Book 5: Chapter 49

Book 5: Chapter 49

The blood layered around her felt like very tight armor or that latex outfit she’d tried one time to Eleniah as she soared through the drenching rain at the falling blue core. The coating of black goo that surrounded the glowing blue orb twisted around it, making itself into a new shape. It was a twisted monstrosity just like the rest what these nanomachine things had made, and Eleniah understood why Kay’s people had feared the idea of these things enough to create horror stories about them. The falling chunk looked like an egg covered in spikes and feelers with the core in the middle as it impacted into the swirling flow of nanomachines below it.

Everywhere Eleniah could see the black mass looked disjointed, where just seconds ago the tide of destruction had been a single coordinated body moving as one now there were bits of it getting in the way of each other and she spotted pieces that were pulling away and becoming separate shapes that seemed to stumble as they moved away from the protection of their fellows. Kay and Alahna took immediate advantage of that and erased any that fell away from the main body. The egg wriggled, settling itself in to its new place, and a wave of unified direction spread from where the core now sat. Eleniah grinned at the evidence that it wasn’t only the source of the nanomachines growth, but a means of directing the incessant tide to work together.

She continued grinning as she slammed into the coating surrounding the core like a red meteor. She burst through the first few layers and started rapidly punching her way through the rest of them, the force of her blows empowered by mana and the System creating shock waves that pushed back the sludge and dug her a tunnel deeper toward her objective. Whatever this thing or these things were, they could obviously feel surprise and for a moment there was no response to her attack, which gave her enough time to get her first good look at her target.

The core was some kind of machine, made of twisted and flowing metal that glittered like shining scales but with a sinister tint. It was wide at the top and bottom and narrowed toward the middle, where two oblong glass portals were located, giving a view into the internals and letting out the blue glow. The light was so much brighter this close to its source and Eleniah couldn’t quite make out anything inside except that there was movement. Both the movement and the light were nauseating to look at, but somehow enthralling, and she had to tear her gaze away from it. The top and bottom of the device were stretched out rectangles covered in bumps with hoses extruding from them. The hoses undulated as an endless stream of nanomachines spilled out of them like oil, streaming up into the rest of the mass.

Spinning, spine covered growths burst from every surface and tried to mill Eleniah into pulp. The first few that hit her broke against the armor Kay had given her and began to melt, but there was another one behind that, and another, and another, and another. Eleniah actively fought back, blowing apart anything that came near her as she tried to push forward. She managed to take one step closer under the constant barrage, but the monstrosity was fighting hard to keep her away from the device at its center. Broken, dented pieces that didn’t reform or heal after Eleniah hit them were pushed aside to get more weapons, more dangers and threats forward to end Eleniah Selthoran.

The “ground” beneath her feet rose up to paw at her, sizzling as it made contact with the blood coating her. She started to sprint just so she could stay in one place as her footing started dragging her backward, the nanomachines under her acting as a giant treadmill. She threw punches and kicks in all directions as she ran, destroying attacks aimed her way, ripping barriers thrown up in front of her, and above all doing her best to get to the core and end this. A legion of weapons and throngs of limbs grew around her and struck as one and Eleniah had to use a Class Skill.

“[Unstoppable Fist].” The burst of destruction that came from her simple punch wiped out feet of nanomachines in all directions and gave her a clean shot to the core. She landed and rolled, already running toward the device and drawing back her fist to punch again. Her ability to destroy it had just been shown, and the eldritch nanomachines had no choice but to break out their trump card to stop her. The blue glow that flowed through the mass of nanomachines raced back toward the core and the shining light intensified tenfold. It was blindingly bright, but it wasn’t enough to slow down the Indomitable Fist of Avalon. Her elbow bent

Screaming in rage and pain Eleniah wrenched upward, using the strength of body she had trained so hard for to tear her arms free. Sprays of glowing blue dots were thrown around as they burst above the surface. The blue tide didn’t stop trying to eat her, to consume her not as food but as resources and Eleniah only had one move left.

