Dee was ecstatic as she continued to prepare Demolisher’s Devastation with the [Trap] Skill Evolution. She had planted all types of acid, ice, hyper-abrasive silicate particles – all manner of Nebula and Flux effects. But the repeated Skills had tapped her dry, and she leaned against the sides of this temporary wall as she sucked in air.
The creatures below were still making their way up towards the trio; a shrieking horde of monstrosities that were completely alien even to someone like Dee who had seen a lot of the various species in Khrox and along The Cosmic Corridor. There are maybe…a few hundred left? She thought.
Glancing sideways at Greg, he was still pulling back the phantom bowstring as projectiles of lava manifested in his grip. He was precisely picking off each of the large creatures but left the small ones. “I’m getting low on energy,” he said with a determined, monotone voice.
Priam got next to Dee and looked over the edge, “They are about to climb up the pillar!”
Dee grinned, held out her hand before her, and formed it into a fist. “Detonate.”
She cackled with manic glee as the entire base of the tower exploded; not harming the stone itself, as she designated the tower’s stone itself as a ‘no harm’ zone thanks to her Artillerist’s Discipline Skill. The cacophonous, riotous explosions shook the air around the trio as all manner of Cosmic and Ascended Power effects went off; acid bursts, freezing winds, slicing gales, ultra-fine particles of silicate that sandblasted away flesh and bone.
Greg winced as the air blew back, “Damn, you’ve put a lot into that.”
Dee clapped her hands with excitement and cackled with glee as she looked over at the carnage she had wrought. “Look at the craters!” she shouted as she grabbed Priam by the scruff of the neck armor, lifted him up slightly, and helped him see over the higher ledge.
Priam nodded, “Looks like they’re pretty much dead.”
Greg shook his head, “There are still some survivors.” He gripped the center of his bow and split it into two blades. “I’m going down to clear out the survivors.” He hoisted his bulk over the wall, planted one of the blades into the tower, and slid down in a controlled descent before beginning his headlong charge down the hill.
Dee looked at Priam, “Mind juicing me up?”
The bunny priest nodded, “Fount of Energy (Rank 5).” A stream of white and gold energy shot out from his body and into Dee’s suffusing her with the energy needed to use her Skills. Priam sagged down behind the edge of the tower and sucked in deep breaths of air. “Go…get them…I’m going to…take a nap.”
Dee looked back to the front and began blasting. One shot per target, focusing on the ones that were approaching Greg but further back to ensure he did not get overwhelmed. Not that he would need to worry about that, she thought. These things have hardly posed a threat.
She heard him scream out in pain as one of the creatures closed in with him and bit down – through his rocky shell, Priam’s barrier, and all of his other Skills.
Quinn’s voice came over the comms, “The impact point of their natural weaponry pierces all Skills. Something about the nature of the Astral Verge and how it interacts with our universe. Xera is still working on it. Avoid getting hit!”
Greg’s voice came over the comms – he sounded like he was in a minute amount of pain, “Now you tell me!”
Dee raised both of her hands, “Demolisher’s Devastation (Rank 13) [Broadside]!” Instead of focusing on single targets to conserve energy, she launched a massive volley that would hit every target she focused on and had the energy to effect. The bullet-like spheres of neon-green acid shot out from her, hit each target on the battlefield that was still moving, and then detonated. The Astral Demons were obliterated and collapsed.
Greg dispatched the one that he was in melee with, and looked up towards the tower giving a thumbs-up as his voice came over the comms. “We’re good! What now?”
“We release the souls trapped inside,” Xera replied.
“Come again?” Jace asked Ollie who was tossing the white goopy substance between his paws.
“This is Essence. What Astral Demons – creatures native to the Astral Verge – are made of. Xera figured out after your last encounter back on Graskorn that this is what they are composed of at their base level of existence – much how everything in our universe is Stardust.”
“Then the blue things I saw released from the body when you dusted it…were those souls?”
“Yup! Astral Demons use Souls and Universal Matter as a type of ‘currency’ within their Astral System to level up. It could explain why Troxanir wants to grow his black hole – he wants more Universal Matter to level up faster. And, he catches Souls on their way through the singularity.”
Xera’s voice came over the comms, “The other team dealt with their Incursion as well. No casualties for Dark Between Stars Signers.” She sighed, and he could feel the frustration behind her words. “I have to rework plans. With this knowledge and my conjectures – plus millions of simulations I ran – I can only conclude that Troxanir is hoarding Souls and growing in power. Every death within our universe of a sentient creature empowers him further. And, these creatures using Universal Matter to ‘level up’ within the Astral System explains why he wants Oblivion to grow. It directly gets him more currency to ‘level up’.”
