Festus’ focus was waning, keeping such a collection of runes active in a dream-script was taking a toll on him. He could feel his command over the script slipping when he heard the first gunshot boom through the forest.
With so much focus, he didn’t have the time to focus on each individual aura signature around him so he hadn’t sensed the monsters which made him doubt there were truly any monsters present.
When the second gunshot rang out, he was certain there were monsters.
He frowned down at the slowly dissipating dream ward, the only one he knew, and struggled to hold it together even as each rune turned like gears in a clock, their deep blue tainted with a hue of purple struggling to stay together.
It took Festus only a moment to realize why the ward was degrading so quickly. Beneath it, whispers of mana slipped into Zed’s head, burying themselves into the pores of his skin.
He’s absorbing them, Festus thought, confused. That’s impossible.
Mages couldn’t absorb spellforms created by other mages. It didn’t matter what type of mana was used, if it was under the command of another mage, it was impossible to absorb it. Yet, the impossible was glaring at Festus.
…………………………………………..
Ven pulled his trigger, firing off shots in bursts of three. Everyone was making an unnecessary stand here, protecting people they didn’t need to protect.
Their mission was to the east, buried in the remaining portion of the forest they were yet to explore. Their drones had already mapped it out now, reading and highlighting the mana signatures of every monster within that part of the forest. Their path was just within reach, yet here they were, protecting a red head they weren’t even sure was going to survive.
“Should we make a break for it, Boss?” Daniel asked through the com-links.
Ven almost scowled at him. Trust Daniel to always echo his wrong thoughts. Most people had a conscience in their team, someone that kept them from making the immoral decisions. But him, he had Daniel, the stoic second in command always more than willing to bring his negative thoughts from his head and into the real world for the benefit of the team.
Making a break for it would ensure the safety of the team but Ven shook his head.
“No,” he said.
“Why not?” Ronda asked, filling a monster with bullets as she pinned it down with her foot, knowing fully well that a Rukh rank monster wouldn’t die from that.
If they really wanted to kill the monsters here quickly, they’d have to activate their suits, and Ven had no idea how long that would last.
Most people didn’t know it but the average VHF Olympian wasn’t a very good mage. In fact, the armors were designed for mages who had poor links to any specific type of mana, mages without specializations.
The reason for this was because they needed the mages to be able to—amongst other things—possess enough mana to power the suits once their batteries ran out without killing themselves. Another reason was because mages with specializations were known to cast spellforms on nothing but reflex. They could twitch a finger and create spellforms simply because they did it a lot, and the armors were designed to keep the mana inside, inside, and the mana outside, outside.
A VHF Olympian was a mage with a mana core with no affinity to any mana type and a mentality that didn’t rely on spellforms.
Thus, Olympians were never feared for their magical skills but their suit. Besides the rank up in strength and overall physical combat ability, the only other specialty of the average Olympian rested in the runes embedded in their armors. Runes they could only use once they activated them and burned through the mana stones that kept them powered up.
Once the stones were burned up, it fell to the mage’s mana core to serve as the secondary battery. And Ven wasn’t confident that they could take on the ire of a Knight rank mage and still scour the rest of the forest.
He’d seen the mana signatures within the part of the forest newly mapped and was sure of it.
“Boss?” Ronda’s voice rang in his helmet.
“I’m thinking,” he hissed, grabbing a monster and slamming it into the ground. “We can’t run.”
“It’s not running, sir,” Ronda said. “It’s a strategic retreat.”
“Not from a Knight mage, it isn’t.”
“Even more reason to go. They have a Knight with them, they’ll be fine.”
“And what if the young mage he’s trying to save dies?” he asked, ducking another beast only for one of the mages to swing a particularly large club of bone white into its head.
The swing was vicious enough to send the beast flying and she followed it with a spellform of earth and fire, slamming it with a molten boulder.
Something about the technique was familiar but Ven didn’t dwell on it. If anything, he was more interested in how she’d gotten her weapon out here.
“Are you sure this isn’t about saving another red head?” Daniel asked, pinning a large monster down with nothing but the strength of his suit. “That Odin is looking for red haired mages doesn’t mean we have to risk our lives to get one.”
