There were five Revenants, three of which I had stopped with my power. Which left two still coming slowly toward me. No, not at me. They wanted Shiori. She was the one who was messing with that crystal. If I gave them even a second with her, they would tear the other girl apart. I couldn’t let that happen. I wouldn’t let it happen. Everyone else was still busy with the others, struggling to stop even more from coming after us. Somehow, someway, I had to stop all five of these monsters. No matter what it took, I had to keep them off of Shiori.
Taking a breath, I held my staff out to one side, and spoke inwardly as the things approached, even my silent voice shaking slightly. Get ready. Wait till I give you the signal.
That was all I had time for. The two still-moving Revenants, which had been taking their time approaching, as though they knew just how fucked I was and wanted to rub it in, suddenly began to give those awful shrieks while rushing straight at me. All while their eyes weren’t even on me. They were on that crystal. All their rage was purely focused on the fact that Shiori was trying to stop their companions, and they were intent on tearing her apart for it. I wasn’t even worth looking at.
Well I was sure as hell gonna make them regret that. Even as they came at me like a pair of buses while I was a fly on the freeway, I triggered a very short burst of energy from the end of my staff. It sent me forward and sideways toward the monster on the left. I saw its eyes easily track my movement as it lashed out with one hand to grab my hair. But at the last instant, I used the power I’d taken from that Fomorian giant ape-croc thing to increase the resistance my clothes had to being moved. I slowed suddenly, making the Revenant’s hand flail through the air where it thought I was going to be.
Before it could recover, six of my ghosts appeared around it. They were all holding the thing, three grasping that outstretched arm together, while the other three clung to its shoulders and waist. Even with all six, and despite the fact I had shoved power into them so they could be solid, they still couldn’t hold this monster for longer than a second or two.
Fortunately, that was all the time I needed. Canceling the slow-movement effect on my clothes as I landed on both feet in front of this thing, I drove the blade of my staff toward its throat. In that same motion, I activated both the kinetic-boost on the staff itself, and used my rocket burst power on the end of it to shove the thing even faster, even harder. It collided with the monster’s throat with so much force, it felt like I could have torn through solid steel like it was butter.
And yet, even with all of that, the thing was barely affected. My blade couldn’t cut through its skin, not even managing to leave a scrape on it. The Revenant, meanwhile, staggered back one step. One single step. But one step was all I needed. Even as it screamed and ripped itself free from the grasp of my ghosts, I was already using my rocket burst under my feet to launch myself into the air, through both of my speed-enhancing rings that were waiting right there above me. I went flying upward at near blinding speed, away from the Revenant I had just knocked backward that single step.
But I wasn’t alone. In the course of that brief interaction, as I had stabbed the blade of my staff toward the monster in front of me, I had also triggered the grapple on the other end. It shot out toward the Revenant who had gone right past on its way to Shiori. Which normally wouldn’t have meant anything. If the blade of my staff wasn’t going to penetrate these Revenants even when I had it boosted that much, the grapple sure as hell wouldn’t make it through them.
That’s what the other ghosts were for. Seth and Grover had both appeared right where the grapple was going. Before the Revenant there knew what was happening, they quickly wrapped the thing around its neck and hooked it securely back on itself. Then they vanished before the monster could retaliate.
And that was when I had launched myself upward with that rocket burst boosted by the rings. I was sent flying toward the ceiling, and the speed was enough to rip the unaware monster off its feet and drag it away from Shiori right as it was reaching out toward her.
If I thought these things were screaming before, it was nothing compared to the unholy noise the bastard let out as I dragged it into the air. The good part was that it couldn’t fly, and it didn’t actually weigh any more than it should have. Once I got it off the ground, where it didn’t have anything to grab onto, or any other way to use its incredible strength and durability, the thing was almost helpless. At least, for the moment.
