Legacy of the Fallen
Page 47
“There’s no end to them!” Constantine called out to me as he finally climbed back up to his feet and fell in beside me, both of his short swords slashing out at one of the three remaining Shades. “How the hell do we beat them all?”
“I have no idea!” I replied, using Constantine’s arrival as a brief reprieve to cast a glance behind me, noticing that Lazarus was slowly rising to his feet with his translucent sword in hand. “But we need to get back to the rest of the group!”
I turned away from the still rising half-giant and returned my attention back to the Shades before me, seeing that we had managed to attract two newly spawned Shades that had just emerged from the tainted Æther Crystal. “Lazarus! We need to go! Can you move?”
“Nyah,” the man grunted what I hoped was an affirmative response because no sooner did I hear his reply than I lunged forward at the two Shades loosely arrayed before me, accepting a grazing slash from each of their spectral claws in exchange for cleaving Splinter through both of their stomachs.
Reacting as if they were still creatures of flesh and blood, the two Shades howled in pain and reflexively clutched at their abdomens, which now trailed a stream of ectoplasm as the energy that bound them together gushed from the open wound. With both of their clawed hands no longer threatening me, it only took me a heartbeat to reverse Splinter’s momentum, slicing the blade through their now unprotected heads and putting an end to the two undead creatures.
Not waiting to see if Constantine had dealt with his own Shade, I immediately took off at a run, angling myself in a sprint across the chamber, looking to circle around the tainted Æther Crystal and rejoin the rest of the party. As I ran, six more Shades emerged from the Crystal, their ghostly bodies falling to the ground soundlessly before slowly scrambling to their feet.
Individually, or even in small groups, the lower leveled Shades were nearly effortless to kill, as evidenced by how easily I had managed to kill three of them, suffering only a small wound for my efforts. It wasn’t until their numbers grew, however, that they became dangerous, their ghostly bodies allowing them to stack on top of one another in a way that no physical creature could ever hope to mimic, forcing you to defend against a dozen ethereal claws all coming from the same direction at once.
“There’s an Unstable one in that pack!” Lazarus’s voice boomed from just behind my shoulder, causing my heart to leap in my chest as I glanced back towards the Crystal, my eyes landing on an all too familiar shifting form. “We won’t make it far unless—”
“I’ll take care of it!” I shouted back to the man, angling my desperate sprint across the room directly towards the tainted Æther Crystal. “You guys keep running! I’ll catch up with you on the other side!”
“Lyr—” I heard Constantine begin to call from behind me as I shifted directions and immediately cut him off.
“Go, Constantine!” I barked, putting any further replies out of my mind as I rushed towards the six still-rising Shades, my attention focused solely on the one Shade that was roiling with azure light, the magical energy dancing across the emerald ectoplasm that was its body. We had learned early in the battle that any of these multicolored Shades with an ‘Unstable’ prefix attached to their name were substantially more dangerous than their more common variant.
Namely by having the ability to explode with extreme force after rushing into near point-blank range and sending everything around them flying through the air and crashing to the ground, allowing the rest of the Shades to quickly swarm any prone victims.
Which hopefully I can keep from happening…again, I thought while gritting my teeth and speeding up into a sprint. It was because of the Unstable Shades that Constantine, Lazarus and I had managed to get ourselves separated from the rest of the party in the first place. The three of us having been caught on the wrong side of the crystal when the encounter had first begun, and then forced to keep moving in order to avoid the seemingly never-ending stream of Shades emerging from the strangely-colored Æther Crystal. If I can try and trigger the Unstable Shade early, and try to get out of its way before it can explode…
I put on one last burst of speed as the distance between me and the Shades vanished, throwing myself forward directly into the middle of them as I entered melee range, sweeping Splinter in the wildest arc that I could manage. The Æthertouched blade sang through the air harmlessly as the three Shades centering the line before me reflexively leaped away from my attack, some spark of self-preservation having stuck with the creatures despite their now undead state.
Just how I had hoped they would.
Maintaining my sprint, I sped past the cluster of Shades, taking advantage of the opening and passed through the gap between their ranks; my eyes focused on the Unstable Shade standing just behind the trio. I had just enough time to see the multicolored Shade begin to raise its claw to strike me before I drove Splinter’s point directly into its chest, discharging the Shocking Touch that I had stored in the weapon into the spirit’s body.
