The last time he had used Primal Summons, it had converted his entire hand into a draconic arm. What if he did the same thing again, but instead of his arm, this time, he applied it to his whole head?
Shivering with excitement, Ray decided to test it out. This was going to be a bit freaky, but if it worked, then it would open a whole new avenue of power use he hadn’t foreseen.
He would be able to disguise himself as practically anyone. All he would need to do was…
Kill them and absorb their face or head as a Soul Aspect.
Somehow, the realization of what that entailed dampened the prospect of fun.
Nevertheless, Ray called on Primal Summons again. Thanks to his Mana Core and Mana Imbuing now completed, he could direct the Mana to—
[Warning!]
All available Imbued Mana has already been used on the arm. To imbue a different part of the body, defeat more foes to Imbue extra Mana.
Ah, damn it. Ray had forgotten about the spell’s description. Not spell, skill. This was a more integral ability that used extra Mana from killing foes to practically replace his biological matter with magical energy.
Ray tried not to groan in disappointment. He supposed something with so much potential wouldn’t come easy.
Well, time for more rudimentary means of camouflage.
Ray dug out a bit of the ground and caked his face as quickly as he could. He had already wasted a ton of time. One or more Sylvans would no doubt pop in to check on the missing Brighthorn. He had to be ready for it.
Satisfied with his preparations, Ray summoned the winged eyeball with Lifeblood Construct. Next, he called on the Greater Wyvern Maw as a construct too, also with wings. Ray figured he could even up the numbers game. More and more constructs to flood his enemies with chaos. It wasn’t like Mana was an issue. He had a ton of Mana crystals to use up.
And he was still within Lifeblood Construct’s Tier limits. At Tier 3, he could only summon three Soul Aspects. Right now, he had exactly three. Even if they were a bit separate.
[Warning!]
Your Intellect [Tier 2] can fully support only one construct at a time. Multiple constructs will reduce the range and efficacy of control.
Right. Of course. Ray should have figured he wouldn’t have been allowed to just pull out as many Constructs as he wanted. There were limits to everything. Well, good thing he had discovered said limits during prep instead of in the midst of a fight.
Ray called up the Windbane Maw. The summoning didn’t make him feel any different, but he’d have to test.
Like with the eyeball, the Maw had the wings sprouting from the top left and right corners of the head. Its wings were bigger than the eyeball’s though, to carry its heavier weight.
Interestingly, it had actual eyes this time, of the same kind that Ray had summoned separately.
The test didn’t reveal that big of a range impact as he had feared. Even at a football field’s length, Ray had perfect control over both constructs. Farther than that was where it started to degrade. They were slower to respond and needed more mental focus. That was fine. The range he still had perfect control over would work well enough for his plan.
A quick test revealed that, despite having no direct connection to his body as a construct instead of as grafted attachment thanks to Primal Summons, the maw could still spew flames. Chaotic flames. A burst of pure black fire highlighted with red.
It flew forward a good distance too. Yes, this would do nicely. Ray was ready.
“Alright, men,” Ray said. “Time to head to battle.”
The plan wasn’t anything too complicated. All Ray wanted to do was lure any Sylvans he found into the right position, and from there on, it would be game over for the aliens caught in his trap.
Ray could have used True Enhancement, but the clock was already ticking. He didn’t want to take up more time than necessary.
The area was still mostly the same grassy plan dotted with dead, petrified trees that he had experienced while meeting Joaquin. Since the grass was big enough to hide himself in, he proceeded to do just that, while sending out his minions to do his dirty work.
Positioning, Ray reminded himself, was going to be key here. Everything depended on it.
It took a bit of waiting, but the first Sylvan finally showed up. Ray wasn’t close, and neither was the eyeball, but the focusing power on the eye was pretty great. It was easy to spot the Sylvan striding confidently through the grass, though the alien did have a slightly confused expression. Probably wondering about the Brighthorn.
Well, the Sylvan was about to meet a rather cruel surprise.
The alien finally found and came to a halt next to its dead pet. Ray didn’t care whether the expression on the Sylvan’s face was horrified or sad. It was time to execute his plan.
Ray stepped forward.
[Warning!]
