The proverbial game of cat and mouse continued far longer than Amara wanted it to. She couldn't seem to do any real damage to the mana-warped creature, and her own regeneration kept her resources mostly topped off. But that internal timer slowly ticked down toward the next burst of mana the ravine would gift her.
While she may have confidence surviving down here normally. She knew if she came into direct contact with that wall of mana, she'd become overloaded just as her shamans had when the cataclysm first happened. Tenacity only seemed to safe guard from the negative values, not the positive ones.
Her flight skill, having been disabled by the tiger, she began to jump and climb up the walls, all but abandoning the fight. It wasn't getting her anywhere. Her opponent, however, had other plans. It began using that skill-cancelling beam of mana as a swiping attack. Causing Amara to lose ground and constantly leap from wall to wall. The tiger was able to climb up much faster than she was as well.
The floating weapons of her skills left her opponent alone. Instead, she focused on a ledge not far from her current location, using the mana and blood-infused things to bludgeon, slice, and cut stone from the wall. Silently she chastised herself for not having a skill or weapon better suited to slicing through solid stone. In her adventuring days, she had relied on her allies for those tools.
Still, she was hundreds of years old, and she should have an answer for this problem. The beam passed inches in front of her face. Reminding her that her opponent was a very dangerous creature and that perhaps she shouldn't be daydreaming so casually.
Scrambling up to the ledge where she was building her vacation home, she turned to peer at the creature on the other side of the ravine. A thought occurred to her, why were her skills working down here? On the surface, crossing over the ravine canceled most skills and prevent many others from working. The tiger crouched on its own ledge opposite of her, muscle rippled, ears and tail twitched.
As the tiger leapt toward her, Amara decided on a different tactic. Instead of rolling to dodge or using her axes to attack, she dropped her weapons and leapt at the flying missile of fur. The two crashed in the middle of the air Amara's jaw cracked and deformed, four huge tusks jutting from her mouth as she sank her own fangs into the creature's face.
Her absurd [Brawn] was entirely too much for the tiger to handle. Her tusks sank through its skull and into its brain. The tiger thrashed, its front and back claws raking at Amara's chest and legs. Her armor held up decently, but the claws were still finding purchase and digging into her flesh. A new debuff appeared.
You've been afflicted with [Mana Venom]!
[Mana Venom]
Poisons the mana flows of the afflicted creature, causing them to burn health and stamina, in addition to mana anytime skills or spells are used.
Well, wasn't that just fucking lovely. The two were now on the ravine floor. As more and more of Amara's blood flowed from the wounds, her fighting only grew more intense. Skills from a half dozen classes flared to life at the scent of the blood, and her own tusks began to glow. Despite being mana-warped, the tiger knew fear. It began jerking its head back and away from her, causing its skill to rip and crack open. Some kind of viscous blue goop started to ooze out of its skull.
Amara didn't relent. Pushing her head forward and pinning the tiger's head to the ground, she released her bite. Immediately she bit back into the creature's head, finding new purchase. The claws became slower in their attacks. Amara activated another skill, one to siphon mana with her bite from her opponent. Being under the effects of [Mana Venom] meant her resources weren't topped off. She would remedy that.
Another few minutes passed before the creature finally lay still under her. As its life fled the corpse, so to did the discoloration of fur. Amara flopped down beside it, tusks receding into her mouth once more. She had figured if the creature couldn't open its mouth, it couldn't use that beam attack. She had been right. The [Mana Venom] debuff still had another three minutes and thirty-seven seconds left. Her resources had dropped dangerously low.
You've defeated [Greater Shattered Tiger]!
Less experience is awarded for defeating an enemy more than one hundred levels lower than your Derived Level.
Trait found on enemy: [Primordial Spawn] Experience awarded is doubled.
Trait found on enemy: [Mana-Warped] Experienced awarded is tripled.
The tired Chieftain slowly crawled back up to the ledge cave where her weapons had stayed at work during her struggle on the ravine floor. The cave was a solid thirty feet deep at this point. Amara slowly worked at clearing out all the rubble, letting all of her skills fade. Her mana began to slowly rise again, and the rest of her resources soon followed. At the back of the cave, the rise in mana was barely noticeable. Good, she thought.
Her back to the wall, she summoned weapons until the rise of mana stopped, and her total levels of mana plateaued. She'd keep these summoned as a way to ensure she didn't overfill on mana. Hands outstretched, blue flames once more poured from her fingertips, she had tried the attack against the tiger, but it shrugged it off just like everything else. She still wasn't entirely sure why her last plan worked. Maybe diminishing returns? The attack was strong enough and damage constant enough that it overwhelmed whatever sort of regeneration it had on its body.