There was a slight pause as the ghost shuddered from the after effects of my spell, giving me the chance to pull my blade free and take a step past it, before its allies all spun around and attacked me from behind. Recovering slowly from my attack, the Shade spun to follow me, swinging a claw wildly in my direction and earning a savage cut along its forearm for its efforts as I brought Splinter up just in time to block it. Snarling from the combined attacks, the Unstable Shade’s body immediately began to glow with bright azure light.
I think that’s my cue, I thought as I dodged a second swipe from the Shade’s other claw and slashed a shallow cut into its shoulder, the wound causing the light emanating from it to intensify. Time to get out of here!
Disengaging from the fight before the now brightly glowing Shade could work itself up into a frenzy, I spun on my heel and rushed around the raised dais of the Æther Crystal looming over us, before triggering Blink Step. My vision blurred into a familiar kaleidoscope of colors as I teleported across the room, rematerializing midstride just as a blinding flash of azure light filled the air behind me, followed closely by a thunderclap of magic.
“Lyr!” Constantine’s voice rang out from much closer than I had expected, causing me to flinch in surprise as I turned my head towards its source, spotting both the rogue and Lazarus angling towards me, the pair having made great time circling around the Æther Crystal. “You made it!”
“Barely!” I exclaimed, feeling the sting of a wound I never remembered taking flare up on my back.
“We’re not through yet!” Lazarus grunted, breathing hard as the three us of fell into line with one another. “The others are getting swarmed! Look!”
Taking my eyes off the pair, I snapped my head in the direction that I assumed the rest of the party to be, immediately seeing what Lazarus was referring to. In the time that the three of us had been separated from the group, they had been forced back into a corner of the room as a veritable horde of Shades had descended upon them, stacking atop themselves in a sea of emerald light, their ethereal forms allowing several of them to occupy the same space at once. Standing at the front of the group, I saw the bloodied and exhausted forms of both Amaranth and Drace doing their best to keep the enraged spirits at bay as a never-ending avalanche of claws continuously swept out from the mass before them.
“Shit!” I spat as we all adjusted our approach to hit the Shades from behind. “Anyone have a plan how to handle this?”
“We don’t need a plan!” Lazarus barked harshl
y, anger boiling in his voice as he shouted, “Just follow me!”
Putting on an extra burst of speed, the enraged half-giant pulled away from both Constantine and me, his long legs pumping wildly as he charged the distracted Shades from behind. With a mighty cleave of his greatsword, Lazarus carved through a pile of the Nafarrian spirits clustered before Drace, turning the Shades near overpowering strength in numbers into a fatal weakness as the blade passed through several of them that had all been caught occupying the same spot at once.
With Lazarus’s one attack, the pace of the battle shifted as a gap opened up in the Shades ranks, many of them shifting around in surprise to see what had attacked them from behind.
Just in time for Constantine and me to arrive.
Taking up position on either side of Lazarus, the two of us set about attacking the small army of Shades, scything through the mass as they all scrambled to meet our attack, only to have the rest of our party slam into them from the other side.
“Take the shield down!” Drace shouted, a thundering clap of magic filling the air a heartbeat afterward as a burst of Ætherfire from Halcyon’s Pyroclap rolled over a cluster of Shades followed by a constant stream of fire from Caius’s skull-tipped staff. “Hit them with everything we have before more spawn!”
Caught between the two forces, the Shades melted under our combined onslaught as we all surged forward, capitalizing on the ghost’s tightly packed ranks, each one of our attacks hitting several of them at once. But yet, for all of our success, the sheer quantity of Shades meant that wounds were inevitable.
Ugh! I cursed mentally, unable to move my arm in time to prevent a spectral claw from running itself across my arm, the ethereal nails passing through my armor as if it were nonexistent and slicing through the flesh underneath. In retaliation, I reflexively thrust Splinter into the body that the claw was attached to as well as at least two others that happened to occupy the same space at the moment. Feeling no resistance to my attack, save for the cool flow of mana up my arm as I trigged my Mana Leech ability, I then twisted the blade sideways before sweeping it out of the several Shades’ bodies, watching a spray of ectoplasm fill the air.
Over the next few minutes, the battle gradually shifted until the bulk of the Shades that had once threatened the party had been cleared out, allowing Constantine, Lazarus and I to finally fall into our proper places, forming a solid line of battle and giving the ranged members of the party the space and time they needed to pick off any Unstable Shades at a distance.
