CHAPTER FORTY FIVE
The burning noonday sun beat down mercilessly on the marching contingent of thugs and cutthroats. Transforming the pack of normally sharp eyed killers, into a troop of half-lidded, half conscious sleepwalkers—resembling a classroom of sleepy toddlers, just before nap time. Their movements sluggish, their reactions slowed, as their biology made itself known in no uncertain terms. A novel sensation for all but the most traveled among them. Those that had spent some time topside, no matter how fleeting.
So used to the smog laden air, were they—the stuff inimical to the presence of natural sunlight—that this excess heat-born drowsiness was a new development for many. Not a small number of his crew crying out over the course of their long march for a short break to rest, and maybe lie down. Scrap was having none of it however, and was there any wonder? This place… it was a land of plenty the likes of which he could’ve never imagined! It overflowed with generous bounty. Stuffed to bursting with pitifully weak beasts ripe for the killing.
You couldn’t take two steps without tripping over a bulging bag of experience. And not once had he even felt the inkling of a threat to his life.
In just two hours not only did he manage to gain a level—something that would have taken at least half a year back in his home sector—but, by some strange miracle, he’d managed to gain several. Breaking through the level barrier that’d irked him for quite some time now. Finally, he could count himself among some of the truly strong undersider’s. Even the guard captain of the peacekeepers, with his Common Class of Guard Captain, was only Lvl 55, and he was one of the most feared males in all the under.
Now, Scrap would’ve bet on his tail he’d be lvl 56 within the week. At least.
-|—Status—|-
Name: Scra Pa’sheer
Level: 50
Age: 39
Class: Cutthroat (Common)
Body Grade: F [1 Star Prestige]
Soul Grade: F
Core Grade: Blank (2nd Level Purity)
Master Formation: D
Peerage: Peasant
Noble Regalia: None
Strength: 124
Endurance: 121
Resilience: 31
Regeneration: 127
Control: 14
Mana Capacity: 24
Free Points: 0
Abilities: (10/10)
Mana Chain ? Lvl 23 ? [Uncommon]
Class Skills: (3/3)
Quick Steps ? lvl 25 ? [Common]
Double Slash ? lvl 25 ? [Common]
Hemorrhagic Cut ? lvl 29 ? [Uncommon]
Equipment: (2/7)
Copper Ring of Strength (+1 Strength) [Common]
Copper Ring of Endurance (+1 Endurance) [Common]
Title: |Fledgeling Ascender (II)| [Uncommon]
Even before they’d set out on this particular expedition, he’d been head and shoulders above the other members of his crew, both in terms of attributes, and ability levels. Now? Well, it was becoming increasingly more difficult not to think of himself as invincible.
“What in the-?!”
A shout from one of his forward scouts caused Scraps head to snap up in alarm. He dismissed his status screen, unsure of whether he’d really heard what he thought he’d heard, or not. His doubts were quickly put to rest, however, when the first cry of alarm was immediately followed by a second. Then a third. And then several voicing their panic in very quick succession, as the furthest ranging members of their sweeping procession were thrown into utter disarray.
Scrap shoved past his nervously shuffling subordinates, trying to peer through the trees obscuring his vision. To see just what in the world was going on in there. There was movement between the trees, though they were packed so densely, he couldn’t make out who or what. Whether they were friend or foe, it was too hard to tell. Shots were fired, catching bark more than bodies, and causing wood chips to go wizzing through the air. Brilliant flashes and harsh reports followed by cries of pain and swearing.
Scrap grit his teeth. His hands tightened around the stock of his rifle. About to order his men to charge forward with guns a’blazing, a lone figure suddenly fell from the sky. Landing in a crouch not a hundred paces away. A very… diminutive figure. Instinctually, weapons were raised, before, confused, they were swiftly lowered back down again. A very very diminutive figure. In fact he was so small that- actually… hold on a moment… wasn’t that…?
“A baby…?”
+++
Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.
Richard slammed down hard onto the soft mulch of the autumnal forest. Loose earth and fallen leaves exploding away from him in a wave. His pulse raced. His eyes narrowed. The blood pumping through his ears so fast, it sounded, to him, like a rushing river. Gritting his gums, he fingered the hole in his side. A lucky bullet punching straight on through and out the other end.
