Unbound

Chapter Two Hundred and Thirty Four - 234

Chapter Two Hundred and Thirty Four - 234

Vess steadied Atar and Alister both with a hand, as the streets tilted and sank. The stone beneath her feet drained away, and when Vess turned she saw why. A collection of hexagonal pillars shot upward after the Arcid's own wild growth, and Vess could see Felix atop it.

Fight for us, Felix. Vess turned her attention forward again, giving her friends a boost as they all ran back to the horde of monsters. We will take care of things here.

"Atar! Kill spread the fire ahead! Alister, can you give us a lift?" Vess shouted.

Flames surged by way of confirmation, and on their next step three pillars of translucent blue Mana sent them flying upward. They were launched over the field of flames stymieing so many monsters, the wind rushing in their ears as a roar edged with a faint chiming. Atar screamed and Alister laughed.

Spear of Tribulations!

Conjured once again, six of them uplifted her two friends, slowing their fall. Vess, however, came down like the Hand of the Twin's Immutable Justice.

Dragon's Descent!

Vess hit among a grouping of Ghostfire Simians, crushing two beneath her boots while the impact damaged dozens more in a twenty foot wide crater. The Tempered Skill boosted her Endurance and Strength enough that landing was never an issue, not for her at least.

Dragoon's Footwork!

Vess lashed out, her spear a scalpel. Each thrust was a kill, each turn was just enough motion to evade their counterattacks and set up one of her own. In seconds, her landing area was clear.

Atar and Alister landed shortly after, their Skills unleashing a torrent of fire and force. Attuned to fire the Simians might be, but Atar's own was a magnitude more destructive. It seemed to eat away at anything it touched, while Alister's attack were punishing blows that their hide did not do much to mitigate.

"Cut a path to the shield wall!" Vess ordered above the din of battle. "Atar use your flames to cut the monsters off if we can. They need time to flee!"

"On it," Atar panted, finishing off another Mana Potion. He only had a few left, but Vess didn't tell him to slow down. There was a glint in the man's eye; his failure with the Arcid stung. "Flank and burn. They won't live through the night."

"I'll lead the way," Alister said. He brandished his new rapier, fully enchanted by Hector and the Coldfires. "Just don't kill yourself."

Atar and Alister embraced for a quick moment while Vess tried to ignore the pangs in her own Spirit. Felix and Evie were both risking their lives up there, beyond the Inquisition's defenses. She hardened her heart, and let her Dragoon's Footsteps flow through her Body and Mind. Monsters ran at them, spectral flames coating the monkeys and the Wretches in equal measure. A path between them appeared to her.

Silver spears floated around her, and Vess advanced.

"Our people won't last long before they run!" Vess said between steps, ducking beneath a stream of white flame. She pivoted and spun to the side as a Lesser Wretch buzzed forward. Two of her spears detonate against its carapace and sent it reeling backward, the storm of air Mana enough to rip it in two. "Stay close!"

They pushed their way through, each step a contest of stats and Skills, pitting their greater abilities against sheer numbers. The beasts seemed to be moving in uncanny concert with one another, something that was slowly overcoming their allies. An endless tide of unthinking beasts was one thing, but if they had the simplest of tactics at hand it would prove deadly. And it was.

Through the press of bodies, Vess saw members of their camp fall to claw and scythe, fire and paralytic bite. She pushed all the harder, throwing herself into harms way and screaming out Taunts to draw the enemy away from their lines. The horde came at her, their eyes entirely too intelligent for her liking. Her spears gathered, and the three of them thrust through the monsters before letting their Skills explode outward.

"Field of Flames!"

"Pillars of the Domineering Sentinel!"

"Seven Tribulations!"

Fire, force, and air Mana consumed their center in a whirlwind of power and death. But still, the monsters charged. Surrounded, the faint chime Vess had heard increased as they penetrated the horde, until it was all but subsuming her senses. It felt like sickness and rot, a line that tugged at her core despite her resistance. Vess flared here Elemental Eye and her Affinity, pushing both to their limits between strikes.

Elemental Eye is level 52!

A sickening glyph blazed in her vision, branded onto the abdomen of every enemy. Vess gasped in recognition. "They're Marked!"

"What? Which ones?" Alister panted. His rapier was a blur of parries and thrusts.

