Chapter 672: Sphering Voidening (1/2)
Chapter 672 Sphering Voidening
Ilea invested her stats into Vitality, to get a little bit more of an edge against anything that waited for her down in the dark cavern below. She checked the locator for a moment and found that it pointed in the same direction. Because of course it would. What if the Fragment wants the same thing I want?
She tried not to overthink it. As it stood, she expected to fight the lich either way. It either believed itself invincible against her or was simply too focused on whatever it wanted from the death of the void creature. A creature it couldn’t slay on its own, a level one thousand sapient lich fragment. In the end it had blackmailed her, threatening to kill her allies if she didn’t do its bidding. A bidding that seemed to be a win win situation but Ilea would make sure its actions had consequences. Something the creature must’ve forgotten in its undead life dwelling in its northern dungeon.
“Will you go then?” the fragment asked in a strained voice.
“You’ve waited how? I might die if I rush it and you can wait another thousand years for the next suitable candidate,” she murmured absentmindedly, spreading her wings and layering her mantle as she gathered heat within her chest. Maybe I can even ally myself with whatever is down there, she thought with a smirk and jumped.
Her wings made her float down slowly, her dominion spreading out again below as she left the influence of the icy walls in the City of Glass dungeon above. The environment turned to stone, more jagged and natural than what the liches had surely created or altered. Her enhanced eyes let her see even in the complete darkness of the cave.
Ilea noted the lack of space in the area, seven small crevices leading deeper into the stone with dozens more spreading out like the roots of a tree. She saw occasional spheres of stone missing in the area, easily explained by the void magic mention.
So far she couldn’t find a creature waiting for her, so she instead used her locator to find where the key would be. It was the only reason they had come here after all, and now that her companions seemed to be safe up above the dungeon, she could do pretty much whatever she wanted. Ilea planned to fight the monster either way, now or whenever she was ready. If only to fuck with whatever the lich was planning to do.
She listened for anything in the vicinity, checking with Eternal Huntress to see if she could find trails of a powerful being. She did.
Well, very informative, she thought, her skill letting her know that there had been a creature beyond her level somewhere within these caverns. She smiled to herself, wondering if that part of the skill would ever truly be useful. Pretty much everywhere she went had monsters that outmatched her in pure magical prowess. Me seeking out dangerous places doesn’t help, she thought, climbing deeper while mostly using her teleportation. She didn’t exactly want to bruteforce her way through with her ash. Everything seemed somewhat unstable. Nor did the skeletons of various creatures currently stuck between chunks of stone instill a lot of confidence in the structural integrity of this den.
Gods I would’ve slapped myself back on Earth if I ever even considered going cave diving. Without a lamp, rope, a radio, a team to get me out if something happens, or enough space to move through stuff.
Ilea just hoped half of it wasn’t full of water but so far that didn’t seem to be the case, the temperature even so far down into the earth still incredibly cold. Her dominion skill made any considerations for claustrophobia entirely irrelevant. Coupled with her teleportation and sheer physical might, there was simply no rational reason to be scared of confined spaces. And Ilea never had that fear to begin with, one of the common ones she understood on a logical level.
Same as deep waters, she thought, shuddering as the eye of the Leviathan flashed within her mind. Aftershock mind attack I suppose, she thought, trying to discern where the water creature was located in the surrounding space. She hit her head when she found a single eye staring back at her. Not the Leviathan’s but that of a mostly humanoid creature hanging on a wall deeper in the cavern.
It had a single head with a single eye, its body thin and elongated, its rib cage open to reveal a gaping maw that followed most of its torso’s length. Four thin and bony three jointed limbs with long clawed fingers kept it on the side of the wall as it looked her way, waiting.
Ilea couldn’t shake the instant familiarity, the being reminding her of the Soul Rippers from Tremor in a more than uncanny way. The way its spine pushed up through the skin, barely ten kilos of meat on the two meter long creature, and most of it was arms and legs. Can it see through the stone, she thought, the creature still a few dozen meters away from her.
“Hello,” she sent, in an effort to find a diplomatic solution.
The creature didn’t react, remaining where it was without making the slightest move.