Once her mana was at only three percent, she stopped using the flame attack. Her mana stayed steady at the lower percentage. Now she sat back and enjoyed the show, counting the seconds until the wall of mana rushed past the entrance of her cave. Her mana went from three percent to forty percent in a single second. Amara resumed the flames once more. It was merely her most expensive channeled attack and thus used the most mana in the shortest possible time.
Still, her mana rose. It wasn't as fast as before, but it was still twelve or thirteen percent a second. Amara knew the wall could last upward of five minutes. She summoned more weapons and used every maintained buff she had. Both hands were outstretched, trying desperately to expend mana faster than she was gaining it. Her mana crept above three hundred percent.
Fuck.
She knew she'd get hit with at least the first stages of mana sickness. It was inevitable at this point.
But like any good plan, the universe decided to smash it into a million tiny little pieces, giggle in her face and throw it into the void. The intensity of the wall seemed to grow.
Four hundred percent.
You've been afflicted with [Mana Sickness](Minor)!
...
...
Five hundred percent.
You're affliction has worsened. [Mana Sickness](Minor) has become [Mana Sickness](Major)
...
...
Six hundred percent, fear crept into Amara. Turns out counting the seconds of some giant wall of death, made the time pass much more slowly than one would have thought.
You're affliction has worsened. [Mana Sickness](Major) has become [Mana Sickness](Severe)
It is advised you stop consuming mana potions, you will die soon.
Cheeky fucking message. As if she was sitting here getting drunk off of cheap mana potions.
...
...
The wall vanished, and Amara sat at a cozy six hundred eighty percent. Sweat dripped from her forehead. A few seconds more, and she likely would have died of mana sickness in this fucking ravine. As she crawled closer to the exit, her blood ran cold. Looking down at the floor of the ravine where dozens of those tigers were prowling. Amara scampered back to the back of her cave, setting another timer.
Ten minutes later, she checked again. and most of the tigers had moved on. She took this time to quickly start scaling the ravine wall. Her [Poach The Living] skill hadn't worked on these creatures. She didn't understand why. As she crawled her way out and onto the surface, she rolled onto her back, breathing heavily.
She hated mana sickness. It made a person nauseous, but worse was that any expenditure of mana caused vertigo and worsened the feelings of nausea. Rolling to her hands and knees, she dragged herself up and out of the zone that was feeding her mana. She knew what she had to do and hated the idea of it. Once she was a safe distance away, she found a good rock to lay on, her head hanging over one side, the rest of her body safely held up by the rock itself. Hands outstretched, she used her favorite mana-burning skill.
As her mana rapidly fell, so to did the contents of her stomach. When her stomach had no new contents to expel, she dry heaved. Sweat formed on her arms and forehead as she approached zero mana. Once that resource bottomed out and the flames stopped, so too did the vomiting. She rolled over and off the rock, wanting to get as far away from the puddle as possible. She felt incredibly weak.
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You're affliction has lessened. [Mana Sickness](Severe) has become [Mana Sickness](Major)
Sometimes she really hated the system. It's how she knew that the system itself was a thinking entity. It's timing was entirely too perfect, far too often to be coincidental. Only some sick twisted asshole would sit there with a giggle and hand out messages with such impeccable timing.
Amara groaned again, looking toward the ravine. She had no idea how she was going to search for Trillia. Or if Trillia was even still alive. Tears threatened to surface, and she promptly buried them and the emotions they represented. Crying wasn't going to help her daughter. Taking another deep breath, Amara stood. She began walking along the ravine at a safe distance. Keeping her mana at zero.
You're affliction has lessened. [Mana Sickness](Major) has become [Mana Sickness](Minor)
...
...
...
You're affliction [Mana Sickness](Minor) has ended.
"Fucking finally. Now to wait for the next burst of this fucking wall and another trip to the endless sea of fucking primordial spawn we go."
Her mood was rapidly souring. She stood next to the ravine waiting for the timer to tick down. Voices calling out to her made her spin around. Varga approached.
"What have you learned so far, Amara?"
Amara moved up, giving the man a hug, reveling in the comfort of his arms and scent for a moment before answering.
"It's bad, Varga. There are mana-warped primordial spawns down there. Insanely difficult to kill."
Taking a step away, she motioned to her rather torn armor. It was slowly repairing itself, but to see it in such a state was a testament to the power of the tigers.
Varga gave her a worried look, motioning to the scouts that had come.
