Eventually, everybody got over the chaos shield situation. Alyx finished taking all the notes he needed, and since he couldn’t do any experiments then and there he was happy to move along. Lili was also a bit more put together as she got used to the constant feeling of the Chaos Mana and was simply glad that everybody was too busy with their own things to notice any changes in her composure. Rose eventually accepted the fact that things were going to be out of her control, and taking a page out of Jasmine’s book, she began to see the whole thing as an extra challenge. Of course, Tesilim was unbothered by the situation and was ready to continue their hunt.
Following Tesilim's marker, they pretended to look at the map the guild had given them, and the party continued toward the place where the bunnies had been spotted. It would probably take another hour to get to the location. And since it was just getting a bit later into the morning the party should have enough time to clear out the bunnies and return to the city.
The walk toward the bunny area was calm, and no beasts or monsters bothered the party. Those who did were scared off as three to four different presences blasted them. So, it was a surprise when a bear and two large boars that were almost the same size as the bear did not get scared off by a blast of Lili’s presence and instead kept charging at the party.
“Shit! Something’s wrong. Two boars and a bear just shrugged off my presence and are coming straight at us.” Lili spoke up suddenly, and the party quickly responded as everyone but Alyx and Jasmine, whose shields were already active, enhanced themselves.
Rose, glowing slightly gold, moved in the direction Lili had pointed with her shield and sword at the ready. Flanking her were Lili, wielding her two daggers, and Tesilim, whose pair of boots had been replaced with the ones from his die. A bit behind the two elves, Alyx and Jasmine got ready as staffs appeared in their hands. Jasmine’s staff was a long piece of metal that Alyx recognized as adamantium wrapped in what had to be silver mythral embroidery that would help with grip it in combat.
A second or two after they formed up, the bear and boars appeared as trees came crashing down. The beasts looked as they should with their brown furs and whitish tusks. The problem was that it looked like their brains had come out of their skulls.
“What the fuck! Are their brains falling out or what!? Is that why they're charging at us!? Have they gone crazy!?” Tesilim blurted out first, unsure of what the hell was going on.
Ignoring Tesilim, Lili spoke up, addressing the rest of the group, “I just want to make sure, but everyone knows what those things are, right?”
“Yes.” Said the gnome.
“Affirmative.” replied the redhead.
“Uhuh. They suck.” Answered Jasmine.
“No! What the heck, guys!”
“Tesilim, those aren’t their brains.” Lili finally addressed Tesilim, seeing as the rest of the party knew what they were dealing with, “They are aberrations.”
“Seriously!? What, do they take control of their targets brain or something? Is that why they look like that?” Tesilim responded half-jokingly.
“Actually, yes. They are called Brain Huggers for that reason.” Alyx added helpfully.
“Fuck. You’re joking, right?”
“I would never.” Replied the scholar.
“Guys, we are switching over to telepathy.” Lili’s voice rang in their brains, and then the beasts were right on top of them.
“Shield Wall!” Yelled Rose as she activated her technique, causing a wall of golden energy to appear before her. The beasts, unable to stop their momentum, slammed right into it. If it had been just one D Rank beast, the wall would have held, but the technique simply delayed the beasts. And they broke through, scattering the wall into light as it flashed out of existence, bringing a bit more light into the already sunny day.
The wall had accomplished what Rose wanted giving the rest of the party a path to follow as they continued their engagement.
“Jasmine, bind the bear; I will stop the boar coming at Lili. Lili, take it out. Tes, let the other boar hit you so we can get rid of that shield!” Alyx’s voice rang in their minds, and soon after, the two elves heard his chant start behind them.
"By earth's grasp and nature's might;
Roots arise and bind tight; -
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The bear slammed into Rose’s shield, and the two boars passed on either side of her. She heard Alyx’s instructions but not his chant. What she did hear was Jasmine’s yell as she activated one of her techniques.
“Binding Light!”
In front of Rose, the bear, which had backed up a bit and was beginning to glow with pink energy, was startled as silver chains appeared around its body and began to tighten. Not wasting the opportunity, Rose’s body enhancement dimmed as she activated her sub-enhancement, which rerouted some of the power to her sword as she went to stab the bear.
Meanwhile, Tesilim was standing in one spot, watching as one of the boars glowed with pink energy and sped up. It was taking all he had not to teleport away, even if he rationally knew that the shield would block the attack.
As for the other boar, well, it came to a stop as Alyx finished his chant, and roots rose from the ground, grasping its legs.
From soil below, ensnare and hold;
Trap my foes in vines untold."
