Rune Seeker

“I’ll take the Mid-Boss,” Hiral said, senses locked on the aforementioned monster while it stayed hidden behind the stone pillar inside his domain. “You two need to get to the defenders and help them.”

“Maybe we should take on the Mid-Boss,” Right offered. “Two against one.”

“No,” Hiral said. “Left’s buffs – the Banner and Herald – will help more with the large groups. And you, Right, have to be as strong as any of their defenders. The two of you will make a bigger difference than me there. Besides, with the terrain here, I’m better suited to go after our shy Mid-Boss.”

“It could be a trap,” Right tried one more time to changes Hiral’s mind.

“Oh, it’s definitely a trap,” Hiral chuckled. “But one I’m setting for our kitty-friend. Don’t worry, like the achievement said, I’ve got this.”

“He does,” Left told Right. “When?”

“Now,” Hiral said at the same time he launched himself on a burst of Rejection, straight between an arch of stone, and into the rat’s nest of twisting columns. To his trailing sensory domain, his doubles gave each other a look, shrugged, then dashed down the tunnel opposite to where they’d come in. That had to be the way to the breached wall mentioned in the notification window, but Hiral had something to do before he found out for himself.

RHCs going to his thighs, runic energy pulsed out of him, Rejection, Attraction, and Gravity changing the playing field, and he landed on a nearby pillar before leaping off again. Back and forth like a pinball, Hiral streaked towards the Mid-Boss’s hiding spot, while terrible claws of Separation formed on his hands. Like the Mid-Boss itself had done, gouges of stone tore from the pillars as Hiral landed and leapt again, closing the distance within brief seconds.

Almost too fast for his opponent to feel him coming, Hiral flashed past the pillar that had previously blocked his senses, and flipped midair with arms crossed in front of himself. Palms facing away from him, he slashed out while pouring solar energy into his runes. Ten crescents of cutting energy expanded in the blink of an eye, tearing through stone and plant matter where the Mid-Bosshad been just a second before.

Too slow, Hiral grimaced, catching sight of the long, red tail darting behind another pillar, while he completed his flip to land feet first against a nearby stone. Without needing to think about it, he altered his own gravity to make it feel like he was standing on the ground, even though he was actually staring down at it. Standing wasn’t going to win this fight, though, and more runic power launched him after his prey.

Intimidating Aura+ billowed out through the space around him as he gave chase, the pressure of it tearing plants out by their roots and cracking stone. The Mid-Boss seemed to flinch as the aura reached it in Hiral’s sensory domain, but it didn’t slow more than a hair, though it sprung off to the side to try and lose him.

Up, down, over, and around, the pair rocketed through the chaotic web of stone archways, plants that survived Hiral’s aura whipping in the air at their passing. Red and orange suddenly lit up the tunnel ahead, and heat billowed ahead. Not willing to slow, Hiral threw out Dreaming and Decrease, while wrapping himself in a dagger of Rejection. Cutting through the cascading flames in and instant – High-Speed Regeneration+ taking care of any damage from the heat – Hiral came out the other side with his opponent finally right in front of his eyes.

(Mid-Boss – Chimera) Ruby Lioness – Unknown Rank

True to the monster’s name, a red, maneless lion crouched vertically on a nearby pillar, claws dug deep into the stone to hold it in place. Flames licked from between blood-red teeth, and the whole beast had to be almost fifteen-feet long, not even including the tail that nearly doubled its overall length. Weight and size alone, the Mid-Boss dwarfed the other Chimeras Hiral had seen, and power radiated off it.

No, that’s not just power, that’s heat. Barely visible patterns in the lioness’s coat rippled like flames between the individual hairs, while the stone near its paws sloughed like it had melted. Was it using that before? Or saving it for now?

Without an answer to the question – and honestly not really caring – Hiral reinforced the bladed wedge of Rejection around him with Dreaming and Separation, then added another burst behind him. Snap, stone broke as the lioness leapt away, a heartbeat before Hiral slammed into and through where it had just been.