As we flew toward the cavern ceiling, I suddenly used the same power I’d activated a moment earlier to slow my clothes. At the same time, my rings appeared in front of me, using the slow-side that time. My momentum basically completely stopped. Even more so a second later as I used the five second pause power on my shoes. Then I was literally standing in midair. The Revenant I had dragged up as well was right behind me, flailing and screaming in rage. But even as its grasping, claw-like fingers grabbed for me, I canceled all the powers keeping me motionless in midair and let myself fall backwards away from the thing.
In the same motion, I retracted the grapple, leaving the Revenant to continue its flight upward rather than pulling it down with me. My rings flipped into place over the monster with the fast side facing it. As fast as it had been going before, that speed was doubled by the first ring and then doubled again by the second. Just like that, the monster was sent like a fucking bullet into the ceiling of the cavern. It left a hole where it punched through. Obviously not enough to kill it, but I didn’t need these things dead, helpful as that would have been. I just needed them slowed down enough for Shiori to finish her part.
Speaking of which, the other Revenant was already launching toward the other girl as I dropped back toward the ground. It had recovered from that slight stumble, and was intent on its target once more. Especially now that it thought I was out of the way.
Well, I was just going to have to disappoint this thing. As it reached for Shiori, I created a small portal in front of it, with the other end next to me. Its grasping hand and arm went through the portal, and I caught hold of the thing while falling. The monster was so strong that it actually held me in midair, leaving me dangling like that with its arm through the portal. Which held the thing back that single, crucial step away from reaching Shiori.
Of course, that wouldn’t last long. The monster was already starting to rip its arm out of my grip and back through the portal. Any attempt I made to actually resist would have been like a child trying to hold onto a truck that was driving away. There was absolutely no way I could manage it.
So it was a good thing that wasn’t my plan. Even as the Revenant began to pull its arm back, I canceled the portal and let go. The arm was severed, leaving me falling with it. Meanwhile, the Revenant staggered from the force it had been using to yank its arm back just as it was cut off.
Quite a long time back, I had picked up the power to instantly transfer any small, non-living item anywhere on my body through touch. I typically used that to bring weapons and spell objects from my pocket to my hands, or to change clothes. But it wasn’t limited to that. While I had been holding the Revenant’s arm, I had used that power to transport an enchanted coin from my pocket over to the monster’s own face, since ‘anywhere on my body’ had applied to his while we were touching. Now, while dropping through the air, I activated the spell on the coin before it could fall away from him.
It was a freeze-bomb spell, like the one Carfried had been teaching us basically right after Christmas last year. Fortunately, I had gotten much better with the spell since then. This one exploded in the Revenant’s face, completely freezing its head and the top-third of its body. No, it wouldn’t last long, of course. Even as the monster fell backwards with ice encompassing so much of its body, it was already starting to crack. In another second, the ice shattered as the Revenant tore its way free.
But by that point, I had already shifted my staff into its bow form while falling. I took aim, sending a concussive-energy arrow that way. Except not that way. The arrow hit a portal I summoned in front of myself, passing through that and out the other end, directly in front of the monster just as it was sitting up. The force of the arrow would have blown most beings through the air and sent them tumbling end over end. But in this case, it barely made the thing’s head snap back a bit.
Fortunately, that gave the Revenant a really good view of my staff coming down to slam into its face as I reached the ground behind it, slowing myself just enough to land without ending up crippled. Even then, with the speed of my fall added into the force of the blow, it wasn’t enough to break the skin. It did manage to knock the Revenant fully onto its back, at least. Not to mention piss it off pretty good, judging from the way it was screaming at me. Not that it had ever stopped.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
And speaking of being pissed off, the Revenant I had sent through the ceiling was back. It clawed its way down through the hole and was falling toward us with a screech that matched the one I had ever-so-briefly knocked down. At least this one looked a little damaged, even somewhat bloodied. But it wasn’t done, not by a long shot.
It really felt as though I had been doing this for hours, even though it had only been a very brief time. Part of that, of course, was the energy I was expanding in keeping the other three Revenants frozen. That was what Tabbris was focused on. Basically her entire job throughout all this was to use my Necromancy to stop those guys from moving and making this whole situation go from hard to completely impossible.
