Either way, she was glad when people finally stopped trying to dismantle her pronunciation, word choice, and intonations.
Ranthia had been stuck waiting for days for her opportunity to trigger her level 128 class up. [Chaosbringer] had only offered a couple of Skills as it leveled that were, ultimately, both easy to pass on. [Armament Retrieval] was largely redundant with [Adamantium Manipulation] and wasn’t worth dropping one of her current Skills. [Magic Recollection] would have let her ‘save’ information about where [Mine!] sensed adamantium, which was a downright bizarre offering when she hadn’t actually used that feature of the Skill except to find her own knives. It wasn’t like she was looking to go mining—or however adamantium was found—any time soon. The lack of interesting new toys left her even more impatient for her class up.
But unfortunately for her, the people of Unbreakable Image had to schedule class ups around one another to avoid losing multiple personnel at once. Their [Healer] was still under, and those who were adept at first aid were desperately needed until he finally finished. Ranthia still qualified, even if many of her people had markedly improved over the years. A couple of them were even considering trying to get a [Healer] class when they finally unlocked their third classes, which would help them immensely in the future.
Even when the [Healer] finished, at long last (huzzah, their [Healer] could theoretically fight if things truly got desperate), Ranthia was forced to wait for a dawn to come where they weren’t under attack. There was no way she could risk classing up at night. A couple of her teams were optimistic that they could stall the troll twin, but Ranthia refused to gamble lives other than her own against such a powerful opponent, especially not indefinitely.
But, at long last, her day arrived and Ranthia wasted no time slipping into the world within.
“Why can’t you reach level 768 in a normal class instead of coming to me with this chaotic nonsense?” Her guide complained as soon as Ranthia stepped through the doors.
“We love chaotic nonsense.” Ranthia retorted, as she eyed the swords.
It sure looked like a normal class up. There were blades with hilts wrapped in every hue she could imagine, racked up with hilts pointed outward along both walls.
Her guide muttered darkly about nearly finding out what happened if she died, but the woman dutifully stepped back from the counter and began to check over blades. …Only to start cursing while she touched a sword.
“What?” Ranthia asked with open impatience.
“It’s a puzzle.” Her guide non-explained in response.
Ranthia rolled her eyes and vaulted over the counter—outright ignoring her guide’s indignant shout—and approached a sword with a hilt wrapped in purple.
[Invalid Blade of Chaos]. …That was odd, when she absorbed its story, she only got a name. There was no description, nor any stats.
And when Ranthia tried to pull the blade free, it wouldn’t budge.
“Oh.” Ranthia grumbled. It was a puzzle.
“Indeed. Get out of my domain.” Her guide retorted frostily.
“We need to hurry to find the actual class offering. I’ll take this side; you take that one.” Ranthia suggested, after she swallowed her frustration.
Xaoc, I love you dearly—but why?!
She sent her deity an apology an instant later. She wasn’t even sure if prayers could reach Him from the world within, but it was better to be safe. Plus, there was a real chance that this nonsense was the result of her own System or soul—or however the world within worked—and had nothing to do with whatever class(es) He had sent her.
Ranthia began to sprint as best as she was able without the System’s influence. She was slow. Too damned slow.
[False Blade of Chaos]. [Incorrect Blade of Chaos]. [Untrue Blade of Chaos]. [Delusory Blade of Chaos]. [Proper Blade of Order]—ew! [Fabricated Blade of Chaos]. [Spurious Blade of Chaos]. [Wrong Blade of Chaos]. On and on the false blades went. Greens, blues, purples, even blacks, but none of them were a real class.
Ranthia’s guide was faster than Ranthia was in the world within. Ranthia trailed further and further behind her as they desperately checked every last blade.
The standard class-representing blades that weren’t sent by Xaoc—wherever the true class’s blade was hiding—were partitioned off by a barrier that Ranthia and her guide could both feel. She knew that she could push through it with ease, but she wasn’t ready to deny Him, no matter how frustrated she became.
“Found it!”
Ranthia nearly tripped over her own feet—gods and goddesses, existing without the System was awful, how did children endure it?!—as she tried to spin toward her guide.
It was the blade inside the display case that usually held her [Paladin] offering that she was barred from. She had never even noticed that it wasn’t sealed this time. …In fact, had the case even been there for her prior divine class offerings?
Ranthia angrily reminded herself that it wasn’t the time to get distracted by pointless curiosity. The world within was weird and did weird things!
Ranthia ran over and seized the blade from herself, absorbing its story even as she scrambled back over the counter and made for the exit. It had taken forever in the world within, and she was dreading to learn just how long she had been under.
[Harbinger]. Chaos is the key to all grand changes that have touched Pallos. Carry it forth and bring about your own change. +10 Free Stats, +23 Strength, +199 Dexterity, +200 Vitality, +198 Speed, +27 Mana, +95 Mana Regeneration, +86 Magic Power, +24 Magic Control.
She didn’t even think to bid her guide farewell on her way out.
Ranthia awoke to the sounds of battle. Thank Xaoc, the sun was plainly up—her tent was filthy after so many years of use, but the sunlight was plain even through the crust of dirt—which, hopefully, meant that she hadn’t been under quite as long as it had felt. Ranthia still scrambled to get out of her tent and join in.
“I’m fine!” Was probably what the garbled nonsense that Magius (triple classed [Warrior], possibly out of spite) meant to convey.
“Your nose is literally missing.” Ranthia repeated, yet again, as she bullied the man toward the [Healer]’s tent.
Ranthia was far less certain that “I’m freed from the tyranny of stink!” was an accurate translation of the man’s next line. People with broad anti-pain Skills got weird when they were severely injured, she had seen it more than once—the refusal to acknowledge that they were injured since they didn’t feel injured.
She was increasingly tempted to ban them and order those with them to abandon the Skills that they had taken. Sooner or later being wholly ignorant of pain was going to get someone killed.
It was only a little hypocritical, it wasn’t like her numbness to pain was Skill-given!
She was still just relieved that she hadn’t been under as long as she had feared—it was still the same day, she had just woken up sometime just after noon. There were a few injuries after the latest attack, but no one was dead. No more names had to be taken from her and added to their monument.
She would take that every day, if she had any say in the matter. It wasn’t like she was closely bonded to anyone on the base, none of them came close to the close-knit relationships she had enjoyed with the members of Ranger Team 6, but they were her people. Every loss felt like a personal failing. If she was given the opportunity to trade her life for their safe return home… well, she would be sorely tempted, but she tried not to indulge in senseless hypotheticals.
Realistically, sacrificing herself would gain nothing and cost them everything.
Ranthia delivered Magius to the tent—and the [Healer] was already treating him, despite the man’s protests—and walked over to lean wearily against the warm wall of their base. She just wanted to people watch for a little while, plus it was a good opportunity to finally go over her class up gains.
[*ding!* Congratulations! You have upgraded your third class – [Harbinger – Magic Metal]!]
[*ding!* Your skills [Adamantium Manipulation], [Adamant Force], and [Adamantium Forge] have evolved into [Adamant Commander]!]
[Adamant Commander]: By His decree, that which denies change shall succumb to chaos. Manipulate, control, reshape, and break down adamantium. Increased force and precision per level. Decreased penalty to form larger designs with level.
[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [One With Chaos]!]
