Motes of dust floated down from the station's roof, highlighted by the rays of the early morning sun.
The quiet room was punctuated by the intermittent sound of groaning metal.
Mark watched for movement in the room from the other side of the turnstile. Flinching each time Jonathan or Lisa bent one of the bars out of the way. The Hydras had not moved since their group had spotted them, but that could change in an instant. The plan was rather simple. A full-on fight right now would be a disadvantage for them, so they had decided to make a run for the opening, and only fight if they absolutely had to.
In an attempt to remain undetected, they had been working as quietly as possible, and after around twenty minutes they’d made a gap big enough for everyone to get through. The ground was covered in Corruption and pustules that stretched halfway up the walls. The room felt similar to the focal point they had encountered in the first dungeon. Corruption seemed to collect in the area, but it was nothing compared to the depths they had seen today.
Gathering up, they moved into the room, and by some miracle, the Corrupted didn’t seem to notice them.
The collective relief was visible in everyone's eyes. They moved near the outskirts of the room to avoid attention and looped around just below the crack in the concrete. Mark concentrated and formed a construct, raising the platform towards the exit.
The problem came when they got a closer look at the dimensions of the thing. The cause of the crack was unknown, but while it spanned a good portion of the ceiling, it was incredibly narrow. To the point where they could not squeeze through it even if wanted to. Perphs an Aura user may be able to dig their way out but that would no doubt alert the Corrupted.
Mark anchored the construct onto the wall, while Sam got to work widening the gap. As soon as she started Mark could see her struggling, so when he reached out to help her, he encountered the same problem he had down in the levels below. The difference here was that there was no presence fighting back, it was simply the Corruption itself, trying to occupy as much space as it could. This made it hard, but not impossible to affect the concrete.
Even with both of them working against it, their speed was slowed to a crawl.
Mark felt Jonathan rapping him on the shoulder, when he turned he saw the guy was looking down at the statue.
He had been so focused on their escape route, that he had not noticed the Corrupted gradually waking below them.
The faster they worked the quicker the Corrupted seemed to wake. Mark realized that the very act of claiming the Dungeon’s territory woke its defenders.
Hissing bounced through the chamber, alerting the others, as the Hydr’s began to uncoil from the statue. Jonathan cursed as the things rose to their full height, putting them level with the construct.
Lisa made a snap decision.
“We’ll delay them, keep working!”
She then hopped down from the platform.
Mark saw Jonathan going too and he began casting [Bestowal] shaping the modifier and incorporating [Earth control]. The spell came together rapidly as Mark forced the idea of ‘Protection’ into it. He slapped it onto Jonathan’s retreating form as the spell was completed.
Gravel and dirt began to collect around Jonathan in midair, and when he crashed to the ground, the spell built up around him faster, encasing him in a shifting stone armor. The rest of the team followed them down.
Mark turned his attention back to working on the exit, Sam had already made some headway, but not nearly as much as they needed.
The sounds of battle were destructive as their backline rained down attacks on the Hydra’s. At this point Mark could see Jonathan and Lisa were only fighting to buy time, just trying to evade as best they were able. Four of the Corrupted seemed occupied, but one ignored the frontline’s taunts and went for the team on Mark’s construct. He moved to block, but Jade beat him to it with a massive circular mirror in front of them. The attack bounced back with a deafening crack, but Jade looked winded.
Gibby and Wesley broke away from their charges and succeeded in tearing its attention away from them. From this vantage point Mark could tell things were not going well. The creature's bodies were incredibly large, so to apply the amount of force needed to kill them was impossible at this stage. Distracting them was their best move, but that put them in grave danger, as with each strike they were essentially rolling the dice.
The Hydra's speed and strength were overwhelming, and while Mark wanted to help, his job was to help make a way out, and so that is exactly what he did.
Diverting his attention to the surrounding rock he wrestled with the Corruption for control. The upside was that it didn’t take a lot of Mana, the downside was the speed with which he fought it back. It felt like pulling teeth, as Mark forced his Will to banish the Corruption from the stone. If Mark lost concentration for even a second, it would reclaim the area he had earned in the space of a heartbeat.
