In order to not have the entire vessel view their actions, Sector Assimilator was required to fly dark, without any System assistance to track down the anomaly. They reached the last known location given to them fairly quickly, but from there, they were at a loss as to which direction to go.
Landing their vessel a short distance away, they left its confines and began searching the area on foot. It took a few minutes to find proof of the anomaly’s passing, as the wind was already beginning to blow sand over the tracks, but it was sufficient to follow, and activating their bodysuit, Sector Assimilator took off at max speed.
They had to hand it to the old native, they had managed to travel far all things considered, but after cresting a couple of dunes, they saw him stomach surfing only a small distance away. Activating flight mode, they took to the sky and began to climb. Once they were certain that they had gained enough altitude that they would only be taken for a variation of local wildlife, they dove downwards, aiming to take the anomaly unawares.
It was a tricky scenario. Not only could they not activate their main System powers, but they also had to take out the anomaly without damaging its soulspace–which precluded most forms of physical harm–although a precise, surgical attack to the brain was possible, but it would require the anomaly to be strapped down and unmoving. Instead, they would go for a direct attack on the soulspace. Sector Assimilator’s suit was equipped with an energy injection technique that resulted in no damage to the channels, while also disabling an opponent when it reached the correct concentration. It’s like the Hive expects us to harvest illicitly with these kinds of suit modifications.
In truth, the technique wasn’t meant for illegal purposes, but as a failsafe should the integration not go as planned and a few assimilation needed to be harvested, but Sector Assimilator wasn’t looking for a way not to justify their actions.
Diving down, they approached the anomaly at full speed. When a safe yet viable distance had been established, they activated the technique at full capacity, hoping to harvest as quickly as possible and return to the ship before anyspawn noticed their activities.
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Mike saw the shadow approach and was prepared to fight off the angry vulture–after weeks spent fighting against much stronger creatures, it would be simple to stop something barely in the early stages of Tier 2. Instead of the anticipated impact, he was pulled into his soulspace as a very large sigil appeared and began to inject energy into him rapidly.
Pupach mentioned that local beasts wouldn’t have soulspace abilities as they were deemed to risky to an integration to be worth the cost, so this must be another member of the Hive. He thought with alarm as he began cycling through the energy as fast as he could, ridding it of any unwanted packets. He found the attack to be roughly on par with the three-headed vulture, maybe slightly stronger.
The increased use put strain on his already occupied filtration fractal, and he found himself unable to keep up. He would be fine for a while still, but he guessed that around 5% of the attack was unable to be processed as fast as it was coming in, causing it to clog up in front of the filtration system, reminding him of shower drains he had had to clean out in years past.
For several minutes he simply endured the onslaught, focusing on processing the energy as efficiently as possible. But as time wore on and there was no end of the skill in sight, he realized he would have to go on the offensive. Leaving his soul space, he removed a fist-sized chunk of Blasting Stone from his spatial storage bag and lobbed it at his assailant. The squid-man had the presence of mind to dodge it before once again aligning above him.
“Game on!” he said as he removed a continuous stream of Blasting Stone from his bag and began throwing them as quickly as he could. “I wasn’t the neighborhood champion of snowball fights for nothing.”
One. Two. Three projectiles were dodged easily, but on the fourth, the creature’s leg was impacted, causing them to wobble in the air. Another struck soon after, forcing them to gain altitude. Unfortunately for his assailant, Mike had grown tremendously on the other side of the rift, and could now throw a stone a few thousand feet vertically.
At a certain point, the squid must have left range, as the injection skill stopped and Mike was able to clear out the sludge-like packets that had continued building up. A process which happened rapidly when he only had to deal with the System domain injections by themselves.
He prepared himself for another onslaught when his opponent began flying at him again, but it soon became apparent that they weren’t planning on simply injecting him this time around as they blasted past their formerly maintained range and bulleted towards his position, resulting in a warning from Damage Premonition that helped him move out of the way in time.
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
*Crash*
The suited warrior careened into where he had stood only moments before, causing the ground to shake as Mike once again found his feet and looked over to see the wreckage. Instead of the broken heap of flesh and metal that he expected, he barely had time to react to the incoming bladed arm that swung for him.
Man, this warrior is faster than me. He realized as he jumped backwards, putting space between them.
