Unchosen Champion

Coop fought Enraged Defenders all day, refusing to yield his position on the battlefield. He kept swinging his ethereal glaive even as the sky turned blood red. The sunset’s brilliant display filtered through the red mana that encompassed the territory cast an ominous aura throughout Ghost Reef. Coop barely noticed.

He fought in the dark, illuminated by flashes of magic, as the ranged combatants did their best to thin the horde of monsters carpeting the island. Despite his battle-trance, he began to recognize abilities. Unable to associate the magic with a face, he simply acknowledged the skills themselves.

Tiny volcanoes, growing out of the sand like termite mounds would erupt, launching molten projectiles that scorched the Enraged Defenders and exploded into splashes of lava that destroyed or maimed any that were touched.

Black totems, gleaming like obsidian, embedded themselves into the ground as if they fell out of the sky, vibrated with energy and struck monsters near them with electric bolts that chained into the crowd, stunning those that weren’t fried completely.

Tiny droplets of glass swept forward, like sheets of rain, penetrating the monster’s armor and leaving them riddled with holes and collapsing on unsteady legs.

Green flares arced through the air, embedding themselves inside of whatever they touched, monster and ground alike, before burning like roman candles and exploding into pillars of flame when they ran out of wick.

Shimmering purple orbs that were difficult to look at directly, hovered across the scrubland in slow, straight lines, eroding the monsters and dissolving them into dust with barely a reaction, just by proximity, until the orbs disappeared themselves.

Chunks of frost, launched as if they were fired from a catapult, splashed onto the sand and unfolded into perfectly formed, giant snowflakes, 25 feet in diameter. Any monsters standing on them were frozen solid, allowing them to be shattered by the slightest touch.

Golden arrows raced through the air, puncturing metal limbs and bodies without losing any velocity, leaving a trail of shining light and defeated monsters until they simply disappeared, extinguished by a lack of mana.

The pattern would continue until it culminated in the most reliable attack of them all. When Charlie’s colossal tornadoes formed, swallowing multitudes of Enraged Defenders. All of the rest of the efforts to stem the tide of monsters paused when the Aeromancer took over the battlefield.

Shane had organized the ranged defenders into groups of three. One would cast their spells, while the other two recovered their mana or waited for cooldowns. The one exception was Charlie, who took a turn all by herself, resetting the cadence of attacks for the entire army. The archers would only be active as her tornadoes faded, before the first group of casters resumed their spells. Arrows were already becoming limited.

No matter how many spells they cast, monsters kept flowing forward, giving the melee fighters an unlimited supply of opponents.

The melee fighters that joined Coop had fallen back one-by-one, and for the most part didn’t return. Shane was forced to adjust their defensive strategy, as even though Coop and the others had successfully protected the bridge, it hadn’t been a meaningful victory. Coop remained in order to prevent monsters from reaching the main gate directly, allowing the phantoms to keep it open.

Unfortunately, the Enraged Defenders weren’t discouraged by the presence of the wide moat. Instead of funneling toward the bridge, like they had expected, the monsters simply leapt into the deep water. Eventually, they reappeared on the opposite wall, climbing the vertical stones with their spiked legs, and moving to assault the walls. They chiseled the outer bricks, attempting to dig their way into the fort, chipping away at the ground level stones. The phantoms inside the first floor repelled the monsters that appeared in front of the pillbox gaps, but many of the monsters found blind spots in between windows and remained.

The melee fighters that had joined Coop originally were now tasked with periodically sweeping the walls. Using Charlie’s tornadoes as their cue, they carved their way through the sieging monsters before returning through the main gate.

The walls held against the Enraged Defenders. As long as they were able to thin the masses before they accumulated against the surfaces, the reinforced walls would continue to stand. It was a credit to Jones’s careful maintenance, Balor’s diligent work, and the fort’s original construction.

The Cleary brothers had been a sight to behold. They fought aggressively, smashing through targets and charging together in formation, like a flying V. They were strong, especially against other armored targets, like the Defenders, but they were also the perfect standard for Coop to compare his stats to.

Despite being completely covered in metal as they fought, they were only capable of taking a few hits before they needed to retreat. A lunging attack from one of the monsters was enough to rip away their armor. They were strong enough to defeat the monsters, but their defenses wouldn’t allow them to withstand a series of attacks.

Coop’s overwhelming stats really made themselves apparent when he compared his survivability to theirs. Coop took hits here and there, but his health pool barely moved. He was protected with his ethereal armor, Mind over Matter, and Body attribute’s physical defense. Even when his health pool was scratched, he fully recovered the minor damage with the monster’s defeat.

He was much stronger than his companions, but against weak normal monsters that didn’t count for much. They were dead when their health pools hit zero, no matter how much overkill damage he applied. He was also significantly faster than his companions, allowing him to handle more targets, beyond just being way more durable.

Surprisingly, the residents that maintained the front line with Coop the longest were Camila and an elderly woman whose class was Dreadnought. Camila wasn’t able to maintain her speed for more than quick bursts, and the skills she used to assault her targets were limited by cooldowns, but her Perfect Counter ability let her stay in the fight for as long as she could prevent herself from taking damage. Her default Agility was enough to avoid the Enraged Defender’s attacks until she found an opportunity to counter, defeating monsters with their own efforts.

