Meanwhile, two-thirds of the supporting force waited behind them. Zelsys had retained a few sect members, Strake, three Third-model tankmen, and three squads of Hellhounds. All others had been assigned to Zefaris and Victor. It was no surprise, between Lady Zelsys and Strake, there would likely only be a tiny fraction of enemy forces to clean up. Victor was sure that it wouldn’t be nearly so easy on their side - not because he thought himself or Zefaris lackluster, of course.
Once Victor was finished refueling the battering ram, he accelerated the summoning. It was a bipedal, digitigrade beast with hands based on his armor’s gauntlet, a monstrosity with a thick, claw-ended tail and a wide, horned, drake-like visage. It was the size of a Dragon Knight… And only one of two that would hold open the gate. Zefaris had already began carving it with the requisite Antediluvian Glyphs before its counterpart was one-third conjured.
It was… A curious coincidence, that he had grown towards wielding Servitors and Zefaris had come upon the Sword Phantom Scripture. His Servitors and her Phantoms functioned fundamentally differently both in operation and in their actual use cases, of course, but… He couldn’t help thinking of the account of the Blue Moon War - specifically the technique that a certain unknown cultivator used to turn Ubul’s clay soldiers against him by imbuing them with the fighting will of fallen soldiers. Surely, it was a mere coincidence combined with his mind seeking connections where there were none. After all, the Itrian Scroll contained a vast breadth of knowledge, with servitors merely being one. He had kept it to himself, but the depth and breadth of the Itrial Scroll was truly vaster than any single text he had seen. It felt very much like a work whose fragments could become foundational texts for entire sects… And for all he knew, it could very well be that. The Smoke Witch was exactly the type of temperamental immortal said to bestow such treasures on a whim.
The fact that even individuals who fully grasped the power in the scroll couldn't stand up to Tian Feng spoke volumes of his great and terrible strength. He had no choice but to push further, to dig deeper, to merge the esoteric knowledge of Itrian shrine guardians with the philosophy of Sturmblitz Kunst. Thus…
They had been born; his Rising Sun Drakes.
These beasts of bone and flame, wrought in imitation of not guardian golems… But of tanks. As they were, they couldn’t really fight - or rather, Victor couldn’t make them fight for an extended period of time while doing anything else. Having them hold open a gate would be no issue, though.
“Ready?” came a question from Lady Zefaris.
He brought out three items; firstly, a dark gem, encrusted with dragonbone, white flame swirling inside. A Black Sun Core, refined from a ruby and imbued with power from vast quantities of crystallized ignis, owing to the fuel enrichment chambers of Reactor 4. The other two were dragonbone keys, based on his own, with their own Black Sun Cores in the stead of his Antediluvian Gem. With a gesture, all three flew into their places; the Black Sun Core into Dawnwolf’s waiting maw, and the two keys into the backs of his Rising Sun Drakes. Dawnwolf lunged in his direction and swallowed him whole, collapsing into a swirling mass of muscle and bone that soon became his armored form, subtly and invisibly strengthened in places by small amounts of bone and muscle from Eisengeist. Being wrought of Teutobochus, certain areas were simply better left alone; determining where Eisengeist tissue served better was half of the challenge. The other half was working with it.
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Another gesture, and with turns of their keys the Drakes rumbled to life, bonefire blazing in their hollow eye sockets. Needing no further instruction, they sprinted over to their rightful places to either side of the battering ram. Victor, his belt closed and helmet open, turned to Zefaris: “Ready.”
The time window was hair-thin, but they’d worked out the ignition delay and acceleration time from the first firing. Like a gigantic drill, the battering ram careened forward, spiraling, meeting the final ripple. It went on spinning, twisting, pushing, pulling, piercing, tearing away the Red Fog, winding it in long reams along its own axis as it screamed against the barrier.
Then, it went through. Not slowly or gradually, but all at once, screaming right into the city atop a column of explosions. The Rising Sun Drakes rushed in to hold open the tear, the Red Fog’s solidified, stone-like form collapsing in around them, and only solidifying further when their rune-carved claws halted its influx. Waiting not a split-second more, Victor turned Koschei’s Key and set ablaze his armor’s beating heart, flying forward and grabbing Zefaris as he went, right after she had barked a simple command to the supporting force. He set her down right when they were inside, in a tactically sound position, before he zipped over to where the Black Rod Ram had fallen - embedded within a once-regal three-story house. The city’s occupiers were prepared for them, and unlike Lady Zelsys, he and Zefaris found it prudent to fully rely on the support of their contingent.
The enemy force could only be described as dense. It was most easily compared to the forces of the Conspirator Clans, with even the weakest among them having notable abilities. Three core archetypes were the most prevalent: Hemomancy, Hidden Weapons, and… Living Weapons. Flesh-puppets. One or more humans twisted into weaponized forms and controlled through doubtlessly abominable means. From there, supporting archetypes were even more varied, though wind magic was commonly employed to manipulate the hidden weapons and give them extra velocity. Victor lifted Zefaris onto a rooftop, and took off before a barrage of needles and bolts could come their way. From observing their impact on the buildings, it was clear that the penetrative power was easily comparable to contemporary sparklocks, while the volume of fire surpassed them by far. Dodging was, thankfully, not a problem for either of them, and neither was eliminating the opposition. Lady Zefaris certainly had no issues.