Dark Matter Ascension

Jace got down to the plains and his feet crunched onto the cracked dirt. It did not look like it could sustain life, but it did; with some type of short brown grass that grew in patches among thorny vines. The very land seemed to react to his presence, as it tried to reach towards him and clasp around his feet.

But, thanks to his armor's integrated Sliver Arc, his prosthetics, and his various Skills enhancing his form – Jace practically flew across the landscape. He could see the horde of demons far ahead in the distance, and felt that same swelling from earlier, that prideful desire to save others and be hailed for his deeds, spurring him on.

An odd sensation for him, as he never craved glory or heroics. Just survival. His whole life had been a struggle to survive, to live through to the next day; a near-constant struggle. Being valorous and craving recognition or adoration was a foreign sensation, and it felt right. I deserve adoration, Jace thought. I saved an entire universe from an Astral Demon who wanted to consume all of it. That feeling of importance continued to build, and as he looked upon the enormous army of Astral Demons in front of him…he felt confident.

Void Stalker (Rank 1), Void Shield (Rank 6). The familiar and comforting white-grey appeared around him as he approached the demon army, and thanks to his stealth Skill. He almost stopped running as he saw a brilliant, gold energy cascading down his arm and coating his sword. "What's going on?" he asked as he felt…stronger. His reflexes sharpened and senses heightened. The armor interior smelled like fresh detergent, and his hearing picked up the sounds of combat miles out with crystal clarity.

That is the Talent, Ollie said in his mind. Valiant Crusader's Might. All offensive capabilities are amplified based on your current depth of emotion. And right now, you are acting in quite the valorous fashion.

Jace crossed the miles in a minute, barely seeing his energy dip below its maximum. He could hear the yelling, screaming, bellowing, and violence ahead of him. An army of demons, incomprehensible horrors from the darkest twisted minds of possible imagination. Mangled bodies that were bent into unnatural directions, covered with bristling arms and armor. Nothing technology-based, true to Xera's scans. The armor looked advanced but was ramshackle. An army of creatures that were unorganized and more akin to a roving band of marauders than a proper military force.

They were all pressing forward, attacking the shields surrounding the city in waves before the weakened ones fell back to allow for fresher bodies forward. Jace could see the barrier flexing inward before rebounding back; a crackling orange cascade of energy occasionally jolting out from towards atop the walls – some type of defensive fortification. Raging Cleave (Rank 10), he thought as the phantasmal, crimson extension to his sword appeared. He unleashed a horizontal sweep against the unsuspecting foes, and in a split-second, severed hundreds in twain. The grey-white of Void spread, and he could see their halves attempting to reattach themselves as some sort of regeneration tried to activate. But the all-devouring Void was relentless and inexorable, and the [Rending] Augmentation only sped up the continually chewing of their bodies.

He heard shouts of alarm, screams of agony, and a large chunk of the army turned to face him. Twisted forms, with pitted, black holes where mouths would be, singular eyes in the center of their foreheads, bristling with horns and what looked like tumorous growths that oozed a sickly, brown liquid. With a bellowing war cry, the part of the demon horde that turned rushed at Jace.

A Cosmic System message appeared in his vision.

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[Foe that is vastly superior detected.]

[Shattered Limits enabled.]

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That is due to the sheer number, Ollie stated.

Jace smiled as he activated Shattered Limits (Rank 19), amplifying all of his traits by x100. He blitzed forward carving a bloody canyon of decimation through the ranks, charging toward the barrier and wall protecting the city. Left, right, left, right – he just cut back and forth as he mortally wounded foe after foe. Never outright killing them, as they were made of sturdy stuff. Even when he cut a head off, the body continued to move and try to swing at him.

But he was far beyond their capabilities. Jace was a hurricane, a storm of slicing blade and devouring Void that devastated everything he touched. And these were some hodge-podge assembly of various Astral Demons. They did not stand a chance. He reached the base of the shield within seconds of his charge beginning, and that golden glow surrounding his arm and blade had spread to suffuse his body entirely. He could see the pink-text on black boxes appear in the corner of his vision.

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[You have arrived at Outpost 1198.]

[A location for Dreamers to gather.]

[Those who do not seek to harm those within may enter the shield.]

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Jace turned to face the army and heard Quinn's voice over the comms, "You look like you're having fun. Heads up, big one heading to you. Tagging it." He saw a slightly-larger but far better equipped Astral Demon barreling towards him.

Jace kept hacking and slashing, back and forth, keeping a swath around him fully cleared away as the enormous figure arrived. It was a quadrupedal entity with a torso sticking up from the center. Four arms held various weapons – all seemingly intended for melee combat. It was covered from head to foot in some type of dull brown metal, and shouted. "Back! This Dreamer is mine!"

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Jace raised his hand, "Dark Matter Dart (Rank 4) [Exploding]." The spikes of dark purple shot out from his palm – three impacting the centaur-like figure, and the rest going into the surrounding demonic army before detonating. The main target he had struck was blown to bits, only to have the upper half rapidly recover and re-form. But the surrounding army did not recover as quickly. The larger Astral Demon charged Jace.

But was far too slow. Jace easily avoided each weapon swing, even deflecting with his palm as he leaped overhead and decapitated the creature before landing behind it.

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[Fulmination charged!]

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A small orb popped out of the top of the hilt, near the cross guard. Jace quickly spun in a circle, activating another Raging Cleave (Rank 10) as he thumbed the small orb. The blade crackled with the dark purple of Xera's eyes, and the enormous, fifty-foot slash that carved through the horde exploded with the same brilliant light, sending a scything shockwave across the battlefield and decimating thousands.

