Chapter Two Hundred And Ninety Six - 296
Harn came at the Arcid like a storm unleashed. The metal warrior must have truly taken him by surprise originally, because the flare of Harn's Raze Skill beat back the Arcid's strange Mana with every sweeping blow. Vess, Alister, and Atar joined in again, and this time it was forced on the backfoot, unable to bring its dangerous oversized fists into play.
That did not mean that it was beaten, however.
"To me! To me!" it cried, and its thickened voice boomed out into the night air. Howls and roars answered, and from the lip of the hole came even more of its horde. Hoarhounds leaped with agile grace and Wurms swam through the earth to bear their four-way jaws and twisted teeth. Reforged conjured axes and clubs of ice that snapped in the warm air, while ice followed their footsteps like a trail of blood.
"Fall back!" Vess shouted. "Harn! Fall back!"
This too was part of her plan. Felix had built most of the tunnels they fought within, though he'd leaned on already existing sewers for the most part. His gifts were astounding, but he was still only a Journeyman. The plan was to grab Harn and escape down a side tunnel Felix had fashioned, leading out of the area. Yet as her people headed toward it, the Wurms tunneled across its surfaces and collapsed it.
"We're cut off!" Davum roared. His tusks glinted in the reflected moonlight, same as his massive axe. "Lady Dayne! Where do we go?"
Harn pushed the Arcid, not far away, giving them time to run. But to where? The tunnels were either choked with monsters or stone and debris. Vess wracked her brain, looking for an angle she hadn't yet considered. She Willed her Spears outward, stabbing one after another into the closest Wurms, and detonated them. Gaping wounds exploded into the sides of the beasts, and most dove back into the earth to escape.
Atar sucked in a ragged breath. The man was shaky on his feet after wielding so much Mana, but Imbued Sparkbolts still flew from the tip of his enchanted staff. Alister was beside him, his own enchanted rapier providing kinetic counterpoint to Atar's blazing heat. Enemies fell before them, while Kylar and Davum swung their weapons in desperate attempts to stave off disaster. Nevia hung limply in Kikri's arms, the Elven woman only able to brandish her side sword while supporting the Mana drained mage. Wyvora and Evie bounced about the battle, along with A'zek, each of them taking down dozens of monsters that came to sup on their flesh.
More came, just the same.
"Atar!" Vess yelled. A thought spun at the back of her mind, a hope. "Atar! Do you have enough strength for array work?"
The mage sucked in a shuddering breath. "Yes. I've enough left in me, though my core's dwindling."
"We will make it quick, then," she said. Her partisan spun in her grip, dispersing the spectral fire of a Simian and tearing through the chitin of a Lesser Wretch that jumped too close. She explained what she needed from the mage, and he nodded before getting to work. "Alister! Focus fire on the Arcid!"
"As you wish, your Grace!" The force mage smirked at her before conjuring four pillars of blue light, all of which converged on the fluid shape of the Arcid. "Pillars of the Domineering Sentinel!"
Despite it's preternatural grace and uncanny mobility, the force of Alister's power hit it like a dropping building. Its arm and leg twisted, turned out of true for only a secondbut it was enough.
"RAZE!"
Harn's axe, wreathed in silver flame, cut into the Arcid's joint and severed the creature' left arm entirely. It screamed, more anger than pain, and Vess felt the force of it like a physical blow. Everyone did, and the Apprentice Tiers staggered to their sides.
Spear of Tribulation!
Vess conjured Spear after Spear, guiding them around the battlefield with all the Will she could muster. She intercepted several killing blows aimed at the stunned Haarguard, and she had just enough control that Vess was able to block or parry the majority of them. Only one got through, an attack by a Reforged, but it was stopped by Wyvora. The Farhunter stabbed her own spear up into the ice warrior's wrist, severing its grip and fouling its deadly strike.
Across the way, Vess and the Farhunter met eyes. Wyvora nodded. Begrudgingly, Vess nodded back.
Damage on the Arcid was accumulating, but not fast enough. Even now, without its arm it fought like a demon, fending off Harn with its remaining arm and legs. It was all taking too long. The Arcid said its Master was on his way to them. We have to end this and find Felix. Now.
"Atar!"
"Not yet!" he gasped. Lines of light flickered at his feet as he scribed increasingly complex forms on the ground. Vess was not sure if the fire mage would complete his work in time. There was little choice.
"Farhunter! Harnoq! Defend our people!" Vess ordered, before she leaped straight into the air.
Pierce the Sky!
Dragon's Descent!
She dropped back down, slamming into the earth just behind the Arcid. It pivoted smoothly and intercepted her sudden thrust.
"Come to die, spearwoman?" it burbled at her.
Vess did not respond, only grimaced as she went to work.
Unbound. The Archon is Unbound.
Felix worked his mouth soundlessly for several seconds. It was...he couldn't quite process the enormity of what he'd just heard. "Whahow?"
"Same as you...summoned in great need, to fight the War." Vvim's voice was threadier by the second. He held the wobbling Memory light in his small, wrinkled hand. "Take it, Felix. Before this one fades altogether."
