Chapter 260 - The last of the Colony (Patreon)

There is no mana radiating from the First One, all of it is sucked by the black dagger tethered to his body. He is just using the sheer strength of his stats.

Using my mana as effectively as I can, I block his body, and the armor around my body disappears, reforming only at the places that crash with the black ant.

My mana is sent towards the pillar where Myrra, trusting in me to protect her, continues to control the orbital base and look for signs of ants to crash it against.

Seeing how desperately The First One attacks me, I'm right, and there is indeed another smaller Colony he plans to return to and rebuild after dealing with us. This leader of the Calamity didn't give up at all.

His attacks are quick and hard-hitting, but they are far from what he had shown when he attacked Virelia, and my attacks are the same.

Both of us are tired, our reserves low, reducing us to a lowly brawl with weak bursts of the skills we possess.

He tries to get to the pillar and clacks his mandibles to cut it apart with his ranged attack, and I put my hand in the way and cover it with dense armor, blocking it and getting a cut on my arm.

Then my fist moves, a thin spike created on it, and I stab it deep into his body. When I try to enlarge it there, the mana gets sucked by the black dagger, and even the armor around my arm flickers.

All this time I feel the First One's attempts to cancel out my anchor that binds the dagger to him, and as before, I continue to send my mana towards it to stop it from being destroyed by either him or the black dagger.

An attack throws my body to the side, and I sacrifice a bit of my mana to shoot a projectile boosted by kinetic energy at his head that he dodges, and I'm back to attacking him before he can charge Myrra.

“I need more mana!” the lynthari shouts.

As asked, I send more of my mana towards the anchor near the pillar. I do not hesitate to weaken myself, and instead of using it against the ant, I send it to the base.

The First One's panicked attempts to stop it warm my heart. His demeanor is unlike before. His movements are quick and desperate, his attempts to cancel my anchor or control the black dagger at the peak.

And I'm here. I block his way. I take on his attacks. I sacrifice my mana to destroy his plans even in exchange for more wounds on my body.

And I enjoy it.

At some point, a laugh comes out of my mouth, and I break one of his legs and kick him away from the pillar. Then even more of my mana flows out of me, and the base starts shaking more, a sign of Myrra's work.

Some sort of mental attack reaches me, but I shrug it off with my Mantle and use some mana to stop it from reaching Myrra.

Unlike before, I feel happiness from losing my mana instead of gaining it. Every drop of it sent to the pillar means more pain caused to the black ant.

In the end, he stops moving and just stands there, staring at me.

Nearly all of my mana is gone, and Myrra finally changes the trajectory, spending most of her mana as well.

“Ten minutes until crash. He won't be able to change the trajectory anymore, I locked it,” Myrra says.

Instead of answering her, I continue to smile and talk to the First One, “I know what you plan is. You will wait for us to get close to the point of impact and connect to the Colony to get their strength and maybe use it to stop the crash.”

My mana is slowly regenerating, all in preparation for the final fight. I don't want to fight now, no, I want the First One to watch his plans get demolished, his Colony to get destroyed. And only then will I finish him, letting him know his place.

“Or you might be trying to get rid of the dagger again. Maybe you want to kill Myrra and me after you get some power from the remaining ants. ” I take a step closer. “But you will fail.”

Oh, is that why some assholes like to monologue so much? I know that I hated Elydor and Emeric when I heard their cocky monologues towards me. Back then I was curious why they acted like that, why they talked that way.

Yet, now I'm doing the same. I understand.

It's so silly it makes me giggle once more, all hate brought to the surface just looking at the enemy in front of me.

Minutes pass and the base starts shaking more. Behind the window, I can see the planet coming closer, the clouds behind, and the fire caused by friction.

I form a small orb near me and create an anchor on it. Myrra prepares her attacks.

Then the First One receives the first wave of mana and strength from the Colony, a few seconds before crashing.

A majestic power surrounds his pitch-black body and the glow in his eyes changes. The black dagger dissolves, the leader of the Colony finally finding a way to do so. He immediately gets rid of [Tether] I left on him.

He snaps his mandibles and I pull down Myrra, avoiding a slash that cuts through the air over where we stood.

The entirety of the First One’s mana attempts to slow the movement of the base, he tries to absorb it. He uses multiple skills at once, a pressure put on him destroying and immediately regenerating his body in exchange for the lives of the Colony.

And I disrupt his attempts.

My Mana Wavelength Iris activates, allowing me to quickly decipher the frequency and I interrupt all the attempts.

The mana that The First One has right now is too huge for me to fight against, so I just find the trigger, the important part of the skills, the threads that it can't work without. And I snap them without mercy.

[Resonance - lvl 39 > Resonance - lvl 40]

Congratulations, you have completed a side quest and received a skill upgrade token!

Then it's too late, the base too close to the ground.

My and the ant’s eyes meet and for the first time, I can see an emotion in them even though they feel so alien-like.

It's hate.

Good.

