Abyssal Road Trip - 305 - Light it up (Patreon)

Amdirlain’s PoV - Outlands

The Gate opened to the edge of the flattened forest, and the distortion caused the fine hairs on the back of Amdirlain’s neck to lift.

With an eager laugh, Mars jumped through, his pilum already ready to throw. “I’ve only heard of these! World maggot, come up and fight us.”

As Mars raced forward, he jumped between the decaying tree trunks to avoid the strange-coloured undergrowth. Amdirlain heard him drawing more strength, unobstructed by another pantheon’s claim, and the Avatar grew in power. A Divine aura flexed tight across his form with a thrumming melody of strength held fast in reserve.

Though the aura was worrying, given how Celestial energies felt against her flesh, Amdirlain followed. Letting the Gate close behind her, she pushed Ki Movement and sped across the broken landscape, a wall of distortion keeping her unsure of what Mars’ divine senses could see. The surveyors’ orbital view had the distortion source focused in this area, but its rasping hiss was ahead and beneath her.

They were within a hundred metres when the rocky terrain that filled the desolate ground at the centre rose straight up. Thousands of what looked to be maw-capped tentacles snaked out from under that stone shell. The gaps between them hosted countless silvery eyes burning in the shadows beneath the rim.

[Species: Eldritch Drifter

Equivalent Primordial Tier: 2

Stage: Larvae

{Lots of translation errors. Its alien physiology rejects the realm’s rules and sanity, preventing proper knowledge. This thing’s flesh is hard for me to read since it was outside Ori’s understanding when she created me; rough approximations follow.}

Health: 15,780,349

Defence: 7,598

Magic: 3,786

Mana: 29,345,564

Combats Skills: Untranslatable. Affinities: Gravity, {Translation Errors}

Details: After they breach the outer layer of a realm, these entities can drift along for aeons in space until they find a planet that appeals to their tastes. Once they descend, they settle in and slowly feed from the planet’s life force. A byproduct of the process attunes the soil to the energies of the Far Chaos, and eventually, other entities breach where it has weakened reality.]

Tier 2, so up to mid-tier Demon Lord. It feeds off life force, so not a time to experiment with Ki Blast. Let’s go for protection that will consume life as well. Gideon can’t understand it, so his knowledge is forever incomplete, and he can’t adjust the rules to match.

Placing the shadow vines bracelet into storage, Amdirlain activated Ki State and filled it with Yin Mana. The plumage under her skin expanded outwards and drank up the daylight. Angelic Aura followed and had black flames flailing within the aurora of light surrounding her Ki State. Amdirlain was setting Spell barriers around herself when the energy caught its attention.

The shell lifted further, and more mawed tentacles and twitching antennae emerged before the surrounding ground shattered. What Amdirlain had believed to be tentacles showed themselves as little more than feelers when giant tentacles speared upwards through the earth, flinging aside debris as they struck at Mars and herself.

As he leapt away from the closest black tentacle, Mars cast his pilum towards the gap beneath the shell, exploding a nest of silvery eyes. Other tentacles grazed past Amdirlain, deflected by her combined defences, and she suddenly held a Kopis in each hand. The limbs coiled towards her, and Amdirlain spun free from the grasping attack, unleashing a series of strikes while she moved. Each Kopis' strike gouged through rubbery flesh or severed sucker-like protrusions from the limbs. While the Primordial Kopis left oozing wounds in its wake, those made by her Destruction Kopis started to seal up.

Though Amdirlain tried to keep track amid the flurry of churning limbs, the damage quickly disappeared from view. As she slipped past a telegraphed blow, a severing note sliced the end from a tentacle, only for the wound to seal over immediately. The severed section thrashed as it plunged, and a dozen scuttling claws burst from its cut end, showing it possessed a life of its own.

“It heals well,” laughed Mars as he dodged earth-shattering blows.

With the mass of the withering tentacles about her obstructing each other, Amdirlain tested it further. A Flame Blast Spell filled with Primordial Mana streaked between a gap to explode just out of range of the tentacles Amdirlain could see. The explosion caused chunks of flesh to melt and turned the waving limbs into a forest fire about her. As tentacles collapsed from the damage, Amdirlain got a clear view of blazing eyes suddenly fixed her way. Ignoring Mars, the tentacles lashed out solely towards Amdirlain.