Felix clenched his jaw, cutting off the wild thoughts that rampaged through him. He brought a hand down to the light, and it soaked into his channels like water from a frigid lake. It almost hurt, it was so cold, and it traced a direct path down into his core. Like a rock, sinking to the bottom.
Leave it alone, he commanded. The abyss rumbled, but the Memory sat fixed among the stars of Karys' own recollection, though shining far brighter. Felix hadn't the mental bandwidth to worry about what that meant for the abyss, and he quickly pulled his awareness back up into his body.
The Tower shook, far more violently than ever before. Hard enough that pieces of the walls cracked and fell, shattering against the grime-covered floor tiles. Felix swallowed and breathed, steadying his pulse with an effort of Will and the control afforded by his Tempered Body.
"I have it, Vvim."
"Good. It will...tell you more. It will...reveal...all that this one knows." Vvim shuddered, and he suddenly felt lighter than ever before. It was as if Felix held a piece of cloud, and only the solidity of the Geist's robes convinced him otherwise. "The Tower...will fall. That Arcid is close to breaching our...last line of defenses."
Felix was conflicted. He wanted to save the old creature, but he had no idea what to do, and...Vvim seemed so tired. Worn thin, almost. The Geist's Spirit thrummed, held open for Felix's perusal, and he could hear that there was only weary acceptance left.
"What can I do?" Felix asked.
"Bring this one...to the balcony?" Vvim asked.
Felix did so, side stepping the Ogre statues that had already begun crumbling. The far end of the room had a cleverly hidden door latch, one Felix had seen opened in his Memory previously. It was easy enough to unlatch, even holding the ancient Geist. They stepped out onto a narrow balcony, and Felix beheld a night of fire and blood.
Below the horde raged against the base of the Tower, and beyond there was a massive hole torn in the earth. Vess' plan was working, as far as he could tell.
"Ahh yes...the stars call to us, Felix." Vvim's breathing had suddenly gotten clearer, so much so that Felix couldn't help a sudden surge of hope. "The Geist have a great...many stories about the stars. Each one is an ancestor, a long lost family member that would watch over us. A superstition this one cannot help but love. Yet the stars are nothing more than flames in the dark, cast into the Void by the act of Creation. It is from there you were summoned, Felix Nevarre."
"Earth is beyond the stars?" Felix asked. "That figures. I always assumed this was somewhere far, far away in space."
"Mm. The Void is many things, often simultaneously. It appears empty, as you know, but it teems with life. No place in Creation is without it, not truly." Vvim great stronger with each passing word, until their voice didn't ripple with the cloying thickness of pain. "Yet it is an end, of sorts. A last stop before the Ethereal takes us."
"Desolation," Felix said, remembering. The white fullness of the hole to Desolation, the grinding chaos of everything all at once.
"Some call it such, yes. It is but the Confluence, where all our Spirits rest before being turned back out into Creation." Vvim looked at Felix, eyes bright and curiously free of pain. Their Spirit was placid. "You do not believe."
"No," Felix admitted. "No I don't."
"You will, child. If you are what this one knows you to be, you shall learn a great many things before the next Song is sung."
Felix looked up into the stars, momentarily lost in the beauty of them. Despite everything. "Why not tell me now, Vvim?"
"It would only delay the inevitable," Vvim said. "We shall meet again, this one thinks. The Song is never over, not really. It is merely the...tempo that changes."
"What do you mean?" Felix asked. He looked down, and his gut climbed up into his throat.
His arms were filled with a fading smoke, wrapped with tattered cloth. Then even the robes turned to dust in his grip.
Vvim was gone.
The Tower shook, more violently than ever. So hard, Felix felt the entire thing shift to the side. Swallowing, he looked back through the doorway to see the Ogre statues falling to pieces. Whatever magic Vvim's presence worked on the Tower, it was gone now. That meant the Tower would fall soon.
Unfettered Volition!
Felix flipped backward, narrowing avoiding the sharpened edge of shaped air as it sliced through the balcony floor below. His Perception had tagged the approaching Skill, and the creature that hurled it.
"Arcid," Felix hissed. Within him, both Pit and Karys shouted their annoyance.
Hovering in thin air, the gangling Arcid looked almost regal wrapped in thick flows of green-white air Mana. Stunted objects clung to its back, like a suggestion of vestigial wings, and a narrow, pointed helmet reminded Felix strongly of a heron or egret.
"You are the one our Master warned us about," it said. Its voice was melodious and feminine, though its form was androgynous. "The Nym. He told us you were dangerous." It tilted its head at them. "You do not seem dangerous, though I cannot Analyze you."
Felix didn't answer. It felt like he was looking at himself from a distance.
"The great Master will reward me if I bring you in," it continued. Hands equipped with metal claws lifted toward Felix. "Do not move if you value your pitiful life."
"Pit?" Felix said.
"What?" asked the Arcid.
"Your turn," Felix added.
Before the Arcid could grasp his intent, a flash of light and dark feathers made the realization all too clear. Pit's flurry of Frost Spears drove the point home.
