Rune Seeker

As soon as Hiral got the first aura notification, two more quickly came – the Auras of the Void-Venom Empress and Heaven’s Punishment – though he noticed each had an additional note he hadn’t seen before.

Note: Aura is suffering from moderate suppression due to outside influences, bonuses are reduced by 50%.

That had to be from the orchestra. And fifty percent? Not a small amount. Just another reason they needed to do something about the golems playing on the stage. Except, that energy field protecting them was a problem…

“Yan, you’re with me,” Seena said. “Hiral, consider this the shoulder tap. Do something OP, would you? The rest of you, you know what to do.”

“Oh-pee?” Banst asked, though she turned on the chair back where she still stood, and looked straight at Hiral. “Y’are the only one…” she leaned to the side to avoid another arrow, “… that’s not all glowy and impressive. What ya got?”

“She’s not even counting me, is she?” Drahn said, loosing yet another shot Banst dodged without looking in his direction.

Meeting Banst’s eyes, Hiral ran his sensory domain along his chest at the same time he sheathed his RHCs. Gone was the wound, thanks to his regeneration, and even the Coat of Ur’Thul – no, the Coat of Amin Thett – had repaired itself. “Let me show you.”

First and foremost, Hiral needed to do something about the suppressive – and controlling – music of the orchestra. The constant damage was already wearing down the party’s health in the Party Interface, and the way it seemed to tell Banst what they were going to do was too much. And, for Left, the effects seemed to be the worst – his shaped tattoos faded quickly like the music resisted their very existence.

More than that – more than anything – the way the music controlled him was an unfortunate reminder of how it felt like he’d been led around by the PIMP. At how it kept putting him where it wanted, not where he wanted. He’d defended the PIMP’s actions when it had killed – and brought back – Yanily, but even that gratitude was mixed. Had it just used that to foster goodwill?

The PIMP was helping them to achieve its own goals. They could rely on it to make them stronger, sure, but only as long as their goals aligned.

That wasn’t enough. Hiral did not accept that. And he sure as hell wasn’t going to be anybody’spuppet. Not the PIMP’s, and certainly not Banst’s. He was through literally dancing to somebody else’s music. From here on out, he was setting his own path forward. He’d use the power the PIMP gave him – he’d be an idiot not to – but he’d use it how he wanted.

And he’d start here. Now. With that blasted Threnody representing everything he couldn’t bring himself to accept about the situation. However, since he didn’t know exactly how the Threnody worked, he couldn’t just outright try to counter it. So, instead, like it was doing to his own Primal Chord, he needed to try to drown it out.

Flooding power – and his frustration – into his Runes of Increase, Sealing, and Unsealing, Hiral first activated Double Trouble+. Then, with those powers at the ready, he steeled his concept of what he wanted normal to be – to fend off the Threnody – and activated Domain of the Sun+.

Solar energy poured off him – Edicts flaring in his vision to push his domain outward – the light crawling across the floor, up the walls, and along the ceiling. Even the stage got pulled in by the powerful domain as stands of solid light filled with spectators materialized throughout the theatre. While the orchestra itself didn’t vanish, many of Hiral’s spectral viewers held instruments of their own.

Another pulse of energy from Left, and suddenly Banners of Courage stood within the crowd, even as many of the watchers glowed with flames, lightning, and the purple of Void-Venom. Notification window after window popped up, though each held the note about the power of them being suppressed by ‘outside influences’. This time, though, it was only by twenty-five percent.

His runes and Edicts had helped stabilize his own domain, but the Threnody was apparently just that powerful, and he could already feel it working to erode the edges of his coliseum of light.

“Okay, that’s pretty flashy,” Banst admitted, though she didn’t look worried in the least, and casually lifted her foot for one of Drahn’s arrows to shoot underneath it. As soon as the foot came back down, Banst moved. One second she was standing on the back of a chair, the next she was bolting straight at Hiral before he could activate any other ‘flashy’ abilities.

Around came her hand, mid-leap, with thumb and middle-finger already together. Knowing what that meant, Hiral launched himself to the side, barely in time. A snap, followed by a shockwave tearing through where he’d just been standing, and Hiral landed to spin and face the Infested.

Hitting the ground in a crouch where Hiral had just vacated, Banst whipped around as she stood, the toe of her boat skritching along the floor. Hiral almost wondered what she was doing until his sensory domain spotted dozens of invisible spikes bursting from the arc of her turn in his direction. Rejection and Breaking combined in a rush as Hiral swept his hands up and across to form a shaky shield that would hopefully stop the attack.

He was… half right.

The first spikes that struck his shield fell apart thanks to the power of his runes, but each subsequent one put more and more burden on his defense. Coupled with the pressure from the Threnody, and Hiral’s shield fell before Banst’s attack was completely exhausted. Pain tore across his left shoulder from the first spike that got through, though he managed to dodge the second and third, without any Lost Echoes appearing. The Threnody?A fourth still caught him across his thigh – blood spurting into the air – but he didn’t have time to worry about the small injuries.

The Infested was already closing the distance. Fast. Far faster than Picoli or Fitch had been, she would be on him in a heartbeat, and both her hands had her fingers ready for more of their deadly snaps.

But, as always, Hiral wasn’t alone, his doubles appearing in the space between them, each deflecting one of the deadly hands. Dual shockwaves ripped through the air on either side of Hiral at the same time Left’s Dagger of Sath exploded with deadly force against the inside of Banst’s wrist. With the trailing stream behind the strike vanishing like a rapidly burning fuse, the cutting power of the weapon should’ve taken Banst’s hand off at the wrist – even weakened – just like Left had done to Picoli.