Presence of the Primordial indicates your construct’s presence has been detected by Total Perception [Tier 3].
There was no other information, but that was fine. The Sylvan wouldn’t be able to glean any intel about Ray from that eyeball. So long as he wasn’t anywhere close. Which he wasn’t.
In fact, Ray was pretty damn far from his target. Just where he needed to be.
The eyeball revealed how the Sylvan was approaching warily to check it out. It did look around, trying to spot if there was anything else. Clearly, the alien was no fool. But its Total Perception ability hadn’t picked up the presence of Ray’s other construct, the head of the Windbane floating ever closer through the thick grass.
Ray’s heart sped up as he got into position. Almost time. It was good that even though he had to remain close due to his Intellect Tier limit with multiple constructs, he was still out of the Sylvan’s sensing range.
That was why, as he reached the right spot within the grass, he could ensure the Greater Windbane Maw was positioned correctly too.
Just as the Sylvan reached the decision to attack the floating eyeball, Ray attacked first.
The Greater Windbane Maw rushed in on its wings. From its jaws, a huge blast of chaotic flames burned out in a horizontal geyser.
Quick as the Sylvan was to turn around, fast as it was to bring to bear the Pressure Block shield, the alien still got a face full of the flames. Despite the distance, the alien’s scream was loud in Ray’s ears. The eyeball confirmed that his target was burning, at least partially. Perfect.
Hopefully, the Sylvan hadn’t called in reinforcements just yet.
Ray pulled back both arms. He had already condensed Mana into the requisite amount of True Mana, though he didn’t need thanks to his Hallow. It was time to activate True Enhancement and use it on Chaos Chymify.
Wasting no time, Ray rose into the air, activated Vengeful Plunder—which was where he needed the True Mana—and shot blast after spiralling blast of the enhanced Chaos Chymify at the distant Sylvan.
He had never tested the full range of his spell. Every time he had used it so far, he had been close enough to his target to see the spell flying straight at its intended destination in a near-straight line.
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Nevertheless, he suspected it had a certain weight to it, which would cause any longer distance flight to turn into a parabola. He also suspected there had to be a finite range, after which the bolt of chaotic energy would simply dissipate to nothing. As such, Ray had positioned himself as high as his wings could take him while remaining at least fifty feet distant.
Ray continued throwing out bolts of Chaos Chymify until a heavy twinge within him indicated he had run out of Mana. The world spun for a brief second, but the headachy sensation retreated as he crushed two Mana crystals quickly to replenish his Mana.
Not that he needed to. The bolts of Chaos Chymify he had flung out reached the Sylvan and struck true.
He hadn’t been able to throw out too many bolts of Chaos Chymify. The Windbane Maw was using up his Mana to continuously barrage the Sylvan with its flames.
But there was no need to worry. Ray had done enough.
The plan had always been to first distract the Sylvan with the eyeball to let the maw get in close. Then, while his enemy was busy defending against the fire, Ray would attack with Chaos Chymify from as great a distance as possible.
It turned out fifty feet didn’t exhaust the spell. He had to wonder if that was the regular range or that of the True Enhancement version’s.
As it was, the Sylvan didn’t get the chance to take any defensive measures. The spiralling bolts struck the alien’s head, chest, legs, and arms. Each blast exploded into a cloud of black-red energy, lines of white zipping through it like electric arcs. The Sylvan cried out again, the sound even fainter this time.
But the eyeball was perfectly positioned to see the Sylvan fall.
[Enemy Defeated—Sylvan]
Acrobat Assaulter [Tier 3] Sylvan: [Level 16] x1
Essence: +2,400
Knowledge: +3
Mana Restored: +160
Essence to level 15: 6,410/10,000
Ray allowed himself to fall back to the ground. He was tempted to whistle in appreciation at the Essence he had received form just killing one Sylvan. A few more, and he would break into level 15.
Chaos Chymify had activated the list of the Sylvan’s Soul Aspects he could take, but nothing really appealed to him. None of the abilities the Sylvan possessed suited him, and he had no need for the alien’s body parts. So instead, Ray decided to loot the corpse’s sword and the little pouch at the waist.
Inside was nothing more than some string, some of the pills he had gotten from the Imps, and what looked like some kind of small ration bar. Huh.