[One With Chaos]: Through Xaoc you were reborn. In His name you have struggled. Through your trials you have come to firmly believe that chaos is a weapon unlike any other. Now embrace chaos not just in your mind and heart, but within your body. Randomly boosts applicable stats when attacks are made in the service of chaos using an adamantium weapon. -12133 Mana Regen Rate while wielding an adamantium weapon.
[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [Voice of Adamantium]!]
[Voice of Adamantium]: With a touch of adamantium on your lips, your voice will project with great force. Increased volume and force per level. -9436 Mana Regen Rate while adamantium is painted over your lips.
[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [Higher Power]!]
[Higher Power]: Adamantium will never break or buckle, and neither should those that wield it. True chaos cannot be brought low. Reduced shock, strain, and other feedback transferred through your adamantium per level. -13622 Mana Regen Rate while wielding or utilizing adamantium.
[*ding!* Congratulations! [Diffuse Reflectance] has reached level 558! +5 Free Stats, +3 Dexterity, +3 Vitality, +120 Mana, +120 Mana Regeneration, +120 Magic Power, +120 Magic Control from your class, +1 free stat for being human, +1 Mana Regeneration and +1 Magic Power from your element.]
[*ding!* [Mirror Spirit], [Scattered Reflections], [Pure Reflections], [Persistent Imagery], and [Ideal Reflectance] have reached level 558!]
[*ding!* Congratulations! [Harbinger] has leveled up from 128 to level 132! Per level: +10 Free Stats, +23 Strength, +199 Dexterity, +200 Vitality, +198 Speed, +27 Mana, +95 Mana Regeneration, +86 Magic Power, +24 Magic Control from your class, +1 free stat for being human, +1 Strength and +1 Magic Power from your element.]
[*ding!* [Magic Metal Authority], [Adamant Commander], [Unbreakable], and [Adamantium Symbiosis] have leveled from 128 to level 132!]
Ranthia had two slots and three Skills on offer from her class up, but she accepted [One With Chaos] immediately. The Skill invoked Xaoc’s name, there was no way she could refuse it. That had to be important! She wasn’t entirely certain if attacks “made in the service of chaos” was a limitation or just a personal touch on the Skill, but she was content to find out. The other two though both left her with mixed feelings.
[Voice of Adamantium] was clearly an answer to her not-infrequent wish for a Sound classer that could amplify her voice. [Higher Power] was a beautiful name—unlike [Adamant Commander], which was only a step better than [Mine!]—which felt very wasted on a mundane effect. [Higher Power] would have meant more if she wasn’t using [Void Edge]; impacts that might stagger her through her knives were rare. In essence, [Higher Power] felt like a Skill meant to help her against the troll twin, but she had her doubts about how useful it would be in the future.
…Granted, [Voice of Adamantium] had the same flaw. Both Skills felt tailored to her current situation, and she hadn’t completely given up her hopes for the future. Both Skills also felt like they had come a touch late. Her people had already gotten solid at reliably relaying orders and alerts and she had already figured out a way to limit and redirect the force of impact from even the troll’s devastating strikes.
Though as she read [Voice of Adamantium]’s description again, trying to puzzle out how the heck she could ‘paint her lips’ with adamantium an old conversation with Hexara flittered through her mind. Lead and several other metals were poisonous when worn in cosmetics. …Would adamantium also be poisonous? It was dangerous to assume the Skill offering meant that it wasn’t—the System would probably give her a Skill for stabbing herself to get stronger if she really wanted it. The System did not care.
Between that nugget of hesitation, the practicality concerns, and the fact that she felt like [Higher Power] might be slightly more useful, she made her decision. [Higher Power] took her final Class Skill slot.
Beyond the new Skills she was mostly pleased. [Adamant Commander] had an awful name, but that was a lot of utility packed into the same Skill now. The class was still leveling at a ridiculously glacial pace, but it had proven its value in spite of its level.
[Diffuse Reflectance] finally leveled off the latest fight too—it had felt like it’d been stuck for a while now. She was probably deep into diminishing returns for non-lethal skirmishes with the troll twin and slaughtering low tier shimagu, as far as the System was concerned, but it wasn’t like she had the power to change her life.
She just needed the power to endure until she found an opportunity to enact the change that [Harbinger] promised.
Life had long had a sort of routine, in a terrible sense of the word. They never knew when another threat would come, but they knew how to react when it did. Their small groups countered the enemy’s superior numbers surprisingly efficiently. It let them come at trained beasts from different angles, and against parasite-infested opponents it divided the enemy’s response. The wall defenders got to focus on unleashing maximum punishment with the enemy unable to convincingly threaten the walls anymore. They had spent years mastering their responses to shimagu aggression.
And then it all stopped. Late in the fall began a period that Ranthia and her inner circle eventually started to call the great quiet. Enemy attacks had entirely stopped. The shimagu campsite—increasingly resembling a permanent base as infrastructure grew—was still there. It was still defended, and they had started to add in some sort of defensive wards. They weren’t entirely akin to Remus’ inscriptions—Ranthia had no idea how they were setting up thin beams of Light (or perhaps some other adjacent element) that warned the shimagu when it was broken. There were others too, that detected sound or motion.
The enemy had holed up and no one had an answer for why. The wards were more than Ranthia or any of her stealth-focused people could overcome. Incursions toward the enemy fortification were dealt with by bombardments of arrows and thrown rocks.
The wards seemed to suggest a new twin’s presence, but nothing happened. And as the days passed, a new form of frustration set in among those in the Unbreakable Image. The utter lack of enemy activity bred a sort of reckless impatience within her people.
There were calls to attempt a large scouting force toward Remus. Not that the problems with that had changed in the slightest; there were still other shimagu camps and bases scattered all around them. They still had no map. They still had supply difficulties. And there was a very real chance that the shimagu would muster to stop them.
Worse were the calls to attack the shimagu fortification. Taking the fight to their enemies was an intoxicating concept, but every advantage the Unbreakable Image had enjoyed throughout the attacks would be reversed. The shimagu would have the robust defensive position instead, and it was hard to imagine an attack against the base succeeding without staggering losses—even if they struck by day and there truly wasn’t another twin present.
Ultimately, the best that Ranthia could do was to enforce training regimens for her people. Under her supervision—and the medical team’s presence—her men and women trained and sparred. It gave them an energy outlet other than the booming social life available in their little base. It wasn’t quite enough, but it bought them more time to figure out a move.
Almost as soon as winter’s first breath touched the land, a deep cold snap seized the area. They had known cold winter nights, but this was something far nastier than they had experienced. Frost covered the dust and rocks. Her people clumped together and kept themselves buried under old cloaks, blankets, and disassembled extraneous tents. It was so cold that the water they drew from the well had to be heated. They were already drawing up slurries of ice in water, and there was a real fear of what would happen if it stayed so cold for much longer.
Their wood supplies had always been perilously low, but in the face of the cold they were going through the dregs at a downright alarming pace. They had already salvaged what they could. Desperation got so high that one of her people reset his third class to take a [Miasma] class so he could safely burn the fat of the rare beast they killed for warmth.