Already he could feel the wound beginning to close in real time, though it would likely still be hours yet before it was fully sealed. Tearing off a strip of cloth from his onesie, he shoved it deep inside the wound—acting as a makeshift triage. Only then did he lift his head to greet the gaze of several hundred lizard men, decently equipped and well armed. He didn’t even bother to ask why a contingent of Ra’ak Neerian mercenaries were suddenly standing here inside the super easy mode tutorial, because, quite frankly, in that moment, he did not care. All that mattered were that his kids needed him, and these dumb mercs were standing in his way.
Richard rose slowly to his feet, trying not to wince with every twinge in his side. Well, on the bright side, at least he’d learned something from the ordeal. Going over their heads was a fools errand. It made him far too easy of a target, and these guys were the type to shoot first and ask questions later. The hole in his side could attest to that. Which left him with only one option. If he couldn’t go over, and he couldn’t go under, then he’d just have to go through. Going around would just take far too long.
Richard stared into the eyes of the biggest merc of the bunch, a black scaled giant, at least eight and a half feet tall. He was the only one of the several hundred that hadn’t lowered his weapon upon taking in his small stature.
Smart man. Not that it’ll matter much.
Richard bared his gums at the Ra’ak Neerian, causing its reptilian eyes to narrow. It was a feral expression, and the beast man was clearly not used to being challenged. In an instant, he raised his rifle and pressed his finger to the trigger, but it was too late. Richard clawed at the air. Pulling on the mana strings he’d wound around the trunks of several trees to his left and right—by way of the axle to his pully—then had looped around the barrels of all hundred odd firearms loosely aimed in his direction.
The result was immediate.
The bark of the maple trees smoked with invisible rope burns, and every single gun pointed his way was nearly yanked from their hands. There was the sharp report of gunfire, bullets wizzing well past were he stood. Several of the lizard men crying out, as wrists were snapped and fingers were broken. His one hundred and twenty points in strength more than enough to cripple beast men such as these with ease. All but their apparent leader it would seem, his aim still steady, despite the strength he brought to bear.
His rifle fired.
Thankfully, his little trick had been enough to offset the trajectory by just enough. The plasma bolt wizzing past his ear with a sharp crackle and a wave of intense heat. Richards eyes widened.
Plasma rifle? Seriously?!
With this newfound development, Richard didn’t intend to allow the lizard man to fire twice. He looped another mana tendril, several times as thick as any of the others, around the big guy’s waist, then pulled. The Ra’ak Neerian didn’t even budge. Richard, however, rocketed forward at speeds he couldn’t have matched without a running start. Closing the distance in mere moments, the barrel of the plasma rifle calmly tracking him as he did so.
Growing impossibly large as he approached. A yawning hole into the abyss that promised only oblivion.
The merc smirked, watching its prey rocket mindlessly into point blank firing range. Richard, however, had other plans. One hundred and twenty points into strength meant he saw the exact moment when the tendons of his right forearms twitched, signaling the clench of his trigger finger.
His one hundred and twenty points in resilience made certain he was able to think clearly with death so near.
And finally his one hundred and twenty points into control made the manipulation of his mana threads practically effortless, as he wrapped them around a flailing merc several meters to his left, and yanked himself out of range.
The plasma rifle fired, sizzling through the space where he’d just occupied. In the next moment, Richard rammed into their frontward facing formation, and his Premier Fledgling Ascender passive made it so that, instead of rebounding helplessly off the armor clad bodies which dwarfed him in size, it was they who were thrown back violently by the recklessness of his charge.
Several scale clad bodies were tossed high into the air as he shoved his way into their midst. His momentum immediately arrested by the bone jarring impact, though, digging his bare feet into the spongy mulch, he pushed himself harder, further, faster. Making a path for himself he speared through their disorganized ranks, his small stature aiding him greatly here, as he weaved between clawed feet and scaly legs. Bowling their legs out from under them when no convenient avenue of ingress presented itself. Often times accompanied by the snap of breaking bone.
There were shouts, cries of alarm, the report of bullets and harsh alien invectives. He ignored all of this however, his sights set on the light at the end of the tunnel. The end to the confused press of bodies. And, after only a short time of this, he found it. Bursting free from the encirclement into sun-dappled rays. The way ahead clear. Entirely free of enemies.
Richards pace, which had slowed with all the constant evasion, quickly multiplied. His legs a blur as he raced towards where he recalled seeing that pillar of gray flame.
Won’t be long now! Wait for me! I’m almost there!
And of course, it was when he was really beginning to find his stride, and leave those nameless mercenaries in the dust, that something looped around his right ankle, and brought him crashing to the ground. Richard’s body skipping across the forest floor like a flat stone across a pond. Every jarring impact, or concussive collision leaving their mark, despite how high his endurance had become.