Not a communicative fellow then, she thought, checking her locator to find the key deeper still. She teleported once more and found the pupil of the being following her, its body remaining in the same position.
Yeah, that’s very soul rippery. Did you get summoned here by the Ascended too? she wondered. Next she used monster hunter without any changes to it, trying to see if there were more of them or other creatures. But again, the thing remained motionless.
Don’t mind me then, Ilea thought and teleported past, going for the key. As soon as she had passed the height of the creature, it moved, its arms quickly pushing it through the crevices with practiced and instant motions.
Ilea couldn’t help but feel a little creeped out, watching the thing approach through her dominion at a far faster pace than seemed both logical and possible in these cramped and dark crevices. When it reached a ten meter distance, its eye started glowing within her dominion.
She could detect several auras, one expanding past her and currently eating away at her mantle at a concerning pace, another one closer to the being and seemingly only reaching about the ten meter radius around it. She knew it would do something to her teleports but compared to Audur’s preventive aura, this one seemed a purely defensive one. The being stopped when Ilea didn’t move, remaining about seven meters and just as many nooks and crannies away from her.
Hmm, void huh? she thought, watching her mantle in a constant battle of destruction and reformation. Pretty impressive stuff too.
Ilea teleported up a few times to see if the creature just defended its lair, but she found that it followed now, its destructive aura similar to her own dominion coupled with reverse reconstruction. Well, we can see who has better recovery, mr void, she thought and sent destructive mana towards it in turn.
The creature didn’t react at first, not even flinching at the reverse healing capable of destroying Taleen Guardians damn near instantly.
Ilea could feel the fabric around her changing, corrupted in a sense as she watched the wisps float away, pushed instead of guided. She was about to teleport when she saw the spherical field of magic around the core of whatever spell the being was casting. Something would happen if she passed through with a skill, but she didn’t yet know what. Deciding to avoid the ability in a more direct sense, she simply crossed her arms in front of her, added a few ashen spikes and slammed into the stone.
Barely a moment had passed since she first sensed the creature’s spell, her armored body crashing through several sets of stone walls, everything behind her collapsing before it all vanished. The larger magical sphere had manifested in the fabric, closing in on the core and taking all matter with it. A loud noise resounded as the nearby air filled in the void, some of the stone pulled away too.
Ilea had managed to avoid the area mostly, her left wing healing from the much stronger effects of the concentrated spell. Her Eternal sight hadn’t activated, likely due to her third tier Void Magic Resistance. She wouldn’t vanish like the stone and air. I wonder where that matter goes, it can’t just vanish entirely. Maybe just made into mana? Or sent to some general pocked dimension? Maybe there’s a space in the fabric always available but just empty?
It hardly mattered, Ilea now teleporting next to the creature to finally get a read on it with her identification skills. Thought as much, she mused, appearing a few meters away from the being just where its aura ended. Can’t teleport into matter after all, or what is perceived as matter.
Another sphere formed where she stood, Ilea risking the activation now that she saw what had happened before. She teleported out, her spell interrupted where she passed the field, all the void magic flashing towards the breach instead of the previous center. She didn’t wait for it to reach her, instead using her second teleport to try again. The field was gone and neither was she interrupted once more but it meant she had to use both her spells on one of the spheres to escape.
Where she appeared, another sphere formed. Her first skill would likely be ready once the sphere closed but she simply pushed forward, not quite able to break through the walls as well as on her first attempt, the void magic ripping everything around her into nothingness, a part of her mantle dissolving and her flesh and bone below shaken by the flash of dense magic. She coughed up blood, half her body destroyed by the spell and healing quickly. She didn’t lose any limbs or organs but everything felt wrong, her third tier healing working hard to recover everything.
Before she could do anything else, the next sphere appeared, this time coupled with three more.
Ilea didn’t hesitate, her mantle flowing into an ashen drill before she pushed onward, her healing recovering her armor as she punched through the dense underground breaking walls and stone, barely slowing down within the caverns as spheres of void magic caught the falling debris and sent it into nothingness. Might as well have that thing remove its whole lair, she thought with a grin, back at full health as she circled around.
The creature still rushed after her, ignoring the falling chunks of stone hitting its body as its eye flashed time and time again.