Zero Potential: Chapter 21 (Patreon)

Chapter 21

The burning white light of the pendant still burned within Terra’s body, causing her immense pain as an entirely new portion of her mind awakened.

Seer Bloodline Awakened.

A message that seemed to burn its way into the very center of her mind blared to life. Then she got an apparent update.

Bloodline Synergy noted. Your bloodline has destroyed the first lock of your sealed away memory and your future. Current unlocking progress (1 / 5).

The message was both a blessing and a curse, as it meant that the minor fear she had, about needing to keep all five of her arcane power crystals was now gone. For now, she would now only need four of the crystals, to unlock the remainder of her memories. This meant that she now effectively had one as a spare that she could use to either recharge her soul bound items when they completely ran out of power, or she could find a new item that wasn’t charged and use her freed power crystal to charge that.

While she had intended to keep the possibility of unlocking her memories an option, this particular development might speak louder than words. For Terra knew that there were five rankings to the Seer bloodline.

The rankings of the Seer bloodline went as follows:

Seer-> Grand Seer –> Sage -> Grand Sage -> Oracle.

Was it just a coincidence that there were five step of awakening the true bloodline of a Seer, just as there were five locks that guarded the memories within her mind?

Also, what was with the locks, with how much tension she had been feeling earlier in the night, shouldn’t she have more memories get released? Or was that only something that could happen during the dreaming state? A state that would now and forever be plagued by her Seer bloodline having been awakened.

With this revelation, it was both a complete shock, and simultaneously something she easily accepted upon having it happen to her.

Almost as if she had always known about this bloodline within her. Was that why she had been so easily accepted as the Hero? Did her Seer bloodline make it easier for her to be altered by the Gods to be a Hero?

There were so many questions that were roaming through her mind as she continued to easily run through the forest, trying to put as much distance between her and the Montague Seer as possible.

Another thing that wasn’t lost to her was the fact that Lady Montague seemed to know her parents. Mentally, Terra made a note to revisit that subject when she next met Lady Montague and her own Seer.

As she ran, she also made notes of different things, like the rate and progression of Seers to Oracles was both heavily guarded, while also being something akin to a luck of fate.

Yet, deep down in her bones, Terra knew she could go far with her bloodline, much farther than just being a Seer.  The lowest tier of the bloodline.

This was not to say that increasing her bloodline potential would be easy. Rather, Terra was just certain in herself that she would be able to achieve at least the next phase in her bloodline’s evolution.

There was also the slightly nagging notion within her mind about what this all meant for her chances of being chosen again as the Hero to save the world. To her knowledge being both an awakened Seer and a Hero was thought to be impossible as it would put too much strain within the blood of the individual. What did that mean when the being of ultimate evil finally showed their face? Terra didn’t know.

Did it mean her time as the Hero was done, that the Gods had truly moved past her?

She would like to say no, that the Gods could and would still call upon her, but for the first time in all her lives she doubted.

For the first time, she felt a cold emptiness in her blood and bones, where once unwavering hope and acceptance glowed. Yet now there was only a dull cold spot, right at her very core.

Snap-crack.

The sound of a branch breaking off in the distance pulled Terra from her own internal thoughts. With that one sound her mind went from distractedly trying to keep herself awake after a long restless night, to wide awake and prepared for battle.

Wind Wave Sonar.

With the subtle use of wind magic used to find objects in the forest all around her, Terra felt out for objects in her surroundings. Her spell was an upgraded and personal version of the various detections spells that were out there. First her spell lets her see all objects area around her. Meaning that even the use of Illusion spells, like Cloak of Shadows and Chameleon would be rendered useless against her spell. For while those spells would visually hide the presence of a person, they wouldn’t hide the shape in space the person left behind. The spell was then further reinforced with a touch of Spatial magic, allowing her to mentally plot the items that seemed to be out of the ordinary, or if were roughly humanoid or hidden.

This time, she felt out her pulse, and then was immediately informed of a humanoid object one second. Only to have the same object leave the next.

Apparently, her magic had been felt by the humanoid individual. Feeling that the person she had just found had moved, she too did the same, while simultaneously releasing a pulse cast.

