by Ivan Kal
His mind was firing at insane speeds, and he could feel his energy supplies dropping. He wasn’t going to have much more time. He could try and slow himself down with Gravikinesis, but he wasn’t that good at it and he was falling too fast to do much. But it would have to do. Then the world started to speed up and Morgan got to work. First, he focused on his Gravikinesis and started lessening the pull of gravity on him. That slowed his acceleration, but he wasn’t good enough with it to do much more. He pulled out one of his metal spheres from his satchel and turned in the air so that his back was to the ground. He put the sphere above his chest and let go, having it fall alongside him while he kept one hand gently pressed against it from below and the other above it. The hand above it shifted and bulged with muscles.
Then he used his Momentum Shift on the sphere. It shot upward, hitting his left hand, and Sumion’s barrier flashed. He felt reinforced bones crack as it jerked him in the air, his shoulder popping out of its socket as the sphere slipped out of his hand and he continued to fall, but he had slowed his fall tremendously. Sumion’s barrier mitigated a percentage of the damage, and he hoped that he hadn’t exhausted it too much.
He grabbed the launcher on his thigh with his good hand and put in a plant canister. He turned and the ground was almost there. He launched his canister and then used Plant Prison as he reached the ground. He triggered his own personal barrier on his rings, and then there was nothing much that he could do. He smashed into the growing bundle of plants and crashed through them, hitting the ground.
The ground cracked, white light filled his vision, and his personal barrier exploded. Then there was pain—a lot of pain.
CHAPTER NINE
Morgan was lying on his back, having been bounced off the ground and then rolling off the mostly destroyed plants when landing the second time. His world was agony. Every part of his body was hurting, and he felt like he had broken every bone in his body.
He knew that he needed to do something quick or he would probably die, so he tried to move his right hand—but a pain unlike any he had ever experienced hit him, and his vision went all black. Then, when he could see properly again, he managed to focus his mind enough to force Klyn to move. His arm turned into a tendril with vague, hand-like appendages and sneaked over to his other hand to touch his ring. From it, he pulled out a healing potion and somehow managed to bring it over to his mouth and drink. Heat spread through him and he screamed, but slowly he felt the pain abating.
He took a full breath and then opened his eyes. He hadn’t even realized that they had been closed. There was a flash of light high above him, which he blinked away, thinking that he was still healing—but then it repeated, and Morgan realized that it wasn’t just in his head. His team was doing it, and he knew that he needed to let them know that he was alive. He tried to get up, only to feel the full body exhaustion that came from healing so much damage so quickly. He managed to force Klyn into its bow form with his dwindling energy and then he made an Energy Arrow charged with Exploding Arrow. A moment later, he let it fly into the air, as high as he could. It soared and then exploded as he cut energy to it.
It was a small blast, but one probably visible from above. The light high up shone again, twice in a quick succession. Morgan tried to remember if they had ever set up a kind of code for something like this, but he couldn’t remember. Still, he took the two lights as a sign that they had seen him.
Suddenly, he saw something moving along the ceiling: another pack of bats flying toward their balcony. The light had to have alerted them. Morgan grimaced as he realized that his fall and his exploding arrow had probably alerted any ground monster that he was here as well. He pulled himself up, and looked down, seeing that he was lying in a pool of blood. His clothes were soaked and ripped in places where his bones had probably stuck out of his skin. He shivered at that and continued looking over his gear. He saw that his satchel had been crushed along with its contents, but he had another in his storage ring, so he removed it and put it into the ring while he pulled out another. His launcher he had lost in the fall, and while he had no idea where it was, he had a spare.
He heard a roar and he knew that he needed to leave. He started moving, his body protesting every movement, but he knew that he couldn’t afford to stay. His people knew that he was alive, and he would find his way back to them. Even if they came down to the balcony, most of them would need to follow the bridge to the closest tower, so he decided to head over there and wait for them to make their way down.
He just needed to survive until then—alone in a city that was probably filled with monsters.
Just fucking great.
***
Morgan managed to find a secluded room blocked by debris from a caved-in temple. He phased through the debris and made a small camp inside, secure that nothing could come at him without at least trying to get through the rubble—and he could just phase through the wall and exit the building if that happened. He set up a bedding because he knew that he needed sleep, and that he needed to get his body and energy back to its fully rested state.
Before he went to sleep, he changed his clothes. His Shimmering Cloak was ruined, having been ripped to pieces by his own plants as they tried to envelop him as he fell. His Raiment of the Grand Alchemist was mostly okay, barring a few holes, and the fact that it was soaked in blood. Most importantly, the two pocket spatial storages it held still worked.
Morgan decided that he needed to at least let the blood dry out, so he placed the raiment to the side before he went to bed. Only when his head hit the bedding did he realized that he had survived a drop of at least a couple kilometers. He had known, just how much he had changed. Known that he had incredible power now, and yet… He always seemed surprised when something like this happened.
