Rune Seeker

Hiral allowed himself a fraction of a second to be proud of how well everybody was working together. At how well they were adapting to the situation and the opponent in front of them. The hives would be taken care of, it was only a matter of time.

“Yan, how’s it going?” Hiral asked again.

“Stupid glass definitely isn’t glass,” Yanily said as Hiral and Left approached. Color was returning to the area even as they got closer, meaning the spearman had used his Dragon’s Breath attack to try and destroy what they suspected was some kind of power node. It hadn’t worked – not completely – but spider-web fractures spread across the entirety of the dome. “Almost got it, but that was both my big cooldowns. Since you were close, didn’t think it was worth using Turn Back the Clock.”

“Definitely save that,” Hiral said. “Especially since you could do it for the whole raid group if we need it.” As he spoke, Hiral hopped into the air, one hand going to the Greatsword of Amin Thett even as he began channeling his runes – and Edicts – into the weapon. The sword practically came to life in his hands, the new-and-improved fallen-star form bursting with power as the black, runic script etched itself down the length of the energy-blade.

There was a pulse around him, 833’s that’d gotten closer dropping from the sky – no, slamming to the back of the W34P0N – as gravity increased manifold for a hundred feet in all directions. Barely even needing to think about it to make it happen, more like the weapon knew his will and intent before he directed it, a tether of more Gravity connected the blade to the top of the dome. Right where Yanily had struck with his Skyfall+, and lightning still crackled.

Hiral triggered Empower+, pulling on Yanily’s lightning to increase his own power, electricity surging along the greatsword and leaving an arcing trail in its wake. Not satisfied with that being all he could bring to it, Hiral added his Runes of Increase and Connection to lean on the final note from the ability.

Class Ability – Empower+

Empower+: The strength of your allies is your own. Borrow an energy type from one of your allies to infuse into your own attacks or abilities to inflict bonus damage.

Note: Only one type of energy can be applied by Empower+ at a time.

Note (3): Energy types borrowed through Empower+ have a chance to ignore resistances. This effect can be increased further.

The dome hadn’t shattered at Yanily’s strike, which meant it had to have some kind of resistances, not to mention the fact spearman’s lightning looked to be having trouble finding purchase on the brass. If Hiral could ignore that resistance, just how much damage could he do by borrowing Yanily’s power?

As the sword came up, over, and down, he got his answer.

Separation coated the edge of the blade – just like he’d done against the G14NT – but the 0M3G4 W34P0N was made of sterner stuff. Not stern enough, though.

Glass parted before the edge, barely, as electricity dug its way into the cracks Yanily had already formed. Impact came next, like a small moon fell just behind Hiral’s strike, and Hiral flexed his will directly against the dome.

While it wasn’t enough to fully trigger his Rune of Eclipse, it did shift things in his favor. The once impossibly strong glass had a chance to break. Without a sentience of its own, the not-glass had no defense to the slight tweaking of its own existence, or to the power of the sword, runes, and Edicts. On the other hand, the colossal sense of self that seemed to awaken at the same time the not-glass shattered into a thousand, broken shards was an entirely different story.

Even as Hiral’s blade busted through the dome and into the more vulnerable mechanisms beneath – destroying them nicely – a tremendous sentience threw back his manipulation like he was a leaf on the wind. Beneath his feet, the W34P0N truly seemed to come to life, another roar bellowing out from its chest. A notification window sprung up to fill them in on exactly what had happened.

Dynamic Quest: Update

Hidden Trial (A-Rank): Mechanized

0M3G4 W34P0N systems and power at 73%.

Relay destruction detected. Power-up cycle interrupted.

Initializing.

Initializing.

Catastrophe-mode Initialized.

Commencing extermination.

A third roar shook the city as the canine-head reared back, massive jaws spreading. Huge teeth lined the maw, and the swarming bees all around seemed to pause. That last part was fine for the party, who quickly capitalized on the opportunity to shred the numbers arrayed against them. More of Igwanda’s powerful shots landed with resounding thumps against the spine on her side, followed by the echoing booms that chased them. Flames lit up one side of the giant W34P0N, the sheer amount of light speaking to how much fire Seena was using to reduce the bees’ numbers.

Despite all that, the 0M3G4 W34P0Nmoved, practically spinning in place to lash out with its twin tails. Weighted at the end with heavy, tube-like fixtures, the tails came around like a flail, shredding buildings in a massive radius around the monstrosity. The glass, stone, and metal of the structures were not at all up to the task of dulling the sudden and brutal blow, as entire floors got ripped away.