But I still had these two to deal with, and this could only go on for so long. I was going to make a mistake at some point, was going to react too slowly or miss something. Especially considering how much of my energy was put toward that Necromancy. The only real question was which would come first, my mistake or Shiori finishing with the crystal.
No, it didn’t matter how hard this was, or how tired I might have been. None of that mattered. I was there to protect my girl, and that was sure as hell what I was going to do. Whether it was for thirty more seconds or thirty more minutes, these fucks weren’t going to touch her.
To that end, with the first Revenant dropping rapidly and the second starting to shove itself back up while reaching for me, I was already reacting. First, I used my slow objects power on the falling creature’s torn clothes to keep it out of the way a bit longer. At the same time, my foot lashed out to kick the one in front of me as hard as I could right in the face. Which really seemed to do as much damage to myself as to it, if not more. But it still managed to make it slump back down in the midst of getting up, buying me another second. A second which I used by focusing my rock-animation power on the ground where his remaining arm was. With a thought, I made the rock there pull aside to reveal a hole, then encased his fist in that. Just as the rock sealed around his arm, I spat a wad of quick-hardening resin over it just to make it even harder to pull himself free.
It didn’t matter. The rock and resin together might as well have been made of tissue paper. The Revenant easily ripped away free and lashed out at me. I managed to twist most of the way aside, catching only a glancing blow in my leg. But even that was enough to knock me to the ground as pain screamed its way through my bones. It felt like something had broken, or at least cracked, just from that very slight blow. I would not survive a direct hit. No way in hell.
Just managing to throw myself into a roll before the thing could follow up that blow by grabbing me, I used a short burst from my staff to get back to my feet. My leg was still crying out in protest, but I was pretty sure it wasn’t completely broken. I could still stand up, barely. And it was healing by the second.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one healing. Not even the fastest. The Revenant in front of me, clambering back to its feet, had already regained the arm that I portal-cut off. It just grew back that quickly. So not only were these things almost impossible to actually damage, they regenerated entire missing limbs within seconds. No wonder everyone saw them as such a pain in the ass to fight.
Okay Tabs, ready? I sent inwardly, getting an immediate confirmation. Beyond simply holding the other three Revenants in place, she’d been waiting for this. We’d just had to wait until the right moment. If the mental clock in my head was anywhere near right, Shiori had to be almost done. If I was going to actually deal with these guys, it was now or never.
In a blindingly bright burst of light, my sister’s angelic wings emerged from my back and flared outward. But they didn’t fire. It would’ve been too hard to hit everything I needed to with one shot. Instead, even as they flared out, the wings vanished. But their power wasn’t gone. Tabbris used the energy from her wings to enhance her own boost, and shoved all of that into me. It would only last for a few seconds, but I was suddenly faster and stronger than I had ever been. Even the previous times we have tried it weren’t like this. She had gotten even stronger, had been able to pull more energy, had become more efficient at utilizing it. All of the above, and it translated into an absurd boost.
The entire world seemed to completely stop in that instant. The Revenant in front of me, who had been a blur of motion hurtling itself toward me just a second earlier, was practically frozen. It came forward ever-so-slowly, like one of those videos of the hummingbird made so you could see the individual wing flaps. I could see its mouth twisting, those rotted teeth exposed as the thing shrieked at me, its dirty hands extended my way while it tried to get close enough to claw my throat out. A thing it might actually have managed if I hadn’t been boosted by Tabbris right then.
But I was boosted. Which I used, taking a quick step forward before snapping my foot out in as fucking hard of a kick as I could manage. And right then, I could manage quite a bit. My foot collided with that fucker’s face so hard he was literally flung backward off his feet and into the air. And yes, after all the times I had hit these things to basically no effect, that was quite therapeutic. I actually caught a glimpse of what looked like an expression of surprise cross the thing’s face as it was flung away from me. While it was still in the air, I threw myself after it. My rings appeared in front of me, and all that speed I already had was doubled, then doubled again as I passed through them.
