Possession: Success!
Host: Dark Raven [LVL 15]
Stats:
HP: 50/70
MP: 0
WILL: 10/10
STR: 10
PER: 20
SPD: 45
CHA: 5
[Skills known]
Wing Buffet (Grade F),
Peck (Grade F)
Dive (Grade F)
[Skill Siphon]
Roar (Grade E)
Hide (Grade E)
Current Spirit Cores: 55
The giant raven did not resist. It didn’t even budge as Ethan plopped down above its feathered brow and assumed his command over the beast’s nervous system.
ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL. Heh, I’ve always wanted to say that.
Fantastic.
Now, can we get down to business?
Ethan clucked his new, sleek, birdly beak.
After I enjoy the sight of my spectators.
The battle had stopped altogether the second Ethan possessed the bird. The human musketeers watched in awe as it rose, hat firmly attached to its feathered skull, and eyed them with vacant, dead eyes.
“By the Grey…” one musket bearer whispered. “It is the Archon’s power!”
“Zombie bird! DEMON ZOMBIE!” cried another.
But the hybrids at the far end of the glade looked on with awe, smiles breaking across their fur-coated faces.
“What did I tell you?” Tara chuckled. “This Archon knows what he’s doin’.”
They then began pushing back against their distracted opponents, while Ethan stretched his jet-black wings in front of the terrified soldiers.
Impressive wingspan! Now, let’s just see what it can do.
The leader of the marksmen was clearly not as impressed as his men, barking an order at them that rebounded off their steel-plate helms:
“What are you sods waiting for?! SHOOT THE BASTARD BIRD!”
But such shots never came.
Wing Buffet (Grade F)
Your wings flap up a storm, {Repelling} any foes before you with 15 STR or lower away up to 20ft.
Storm was right: as Ethan began a series of frantic flaps, the musketeers were blown clean off their feet. Their eyes were their main strength, not their bulk, and none of them were able to withstand the great buffet of the dark raven’s assault. None of them except their red-faced master, that is.
“Bleedin’ cowards! I’ll deal with this one myself. FOR KING LYSANDUS! FOR THE GRE-“
The soldier’s battlecry was interrupted by the piercing roar that sounded from Ethan’s beak, his tongue lolling out and unleashing the paralyzing sound he’d transferred from his last troll host.
“D-damn it…”
The soldier fell prone, face hugging the lush grass of the glade, ears picking up the sounds of his fleeing men all around him.
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“G-GO TO THE KING! TELL HIM – TELL – TELL HIM WHAT IT IS! TELL HIM THAT IT’S-"
The beak of the possessed raven came down on the back of his neck, and his final words were muffled as his lifeblood ran down his back.
Ethan retracted his beak from the fallen soldier, flexing his claws as he turned away and felt the Spirit Cores of his fallen foe run through his onyx breast.
Spirit Cores Increased: 80
Mmmhmm. Looks like humans are actually some of the best meals around. Who knew?
The soldiers were backing away from him while his companions continued cutting down the warriors who still tried to resist. Glancing over at them, Ethan saw that these guys clearly still didn’t get the picture.
Well, Sys, I’ll give you three guesses what happens now.
…
You do what you do best?
Ethan did. With another wing buffet that sent the last of the marksmen flying into the depths of the forest, he rose and took to the skies—starless skies perfect for a skill he hadn’t even realized he’d managed to transfer.
Hide (Grade E) Activated!
He felt himself blend into the skies, his new dark form feeling weightless and free as it disappeared from sight, bleeding away into the darkness itself.
Could almost just stay here, huh, Sys? Just stay flying up here till the end of time. If I was still the guy I was on Earth, I’d probably have just done that.
…but that isn’t who I am now, right?
This System is not here to facilitate your illusions of character development.
Ethan flashed a hawkish grin.
You know something? Maybe changing things up a little was just what I needed…
His sharp eyes then located the bulk of the human warriors below—those still engaged in bloody melee with his companions. Fauna was blasting them with spells (some of which were working), Tara was slicing and dicing every which way, and Klax was holding on as best he could, striking with his feet instead of his ruined arm. They were a picture of absolute focus.
But not even the most focused of creatures could keep their composure in the face of what happened next.
Dive (Grade F) Activated
You focus your speed into your attack, gaining a bonus to DMG based on your SPD stat and the distance you are from the enemy.
Current DMG bonus: +45
Before the incredulous eyes of the army, one soldier suddenly disappeared in a puff of blood and broken armor—his head practically caved in, and his body reduced to a crumbling wreck.