“If anyone has any bright ideas for putting an end to this fight, feel free to speak up!” Alistair shouted in an uncharacteristic display of anger and frustration. “Because I’m almost out of mana and I’m not going to be able to heal you guys anymore!”
“Same here!” Halcyon shouted. “I’m running on fumes!”
“Try to destroy the Crystal from range!” Lazarus offered through the chaos of battle.
“We tried that already!” Sierra replied immediately. “It just absorbed any spells directed at it, and my arrows just bounce off it harmlessly.”
“Then we’ll have to break up close!” Lazarus shot back.
“Hang on! Breaking it could cause the Crystal to explode!” Caius stated urgently. “All the Æther stored inside it is going to have to go somewhere!”
“All I’m hearing are problems!” Drace snarled. “Does anyone have a solution?!”
“What about that fancy box with the crystals over there?” Constantine called out. “It looks exactly like the one we saw upstairs!”
“Right! The security system thing!” I exclaimed, my eyes shifting to the wall closest to us and seeing a familiar looking rectangular pillar set into the side of it a short distance away from us. Eyes widening, I tried to make mental contact with the device but didn’t get any reply. “I see the box, but I don’t think I’m close enough to activate it!”
“Then we need to move before we get swarmed again!” Drace stated, the big man swinging his heavy mace through a cluster of Shades before him and taking a large step forward. “Everyone on my tail, now!”
Not waiting for a reply from any of us, Drace then went on to blaze a path through the gradually thickening wall of Shades that had steadily continued to pour from the Æther Crystal, these newly spawned spirits quickly replacing the batch that we had killed just moments earlier. Unless we found a way to stop the Crystal from spawning any more of them, it was only a matter of time before Alistair ran out of mana and exhaustion took its toll on us, allowing the Shades to slowly wear us down, or for a handful of the Unstable Shades to get close enough to disrupt our ranks.
Hopefully, this ancient Nafarrian…computer thing, or whatever it is, can help us before that happens! I thought desperately as I worked to keep pace with Drace and the other melee fighters, slashing and stabbing at every Shade that came into range. Moving with purpose through the thinned ranks of Shades, it didn’t take us long to cut our way through them until we reached the pillar and formed a protective circle around it.
“You’re up, Lyr!” Drace shouted as we all stopped moving. “I don’t care what you have to do, but get that thing to turn this Crystal off!”
“I’m on it!” I answered, having switched places with Lazarus in our traditional line of battle and placed myself directly along the wall that the device was on, reducing my defensive responsibilities in case I needed to divide my attention. Crossing my fingers, I mentally reached out to the pillar once again, silently hoping that it would reply to me now that we had gotten closer.
There was no answer from the device for several seconds, the delay lasting long enough for me to begin to think that a reply wouldn’t be forthcoming, but just as I was about to turn to inspect the crystals protruding from the pillar, a distorted voice filled my mind.
Is this thing serious right now?! I thought to myself, unable to believe what I was hearing. I need to deal with the Nafarrian equivalent of tech support right in the middle of a battle?
I mentally screamed back at the device as the realization that we were all going to die began to sink in.
ards the tainted Æther Crystal and didn’t see anything surrounding the metallic rings that gently spun around it.
“How is it coming, Lyrian?” Drace shouted from the front of the line. “This is starting to get too much to handle!”
“It put me on goddamned hold is how it’s going!” I snapped back at the warrior. “We need to wait until it’s done!”
“Are you serious?” the half-giant roared, disbelief in his voice.
“Why the hell would I lie about something like that?” I retorted, the stress of the situation finally getting to me.
“Whatever! But it better not be too long!” Alistair added with a desperate note to his voice. “Because I’m officially out of mana now! Everyone’s on their own!”
“Rah!” Drace growled in response, which was shortly followed by a loud clap of magic as a distant Unstable Shade detonated.
Turning my attention back to the battle at hand, I couldn’t help but notice that the sheer quantity of Shades pouring free from the Æther Crystal had steadily managed to increase, with more and more of the undead spirits filling the chamber. Fighting side by side with Amaranth, my world shrank as the two of us worked to keep our portion of the defense pocket intact, countless minor wounds piling up from the sheer quantity of Shades that surrounded us.