Landing hard on the Revenant’s chest as it flew backwards from that kick, I drove the blade of my staff down through its throat. That time it penetrated the fucking thing. I felt the monster’s formerly impervious skin give away.
But I didn’t have the luxury of time to wait and see how that turned out. My super boost would be over in another couple seconds, and then I’d really be fucked. I had to use this while I had it. With that in mind, I triggered the grapple, sending it flying up toward the still-falling other Revenant.
While the grapple was still unraveling and flying up that way in this incredibly slowed-down world I was living in for the moment, I released my staff, using my pause power to freeze it in place. It stayed upright like that, with the blade sticking partway through the other monster’s throat. Then I used my rocket burst to throw myself upward. Between that and the incredible strength I had right then, I practically flew straight at the slowly-falling Revenant. On the way, my hand snapped out to catch hold of the grapple, dragging it up with me much faster than it had been moving before.
Just before I reached the monster, I reared back and hurled the grapple at it as hard as I could manage. Both rings appeared in front of it, boosting its speed even more. That time, it tore through the thing’s chest an instant before I collided with it as well. The force of my arrival sent the thing back upward, slamming it into the ceiling of the cavern once more.
Kicking off the thing, I flipped over in the air while yanking its arms to throw the Revenant under me with the grapple still stuck in its chest. Then I opened a portal between myself and my staff, sticking a hand through to hit the button to make the grapple start retracting.
As the monster was pulled downward, I landed on its back with my hands on both shoulders. Instantly, I used my rocket burst on my back to hurl both of us straight down as fast and as hard as I could. The ground, with the other Revenant still pinned against it by my upright and frozen staff, came rushing up blindingly quickly.
At the last possible instant, I kicked off the bastard I was perched on. My rings appeared just as I threw myself away from him, slowing my descent drastically.
But the Revenant didn’t slow down. He slammed into his companion with all the force of a small meteor. The grapple had finished retracting, leaving the staff itself to pierce all the way up into his chest until half of it was sticking through his back. And the force of that impact came just as I canceled the pause, meaning the other half of the staff was driven down clear through the throat of the monster who was already lying on the ground.
And I still wasn’t quite done yet. With a thought, I summoned the staff back to my grasp. Then I flipped it around, while still dropping. Holding the thing in both hands with the blade pointed downward, I used the pause power on my shoes to stop my fall. With a loud, probably horrifying scream, I hurled the staff back down toward those two fallen figures. In the same moment, I focused on two things. First, my heat objects power. The staff, blade included, suddenly became white-hot. And the second thing I focused on was the size-increase power. Usually I used that simply to make the staff somewhat longer. But now I made it wider as well. I turned it from a quarterstaff into what amounted to a lamppost. On the way down, my speed-rings flew into its path. So it was the size of a post, hot enough to melt through almost anything that touched it, and going faster than a bullet.
The staff fucking annihilated the Revenants as it collided with them. Pieces of their bodies went flying in every direction, even as I disabled the pause on my shoes and fell the rest of the way down. I landed in a crouch, right as the super-boost wore off. And boy did I feel it. All that extra energy rushed out of me, leaving me drained enough I could have collapsed.
And then I really did collapse. Because the rush of pleasure that suddenly filled me in that second was the strongest I’d felt since… well, since I’d killed Fossor. Falling onto my side, I felt that burst of blinding joy that told me I’d accomplished my goal. The two Revenants were dead. They were gone. They… they were…
“Flick!” It was Shiori, she was right in front of me as my eyes blinked open. Only a couple seconds had passed, even if it felt like hours. Her hand grabbed my arm, yanking me up. “We’ve gotta go!”
“Wha–did you–” My eyes snapped toward the crystal. It was blue now, and humming loudly.
“I got it!” Shiori confirmed, while pointing upward. I could see… more Revenants. Dozens of them. No, hundreds. They were all coming down through the ceiling. And they looked absolutely furious.
“The crystal called them back!” Shiori blurted, still tugging my arm. “But they’re pretty pissed off about it!
“And if we don’t get the hell out of here, they’re gonna show us just how pissed they are.”