Teleport put her atop the creature’s shell, and Amdirlain snapped a Spell together. A forked Lightning Bolt of Primordial Mana had Amdirlain blinking away dots of light. As her vision cleared, she found that the cover over the entity had evaporated just before her feet.

Luckily I didn’t screw up my aim.

The capstone blunted much of the force, but Amdirlain could see its rubbery flesh and what looked like charred organs through the tunnel cut by the Spell.

Enraged by pain, a return blast of Gravity squeezed around her; bones creaked, and flesh threatened to strip free. The attack crumpled the magical protections Amdirlain had put in place, and the pressure crushed the air from her lungs. As her breath rushed out, Amdirlain used it to unleash a song that mimicked her last Spell and dug deeper into the shell. In response, black gravitational bolts coiled in the air from the tentacles and hammered into Amdirlain from every side. While Angelic Aura deflected some, Ki State only provided a physical defence.

Each Gravitational Bolt compressed an area around its impact point, sheering away circles of skin and flesh, sometimes bone. As hundreds of bolts came in, Amdirlain teleported beyond the outer ring of fallen trees. The unleashed assault deprived of a target caused the bolts to patter harmlessly against the creature’s shell and exposed flesh. As Protean restored her flesh and bones, she determined her next move.

Mars had raced among the tentacles, jumping from limb to limb ahead of attempts to grasp or strike him. Yet another throw sent his pilum through the loop of a coiling limb and blasted into the torso, causing a gush of orange and purple blood to jet out. Though the tentacle he stood on flinched erratically about, Mars dodged smoothly forward out of the path of another that tried to swat him.

Despite the limb bucking about, he stood easily balanced as if on steady ground, and his pilum reappeared in his hand. Another throw blasted through a gap among the limbs. As more tentacles sped towards him, a pair of glowing swords appeared; their enchantments set them hovering protectively beside his shoulders. He smoothly avoided most of the strikes, only having to position his raised shield to deflect one. Each attempt brought the drifter more pain, each limb that came close allowed the swords to open wounds.

Amdirlain unleashed a Lightning Storm burning with Primordial Mana on the creature’s far side while Mars’ pilum severed tentacles and stabbed deep into the torso with every throw.

As the Spell Amdirlain unleashed ripped into the entity, a high-pitched keening was released from hundreds of maws. She felt a Spell pulse across the area; reaching out among the toppled trees, it compacted soil and cracked the rotting tree trunks. Even as the Spell multiplied his weight, Mars didn’t stop moving. He continued with effortless throws that sent the pilum glowing with Celestial energy deep into its central body. More swords appeared to dance around him, and they rent open wounds in the rubbery flesh with varying degrees of effectiveness.

The ground gave way beneath his feet, but Mars leapt atop a writhing tentacle and raced along its thrashing surface before hopping to another. Staring down into the collapsing pit, Amdirlain saw holes burrowed into its sides beyond the radius of the entity’s Gravity Spell. The Spell crushed the galleries of its mining operation together with devastating force. It was an odd sight as gravitational pressures didn’t allow the dust to billow as Amdirlain expected.

Even as the collapse continued, two hundred metres of its tubular body wreathed with eyes and tentacles had been exposed. The latter ranged in size from arm-length ones capped with fanged maws to more of the rubbery black fleshed tentacles that would shame a Kraken. As those pulled out of the crushed rubble, their ends withdrew from a honeycomb of tunnels dug into the growing pit’s side.

The closest midnight-hued tentacles grasped at Amdirlain, but she glided past their erratic efforts. Staying clear of the gravity field surrounding it, Amdirlain threw one precisely crafted Spell after another. Though she had to work to affect it, failures were few, and most impacted it with varying degrees of success.

Spinning away from another tentacle, she felt her Wood Elf form fall away, and a golden light blazed from her gaze across the sucker that skimmed just past her face. A growing feeling of déjà vu hit as a Kopis desiccated its flesh, and a notification pinged within her awareness.

[Partial memory synergy achieved <0.001%

Note: You’ve got a long way before you get a total of 0.001.]

