ARC2/C38 – Skill learning and adaptation part 1
Traksis group were allowed to rest to replenish their SP back at base camp. But before they were due to be sent out again she received news that the enemy had retreated. And so instead they and the rest of five squadrons of Profoss troops were sent off to another outpost were fighting was going on.
As they reached the next home world their troops were in high spirits. Seeing the enemy flee before your eyes will do that. But she had her doubts and wasn’t sure if were a rues of some kind.
Due to the fact that at this outpost the enemies also started to withdrawn. This time they followed them into the MR. Where she thought she had found out why.
Within the MR your opponent could choose the terrain and have a clear advantage over you. It was like a labyrinth. The first floor was massive, the size of many football fields. It was like they had stepped into a jungle, complete with wild animals. The only thing that made it dissimilar was the lack of noise. Which saved many a soldier from attack. It was full of overgrowths and trees, making it very hard still for the normal troops to detect the enemy. Many were cut down before the battle ensued in earnest.
The creatures which were vaguely humanoid but had spindly arms and legs, covered in leathery skin, attacked in packs of between five and seven. Many laying in wait, others patrolling solo. Those patrolling would cry out to warn others of their approach and course all packs in the area to attack.
Groups had been organised so that there was at least one tank, but they simply lacked the defence to deal with such large attacks. As a result groups merged. More than often forming up from two other groups. Her group received one more tank, who walked side by side with her.
He was a man with so much armour he looked like a wall. She just hoped he wasn’t easily knocked down. And kept shouting at him to give her room. There was simply no way she could use any of her abilities with him so close, unless he didn’t mind being cooked.
In the end she used her wind skill to push him away from her, gently, but firmly. He eventually got the hint just in time as a wave of enemies came at them.
They were very low level and didn’t even seem to have many abilities, except modder ones allowing them to increase their speed. Instead of offensive skills they just swung weirdly constructed spears. And some had bow and arrows to attack from long range. Many of the archers had climbed into the trees where they could easily take out people one by one.
The fighting did not go well, as they picked of her sides troops while continually retreating or flanking their position only to attack from another direction.
Traksis became more and more reckless with [Absorption Field Projection] not worrying how hard it might be to explain afterwards. Thankfully, nobody could see the enemies being vapourised, due to the heavy tree cover.
Fortunately her side just seemed relieved, that things were going their way.
Then we reached what seemed to be the back of this section of the MR. It was a wall of rock with many tunnels leading into it. Oh, great another tunnel system. But this time there were so many entrances she worried as to how their troops would fair this time. She could not protect everyone.
Heading into the darkness, she would have been killed, well maybe not killed but lost her sight due to a hail of arrows which poured forth from the cave mouth.
As their group was the first to reach this part of the MR and there were none of their soldiers ahead of her. Traksis was allowed free range to use her [Pyro Kinesis]. She sent jets of flame deep into the tunnels, close to her. This was also useful practise with the skill for her as this and the many others she had never used before. With some practise she managed to get the jets to be powerful enough to travel a long way into each tunnel. Where the screams were a satisfying testimony to her success.
Then stealthed and flew along the rest of the tunnels repeating this attack, along with [Pain illusion]. She could have just neutralised the threat but thought destroying the enemies ability to surprise attack her side whilst also panicking the enemy into fleeing was a better tactic.
From then on, it was just her flying through the tunnels. She had told one of her group that she as tank was going on in ahead. Being to restricted her only choice was to go it alone. She continued through the tunnels getting more and more proficient with this new skill. It was ideal was the tunnels as it allowed her to clearly see where she was going also in the dark. Everything was lit up like the sun.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
As she proceeded further underground, she used [Absorption Field Projection] on any enemies in range in adjacent tunnels. Able to pin point them easily as she rushed alone, with AF assistance. Traksis also projected the flames behind her to prevent sneak attacks from behind when she came across other adjoining tunnels.
Though there was little chance of this, as she would blind anyone with the brightness of the flames before they would get to see any glimpse of her. She decided infact to stealth, then all they would see was a wall of flames coming at them.
Eventually she came to an area that opened up and many tunnels intersected. There were a large amount of rocks littering the floor of the cavern. Some as large as fifty feet high. She wondered what enemy would attack here until she received information from her [Absorption Field Projection].
