by Jeff Sproul
On the other side of Glasser, stood Shadow Witch and a man. Shadow Witch had deep black hair down to her shoulders and a somewhat gothic form-fitting leather outfit with cloth frill coming from the hips like a skirt. She’d also acquired some new items since last Riley had seen her, but he wasn’t sure what their effects were.
To the right of Shadow Witch stood a man with his arms crossed against his chest. He was leaner than Glasser and had fair skin with dark brown hair down to his shoulders. He wore a gray short-sleeved shirt and black pants.
“Get out of our way and leave us to our business,” said Glasser. “You don’t want to fight us. Would be a real shame to lose your powers, wouldn’t it? Any of you got bills to pay in the real world? It’d be a shame to start over, wouldn’t it?”
The guy on the ground looked to Laura. Fear was written all over his face. The same fear that Glasser was talking about. The fear of loss, the fear of not paying your bills.
“Did you offer his friends that same option?” said Laura.
Laura’s arm whipped down to her side and pulled her revolver from its holster. The specially designed holster spun the chamber as it came out. Without hesitation, she fired the special shot at Glasser’s face.
Chapter 28: Relinquish
With Laura’s shot, the area erupted in conflict. Both teams had been tense and ready to fight at a moment’s notice.
Having seen Laura’s arm move, Glasser pulled his arms up and deflected the powerful single attack with the hardened glass of his arms. The bullet fractured some of the glass, and surely did some sort of damage to him. But within moments he grew the glass back and charged forward.
An intense blue beam shot out of the right hand and the blue, pink, and purple-haired woman that had been standing to his left. Upon hitting him, a shimmering blue field encompassed his entire body. A second later, a white beam came from the woman’s other hand, which was also directed upon the glass-user.
Riley’s eyes widened as Glasser rushed towards them with added enhancements.
A mound of blue sand rushed up at an angle towards Glasser. He smacked into it, which slowed his speed but he continued to plow forward and through it.
Laura, having taken the best shot she was going to get, withdrew to the back of their group and holstered her firearm so that she could start creating her copies.
Chase had the same idea and rushed to the back as powers began to fly.
His three mortar-bots fired their opening salvo as he went over to them to reconfigure them as quickly as possible. Mortars weren’t going to do the trick here.
Riley got the sense that his powers weren’t going to breach the protective shield around Glasser. He was also concerned that his spike would be deflected by the glass.
He threw his cord out and sent it to Glint. He hated to do this to her. He didn’t remember her being a bad person, but sometimes people changed. If she wished, she didn’t have to participate in the fight. She could always surrender.
As his spike was inches from Glint’s shoulder, a long red spear struck his cord away and sent it flying off away from the group. His eyes widened as he saw the other guy in Glasser’s group, stretching out his arm and directing a red energy based spear. Much like the red hand that had almost killed him during the Saros event, and similar to Paladin’s powers.
“Ah!” Laura cried out, as dark shadows caught her feet and traveled up her body, wrapping around her quickly. She hadn’t even had time to make a single copy, before Shadow Witch targeted her.
Shadow’s hands were raised, as she directed the shadows to entangle and then suffocate and stab Laura.
Erica’s hands swept up and several seconds later, a several-foot wide entanglement of vines struck out from beneath the blue sand. The vines themselves were dark and almost entirely dry. They pushed Shadow up into the air ten feet, twenty, thirty feet, but then the weight of the vines began to wane and crumble. The plantlife down beneath the blue sand wasn’t as strong and lively in this area.
Intense flashes came from Glint. Her hands were out, her palms raised as a strobe light effect was created. It flashed intensely and despite Riley’s warnings, Laura’s group was assailed by the light which caused them to initially wince. There was no visual identifier, but everyone in Laura’s party had lower accuracy for a short duration.
The Shadows that had been constricting Laura receded into the ground as Witch’s concentration on her powers was broken from the mass of vines slamming into her and sending her into the air to fall a short distance away.