"Amelia says that Trillia is alive. The girl could barely move. So I didn't drag her out here. But she was screaming up a storm demanding someone bring her to you or me. Cordaos finally carried her to the command tent, where I was preparing things. Her [Mentor] skill tells her that Trillia is alive and that she's at full resources, which is odd. She's sorry to say that she can't pinpoint Trillia. The skill isn't that advanced yet."
Relief washed over Amara's face at the news. It meant Trillia wasn't dead, which was significantly better news than she had less than a minute ago.
"I'm so grateful for that little banshee. I'm happy Trillia has found such a steadfast friend."
Varga nodded his agreement. The two made their way over to their sons and the scouts. Amara addressed them.
"None of you are to go into the ravine itself. The creatures down there are over level six hundred. In addition, they have a half dozen traits that would make them completely unkillable to any of you at your current levels."
None of the orcs present took offense. There was one thing no one in the camp questioned, regardless of their thoughts and opinions on matters such as staying still. And that was Amara's battle instinct. The only one who could even come close was Cordaos, and the two almost universally agreed on such things.
Tormash stepped forward to speak.
"I have the beast's scent. I can try to track it down. It seems to only come out at night."
Amara shook her head immediately.
"No. Do not approach that thing. If its aura was enough to put you and Ba'Shoon out of commission, the last thing I want is for you to come across it. I have a different plan. I will try to lure it out tonight. I want all of you to find where it makes its home."
Tormash gave her an odd look.
"Mo-... Sorry, Chieftain. It's an Avatar of Alirast. Does it even have a home?"
Amara thought on that for a moment, mulling it over and biting her lip.
"Lord Darktone would form avatars as well. But he said that it took an immense amount of energy and concentration to create an entirely new form. Most host divinities like Alirast would instead inhabit a creature to utilize as an Avatar. These things were likely just behemoths that were resilient to the properties of the mana rift. Alirast took hold of one and created the Psionic variant to utilize as an Avatar."
Those gathered nodded. None of them really had any experience dealing with divine entities. So her word was as good as they were going to get.
"I'm almost positive that I am correct in this. My hope is that it has young of its own to leverage against it. If not...well. We'll figure that out when we get there."
Her sons and husband shared a look. Varga spoke up.
"Amara, do you mean to threaten its child if it has one?"
Amara nodded.
"Of course. Parent to parent. It tells me where Trillia is, or I torture its kid until it decides to play nice."
The ease with which she said it reminded them that Amara was an ancient, demon-killing machine of war. The orc veneer betrayed the fact she wasn't entirely one of them anymore. Amara looked at them all, shaking her head.
"I don't want to hurt an innocent child, even an innocent monster child. But if it comes to its kid or mine. I'm going to choose Trillia every single time. Rest of the realm be damned."
She gave orders and areas to search. Moving over to the ravine to look down into it once more. Now it was just a matter of waiting for nighttime.
-=- A Few Hours Later -=-
The sun had set, and the moon was rising. Amara sat on a large rock she had moved near the ravine. Waiting for the beast to approach. She didn't know why, but she knew it would come out. Once the moon was high in the night sky, the thing crawled out of the ravine when the next wall of mana ended. Amara stared at it, watching it slowly approach her. She could feel the tendril of mental energy touch her mind. It found only a wall of anger, rage, and resentment.
Persona flinched at the feel of it, stopping its approach entirely. The two sat there, staring at one another. Amara's rage grew by the second. The tension in the air was palpable. The standoff didn't last long, however. Amara dropped her suppression and activated all of her auras and targeted stuns. Persona did the same.
You're in the presence of an Avatar of Alirast. You resist the effects.
You resist the effects of the Health drain.
You resist the effects of the Mana drain.
You resist the effects of the Stamina drain.
Your Mind is shielded by [Divine Providence]
Persona now looked actively shocked. As Amara slowly walked towards it, it couldn't move. Couldn't run or overwhelm her mind. The level difference would still give it a solid chance in a fight against her. But in a battle of auras and presence, the [Pact-Bonded] Chieftain won. Recognition flashed in its many eyes. The mental probes came again. Amara closed the rest of the distance in the blink of its many eyes. Her hands gripped its face and dug into its eyes.
Her rage was visible, thin strands of some dark and ominous mana rolling off of her. Persona recognized it. It was the same mana that creatures from Infernus had. It tried to pull away but found it couldn't break the grip of the orc. It lashed out with mental attacks and found the cage of divine and demonic energy impenetrable. Her clawed hands dug deeper into its flesh. It whimpered and tried to pull away. The orc in front of it could smell its fear. The fear of the creature that Alirast was inhabiting.
