Chapter 1653 (2/2)
The strike from Elhume’s hand annihilated even the chaotic void space with its passage. Aether and Nether seemed to ignite each other endlessly in their collisions, infected by Elhume’s furious emotions. The resulting wave blasted outward, covering several hundred meters a second.
“Someone needs to buy me two seconds,” Randidly said. To his own ears, his voice sounded hollow and faint. He braced one hand against the ground as he continued to carve the body of his array. He didn’t even have the spare time to look up at the oncoming doom. Steam wafted from his shaking shoulders.
Congratulations! Your Skill Left Hand the Nether Oracle (M) has grown to Level 309!
Congratulations! Your Skill Architecture of the Primordial Ways (M) has grown to Level 424!
“I can-” Helen began, but she was thankfully pushed to the side by Seeker Three-Tails and Seeker Dusk Jackal. Their billow auras thankfully convinced Helen to stand down.
Randidly couldn’t didn’t have a spare moment to throw a thankful glance toward these two, but he felt the two Pinnacle Seekers glance at each other. Almost all the distance between Elhume’s original strike and their current position was devoured by the chaotic grey destruction. Then the two Pinnacle Seekers turned forward and flared their images. Powerful, sharp figures exploded upward and lashed out at that oncoming wave.
Force met force and the attacks of the Pinnacle Seekers cut deeply into the spreading wave. A half-second passed, bought by their initial strikes. But as soon as they pushed that roiling force backward, more destructive energy began to close in from the sides. In another .2 seconds, the images began to falter and fade from the engulfing tide of destruction. Ambient energy from the shockwave corroded their details and stained their meaning. The edges of the images’ shape began to be smudged. There was a horrible squelching noise, like bare feet in cold mud, as the images began to melt before that wave.
With the two Pinnacle Seekers' efforts, they had endured for 1.4 seconds. Randidly’s trembling intensified.
Elhume’s attack was fueled primarily by emotion, but it was emotion on a scale of intensity that left Randidly shaken. Or maybe he was simply shaking because he was so, so close and his body was sluggishly struggling to finish the Nether Ritual.
.5 more seconds… His fingers were a burning, smoking, shaking blur.
Randidly’s eyes were bloodshot and he couldn’t remember the last time he took a breath. At the moment, his confused and overstrained body didn’t even know whether it was time for him to inhale or exhale. The two powerful attacks from the Pinnacle Seekers faded away like a glass of bright cranberry juice poured into a lake. All of their abilities were diffused in a split second. The horrible wave surged forward and smashed against the edge of their ice globe.
BOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM!!!
CRACK!
Instantly, the walls shuddered and fractured underneath the vicious pressure. Cracks snaked outward through the thick layer of ice. Light refracted the slanted and broken bits of ice, making the scene outside of the safe harbor provided by the Frost Matriarch seem even more chaotic. But from the abrupt spike in the ambient cold of Randidly’s surroundings, it was clear that she was furiously throwing herself against the energy that was repeatedly brutalizing the ice globe. The cracks spread to cover every surface, held together by only the piercing image of ‘frozen’ that the Frost Matriarch maintained.
Randidly released a breath and coughed as he looked down at the hasty Nether Ritual he had created. This will have to do. No more time to spare...
By the end of it, Randidly was relying entirely on instinct as he shaped the Nether Ritual. There was the barrier, the Nether infrastructure that would maintain and strengthen the barrier, and then his body in between them, catching the energy that couldn’t be completely screened by the barrier and preventing that energy from destroying the functional apparati of the Nether Ritual.
But honestly, perhaps it was better that everything was done entirely by instinct. Nether was the energy of amorphous connections between individuals and of the weight of context and history. Clearly defined shapes were not Nether’s forte.
When the ice barrier cracked audibly for a second time, Randidly dropped to his knees and pressed his hands to the ground. His Nether Core was currently running on fumes, but he had set a sufficient amount of Nether to the side before he had started. That energy gratefully escaped his body and flowed through the runes of the array.
Flames of Nether Weight flickered to life along his arms, steadying Randidly for what was to come.
As the ice was cracking and shuddering its way toward a total collapse, the precise Nether Ritual began to glow. A seemingly flimsy barrier flickered and stretched to cover the whole of their little frozen lifeboat. The shockwave changed targets from the ice wall to this flimsy barrier and ground its dangerous emotions and radiation against the new arrival. The barrier flexed slightly, but most of that destructive force was first insulated by a layer of space and then transferred directly to Randidly’s body.
Congratulations! Your Skill Precise Nether Ritual (L) has grown to Level 266!
“Keh…!” Randidly began to tremble and vomited up a mouthful of blood on the ground. At the same time, his images gratefully took over the lion’s share of the effort from his Nether Core. As soon as his body was injured, his powerful Health Regeneration, empowered by his images, began to knit him back together.
But the first backlash was honestly the most manageable. What followed was a series of endless waves of destructive force that sought to tear his body to shreds. Randidly gritted his teeth and did his best to endure.
Congratulations! Your Skill Chimeric Impunity (M) has grown to Level 367!
Congratulations! Your Skill Stigma of the Stillborn Phoenix (L) has grown to Level 319!
Congratulations! Your Skill Yyrwood Flesh of Yggdrasil (L) has grown to Level 343!
Congratulations! Your Skill Grit of the Ascendant Bane (T) has grown to Level 407!