A red bolt slammed into Glint’s chest and stopped the bright flashing lights.
Brenda had crouched and was already slotting a new bolt in.
Numerous orange lotuses filled the air. Having gained the rank of paragon, Carla was able to deploy lotuses more rapidly, at the cost of her stamina.
With dozens of lotuses flying towards them, Glasser’s group began to disperse, but their intent to fight hadn’t been lost.
The guy on the ground covered his face and ducked down as the lotuses exploded around, but luckily none of them had gotten close enough to harm him.
Carla had gained the ability to remotely detonate her lotuses, which created a thick cloud of orange explosions between the two groups. Smoke wafted into the air as Laura’s group split up to better fight Glasser’s.
Laura started splitting herself off, now that she wasn’t being attacked by shadows. Chase was modifying his bots, which seemed to be taking time.
But time wasn’t on their side with the superior enemies they were up against. Glasser had merely been slowed by the sand-mound, but his rage hadn’t been abated. He rushed through the explosive lotuses and Riley was his first target.
Seth fired his clasp-beam at Glasser, but the beams of white light barely seemed to effect the blue-shielded warrior.
Glasser smashed his glass-ensconced fist into Riley—who was still recovering his cord.
The punch knocked Riley’s face to the side, and a follow-up uppercut sent him flying back several feet.
Riley’s vision flashed red as he smacked back into the blue sand.
One after the other, five red bolts smacked rapidly into Glasser’s chest. After the third small explosion from the bolts, the blue field faded, but the white and blue beams were still directed upon him.
Several seconds after the blue field had dissipated, it appeared again. Glasser directed his attention on Brenda, just ten feet away. He rushed for her, his arms pumping.
“No you don’t!” Carla shouted, as a flurry of lotuses intercepted Glasser mid-way to Brenda.
As the lotuses exploded around him, he pulled his glass-covered arms up to protect himself. That, along with the blue shield, allowed him to absorb most of the attack.
A single purple lotus was left, as Glasser lowered his arms. He saw it too late, and it burst into a purple vapor all around his face.
His body took on a dull purple shimmer, along with that blue shield. He re-focused his attention back on Brenda and ran for her. But thanks to the purple lotus, his movements weren’t as fast as they had previously been.
Brenda rose and ran, to distance herself from the glass warrior, as more sand burst from the ground all around him.
Todd waved his arms and piled more sand around Glasser’s legs and torso, but his movements were only about fifteen percent less than they usually were, which gave him a decent amount of mobility.
Todd lifted his arm to send more sand at him, but before he could, a red-energy spear drove into his chest. Without pause, the spear began to turn and spin like a drill, rapidly damaging him second by second.
Erica spotted the spear-user and swung her arms up to deal with him the same as she had the Witch.
An intense series of flashes came from nearby, which broke her focus and kept her from seeing her target clearly. Her decaying vines shot out of the sand around the spear-wielder, but his attack didn’t relent upon Todd.
Having gained the time she needed, Laura’s
clones entered the skirmish. A handful rushed towards the spear-user, while others diverted for Glint, as well as the woman with her beams out on Glasser. None of her clones attempted to deal with Glasser directly.
“Crimson!” Glint shouted over to the spear-user.
Crimson Spear, the man who’d been assaulting Todd, looked over to see numerous versions of Laura rushing around to overwhelm them. He pulled his spear back with his mind, giving Todd a reprieve. Then, he went to work stabbing and swinging his spear at the nearest clones as he made his way towards Glint to protect her.
Some of Laura’s clones were able to block the powerful energy spear with their own physical weapons, but others were killed off as the spear ran through them and turned them into glimmering dust.
“My clones aren’t going to last long!” Laura said. “We’ve got to take them out quick!”
Brenda and Carla focused their attentions on blasting through Glasser’s shield, keeping a heavy layer of smoke around him to help debilitate his perception of those around him. Together, they were keeping him at bay, as they moved around the field. Carla pulled off to the side and got a clearer view on the woman with the beam-hands. She sent her lotuses at her to try and take her out of the fight, as it was apparent that she was the healer of their group.