The Dreadnought was just an unassailable wall of conjured spiked armor. She was by far the lowest level of the fighters that Coop had seen, not even 20 at the start, but she made up for it by being nearly impervious to the monster’s attacks. They would leap at her and be stalled by thick iron shoulder spikes, unable to get purchase with their own pointed edges. Then the old lady would smash them with a one handed mace or gauntleted fist. It would take multiple swings to defeat them, but she got the job done. She ended up retiring due to getting tired rather than any limitation of resources.

The midrange fighters were able to shine while battling the monsters that climbed out of the moat. These were classes that were ranged, but couldn’t launch volleys far enough to reach the masses of monsters as they flowed toward the fortress. Instead, they excelled in the shooting gallery that the moat became.

Arthur’s Bloodseeker class was the real standout. Coop’s potential intelligence advisor was not just efficient, but he had style while fighting that made Coop jealous. He was convinced that the old man had an enormous amount of hand-to-hand combat experience. Coop thought Arthur was a ranged fighter, considering he had a series of bows for his weapons, but he actually practiced a melee skirmishing combat style that Coop dubbed Bow-Fu.

His arrows were daggers as much as they were projectiles, and the man’s whirling attacks were unpredictable enough that Coop couldn’t guess if he was closing distance for a stab or swiveling into a bow shot. Every time he fired an arrow from one of his shortbows, he also slid across the ground, leaving afterimages of himself in various, always elegant poses, like a cinematic guide on how he had just transitioned from firing a bow into a new position. It seemed like he could make distance, close in, or slide sideways at any given moment; an absolute terror to duel against. The arrow strikes themselves didn’t seem particularly devastating, but every wound seeped with red smoke that empowered his movements even further as they bled mana.

Sunny was another spectacle, howling until he glowed like the sunrise, he trotted along the walls with a tiny sun above his head that disintegrated Enraged Defenders as they struggled over the edge of the moat. He generated flames which orbited his sun orb that could be launched at enemies that withstood the beams, but he rarely had the opportunity to use them. He could also rush forward at a speed that might even rival Camila’s though he seemed to be limited to linear motions. In terms of morale, Sunny was a crowd favorite.

When the Dreadnought finally retired, Coop had the opportunity to use his new Fog of War ability. His first impression was that it would be extraordinarily useful. It seemed to behave in a similar way to how Charlie’s abilities escalated with her deliberate input.

When he activated the skill, it rapidly drained his mana as vapors of fog condensed from the ground around him. He could let it continue to consume mana to have the fog cover a larger area or for it to become denser. Unfortunately, the fog could barely resist the light breeze that flowed across the island, due to his low Intelligence, so he had to keep it condensed to a smaller area. It even seemed possible to direct it in some ways, forcing it to slowly flow in one direction or another, though it would take practice.

When the cloud of fog formed, the monsters that entered it were clearly disoriented. They couldn’t simply leave the cloud, and would instead meander through the fog in winding circles. If they pursued Coop, they were also confused. They ended up lost inside the fog, being turned around by the swirling haze and having their senses suppressed.

On the other hand, Coop actually felt like he had sensory overload when he first used the skill. He was suddenly aware of every sound, movement, smell, taste, and shape within the domain of fog. It was like all of the information was shoved directly into his mind in a way that skipped his senses and with way more detail than he would have noticed on his own. It was because Presence of Mind had a surprising synergy with the fog that flooded him with information.

He could hear individual grains of sand grinding against each other as they were depressed underneath his feet, and he could feel the differences in temperature between his skin and the air. It was overwhelming to the point that he had to dismiss the fog on his first attempt, allowing it to disperse in the breeze and putting the skill on a long cooldown.

He had more success while forming his domain in a more constrained area while also keeping it diluted. A light, almost invisible fog barely consumed any mana to maintain after the initial investment. As long as he kept injecting small amounts of mana into the skill he could keep it indefinitely. The thin fog lost its disorienting effects on the monsters, but it allowed Coop to acclimate to the additional sensory information that it gave him, letting his mind filter it the same way it was possible to ignore background noise. As he got used to it, he expanded it, pushing himself to adapt to the skill. He wanted to be able to use it to its fullest when he really needed it.

He spent most of the time fighting with hints of white smoke trailing off of his feet as he moved through an invisible fog bank that he let settle on the ground in front of the wooden bridge. Fog of War synergised nicely with Presence of Mind. It would be impossible to sneak up on him while he was within his domain of fog, no matter how thin it was, and others’ auras would be like beacons to his subconscious. It was no wonder the Zombie Lord had been able to steal the momentum from Coop when they fought inside his storm cloud, an area skill like this was a massive advantage in multiple different ways.

Coop kept fighting, experimenting with Fog of War, and refining his glaive techniques. Others came and went, displaying fantastic scenes, and rapidly gaining levels, but the monsters were constant.