“The last one I fought back on that cat-person world-”
“Graskorn,” Ollie stated.
“Right, that place,” Jace continued, “I had to completely destroy the thing with Void Beam…but this one died to the heart being struck?”
Xera responded, “I have been tweaking how Cosmic and Ascended Power interact with Astral Demons. Results should be more akin to what you would expect from fighting something from our universe – but I have to keep tweaking as we meet new creatures from that layer of reality, and I gather more data.”
Ollie flew over to Jace, stretching the Essence between his paws. “Xera’s going to be sending you to Poltor Six on your own. The focus is going to be getting you to Tier 10 as fast as possible – so no more Stardust split with your party members. The rest of the group are going to be called the AIRS – Astral Incursion Response Squad. While you are off getting stronger to face Troxanir, they will be keeping those Demons at bay.”
Jace nodded, “Makes sense to me. What can we do what that Essence, though?”
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Xera’s voice came through the earpiece, “When enough is accumulated, I can determine what exactly it is and then make a…backdoor to this ancient Astral System that is used in that layer of reality. It should enable me to create a means for The Cosmic System to interface with it. I imagine that this Essence will be a type of currency, much like Stardust is.”
Ollie squeezed his little paws and the strands and tendrils of whitish-goopy energy vanished in a glimmer of starlight. Jace looked around at the shattered and devastated battlefield. He saw the corpses of the fallen all around; dozens of Signers for both factions. “Ollie, might as well dust them, too.”
The otter nodded and began to harvest the Stardust. It took a few minutes, as he was tethered to Jace and he had to move about the battlefield to reach every body.
-----
[Stardust Acquired: 900]
-----
“Hey, what are you doing!” a voice shouted at Jace from the side. Looking over, he saw a group of Conclave Signers – their fingers glowing with black energy – who were staring at him.
“Ollie,” Jace whispered. “Is there anything keeping me from taking them out?”
“Nope!” Ollie replied as he flew into Jace’s hood once more and wriggled around until he was on top of his head. “They work for Troxanir, you can wipe them out if you want. Xera advocates it.”
Jace glanced behind him, and saw some Pulsar Coalition forces that were recovering from the fight and their flight. “What about them?”
“Clear out the Conclave and they will work to dismantle anything they have done on Velenar Prime. I will tell Xera to start talking to them to coordinate it.”
Jace nodded and looked to the Black Hole Conclave members. Dark Matter Cloak is useless with them, because they’ll sense when I get close thanks to that stupid black hole detection Skill. It was quite disappointing to Jace that the main faction that he knew he would be going up against could detect his presence once he got close to them. But their reaction time is another matter entirely. Void Blade (Rank 5) [Rending]. His weapon – to his opponent’s gaze – vanished.
You can detect it, but you can’t react to it! He threw the sword at one of the Signers, and they must have detected the blade at the last second, because they began to dodge – but they were not fast enough against the speed that Jace flung the weapon with. The blade sank deep into the chest, and Jace warped it back to his grip. The figure began to fall, and before they could even start to hit the ground, he had thrown his sword at the next one in line.
They stood no chance against the invisible onslaught. They were all lower Tier than Jace, and he far surpassed their speed and strength. To Jace, it was a necessity that he did not delight or revel in – these people wanted the destruction of the universe. Killing them was necessary. He treated it like a gig; work that he had to do. But not because of creds like back on Earth when he was a courier. Instead, because he was called upon by a higher power – arguably the most powerful being in the universe – who had told him that actions taken against the Conclave were justified. If Xera wants the Conclave dead, they die.
Within seconds, all eighteen of the surviving Conclave members were slaughtered, and Jace walked over as Ollie dusted them.
-----
[Stardust Acquired: 400]
-----
He looked back to the Pulsar Coalition members as he sheathed his sword. “You guys have this?”
A person wearing technologically advanced armor that made him look like one of the mechs on earth approached him. “Thanks for saving us.” The voice that came out was filtered through some audio system, and Jace had no clue what they looked like under the carapace.
Jace waved his hand dismissively, “It’s my job. Can you all take care of the rest of the Conclave activities?”
The person nodded and gestured to the drill site that Jace recalled from his past infiltration. “We can manage it.”
Xera’s voice came out of the comms in Jace’s ear, “Go to the drill site so Ollie can take some scans.”