They were four days into the harsh freeze. Ranthia’s vision was restored to her as dawn broke, revealing a misty haze that had settled over the landscape. It wasn’t as thick as a proper fog, but the haze sharpened the fangs of the cold’s bite and made it easy for eyes to play tricks. In short order there were two separate commotions around sightings that both turned out to be rocks seen through the haze. Rocks that had always been there but became hard to see for just long enough that it seemed like movement.
Tensions and tempers began to rise as those on duty got frustrated at false alarms and tried to make things out through the haze. They were cold, they were increasingly stressed, and—
“Movement!” The call came from the watchtower.
Half of those on the walls groaned in frustration, but the rest focused on the designated direction.
Excitement grew.
“No, there is, look!” “It’s just another—no, wait…” “Sound the horns!”
“Belay that!” Ranthia cut off the [Mage] with a glare, before she looked back into the haze.
It wasn’t an attack, it was a lone person, probably a scout. And more important, the person was northeast of their base.
Did they dare to hope?
“It’s a Remus Legion uniform…!” The [Archer] next to Ranthia whispered with a sharp intake of breath.
[Vision of the Void] excelled at seeing through the haze, but the individual was at her outer limits. Her class qualities were solid, but she didn’t have the best eyes in the base, even if vitality had settled into being her highest stat. It left her uncertain, but she was reasonably confident that the man at her side—who did have some of the best eyes in their base—was right.
“Anyone who can do Skills visible from that far away that won’t bring every shimagu in the region in to investigate, use them! We need to signal that we’re still here!” Ranthia ordered with a shout.
There was a real risk that it was a shimagu spy in a stolen uniform or a captured soldier’s body. If the individual sought entry into their base, they could screen him readily enough—they still had a [Healer] that could kill parasites. But if there was any chance it was a scout from Remus… They had to demonstrate that they weren’t shimagu. Their Skills were the only way they could do it.
Someone still brought the base’s standard up and waved it around, even as flashy Skills were loosed into the ground next to the walls of their base. Radiance, Inferno, Brilliance, Lightning, Arcanite, and more tore at the rocks as they desperately committed everything they could to the slimmest possibility.
And then the individual suddenly took off at a run towards the northeast. They had been too far away for [Divine-Touched Identify] to clock, but they were fast. For a heartbeat Ranthia weighed going after them—not entirely sure if she could keep up—just to be safe, but then she saw a group of ogres and dinosaurs move through the haze just into view. The human should be able to outrun the shimagu, given the speed they showed.
Assuming they weren’t one of the shimagu to begin with.
There was nothing to do but wait and hope.
The cold snap had left them with virtually no wood left, but it finally passed. Replacing wood with mana had long been a priority for them, but it had become an absolute necessity. The cold snap was done, but winter had just begun.
Exacerbating frustrations was the fact that they were running low on preserved dinosaur meat. Their opportunities to restock had all but come to an end with no shimagu attacks on their base, and wild game was in short supply.
Her people got grumpy, but no one’s loyalty to the base—to Ranthia—failed them. At least they still had Doc’s garden. They weren’t going to starve. And soon enough, Spring would arrive.
But their brief flare of hope had once again been smothered by time.
Spring had barely touched the land when Ranthia was woken by her base’s horns. A single blast repeated every heartbeat. The most urgent alarm they had.
She pulled on her backpack and stuffed the remainder of the shaft of the adamantium spear inside of it. Other supplies were already packed. In an urgent enough crisis they were prepared to abandon their base and go mobile—even if the odds of survival were grim.
They had seen too many base killers out of the shimagu to not be prepared.
Quickly, but thoroughly, she checked her armor—decades of experience had hammered in the importance of knowing her armor couldn’t slip—then threw an image that included her backpack to the top of the watchtower and shifted to it.
There was some sort of massive force on approach. An army was approaching from the northeast. …And there were plain sounds and signs of the troll twin’s camp mobilizing after nearly half a year of inactivity.
By all indications, they were about to be pinned between two armies. The one from the northeast wasn’t close enough to make out any details yet, only the dust that indicated a large force was visible.
Ranthia’s blood ran cold in her veins. If the other force had a twin—or if there truly was another with the troll—their base might not be able to withstand it. Another shimagu base killer while Ranthia was forced to engage the troll might be too much, no matter how skilled her people had become. Yet abandoning the base was foolhardy. Even if they fled south, they were almost certain to be surrounded by enemies the instant they were forced to stop their retreat.
Would they stand and fight where they were strongest or trust themselves to fortune’s whim?
The fact that they’d have to run without proper preparation or supplies—and with minimal food rations—settled the matter.
They had to hold their ground.
“All personnel, gather!” Ranthia shouted, confident that her orders would be repeated and would reach every ear. Men and women gathered rapidly and soon enough Ranthia leapt down in front of them.
A few moments later, she was ready to begin. She couldn’t wait indefinitely for the slowest responders.
“Once again, they come to break us! These slimy idiots just refuse to learn! We are the Unbreakable Image! We have been forged and fired in the flames of war! We have been tempered by our bonds and our faith! The gods watch us! Xaoc knows us! We. Will. Not. Break!”
No one had ever taken a Sound [Mage] class just to amplify her voice—it was a poor investment not worth the opportunity cost—but Ranthia’s voice wasn’t exactly quiet.
“For Xaoc! For Remus! For ourselves! Let us smash the shimagu yet again!” Ranthia concluded.
Her men and women screamed loudly in exuberant agreement.
They would be fine. They were strong.
Something was wrong. The troll twin’s forces mustered alright, but they sent the bulk of their forces toward the other army. There was a chance that the shimagu were planning to just meet up and form a more unified hammer to use against Ranthia’s obstinate little base, but it sure looked like the troll twin’s forces were moving to fight the coming army.
There was a spark of hope there, but it was impossible to pay much attention to it with the reality of the problems that were heading their way.
Back when Ranthia first encountered a tarbosaurus, she had seen it as a massive carnivorous dinosaur. The therizinosaurs forced her to reassess her definition of massive. And once again, she was forced to adjust her expectations. The gods seemed to have no upper limit to their visions for life on Pallos.
[Tyrannosaurus – Mountain], level 914.
And, of course, there was a second one, level 862 and maybe the tiniest bit smaller.
It was kind of hard to tell for sure how much smaller the lower level predator was because the higher level specimen was a caster monster and was armored in a thick coat of spiky rocks.
A dozen therizinosaurs and several smaller dinosaurs followed the two powerhouses that were charging straight at their base. Ranthia had a lot of pride and confidence in the tall mud-and-stone walls that protected their base, but the two gigantic predators stood a real risk of tearing their way through.
Ranthia was about to leap, but she saw nervousness on the faces of some of her people.
The levels and the numbers… this was a far grander attack than they had seen in years. Arguably it was the largest attack their base had ever faced, in terms of sheer lethality. It was bad when a large group of therizinosaurs were somehow the unimportant part of an attack.
“You know what I see out there?” Ranthia called out.
In spite of their training, several of her people still turned their eyes away from the approaching threats to look at her.
“Meat! In the morning, we feast better than the emperor himself!”
Cheers followed Ranthia as she gracefully leapt into the night. The slivers of the mystical moons gazed down on the battlefield as it unfolded.
