Their first question normally would have been something like, ‘Where do you think it is?’
There was no need to ask that though, because they could see the head of the behemoth sticking up above the horizon far across the lake. This was both good and bad news. It was good because they knew right where it was. The bad news was that it was not all that far from the other settlement that Tank’s crew went to meet up with.
Fortunately, Tank’s crew had a portal grenade, so they could meet up with them real fast.
“Well, Vacation’s over I guess.” Calvin said, “I was starting to get bored anyway.”
Calvin reluctantly stashed their bottles of booze.
“Take the hour, let’s get ready to head out. This this looks big as hell, Seth, do you have anything for us to help crack it?”
“C’mon over to my workshop. I think we can get something for you.”
Now, one would think with a giant skyscraper sized monster looming on the horizon, they’d be a little more apprehensive. Maybe they should be. But individually they were very strong and as a group, their skills were so diverse, they could meet a wide variety of situations. Something like this would probably test those skills to the limit, but that’s when the rewards would come flowing in. The group saw this as yet another path to getting stronger, and maybe a little richer.
Most everyone followed Seth to his shop. Marshall stopped by the pharmacy to pick up some potions…
Seth flipped through the menus on the manufacturing controller.
“Andy, can you tell us anything about this behemoth?” Seth asked. He wasn’t hopeful.
“I cannot say much. I do not know much.”
“What about the ‘minor’ part? That thing doesn’t look very ‘minor’ to me.”
“Behemoths are common in system integrated space. They’re system constructs and they vary greatly in function, form and species. They’re typically ranked from Minor to Greater, although some classifications lay beyond. Earth is likely inhabited by many such creatures and will end up being a portion of the challenges you will face in retaking your planet.”
“Great, so they get bigger?”
“Yes, but not just bigger. More powerful and resourceful.”
Seth looked through the screens. As he flipped through he muttered to himself.
“We should get a hold of Tank. Get them to open the portal and send Ian through. See if Reaper can scout the creature out and get us some details. I have a couple of drones we could kit out.”
“On it.” Ian said.
Seth summoned a pair of the big spider drones Calvin had seen him working on earlier. With a synchronized hiss, a series of hydraulics engaged from the rear of the assembly line, and two colossal forms rose from their metal cradles. They were walking nightmares, each the size of a small house, their segmented legs clicked with mechanical precision. Their carapace, forged from incredibly dense alloys, gleamed under the holographic spotlights.
But the most chilling aspect was the massive cannon nestled along their dorsal spine. Coils thrummed with restrained power, casting crackling arcs of electricity onto the floor. The air itself seemed to hum with anticipation. Slowly, deliberately, the spider drones lowered their heads, their multifaceted eyes locked on Seth in silent acknowledgment. A metallic purr emanated from their depths, a sound both awe-inspiring and unsettling.
“These babies are modular. Right now one is configured with a standard projectile weapon and the other has the first iteration of a plasma cannon. It’s the first thing I created after getting the skill so it likely needs some work, but hey, we’ll get to test it out in real time eh?”
Seth climbed up the leg of one of the machines and fiddled with a panel on the side of the plasma. He flipped open the panel and removed an essence stone.
“This is part of the experiment. I’ve got an energy transformation rune engraved in the plasma generator. If it works, it should be able to attune the shots to the essence of the installed stone.” Seth hopped down from the lumbering drone.
“Now for the other guy. It comes with ammo and limited spatial storage off the line. It can store about 100 rounds by default. I should be able to improve that as I get more familiar with the system, but I might need spatial skills of some sort. For now, you can store ammo in a spatial pouch and transfer directly.”
Seth grabbed a spatial pouch from the table nearby and summoned a large munition from it. The round itself was about half as big as Seth and was engraved with complex runes all along the surface.
“This is another experiment. When Ian gets back, I want to have him try and infuse a few of these with magic. The last thing I’ve got ready are these.”
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Seth shuffled some things around on his table and searched through a few crates nearby. Clearly, his method of organization was a bit chaotic.
“Aha, here we go.” he said as he produced a much sturdier looking grenade than the healing grenades he’d made before, “Amy, try filling this with poison.”
Amy took the grenade and channeled Blight Bloom into it. The runes lit up in a deathly green color and the entire surface of the grenade appear to take on a pallid, rotting look.
“Looks like it worked.” Amy said. She turned the grenade over in her hands as Seth produced about a dozen more.
“Alright, these are for you. Fill ‘em up. Oh, Marshall! Here.”
Seth flipped open the lid on one more box and plucked out a few charged essence stones, handing them to Calvin. “For Marshall’s gloves.”
“How did you find the time for all of this?” Calvin asked in amazement
“I’ve got workers now, the hard part is moving materials around. I’ve got a process. Plus this factory is pretty amazing. It’s basically set it and forget it as long as it has materials.”
“Well, keep it up. Can’t wait to take these out for a spin. I need to go hit up Ambrosia real fast. I left one of the books we got from the dinosaur bird and he was going to try and cook up some recipes for Freya.”
Calvin made his way over to Ambrosia while Amy stayed behind to charge her new grenades.