Before the notification had vanished, the memory of a song arose, and Amdirlain let the melody spill from her lips. The themes straining her control sent ribbons of Mana spiralling into existence, and blades of Primordial energy rained across the Pit. The white-hot force severed dozens of tentacles and consumed scattering fragments. As the flesh burnt, the Eldritch Drifter screamed in rage. Stumps started to flail before the scream’s shockwave staggered Mars, though a badly thrown pilum still left gouged flesh in its wake.

More gravity bolts struck towards her, humming with the Eldritch energy. Amdirlain sought to race away, but their path turned with her, and she raised her voice. Warping notes burst the spells across nearby tentacles, but the rubbery flesh was unaffected, and more bolts shot her way. As the entity’s distortion increased, Amdirlain destroyed waves of bolts but three purple lances of energy behind them pierced her defences. She flinched aside and avoided two, but the third impacted high on her breast.

The impact spun Amdirlain around, and the motion flung her right arm into the undergrowth. Where the blow had sheered through her, blackened flesh, lung nodes, and stubs of bones showed. Teleporting clear, Amdirlain severed distortion-corrupted flesh from her body and let it fall free. As Protean sealed the cleaned wound, the entity cast more spells her way.

“Get clear,” Mars warned, and Amdirlain felt his Avatar inhale a tidal wave of power across the planes.

His Divine Aura, previously under tight control, rolled out from his body. It caused a white light to project around him, shrugging aside the creature’s tentacles and spells. Even at a distance, her skin smoked and burned, prompting Amdirlain to flee before the rush of power.

Amdirlain repositioned herself beneath the clouds kilometres above, but as Mars changed, she worried she was still too close. As she prepared to move again, he went from a man racing across the tentacles, inflicting wounds at will, to a mountain at the pit’s edge. The aura’s light banished all the shadows. His pilum burned with Celestial fury, and he gripped it in both hands to plunge through the Eldritch Drifter. The spear pinned it against the pit’s floor like a moth on display. Yet that blow wasn’t enough to kill it, and the being thrashed about flinging bolts of energy at the pair.

Amdirlain had intended to use Universal Life to repair the injury, but the eruption of energy almost atop her cast that plan aside. She teleported clear of the new wave of spells, drawing on Protean’s stored mass to replace her arm. Even with her body whole, Amdirlain could feel the ache throughout her being with the health loss from her severed arm.

Taking a wide stance, Mars yanked the pilum from its body, and the spear’s tip broadened. Though the pilum was still shifting form, Mars stabbed down, opening a massive wound in its side that continued through its body. The impact collapsed the pit’s side, sending dirt cascading into the gravity well that was still compressing the soil.

As Mars twisted the spear and yanked it free, its outer points ripped hunks of flesh away. Gouts of purple and orange blood gushed from the savage wound, and an unearthly shriek smashed against them. The entity thrashed and futilely pressed against the Divine aura seeking to grab at Mars’ body.

Lifting it high, Mars ignited the spear and struck at a new angle; the blow drove through raised tentacles and crushed the drifter downwards. The impact rang through the bedrock, and trees standing kilometres away shook from the force. A brilliant burst of Celestial flame erupted from the burning spear cauterising the wound and incinerating flesh.

The strike’s success didn’t slow Mars, and he kept pulverising the entity with a frenzy of blows that sent shockwaves through the ground. The drifter’s Eldritch-infused screams hammered at his aura and tried to twist Amdirlain’s flesh, but Mars’ pace didn’t slacken. Amdirlain caught sight of severed tentacles from her vantage point, starting to grow claws to scuttle away. Before they could burrow into cover, she unleashed the burning song again. Shards of white energy seared the scuttling pieces to ash, turning tentacles still attached to the torso into wicks that intensified the screams.

As it struggled to defend itself against Mars’ assault, Amdirlain saw untouched tentacles fall away. Prompted by their earlier transformations, she tried to destroy each one and set fire to their stumps. With the charred protrusions showing no sign of regrowth, Amdirlain flailed at the central torso with the scorching theme. More limbs dropped away, and though the complexity of the melody abraded her health away, Amdirlain persisted. Through the Primordial flames, Mars’ spear continued to open scores of wounds across the creature.