Time was of the essence; she had to stop the beasts away from the walls. She couldn’t trust that the artillery [Mages] would be able to bring down high level monstrosities like those tyrannosaurs fast enough. And so Ranthia didn’t run or dance toward the dinosaurs, she shifted through a chain of mirror images placed at the edge of her range several times in succession as swiftly as she could. It was mana intensive, but it was a bit faster than she could move. She was ‘helped’ by the massive strides the beasts took as they rapidly outpaced the ‘lesser’ dinosaurs that followed in their wake. The damned things really were just stupidly massive.
The instant Ranthia was in her latest body she was already dodging as the lower leveled tyrannosaurus bent down and snapped at her with its powerful jaws. She got clear from the half-hearted attempt to devour her, but the jaws closed with thunderous force.
She decided to try to avoid being bitten. …Not that she usually was okay with being bitten, but it was plainly an especially bad idea with those monsters.
Far beyond the dinosaurs, she thought she caught sight of the long-absent troll twin. It kind of looked like something else was approaching him, but there was no time to pay much attention. As much as Ranthia normally prioritized engaging with him, she had to do what she could to stall the two obnoxiously oversized dinosaurs. Not that she had any idea how to kill something on such a scale—the reach of her knives was laughable comparatively.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
She had more than a few mixed feelings about the fact that her people were on their way to join her. She wasn’t sure how she could eliminate such massive threats alone, but she wasn’t optimistic about their odds of bringing the beasts down without casualties if they fought together.
Not that she could focus on her concerns. A thick, massive tail tore through the air straight for her, one that was coated in rock. Ranthia danced towards the tail and vaulted into the air—spinning in midair to point downwards—and lashed out with her Void-empowered adamantium knife. The slash went straight through the rock—good, it wasn’t backed by the beast’s vitality—but only left a shallow cut on the beast’s resilient hide.
Ranthia tumbled back onto her feet when she landed and kept an eye on the spot she had cut. The good news was that the rock armor didn’t immediately reform. The bad news was that the armor was thick enough that her cuts were effectively harmless, unless she somehow sheared the armor off first. It was what she had done against the kraken, but there wasn’t time to spend a day whittling the beast down.
Ranthia hadn’t seen a single dinosaur in the troll twin’s forces that had a shimagu inside of it, and she had to gamble that it was still true—though seriously, where in Xaoc’s name had the troll found these monstrosities?! They had to be the reason that the troll’s forces had become so inactive. There was even a chance that their training was incomplete, if this hadn’t been planned as a coordinated pincer attack. But even the best training could be broken with enough anger (so long as there wasn’t a shimagu in control).
Her plan was about as complex as most of hers tended to be. They gave her two big threats, so she would use one to kill the other. Easy.
Step one was to piss off the big one. And Ranthia considered herself to be an expert at being an annoying opponent for any foe. She scattered mirror images across the area as swiftly as [Scattered Reflections] allowed. Nine of them were handed off to [Submind] while she kept another five that were inert. Her images weren’t just distractions—or escape venues—she needed to keep the other ‘lesser’ dinosaurs out of the mix for the moment. Assuming they were actually stupid enough to close in alongside apex predators.
Ranthia’s first priority was the larger tyrannosaurus. Ranthia closed in on the beast and danced about while she slashed it over and over. Despite the size difference, the beast seemed to focus on her readily, which allowed her to focus her attacks on its head—where even the shallow cuts that she inflicted would be harder to ignore. The beast was about as nimble as she would have expected from something at its level—regardless of scale—but she was no stranger to a battle where the slightest mistake would end her existence. At least the dino was somewhat predictable as it continually sought her out with its jaws.
It was also frustratingly stoic about the injuries she inflicted. The beast just wasn’t getting angry or upset! It would probably react if she somehow managed to disable its jaws, but she needed the monster to remain lethal for the next phase. She needed to find a way to inflict damage it couldn’t shrug off though, because the predator plainly believed catching and consuming her was an inevitability.
One of her better possible options—at least in theory—was unlikely to actually help. [One With Chaos] was a strange and exceedingly disappointing skill. With every strike she made, the numbers of her stats twitched a little. Sometimes by a hundred, sometimes by a single digit. Obnoxiously, it felt like a skill that would have been more helpful at half her current level. With her lowest stat nearing thirty thousand the tiny, randomized boosts offered precious little.
Absent a better idea or a miracle—and no, she wasn’t quite desperate enough to request one from Xaoc—Ranthia chose to take more risks. One precariously placed image later, she shifted on top of the gargantuan dinosaur’s snout and tried to lunge for its eyeball. Yet before she had managed to move very much, the Tyrannosaurus flicked its head upward, which threw her into the air with a surprising amount of force.
Ranthia found herself considerably higher up in the air than even their watchtower reached. She allowed herself a moment to take in the larger field of the conflict while she was airborne. The army that approached from the northeast had some strange banners, but there was something far more familiar mingled in. Reman standards! The troll’s forces hadn’t reached them yet, but someone had run ahead of the army and was moments away from reaching the troll twin itself.
But Ranthia had to tear her eyes away and bury her elation. The fact that the army was on their side—presumably—and had an elite that was confident enough to take on the troll twin was a good thing. Mostly. Okay, yes, she would have rather killed the troll herself, but they weren’t alone. Unfortunately for the moment, gravity had its will upon her. She was falling straight toward the open mouth of the tyrannosaurus.
Just as she had hoped. The great thing about predators that wanted to eat you was that it made them somewhat predictable compared to a more cunning adversary. Not that she had any intention of letting herself be consumed—only an idiot would count on getting past the teeth in good enough condition to unleash fury inside of the beast, plus most large predators had fairly extreme vitality to survive whatever they swallowed.
Starting a spin after she was already in midair had gotten easier as she leveled—the quirks of high stats were numerous. The spin was enough of a dance to reactivate the breadth of [She who Dances with Chaos]’s abilities and, when the angle was… closer to perfect than she had any right to expect, at least, she tapped [Void Edge], [Sustained Chaos], and [Adamant Commander] as she launched her left hand’s adamantium knife straight at one of the tyrannosaurus’ eyes.
The oversized dinosaur was relatively swift and nimble, but it seemingly lacked the intelligence to recognize the danger in time to react. The deceptively small blade—far smaller than its own teeth—was fast enough to slice through and cleave the air itself thanks to her own stats and Skills. The blade struck true and pierced deep through the beast’s eye.
Her opponent roared with such force that Ranthia swore her descent slowed as the sound collided with her. Even with her vitality, it was too much for her ears. A flash of pain was replaced with the downright uncomfortable sensation of blood in her ear canal.
Fortunately for her, she had already activated [Reflections of Reality] just after she threw her knife—the vertigo from ruined ears was a horror she wasn’t eager to relive. Her perception blurred for an instant and she was back on the ground in an image that had seemed safe. One of the smaller dinosaurs was leaping at her, but it was easy to evade and end, even with a single blade. Then once it was dealt with, she triggered [Adamant Commander] to recall her knife to her hand from the dinosaur’s ruined eye.
…Or she called for it to return to her hand, at least. She was plainly in range because she could feel the Skill taking hold, but nothing happened. The damned gigantic beast was so resilient that she couldn’t pull her knife free with the power [Adamant Commander] had! Being down to a single knife was more than a little problematic, especially with so many threats still standing.
