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Book 5: Chapter 34 - Realization (RAW)
🕑 Added 2025-03-10 13:49:49 +0000 UTCChapter 34 - Realization
Observe the humble saplings that grow beneath tall, ancient trees, for therein lies the seed of greatness yet to unfold. If we learn to perceive with discerning eyes, we can glimpse the fullness of what shall be, even when it is merely in its nascent form.
- Unknown.
Over and over, I became an adamantine ball of flailing limbs, until I struck something—hard—and saw the certainty of a life extinguished in plain text.
You have slain Unknown. 10 experience gained.
A vague feeling of regret washed over me for a fraction of a second. It was probably one of our own, I realized sourly, but there was no time to dwell. I scrambled upright, ignoring the blows raining down upon me as I willed the dark choir to unleash Greater Drain. Tendrils of life-sapping magic burst from my body, writhing through the melee in search of any foe daring enough to stand against me. The seafolk of the Mer were ensnared by its hungry pull, their life energies drawn into me with a shuddering gasp.
Through the haze of swirling sand and blood, I spotted it: a green and blue scaled monstrosity towering over the fallen Xaruar's corpse. More than ten meters tall and crowned with seven snapping heads, the Hydra was a horror torn from myth. Each serpent-like maw struck out at spears and men or spewed gouts of corrosive green liquid
Irritation twisted in my gut. “Well, that’s hardly fair,” I muttered bitterly.
Then another thought burst to the forefront: Where was Larynda? My ward had fallen somewhere in the tumult. Panicked, I whirled until I saw it—a dome of purplish crystal shimmering beneath the onslaught of the Hydra’s heads. She must be in there. The dome was already splintering under the Hydra’s violent attacks. I had to move quickly.
Calling upon Improved Dash, I launched myself into the fray. The Mer, now wary of me, reeled back from each swing of my war hammer and the life-sucking aura of Greater Drain, granting me a narrow, blood-slick path. When they did not retreat fast enough, a vicious elbow or a swift kick sent them sprawling. Their flimsy weapons bounced off my black-and-gold armor, doing only trivial damage to my Health points.
At last, I reached near Larynda’s fallen position. The Hydra loomed overhead, six of its enormous legs working against a spear of jagged purple crystal that had impaled it—her handiwork, no doubt. Larynda was far more battle-hardened than any girl her age ought to be, showing skill and bravery that put Silver-Ranked adventurers to shame.
The creature was uncaring of the damage its struggles were doing to itself against the spike of smooth crystal, flesh knitting over torn wounds. Yet the cracks in her dome of crystal were spreading. Her defense would not hold much longer.
My heart hammered. It was time to deal with that monstrosity. Idly, I wondered how much experience I would earn upon its death. At the moment, I was only a few thousand points shy of a new level, after all.
Clearing a space around me with a sweeping strike of the hammer, I lifted my visor and slung my bow from my shoulder in one fluid motion. With deft, smooth precision, I nocked a steel-tipped arrow.
Let the legends be true… were my thoughts that I voiced almost like a prayer. My pulse pounded as I drew back the bowstring. The Hydra might share a crucial weakness with its namesake of another world: Fire. An element that, at least according to my “character sheet,” I was also weak to.
Praying that the old tales would hold true, I released the arrow and simultaneously cast Inferno Bolt, raging white flames wrapping the quarrel in a blazing shroud as it streaked below the Hydra’s snapping maws, searching for its heart.
Anti-climatically, the beast did not die immediately. Though the bolt I unleashed still burned hot, I could see that its viscous blood was taking away much of the heat. Still, the flesh around the wound was not reknitting, and it was not immune to pain as its animal cries told me.
I would have to do this the hard way. At least the creature had ceased its attack on Larynda’s crystalline shield.
Batting away a tentative strike from a Mer with long blue pike, I cast Sage’s Sight upon the titanic, serpentine creature.
Sea Hydra ‘Seven Snake’ - (Lesser Dragon lvl.37)
Health: 1335/1748
Stamina: 36/102
Mana: 4/7
Corrosive Breath (lvl.3)
Greater Regeneration (lvl.2)
I laughed, though there was little mirth in it. No matter how mighty one fancied themselves, there was always something larger and crueler lurking beyond the horizon. The Sea Hydra was proof enough of that—it was an abomination in scaly form, a terror from the deep. Fear was a stranger I had not known for a long, long time.