Eventually, it stopped moving, but their assault persisted until they destroyed the remnants of tentacles that tried to flee. Between Mars’ Divine ability to see clearly and Amdirlain’s Resonance, none of them successfully hid. Only once they were all dealt with did Mars finally step back and resume a Human-sized form, his aura shutting down.

A set of notifications appeared when they stopped.

[Combat Summary:

Eldritch Drifter (x50%): x1

Tentacle fragments (x50%): 3,472

Total Experience gained: 8,410,844

Resistance: Eldritch [I] (26->27)

Angelic Aura [S] (45->46)

Protean [S] (68->69)

Resonance [S] (114->116)

True Song Genesis [M] (5->7)]

[Achievement: Incursion Blocker (Intruder: Eldritch parasite foothold - minor)

Details: Have contained the potential for a serious Eldritch foothold.

Reward: 500,000,000 experience points

Note: That’s for each of you, even though he spoiled your fun.]

“Gideon notified me; we’ve dealt with the incursion,” coughed Amdirlain, her throat hoarse from the demands of the song. “You didn’t need to go all out on it.”

“Are you alright?” asked Mars, his gaze directed at her shoulder to show what he meant.

Amdirlain swivelled her arm about and waved. “It works. I still have some cleaning to do.”

She let the Ki State fall and retrieved the shadow vines from inventory; the silken garments quickly settled back across her body. Amdirlain found the remains of her arm, and the stench of Eldritch energy corrupting it had her nose wrinkling. Cleansing it with Primordial flames, she did the same thing to the places where Eldritch lances and blood had struck the ground.

When all the distortion had gone, Amdirlain returned to Mars and gave a good-natured huff. “Bad boy, that was my toy. See if I bring you along to the next play time.”

“I could see the inside of your chest, Amdirlain,” noted Mars. “And your voice sounds like you swallowed briars.”

“It was but a flesh wound,” quipped Amdirlain.

Mars frowned. “I could see ribs and the top of a lung. You don’t need your lungs to function, but it was still a substantial injury.”

“I guess that was a needless joke then,” riposted Amdirlain.

“Ahh, you’re the type that indulgences in awful jokes after dangerous situations,” noted Mars. “I’ll try to keep my vomiting in check.”

Amdirlain pouted. “Gee, thanks, but it was only dangerous until you squished the Eldritch Drifter. How can I challenge myself if you squash a foe?”

“You see such foes as a challenge and not an abomination?” enquired Mars.

“They’re alien, but fighting them is a challenge and I need to push to improve,” explained Amdirlain. “Not like you weren’t treating it lightly as well, since you started Human-sized.”

“The more I draw on my Mantle, the less my strength grows from battle; this one gained me nothing in the end. Have you considered the possibility you’re addicted to danger, Amdirlain?” enquired Mars. “I’ve seen soldiers like you. Never able to stop or retire, continually enlisting for another term until death claims them.”

“I’m on a time limit and don’t know how long I have, so going slow isn’t an option,” rebuffed Amdirlain, and she nodded towards the pit. “I want to repair the damage it’s done before I head off.”

“What species calls this world home?” enquired Mars.

“Some elven variants are the only occupants,” advised Amdirlain.

Mars frowned in confusion. “I thought elves had their pantheons. Shouldn’t they have blocked our arrival?”

“This world hasn’t yet contacted the courts or gained a pantheon of its own,” advised Amdirlain. “Do you want to introduce the elves to agriculture?”

“I didn’t think elves were into farming,” replied Mars.

Amdirlain snorted in amusement. “Do you think they just dance among the trees picking fruit? They plant and tend groves of trees and seed mushrooms in the undergrowth, among other things. While it’s not how humans set up fields, they still have their form of agriculture.”

“Admittedly, I’ve not thought much about elves; I might go look around,” Mars said, taking in the nearby trees that still stood. “A disguise, perhaps?”

Mars’ arms and weapons disappeared, and he suddenly looked like a Wood Elf with an iron-tipped spear, dressed in rawhide leather. “Think I’ll be believable?”