At least she had very obviously pissed off the Tyrannosaurus. Ranthia was forced to break off her attempts to recall her knife and dance away as the dinosaur rampaged after her, its jaws narrowly behind her. Twice she was forced to shift to keep it up, but she managed to lead the beast in a semicircle until it was facing the lower level, non-caster monster tyrannosaurus—the one that was still heading for her approaching forces. Ranthia put an image on the back of the probably-smaller beast’s neck and shifted one last time.
Ranthia smiled with anticipation and pulled mana from her arcanite while she could.
…Except the dumb beast that had been chasing her seemed to have lost sight of her!
Ranthia whistled a jaunty tune—she had no idea what the song actually was, but the tune was one that she heard in her base regularly—while she waved her arms to try to catch the eyes—sorry, eye—of her original opponent. Unsurprisingly, the beast that she stood atop noticed her presence, but Ranthia danced in place on its neck as the beast thrashed and tried to dislodge her. The brief contact she kept with the creature let [Rhythmic Grace] keep her footing stable enough to remain where she was for a few moments until—Ranthia suddenly kicked off the beast’s neck at the last moment.
Less than a heartbeat before the larger tyrannosaurus’s powerful jaws closed over the neck of its smaller counterpart.
Blood and scraps of meat flew through the air as the two truly massive dinosaurs tore at one another in a frenzy of bloodlust and hate. Thank Xaoc, it worked! …Which meant she just needed to get the other dinosaurs invited to the orgy of violence.
As she got some distance from the titanic clashing beasts, Ranthia focused on restoring the mirror images that had been destroyed while she took in her immediate surroundings. Her people were close and, as they arrived, she had them join her and her mirror images as they circled around to the far side of the therizinosaurs and other beasts and tried to drive them toward the two tyrannosaurs that were locked in battle.
Things happened quickly as the chaos spread. A therizinosaurus struck by the spiky tail of the larger tyrannosaurus immediately recovered and started to attack the hindquarters of the larger, bloodied dinosaurs with its claws. Megaraptors were trampled underfoot by the larger dinosaurs. The violence intensified as beasts cast off their training and embraced their bloodlust. Blood and the sweet scent of raw meat filled the area as beasts died and tore at once another.
Ranthia ordered her people back—though [Mages] and [Archers] did their best to keep the carnage flowing. Ranthia, on the other hand, danced through it all—she was a one woman force of chaos that kept the clash between the beasts flowing and prevented dinosaurs from escaping. With her sole knife she slashed and cleaved as she danced and weaved. She inflicted injury and she brought death. Kill notifications sang in her ear, but neither of her primary targets were down yet. Even against one another, the beasts were obnoxiously resilient.
Her dance carried her below the smaller tyrannosaurus, and she did her best to remain between its legs—striking them as she was able—while it fought against the larger. The predators had their own rhythm of conflict, but she was something of an expert at reading the flow, no matter how chaotic it became. At last, it felt safe, so she leapt and awkwardly climbed the beast’s leg until she was able to slash into the beast’s gut. It was so focused on its greater adversary that she went unchallenged as she delivered slash after slash. [Void Edge] and [Echoes of Devastation] carved deeper and wider with every swing. It took time, and more than once she was forced to let go and dance away as the clash between the titanic beasts continued, but Ranthia was determined. At last organs began to slip out of the widening wounds as the tyrannosaurus’ thick hide and dense musculature were erased by her attacks. She cut them free as they came out and most ended up pulped by their owner’s feet.
[*ding!* You have contributed to the slaying of a dinosaur [Tyrannosaurus] (Mountain, level 870)!]
Huh, that was a fairly novel notification, it wasn’t often that she received partial kill credit alongside a non-ally. Ranthia was bemused as she hurriedly waited the moments to shift to one of her still-intact images before the dead dinosaur collapsed on top of her. Surprisingly the image she shifted into wasn’t in any sort of immediate danger, so Ranthia took a moment to replace several of her destroyed images.
She had one major target to go. Once again, she danced into the melee and an opportunistic leap brought another therizinosaurus down with a swipe of her solitary adamantium knife. She really needed to get her second blade back, having to pass the one back and forth between her hands (no, she refused to be grateful for Rigira’s mandated juggling lessons) was getting old.
The larger tyrannosaurus had been about to take a bite out of its slain adversary when it finally got tired of the three therizinosaurs that were attacking its backside with their brutal claws. The greater beast snapped at them, while they scattered and continued to try to claw the stone-covered brute to death. Ranthia watched their skirmish while she focused on taking out smaller dinosaurs—and avoiding her own [Archer]’s stray shots! Honestly, Ollius, aim then loose!
About the same time as she completed her own rude gesture, the tyrannosaurus finally lowered its head and began to charge at the therizinosaurs, plainly aiming to bowl its adversaries over with its greater bulk.
That was as solid an opportunity for her as any. It took four tries, but she finally got an image on top of the beast’s skull and managed to keep it there long enough to shift to it, only to almost immediately get thrown off while the dinosaur barreled into the therizinosaurs. Still, she caught herself and immediately lashed out to carve away some of the fracturing stones on its skull, then followed it up with a second fully empowered strike on the beast’s head.
The tyrannosaurus began to thrash, but Ranthia managed to bury her free hand in the rent she had just carved into its flesh. It was far from a pleasant or firm handhold, but she gripped the dense bloodied meat as hard as she could while she endured.
“Hit it with everything you’ve got!” Ranthia shouted, hoping at least some of her people could hear her over the dinosaur’s stomping tantrum.
It wasn’t like she was idle either. [Adamant Commander] was dragging her knife finger-by-finger closer to her hand through the massive beast’s head. Her other knife she buried in the beast’s flesh and tried to hook it in as best as she could.
The therizinosaurus—the only one that survived being trampled by the tyrannosaurus—was being ignored and the beast joined her people in unleashing fury on the apex predator. Ranthia couldn’t watch the attacks come—but she felt the beast shudder and shake as Skills and empowered arrows tore into it from all sides. Yet dislodging her remained its greatest priority, as the beast shook and thrashed.
[*ding!* Your allies have slain a dinosaur [Tyrannosaurus] (Mountain, level 917)!]
Her knife suddenly tore through the statless skull with ease—and a spray of bone, blood, and bits—and reached her hand, even as Ranthia tried to throw herself clear as the beast fell.
She was still forced to shift, there was just too much bulk to escape unscathed.
“Well, that was horrible.” Ranthia grumbled while she took a moment to catch her breath. No hostile dinosaurs were in her immediate vicinity, but she didn’t have many images left intact. [Submind] was borderline useless without her eyes on the situation her images were dealing with. But for the moment she was safe. She had survived another reckless maneuver. Things were going well.
Or so she thought until she cast her gaze to the north.
The troll twin was engaged in battle. …With a very familiar face.
Statia was struggling against Ranthia’s most hated enemy. Half of the woman’s shield was gone, and the tip of her spear had been erased. She took another wound while Ranthia watched, as Void energy from the troll tore at her leg.
The troll had sacks dangling from either side of his waist—which was unusual—but Ranthia didn’t care about the troll’s new accessories. She cared about the woman she had once been friends with.
“Kill the rest of the dinosaurs, I’m on the twin!” She called back to her forces.
She was already moving as fast as she could, desperately wishing she had some Skill with better range than throwing her knife. Gods and goddesses, how could she have just assumed the other force had someone that could take the troll out?!