More cracks and crashes resounded as the instantly unsupported tops of the buildings toppled down, crushing their own bases beneath them in a series of catastrophic, structural failures. Through it all, solar energy pulses went off like small bombs as each of the party members who’d been using the buildings as battlegrounds did everything they could to escape the collapses. Movement abilities, shields, short-lived buffs came and went, more than one person blindly leaping out through a shattering window just in the nick of time.

Through some kind of miracle, none of them had been directly in the path of the sweeping tails, but, just like that, half the raid group had injuries. It didn’t get any better from there, either, with those same two tails rearing up behind the four-legged beast like a pair of scorpion’s tails.

Light grew and converged at the ends of tubes, before powerful beams of searing energy swept out in lines raking at forty-five degrees from each other in front of the Wild-Boss. Where the beams passed – each several feet wide – nothing remained. Glowing cuts lay smoldering in the black stone of the streets, through the distant buildings that hadn’t been felled by the earlier rampage, and almost to the edges of the city.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“We need to take out more of these nodes!” Hiral shouted at Yanily. “I’ll get the other shoulder one, you move toward the back.”

“Got it,” Yanily said, activating his movement ability at the same time Hiral darted across the wide back.

Left, without needing to be told, followed after Yanily, trails of burning liquid hanging from both his daggers and the wings of his Bond.

“Right,” Hiral said as he tightened his grip around the greatsword’s hilt. “Any nodes down there on the ankles? Should be one if they are like Meridian Lines.”

“There are,” the other double said.

“Break them,” Hiral said, though he got the distinct impression Right was already on his way to do that. “As for anybody else under the 0M3G4 W34P0N, see about breaking the dome-shaped nodes. They’re strong, but don’t give up.”

With those words said, Hiral brought the Greatsword of Amin Thett down on the next node. Energy splashed out as the blade dug into the glass-like material, but it didn’t completely Separate, only going a few inches deep. Impact followed a heartbeat later, smashing down on the dome, and sending spider-web fractures out in all directions.

Tearing the weapon free, he brought it down again and again, each blow carving off sections of the broken glass as he tore his way down to the more vulnerable mechanism inside.

“There really are strong,” Seena said over the party chat. “A few more seconds…”

Suddenly, Hiral was in the air, the brass-like back of the W34P0N flashing by inches below him. Then it was gone, the two tails passing on either side of him before he watched it crash into the distant building Igwanda had been firing from.

Such explosive speed for something that size was more than a little terrifying.

And, so was it’s power, the building practically getting turned to dust by its attack, though that didn’t last long.

Emerging out of a nearby street, a figure clad in glowing, blue armor rose as it charged the Wild-Boss. Growing with each step, the Aspect reached nearly two-hundred-feet tall, and it was still dwarfed by the larger construct in front of it. Not that Nivian would be intimidated just by his opponent’s size.

Up and under, Nivian brought his new form’s blue-flame hammer to crunch into the chin of the construct as it turned – almost in surprise – to face him. Nearby windows shattered from the expanding shockwave of the blow, the impact even lifting the Wild-Boss from its feet before weight and gravity brought it back down.

Even before its feet reached the ground, the Death Knight charged in even closer, jamming his spiked shoulder into thing’s neck to try to get inside the dangerous range of the powerful jaws. The empty, left hand reached out to grapple one of the piston-powered legs, and Nivian pushed.

Back legs digging divots in the street, the Wild-Boss struggled off-balance, until Nivian stopped his forward momentum and did something amazing. A small step to reposition his feet, a twist at his waist, then a flare of solar energy so powerful, Hiral felt it from the distance, and the tank hauled the much larger Wild-Boss up and over himself to body-slam it into the ground with a city-shaking smash.

“Yessss!” Hiral couldn’t help but shout at the awe-inspiring display that’d all happened within barely a few seconds.

“Show off,” Yanily said, from the ground below Hiral, where he stood with the rest of the party. “But, yeah, wow.”

“We need to get over there,” Seena said, more of the raid members pushing their way out of the rubble of the fallen buildings. Another slam resounded from the direction of the two battling titans, and Hiral looked over to see Nivian literally boot-stomping the Wild-Boss trying to find its feet beneath him. Blow after blow rained down on the heavy brass Tomorrow used to build her weapon, but despite the one-sidedness of the encounter, Nivian wasn’t really making any headway.