“Why do you bother struggling? You can’t possibly match me. My suit can take on a Tier 3 in a pinch, and while you have grown stronger, you certainly aren’t a Tier 3.” The System spawn said, in a surprisingly nasally voice. Mike generally tried to not judge people, especially before he knew them, but something about his opponent made him want to punch the squid in the face, and that was in no way stemming from a place of self defense.
Deciding to do just that, he activated Footsteps of the Wind and went on the offensive. With the skill up, he was quite a bit faster than his opponent and was able to get in quite a few hits, although nothing permanently damaging, as the suit proved exceedingly durable. With only a few seconds left on the skill, he backed up to give himself some space and opted to verbally reengage his opponent to try and bluff his way through the impending lack of grace when Footsteps of the Wind ended–once again he wished he had put effort into upgrading that skill before the Quantum Tear.
“It’s easy to accuse another of weakness when you have the bigger gun, but things would be different if we fought man to… erh squidman.” Verbal sparring wasn’t one of his strong points, and the childhood, playground-inspired barb felt weak even to his own ears.
“That makes no sense, why would I give up easily beating you.” It turned out his challenge made even less sense to the overly-logical hive member. “Besides, it is not as if there is any real challenge going on. I am simply running down the clock so that I can simply end you with the push of a button, and I think that I have waited long enough.”
With a flourish, the assimilator raised one of its arms, allowing a panel to open on its suit, before it lifted its other arm and held its hand ominously above the exposed control panel. “Goodbye anomaly. Thank you for all of the insights you have already granted me and for the vast amounts of wealth your channels will grant me in the future.” It said before pushing the button.
Mike felt the few remaining packets sizzle slightly, but in such a small concentration, they had no effect on his channels or energy levels. He briefly considered acting like it had, but the whole, ‘playing dead so an opponent lets down their guard’ had always felt a little melodramatic to him. Much better to simply overwhelm them. In an instant, his mind played back what the opponent had said so far in addition to things Pupach had told him. Scanning his opponent, he located his target and attacked.
Running forwards, he went on the offensive, his mind barely registering the shocked expression of the squidlike face as it realized the injection technique hadn’t worked. Securing a leg ride, he hooked the inside of his opponent's thigh (or at least a similar position even if squidmen didn’t have thighs). Step by step, he forced his opponent into position, until the head was locked against his abdomen and the guillotine lock was secured. The alien struggled against the hold with much more force than a human would have been able to, but he stubbornly held on, applying way more pressure than was used against humans–he didn’t really care if spinal damage occurred. At length, the struggles ceased and labored breathing was the only sound coming from both of them.
“You will run out of energy long before the suit does.” the assimilator said after a brief period.
“Maybe.” Mike said as he reapplied pressure, correctly predicting the exact moment his opponent tried to break free.
Entire minutes later, as the fight once again died down, he did his best to continue the conversation, hoping to keep his true intentions hidden for as long as possible. “But just like James Baxter, you are finding that once you are in a guillotine hold, you can’t break out.”
“You realize this is pointless though, right?” the nasally voice replied. I have only chosen not to end you with a burst of energy or a laser to the face because I still want to harvest your channels. Eventually you will tire, and I will do just that.”
“How does that work?” he asked, completely ignoring the response as he turned inwards and looked at the Energy Sucking symbol that was currently draining the large cosmic energy storage device placed on the suit’s chest. To his energy sense, he could see that already he had drained it halfway, and the energy continued to pour in at an alarming rate. He would easily outlast his opponent, it was really just a matter of his soulspace not being overloaded. Already it was near bursting.
With the last bits of energy drained, he interrupted the villain’s monologue. “Ok, I am ready for you to kill me.” he said as he released the hold.
“Very well. Goodbye then.” the creature said as it tried to regain its feet, only to find that the suit was now too heavy to move in without the cosmic energy.
“What? You drained my suit? How is this even possible?” it wailed in an impressive tantrum.
Mike didn’t bother to reply, by now he was beyond sick of the constant dribble, instead opting to quickly open the suit’s helmet before decapitating his opponent.
Mentally arguing with himself over the morality of turning the neck tentacles into calamari, he sat down and began cultivating. His soulspace was beyond full, and it was time to push to the cusp of Tier 3.