Wind Wave Sonar.

Then turning on her Obfuscation Aura, she moved around getting the result of her pulse the object abruptly moved. Now she could cast again, but that would start to negate the effects of her Obfuscation Aura.

Slight tingle.

From the back left of her mental field around her she felt the intrusion of a mind, one that apparently felt not only the effects of her magic, but then was aware enough to react.

Movement away.

This time she was close enough to feel the magical resonance and wake of the spell being cast. It was a form of Spatial magic, but not one that she herself was capable of casting, meaning that this time the person tracking her was not human.

For Terra was fairly certain that she could cast or at least dissect most human variants of magic by now, particularly those related to Spatial magic. The fact that this one was so odd to her meant that she had either never been in close contact with a practitioner of this kind of magic, or she had never experienced this exact version before.

Realizing that the person chasing after her was not human and possessed a very advanced form of magic narrowed down the list of possible pursuers to Terra’s mind. Almost instantly she assumed that this entity tracking her was one of the immortal races, but why would they be here of all places?

While she had heard rumors of a few Immortal assassins for hire, she had never experienced one herself, a fact she was more than thankful for.

With her opponent being an Immortal, a few things instantly made sense, as the Immortals often had a stronger affinity towards the four primary elements than humans. The sudden realization as to why this person could suddenly detect her wind magic spells when no one else could made sense. For the wind magic was likely a dead giveaway for the hunter, just as their use of Spatial magic was a dead giveaway for her senses as well.

Suddenly intrigued by the pursuer, she felt a smile form on her lips, as she reached for a weapon. Not wanting to fully lose herself to the bloodlust, this time she held back, focusing on using just one of her obsidian blades, while wielding her soul bound staff in her right hand.

Of course, she wasn’t going to make this easy on her attacker, for she decided to move.

As someone who was used to being targeted by faster and stronger targets, she had developed many tactics, most of which would be considered underhanded, but when you are dealing with the living embodiment of evil, sometimes people didn’t have places to land on the moral high ground if they also wanted to survive.

When facing an Immortal, Terra knew that she would have to be perfect. For an Immortal, as the name might suggest, had just as long, if not longer to hone their skills and abilities as she herself had. The only problem was that she was still trying to build her proficiencies that she had learned over many lifetimes. While this Immortal before her, likely had all their proficiencies maxed out long ago. Meaning that in a long-drawn-out fight, she would be at a disadvantage. This further prompted Terra to act aggressively.

Channeling energy into the back of her hand, she brushed the hand against a nearby tree, before moving. Then she proceeded to do more.

Boom!

As she moved to the fifth tree, the assailant apparently found her first marking.

Turning her head, she already felt the dispersion of Spatial magic, as the assailant had managed to teleport away while in mind blast. Realizing this, Terra couldn’t help but be impressed, as such concentration while being bludgeoned around was tough to pull off with any modicum of success.

Still, Terra couldn’t let her guard down as she continued to hide more of these runic traps. They were simple mines triggered by nearby ambient mana sources getting close to an already volatile mana infused rune. The idea being that if the runes were left alone, they would eventually bleed off and ultimately provide extra magical energy for the forest. However, if a creature with intense magical energy came nearby, they would inadvertently feed additional ambient mana into the rune, thus causing it to be unstable and burst.

Nothing major, and honestly the runes were more draining to her than they would be to the Immortal pursuer, but they were very annoying.

Ka-boom!

Another burst, and another teleportation away in a random direction. Though Terra thought she was beginning to see a pattern with the explosions.

“Does thou think they methods will be successful?” A male voice called out in what was clearly old Common.

Hearing the archaic words used, Terra first wondered if this was a ploy to get her to divulge her location by calling out in confusion. If it was, then Terra mentally felt sorry for her pursuer, as he would have to do better than that to get her to break her cover.

Right now, Terra still had the advantage, since she was being chased, she controlled the location that she moved, she controlled how she moved, and most importantly she controlled where she moved.

Tap, tap, tap.

Realizing that the Teleportation after each burst was likely very taxing for her pursuer, she doubled down on her application of overcharged runes.