“By the Grey! Who – where’s the attacker? Where –“
The screaming man was the next to die—his head cleaved clean from his shoulders, seemingly by nothing more than a sudden rush of wind.
And as Ethan soared right back up before he dived again into the wave of screaming soldiers below, he smiled to see his stats:
Sneak Attack: Success!
DMG: X2
DMG: 90
Spirit Core Increase: 100
You’ve gotta admit, Sys, now we’re slaying with style.
Sys did not reply. Or, if it did, Ethan missed any retorts in the screams of the soldiers who were too busy ordering a general retreat.
“The Archon is up and about, baby!” Tara shouted at the fleeing bunch. “Go tell your rat-faced King! And your precious Greys!”
“Why don’t you tell us yourself?”
A sudden rush of power slashed through the treeline—strong enough that Ethan took note as he was beginning his next dive-bomb assault on the fleeing humans.
He knew that voice. He’d never forget it, and his eyes begged his companions to run.
MOVE! He tried to shriek, turning midair and coming in hot as Artorious, eyes flashing with killing intent, hit the catgirl with a single jab to her stomach before grabbing her by the throat and slamming her into the ground.
“TARA!” Klax roared, joining Fauna as they both turned to take down the thawed swordsman. But Ethan was faster—bludgeoning into Artorious’ scarred face with just as much force as he had used to kill the men earlier.
And yet, miraculously, the one-armed man gripped his beak in his hand and stopped him before Ethan could even touch his head.
“You think me as simple as a mere mortal?” he asked. “Your ignorance is as pitiful as your new friends' doomed struggle.”
Ethan tried wriggling free, readying a wing buffet to shake this guy off. But the strength of this… inhuman human… was unbearable. It was like he radiated something wrong. Like the energy from his very being was a magnetic force that repelled Ethan on a natural level. Ethen even felt Sys reel back in his mind, and when the eyes of the warrior found his again, it was all Ethan could do to stare right back at his burning sapphire eyes and try to peck them clean out of their sockets.
With as much effort as throwing around a scrap of food, Artorious then swung Ethan overhead and smashed him into the hybrids running to help their Archon, watching as the rabbit-girl’s staff snapped in two and she fell to the ground.
The wolfman, meanwhile, was brought to his knees, breathing heavily, blood dripping from his mouth onto the grass.
Ethan’s mind reeled as Artorious pounded him into the ground again, and again, and again…
“Pathetic,” Artorious spat. “None of you can hold a candle to the true power of the righteous.”
“Righteous…” Klax spat as he struggled to stand. “Not even you believe that… Lightborn.”
Ethan’s eye then lighted on the shining stone Tara was holding in her hand—the one she was waving at Klax surreptitiously as he kept the Greycloak distracted.
“It is fitting that you should die with your precious savior,” Artorious said, creeping forward with Ethan still in his grip. “Do you not understand it by now? Your kind was not chosen. You are a blip in history. A stain on this realm. And if you fight us, you will lose.”
“I… told ya,” Tara wheezed as she steadily rose to her feet. “Maybe we can’t beat ya, but we can run away real good. Us hybrids… we’ve had to… get good at it…”
Ethan could hear the sorrow stuck in her throat, speaking of some unknown history here—some ancient hatred this Lightborn and his Order must have for her kind… but he also saw the eyes of her teammates all meet his, desperately trying to get him to understand their plan.
Her fingers twitched on the Teleport Stone. Ethan needed no further instruction.
He threw back his head with a roar that made the trees themselves shudder, and as Artorious turned to close his throat, Fauna managed to pull off a barrage of spectral missiles that sent the warrior into a defensive stance, letting go of Ethan just as the paralysis took hold.
“T-that’s for my staff!” Fauna squeaked.
Ethan then made a beeline for the stone as the other hybrids touched it and instantly evaporated from sight, their bodies flying to whatever strange environ they must call home, far away from this place.
See ya, Arty! Ethan shrieked back at the dismayed face of the Greycloak. He liked to think that, even if the old guy didn’t speak bird, he could at least understand the sneering grin the dark bird was shooting his way.
“Run, fly, jump, or swim, Archon—I will find you," he said. "You were a failure in your last life, and you will fail in this one, too.”
Ethan turned in the air, spreading his new wings wide in open challenge just before his claws touched the tip of the sapphire stone and he rocketed away with his newfound allies.