Dark shadows rushed up to create a protective screen around the woman shooting a blue and white beam at Glasser.
“Watch your sides, Aurora!” Shadow Witch lectured as she ran over to position between the multi-colored haired woman, and Glint.
With a wave of her hand, the shadows that had protected Aurora, shot out like needles towards Carla.
“Damnit!” Carla gasped. All she knew how to do was use her lotuses. She decided to try something new.
She flicked her fingers and created a dozen blue lotuses, which were only in the air for a second before being hit by the black needle-like shadows. Puffs of intensely cold blue mist expelled from the lotuses. A makeshift ice barrier formed and cracked, then shattered under the assault of shadows. The ice-lotuses had only worked for a couple seconds, but that had been all she needed to protect herself.
A series of red bolts streaked towards Shadow Witch. The shadow-user was forced to toss up another protective barrier.
With their damage dealers occupied, Riley took the initiative and threw his spike at Glint again. He caught her arm and quickly drained a helping of silvery essence. As it drew to his palm, his left cable went out to send the essence over to Erica to help her resist Glint’s effects.
As the battle raged on between the two groups, the guy that had been on the ground, managed to get up and run over towards Laura’s group. He kept running until he got over the ridge, where he then crouched and watched from a safe distance.
Carla and Brenda were in a constant struggle to apply pressure on Aurora, Glint, and Shadow Witch.
Laura’s duplicates continued to drop one after the other as Crimson Spear targeted them individually, while pressing his attacks upon Todd and Erica, with Glint’s aid.
Glasser was the hardest to control on the battlefield. Every time Brenda and Carla let-up on their damage on him, he would gain ground and attack anyone he was nearby. Riley gained several more bashes to the chest and face. Carla even got hit a few times, while Brenda remained mobile enough to avoid the glass-user.
Chase’s bots entered the fray after about several minutes. Altering the bots’ configuration appeared to be something that took a great deal of time mid-battle. The spider-bots skittered around and neared Glasser. With a small spark, the bots deployed streams of flame upon him, while moving in quick circles to avoid his reach.
Carla continued to renew her slow effect upon Glasser, but each time she used it, its potency and duration diminished.
“Heal!” Shadow grunted as a bolt from Brenda found its way over to her, to explode against her arm.
Todd diverted his attention toward Glasser. As Aurora’s white beam diverted to Shadow, Todd pulled the sand up rapidly between Glasser and his healer/support. Line of sight was now broken between the two. Riley, Brenda and Carla began focusing him down again. If he was just a tank-based role, he wouldn’t be much of a threat. The problem stemmed from the fact that Glasser was both a damage-dealer and an effective tank, all in one.
Riley managed to steal a helping of Glasser’s essence and sent it on its way to Carla, to help her resist his physical attacks, since she repeatedly found herself within his reach, which usually resulted in close-encounter explosions.
Seth stood beside Laura. Laura was firing off the occasional special-shot from her pistol, taking careful aim at Crimson Spear. Seth was also dishing his blasts out to the spear-user, hoping to whittle him down since he was on the outskirts of the enemy group.
But each minute that passed, saw the death of several more of Laura’s duplicates. She was soon down to only five, which she kept at a small distance from the somewhat tightened-up group of Crimson, Shadow, Aurora and Glint.
Glasser seemed unaffected by the fact that he’d lost his shields and healing. He pressed on his attack towards Carla, whose health was falling lower and lower, even with Riley’s vampiric ability giving her health. Carla was being forced to decide between damage, or healing. She hadn’t thrown a single healing lotus, simply due to the fact that it took such a large amount of her max stamina to do so.
Brenda was in the same situation. While she had the ability to heal others, she was a stronger force when she was offensive.
Since Chase’s robots were configured for flame, all the healing was being left to Riley; which he could only achieve if he was able to steal essence. The same sand-barriers that prevented Aurora from protecting Glasser, also kept Riley from being able to easily target any of the other combatants.