But the thing that struck him the most was just how completely inhuman he had become. Suddenly the thought of Klyn taking over more parts of his body didn’t seem as crazy as it once had. He was already as far from human as anyone could get. What was one more step compared to that? He wondered what he would be able to do if he changed his entire body. Would he be able to shape-shift into any of the forms that he had consumed? It seemed completely possible. It was almost funny. His original build had been something similar to a hybrid between a ranger and a druid, fighting with plants and using a bow and arrow. And now he might finally be able to take on animal forms. It seemed like he hadn’t really changed his build after all.
He knew that he could change Klyn as long as it had the mass and he had energy. With his several core upgrades, he did have quite a lot. Slowly his eyes closed and his mind wandered, his sleep taken over by dreams of transforming into a great dragon who could burn down his enemies with ease—and most importantly, could fly.
***
Morgan woke up to find himself surprisingly safe and uneaten. That surprised him, if he was being honest with himself, and that then made him chuckle, because just waking up alive was an achievement considering what had happened over the last few days. He shook his head as he laughed silently to himself and then gathered his things. He geared up, putting on the raiment, which was dry but now had a crimson color instead of its usual brown. There wasn’t much that he could do to help that; he just hoped that the monsters down here couldn’t smell his blood.
He stilled. Perhaps he shouldn’t risk it. He grumbled and took the raiment off and put it into his storage, then he put on one of his spare light armor sets, which was basically just a ranger’s outfit.
Finally, he sat down and planned his next move. He would most certainly encounter monsters, and he knew that his first goal should be to avoid them. Fighting high-level monsters on his own wasn’t smart, and he would be better served with stealth or with speed. He felt rested enough that he figured he could just start running in a direction and phasing through obstacles, going through until he reached the tower where he suspected the others would be. I didn’t have the chance to really look and see how far away the tower was yesterday
, though… He might run out of energy and phase in inside a room filed of monsters. That plan was probably a no-go.
Still, he could move stealthily when he wanted, although without his cloak he was going to be somewhat more visible. He sighed and stood up. He formed his hand into its sword form, loaded his launcher with a smoke canister, and, readying himself, phased through the rubble.
He began heading out, hoping that he wouldn’t run into a lot of monsters. But based on my luck these days, he thought grimly, I’m going to walk into a lair of about a thousand bloodthirsty spiders.
INTERLUDE III
Kai Zhao Vin looked at the screens that now showed nothing.
“What happened?” he heard Voralla Ohm ask from behind him.
“Dawn’s Light?” Vin asked.
The Guardian turned to look at him, and Vin saw the confusion in its body. “We lost contact with the main Guiding Force system. The local systems are still working, but we lost surveillance and any connection off world.”
Vin frowned, and then flicked his wrist, attempting to open a portal. His attempts failed, which shouldn’t be possible with his level of access. He was the Master of this Tower.
“What about the ascended? Are their systems operational?” Vin asked.
“Yes, most of the local systems are still working. Energy pools are still active and the automated system is still online.”
Vin sighed. That meant that the ascended, at least, wouldn’t see anything amiss. They would still get experience and could still level, and their soul-implants were designed to be able to improvise in emergencies.
He turned to look at the two former ascended standing behind him.
“Come,” Vin said, and started walking. He glanced back at the guardian and spoke as he walked. “Try to find out what is wrong and contact me if you are able. I’m going to find the ascended and make sure that nothing disrupts them.”
They walked through the far wall and headed down a long tunnel.
“You don’t know what happened?” Rainor asked.
“I suspect,” Vin said, and he did have his suspicions. There were only a few type of beings capable of doing something like this on a world connected to the Guiding Force, and very few of them would dare interfere with the Heart of the Mountain’s affairs. On the other hand, however, there were a couple who most certainly would dare. Vin just hoped that he was overreacting.
“We will go to the last known location of the ascended and find them. Once we’ve located them, we will observe only. Do you understand?”
He turned and gave them both a look. They nodded hesitantly, and while Vin wanted to get more out of them, he figured that that would have to do for now.
They left the tunnel and entered the ruins of the city.
CHAPTER TEN
Morgan didn’t walk into a room filled with spiders, which was a plus. Instead he found himself in a temple. As he walked slowly through the ruin of the said temple, his Nature Seismic Sense was looking for any signs of something near him, for there was vegetation down here: strange plants that seemed to glow faintly grew on the walls inside the temple. He hadn’t really noticed them much before, but in his defense he had just survived falling all the way down there and hadn’t had a chance to take in his surroundings.
He paused next to one of the temple’s walls, as he saw a cracked and nearly faded painting on it. It was, like what he had seen in the temple above, filled with the same kind of beings. They were cat-like, with large, bulbous eyes. In this painting he could make out people adorned in robes, holding glowing rods and staves as they looked over people who had dug a massive hole in the ground and were now in the process of constructing a large building. Definitely a culty vibe, Morgan thought to himself. He turned around, looking at the other walls to see if the story continued, but there was nothing else that had survived.
