Chapter 1764: How To Maim Trash Tier Divines (1)
Moments earlier...
"This seems... unnecessary. If you have to use those three as an exercise, why don’t you and the other Stars handle this?" said Uyuniya, frowning, when Kintar unceremoniously summoned all the Stark Troops to Amanas’ summit.
"Please..." said Kintar, shaking her head. "Compared to the masked man, these guys might as well be Master Stage experts to us. Besides..." She pulled a confused Gerriey over as she (Gerriey) was just about to ask what was going on.
"...You guys are ready to level up, right? Master even gave you all this sweet gear. This is the perfect time to use it and prove that you’re not useless after all." Kintar cleared her throat and threw her chubby hand outward. "I command it, as your acting-Commander, for all you chumps to dash outside the nooks of your asses and kill those dickheads. Whoever dies more than once will answer to me."
The Stark Troops groaned as a collective.
"Kill me..." murmured Timmit the stork.
"I’ll do you if you do me," whispered Ruge.
The rest of the Troops murmured similar phrases, with some wishing Kintar would just go to a place hotter than hell.
"Come on now," said Kintar, grinning and clapping her hands. "Oop. Look, they’re coming. They think they can take master’s vessel because the bunch of you look pissy weak. Are you going to take that lying down?"
Groaning at the slightly motivational speech, the Troops turned and leaped to meet the enemy. Gerriey led them.
Upon receiving the Treasures from Warmoth’s Treasury, the Troops hadn’t idled by, admiring the way they looked. They’d analyzed them, their effects, and figured out ways to use them in coordinated formations for maximum effectiveness. What Skullius had taught them would not soon leave their heads, after all. In a fight against a Divine, your best bet as an average combatant... was probably a Treasure.
The great void stole a bit of the Troops’ confidence, however. The barrier around Amanas not only shielded the vessel from harm but also created a habitable environment free from the great void’s suffocating characteristics. Leaving it instantly made the Troops bear the coarse, sand-like sensation, not being able to see properly, which threw most of them off.
...And then Kiek’s Amras slammed into them. Half were knocked unconscious, and many were killed.
Ruge, Timmit, and Gerriey were among the exceptions to either effect.
As Kiek, overjoyed at the effect her Amras had on the wave of opponents, approached with her sword, the three Troops sharpened their focus. It just so happened that everything up until that very moment worked in the Stark Troops’ favor. It was great that they looked doomed from the jump.
...Because that didn’t last long.
Those who had died were revived by Granted Restoration and either shielded or awakened those who’d been knocked unconscious, much to Kiek’s surprise. She was just about to catch her first victim with a physical blow when Ruge acted.
The Stark Troop’s Treasure was a Realm rank Prime black gauntlet. With enormous effort, he pointed it at one of the Stark Troops and then at Kiek.
At once, the target Stark Troop warped right in Kiek’s face, carrying great momentum, her Treasure, a shield, ready for a parry. The maneuver caught Kiek by surprise. The best she could do was continue her strike with full force.
...Which didn’t end well for her.
Her opponent’s Treasure happened to be a Realm rank Wicked Treasure, poised to unleash its Absolute Wicked Property.
Clang!
In a contest of opposing Treasures (Wicked and Prime), their rank became irrelevant if their Absolute Property struck the other first. The shield’s Absolute Wicked Property specialized in shattering oncoming attacks and flinging them back against their user.
Thus, Kiek’s Treasure shattered on contact with the shield. Its shards flew back at her with striking speed. Had she not been reinforcing herself with Amras, she might have suffered greater damage, but even still, her stone frame was pelted by the steel.
When she recovered, things had only gotten worse.
’What’s with these mortals?!’
Three more Troops were upon her, having been warped by Ruge’s gauntlet. He didn’t send more only because Mongul’s attack right then proved to be even more debilitating than Kiek’s earlier blast of Amras.
It was a Second Grand tier Andori. Mongul’s three maws were opened eerily wide, and his roar sent visible, blurred rings out and around most of the Troops, caging them while blasting them with crippling bursts of noise.
It was effective, killing the Troops’ strategy. Mongul himself then fell upon the targets, ready to bite their heads off.
...But Ruge wasn’t the only lynchpin of the Troops’ attack.
The collection of experts had sorted their Treasures into three categories: mobility, defense, and offense. They had decided that should they come to arms with an enemy, they would prioritize protecting those with defensive Treasures, while those with ones that afforded mobility would be spread out so that they wouldn’t be taken out all at once.
...That was why Timmit was a wild distance away from Ruge. The stork, wearing some variant of a shoulder plate, a Treasure, over his customized Granted Armament, was carrying two other Troops, one of whom had a choker around his neck – a Realm rank Prime Treasure that warded away negative statuses from a sizable range around them.
Timmit activated his own Treasure and spread his wings, flaunting their span. In a breath, he became akin to a spinning wheel that whipped through the great void, evading the Troops, racing past Kiek, and towards Mongul.
With three pairs of independent eyes, the Divine saw the attack coming. Reinforcing his arms with Amras, he locked his fingers and used his fists to slam against the spinning Timmit, effectively parrying his spinning charge.
...But then four of his eyes were suddenly destroyed.
"RAAAAAAARGH!" The agony killed his focus. His scream squashed the activation of his Andori.
Mongul, with his remaining two eyes, searched for the cause, only to find four ethereal short spears, barely material in nature, stabbing into his two other heads from the eye sockets.
The culprit turned out to be a dizzy Stark Troop riding Timmit’s back. He was pointing what looked like a paintbrush designed like a spear at Mongul – another Treasure.
"MONGUL!" Kiek cried as she swatted four Stark Troops away. She’d managed to resist the effects of two other Treasures aimed at her and kill their users, but more just took their place. The seemingly harmless, small army of mortals now seemed dangerous in her eyes. "We’re taking that vessel no matter what! Don’t let them look down on us!"
She fueled an Andori. It would have paired really well with her Treasure, Dwain Bust, which, instead of cutting, released violent, blunt shockwaves, but she had no choice but to use it as it was. Her resolve was firm.
A simple Andori, really. Kiek’s Amras swelled in potency. She condensed and expelled it in a wave. With that enhancement, it would kill every single one of the insignificant gnats around her.
...But Ruge had acted first.
Before she knew it, Kiek was pushed right into Mongul by something she couldn’t see and ended up blasting him with her Amras, along with several Troops closeby.
The two were dazed for only a second, but they would come to regret it.
It was impossible for Master Stage experts (or the equivalent) to adopt the powers granted to them by domestic power systems in the great void. This was especially so if they were far from their home world, hence why the Stark Troops had to rely on Treasures.
But the Troops also had one other thing to count on.
"TRIPLEFOLD AGGRANTE!"
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