, immolating itself to turn into a meteor before hammering at Mary, Alice was there to defect the blow.
She had jumped up too, her sword shining as she held it in a guard position for an instant before she collided with the Lostcaller.
Then she screamed as the monster’s meteoric rush struck her, sending her burning and flying off the spire’s side.
But she had done enough. The Lostcaller itself had been deflected. Instead of hammering in at Mary Felds, it now flew off to the side to crash land on a different spot further downslope. A spot that was on Ray’s level.
Not that he was paying attention to where the monster had gone. His eyes had been riveted to Alice, to the body of the woman burning with black fires, crashing down with no less of a powerful impact than the Lostcaller. He was already trying to fly over to where Alice had landed, but Mary got there first. It seemed her business with the Tower Node was done.
Almost as though the Node had been holding her back until her sister had been dealt with.
Ray didn’t need to get close to see the extent of the damage. Alice’s whole body was burned and blistered. Her clothes were in a smouldering mess, much of her golden air was still aflame, and one of her eye sockets was charred entirely, still steaming as though the eyeball had been vaporized. Ray’s stomach roiled at the sight, his heart beating hard.
“No!” Mary was shouting, shaking her head. Her eyes were wide and tear-strewn, her expression collapsing. “No, no, no, no, no.”
Ray was a little frozen. What could he do? Was there anything anyone could do?
Still alive, though. Alice was still momentarily alive, though that wasn’t going to last for long. So much blood. So many devastating injuries. And neither Ray nor Mary had a way of doing anything about them.
Another Dead Rift Roar rolled over the spire. The whole world flickered. But the monster’s scream was drowned out by the one from Mary Felds.
“I can’t hear you, Alice,” she yelled over the noise. “I can’t hear you.”
It became obvious why a moment later. When Ray forced himself to look properly, he found that most of Alice’s tongue had burned away too. She was trying to talk but couldn’t get any words out. Fuck.
Ray didn’t know where the idea came from, but he found himself constructing his mimic with Lifeblood Soulform. He opened his mouth, allowing the black-red Imitator to observe the inner workings. Then, after he passed on his intention, the construct slithered over to Alice’s mouth.
Mary didn’t even try to stop it. Barely even reacted as a foreign mass compressed itself inside her sister’s dying mouth.
To form—and graft—a small tongue.
“You’re… okay,” Alice said, staring at her sister.
Mary’s eyes filled with tears as she began sobbing. She had cracked apart.
Ray’s heart quailed too, twisting like a cloth being forcefully dried. He didn’t want to be here. Didn’t want to see this. Didn’t want to be an interruption in this personal moment between two sisters, one of whom was dying.
Or maybe he just didn’t want to feel like he had felt with Randall all over again.
The Lostcaller’s approach gave him an excuse. An angry excuse.
“I’ll take care of that son of a bitch,” Ray said as he got going.
“Now?” Mary said. “You’ll take care of it now?”
Another little stake drove into Ray’s heart, but he steeled himself. It wasn’t hard. Rage was pounding far harder than guilt, almost smothering his thoughts. He shouldn’t be reacting this heavily. How long had he even known that woman?
With another yell, the Lostcaller bounded towards Ray. He dismissed and resummoned his wings, crushed a True Mana shard, then rushed the monster too.
Ray held nothing back. Neither did the monster. A salvo of black flames and spectral lightning slammed in at Ray, but he managed to push through by casting enough Mottling Spiritguard to safeguard his body. It helped that he was moving incredibly fast through the constant attacks as well.
He was already crafting his own counters as he pushed through. Two draconic maws ad formed using Primal Spiritcraft, one on each arm. Over his shoulder, two giant True Mana arms flashed forward to strike at the monster courtesy of Soulstrike.
The Lostcaller phased through everything. Like Ray, it was moving with incredible speed too. It dodged his Soulstrike impales, then evaded the fiery laser blasts from his two maws.
Even when Ray made the emissions from his grafted Greater Windbane Maws cross so that they detonated with a humongous explosion, the Lostcaller moved through the explosion without taking much damage. It was still well enough to continue attacking him.
Ray flashed past. As much as his impulses drove him to slam into the monster, to bring his full fury to bear and try to tear it apart, that wouldn’t work well.
He had seen Alice losing her powers with every exchange. The black flames had sealed away her abilities one by one. Ray couldn’t go through that. It was why he was staying mobile and fast.
Though, the reminder of Alice brought on a fresh wash of anger that made him try a different tack.