Jace turned away from the Pulsar Coalition member and jogged over to the site that used to house some type of mechanical device. Ollie’s eyes glowed a vibrant blue and he nodded his head in a slight bob, gently tapping the top of Jace’s head with his little, whiskered chin. “Scans taken.”
Xera cursed, “Those fuckers. It was a punch drive they were installing. A way to use an enormous, directed explosion to force reality open, travel through the Astral Verge, and force another entrance. If they have been using these for a while…I should be seeing more holes in our reality. These engines are not delicate, and do not ‘zip up’ reality behind them.”
Jace tapped his foot as he thought, “What if they just developed the tech? You have a lockdown on warp style technology to prevent this from happening, right?”
“Yes…Where are you going with this?”
Jace frowned and headed back to the hypercycle, passing the Pulsar Coalition members as he did so. They gave him glances of suspicion mixed with gratitude. “The Conclave is trying unconventional methods. Like when I was back on Earth. I had to make ends meet with scraps that I found and throw together some unconventional tools. They aren’t being given what they see as necessary to survive- er, accomplish their goal. So they’re improvising.”
Xera made a noise of curiosity, “Hmm. Interesting take. I’ll have to think on that more. In any event, recharging the hypercycle’s cells will take some time.”
Jace walked over to the vehicle and saw it was still barely hovering off of the ground, “It still looks like it is functional.”
“It could go maybe a few miles-per-hour.”
Jace mounted the vehicle and began slowly puttering his way back to The Cosmic Corridor.
Priam nodded as he was informed of Xera’s decision regarding Jace and what she was calling the Astral Incursion Response Squad, or AIRS. “Your task going forward is going to be responding to any more of these Incursions. They will be frequent, and they will need to be responded to quickly.”
“What about Stardust to keep advancing?” Greg asked. “I want to be Tier 10 as well for…personal reasons.”
“I know why you want to be Tier 10,” Xera replied through the comms. “I have already secured your future spouse’s longevity via technological means. The same goes for Dee’s sister, and Jace’s partner.”
Greg let out a sigh of relief that was noticeable, and then he chuckled. “Well, still, getting to Tier 10 would be really good in the long run, right?”
Xera made an affirmative noise, “We’ll put it this way – you three will get System-generated Quests for Stardust each time you go to fight an Incursion.” She sighed, and her voice dropped to a melancholic tone. “I will have to make a lot of trades to the Nebula Alliance to fund those Quests…but if it ensures your compliance with my tasks, I am okay with allotting the resources.”
“It’s not fair,” Dee said as she crossed her arms. “It’s not fair that Jace gets to go to this ice-world and get all of those Complexes and all of that Stardust.”
“Life is not fair,” Xera replied tersely. “I need him to hit Tier 10 faster than the rest of you. Troxanir’s power grows – I have a gut feeling about that. I need that faction leader either dislodged or defeated.”
Dee sighed and grumbled a bit, crossing her arms as she leaned against Greg’s tower. “What about this goop stuff you’re collecting? Essence?”
“The more samples I have, the faster I can deduce how to integrate the Astral System with my Cosmic one.”
Priam detected just a hint of dishonesty in those words. She’s not telling us the full truth of what she intends to do with the stuff, he thought. I would bet she’s hoarding it for Jace to use when he can access the Astral Verge, reaches some hidden milestone, or something like that. Priam shrugged and spoke for the first time since their battle with the Astral Demons wrapped up a few minutes prior. “It’s okay with me. We’ll make sure we protect the universe while Jace works to keep it safe in the long run.”
Xera’s voice came through in a satisfied tone, “Good. I have to go.”
Quinn’s voice came through a moment later, “Head back to Khrox. You get some downtime while we wait for another Incursion.”
Greg slapped his knees and stood up from his seat on the ground, beginning to walk towards the portal leading back to The Cosmic Corridor. “Come on, you two,” he said. “Let’s get home.”
Dee followed him, still looking a bit sullen, and Priam walked over to her, nudging her. “Look at it this way,” he began. “You and me get some time to just kick back and relax. Plus, we get to save whole worlds!”
Dee’s frown persisted, “I…I don’t like being left out.”
Priam sighed, “Yeah, I feel that. But look at it this way – we are saving the universe. That has to count for something, right?”
Dee nodded, “I suppose.”
He nudged her slightly, “And, Xera said she’ll still give us Stardust through Quests. We’ll get to higher Tiers – just a bit slower than Jace. We’ve got lots of time.”
Dee looked down at him and nodded, her demeanor shifting slightly as she brightened just a bit. “Thanks, Priam.”