There was no time to waste, though. More Sylvans would be coming soon enough. So, Ray got ready for the next ambush.
The plan would essentially be the same. He dismissed all his spells—save the eyeball—only waiting to call them up once he spotted any Sylvan coming to this exact location. The eyeball he sent to scout ahead and warn him when a Sylvan got close.
Leaving the body behind, Ray hid and waited.
The eyeball was so fantastic for scouting. Ray didn’t even have to do anything, just wait while the eye flew around and let him see whatever he wanted through a third of his expanded field of view.
Eventually, Ray got that there were three more Sylvans in the area. Their actual lookout was rather strange. It was a small tower-like outpost, but not any kind of tower that Ray had seen. If he had to guess, it looked more like the Sylvans’ hornlike growths, as though they had grown a massive, twisted version of their horns straight out of the ground. Weird.
One Sylvan sat at the top, lazily surveying the surroundings. Ray could tell by the posture that it was mostly a formality. The Sylvan wasn’t really paying attention.
He also got the sense that he was viewing the one that had to be the leader. There was a certain sense of importance about the alien’s silky, armoured robe. A certain sense of superiority about the posture and everything else that spoke of someone used to giving orders.
That was when the eyeball located another Sylvan moving closer to the location of the dead one.
Ray’s heart rate picked up. Time for his second execution.
Thankfully, it went much as the first one had done. The Sylvan was distracted by the floating eyeball just long enough for the Windbane Maw to get behind and blast out a stream of chaotic fire. As the alien tried desperately brought up a defensive ability, Ray was already firing off a bunch of Chaos Chymifies.
Interestingly, the Sylvan wasn’t using Pressure Block as the others had done. This alien possessed a different shielding ability. It was using its weapon directly.
Ray had noted that it didn’t simply use a curved sword. This was more like two swords joined together, or perhaps, a spear with curved blades at both ends. What were they called again? Twinblades? Ray wasn’t fully certain, but it was definitely flashy.
The Sylvan’s defensive ability was about spinning the twinblade around its horizontal axis so that it formed a weird, spinning shield. There was a soft, amethyst glow about it too.
Strangely, it worked. The fire was indeed being blocked by whatever that skill was, though of course, the Maw had still managed to strike earlier. That was why parts of the Sylvan were burning away, eaten by black-red flames that made the flesh pop, sizzle, and spray blood. Sheesh, that had to hurt.
Good thing Ray was there to end the poor Sylvan’s suffering with a barrage of Chaos Chymifies striking all at once.
The thing about activating Vengeful Plunder before attacking was that it raised Ray’s power as every hit landed. That meant every Chaos Chymify was stronger than the last, dealing increasingly higher damage. Ray felt like patting himself on the back for finding an interesting use case for his True Mana skill.
He had lost the boosts from the previous use of Vengeful Plunder, but that was fine. He had Mana to spare.
Though, it did make him wonder if the Marauder was being notified about the use of the skill. Did the Paragon gain anything by Ray using his skill? It didn’t sound like it, from what the Mentor had said.
But then, why was the Paragon so gleeful about Ray using his Tower Node?
[Enemy Defeated—Sylvan]
Acrobat Assaulter [Tier 3] Sylvan: [Level 16] x1
Essence: +2,400
Knowledge: +3
Mana Restored: +160
Essence to level 15: 8,810/10,000
Interesting. Despite not using the same abilities as the last Sylvan, the class hadn’t changed. Maybe this alien’s Path was different.
Ray would have been happy but there was one small difference, compared to last time.
Just before dying, the Sylvan had warned the others.
There was no real sign of it. The Sylvan didn’t set off a flare or yell out or anything of the sort. But Ray could tell, mostly because he had set his eye to keep a lookout now that its current distracting task was done. It had spotted the Sylvan at the top of the strange tower begin to move as soon as Ray’s current target was dead.
In other words, things were about to get more frenetic.
That couldn’t be the only other Sylvan in the area. He had set the eye to move as it kept watch, and now it had spotted another one farther off hurrying closer.
Clearly, the dead Sylvan had warned every other one that was in the vicinity.
