Asheron's Fall: The Power of Ten, Book Six

“You notice the Paradox are expanding their territory?” I asked the Mick.

He turned his head in that direction, considering the point, just as another wave of Summons crested the hill a half-mile away, about two dozen of them, and swept toward us. The line of Melees immediately moved to intercept in that direction, a trio of Archers moved quickly to support and get the first arrows off as they came in range, and Willow shifted quickly in position to Heal if it was required.

The rest of us turned our eyes in the other directions, just in case they got clever and tried multi-pronged attacks. That generally didn’t work out well for them, as the best way to break those up was to toss some Shards at rocks or boulders in their way, and POOF, up popped up to a dozen Dual Elementals right in their paths, happy to crash right into them and take that fight.

By the time they could make it to us, their flanking attacks had to wade through a hundred Elementals or more from the active stuff on the landscape, and the Archers generally had a great time sniping them down as they did so.

“Weren’t here on yer initial run through with Her Highness, an’ never paid attention to the fine lines afore,” he admitted to me, eyes wary as he watched the two cutters at work. His job was to be the first to jump on any Duals that popped up, before they could focus on the two craftsmen chipping away with Crafting Tools of adamantine, concentrating hard as they did their jobs.

Combat Gemcutting was quite an art, it turned out!

I watched the first arrows shoot out, glittering with Armor-Cleaving Prismatic goodness, defying gravity for extra range and zipping in on the four-winged flying olthoi before they could evade. The first one was punched out of the air well before it could swoop over and past the melee lines, and Selena’s trio smoothly walked their shots over towards the other three present.

The olthoi weren’t dragonflies and couldn’t instinctively evade the dots of light coming at them effectively. While the shots rarely killed them outright, once they were on the ground they were much less threatening.

“The anti-magical nature of the Paradox Olthoi makes them much more dangerous to things that use magic than the normal Bloodlines. You notice their fliers don’t spit acid, right?”

“Huh. No, I hadn’t.” He promptly accessed the Markspace folders on Olthoi types and tactics to fight them, reading the updated material on them between glances about.

There was a grunt from Master Feld. It didn’t take much experience to tell when a Stone was about to surge again, and the Mick settled into a relaxed crouch, his feet an inch off the ground.

“They’ve less magical ability and pure intelligence than the pure breeds, and don’t grow quite as big or bad, but that anti-magical nature is proving useful against the Elementals. Their Queen has expanded a long distance north since the Prismatic Fields came into being, and the Summon points are reflecting her influence.”

“Has she removed a competing Queen or the like?” he asked pleasantly, just as Master Feld cursed, made a flinging motion, and whorls of blue Ice and purple Lightning erupted off the Stone the lugian was holding. They gathered quickly into a Matrix forming out of nowhere in the same manner as the Summons system.

The Mick was right in front of the Blizzard Dual Elemental as it formed, Bunita’s sparkling path of Lost Light shining with Prismatic slay-the-Elemental fun, shredding and slashing as he tore through the amorphous armor of its defenses and punched a deep Valorous Charge into it.

Busy with the olthoi, only two Archers were in support of him, but I was standing right there, dropped a Slashing Vuln IV on it, and waited patiently as he hacked it down in a whirlwind of cuts and slashes, while sparkling broadheads inserted themselves at precise and awkward points in its Matrix.

It took him less than thirty seconds to chew it down, its blows and spells crackling off and over Clan’s Baned-up surface, the Shield taking the magic and energy of its blows as it was meant to, and the spikes across its surface cutting and stabbing the appendages the Blizzard leveled upon the shifting blue-black barrier of its surface.

I retrieved the glittering jewels that fell from the Elemental as it died, and they joined a small sparkling heap of them on the Mick’s own Disk. Supplementary goldweight was still goldweight, and sometimes a truly valuable jewel would appear among the purified crystals and less precious gems that dropped from the Elementals here.

Best of all, most were Elementally-aligned, and so worth double value if used on something requiring that type of energy.

The Mick rejoined me, first inspecting Clan carefully to make sure there was no damage. “That Blueshine treatment be nice. A bit o’ a shame the Silvershine is a mite too bright fer me,” he commented.

The Blueshine alchemical treatment was one of the new Armor processes that Princess Kristie had started spreading, as were Shadowslake and Silvershine. Blueshine made the object so treated immune to acidic and corrosion effects, so effectively impervious to acid Elementals and acidic magic, and a cinch to maintain. Shadowslake made something non-magnetic, non-reflective, and non-generating sound when they struck something, perfect for stealth types.

The first two could stack, but Silvershine did not. Silvershine was bright, showy, and did everything Blueshine did, with the addition of being impervious to Lightning damage. You just had to be able to tolerate walking around in something as polished and bright as a silver mirror. No shininess meant no anti-lightning, so you couldn’t dim it down, either.

As a result, it was only used by the vainglorious or attention-seekers, or in Shields which could be covered when not fighting. As shiny as it was, it could be seen from a long way off, and it sent a clear message if you dared to wear it, too.

