Rune Seeker

“Hiral, we can’t see the Enemy yet,” Seena said. “Do you still have eyes on it?”

Tracking the invisible monster as it swept back and forth through the rain, Hiral gave the affirmative answer.

“Great, slap this on it,” Seena said as Vili swooped in beside him. The next second, a notification window popped up telling him Seena had used Shared Strengthto give him access to her Target ability.

“Smart,” he replied, focusing on the Enemy and activating the ability.

As soon as red outlined the sleek form darting through the rain like a long, flexible arrow, the monster stopped cold, twisting in the air until one end pointed in their direction. It sensed the ability? Before Hiral got an answer to his question, the closest end exploded into a swarming mass of tentacles.

“Oh, it looks pissed,” Seeyela said as the party reached the edge of the town, just a few hundred feet away from the writhing maw.

“Not as much as me. Hit it!” A line of fireballs appeared above Seena’s outstretched right hand, while her left clawed across. Cinder+ scarred one of the tentacles, causing it to recoil slightly, but then all ten appendages stopped at once.

Hiral pulled both triggers on his RHCs as he continued sprinting forward, but he wasn’t really paying attention to whether they hit or did damage. No, his eyes were on the balls of energy unfurling at the tip of each tentacle. What was it…?

Runes of Energy. Ten of them etched the air as they solidified.

“Scatter!” Hiral commanded, launching himself to the side, and the sisters did the same.

Not a second too soon, either, as ten beams of slicing energy cut through the air where they’d just been. Unlike the bolts from Hiral’s RHCs, though, these beams didn’t end after a heartbeat. Instead, they tracked along, following the racing party members.

Two of the beams even cut a weaving pattern in the air as they chased after a dodging Drake.

Need to get its attention off Dr. Benza and completely on us.

Hiral had two beams chasing him, while Seeyela and Seena each had three, and he pulled his triggers again. A loooooong red health bar appeared over the Enemy’s head as these bolts of Impact hit it, but it wasn’t enough to get more of the monster’s attention. It wouldn’t let the biggest target go that easily, and the slicing beams were already catching up to the swerving Dracolich. All it would take was just one touch to cancel its summons, and then the three researchers would be left on their own—hundreds of feet up.

He sheathed his RHCs on his thighs as he ran on planes of Rejection down behind one of the town’s buildings, but the beams cut clean through the stone like a hot knife through butter. Red-hot seams glowed in the rain where the energy blasts passed, and Hiral could only shake his head and redouble his efforts.

Grabbing his blunderbuss, he bound up above the roof of the closest building, pulled the trigger, and then flipped and shot back down towards the road. The concussive impact of his blast sounded over the falling rain while the beams trailed after where he would’ve been, had he not changed direction.

With a second of freedom from the tracking beams, Hiral quickly canceled and activated Foundational Split. Left and Right sprinted down a nearby alley without a word. Purple flames trailed after Right as Left shaped his Wing of Anella and then combined two other tattoos to use his Touch of Night. With the dark storm clouds overhead, the double would be practically invisible in the shadows, and the buff to his physical stats would make him a real terror.

Hiral still had his part to play, too, as the tentacle beams were already homing in on him again. Seems Dr. Benza was right. Even after breaking line of sight with it, it knows where I am.

Left and Right splitting off had helped, though, with a beam each turning in their directions. Did that mean Drake was free of pursuit?

Another burst of Rejectionshot him back up over the roof to pull his trigger again. Whomp. The blast slammed into the side of the hovering Enemy at the same time a barrage of fireballs lit it up like a celebration. While the monster was consumed in roiling flames that instantly turned the pouring rain to steam, Hiral scanned the sky for the Dracolich.

Apparently also seeing the Enemy preoccupied with being trapped within a maelstrom of flame, Drake made a break for it. The stone building Dr. Benza had to have been talking about sat a few hundred feet behind where the flames were just now dissipating, and Drake raced past.

Eight beams of energy still cut through the rain—and the flames—towards the party dancing around the squid. Wait, eight?

Balls of force shot out of the flames, parting the rain in the blink of an eye to leave a tunnel carved behind them. Before Hiral even had a chance to shout a warning, the twin bolts of Impact slammed into Drake’s wings.

The Dracolich vanished without a sound to leave three panicked researchers hurtling through the air.

Hiral pushed solar energy into his Runes of Time Dilation and Time Contraction, the whole world grinding to a pause around him. Individual raindrops slowed to a crawl. The flames around the squid parted in places to reveal—well, nothing. The monster was still invisible. The eight beams hung like concentrated rays of light, so pure and sharp they could cut through steel.

And, most importantly, three wide-eyed researchers paused in their uncontrolled flight.