The gap was widening slowly, and with Sam pushing against the other side, they managed to create a narrow passage for escape. The light illuminated the space more and more as the fissure opened up revealing the sky beyond.
“We’re ready! Fall back and let's get going!”
Mark shouted down to everyone. He pulled his Mana back and the Corruption flooded the stone again, but with no direction, the stone stayed fixed in the state he had left it. Mark thought he could even see clouds from here.
The call for retreat came quickly, but no one wasted it, disengaging as fast as they were able. Shameez was the nearest, leaping onto the construct, grabbing a protesting Jade, and swiftly ascending, up and out."
Terry and Bonnie released one final chord throughout the room and fell back as well. The frontline quickly regrouped and shot toward Mark's construct, with Lisa and Jonathan bringing up the rear.
Wesley arrived next and threw both Patrica and her follower over his shoulders, before jumping through the open. Gibby arrived but he paused waiting for everyone.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
By this time the Hydra’s had recovered and were giving chase. Tyler made the jump toward the construct but before he could land, one of the Corrupted stuck him from the air and sent him hurtling toward the floor. Jonathan changed directions at the last instant and dove to catch him. The opening allowed for a wide tail swipe to hit him but he used the rock armor to take the brunt of it, exhausting a good portion of the spell's energy. Then with one fluid motion, Jonathan tossed the guy in the direction of the platform. Lisa who was already in the air, intercepted him and brought him up.
Tyler was panting and blood ran from the side of his face, soaking through his armor. The dazed look spoke of a concussion and Mark sacrificed a fourth of his remaining Prana to set up a strong [Regeneration].
Below, Jonathan was suffering for not escaping when he could. Dodging multiple Hydra’s attacks, his speed and comparably smaller mass were his only advantages. He needed an opening to retreat.
Mark turned back to Lisa and Gibby, shifting the construct under them. Fixing a lesser construct in place.
“Go, we’ll be out in a second-”
Before either of them said anything, the sound of a tremendous blow shook the place. Jonathan's shout of pain was chilling and had Mark's head snapped down to see the guy being pinned under two Corrupted, a third lunging at him. He put his arm out to block but Mark only heard the cracking of bone. The stone armor stopped him from losing his arm entirely, but it crumbled in that area, unable to repair itself before the next strike came.
Sam never said a word diving towards Jonathan, water, and steam collecting around her form. Mark pushed off the construct at full speed, following her closely as he charged his barrier.
When they hit the ground, superheated water detonated out into space, eliciting hisses from all five Hydra’s.
Mark funnled Mana into [Telekinesis] and shoved at the Corrupted pinning Jonathan down. The wave pushed them back less than a meter but it was enough to allow Mark to then pull Jonathan towards them. One of the Hydra’s pronged tails narrowly missed skewering him midair. Mark moved to intercept, catching Jonathan, the act knocking the wind from Mark's lungs, but he had him.
The physical contact allowed Mark to see Jonathan's condition and he almost dropped the guy. Physically, it was nothing Mark could not heal, but right now these types of wounds were life-threatening, for they directly affected his mobility.
One of his arms lay dead at his side, probably dislocated, but the real problem were his legs. When the creature had fallen on him it had crushed Jonathan's lower half. His legs had multiple breaks in the bone and muscle tears, to the point where he could not stand even if he tried.
Mark did not have the energy to fix this.
At the same time, Mark felt a tremendous crushing weight latch onto his construct from behind.
Sam retaliated with a stream of scalding liquid, but another body wrapped around the other end of Mark's dome. Realizing they had to move, Mark attempted to lift them up and out, but a third Hydra piled onto his construct fixing them in place. By now the pressure was increasing and Mark was already low on everything. His construct showed signs of splintering and Jonathan was basically immobile.
A fourth piled on adding its constrictive strength dome of force.
Sam threw bubbling water and ice at their shrinking prison but to little effect. These things refused to let go.
Jonathan panted and used his one good arm to sit up and look at them both.