Stan had been hard at work and had created two interesting things from the recipe book so far. They were both attuned treats that granted buffs. The fire attuned treat granted a 10% HP and toughness increase, and the water attuned treat granted 10% speed. Stan had prepared a dozen of each and promised more to Calvin by the time they returned.
Calvin ran into Marshall on the way back to Seth’s workshop.
“Get everything you need?” Calvin asked. Before taking out the essence stones and handing them over.
“Sure did! Now I’m ready to go kick some monster ass.”
Roughly two hours later, the portal open and Ian stepped through with Reaper.
“Ok, so we’re in for it this time, and we gotta move fast.” Ian said.
Reaper pulled up a screen containing data from his scouting drone. On the screen was an image of the behemoth, and the group felt like the system was using the word ‘minor’ a little lightly. What they saw was a creature somewhere between dinosaur and demon. Its body was enormous, easily several hundred feet tall. It was an amalgamation of nightmares. The reptilian head resembled a massive horned tyrannosaurus, lined with teeth like jagged swords. A serpentine tail lashed behind, its spiked scales black as obsidian. Four massive limbs clawed at the ground, each paw bigger than a house and armed with three razor-sharp claws. Its back was armored in a massive spiked shell. All in all, the creature seemed impressively armored. Runic inscriptions laced the creature’s body, hinting at magical enhancements or skills.
A label appeared next to the creature on the screen.
Minor Tarrasque Titan (Behemoth)- Level 81
“Holy shit guys. Can we take that?” Marshall asked
The group just silently started at the screen. Each step from the creature had tore massive gouges in the landscape. Behind it, the scan showed that the environment was completely destroyed.
“I don’t know that we have a choice. It’s heading straight for that other settlement. I give it 12 hours before it arrives. It doesn’t appear to move very fast, so we have that going for us.” Reaper said.
“Any indication what kind of attacks it has?” Calvin asked, but Reaper just shook his head.
“Alright, well we know a few things. It’s not a huge robot, or pile of rocks or something absurd like that. So it has flesh and blood I would imagine. Do you think we need to reconfigure the bots?” Calvin asked.
“I wouldn’t even begin to know. What they’ve got now should be about as good as it’s going to get. The armor on that thing looks pretty nasty, so either you crack it or find weak points.”
“I… what am I even going to do against this thing?” Marshall asked. For the first time in recent weeks, his confidence waned. The creature’s claws were bigger than him, by a lot. Getting in to punch the thing was pretty much out of the question.
“For now, you’ll be healing and support. Ranged damage looks to be our only ace unless we can knock that thing over. Let’s get to it. Seth, keep cranking out bots, I think we’re going to be out there for a while, so we’ll have Ian crack open a door every once in a while so we can resupply as needed. Everyone got what they need?”
The group nodded and prepared to depart. They signaled for Tank to crack open a portal, and just like that, the magical power of system spatial fuckery whisked them away to faraway places.
They arrived just outside the other settlement. It was quite different from Olympus. It was obviously a few tiers lower and surrounded by pointed wooden walls. There were several guard towers placed around and Calvin could see archers manning their station.
Tank walked over with another man Calvin had not seen before. He was dressed in fine leather armor and carried a large two handed sword slung across his back. For being stuck out in the wilderness for months, this man was clean cut and looked every bit like the leader of a military force.
“Calvin, this is Harlon, leader of New Aspen.” Tank said.
“Nice to meet you Harlon, looks like you’ve got a little monster problem on your hands.”
The man looked at Calvin with sorrow in his eyes. “We do, and I don’t understand how our town is supposed to survive this.”
Calvin looked out at the lumbering monstrosity. Even as far away as it was, it was damned huge. He certainly could understand why Harlon felt the way he did, but Calvin had much more confidence than that.
“Eh, that little thing? We’ll have it cleared out in no time.” Calvin said.
Clearly the leader of New Aspen had his doubts.
“I’ll prepare my people for evacuation. Tank here says if New Aspen is destroyed, you might have a place for us?”
“That’s right, but we’re not letting your town be destroyed. Get your people ready.”
By now, everyone, including two massive spider bots had made their way through the portal and were getting ready for a fast march to the behemoth. At top speed they could make it there in probably just over an hour, so at top speed they moved.
They stopped high on a ridge about a mile away. Harlon had joined them. It made sense he would be there to defend his town, however, Calvin asked him to stay back.
“It’s not that I think you can’t handle it, it’s just that our skills are… destructive, and I wouldn’t want you to get caught up in the crossfire.”
Calvin knew the explanation was bullshit, their skills didn’t hurt allies. But he also didn’t want to offend the man if they were to build relations with him in the future.
“Alright, everyone ready?”
“Hell yeah I am. Let’s kick some ass.” Marshall said.
“Alright then, Reaper, Tank. Y’all wanna kick off the party?”
Reaper sent an orb high into the air, preparing to call down an Ion strike, immediately after activating the skill he went prone and activated All-In. A massive flash burst from his rifle, tearing apart the air as the shot flew toward the lumbering behemoth.
His shot struck home, right in the creature’s face just as the ion strike arrived.