Letting his Rejection-wedge carry most of the stone away even as the pillar began to collapse, Hiral twisted midair and shot back the way he’d come. Barreling through the rock shards and dust before the stone arch folded in on itself, he came out swinging. Arcs of Separation sliced through the air, just a hair’s breadth behind the fast-moving cat. And, apparently that wasn’t just his trick, as the Mid-Boss twisted to hurl its own crescents of flame in his direction.

Part of Hiral wanted to laugh – What is it with Mid-Bosses stealing my tricks? – but it was the competitive side of him that won out. Launching his own attacks to meet the lioness’s head on, he didn’t even use his concepts, instead relying on his power to simply be better, and bolted straight at the Mid-Boss.

Meeting midway between the pair, the two attacks collided. Flaming crescents attempted to burn through everything in their path, while Hiral’s own sought to cut and break down anything they met. A sizzle shouted the power of the flaming lashes to the world, before it cut off with a definitive sching. The Mid-Boss barely had an instant to realize what had happened before Hiral’s blades reached it.

Weakened and slightly deflected by the collision of the attacks, the blades only grazed its back. Lines of blood-red suddenly joined the flickering-flame pattern along the big cat’s spine and neck, a yowl of pain hissing from between bared teeth. Intimidating as the fangs should’ve been, Hiral didn’t slow, eight spectral arms appearing from his back at the critical hit.

Closing the distance, Hiral reinforced the Hundred Handed buff he’d gotten from the Second Movement of the Primal Chord of the Lost Echo with his Rune of Dreaming. Suddenly not-so-spectral, the eight hands reached out and grasped the Mid-Boss by the scruff of the neck, back, and long tail. A pulse of Gravity changed down for all of them to be the vertical pillar the cat had perched on, and Hiral landed ‘above it’.

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Then, with a flex of his concept reinforced by his pseudo-aspect, the eight, Dex-powered arms tore the cat free from where it held on. Stone shredded as claws got forcefully pulled away, the whole Mid-Boss getting hauled up and over Hiral, before he slammed it down on the pillar in front of him. More stone shards shot into the air like they were in slow motion from the impact, and Hiral darted forward.

Finding its feet in front of him despite the rough handling, the Ruby Lioness bared its terrible fangs at him once again, just in time for his uppercut to catch it in the bottom of the jaw. Impact and Breaking lived up to their names, a pair of smaller teeth shattering at the blow, and the lioness’s head snapped up. Without a chance to recover, eight not-so-spectral arms came at from all sides. Sounding like a heavy downpour, the blows rained on its flanks, while Hiral’s other fist collided with the Chimera’s exposed neck.

Expansion, Breaking, Separation, Compression, and of course Impact hit the crimson fur and continued straight down the length of the monster. Sure, it probably didn’t have an airway he could crush with the blow, but his Cycling senses told him how the punch wreaked havoc inside the monster. It was a pity he couldn’t attach runic powers to the Hundred Handed buff, but it’d have to do for now.

Two more jabs and a straight pounded the cat back, Hundred Handed hammering it on all sides at the same time, before the counter came. Up and across, a paw as big as Hiral’s head – with knife-like claws – trailed flames as they carved into soft flesh.

Well, as they appeared to, with Hiral ducking smoothly under the blow and coming up unseen at the cat’s side. For what it did see, that could only be the Lost Echo of Hiral that mercilessly hooked a fist across into the side of the cat’s head.

Then it exploded.

Flames – and not the kind the cat dished out – washed over the front of the Mid-Boss while Hiral thrust out with both arms to slam his fists into the monster’s side. As soon as he made contact, the familiar balloon of combined runic powers burst. Bending around the expanding sphere for a split second, the cat hung in front of Hiral before it shot off with more force than he’d ever been able to put into it before.

Thank you Edict of Increase, was all he had time to think before there was a tremendous smash, then another, and one more, from the cat breaking pillars in its path. Rejection under his feet launched him along the same path, Coat of Amin Thettsnappingin the air, while the stone arches around them began to collapse.