“You two need to go now. If you make use of the gaps you could fly out”
Mark glanced at the gaps between the constricting Hydra’s. He was right if they booked it they might be able to get out through the gaps…alone.
Sam continued to throw spells around as she snapped at him.
“Don’t pull that self-sacrificing bullshit, we're leaving and you are coming with us.”
Jonathan shot back just as quickly.
“Don’t spout useless heroic drivel, your window is closing, so leave!”
Sam pulled all the heat from her spells and used the ice to prop up Mark's shield.
“Oh, so only you get to be the hero? Now I’m not leaving on principle!”
Mark struggled as the weight increased by another degree. For the first time, Jonathan looked and sounded well and truly desperate.
“For heaven's sake, Samantha, Mark, please just go!”
She didn’t respond for a time, during which one of the two final gaps disappeared. Sam's eyes twitch in panic and irritation. Resolve and recklessness painted her face in equal measure.
“Mark hold out for as long as you can, I need every second you can make me.”
He hadn’t said a word yet but Mark nodded to her glancing at Jonathan.
“Come on dude, it's not fair to tell us to leave when we know you wouldn’t do the same. We’re not leaving.”
The final gap closed as the fifth and final Hydra piled on. Jonathan looked at them in disbelief.
Mark regulated his breathing as he moved the last of his Mana and Prana into the creation of and new construct, only this time he began mixing in a modifier he had been toying with ever since he found out how weak he was to vibration magic.
He had varying degrees of success with this one but now as the pressure built. Mark pushed himself and the spell to take on a new aspect, everything just seemed to click into place. The spell sat potently at the threshold of his skin, then expanding beyond, and not a moment too soon, as his outer construct fractured.
Mark let the old spell go, to lessen rebound, and when the walls of Corrupted flesh crushed inward, he expanded the new one to cover just the three of them.
The space shrank to a fifth of what it was encasing the three of them snuggly in a semi-transparent bead.
The modifier Mark had selected was ‘Absorb’.
Mark had always used [Sculpt Mana] to create a force to stop incoming attacks, but what if he could bleed off some of the attacking force, and use it to fuel his barrier? Jade's mirror had been an eye-opener, and what he was doing was similar, but instead of creating the opposing force, Mark was redirecting some of the attacker's own force to block their attack.
Similar to a kinetic battery, absorbing the force for later use.
In this case, the more they tried to crush the spherical construct, the more force Mark could redirect towards their protection.
In any other situation, Mark could have held this up for hours, but he was already so stretched for resources that even with all the new force coming in, he knew he would not be able to last long. By now, they were completely encompassed by the Hydra's undulating bodies, so the space was pitch black and Mark didn’t have the attention to divert to a light spell. But slowly, the space began to brighten.
Little bits at a time, until tiny blips of multicolored light began to fill the claustrophobic space. At first, they just looked like specks, but as the light filled the space, Mark was reminded of the stars as seen from an observatory. Patches of space dust floated through the dome for a moment, taking on the image of the pillars of creation. At its center was Sam; she was so close Mark could reach out and grab her, but the vastness of the magic made it feel as though she were an unreachable celestial body. Between her hands, three stars orbited one another, each with their own gravitational pull and bodies of moving lights, all trapped in their orbit. The scene was breathtaking, then Mark saw the blood. Streams of red ran down Sam’s nose, eyes, and ears. Mark knew the signs of overreaching all too well, as she attempted to cast a magic far out of her reach. For someone like Sam to reach her thread limit, the complexity had to reach heights Mark couldn’t even imagine. The spell she was building had begun to revolve around her more desperately now, speeding up, as if they were watching a living, breathing universe. Mark felt the construct groan, and he let a breath out. Sam said she needed time, so it was his job to give that to her; it was all he could do at the moment. Time stalled and stretched.
When the spell activated, there was no explosion or detonation of light. The specks of glowing stardust expanded beyond Mark's construct, melting holes in the Corrupted’s bodies, smaller than a grain of sand, but their numbers were as countless as the stars. Expanding through their prison as though it were not there. The serene sounds of an expanding universe barely registered to Mark as the pressure against the sphere disappeared, along with the Hydra lives.