Ven dodged another beast and strode up to Daniel. He shoved his gun into the beast’s open maw as it shrieked and struggled against Daniel’s hold and let out burst of gunfire. Blood splashed all over him and Daniel before the monster stilled.
Dead, Daniel let it fall to the ground and Ven holstered his gun and drew a cylindrical tube from his waist. He triggered it and a red bar of concentrated mana burst to life.
“Always wanted one of those,” Daniel grumbled, looking at the mana sword.
“And what are you going to do with it?” Kid asked. “You have zero grace, and everyone knows you need to have grace to use a sword.”
“No reason,” Daniel muttered, head on a swivel for another attack. “I’ve just always been a starwars fan.”
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“So you just want to play jedi.”
Daniel shrugged as he switched his gun from physical bullets to mana shots. “What can I say, I’m a fan.”
“And that is exactly why I’m glad the VHF doesn’t allow mind mages own one,” Ronda said, also switching her gun to mana shots. “They’d just go around calling themselves jedis.”
Ven stepped forward and deflected a monster’s attack with his mana sword. It buzzed on contact, throwing the creature’s attack to the side. The sword was powerful enough to cut through most Beta rank monsters not specialized in strength, but Rukh rank monsters were a different conversation. They were powerful and their skin was tougher.
“Are the both of you telling me you’ve run out of bullets,” Ven said. “Or is that a tactical switch.”
“Tactical,” Daniel said.
“Out of bullets,” Ronda said.
“You guys have no concept of the word economical,” Kid said.
Then he switched to mana shots.
Ven sighed. He’d picked the wrong members of his team for this expedition.
…………………………………………
Chris darted beneath a Rukh rank monster, rushing over to support Ash who was doing her best to stay alive against one of the monsters.
The monsters they’d been facing up to this point had been Beta ranked, so Chris was left confused as to why they were being charged by Rukh rank monsters.
And aren’t monsters afraid of stronger opponents, she thought as she hurried her steps, weaving around a tree, her mind going to Festus where he remained bent over Zed’s unconscious body while Shanine wrapped herself as close to them as possible.
All she and the others had to do was keep any monsters from venturing in too deep and they’d be fine. So far everyone was doing a good job of keeping a wobbled circle around Festus, giving him a wide berth to work with.
Chris chanted a spellform, her words quick, and her connection to lightning mana solidified as she brought the spell to bear. She sent it streaking through the air like a lance, piercing the distance to wrap itself around the monster Ash was fighting.
In the easiest summary, it was a giant spider, and her club smashed into its head with all the force of a Rukh mage’s swing propelled by the momentum of a starting run.
The creature’s legs gave out under the weight of the club and it cracked the dirt beneath it as its entire body hit the ground.
Chris cast another quick spellform even as Ash peppered the creature with shards of ice.
Poor girl, Chris thought as she sent lightning lancing through it again, keeping her attention on the level of her mana reserves. Must be tough having a water specialization and not knowing how to really use it.
The giant spider bucked from the force of the electricity and Chris silenced it with another clubbing to the head.
It moved no longer.
…………………………………….
Big Man Desolate watched everyone fight from his place high up on a massive tree branch. The Olympians fought with such a high level organized teamwork that he could’ve sworn they were communicating somehow. Whenever one slipped up or was overwhelmed another was there to offer support.
The captain in his high tech armor was a moving swordsman in the battle, a sword of mana deflecting and inflicting damage on each monster he passed by. Each blow he dealt was precise and Big Man Desolate found he enjoyed watching the captain play swordsman.
The other mages were basically average. Zed’s friends fought with the comfortable grace of having fought together on multiple occasions but showed none of the disciplined teamwork the Olympian displayed.
Being the Beta in the team, Ash needed as much support as she could get and Chris gave it as best as she could. If Big Man Desolate was being honest, the only real threat in the team was Chris. She moved like a girl accustomed to the battlefield, playing support as she had done in previous fights. She was everywhere, slipping between enemies with her massive club, inflicting just enough damage to be a distraction that kept her teammates alive and with the advantage.
Oliver struck a monster with a gravity spellform designed to keep it grounded and Chris used an earth based spellform to shift the ground beneath it, disorienting its attempt to stand. Even from here Big Man Desolate had known the gravity spellform lacked enough oomph to keep the monster down.