My domain activates around as big an area as I can and I absorb kinetic energy around Myrra and me as we crash against the ground. Time feels as if slowed down and I constantly look for something, while the walls around us crumble and bend, an immense amount of energy around us.

Then I find it, a crack in the base, and finally, my domain passes through, creating an anchor outside of it.

I grab Myrra and transport both of us outside and right after I shoot the orb I created as far as possible.

A second passes, the amount of energy and heat around us immense and putting a strain on me and only then do I activate the anchor, transporting us near the orb that in the meantime traveled far away.

I repeat it until I'm almost out of mana.

Myrra creates a barrier around us and then we wait and fight against the shockwave and waves of heat that hit us. There is nowhere to hide as to all sides there are only sand dunes that get thrown into the air and the ones closer to the impact melt.

[You have defeated Worker ant - lvl 15]

[You have defeated Worker ant - lvl 80]

[You have defeated Sentinel ant - lvl 164]

[You have defeated Worker ant - lvl 67]

[You have defeated Worker ant - lvl 88]

[You have defeated Flame Legion ant - lvl 115]

...

[Lvl 210 > Lvl 211]

I try to stand up from behind Myrra, but I stagger and fall on my knee, my head thrashing and hurting like crazy, and the vision in front of me blurred, barely being able to see with one eye. Standing up again, I push Myrra to the side and start walking towards where the impact was, my feet burrowing into the hot sand thrown away in waves, creating a deep crater of melted material, the heat palpable in the air.

In the center of that hole, a base lies, a building made of gray stone and of a shape that is hard to describe right now, with broken pieces everywhere. The base, by my estimates, used to be as big as a shopping mall, a smaller one.

Absorbing the heat around me, I step toward the edge of the giant crater and start sliding down toward the center of the explosion.

I roll a few times, get burned twice, and I still barely see with one of my eyes, yet I reach the base.

A detection touches me, and from inside the black ant crawls. Wounds all over the carapace, unable to be healed anymore, all vitality of the remains of the Colony used to keep him alive.

My mana encompasses the area, and I find only corpses of the ants and even the notifications have stopped. The explosion set tunnels in a rocky area under the ground on fire and causing an explosion that killed them.

The First One is the last one to remain.

Surrounded by debris of the orbital base, melted sand, and the heat that turns the sand into glass, the ant takes a step towards me.

It's a wobbly step, a few legs broken.

I feel Myrra's mana move, but I don't stop her, and an attack of Aurora glass hits the side of the ant, cutting him in half, the back half remaining behind in the sand.

Yet the ant doesn't stop. He falls to the ground and starts using his remaining front unbroken leg to pull himself closer to me.

Slowly, second after second, he moves closer. Sticking a leg in front, burrowing it into the sand, and pulling, half of his body sliding on the ground.

The entire time I feel his attempts to connect to my mind. It's not an attack, only an attempt for communication. Either hateful words, maybe begging, maybe something entirely else. And I don't let it connect, not even giving the last word to the leader of the Calamity.

He finally reaches me, and his cracked mandibles snap around my shin, trying to cut it. The First One bites over and over again, his weak attack dealing no damage at all, not even piercing my skin.

Feelings roar inside me, hate and sadness, anger and weird calm. I stare at the being that is strong enough to be considered nearly capable of reaching the rank of Champion and kinetic energy flows through my right leg.

Then I stomp on his head.

[You have defeated Hive Confluence Sentinel - lvl 264]

[Lvl 211 > Lvl 212]

[Lvl 212 > Lvl 213]

[Lvl 213 > Lvl 214]

Congratulations! You've successfully completed the 4th floor's main quest in the fifth round of the tutorial for Hell difficulty. An entrance to the 5th floor has been created.

Next to me, the portal to the 5th floor opens.

I stomp again, the sand exploding under my feet and turning what remains of the First One into mush. And again, sending more kinetic energy through my leg, I stomp as hard as I can. Again and again, until my leg hurts and even the energy I was able to restore is gone.

I receive 1,000 shards and a skill upgrade token from completing side quests, and then another side quest appears.

Side quest: Kill the Calamity

Reward: 4000 shards

Attention, a milestone reached. Entry into Irreversible Narrative Progression has been detected for group 4. In accordance, the Community Interface with other groups will now be deactivated.

I open Beyond Community.

Sset - Our quest also got completed and we got the entrances, but we will be staying.

Noname - Take care.

Sset - Yes.

After that, I close the Community.

Myrra slides into the crater, also moving slowly, tired and manaless. Even then, she looks at the half that remains from the black ant and burns it to ash.

“You keep looking there,” she turns towards the entrance to the 5th floor, “Judging from how you move your eyes, it's something similarly tall to me and a few times wider. But I can’t see anything nor can I sense it.”

None of us wants to talk about what just happened, so we shift the conversation to something else.

“I will try to explain it later,” I say, and Myrra nods. “How about we rest for a while and examine what remains of the base?”

Myrra follows my gaze, an interest also showing on her tired face. “Let's do that.”

***

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