The siege event had started as a battle of attrition. Coop wouldn’t be worn down, and Shane’s capable management of their forces allowed them to rest in waves while constantly maintaining enough firepower to prevent the walls from being overrun. The strategy split the organized parties, but allowed their forces to be better distributed for the duration of an extended fight.

Coop started fighting during the day, fought straight through the night, then fought through another day, and another night. It was day again and Coop could tell that less monsters were reaching his position in front of the wooden bridge. The monsters may be trying to wear them down, and they could potentially succeed given enough time, but for now they were also making everyone else stronger, more effective, and more experienced.

Residents and phantoms alike had been leveling like crazy. The nights had been a constant series of flashes, whether it was from the glow of levels on the walls or spells exploding on the battlefield. Charlie wasn’t the only one to have benefitted from the combat, though he doubted anyone would be able to match her ridiculous area of effect abilities. Even he had been able to dump more unallocated attribute points into his Mind stat, though he hadn’t had a chance to review any notifications or leaderboards yet.

Charlie’s tornadoes were ripping through the monsters and Coop was getting as close to a breather as he had the entire event when a loud beeping interrupted the sounds of the battlefield. Coop let his attention be drawn to the countdowns in his peripheral vision.

[000:00:00]

[000:00:07]

The second timer reached zero and the buzzer echoed across the islands. Some scattered cheering slowly built with relieved expressions of joy. Coop felt himself smiling as well. The Enraged Defenders had marginally slowed their push compared to the massive surge that they had arrived with. Coop even had a brief chance to check his notifications.

[You defeated Enraged Defender (Level 30)]

[+17 Basic Credits]

[Congratulations! You leveled up!]

…

[Congratulations! You leveled up!]

Quickly scanning the messages between cleaving the remaining monsters, he was happy to find two level up notifications and three more profession level ups. He was a level 53 Revenant with level 49 Basic Scavenging. He snuck a look at the event leaderboards as well.

Siege Event Individual Scores

Charlie Seraphin - 25,120

Coop - 21,264

Elder Olani - 9,245

Shane Peters - 8,123

Derek Anderson - 8,072

Reese Maddock - 7,501

Sunny Paws - 3,423

Arthur Anonymous - 3,238

Edith Buford - 2,337

Camila Alvarez - 2,323

Coop hadn’t expected to be ahead of Charlie, but he had been fighting non-stop the entire time. The real surprise was that there weren’t more casters on the leaderboard, but he guessed if they didn’t have the absurd area of effect range that Charlie did, then the downtime between casts would kill their efficiency. Otherwise, the leaderboard was delineated in a predictable way with the support classes dominating, followed by the top performing midrange classes, and then the melee. The rest of the thousand rankers hovered around a score of 1,000. The list was entirely composed of members of Ghost Reef.

Olani’s identity was so tied up in being an Elder, even the system recognized her as one. He guessed Sunny had selected his own last name, and Arthur’s was interesting. He thought it would be best not to ask the gentleman about it.

Siege Event Settlement Scores

Ghost Reef - 445,046 (x48828125)

Shinjuku Garden - 0 (x125)

Neon Park - 0 (x125)

…

None of the other settlements had started fighting yet. He cut through a handful of Enraged Defenders, and tried to rest a bit and check the global leaderboards. He was curious to see if Charlie had finally made it, but before he checked, warning bells started ringing.

Coop looked back at the fortress and spotted Shane frantically rearranging people that had wandered away from their posts, thinking the fight was over. Coop frowned, feeling like he was missing something as Camila rejoined him.

“What’s next?” Coop asked, keeping the weariness out of his voice. He was tired, but not exhausted. He shifted over to defeat another Enraged Defender that seemed to have lagged behind. Glancing around he realized there were still quite a few Defenders lingering. Strange.

Camila frowned as she pointed back across the dunes. “Ancient Prowlers.” Coop squinted, spotting the giant rat-like monsters as they faded in and out of view, like mirages on the sand, between Enraged Defenders that continued to trot across the dunes. “Shane wants to turtle up and close the gate. The Vulnerable debuff is too strong to keep sending people out and he doesn’t think they can do much damage to the walls.”

“Makes sense.” Coop nodded. “I’ll let myself back in.”

“Careful.” Camila warned him with a tap on his shoulder before she headed back inside.

Coop stretched his arms and legs, warming up for the next round. Compared to Ancient Defenders, Prowlers were a massive step up in terms of fighting ability, but Shane was right about them being less of a threat to the walls. They relied on their afflictions to be dangerous. He cleaved through two more Defenders and scanned the battlefield. There were still plenty of Enraged Defenders. Were they really done with the first wave?

Coop swapped to his spear and shield, wanting to hunt down the Defenders with his mistjumps before the Prowlers arrived. He dashed between monsters, but his efforts didn’t seem to be thinning their numbers. By the time the Prowlers started getting in range, there were actually more Defenders than there had been ten minutes earlier.

He was abruptly made aware of dozens of Ancient Prowlers by the fog that still lingered around him, like a stray thought had suddenly entered his brain. He searched, but couldn’t see them, but when he threw his spear to where Presence of Mind indicated one should be, he successfully impaled an unsuspecting and invisible monster.

The Ancient Prowlers were already there!