Within a second, he spotted the crater in the side of a distant stone pillar where the cat struggled to hold on, blood oozing out of the blunt trauma wounds in its broken flesh. More of the crimson liquid gushed from between sharp fangs, the cat spreading its mouth wide to breathe a cone of flame in his direction.

Instead of creating a wedge of Rejection to brute-force his way through it, Hiral instead used a burst of the same rune to jerk him to the side. In his place, a Lost Echo formed – showing he’d dodged the attack – though it was consumed by the hungry fire. That was fine, Hiral was still smiling at what he’d gained from it. Then, again, as he boosted himself up and over another cone of flames trying to catch up to him. Like the warthogs, the cat just didn’t seem to learn what wasn’t working. A third cone – also evaded – and Hiral’s feet touched down on a nearby stone pillar. The Chimera’s head turned to follow his movement, but a crack of the stone where he’d been standing was all that was left for it to find.

Feline eyes widened in horror as Hiral appeared right in front of it after finally pushing his speed to the maximum. Left hand stretching out ahead of him, he shoved the Mid-Boss down while changing the orientation of their gravity. Weakened as it was from the battering it’d taken, it didn’t mount quite enough resistance against his will, while his runes countered the natural size, strength, and weight advantages it held over him.

Pounding in tune with the Primal Chord, the Mid-Boss’s head slammed to the stone, while Hiral brought his other hand around. Fingers splayed like crooked claws, blades of Separation and Breaking pulsed with the power of Right Back at You and tore rips in the air as they arced for the Ruby Lioness’s exposed throat. Chimeraor not – Mid-Boss or not – he was going to take its head from its shoulders.

Except, as soon as the tips of his claws bit into the cat’s hide, the Primal Chord screeched offkey,screaming a warning to his ears. Separation and Breaking vanished to be replaced by Rejection and Dreaming, while Hiral crossed his arms in front of his face.

Barely in time.

In a conflagration that turned the world red and orange – and burned his concept to ash like cheap paper – the Mid-Boss erupted with enough force to hurl Hiral away like a charred meteor. Flames ballooned out and between the stone arches, reaching for the open sky far above, but Hiral didn’t – couldn’t – pay much attention to it. The approaching end to his sudden, uncontrolled flight was much more pressing.

Arms scorched to the bone – and his legs not in much better shape – his body wasn’t going to do anything helpful to dull the coming impact. No, all he had to rely on was his runes, and he sent out threads of solar energy in the second he had left.

Rejection pushed against where he was going, while his Rune and Edict of Attraction whipped out in the opposite direction, anchoring him towards where he’d just come from. Gravity twined in with those last two, then Increase and Decrease went to work.

All in all… it still hurt, his scorched body slamming into the pillar to blast the air from his lungs. Restoration immediately joined in with his High-Speed Regeneration+ to passively work on the damage, but he didn’t trigger the active effect. Instead, he reached out through his sensory domain to make sure that was the end of the Mid-Boss.

It wasn’t. At least, not exactly. Where he expected to see a crater and an influx of solar energy into himself, he instead found a trail of flames leading away from the battle. Towards where his doubles had gone.

That final explosion wasn’t an attack – it was some kind of escape ability.

As soon as the thoughts flitted through his mind, a notification window popped up.

Dynamic Quest – Beast Wave: Update

Chimeric Interlopers slain: 73/73

The walls have been breached!

A catastrophic mistake by the defenders has led to an entire flank being exposed. Chimeras surge towards the opening, sensing the weakness.

If the remaining champions are overwhelmed, monsters will flood into the city, laying waste to it and its citizens.

Key Defenders Remaining: 574/590

Predator Defeated Chased Off: 1/1

Approximate time until the Hanging Gardens is lost: 30 minutes.

Hiral dismissed the notification, and when he didn’t get another, it confirmed that wasn’t the end of the Mid-Boss. A quick look at his arms and legs turned his stomach, but his passive healing was already taking care of things. He could speed it up with the active ability, but since he was on a timer and didn’t know when that cat would show up again, he didn’t want to trigger that reduced passive.

Instead, he pushed through the pain, then Rejected himself the same direction the Ruby Lioness had gone.