They were what she knew to be golems. Hundreds or maybe thousands of them. This would be a mincing machine for most squads.
As she had sped ahead, she felt she had a lead of at least twenty minutes on the other teams giving her a chance to try out some of her other abilities.
She tried her flame inferno on them and saw their rock skin, heat up until it quickly became a glowing red. This seemed like a very good way of getting their attention as she sprayed the area with a 180 degree jet of white hot flames.
They came at her from all directions. But could they damage her. She remembered how her SP had dropped and wondered if she could avoid using SP at all.
The first one which was about eight feet tall, a dwarf in comparison to most there. It exploded as she punched it with both fists square in the chest, showering those behind it with debris.
“HP” she said internally to AF. “No change” came the reply.
Alrighty thought Traksis, limbering up. It was good for her to get used to this new body of hers.
But there were so many surrounding her that she had little time for finesse and just spun around fists out, then legs out using [Flight]. Scattering the golems, making them explode and knocking others back in heaps behind them.
She had found her body was pretty resistant. Next test, could she take on the biggest ones.
Jumping over a dozen on so golems, she found the largest one nearby, easily fifty feet tall. She noted it also looked quite different with a metallic sheen to its upper body.
Feet cracked against, stone. There was a cacophonous crash that echoed round the chamber as they met. The giant flew back flailing its arms to stabilise itself. Although it had a large dent in its chest, it was still intact.
“Your health just dropped by 100 points” said AF helpfully.
Ok, She guessed running into a metal wall wasn’t good for your health, after all.
So she switched to using her abilities. First up, [Pyro Kinesis]. She wished she had [Pyro Wave] but she would have to make do with spinning in the air while using it.
Looking down below her, she saw they were starting to glow all around her. So she followed up with [Cryo Wave].
KaBoom.
The chamber rocked as at least twenty golems exploded, including half of one that was about twenty feet. This left rubble strewn over a few hundred feet area, except for about seven or so, larger golems which had remained, not unharmed but still standing after the blast.
AF informed her of her SP drain and she used [Absorption Field Projection] to top up her SP to full. She didn’t intent on getting into a situation where she wasn’t full on SP in case of emergency and also just as common sense.
She found that all absorption skills worked perfectly on them. And that after her melee attacks on the golems her [Tough] ability had levelled the fastest. AF was giving her a running commentary that aloud her just to try out anything she want. It was like having your own personal trainer, AF told her. Whatever that was.
[Cryo Wave] was also useful to slow her opponents as were her drain abilities. [Cryo Wave] also meant the big ones fell or at least slid a lot further when she hit them. But using [Pyro Kinesis] on the bigger ones she found was not very SP efficient at all. And [Aero Kinesis] could lift most of the smaller ones and be used for crowd control but could barely push back the larger ones.
She felt a bit defeated as she had to use [Absorption Field Projection] on the remaining ones to clear them out before her allies arrived. For a while she was worried that something had in fact happened to the Profoss troops and it had now been almost an hour.
But thankfully they finally arrived looking weary but with very few injured that she could spot. She explained away the debris that remained in the cavern by stating that they had the roof had partially caved in at one point. This seemed to satisfy the group leader. But he cautioned her for heading to far ahead.
She then wondered where all the strange spindly creatures had retreated to as none had entered this cavern. When she was told they were still fighting some she retraced her route, with AFs help of course.
Were there more enemies to kill? Traksis thought actually quite excited to find different foes to take on. She felt maybe she could show a fraction of her power in order for her group leader to give her a bit of leeway.
She also wished she had Sam’s ability to use psi-energy to cloak items and float them around. As she could have earned a heap from the cores in here. But it didn’t seem to be listed in her abilities and AF was none the wiser about it.
After travelling for a while with her group, making very slow progress, cautiously trekking through the tunnels. It was speeded up a bit by avoiding any ambushes by Traksis using [Absorption Field Projection] on any would be attackers.
Finally they reached another open area. She could see how the enemies tactic of drawing them into the MR had been a very good one. Any normal army would easily have been out manoeuvred by an opposition who knew the terrain.