Jace turned back to the centaur Astral Demon and made sure it was dead, cutting it to bits and ignoring the volley of ranged attacks that slammed harmlessly into his Void Shield. He heard shouting from the walls above, "Get inside before you're overwhelmed!" someone with a deep, female voice yelled.

Jace ignored them and rushed forward into the fray once more. The golden light suffusing him as he felt alive. He was not just alive, he was being a hero. No, he was a hero.

Phral had seen a lot. She had seen the crashing arclight engines of her universe breach the barrier of reality and the Astral Verge. She had seen the dread hordes of Astral Demons from the fields of madness, the deepest layer of this slice of reality, assault outposts and bring them down. She had witnessed horrors and depravity beyond imagination as her people's combat prowess was turned against them, and their shielding technology was broken beyond all use. Time after time.

Outpost 1198 would have held for a long, long time against these Potency 1 Astral Demons. Perhaps indefinitely, if the kinetic batteries continued to be charged. But the shields could not take a good, solid hit from something powered by Psykinetics. Technology from the universes was not suited to fighting pure manifestations of willpower and emotion turned into energy, and as such most defensive technology was weak. Offensive? Sure, they had that aplenty, such as their arclight emplacements that were protecting her species' Dreamer outposts.

But here, she saw something that defied all logic. An armored figure, wearing very futuristic gear that would rival the mech frames of Perilor Gyantra, slaughtering an army. Whoever they were had the chance to flee inside the barrier, but instead they turned and launched themselves into the enormous mass of Astral Demons.

They held no weapon, and yet where they swung their arm, swathes fell. Enormous explosions of a violent crimson, tinged with a brilliant, lustrous gold, and deep, dark purple decimated clusters of Astral Demons, breaking the assault on the western wall. She let out a cheer of excitement, "Go get them!"

The figure must have heard her – though she didn't know how, as she was a good few-thousand feet away – and they were mid-combat. But they turned to face her nonetheless. The black, armored faceplate was inscrutable, and the figure seemed to shine a more brilliant gold as they resumed their carnage.

Phral ran to the tower along the wall, barging in to find her commander and his lieutenants resting in between shifts. "There's a Dreamer out there!"

Her commander, an older one of her species who had seen far more than she, shrugged. "If they didn't make it inside the shield, that is on them."

"No! They are beating the horde!"

This caused the older male to look up, "What?"

"Come see!"

Jace cleared the entire western side of the city and tore into the southern edge. A message of some type had spread among the Astral Demons, and they began to assault him. Quinn spoke over the comms, "I've sent my observer high above to its maximum tethered range – you have the whole army coming at you."

Time for my plan, Jace thought as he turned and sprinted, carving through the horde as he baited them back to their destroyed and decimated allies. They followed, like a swarm of piranhas chasing fresh meat, encircling him as they tried to defeat him. But even with a quarter of his energy gone, Jace was more than capable of annihilating them. He heard cheering, and sparing a glance to the walls, saw a huge crowd had gathered and were extolling him.

The golden glow surrounding him burned even brighter. Each swing left a glittering trail of the luminescent energy, and he burned like a beacon drawing the Astral Demons closer. A lure, bringing them to their end.

Ollie spoke in his mind, I'm keeping a tally of the Essence and will give you the readout at the end.

"Thanks," Jace muttered. He had seen the strands of white, goopy energy floating around the battlefield as the Astral Demons expired. The strands had seemingly been sucked towards him, and he felt an odd, tingling sensation as the substance passed through his armor and soaked into his skin. "Let's crank this up a notch. I want to shatter the battlefield in a cataclysmic inferno, not harming the city or its citizens. Archmage's Admixture."

The ground beneath him flared with a golden glow before the power surged along the terrain, cracking and splintering the earth apart as the effect spread to surround the entire city. He kept fighting the horde as they washed over him like a flood. The numbers began to build as they stopped trying to strike at him to kill him, and instead dogpiled on top of him. He couldn't swing his weapon back and forth fast enough as the press of bodies pushed against him. Jace wasn't harmed thanks to his Void Shield, but even activated Aura of Wrath (Rank 11) [Voidflame Vestment] to annihilate more of the Astral Demons, he was being overrun.

Irritating. Come on spell turned Skill, do your thing.

Phral gripped the edge of the wall and held her breath. She saw the ground spiderweb and crack, a faint, shimmering gold spreading from the Dreamer before fading. And then she saw them overwhelmed. "No!" she whispered.

Her commander, the lieutenants, and several of the citizens were watching the scene, and there was general muttering of dismay. The commander chuckled, "One Dreamer against an army? Yeah, sure. They got the surprise earlier, but I never expected them to do wel-"

His words were cut off as the ground erupted. All around the city, the earth tore asunder and fountains of blazing, golden fire surged up and devoured the Astral Demons, flooding the whole perimeter outside of the walls in a boiling, golden, liquid flow of burning radiance. The Astral Demons were burned to nothingness in a split second as the radiance surged skyward, forcing Phral to squint through the brilliant luminescence.

"By the Founders!" the commander said, breathless, in shock.

Phral let out a cheer as she saw the black, armored figure standing upright, unharmed.

Jace turned to face the city. "How much Essence?" he asked as he let his Skills fade.

We got 134 Essence.

"How much to level up in the Astral System?"

For levels one to ten, we are looking at one-thousand per level.

"A good distance off," he muttered as he walked towards the walls and waved. Raising his voice he shouted up to the people up above, "Hey! I'm new here! Can we talk?"