Still, while it wouldn’t help you wading through an acid pool or if immersed, the treated Armor or Shield took absolutely no damage from acid whatsoever, and Silvershine conducted any lightning that contacted it harmlessly away. That was an incredibly desirable effect!

“We don’t know if the Paradox Queen is bullying the others, or if they are being coordinated by the Queen Mother. Hey, you want to go wandering down to the closest Hive to the south and see what they are coughing up?” I inquired.

“Those be looking like Paradox Nobles over there,” he noted, his Grey Sword on Black Kite Shield Mask of Clarity coming down and magnifying his vision toward the olthoi watching unperturbed as their Summons were cut down. No doubt another group was already being rounded up and on the way, coming in about every ten minutes, with a major group arriving once an hour. The major group had been divided into three sections initially, but after the total failure of the first pincering attempt, they all just came straight up the middle in a horde of nearly a hundred of the things now.

Those were the fights where I dropped Speed on everyone and really let them go to town on the hacking and pounding, even the two cutters putting down their chisels to join the bashing crunch-work line of fighters. Blueshined Armor and Shields really did shut down the acidic aspect of the olthoi attacks.

“Yes,” I agreed with him. “It means this really is going to be a melee fight when it comes up here. The forces pressing further east haven’t reported any excessive numbers of Paradox yet, but I’ve no doubt there’s going to be some.”

“There be a Brood Hive on the southern slopes in the southeast there,” the Mick dredged up from memory. “Sits right on the main pass inta the North here. If that Queen were deposed and it now be spawning Paradox Olthoi, that might be important, aye?” he mused aloud.

“Creating work for yourself, I see.” The Melees were almost done with the olthoi, a heap of shattered carapaces already Burning vivic and crumbling with unnatural speed, even for Summons. It appeared their own Paradox nature made them a fast meal for vivus.

“I been putting all the Scouts I can through the Hives, getting the Achievement Feats an’ getting’ Favored Enemy bonuses up as fast as they can. The bugs are not a foe ta underestimate. Some o’ the kids actually take the advice seriously, especially when they get run over by swarms in the Hive Dungeons an’ barely make it out alive.”

“How’re the Roaches doing in Baishi?” I asked, inclining my head at his team.

“With Kopf there, they can hold their own steady-like, no issues there. Without him, they are shaky and they know it. They just cannae kill the stuff fast enough.” He flexed his arms unconsciously. “Need t’ be stronger, be able t’ push back against them an’ their mass in tight quarters where ye can’t dodge everything, an’ archery be not always possible. The girls be puttin’ a lot inta the flanking stuff for teamwork, but ye can’t surround an’ wolfpack a whole swarm o’ the things. It’s a harsh an’ cruel learning experience.”

All of the Roaches, even the slenderest and shortest women, were as strong as the strongest of natural humans by now, investing a lot of Karma into the Isparian side of the System to get their raw muscle up, if only so they could carry more. This was helped with Scout, Melee, and Archer Levels raising up their foundations with Cover Your Weakness.

The bugs were still stronger than they were, generally speaking, and they weighed more than any human of equal height, with the beetle-like ones up to twice that. When a dozen of them were running at you in a swarm, pushing, it wasn’t fun trying to hold them back, and finesse-style melee combat just didn’t work well in such circumstances.

“I’ve noticed they’re upgrading their Armor slowly, too, but they’re clinging to their agile fighting style, so they aren’t moving to the heavier armors.”

“Aye, an’ we not be tanks, so I’ll not press them on it. It be pressing on their limits, however. They be looking at Her Highness and those Bracers she wears pretty enviously…”

“And they saw how chopped apart she got without proper armor, right?” I asked in return.

He flashed a knowing smile. “An’ that after knowing how hard it be t’ hurt her. Woman acts like she’s made o’ steel or something,” he said knowingly. “Her Highness says there’s a couple Enchantments which make Armor move smoother, an’ they be very interested in them.”

Armor had Slot restrictions, and conserving those Slots while getting everything into them possible was important. The Classic combination was +V and Heavy Fortification, if you could reach it, giving you maximum protection and the highest order of protection against critical hits.

That took all ten Slots, however, meaning that if you wanted flexibility in your Armor, you had to overwrite some of the existing magic. It was also why Greater Soulbound was so beloved, granting +IV for just two Slots and some Essence!

“Celestial Mail, yes. I’ve seen them putting Nimbleness onto their Armor to up the Dex limit, yes.” Nimbleness increased the Dex bonus limit of your Armor by two. +2 to Armor Class for one Slot was a good deal, but you actually had to have the Dexterity to make it useful.

“What be Celestial Mail?” the Mick asked genially, always finding us a well of just more stuff that were possible that nobody else knew about.

“It’s a way to make Armor that is very light and strong. It’s also Slotless and pricey to construct, you’re basically making Armor along the Heavenly paradigm of what is worn by actual Angels and other Celestial warriors,” I informed him.