Ray got moving, indicating the Windbane Maw to follow along. He had at least two other Sylvans to deal with. No way was he fighting them together. Which was why it was probably a good thing that they were separate for now. He could still take them out individually.
A circuitous route took him towards the Sylvan farther off, the one accompanied by the Brighthorn. The tower Sylvan looked like more bad news, so he’d leave that one for later.
There was also the concern of what exactly the last alien Ray had killed had said. He was more or less certain the alien could only have warned the others about the exact experience. A floating eyeball. A draconic head. Chaotic flames.
And someone attacking from distance at the end.
Could the Sylvan have gotten off all that information in such a short amount of time? Ray thought it unlikely, but still. Hope for heaven, prepare for hell.
A quick look with the third eyeball confirmed that the head Sylvan, as he had begun to think of the alien, was almost at the site of Ray’s last ambush. He would have a tiny window to deal with his intended mark.
No time to waste.
Ray started off the same as before. The eyeball went first, getting into position to distract the Sylvan. Meanwhile, the Windbane Maw reached the right spot just outside of the approaching Sylvan’s range of perception.
Both the alien and the hellhound spotted the eyeball. With a shrieking bark, the Brighthorn charged the flying eyeball.
Instead of following, the Sylvan twisted around and started surveying the local area.
Ray still couldn’t tell just how much his opponent knew about his plans from the dead Sylvan. It was clear, though, that his current target wasn’t going to be taken in as easily as the others had been. In fact, the Sylvan spotted the Windbane Maw far too soon. Just as the stream of fire blasted in, the alien leaped, landing on the Maw with twin curved swords slicing in.
Landing at just the right spot for Ray to take the Sylvan out from distance.
He knew Chaos Chymify, even when using True Enhancement, wasn’t going to work. If the Sylvan was dealing with the Maw in that manner, chances were that the rest of Ray’s previous strategy would be just as ineffectual.
But he had prepared a countermeasure.
All he had to do was use True Enhancement on Lifeblood Crucible and follow it up with a Primal Summons. He had already condensed enough of his regular Mana into True Mana while he had been moving into position.
The Windbane Maw in the distance died, but in that instant, a different one formed on Ray’s arm.
He winced at the pain. It was more intense this time. A regular Primal Summon with Mana Imbuing had made him feel like he was itching himself with rather sharp nails. Now, with his summon enhanced with True Mana, Ray felt like he was gouging out his skin. It was a good thing he could groan. He wouldn’t be giving his position at this distance.
Thankfully, the draconic head formed around his hand in no time. Except, it wasn’t the regular, gold-scaled Maw like the dying construct.
What took the place of Ray’s arm was a spectral version made of pure monochrome energy, the pits of its eyes burning with bleeding, ruby red flames. The black-and-white Windbane head was larger too, easily big enough to swallow a little kid whole. Wild that he could hold it up.
There was no time for Ray to marvel. The Sylvan in the distance had just taken care of his construct. Now or never.
So, with a forceful focus, Ray bid his summoned Maw open wide and fire.
He didn’t get a stream of flames shooting at the Sylvan. It wasn’t even a fiery geyser, though that would have been good enough.
What Ray got instead was an honest-to-goodness laser.
He had no other way of describing the compressed burst of energy emitted from the spectral Windbane Maw. A ball of golden power burned in between the jaws, before it shot out nearly too fast for him to keep up with it. The golden orb turned into a black-and-white laser, mirroring the head itself as it struck its target.
The poor Sylvan had no way of knowing what even struck. Ray’s laser struck his target and sent the alien flying back. He didn’t need to see the effect that blast had to know it was fatal.
[Enemy Defeated—Sylvan]
Crescent Wielder [Tier 3] Sylvan: [Level 17] x1
Essence: +2,550
Mana Restored: +170
Knowledge: +3
[Level Up!]
Reward
* +3 Intellect, +3 Spirit, +2 Vitality, +4 allocatable free stats.
* 1 New Spell: Arcane Orb [Tier 1]
* Arcane Orb has been converted to Sphereguard of Chaos by Path of Lifeblood Chaos.
Essence to level 16: 1,360/12,000
There. Another level achieved. Amazing. Ray would have exulted in the feeling if he hadn’t needed to turn around.
The other, final Sylvan was almost at his location.