He was controlling the fight, battering the head with his hammer, fist, and spiked boots, while he continually kept the thing from getting up, but he wasn’t damaging it. Against a true, A-Rank, Wild-Boss, the tank didn’t have the offensive power to win by himself.

Hiral’s eyes narrowed at something in the center of the Aspect’s chest. Was Nivian actually alone?

While the Death Knight resided within the skull of the Aspect, there was clearly somebody else within the chest of it. Hidden by the thick energy that made up the nearly-solid armor, it wasn’t really a question who that could be, and the lantern that materialized over the Aspect’s shoulder confirmed it.

“Wule is in there with Nivian,” Hiral said as the six-sided lantern flashed in alternating colors. Finally, it settled on orange, and a beam of concentrated energy larger than a house drilled down into the Wild-Boss’s exposed chest.

“Do we even need to help?” Ilrolik asked at the same time she threw a slab of foot-thick stone off her like it was a dirty blanket.

The whole party got their answer as the Wild-Boss seemed to give up on getting its feet under it, the twin tails instead whipping up. One-two, they slammed into Nivian’s side and shoulder, staggering him to the side. Considering similar blows had completely blown through the towering buildings of the city, the fact Nivian was still standing and in one piece was a testament to the power of his Aspect. Though, from the cracks running from the impact points on his armor, it wasn’t as easy as all that.

Unfortunately, the W34P0N wasn’t finished after that, its rear legs lashing out even as it lay on its back. Claws that would’ve towered over Hiral in length tore into the side of Nivian’s Aspect, huge chunks of it torn out to leak blue, solar energy. Even as Nivian staggered back, the giant construct flipped over with unreasonably agility to its feet, then lunged straight for the twins.

Fangs stretching for the head of the smaller opponent to crush it – and the Death Knight within – Tomorrow’s construct was clearly going straight for the kill. Crunch, the jaws closed hard enough to crush the armor they crushed like an eggshell.

The armor of Nivian’s forearm, which he’d managed to slip between himself and his attacker at the last second. He’d saved himself from instant death, only for the W34P0N to whip itself around like a dog with a bone.

Feet leaving the ground, Nivian’s Aspect slammed through the rubble of a nearby building, sending crushed stone and metal showering for hundreds of feet to rain destruction on everything in its path. Again and again, the four-legged Wild-Boss jerked Nivian around, bashing him into buildings or the ground with every violent thrash. One final slam put Nivian and Wule down on their backs, and the W34P0N’s clawed foot crashed down onto their chest to pin them beneath it. The deadly blades on the foot dug into the plate armor while it pressed down.

Then, without mercy, the Wild-Boss snapped its head away, tearing the arm right off Nivian’s Aspect. Blue-flame solar energy poured out, but if the W34P0N expected that to end the fight, it got a rude surprise in the form of Nivian’s hammer coming up and slamming it in the face as it looked back in his direction.

Stunned by the blow, the thing staggered off the brothers, who rolled over their now-armless side – like it was all part of the plan – and to their feet in one fluid movement. As they rose, the hammer came up with them in a vicious uppercut that again caught the bottom of the Wild-Boss’s chin to send it careening into a block of collapsed buildings. Something must’ve snagged one of its legs, the huge beast toppling over the rubble in an undignified roll.

The brothers didn’t immediately give chase, with Wule’s lantern flashing again. The cracks in the armor sealed even as Hiral watched, while Nivian pushed himself off the building he’d staggered into from the momentum of his own blow. Hammer still in his one hand – the other arm wasn’t regrowing – he turned on the W34P0N as it found its feet.

Head lowered, jaws open, another growl reverberated out of its chest as it sized up its opposition.

“Everybody here?” Hiral asked, doing a quick count before reaching out with his scarves. It was time for them to…

Hiral’s brain blanked for a second as the Wild-Boss whipped around in one spot again. This time, it wasn’t to slam its tails into Nivian as it had before. No, this time it spun perfectly around to face Hiral and the others just as he flared his solar energy to grab on to the others. It noticed us. Me.

Worse, it came around with its mouth wide like it was silently roaring, a ball of spiralling energy directly in front of it – and between the crescent horns. Black and white rolled over and over into the rapidly building power, the area around it turning monochrome.

It was the same type of attack Hiral and Yanily both used, except it had to be more than fifty feet in diameter.

“Oh… shit…!” Seena swore from right beside him as the Wild-Boss released the instantly-full-power blast directly at the party that’d conveniently gathered all in one place for it to wipe out.