The rest of her mirror images broke in rapid succession as they were denied access to her senses. Not that she cared, she would have dismissed them had she thought about it.
“Statia! Get away, you can’t take that guy!” Ranthia called out desperately as she closed in.
[Artisan – Water] level 527, [Mage – Brilliance] level 491, [Leader – Storm] level 160. Statia had gotten stronger, but she wasn’t strong.
[Warrior – Light] level 876. [Warrior – Forest] level 809. [Warrior – Void] level 593. The troll’s levels hadn’t grown near as much as Ranthia’s had—aside from his third class—throughout their numerous clashes, but he was still in a league of his own.
Ranthia had level 580 in [She who Dances with Chaos], level 561 in [Diffuse Reflectance], and level 137 in [Harbinger]. But more importantly—she could meet Void with Void. Her adamantium could take his strikes.
The legion-issued leather and steel that Statia carried plainly offered precious little protection.
“You see me.” Statia replied, with a large smile on her face. Something about how the woman carried herself seemed to shift, an effect that Ranthia had only seen a few times, but she could never forget… A request for ‘help’ had been addressed.
Ranthia’s heart threatened to stop.
The memory bubbled up as she watched the change come over her old friend.
Ranthia had thought her words would help the woman survive. She couldn’t call Statia a close friend, but she had felt obligated to do her best to help the woman. To offset what the emperor had tried to turn Statia into.
Please, help me to see you again after we finish our training out there.
Xaoc, no…! Ranthia had forced Statia to leave her forces behind and engage a foe she couldn’t beat.
Ranthia had spoken the words with the best of intentions, but every request for help was a curse to Statia. A binding obligation. One that overrode sense and the woman’s own desires.
With the change, Statia discarded the damaged spear and shield, then drew two short swords. The woman immediately lunged at the troll.
The troll was about to attack with its tricky bone weapon in response.
“No you don’t!” Ranthia screamed as she joined the battle. Mirror images were already being scattered about them as fast as Ranthia could manage.
Once again, as they had many times before, adamantium met bone—nearly invisible Void met deep black Void. But more importantly, the weapon failed to find Statia with that swing. Ranthia wasn’t holding back anymore—she didn’t care if the troll realized that she had learned how to redirect his weapon without breaking every bone in her arm. She had to get his attention away from Statia.
Statia’s first short sword was stopped by the rock and vine armor, but her second scored a solid cut across his chin. It sealed almost as quickly as the blade left the troll’s flesh.
The troll sneered and kicked at Ranthia. She shifted to another mirror image and slashed the leg with her other knife. [Void Edge] had considerably more power than it had when she had first tested the Skill against the troll. Against the weaker armor away from the troll’s neck, she could tear right through the troll’s defenses. Not that it mattered. As always, the troll’s injuries knit shut—only a touch slower than his armor mended itself.
Statia had to know what they were up against. They had taken the same courses back in the Academy!
The clashes continued. Ranthia desperately focused on the bone weapon. She fouled attack after attack that was directed at Statia, but the troll continued to treat her like an afterthought. He only kicked at her to move her. He broke her mirror images with impunity as the skirmish continued. Statia was being reckless with her own ineffectual attacks though.
It was inevitable—when Ranthia was forced to shift again, the bone weapon swept out while Ranthia was out of reach. She couldn’t stop it. Statia’s combat instincts or whatever megalomaniacal ‘help’ request she was normally under failed the woman utterly. Statia tried to parry the weapon. Her short sword and the right hand that held it disappeared, consumed by the roaring Void of the troll as his weapon tore through.
Blood fell from Statia’s incomplete forearm, but the woman adjusted her stance and tried to fight on!
Ranthia roared out in desperate anger—her cold hatred for the troll was igniting into a blazing fury. Ranthia replaced her mirror images and put nine under [Submind]’s control, then the ten of her tried desperately to engage the troll’s attention.
Ranthia cut and cut desperately. The troll seemed to largely ignore her; he let her attacks tear into his limbs and torso—her images were still too ineffectual to leave a true mark, even for an instant—and only leaned aside or kicked at her if she tried to make an attack that could have reached his neck. Instead, he continued to strike at Statia. Ranthia deflected every attack that she could, but she ran into an ironic problem.
She couldn’t be everywhere at once.
The troll’s level was too high. She had always hoped that he had stopped holding back in terms of his speed, but she had been wrong. The bastard was so fast and powerful that Ranthia still couldn’t quite properly keep up. The troll wasn’t holding back anymore. He wanted Statia dead and the heartbeats it took for Ranthia to do anything were an eternity when she needed to be in a specific place at a specific moment.
There was no way Statia would survive this.
“Please, go! I’ve got this!” Ranthia pleaded once again.
There had to be some way to word a request for help that would force Statia to leave. But it took a measure of concentration to try to think of such things. The tiniest slip of concentration slowed Ranthia down. The tiniest lapse endangered the woman that was only there because of Ranthia’s foolishness! If not for [Submind]—and the fact that it didn’t require any real input from Ranthia anymore—she wouldn’t be able to keep mirror images involved in the melee.
But one percent of her power was no threat to the troll. They weren’t threats he had to counter. Their cuts couldn’t get through his armor and the rare blow they struck on his exposed flesh were miniscule and healed as quickly as they were inflicted.
Statia still didn’t reply. The woman gamely fought on with her last short sword, with her single arm.
Desperate, Ranthia lunged for the back of the troll’s head. She had to get him to focus on her. Her absolute need forced her to make a reckless attack.
It worked.
The troll turned his attention to her and immediately attacked with his weapon. But she was in the midst of a reckless strike—Ranthia had no way to dodge. She barely had time to appreciate just how fast the troll could turn when he wasn’t holding back. The roaring Void tore into and through her stomach, erasing much of her body. Between the momentum his blow imparted on her and the troll’s own movement, there was no hope for her knife to reach his throat.
She was forced to activate [Reflections of Reality] instead of trying to throw her knife. Precious heartbeats later she was in another mirror image and replaced the one that her reckless move had cost her.
An explosion of flame erupted across the troll’s side.
Ranthia tried to lunge in and take advantage, but she ended up kicked away. Her ribs shattered and again she had to shift. The troll’s armor had charred, but the vines were already being renewed rapidly.
Statia held a second alchemical firebomb in her good hand, her short sword was stuck in the ground next to her. Her face was pale, too pale.
Ideas bloomed in Ranthia’s mind in those helpless moments while she waited for [Reflections of Reality]. Help me to escape—no, Ranthia was worried that Statia would sacrifice herself to get Ranthia a chance to escape.
Statia threw the other firebomb, aimed straight for the troll’s face. A blue-green sludge—the shimagu’s Ooze—surged up from the neck and absorbed the impact. The flames were engulfed by the Ooze and smothered.
Statia was distracted by the utter failure of her attack. The troll’s weapon was already flashing out.
Ranthia tried to lunge, but the ground under her feet turned to sand and collapsed inward. She stumbled.
She would never make it. Desperately she gambled everything on [Diffuse Reflectance], the class had to get her there in time. Her heart thundered in her chest as she ran, even as she desperately tried to shift. She knew there wasn’t enough time. There was no time to even pray to Xaoc to intercede.