Until the trunk of a tree brought his little ride to an end with a resounding…
CRACK!
Bark splintered. The tree shook. Red leaves and broken branches raining down like curtains on a finished play. Obscuring his blurry vision behind a screen of autumnal colors. Though the glowing blue chain tethered to his right ankle was something not even Richard, in his less than stellar condition, could miss.
“Mana chain? What-?” he mumbled, blood dribbling from his mouth to paint his chin.
Then he looked up, past the thinning screen of leaves, at the looming black scaled figure standing over him with rifle raised—glowing blue chain trailing from Richards leg, all along the ground, whereupon it finally rose to bunch around the mercenaries right forearm.
The Ra’ak Neerian raised the barrel of his rifle until it was pointed squarely between Richard’s brows.
Then fired.
+++
Penelope plummeted. Fell from the sky like a stone. Her floaty friends pushing her to greater speeds than she’d even thought possible. The world around her quickly became a blur, even as the rippling black dome grew larger by the second. Suddenly, alarm bells were going off in her head. The feel of an unfair trick, a trap yet to be sprung, blaring loud and clear. Without taking the time to think, she let her instincts guide her. Instincts that’d been trained and subsequently honed over the course of the last two weeks.
She shifted her trajectory so that she was flying parallel to the shivering dome, instead of directly at it, in the bare instant before a sea of shadowy hands burst forth to claw at the air where she’d just been. There were hundreds of them all told.
Thousands.
Black, wispy appendages that seemed to be more shadow than flesh. Only a small fraction of which were actually human. Claws, and pincers, and talons and more tripping over one another to be the first to rend her to pieces. Something they were surely more than capable of.
Because, while they might have looked immaterial, that wasn’t at all what the mana was telling her.
Penelope arrested her momentum, tried to come up with a plan, only the second she did, the dome rippled ominously beneath her, and her stinky rotten cheater sense went haywire. Penelope shot high into the sky before yet another forest of grasping hands could engulf her. The stomach turning sight nearly gaining on her in its rapid climb. Ultimately forcing her to skate around the dome in circles, or be overrun by the seemingly endless army of appendages.
Several more times Penelope tried to breach the dome, to at least get a glimpse of how her friends were doing, but no matter what she tried, none of it seemed to help. Pillars of scorching fire, massive root like mana tendrils, even a few round wrecking balls of mana. It didn’t seem to matter what she did. All of the mana she pumped into the dome seemed to vanish the second it came into contact with that black substance. As if it were being taken somewhere else entirely. She even tried prodding the mana lattice for weaknesses, like teacher did.
But, either there were no weaknesses there to exploit, or she was too inexperienced to spot them in time. And time was at a premium. She could feel it in her gut. She was running out, and fast. What was it that teacher always said? She needed to act decisively. If the status quo wasn’t working, flip the game on its head so that it played by her rules. Preferably before time ran out.
Penelope took a deep breath. She knew teacher had told her never to use this unless it was an extreme emergency, but surely this counted, right?
Not allowing herself a moment more of hesitation, Penelope called on her very last friend. Her best friend out of all those lifelong companions she’d made thus far. It’s presence was a comfortable weight in her mouth. It’s greeting an exuberant glow of warmth and cheer.
A pulse of authority rippling out from Penelope in a clearly visible golden wave.
The very foundations of this doctored reality, this sham of a tutorial, trembling before the might of her- no, before the might of their combined preeminence. Empress and Regalia acting in complete unison for the first time since their very first meeting. Since her regalia’s conception. The entire world feeling like it were merely yet another aspect to be controlled.
A writhing forest of appendages burst from the rippling black dome. A sea of grasping hands and bestial claws soaring high into the sky on inexplicable momentum. Rocketing upwards, rending the very air, her vision nearly eclipsed by the shifting shadowy hellscape.
And then, just as the most eager of the crowd came within bare centimeters of tearing her limb from limb, with a wave of her hand, Penelope stripped the shadowy flesh from their blackened bones. Rendering the mass of arms into little more than a mass graveyard. Dappled devastation raining down from the sky. A cascading catacombs’ worth of impotent shade.
The attack failed, the dome fell, and Penelope taxed beyond anything she’d ever experienced, slipped blissfully into unconsciousness.
3 Days A Week, basically Monday, Wednesday, Friday, if only as a temporary measure to get caught up over on patreon. We’re nearing the finale over there and the chapters are taking a lot longer to come out than I’d like.