Reaching out with threads of energy, Hiral tethered himself to the three, his Runes of Separation, Gravity, and Connection getting to work. The first rune severed the natural pull of gravity on them, though only for an instant, while the second and third runes reversed the pull on them towards the clouds above. That too would only last for a few heartbeats, but it would have to be enough.

With that done and the pressure in the back of his head starting to come down on him like a sledgehammer, Hiral quickly wound out a few more runes. Rejection beneath his feet to send him towards the researchers. More twisting of Gravity and Expansion to create a field around him to catch them, and Connection to make it all easier.

Finally, with the pain enough to make his vision blur, he released his hold on his time runes and sprang towards the researchers. Their terrified screams quickly turned to ones of confusion as they began to fall in the wrong direction—toward the sky—but Hiral was there before they could get too far. His field of reduced gravity enveloped them as he passed, pulling them along as if they were caught in his wake.

Even with them saved from an abrupt meeting with the stone road, they weren’t safe yet, with more bolts of Impact cutting through the rain in their direction. Tethers of Attraction pulled Fenil, Laseen, and Dr. Benza to Hiral, while a fourth tether reached for the ground and then yanked them all down. The powerful bolts missed the group by bare inches, but then they were down beneath the level of the buildings, and Hiral cushioned their fall with a wide burst of Rejection.

Whomp, whomp, whomp, whomp. Stone chips exploded from the walls of the building beside them, more bolts of Impact from the Enemy hammering away. Even hidden by the walls, the rain was telling the monster exactly where they were. The rain, huh?

“Run for the building when I say,” Hiral said.

He then concentrated on the falling rain and pushed energy into his Rune of Rejection. Up and down the street, a hundred feet in all directions, the rain seemed to hit a barrier ten feet above the ground. Streams of water quickly slid down the slightly angled field to pour like waterfalls on the sides, but for the most part, no rain fell on the center of the street—or the people there.

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“Go! Now!” Hiral shouted.

Not waiting to be told twice, the three researchers bolted for the large, white building. Whomps came in a quick staccato as more and more blasts of Impact shredded Hiral’s field, the Enemy obviously aware he was up to something. Thankfully, he didn’t have to hold out for more than a few seconds, the researchers already vanishing within the building. As long as there weren’t any major holes in the roof, the three of them should be safe in there.

Which just left the Enemy for the party to deal with.

Leaving the mangled field of Rejection in place for the moment, Hiral dashed down an alley in the direction of the monster. Thanks to the Target debuff he’d put on it, he could see the red outline of it even through the stone walls of the buildings. Seeing it and killing it were two very different things, though.

Fire bloomed above the town as Seena scored another barrage of hits with her fireballs, and Hiral vaulted out of the alley with a burst of Rejection. Death Knell and Stormstrike came to his sides as he called on them, Ever Changing+ reaching its third stack, and he thrust both hands forward. All eight beams of concentrated energy seemed to be chasing Seena as his blades struck the monster, and View finally gave him some information on it.

(Boss) Enemy – Unknown Rank

Okay, it really didn’t give any information other than confirming the monster was the dungeon’s Boss. Still, his blades cut into the Enemy, shaving red off its health bar, and his feet touched down on a flat roof. If it wanted to focus all its attention on Seena, that was fine with him—for now—and he lashed out with attack after attack from the flying blades.

And he wasn’t the only one.

With the Enemy floating motionless twenty feet above the road like some kind of stationary weapons platform firing endlessly at Seena, it was practically a sitting duck for the others. Seeyela Bamf’d on top of it, her feet skidding along the slick, rain-coated surface before she caught her balance and lifted her Fangs of the Lady above her head. The green corona of energy surrounding each weapon sharpened, and another crack of thunder and lightning outlined the silhouette of a massive spider in the sky.

Then, with a wordless yell of anger, she drove both weapons straight down into the Enemy’s body. Green veins of energy spread like fire through a dry wheatfield across the invisible body, the tentacles twitching as the venom took hold. Before the monster could repurpose those appendages to swat at the madly stabbing Unseen Fang on its back, something rose from below on a five-foot-wide pillar of purple flame.

Right slammed into the Enemy with enough force to bend the creature around his blow, and purple fire spilled out in all directions. The assault didn’t end there, though. The nimble double somehow flipped himself around to follow up with a brutal axe-kick that again trailed infernal flames and buckled the Enemy’s large body.

Not to be outdone, Left leapt off a nearby building, his Wing of Anella trailing snowflakes in his wake. Pure darkness covered his body from head to toe, exposing nothing but eyes like burnt coals. With his Dagger of Sath lifted and ready to strike, his other hand touched his thigh, where the tattoo of The Pack lay. Even before he hit the Enemy recoiling from Seeyela and Right’s attacks, six infernal wolves joined his leap.