It was difficult. Costly. He knew he wasn’t supposed to do it. But it could just be what was needed against a creature like that. Especially when it was throwing another furious salvo of a spectral, mostly-unseen lighting storm at him again.
Ray cast more Mottling Spiritguard to both replace the orbs he had lost and add to the total tally. Now he had enough to go on the direct offensive again.
He flashed at his target. The monster’s attack was too furious though. Despite the best efforts of his Spiritguard orbs, the lightning was slipping through. He was focusing too much on keeping away the sealing flames.
No surprise, then, that Ray got hit by stray bolts of black lightning.
Except, that wasn’t the real Ray at all. He had cast Lifeblood Soulform to create another Imitator that had taken the exact shape of Ray. A copy good enough to fool even the Lostcaller.
The real Ray, farther off to one side, had sent out several of his orbs. He’d even had space to crush another True Mana shard. With the Lostcaller already having immolated itself once more, they wouldn’t do much. In fact, the monster didn’t even care that there were almost a dozen sparking orbs headed for it. It had great faith that its black flames were surefire protection.
But Ray was prepared. Before the orbs connected, he had them surround their target and then instantaneously turn them all into Greater Windbane Maws.
Then they all fired their compressed laser breaths at once.
Ray’s brain felt like it was splitting apart. He still recalled that warning from the First Floor, when he had created too many constructs. The same situation had arisen again. But there was nothing for it. Didn’t matter if his world spun out of control, didn’t matter that his mind was losing itself. He was killing that fucking monster no matter what.
But even that detonation wasn’t enough. A chaotic inferno the size of an airplane hanger overtook the entirety of the spire top. Somehow, someway, the Lostcaller survived out, burned and blistered though it appeared.
Might have something to do with the fact that it had ripped out another Dead Rift Roar. The way the world had rippled had made Ray’s condition far worse.
And now, the monster was heading straight for Ray. The real one, this time. He could have gotten away, of course, but the sudden disappearance of all of his Greater Windbane Maw constructs had cleared his mind.
Ray remained bent over, clutching his head, breathing ragged. It was only the corner of his eye that showed him what was happening.
The corner of his eye that told him when to use Project Presence.
His focus and senses all split again. He saw the world twice, heard wild sounds overlaying on one another. Pain flared through his head. So much so that he actually fell to his knees. But he retained just enough concentration, just enough willpower, to cast one more spell.
Spectral Step.
Ray had managed to time it just right, forcing up on his feet at the same time. As the Lostcaller passed through his projected spirit, Ray had teleported away from his original location. To reappear at the exact spot his spirit was located. At the exact spot that the monster was passing through.
It was definitely a bold move. An experiment, in truth. Good thing it turned out to be successful. Ray’s hastily drawn hypotheses proved to be correct.
He reappeared inside the monster.
His body felt an immense pressure as the world shifted in the space of a blink. Then his chest was crushing the Lostcaller’s ribcage, his hand punching up through the monster’s gullet. His other hand had ripped through the wings of writhing flesh.
It all happened in a split second, but it was enough. Two beings couldn’t exist in the same physical space at once. Just as Ray had hoped, Spectral Step made his reappearing body displace anything that was in the location where he teleported to. That spell had always had the potential to be overpowered, but it was only now Ray was exploring its real strengths.
With another ear-piercing howl, the Lostcaller fell apart to dozens of fleshy and bony pieces on the ground just behind Ray. He turned around to see them all burning with black flames. And then they fell still, charred to nothing.
[Enemy Defeated—Lostcaller]
Tier 11 Monster: Lostcaller [Level 34] x1
Essence: +3,740
Knowledge: +3
True Mana Restored: +340
Essence to Level 25: 15,580/37,500
Knowledge to next Threshold: 702/800
[New Personal Achievement—Vengeance Empowered!]
You have defeated a far stronger foe after it has dealt you a grave, emotional wound. The determination to exact vengeance has filled you with great strength.
Reward
* Reputation: +20 Ruthlessness
[Reputation Threshold Crossed]
For reaching the 150-point threshold, your Ruthlessness boosts all your damage dealt even further. All damage inflicted gets a 15% bonus, including damage from any afflictions.
Ray would have slumped in mental and a physical exhaustion just then, but he received a surprising communication from an even more surprising source.
Mary: There are people coming,
Ray: What?
Mary: People, you fucking idiot. There’re people coming across the bridge. From over the cliff.