Carla’s slowing-lotus effect was no longer having any effect on Glasser, who was starting to notice what was going on with Riley’s powers. Apparently, Glasser hadn’t watched the news segment involving Riley a while back.
Glasser protected himself with elongated shield-like segments of glass which absorbed the brunt of Brenda and Carla’s attacks, while he closed in on Riley, who couldn’t outpace the glass warrior.
Riley knew he couldn’t run from the faster and much higher-level player, so he turned and threw his cord at Glasser as he closed in on him. Glasser easily deflected it with his shield which sent the spike sinking into the sand nearby. It retracted back to Riley’s hand, just as Glasser slammed into him with the flat shield-section of one of his glass arms.
Riley’s vision flashed red as he fell to the sand. His eyes opened and Glasser was above him.
Glasser pulled his hand up and swung down at Riley’s prone form.
Riley rolled to the side and just barely avoided the hit. He scrambled to his feet, just as Glasser swung his arm wide and knocked him back, causing him to stumble but not fall.
“So this is what you do now?” Riley yelled. “The White Weevil scares you, and you resort to PKing?”
Glasser looked to Riley. For a moment, there was hesitation in Glasser’s eyes, as he was confused by the statement.
“Warcry told me you ran,” said Riley. “You ran from the Weevil, you ran after she kicked your ass after you stole my gear!”
Glasser’s eyes narrowed. Realization hit him. “Radiance?” he growled. “What the hell are you—” His words were cut short as several red bolts smacked into his back, followed by half a dozen orange lotuses, which all exploded around him.
Chase’s remaining spider-bot finally caught up to Glasser again and doused him in fire, which gave Riley the time he needed to turn and run. Forcing Glasser into conversation had bought him the spare seconds he needed for Brenda and Carla’s attacks to catch him.
It was Glasser’s turn to stumble back as he swung his arms to clear the smoke. He smashed one down, destroying Chase’s remaining bot.
“Heal!” he bellowed out. It was only then that he turned to gain his bearings. Aurora hadn’t managed to gain line of s
ight on him. The remaining duplicates of Laura kept his four party members at bay on the other side of the sand-wall—that Todd painstakingly maintained, even as Crimson Spear cut into it to try and break through, in-between dealing with vines and the last few Lauras.
Todd and Erica spent most of their efforts on keeping the other four paragons contained and away from Glasser, which didn’t give them much opportunity to put forth any actual damage. Laura’s last copy was sliced through, by Crimson’s spear. Seth kept firing at the four isolated paragons, making himself seem like a bigger threat than he actually was.
Cut-off from his group, Glasser’s health would’ve fallen bit by bit thanks to Carla and Brenda’s attacks.
“Finish him off!” Riley shouted, as he turned, having gained enough distance.
Lotuses and bolts assailed Glasser. He held up his arms to defend himself, but his glass shields were breaking and not renewing.
“Help me!” he yelled, but couldn’t turn to see if his comrades were going to arrive in time to rescue him. He quickly tapped in the air as he defended himself with only a single arm. A vial appeared in his hand and he brought it to his mouth.
A spike drove through the potion and shattered it, only for the corded spike to smack into the sand-wall behind Glasser.
Glasser’s eyes widened as the potion had been in his hand one moment, and then gone the next as the glass fragments fell to his feet. The shield of glass on his arm whittled down to nothing from the red bolts and lotuses smacking and exploding against him.
His eyes widened and looked to Riley.
Glasser’s body broke into a thousand glittering pieces, which reflected the bright red moon in the sky, and the blue sand beneath.
With Glasser’s death, Todd swiped his arms out and dropped the sand wall he’d been building up.
The glittering fragments that had once been Glasser, lingered in the air for several seconds longer, plenty of time for Aurora to reach out towards him, only to see that it was too late and he was gone. “They got Glasser, we need to withdraw!”