A little yelp from the side caused it to freeze in place. Its nose sniffed the air in a panic. A low growl rumbled through its body. Amara's eyes flashed a dangerous red. The scent of its pup's blood caused it to go into a frenzy. Jerking and thrashing about, it sent out mental attacks at everyone in the area, but no one except the demon in front of it was close enough. It tried snapping its jaws at the demon's face but found no purchase, unable to budge the thing's mighty arms.
A chilling voice shook it from it's thrashing.
"Where is my daughter? My people value life, I teach them to value life. I do not. I will butcher your children in front of you, cook, and eat their corpses. I will slaughter every behemoth this realm has to offer if you do not tell me where my daughter is. I do not care what Alirast is telling you. I do not care about anything but my child. I know you can verbally speak. Do so."
Persona trembled. This thing's level wasn't right. It couldn't be. Persona had more levels than this demon in front of it. Yet nothing worked. It was like one of those [Primordial Spawns]. On a whim, it scanned the demon before it.
[Orc - Grand Chieftain - 773]
Notable Traits:
Pact-Bonded [2nd Axle]
Demon Blood [Lord of Rage]
Divine Spark [2nd Axle]
Rage of Mortality
Vengeance of Mortality
It stopped fighting. The first two traits alone would even be the playing field. Persona knew, from its own divine connection, that utilizing those traits was dangerous. It took little pieces of your soul as payment each time they were used to their fullest, like the demon before it was doing now. It glanced towards the yelps, a hundred feet away, it saw more orcs holding two small behemoths. Glowing red weapons hung over their heads, and thin lines of blood dripped from their faces.
-=-
Amara hated drawing on this feeling. Hated becoming this weapon that had been created to fight the [Primordials] centuries ago. She could feel the demon from Infernus staring into her soul. Could feel her very soul being pulled out of her, like some sort of puppet string. But the creature in front of her had to understand. It had to realize it couldn't fight. Its hope had to be crushed and ground into dust.
"Where is my daughter?"
The creature's eyes shifted from it's young to Amara. It's mouth opened.
"Child lives! Child Lives!"
The sound wasn't natural. Amara could smell more blood bubbling from its throat. It seemed verbally speaking caused the creature pain. Its anatomy wasn't meant for verbal communication. Amara still didn't quite trust it near her mind.
"Your children live for now. Where is my child?"
The creature tried to shake it's head in vain.
"Child lives! Child Lives! Child lives! Child Lives! Child lives! Child Lives!"
Blood streamed from it's mouth. Amara could smell the terror wafting off of it.
"My child lives?"
It nodded, despite the movement causing her claws to dig deeper into its flesh. Its eyes darted over to its own young once more. Finally, Amara let the mental probe in. She was overcome with thousands of images and emotions. Intent and concepts flooded her mind. Unlike her children, Amara was all too used to dealing with such types of communication. She wasn't overwhelmed. Instead, she silenced it all with a single clear image of Trillia. Forcing the creature to move at her pace.
The response was an image of Trillia in what looked like a large flower pod floating in some sort of blue liquid. As her anger rose, it tried to flood her with emotions of safety and happiness. Tried to make its intent clear it didn't want to harm Trillia. Amara sent her own intent through the link. If Trillia was hurt, its children would be hurt. Once more, a flood of emotions came through. A pang of guilt hit Amara. The thing was absolutely terrified. It didn't want to even approach the orcs, to begin with. It wanted nothing to do with Trillia or Amara. The realm forced it to do its bidding, so it did.
Realization seemed to dawn on it, as Amara got a new status pop-up.
Persona [Avatar of Alirast] is offering to enter a [Divine Geas] with you. Terms below.
Persona agreed that Trillia Demonsbane is safe, and will remain safe in it's care, so long as it's own children are not hunted or attacked for it's actions against the Demonsbane clan. Furthermore Persona agrees to lead Amara Demonsbane to where her daughter is kept, to show proof that Trillia Demonsbane is alive and well. It cannot undo the actions the Realm of Alirast forced it to do, but wishes to make amends. Do you accept this [Divine Geas]
Amara was a bit startled. She had only been offered one geas of this magnitude before. It was how she got her demon blood trait. She looked deeply into the creature's fifth eye. The rest of its face was covered in blood and cuts. Amara was even more startled that she had done so much damage to it in her rage. Shame crossed her eyes for a moment before she reminded herself that her daughter's life was on the line. She accepted the geas. Turning to Varga and Ralrouk.
"Keep the pups safe. I've entered a divine geas with Persona. I will go and check on Trillia's condition. If I am not back in one hour, kill them."
More emotions flooded through her. The creature emphasized time over and over. Amara looked at it, then back to her family.
"Make that four hours."
Once Amara fully released the creature, it turned and quickly began running off, urging Amara to follow. She did.