She had to try.
An accelerated heartbeat passed. The weapon was already so close to Statia.
Ranthia’s mirror image appeared, just on the other side of the troll’s club.
The second heartbeat came.
And Statia was gone.
Before Ranthia’s third heartbeat—no matter how swift they were—came, the Void shockwave that roared out of the troll’s weapon had erased Statia’s head and most of her chest.
Grief, guilt, and rage assailed Ranthia in waves.
The troll’s levels ticked up.
[Warrior – Light] level 877. [Warrior – Forest] level 810. [Warrior – Void] level 595.
Far too damned late, Ranthia was finally in her new image.
All she could do was howl in fury as she hacked at the troll. Her blades cleaved through his wood and stone armor. But no matter how she tore into the armor—into him—both flesh and protection rebuilt themselves just as quickly.
Again, the troll landed a blow on her, Void tore deep into her left shoulder. Ranthia once more shifted before the lethal damage shut her mind down. It was all that she could do to dodge for the precious moments it took.
While they were separated, Ranthia took a deep breath to try to stabilize herself. She tried to push her emotions to the side, but she couldn’t. She would avenge Statia, she would atone for her role in the woman’s death. It was hard to force herself to stay out of hysteria though.
“I will kill you for this!” She promised.
This was it. There was no way in Xaoc’s eternal name that she and the troll were both walking away from the fight. One of them would die that night.
The troll replied in a series of grunts and snarls; somehow, she doubted that the accursed monster knew the tongue of Creation.
A cold smile spread over Ranthia’s face; she knew a language they had in common.
“
The shimagu language burned her throat as she forced her body to utter a language it wasn’t designed for. She had no idea what Xaoc’s name was in shimagu—if their blasphemous tongue even dared to adapt His holy name—so she used Creation for that word.
The troll’s eyes widened with obvious amusement. He understood that well enough.
Their battle was joined anew.
Adamantium knife met carved bone. Her nearly invisible Void sheared through his impossibly black Void.
Ranthia poured everything into her dance. She embraced every shred of chaos that she had been blessed with. She shifted between bodies on whim, rather than by necessity. Her heart and mind blazed as she burned her hatred in exchange for strength of will. [Submind] was focused on evasion and distraction, her images’ attacks were pointless and the troll always knew exactly which body was the true her—even without large sections of her armor being gone. That was fine.
She was slower than the troll. The twin likely still had several times her strength.
But her classes and her insight into him closed the gap just enough.
For the first time throughout all of their clashes over the years, the troll made the last tricks—and the elements—of its shimagu partner known. A dense sandstorm formed around them. Her tattered blindfold protected her eyes and [Vision of the Void] ensured the sand couldn’t obscure her vision. The sand tore at her flesh, but the abrasive pain meant little. She would have to retreat from the sandstorm to get a breath, but it was almost trivial to work that into her chaotic dance of death. She was used to similar issues with her shifting.
More problematic was that the parasite could form holes in the ground beneath her feet. [Combat Awareness] couldn’t detect the holes until they started to appear. Her only defense was her chaotic dance. She had to keep the shimagu incapable of predicting where she would be early enough to disrupt her footing. As she sped up her dance, it seemed like the holes caused more problems for the troll’s footing than they did for her own.
She was still relieved when her opponents seemingly gave up on creating them. She had no doubts that the trick would return if she got careless, but she couldn’t find a tell for the parasite’s Skills in the troll’s body language. She could predict the troll just enough to offset his stats a little, but the shimagu was a dangerous wildcard.
There were no shimagu forces in the vicinity to interrupt them. It was a duel in a purer sense of the word than any they had ever fought. Especially since the troll had abandoned his hesitation to kill her and she was determined to see him scoured from the face of Pallos.
The troll had honed his combat style against her, but she had adapted just as much. They were natural enemies by that point. There was one important difference though.
Ranthia had learned how the troll moved. In contrast, the troll plainly had never managed to master her dance because she never followed the same steps. She was a being of chaos; he was a being of sheer overwhelming power. She could out-adapt him.
The tyranny of stats often decided who won with dramatic level differences between sapient creatures. He was faster, he was stronger. By wildly different methods they both ‘healed’ swiftly from harm that didn’t outright kill them, but his had no delays like her own shifting. His Void had better range. His weapon had better reach.
She still cut him far more often than he injured her.
His armor was useless, but he didn’t shed it. Had he tapped that last bit of speed that was restricted by his heavy protections, Ranthia might truly have been in trouble.
[One With Chaos] was an obstacle. With any given strike her stats shifted in unpredictable ways. The difference could sometimes foul her aim a touch and none of her combat Skills quite seemed to be able to overcome it. Worse, the additional bits and iotas of power continually failed to even matter in terms of how much damage she could deal.
[Higher Power], on the other hand, was a boon. As their battle continued through the night it became easier and easier to deflect the troll’s attacks. She had learned to move with the attacks to avoid breaking. But [Higher Power]’s rapidly increasing levels gradually took away the jarring that her momentum alone couldn’t bleed off. It became easier, one unheard [*ding!*] at a time.
Much like the battle against the kraken, Ranthia lost track of time and fatigue. Her focus was on inflicting every cut she could. On deflecting every attack he made. Bolstered by [Higher Power] and her ability to read the troll’s movements, Ranthia was able to focus her counterattacks and deflections on roughly the same spot on his weapon.
The sandstorm came and went as they fought. The troll was probably trying to pulse it randomly to keep her guessing, but it was such a nonissue that she barely cared whether it was there or not. She was more focused on staying alert for the return of holes in the ground and dancing too chaotically for the shimagu to try them.
His weapon was powerful and resistant to Void, but as they fought on with nothing held back, the bone took damage. Adamantium was just a class above whatever creature’s bones the troll wielded. The strip of hide that connected the two lengths of bone began to fray. Knicks and cuts turned into cracks as their duel continued unabated.
And then part of the bone weapon shattered when she struck the biggest crack with both knives. Every contact or potential contact she had with the troll or the weapon had been fully empowered by [Void Edge] and [Echoes of Devastation]. At times that meant she had to keep the Skills active almost nonstop. She had no idea if her knives could truly withstand the punishment indefinitely and her armor’s remaining arcanite was nearly drained from the massive rate she was tearing through mana, but her focus was on destroying his weapon.
And at last, almost the entire length of one end of the club went flying into the distance as bone shrapnel pelted both of them.
“Now!”
What?!
Ranthia and the troll were both caught off guard when a trio of her stealth-focused people threw off a pile of rock-covered cloaks, revealing themselves. And her base’s last true [Healer]. Honestly, she was more than a bit disappointed in herself for not noticing!
Immediately, a jet of Pyronox was unleashed. The black flames were met by a wave of Ooze from the troll, but the attack doused the troll ineffectually as it widened.
Not that the Pyronox was the true attack, it was only the vessel for the [Healer]’s [Imbue]. Anti-parasitical healing was pouring into the troll through the flames. Gods and goddesses, they’d talked about letting him try, but Ranthia had always refused—it was too dangerous to risk their last [Healer] against the troll.
Her people had defied her orders and waited for her to make an opportunity. She would have been proud of them if she wasn’t so terrified.
Because, quite plainly, it wasn’t working. The troll shielded its face with one arm, even as the [Healer] turned increasingly pale.