Shapes pulled themselves free from the edge of the mass of nanomachines, looking drunk as they staggered away. Kay drowned them in blood before they could recover and fuse back in to the main body, melting them away. Separating the core, even for just a moment seemed to have an outside effect on the battle as Kay was able to push dozens of feet forward, destroying huge swathes of sludge while it seemed to struggle against itself. All coordination was lost, with limbs and tentacle blocking each other and getting tangles up and waves of black that dropped down on Kay splitting into pieces and flowing in different directions. It was a perfect opportunity, and Kay wasn’t going to let it go to waste. He stormed forward, the still spinning red maelstrom eroding away everything it touched with physical force and mana fueled Skill. The blood sea rose up and ended the black tide, forcing the lines of battle closer to the core, and Eleniah.

Alahna flew through the air above, crushing with clouds made solid, unleashing foot wide bolts of lightning that danced through the black mass leaving scorched ruins in their wake, and showering down spiraling vortexes of frothing water that split piece from piece and dashed them against the ground. The storm that hovered ominously above continued to pour down rain for her to use as a weapon and for a moment the sky cleared as all the rain gathered together. Alahna reached out and mimed condensing the rain into a giant ball, which began to rapidly shrink. It went from being larger than most buildings to the size of a basketball in the blink of an eye, and then it fell. It landed and immediately detonated, clearing enough nanomachines away to be able to see the churned up ground which had been scoured clean, for just a moment before the black tide poured back in.

The rain resumed pouring down and Alahna started forming spears and pressurized blasts that she threw down at the enemy, and Kay decided not to be outdone. A titanic form rose beneath him, the blood streaming around him before reforming into shape after passing over his body. A copy of the asura golem miniboss from the local dungeon loomed over the scene, half as tall as the black tower that had just been felled. Kay wasn’t able to create a simulacra that copied the Skills or abilities of something without blood, but he could freely shape them as he wanted with Blood Manipulation. It was meant to be a distraction as much as it was a useful weapon, but the simulacrum didn’t care. It slammed its fists into the enemy in front of it and started tearing with its fingers, throwing chunks of black goo around as it bulldozed a path forward.

The egg shaped lump wrapped around the core that Eleniah had dissappeared into bulged outward as if an explosion had gone off inside of it, and the battle changed. The blue energy empowering the nanomachines rushed toward the egg and the goo near Kay started to die at high speeds. It wasn’t just dying on its own, but every bit of protection it had against Purify Blood and the speedy duplication that let the nanomachines sustain against his power to destroy them cut off with the lack of the energy, and everywhere Kay’s blood touched the enemy began to melt.

The shape around the core began to glow with the same blue energy, bright enough to be seen clearly through the pouring rain. Kay’s eyes widened in surprise and concern and he started mowing down all of the goo in front of him desperately pushing closer to try and assist. Even with the increased speed at which he could now destroy the nanomachines it was slow going, because there was just so much of it in his way. He ran behind a continuous stream that he blasted forward, cutting a path forward.

A bright flash lit up everything, and time seemed to stand still. It looked just like the old film of atomic testing he’d seen in history class, and it was right on top of him, coming from where the core was. Where Eleniah was. Time seemed to stand still and Kay felt like he was perceiving faster than the speed of light as the flash sprung from the center and spread out. At the center of the light was the blue energy of the nanomachine core and Kay couldn’t help but stare into it. As he did he felt part of himself that shouldn’t have existed, something born of his journey into that space that wasn’t a space, a hostile universe beyond this one, reach out. He saw flashes of imagery, tasted strange tastes, and knew the stories of a million lives, all in that instant while the blast wave traveled toward him.

And then the moment ended, Kay forgot everything but the tiniest glimpse of what he had just experience, and the explosion reached the barriers Kay had instinctively thrown up around himself, turning them all into dust. The force lifted him off the ground and slammed him back down into it, destroying the blood sea he’d been walking on and burying him beneath the soil of the Island of Sel, his skin blackened and charred, unmoving.