I thought of the Al-Lazarians: How did they ever contend with such a beast in times past? How would I slay the spawn of lesser dragons?
As my mind raced at the immensity of the task before me, the world ground to a halt. A frozen heartbeat.
All around me, the fray seemed trapped in amber. Soldiers and Mer hung frozen in the midst of blows, their eyes wide in terror or hate. Screams died unborn on the lips of the wounded; arrows hovered in mid-flight, quivering like insects caught in a spider’s web. Time itself had taken a breath and refused to exhale.
It was then I felt slender, cold arms curl around my neck—soft as silk, yet weighty as iron. A sultry whisper slid into my ear, velvet-laced and dangerous. “Do you like them? They are my gift to you.”
I wrenched myself half around, lashing out at the speaker, but found only empty air. Slowly, the shape of Iasis, Mother of Monsters, swam into sight. Shadows clung to her like living things, and her gaze was as old as the seas and mountains.
“I thought they would be fitting foes,” she drawled, her lips curving into a smile as she gestured across the battlefield. Six more colossal forms surged toward our lines, great shapes glimpsed in the swirl of chaos. “Seven,” she said lightly, “is a most auspicious number, wouldn’t you agree?”
I refused to answer. I merely bared my teeth and drew another arrow. This one I nocked and imbued with Inferno Bolt, flaring bright as a dying star. My high Dexterity and Rapid Shots allowed me to loose four more arrows in rapid succession. Rapid Shots, a skill learned from the last steps on my Path of the Asura and inspired by a friend no longer with me.
Yet before the first arrow could even strike the monster’s flesh, Iasis’ divine power pressed me to my knees, my body trembling with the weight of her will. The blazing projectiles hung suspended in the air, a heartbeat from tearing into the Hydra’s wounded form.
“Tsk, tsk, little Gilgamesh,” Iasis cooed. “Must you always cheat? Without struggle, there can be no growth.” Her tone was playful, as though scolding a wayward child.
I snarled, raw fury burning behind my eyes. “Yes, that look. Show me the triumph of life,” she demanded, her laughter a ripple of midnight silk. “Only in agony, only in the throes of desperation, does existence gain its meaning.”
Her words were as hollow as a funeral dirge, and my scorn flashed across my face. I loathed her sanctimonious riddles, her cruel delight.
She smiled, a breathtaking thing of shimmering, living darkness. “But that little spark of defiance, that show of boldness… Perhaps it deserves a reward?”
No matter how I strained, my muscles would not obey. My mouth might as well have been sewn shut. Iasis only laughed again, throaty and musical. “A small hint,” she purred, “regarding my children’s breath: mind it well, lest it defeat even you.”
Corrosive Breath? How would one withstand that?
Then, as if she had never been there, she vanished—and time, that vile and fickle wretch, chose that moment to lurch forward again.
In a single instant, all five of my arrows slammed into the Hydra I had wounded. Each bolt burned white-hot, cutting through draconic scales with explosive force. The beast let out a gurgling wail so loud it seemed to rattle the clouds. Its heads and tail flailed in a final, desperate death spasm before the great monstrosity toppled, still pinned by the purple crystal that Larynda had summoned.
A small hush descended on that patch of battlefield, but it was a hush soaked in blood, choked by desperation, and weighted by Iasis’ damning promise—there were six more behemoths still bearing down upon us. And I, for all my arrogance, still felt the sliver of fear in my heart.
You have slain Sea Hydra. 757 experience gained.
You have gained 1 Dexterity.
You have gained 1 Wisdom.
I licked my lips, a grim amusement taking me. Once, I had thought myself the pinnacle of physical power, but there was always something bigger or better. The Sea Hydras were living proof—hulking creatures that could shrug off punishment like it was nothing. These monsters were, however, worth a lot of experience points. Enough, I hoped, to thrust me closer to the next level of power
Tearing the stopper from a dented vial of Mana potion—its potency questionable at best—I swilled it down, half of it splattering over my cheeks and chin. It seemed as if my pores flared wide at once, drinking in the sudden rush of ambient energies.