The rooms were mostly empty, with some remnants of what looked to have been furniture in the corners, rotting and twisted so much that it barely resembled anything. He shook his head and slowly left the building, walking out while keeping an eye on everything around him. There didn’t seem to be any signs of monsters, and while his skill wasn’t picking anything up, that still didn’t mean that he should drop his guard.
As he walked, he realized that keeping only one of his eyes open at a time was troublesome. He wasn’t used to it, and it was hampering him. Perhaps he should’ve changed both of his eyes. For a moment, he debated going back to safety and doing so, but he didn’t want to delay. He knew that the others would be coming down into the city, and he needed to be there to meet them.
He cast his eyes up to the ceiling and the tower he’d fallen from, looking for any signs of the others, like the blinking flashes he’d seen before, but there were none. Morgan understood that announcing their position like that was dangerous, and that they probably wouldn’t risk drawing the bat monsters to them.
He looked at the narrow street. Most buildings around the temple were one or two stories high, and he quickly realized that if he ran into monsters, it would be hard for him to maneuver. He could always just phase inside of a building, but he did not enjoy the limited viewing distance. He glanced around and found a building that had half of its roof collapsed and he made his way there.
That’s more like it, Morgan thought after he’d climbed up the rubble. He could see far in the distance from this higher viewpoint. There were buildings and statues that peeked over the roofs here and there but he doubted that something would jump around a corner and try to eat his face, at least. He glanced upward, looking at the temple he’d fallen from and then looked at the only surviving bridge connecting that tower to another, which still stood and reached up to the ceiling. That was the most likely place where the rest of the raid group would come down through. With his destination set, he started walking over the roof, jumping from one to the other and using Phase Dash when the distance was too long.
He realized that the bridge was a lot longer than he initially thought, and the tower was farther away as well—it was just so massive that it looked like it was close. He hoped that it wasn’t filled with monsters, and that the others wouldn’t have issues getting there. Thinking on others, he inevitably went to thinking about Ves. He hoped that she was okay; the others should be aware that he was still alive, but he knew that she had some…abandonment issues. But there was nothing he could do for her other than make sure that he survived and found her again.
The roofs of most buildings were bare, some broken and collapsed, but for the most part solid. Some were even covered in plants that looked like vines. It appeared that the crystals up above provided them some kind of energy so that they could grow down there. Morgan even paused and took a couple of samples, as well as had Klyn consume some. The plant was extremely tough, and it could glow, so it might be useful in the future.
His night-vision eye saw a lot better than his regular one, even with the light coming from the crystals. There were large swaths of the surface of the caver that were covered in shadows. And the new eye was just better in every way. He could see farther and better with it.
Then, his Nature Seismic Sense detected something—vibrations in the ground around the roots of the plants down on the street. Morgan got down on the roof and crawled to the edge, as his senses told him that something was passing through on the street below him. He raised his head and looked over, seeing a pack of monsters.
Sand Lammergeier Lizard LVL 55
Morgan blinked at the strange creatures. Their heads looked like those of a bearded vulture, and their bodies were long and sinuous but covered in feathers. They didn’t appear to have wings, although he could see some larger feathers on their front legs, so perhaps their front legs could double as wings, but he doubted they could fly—maybe only glide at most. He closed his left eye and looked at them with his right, seeing that the color of their feathers appeared to be mostly yellowish and red. They were running around, letting out screeches that were high pitched and echo
ed loudly around him.
There were seven of them, and yet the part of him that loved ascending urged him to attack while they were occupied. The rational part told him that he should avoid fighting until he met up with the others, but already his mind was putting together a plan about how he could take them down.
Before he had a chance to make a final decision, however, a loud crash startled him and the monsters on the street. A wall burst apart, and something massive came through: another monster ran into the street and smashed into the closest lammergeier, a massive clawed hand grabbing hold of the body and squeezing hard enough that Morgan heard bones pop.
Demi Behemoth LVL 60
The new monster was massive, resembling a cross between a gorilla and a bear, only without any hair and standing on two legs. It had short legs and long arms, its hands having massive black claws that looked sharp enough to cut through iron. Its head was similar to that of a bear, though twice as wide and the snout twice as long. Its skin was tough and leathery, like that of an elephant, complete with a similar color.
The other lammergeier screeched in panic, but then one of them started making some-kind of low rumbling nose and they rallied. A moment later they charged the new monster, and it became a battle.
The behemoth dropped the dead lammergeier and roared in challenge, and then the pack fell on it. They were faster, and ran around the behemoth while snapping forward with their beaks picking at the skin or swiping with their front claws. The behemoth backhanded one and it was thrown into the side of the building cracking the wall. Another lammergeier leapt on top of some rubble and then jumped, extending its front legs and its short wings, gliding as it brought its rear legs forward. It stabbed its claws into the behemoth’s back, causing it to roar in pain.