Fangs bared and bone spines extended, the bulky canines crashed into the Boss at the same time Left thrust his dagger into its invisible body. The trailing stream of burning, purple water raced from behind to catch up with the strike, then exploded down into the monster.

Between the trio of devastating assaults, the Boss would have to be feeling it, and…

A sphere of force ripped outward from the squid, catching Left, Right, Seeyela, and the hounds like they were spread across a giant—and growing—soap bubble. It hit them hard enough to drop Seeyela’s health by twenty percent in the Party Interface, hurling them away.

Right cratered the stone directly below the Enemy, where he crunched into the road. Left and the hounds slammed into—and through—the wall of the building they’d leapt from. Seeyela got thrown straight up into the falling rain—which seemed like the safest direction, until the squid pivoted around so fast its tentacle came across like a giant flail.

WHAAAAM! The appendage caught Seeyela in the side, bending her body around the limb before sending her rocketing toward another building.

Bamf, bamf. She vanished before she smashed into the solid stone, only to appear back in the air again. A third and fourth bamf settled her back on the ground, but her legs swayed weakly beneath her, and her health sat at a bare 50%. Through it all, like it knew exactly where she was going, the squid turned in her direction and reached out with its tentacles. Only the falling rain across its invisible skin and the red lines from Target showed the progress of the limbs as they snaked towards Seeyela, and the woman took a step back.

Her knee buckled immediately—the woman was obviously still hurting from the blow she’d taken—but she lifted one of her Fangs to ward off the Enemy. The dagger shook in the air, her entire arm quivering from the effort of holding the weapon upright.

Runes seared to life on the ends of each of the tentacles: Five Energy and five Impact. Enough firepower to completely erase the woman.

Hiral snapped his left arm down, Death Knell following the motion to slice across the side of squid’s body, then activated Cutting Field. Dozens of invisible blades slashed at the large monster within the blue column of light. If the squid even noticed the attacks, it didn’t show it.

Instead, solar energy gathered in the runes, reaching a crescendo within the blink of an eye, then released.

Cutting beams and balls of crushing force parted the falling rain and… slammed into a pair of flaming wings that came across to shield Seeyela at the last second. Explosions of Impact sent out shockwaves to both sides, while a cloud of steam rose from where rain met fire. The beams of Energy continued even as Hiral drew out his Blightsteel Sabre and kept attacking with it and Stormstrike. His assault was definitely shaving off small portions of the monster’s health bar with each hit, but it was still ignoring him.

At the same time, the Enemy seemed to realize its bombardment wasn’t working, and it tilted back to hold all ten tenacles above it. More runes immediately formed—as did a ball of Energy and Impact as big as Hiral. Power like a small sun radiated outward, turning more rain to steam in an instant and even slagging stone.

Another barrage of strikes with his swords still did nothing to hamper the monster, and the ball of power was suddenly as big as the squid. Without waiting for more, the Enemy leaned forward and hurled the ball of destruction at where Seena and her sister hid within the steam.

Except they weren’t hiding, and the screech of a powerful bird of prey threw back the curtain of steam. Wings stretching from one end of the street to the other, the flaming phoenix shot forward to meet the Enemy’s attack.

Primal flames met sun-like plasma and unstoppable force, and… passed right through it.

Seena’s movement ability scorched past the ball of energy to roar over the Enemy itself. Flames licked and bit at the squid as the ability engulfed the monster before moving on, while the ball of destruction erupted back where Seena had been protecting her sister.

Everything within a block of the impact zone vanished as the ball massively grew in size, bright light flooding the village to make it seem like high noon. Heat cascaded outward, evaporating all the rain across the village in a heartbeat.

Like a pause in the battle, everything ceased: The constant thrum of pouring rain, the thunder and crack of lightning, the clashing sounds of combat.

Beyond the squid, now only visible because of the red outline from Target, Seena’s phoenix ability touched down on a nearby roof. Seeyela and Right stepped out of the flames at her side, small licks of fire running along them. In the Party Interface window, Seeyela’s health steadily crept up—likely some kind of heal-over-time effect from her sister’s movement ability.

Handy she picked up Right on the way. Must’ve gotten the utility to bring other people with her when we ranked up.

On another roof, Left stalked to the edge, the Touch of Night still coating him and the six wolves of The Pack beside him. With the others in position, Hiral relinquished control of the two swords, then wrapped his hands around the hilts of the Bestial Axes.

The Enemy had taken some of their strongest blows and shrugged them off. But the reverse was also true.

As the thunder boomed overhead and the rain sloshed down like a curtain, phase two of the battle began in earnest.