"All of them!" Vess responded in disbelief. From what she understood, a Mark created a Spiritual link between the beast and the Skill user. It allowed direct control, as well as a host of unknown applications. But what sort of abomination could handle all of them?

"We have to cut it off, somehow!" Atar added. Imbued Sparkbolts whirled around him like a cyclone of flames, scorching any that came too close.

"Abdomen and chest! Aim for them with a Spirit-based Skill and you'll sever the connection!" Vess advised as she pressed deeper. At least I hope so. There was little literature in breaking a Mark from a beast, so rare was the ability to inflict them. They couldn't afford the horde to think.

Dragoon's Footwork!

Spear of Tribulations!

They would just have to kill them all.

Unfettered Volition!

Abyssal Skein!

Felix vanished into the blackened smoke and bright Mana vapor, the Void crawling over his flesh like a living thing. Just in time, as a spear of hardened vine thrust out of the miasma, missing him by inches.

Cloudstep!

Cloudstep!

Cloudstep!

Felix spammed Cloudstep, creating tiny, crackling footholds in mid-air. Each step revealed his presence but allowed him to reorient his trajectory around the forest of vines that thrust upward at him. Felix spun, extending his clawed hand out and digging deep into the side of a vinestill cloaked, he fell while attached, spiralling all the way down through the thickening smog.

Cloudstep is level 29!

...

Cloudstep is level 33!

He emerged into chaos, as hundreds of redcloaks fired their light bolts at the Arcid that stood stall atop their bulwark. Felix kicked off the vine, clearing it just as Skeleton realized where he was; thorns bigger than him erupted from the vine he'd just vacated.

"FIEND!" the Arcid howled. "You will die!"

He didn't reply, relying on his Abyssal Skein, and sure enough the Arcid's eye-fires did not track him as he fell. The moment he touched down on the battlements, however, Felix hit the metal hard enough to dent it and send a wave of sparks into the sky. Vines immediately raced for him, all but ignoring the redcloaks and their attacks.

Felix burned Unfettered Volition for all he was worth, dodging aside from the rising tangle of vegetation and still pushing himself forward. If fighting Mud had taught him anything, it was that he had to get close in these fights. The Arcids would not be taken down by his paltry magic.

Unfettered Volition is level 51!

...

Unfettered Volition is level 55!

Tooth and claw, his instincts urged. Instincts of the Primordial that he had become. Bring down your prey and sup on their lifesblood.

Felix embraced the beast within, pushing himself further and faster. Diving and twisting among the unfocused attack of the Arcid, he ran atop undulating vines and kicked across patches of thorns that crushed an entire squad of redcloaks. Abyssal Skein flared, harder and harder to maintain, but Felix pressed onward. He sped up the crest of a massive vine and threw himself higher than ever. He soared through the air, above a field of light and flame as the Inquisition brought all they had left to bear. Toward the screaming, enraged Skeleton Arcid that was covered in a shield of woven vines.

Mid-air, Felix pushed his Mana through his channels and out into his weapons. Golden-blue vapor clung to his bone and Blade, each crackling with liquid-seeming lightning. Abyssal Skein flickered and dropped, unable to hold out any longer.

Arrow of Perdition is level 32!

Arrow of Perdition is level 33!

Arrow of Perdition is level 34!

Wild Threnody is level 51!

Felix brought both weapons down as he dropped, slicing through the woven shield like it was paper. He met the Arcid's hand as she tried to slap him away, and Felix felt the thrill of her fear.

*KRAKOOOM!*

Like a bomb went off, the interior of the vine dome exploded outward in a tsunami of golden-azure flames. The Arcid was thrown backward, nearly off the wall itself. Felix, however, hit the ground hard enough to send up a series of volatile eruptions from the bulwark. The material bulged and flexed under the force of his landing, and he slowly rose to his feet, bone and Blade held aloft.

"We end this now, Arcid!" Felix shouted. He cast his Perception back, into the Sunrise Quarter where his friends had chased DuFont. I don't have time for you anymore.

Make An Entrance is level 44!

Make An Entrance is level 45!

The notification surprised Felix, and he blinked as it appeared in a swirl of System-born harmony.

Due To Your Increasing Expertise, Make An Entrance has Evolved!

Make An Entrance (Uncommon) has become Manifestation of the Coronach (Epic)!