“It’s resisting!” The man managed to get out.
An instant later, the remainder of the troll’s weapon was thrown their way. The Void winked out the instant the weapon left the troll’s grasp, and the weapon was plainly off-balance with nearly half of its mass gone. But the troll was dangerously good at throwing.
Ranthia’s people were triple classed combat veterans though. One of them lunged at the weapon, even as another charged forward with a shield. The bone weapon—propelled by the troll’s raw, overwhelming strength—tore through the first woman’s hip. It struck the shield and likely broke the man’s arm, but he managed to hold out. The weapon dropped to the ground, leaving a horribly deformed shield and a bloodied man behind it.
“Get out of here!” Ranthia ordered, even as she drove her knives into the sides of the troll’s arm and tore as deeply through his flesh as she could.
Her people went, even as the [Healer] tried to treat the two that were injured.
The troll snarled and lashed out with a punch with his other arm. Void energy erupted from his fist, which might have killed her outright had she not happened to have triggered [Reflections of Reality] just before the troll began the attack. The first thing she saw from her new perspective was the blow erasing the mirror image she had been in.
The flesh knit back over the hand as the troll regenerated; he was just as vulnerable to Void energy as she was. Neither of them had [Void Resistance].
Dawn would arrive soon. He was disarmed. For the first time ever, Ranthia almost believed that the fight was hers to lose. If she could just pressure him a bit longer and didn’t get careless—
The troll snarled and… It was all too obvious when someone pulled mana from their arcanite. Everyone experienced things just a bit differently when they drew from arcanite; the sensation varied between each person. But the deep inhale was unmistakable, it always looked the same.
The troll had never carried arcanite before! The three sacks that dangled from the vines of his armor like oversized pouches had to be the source.
Ranthia once again roared as she closed in. This time her knives sought the pouches.
The first contained sand. The troll had tried to dodge, but [Echoes of Devastation] let the tiny touch of her blade tear a hole large enough for the sand to trickle out. It was likely how the troll supplied its sandstorms. Irrelevant.
Ranthia’s blades tore through the troll’s armor again and again as she drew more and more of her opponent’s vile blood. There had to be some upper limit to his regeneration. The System didn’t do anything for free. There had to be a cost.
The troll tried another punch. Ranthia evaded the roar of his Void and sliced the next pouch near where it was joined to his armor. The pouch spilled dark shapes all over the ground. Sausages?
The troll stepped on them and there was the unmistakable crunch of breaking bones and the smell of smoked meat. They were smoked fingers from ogres and humans. The troll seriously brought some vile snack to fight and kill Statia!?
Ranthia drained the last wisps of mana from her armor as she pressed the troll. Until, at last, the troll misjudged where she would shift completely. Ranthia didn’t slice open the third pouch though.
She stole it, even as the troll once again activated his sandstorm.
A fresh image was sent further out and Ranthia blindly stuffed the sack inside of her damaged backpack before she triggered [Reflections of Reality]. Once she was clear of the sandstorm, she took a deep breath and pulled the sack back out of her backpack.
It was full of decently sized arcanite stones. She wasn’t attuned, but they were still glowing. The troll hadn’t drained them dry yet. Ranthia drove her hand into the sack to get contact and pulled against the arcanite to refill some of her own mana pool.
But she hadn’t expected that the troll sacrificed his arcanite on purpose.
The sandstorm was a distraction too. [Vision of the Void] let her see the troll leaving it on the far side from her and was running for one of the mesas. He’d only delayed to grab the remains of his broken weapon and had it in hand once again.
Ranthia swore and tossed aside the sack of arcanite as she sent an image as close to her opponent as she could reach. [Reflections of Reality] let him get some distance before she could shift, but she was after him in short order.
The troll tried to fend her off with his damaged weapon as he ran. His desperation hammered home a fact that she’d overlooked—the sky was starting to brighten and color. Dawn was near and with it, the sun would rise. The sun could kill the troll that her blades still couldn’t bring down.
As they neared the mesa. Ranthia saw rock falling and crumbling away as the troll’s partner formed a cave—a place to hide from the sun.
Fuck that! Ranthia refused to let him escape—she couldn’t. She roared with renewed determination as she attacked the troll with everything that she had. She had come too far to let him live!
The sky grew brighter. She tore at his armor and flesh, even as he tried to stave her off with what was left of his weapon.
Step by rock-shattering step, they drew closer and closer to the mesa. To the troll’s salvation.
He was just a few moments away from the point where the mesa would block the direct sunlight when the sun finally crested the horizon. After that, he was practically guaranteed to reach the cave safely.
Xaoc, please—I can’t let him escape! Desperation brought her to sacrilege as she, once again, made the sort of selfish prayer she had sworn to never demand. Ranthia lunged and made a final strike, on the edge of despair.
Her mana dropped.
And sound unlike any Ranthia had ever heard filled her ears.
Her arms shattered and her muscles ripped themselves to bloodied shreds. Her adamantium knives flew from pulped fingers.
But her final slashes had unleashed a cleave of Void unlike anything she had ever seen before.
For a single instant, her stats showed numbers larger than she could make sense of before they were gone.
And the troll’s legs vanished mid-thigh, aside from portions of his feet left behind. His body crashed to the ground, too heavy to bounce.
Ranthia and the troll both reacted. She triggered [Reflections of Reality] as she sent out a fresh image. The troll tried to drag himself forward with his hands, even as his powerful regeneration tried to restore his legs—but there was nothing left. It was taking him precious moments!
Ranthia leapt for the troll’s back, even as the sun finally peeked over the horizon.
Ooze flowed across the armor of stone and wood, as more rocks were conjured. The parasite desperately tried to shield its partner from White Dove’s hateful curse.
Ranthia was pretty certain that if she did nothing, the troll was still doomed. The parasite presumably could only slow the inevitable.
Ranthia wasn’t that nice.
Her knives tore through the sludge and the stones, exposing the troll’s own armor. Her sweep ended only when she buried her knives both in the back of the troll’s neck and tore through him with savage fury—and an even more primal roar of hatred.
[*ding!* You have slain a troll [The Endurance of Pallos] (Light, level 877), [The Armor of Life] (Forest, level 810), [The Might of Gloom] (Void, level 596)//a shimagu [I Will Make You Invincible] (Ooze, level 877), [Unyielding Aegis, Eternal Sanctuary] (Mountain, level 880), [Raging Deserts] (Sand, level 480)!]
Relief. The word and the sensation sang through Ranthia’s very being, even as she fell to her knees and knelt atop the headless statue’s back.
“Xaoc, please see these two consigned to the bleakest fate you can manage. Thank you for your guidance, and I will never, ever forget the gift that you gave me tonight. At the risk of asking too much of your favor, please do what you can to ensure that Statia finds peace and happiness in her next life. She was a good person, she deserved better.”
Better than half of her remaining mana was taken with the prayer, but she gave it freely. What she had left would be enough to see the battle done.
Ranthia stood and took in the state of the conflict around her. Her people had already finished off the dinosaurs and had joined the other friendly forces, the shimagu were trapped between her people and a grand army. Their fates were sealed.
Ranthia joined in their slaughter like a force of nature.
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Nozomi Matsuoka.
Sarah "Neila" Elkins.