Sadly, the roots weren’t strong enough to hold the boar down in one go, but they were still sufficient to cause it to falter in its stride as its feet failed to find purchase. Finally, Lili saw her quarry come to a stop as it slid across the ground, leaving a large furrow behind, and ran at it. On her way there, she had to dodge blasts of pink energy that the brain-looking aberration unleashed. Thankfully, since the thing had stopped, the root spell from Alyx caught up and finished its work as it enveloped the pig, stopping any chances it had at getting up.
It didn’t take long before Lili was on top of it, her blades already covered in a void of darkness, and she released her technique at point-blank range.
“Consuming Slash.”
Lili stated simply as her daggers crossed and an X-shaped slash slammed into the aberration’s pink barrier. The barrier held for just a second before her rank asserted itself and broke through, hitting the monster directly sending its flesh into the abyss.
As Lili hit her monster, Tesilim was hit with a monster. Well, not really. The boar had picked up a good amount of force, and Tesilim felt like he was looking at a semi coming straight at him. And like he would do if a semi were coming at him, he closed his eyes at the last second only to feel a rush of air soon after instead of pain. Opening his eyes, he saw that the boar had come to a full stop. Tesilim’s shield was gone, and the boar was fine. Its power had been negated.
Of course, since the shield was gone, that also meant the Chaos Event was coming, and Tesilim teleported backward away from the boar while also letting his teammates know.
“Guys, it's coming, get ready.”
🔷 Crystal Notice 🔷
Warning! Your Chaos Shield has activated a Chaos Event against your attacker.
Rolling d20. 12. Rolling d4. 1. Rolling d4. 2.
🔷
The notification came, and not long after, a white portal about ten feet wide came into existence under the still-shocked boar. From what Tesilim had seen, the portal was still stabilizing before opening to where it would lead.
Rose was stabbing the absolute crap out of the bear, who was still chained by Jasmine’s technique. Jasmine and Alyx had snapped their attention over to Tesilim after hearing his warning. Meanwhile, Lili was running towards Rose, unworried about any Chaos Event. Well, at least until she felt as all the wind in the nearby area began to rush in its direction.
Tesilim, who had been watching the portal, finally saw as the white garble of magic stabilized, and the boar was sucked into the damn thing. He was confused at first, but considering the sucking didn’t stop, and all the air was rushing towards the portal along with himself, he realized what was happening.
“Holy Shit! Guys, get the fuck away from here! A portal to space just opened! We are going to fucking die!”
Hearing Tesilim’s words in their mind and feeling the obvious shift in the environment as if a windstorm had just appeared, the party did not hesitate. They all enhanced themselves to the max, with Alyx and Jasmine dropping their shields to do so.
Their progress was slow, and they had to doge quite several bushes, tree limbs, and animals. The only saving grace was that the portal had begun to shrink after it appeared. And it wasn’t long before they were all standing around a destroyed forest, being able to breathe normally again.
“Holy shit…. That was freaking crazy.” Tesilim said as he lay on the ground looking up at the sky while avoiding the annoyed looks, he was receiving from everyone else.
“Crazy? That was insane! We almost died!” Rose yelled while still looking around for any further threats along with Lili.
“Thank the World Crystal, we didn’t,” Alyx stated, earning a look from everyone except Lili.
“What do you mean?” Jasmine asked obviously interested in the topic.
“Yeah, what she said.” Tesilim also added while throwing a lazy thumb at Jasmine, who was resting against a tree.
Alyx, who had been more interested in the event than the fact he could have died, was still looking around as if doing so would give him more insights into the workings of Tesilim’s magic and, hopefully, reality. Seeing as he had most of their attention, he stopped and explained himself.
“Well, though we can open portals to the Astral, it is not something you should do for obvious reasons. Still, high-rankers can survive in space for a while, so there have been experiments with such things. The problem is that those experiments and their portals don’t last long because the World Crystal isn’t fond of having portals that lead directly into the Astral just sitting around. Thus, if one pops up, the godly entity uses its powers, part of which deal with the spatial stability of our planet, to snuff out said portals.”
“Hmm, I see. So, that’s one of the few things that it can interfere with then?” Jasmine questioned.
Hearing her question, Alyx gave her a “well, that's an interesting topic you got there” look but didn’t pursue it further outside of answering her.
“Yeah, pretty much.”
“Wait. So, why allow us to open them at all?” Rose chipped in.
“Probably, something along the lines of free will and having us learn from our mistakes. Right, Alyx?” Tesilim interrupted, looking right at Alyx for confirmation.
In turn, Alyx just looked at Rose and copied Tesilim’s earlier statement while also throwing a lazy thumb in the elf’s direction. “Yeah, what he said.”