As my Mana bar filled up, a worm of worry wriggled in the back of my mind. The Hydra’s death was a triumph, true, but also a grim reminder of how I might meet my own feet with the lick of hungry flames.
Even with the potion, my Mana reserves remained low. I had poured so much into my Rapid Shots–Inferno Bolt onslaught that I needed precious moments to recover. Spells cast on cooldown cost much more Mana like a starving beast, and now Greater Drain provided only a frustrating trickle. The spell was always more inclined to sap magical essence first, and the Mer simply were not supplying enough of that currency.
Then, amid my calculations, I glimpsed another of the towering titans of the sea enveloped by writhing Black Flames. Larynda’s handiwork, no doubt. The little minx was snatching away my kills. In another time or place, I might have grinned at the nerve of it.
I spotted her then, a lone figure in a patch of churned, blood-soaked sand, the bodies of Mer and men parted like the sea around her. She stood chanting words twisted by some unspeakable magic, her eyes narrowed in unbreakable concentration. She looked so painfully small, so terribly fragile. My heart sank. I had to get to her before the crush of monstrosities found her.
I sprinted across the battlefield, rolling off a wave of dread. A voice inside me whispered: What does it matter if she lives or dies? A darker voice suggested she might be worth as much experience as a Hydra herself, especially after felling one of those horrors. I shoved both thoughts aside and drove forward, hammer in hand.
Mid-chant, she twisted aside from spears and swords, a shell of conjured water deflecting a few that came too close. But I knew that she could not dodge forever. Fate, determination, or raw Luck brought me to her side before the enemy closed in, my Mimic Shield flaring up in an organic growth to parry a brutal slash.
“Five more of those monsters to kill,” I growled. “You still have fight left in you?”
Her cheeks were paler than the rising moon. “I can’t…I’m drained,” she whined, voice cracking under the strain.
I battered a particularly hideous Mer with my Bellringer’s haft. “Find it somewhere. Or our men will be slaughtered.”
“You don’t understand,” she pleaded. “I’m spent. My Mana’s gone.”
Frustration nipped at my insides. A miracle was unlikely. The future that I saw could only be described as grim. For all I knew, in the next minutes of battle, I might well perish from a Hydra’s Corrosive Breath, and Larynda would die beside me. If I were lucky, my death would be quick.
On my own, I might stand a chance to break free, and my rational mind screamed to retreat, to leave behind this lost cause. But the memory of Enkidu stirred—a friend who had taught me that some things mattered more.
Defiance. Defiance and revenge.
Yes, this entire bloody stage was a cruel test orchestrated by so-called gods who treated mortals like playthings. A strange hush settled in my soul, a peace beyond the raging battle and more powerful even than the Mer Battlesinger’s enchanted song. If these capricious deities sought sport, then let them watch. Let them bear witness. A rebellious snarl rose in my throat.
A voice that was not of the voices whispered within: But was not life itself the struggle against the futile? The struggle against the end? Surely, it was in that very struggle that you could find beauty, that you found art, pure and untainted.
Grim clarity came over me, now it would be a race to see what would happen faster. Either I would grow enough in power, or all our men would die. I needed more experience, enough perhaps to tip the scales before the tide of bodies swallowed us. Another couple thousand points would push me to the next level. A handful of attribute points and a free skill point might be a drop in the bucket, but it was all I had to wager on.
While protecting Larynda, I threw myself into the carnage once more, heedless of the screaming in my limbs. I struck at every Mer that dared cross my path, crushing skulls and scattering them like driftwood. The old adage held true; the best defense was a good offense.
A Hydra charged, massive claws ripping into the ground, but I vaulted away with Improved Dash, hauling Larynda behind me. Three of its leering heads snaked forward, burning liquid dripping from open maws. I might live through their foul breath, but Larynda would not.
My efforts had been in vain.
“Stay behind me,” I commanded.
“And… I am glad that we were able to meet again,” I added in a moment of weakness.
She gave a tiny nod, eyes wide with understanding. We both knew this could be our last stand. Perhaps that was what the gods craved—more death, more drama, their cosmic laughter echoing across the heavens.
Us. A single whisper, a hint amidst all of my pathetic regrets. So be it, why not? I thought with a mental shrug.
Improved Entropic Aura blossomed from me in great waves just as the vile corrosive breath of the Hydra washed over us.