Watching it, he wondered if Chris’ team understood just how much help she was when playing support. She was, in a sense, a true skirmisher.
As for the powers of Hillview, they were as beautifully pathetic as he remembered. Abed was still too distrusting to use whatever powerful spellform he had under his sleeves—it was most likely his Overdrive as a Rukh. Madam Shaggy refused to experiment with any other spellform that wasn’t fire based; her specialization.
The dwarf, Eitir, continued to fire of shots after shots of mana infused bullets. He liked to play the role of modern mage using only guns when he could connect with magic. Sometimes it looked as if the man wanted to keep his entire specialization a secret. What he didn’t know was that Big Man Desolate knew his secret. His connection to mana types was weak. He had mana but that was all there was to it. Eitir was a Rukh rank mage with one specialization and no connection to any other type of mana, not even a pittance. He was an unfortunate mage. One with a lot of hard work but zero talent.
Luckily for him, he made a good team with Lady Long Legs. All she needed to do was talk more and they’d be the perfect duo. But like Big Man Desolate, her interests laid elsewhere, so there was no real reason to interact with the other powers.
Big Man Desolate sighed, his dangling legs kicking beneath him.
“I know,” he said. “They’re a boring bunch, but you know I can’t get near where we’re going without them.”
His eyes panned to the centre of the battlefield as he spoke. He looked down to where the Knight rank mage was trying to save the man of culture.
“Him, however,” he smiled. “He is unexpected. So much raw mana in a single body. If I could have it, I would, but alas,” he spread helpless hands to his side, “he is too well bonded to it. so much so that I suspect it might be all he has. It’s just unfortunate that—Oh, that’s bad. That’s really bad.”
One of the mages, the large one they called Kev, slipped on the brains of a dead monster. It destabilized his balance and he went down while in battle. His teammates’ attention turned in time to see him go down.
“Kev!” Lovina bellowed, disengaging from her monster to run for him.
Big Man Desolate winced as he watched. “Rookie move.”
Lovina barely crossed half the distance before Kev’s monster bit into his shoulder, ripping a chunk of it free.
“No!” another mage roared, braced under the attention of two Rukh rank monsters.
“Leave them and you’ll die, too,” Big Man Desolate noted. He turned to the creature beside him and patted its head. “I know I should help them but there’s nothing in it for me. Zed’s the only intriguing thing here. Him and the Knight.”
Under his hand the creature’s skin was like stone, cold and smooth. Hard.
The sight of Kev being devoured affected Lovina so much that Big Man Desolate felt the fight leave her aura even before it left her body.
“Told you it was a rookie move,” he said to no one. “Mages kill monsters and think they’re strong. The real strength is in watching one of your own die and being able to fight through it. Do you think you can fight through—ooh!” he winced as a monster crashed into the girl.
“I guess that’s that,” he noted, moving his attention to Hillary and Jim.
The mages had been the most uninteresting and random members of the expedition. In fact, if this was a novel and he was the protagonist, he would’ve called them the true examples of extras, side characters designed to occupy space. They did nothing but murmur between each other and use unnecessary spellforms. Even now he had no idea what their specialties were or what they were capable of. He half-expected them to die in this fight.
Sadly, his life wasn’t a story, and sometimes if he wanted the boring characters to exeunt stage left, he had to do it himself.
“But I won’t,” he said. “I’ll leave that to nature.”
He turned his head from side to side as he spoke, giving a small bit of his attention to the two dying monsters. They croaked sounds he didn’t understand and coughed blackened blood from their mouths. Their skins were beginning to resemble husks, necrotizing even as they lived.
“I know,” he told them. “It’s a horrible way to go, rotting alive, but it’s the kindest way I know how to send you guys off.”
He could feel the death aura clinging to them, rising as their lives were made forfeit. The black aura gathered to them like metals to magnets while some of it rose like smoke to the sky.
Death was always a beauty to behold, no matter how gruesome.
………………………………………….
Trapped in the confines of his mind, Zed lived through another memory even as he prayed Shanine survived Abed.
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* Duration to next unraveling: 00:00:00.
* You have unlocked memory (Mana surge).
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