Level Has Been Maintained!

You are more than what you have done. You are all the things people whisper in the light...and in the dark. Harness the lamentations of your enemies and the exultation of your allies. Has a chance of inflicting an instance of Rallying Cry on allies or A Crisis of Faith on enemies. Chance increases with level, effect of Rallying Cry and A Crisis of Faith increase with Tier.

Felix grinned, then outright laughed. Apparently the System had a very loose definition of what "allies" meant, because suddenly the redcloaks facing the Arcid were inundated with a sourceless light. Felix felt their Spirit's swell with an influx of System energy, a rousing chorus to his ears.

Enemy of my enemy, huh?

The Arcid slowly regained its feet, and Felix could feel it's emotions surge wildly. Rage and pain and hate and fear chased each other in frenzied circles. Its parrying arm had been blasted into little more than scrap metal. There was no talking, no clever jibes or hateful threats. Skeleton screeched in primal fury and green-gold Mana erupted from every part of her artificial body. The beanstalk she'd ridden here spread, sprouting violently in all directions.

"DIURNAL REACH!"

A chorus unified voices screamed to the heavens as Felix's vision was inundated with golden hued Mana. Light bolts streamed overhead, enough to banish the night entirely, and though they were individually weak there were thousands of them.

Unfettered Volition!

Wild Threnody!

Felix's scaled body lit up with vibrant cyan light, the whorls upon his flesh igniting as he blurred forward. If nothing else, his new helmet protected him from the winds moving so fast created. It was a short distance, no more than forty feet, allowing him to go all out on his Agility. Time seemed to slow as he raced forward. Light streamed, liquid as the radiance along both of his weapons, Arrow of Perdition channeled once again. Sounds stretched strangely, the Arcid's howls turned into high pitched shrieks while the redcloaks became an army of basso lunged beasts.

Then he was there, meeting the downward blow of Skeleton with his two massive weapons. Before the sound had resembled a bomb going off, but Felix realized he had no idea what he was talking about. Their collision now dwarfed that by an order of magnitude, green-gold Mana meeting golden-blue until everything simply became light.

One moment Felix was swinging his Fang and Femur, and the next he was twenty feet away, half buried in the metal and stone of DuFont's conjured bulwark. His hands were empty, but his weapons were near enough to hand, if partially buried. Felix's Health blinked at him, down now to less than half, while his Stamina and Mana were likewise blunted. But that was nothing compared to what was around him.

The wall was devastated and dun, it's enchanted light gone out completely while a savaged hole the size of the mansions nearby was torn through it from the top down. There were no redcloaks to be seen, only the bent and broken form of the Arcid at the edge of the collapse. Felix stood, and though he ached he was whole.

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

Two oversized orbs of acid shot outward at the Arcid, and both hit a hidden nest of vines. Felix grimaced beneath his helm.

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin!

Wrack and Ruin is level 44!

Wrack and Ruin is level 45!

Felix spent his Mana as fast as it regenerated, sending a veritable tide of acid at the prone construct. Tendril after tendril of greenery intercepted his attacks, until the last one. The ball of acid hit the Arcid straight in its chest, and Skeleton screamed.

"Finally," Felix panted. He sped toward her, weapons upraised, dodging the wholly expected sneak attack of vines. His Blade cut through them with contemptuous ease, and then Felix was there, kicking the Arcid in the chest. Skeleton fell backward even further, spitting up a dark ichor. She fixed him with a baleful eye.

"Do...your worst, Fiend," she said and fear rippled across her Spirit.

"You don't deserve my pity," Felix grated out. He was getting tired. "But for what has been done to you, you have it anyway." He lifted his two melee weapons, remnants of her "Father's" own work.

"We...do not want your pity," Skeleton coughed. Sudden triumph seared across her Spirit. "For we will win. Berserk Blood!"

Felix quickly tore out her throat, but was too slow to stop the words. He shouldn't have let her talk!

A pulse of power flitted outward along a barely visible connection, one that Felix could see stretched between the Arcid and the horde below. He tasted the power as it passed beyond his reach, and his stomach dropped. It tasted of blood and hate.

It tasted of Vellus and the Archon both.

The bellowing screams of monsters abruptly filled the air, each of their voices deepening and rattling with an awful, deadly promise. Then his own people began to cry out.

Oh no.