The faint hints of mint among the chocolate hue of his skin drew a snort of amusement from Amdirlain. “You don’t know if that colouration matches them.”

“I’ll adjust it when I get close enough to observe them,” shrugged Mars, and he reached up to tug up a crimson lock among the mix of hues that made up his hair. “Speaking of colouration shifts, you went through a dramatic change mid-battle. Is there a particular reason?”

“A memory from my first life; I used it to hold off the Eldritch energies trying to twist my flesh,” advised Amdirlain. “Other memories from that life stirred during the fight and brought the form to the surface.”

“Interesting,” grunted Mars. “Take care. Yell if you have something else to destroy. Hopefully, it will be like the battlefront next time and won’t need me to draw on my Mantle.”

“You could have avoided using it,” critiqued Amdirlain.

“Not when I see a single strike ripping through your ribs,” rebuffed Mars, and he teleported away.

Amdirlain heard him reappear kilometres away before he disappeared again.

Standing alone on the pit’s edge, the earlier memory niggled warningly at Amdirlain. There wasn’t a hint of distortion left, so Amdirlain looped around the hole, examining the surviving tunnels for any clue about what had set her nerves on edge. The upper tunnels, though hardened, had collapsed completely, so Amdirlain persisted into the bedrock. There she found tentacles had scoured the stone away, leaving undulating patterns where the limbs’ movements had cut into the rock. The curvature of the designs caught her gaze, and she had to push away their hypnotic effect.

[Mental Hardening [S] (172->173)]

Oh, you shit. Artificer runes are draconic characters empowered with Mana. Do you freaks have something similar?

Working inwards from the side, Amdirlain cleared the ash, collapsed dirt and rock from the base of the pit. As she neared where the drifter had stood, Amdirlain found more of the swirling patterns cut into the bedrock. Rock fragments from the collapsed tunnels revealed more patterns that tried to catch her awareness. Not sure how they managed it without a hint of dissonance, Amdirlain drew on Mental Hardening to keep her mind clear.

As other patterns emerged, it required more concentration to keep her focus, and Amdirlain stopped pushing her luck. Listening to the themes within the local rock, she fashioned a piece to liquefy it. Having recovered during her extensive search, Amdirlain obliterated the patterns in every tunnel. The softening of the rock caused the ground level to sink, but ensuring the pattern's destruction shifted a tension from her shoulders.

[Achievement: Eldritch cleanser

Details: Rewarded for removing madness-inducing patterns and traces before Mortal exposure.

Note: They’re not Artificer runes but patterns that twist mental structures towards madness. Though the forms of insanity it can cause vary, they help attune Mortal minds to dreams that leave them vulnerable to the influence of Eldritch beings.

Note: Is it lucky you’re already crazy?]

“Thanks,” drawled Amdirlain.

Lifting into the air, Amdirlain took the repairs a layer at a time until the fertile soil within the devastated area was finally level. Taking in the trees and undergrowth, she continued to sing until it wasn’t readily discernible where the devastation had been.

Exhaling sharply, she considered Gideon’s question and opted for reinforcement.

[Mental Hardening [S) (173) -> [G] (1)]

Having spent so many points, it was anticlimactic for Amdirlain that her first Grandmaster Skill caused nothing to merge. Snorting in amusement at her disappointment, Amdirlain turned off her Angelic Aura and shifted back to the Outlands.

Standing in the Plane’s refreshing sunlight, Amdirlain grew aware of the mental pains and stresses that lingered in the back of her mind. Yet even as she paid attention to them, Amdirlain felt the tension ease. While the grief and loss were still tender, they didn’t dig the way she’d refused to admit.

Mental Hardening absorbed the resilience version. It’s not about suppressing anything but treating myself properly. Parallel processing on steroids, applying the mental health exercises I learnt.

Morbidly curious about what would happen if it hadn’t been destroyed, Amdirlain tried some Analysis options before Gideon finally coughed up the information she sought.

[Eldritch Drifter Outcome:

Once the planet gets drained to a husk by themselves or others, they tip through the breach formed. Then, riding the Material Plane’s outwards pressure, they return to the Far Chaos. A Super Nova event is required to cauterise the wound.

Analysis [S] (33->34)]