Flaring his Adamant Discord, Felix followed them both into the skies.
Beaten and bloody, Vess sucked breath through a broken nose. Everything smelled and tasted of copper and salt, as if the world had been coated in blood. She lingered back, while Harn, Alister, and Atar traded blows with the Arcid.
It fought them like the machine it had become. Though it could be hurtits severed arm had proven that pointit could beat them in other ways. Its Stamina was bottomless, which while slow, meant it could outlast all of them given enough time. All of them were running ragged.
Atar had his shoulder torn, and Alister had to drop his rapier when the Arcid smashed his dominant hand. The both of them used their limited Mana pools to harry and confine the Arcid, but they no longer had the leverage to truly hurt it. Harn was hurt too, but his armor took the brunt of the creature's rage. Only, his axes couldn't find purchase on the thing anymore. It was too mobile, too relentless for even Onslaught to finish off.
Yet they kept trying.
The Haarguard, Harnoq, and Farhunter fought off the horde. Less remained of them than ever, but still a few fell down from above every few minutes, called by the Arcid's thick, bubbling voice. Truly, Vess was impressed with their tactics and comittment. They hadn't been overwhelmed, had, in fact, fought back waves of beasts that would have taken down lesser combatants. The had proven themselves brave and reliable, even the Henaari, she could admit.
But it wasn't enough.
Vess skidded backward, her partisan warded off by the whirling spikes of the Arcid's form. Her hands buzzed, almost numb from the vibrations of her many assaults. She needed more power to pierce its defenses, to end it. They had so little time before the Archon would arrivethey could not afford to assume it was a bluff.
Desperate, Vess cast her mind up, ascending to her mountain temple in the heart of her core space. She fairly flew up the ten thousand steps, each one carved with painstaking details taught to her by her family's traditions. It was a taxing effort, as each step felt like the space around her was compressing, folding down upon her shoulders like the mountain itself was falling. Still, she took the steps as fast as she could, until at last she stood at the top, before her Temple of the Winds.
Dragoons do not jump. They do not fall. They ride the winds.
Outside of herself, a spiked fist dropped with cataclysmic finality, but Vess flowed out of the way. The Arcid punched the ground, sending up a spray of dirt and stone chips. Vess' spear flashed forward, thrusting in a lightning flurry. Each hit struck sparks from its metallic hide, but the Arcid grunted in pain and hunched to defend itself.
Within, Vess felt a stillness to her Temple. A curious weight fell over everything as her limbs described strike after strike against her enemy, as if her Skills were dragging against a current. She couldn't penetrate its defenses, not matter her speed or Strength, and the Arcid bashed the tip of her partisan away with an angry swing.
"You do not even harm me, Human!" It smashed another two silver Spears she conjured, not even caring that they detonated against it. "You are nothing!"
It flowed forward, around her partisan and shoved its spiked fist into her arm and shoulder. The metal spikes punched through her armor as if it were nothing, and tore deep into her body.
Vess screamed and dropped her spear. The Arcid laughed and reached for her with its other arms, fast as lightning, shredding the armor there too. Vess' eyes were wide, wild with pain and feverish. The Arcid seemed to breath it in, to enjoy it.
"It will be over soon, Human," it burbled. "Just surrender."
Vess grappled it. Her bloody hands latched onto the sides of the Arcid's spikes, and she twisted. The constructed abomination sucked in a breath of surprise, but began to slip away regardless, her Strength not enough to halt its movements. It twisted, sliding, placing it's clamp-like hands on her and wrenching her limbs. She screamed.
Without warning, chains wrapped around it, clattering against its metal hide like a warhammer hitting a bell. The both of them, Arcid and Vess, were staggered as the bladed chains dug in and burst alight with purple-white Mana vapor.
"You!" it hissed.
"Me!" Evie shrieked back at it before leveraging her freezing steel core. Power poured through her channels, all but visible to Vess' Elemental Eye, and ice snapped across the Arcid's neck chest and shoulders.
Vess pushed it's arms back, just a bit. Her Strength surged with desperation.
"Let her go!" The chains increased in weight, enough to drop the Arcid to his knees. It still had Vess though, unable to overcome the heiress but still within its grip. "Let her go or I crush you to scrap!"
"Your magic is weak!" The ice itself begins to shift, sliding as if it were melting atop the creature. Evie's eyes widened, and Vess couldn't get a breath inthe thing's grip only tightened on her diaphragm as it lifted her entirely. "You could have had the peace of submission! You could have been part of the Great Work!" It stood, fighting against Evie's chains, dragging Vess forward. The ice quickened along its frame, but it was nearly free. "No longer. The great Master will toy with your corpses before He's through! And I! I will laugh!"
Vess screamed, putting everything she had into a single, final kick. The Arcid's three eye fires went wide with pain and surprise as its knee folded. It stumbled, as if in slow motion, staring at Vess in a fury. It was unable to see its fate, however.
"Here's your peace, chuckles."
Two axes, wreathed in flame, severed it's blighted head.
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