Placing them on stones on the ground, roots, and of course random trees.

Better still, the pursuer also Teleported away at the first interaction with her aura.

This time Terra followed her gut, and the pattern she had observed. Back and to the right twice, then left once, but when he was frightened or flustered, he always went back to the right as a default impulse. Such habits had been hammered out of her over her lifetimes, but now she saw the pattern easily. Mentally she knew part of this had to due with her Burning Eye of the Tiger, that helped her identify such patterns easily.

Trusting her analysis of the fighting style of this Immortal, she forward.

Slight Tingle.

Once again, she felt the slight tingle of the attacker, and then felt him go as he once again Teleported away.

Half right pivot, then charge forward.

Huffing.

She now heard huffing coming from up ahead, just as she had expected, the Immortal had been nearing his end from having to constantly Teleport away.

Tingle.

Then just as before she felt a tingle, and then a quick Teleport.

Half left, since this was the second straight back right Teleport away, Terra knew he would once again change his tactics. Prepared for this, Terra followed to the left and sure enough, she once again felt the presence of her attacker enter her aura range.

There was the dispersal of magic, all except this time there was a slight problem.

Thud.

Off in the distance, Terra heard the thud of a body hitting the ground. While she attempted to be cautious, a slight smile couldn’t help but form on her lips as she realized she had outplayed her pursuer.

They had collapsed to the ground, when they ran out of mana. At least that is what the normal thought would be, though Terra had been in far too many near death experiences to assume that a known assassin would run themselves to the point of exhaustion.

Realizing this, Terra smiled brightly as she once again tried out her newly acquired Arcane Staff of the Elements, this time she promised to try out the full extent of her powers.

Summoning forth waves of Wind, Fire, Lightning, Shards of Earth, and even Water she created the largest amalgamation of a spell that she could.

Grand Arcane Tempest Arc.

The wind was so intense that if seemed to pull the clothes off Terra’s back, all while pulling her forward into the sphere of death she had created.

Terra also made sure to cast this spell in a diameter that was as far as every escape Teleportation spell he had created, though to cut down on energy use she focused on just an arc of flames and storms that went off to the right.

Sure enough, the Immortal who had been laying in what many would assume was a passed-out lump had enough for one more Teleportation, which he used to fly directly into the arc of flames that were still expanding and going in the exact direction that everyone of Terra’s analytical instincts told her that he would go.

“GAHHH!” There was an intense cry of pain, before Terra once again felt the pull and tug of Spatial magic being used in the area.

With that, Terra released control over her spell.

Yet, unlike how she thought she should feel after having cast one of the most destructive spells ever, she felt elated. Thanks to the amplifying powers of her staff, she had used only a minimal amount of her personal mana, most of which went to awakening the staff. Once the staff was awake, the arcane power core at its center did most of the work.

While the spell had been costly, dropping the remaining power of the staff down to 92%, Terra felt that this was a fair use. First, she now knew that she had at least one spare arcane power crystal available, thanks to her awakening her bloodline that would also unlock her hidden memories. Secondly, it was great to see what the true potential of this staff truly was.

As the flames died down, only burnt husks of giant trees lined the forest, there was also a clear open path to the sky, something that had been missing moments ago. With everything going so well, she almost forgot about the danger that was present around her.

Thump, sizzle.

This time a burnt and charred body crashed to the ground. The impact seemed painful, as the Immortal cried out in pain and then rolled once to put out the flames.

Terra was able to witness all of this, thanks to her subtle use of passive wind magic, ones that told her that this was the second back right turn of the attacker.

With her attacker down, and seemingly needing to stop due to intense burns and damage incurred from being at the heart of such a powerful beam, Terra leisurely strolled up to the downed Immortal.

Wheezing.

While the Immortal had been clearly faking before, now the subtle sounds of burnt lungs being used to pull in oxygen could be heard. Meaning that even if the Immortal was faking, not everything was fake about this encounter.

“Thou,” The Immortal began, his words coming out choked due to the clear pain he was in. “Thou art a monster.”

At that Terra could only grin maliciously, as she prepared for what to do next.