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

What Hiral saw, instead, made his eyes widen. Some kind of invisible field – barely a finger’s breadth above Banst’s skin – appeared to block the blow. All the force Left had built up split above and below Banst’s wrist, twin streamers splashing into nothingness as their power was expended.

What was that!?

There wasn’t time to wonder, though, with the Infested pressing forward. Instead of punches, Banst lashed out with snapping fingers, the doubles forced to aggressively deflect her hands before they could line up with the trio. Shockwaves of tearing force scarred the air as the Infested advanced much like Hiral would’ve with his RHCs. And with every rapid, snapping attack, those scars were getting closer.

As much as Hiral wanted to stay a step back and figure out the trick to Banst’s assault, the way things were going, he and his doubles would get overwhelmed first. The Infested’s raw stats were simply that high. He’d need to figure it out on the fly.

A curtain of flames and lightning crashed against the stage at the same time Hiral joined the fray, Death Knell and Blight’s Mercy emerging from the ring at his back. Taking control of the weapons without grabbing them, he weaved the swords in between his attacking doubles, while a bamf announced the arrival of another member of the party.

Glowing their trademark green, Seeyela’s Fangs sought the Infested’s back, but somehow the woman turned just the right amount to have the attacks pass harmlessly by. From there, a quick thwap-thwap of Banst’s open right hand slapped Seeyela’s daggers out further, only for a follow-up elbow to slam into the white-carapace helmet. Back Seeyela stumbled, while Hiral’s swords struck at Banst from above – Left and Right coming in at the same time from the sides.

There was no way the woman could avoid all of them.

Clap, a shockwave rolled outward in a sphere from Banst, catching Hiral’s swords in the force to fling them aside. Left and Right didn’t do much better, though they managed to get in position to block the worst of it before getting tossed back a dozen feet.

“I told y’all…” Banst started, before her eyes widened at Hiral cutting through the shockwave straight for her.

With the physical gesture of bringing her hands together telegraphing what was coming, Hiral had released his hold on the swords and turned to his runes. Separation and Expansion cut ahead of him – first through the expanding shockwave of whatever Banst was using – and straight for the Infested herself. The already torn floor of the theatre parted before the absolute edge Hiral had thrown at her, Rejection under his feet powering his own movement in her direction.

Up and across came Banst’s hands – snap, snap – her fingers sending shockwaves to hit the crescent of Separation in an attempt to destabilize it. It wasn’t enough, and the woman smartly hopped to the side at the last second to avoid getting bisected. Landing not even a heartbeat later, Hiral was already on top of her, fists of Breaking and Impact swinging for her face.

One, two, three, she turned aside the flurry of blows, but with each contact, Hiral felt just a hint of what she was doing. More than that, as he threw a hard, straight right for her face, he noticed something else – Banst’s lips were pressed together.

It wasn’t in concentration, either. It was almost as if…

Up and down stomped the Infested’s foot, a directional shockwave bursting towards Hiral at twice the speed of the clap. Too fast for him to cut apart again, he instead burst Rejection under his feet to toss him up and over the wave – and Banst.

RHCs came to his hands as he somersaulted over the Infested, two pulls of his triggers punching holes in the floor at her feet when she dodged. Then, not wanting to get caught midair by his lightning-quick opponent, Hiral switched from Rejection to Attractionto speed his descent. Landing and spinning, he brought his right RHC up just in time to push Banst’s arm out to the side.

Snap, and a shockwave burst past his ear, while he thrust his other RHC – primed with Piercing Shot – towards her gut. The Infested’s own arm came down around to push it out just wide enough the blast flew harmlessly by. And then they were moving, trigger pulls and finger snaps coming rapid-fire while they jockeyed for position. Around and around they went in the tight circle, Hiral moving his RHCs from high to low, left to right, even firing under his arm or over his shoulder to try and land a hit. All the while, he used the barrels of those same weapons to push Banst’s hands and arms out of line, barely evading each of her attacks.

Finally, though, he was too slow, and Banst caught the bottom of Hiral’s right RHC, slapping it out of his grip – with enough force to break his fingers if he didn’t let go – and into the air above, before she brought her hand back down. There, practically next to where the Rune of Separation sat on the center of his chest, Banst snapped her fingers.

And Hiral used his Rune of Time Dilation. Not to try and dodge the attack – no, there was no way he could that now – but because he felt something. Every time she snapped her fingers it was there, just nagging at the edge of his concentration. So, he focused on that power gathering in her fingers. On the feel of it. The familiar feel of it.

Familiar… but not.

When she’d originally cut him, he thought maybe she’d used the Rune of Separation, but he hadn’t felt any lingering power from it when he’d touched his own wound. Similarly, when she clapped or snapped her fingers, he’d thought maybe it was a Rune of Impact and Expansion. Again, that didn’t feel right, and it certainly didn’t explain the gestures she was making.

A snap of her fingers always resulted in an airborne, directional shockwave. The clap gave her a spherical blast. The stomping foot was directional along the floor, while the strange arc’ing gesture she made caused spikes. All of it looked like different runes – despite actually being invisible – but they all felt the same.

Banst wasn’t using different runes with each ability – she was using just one in different ways. That had to be it. The only question was, which rune was it? Then there was the protective field she was using. How did that fit in? Unlike all the other abilities she was throwing at the party, there wasn’t a physical gesture for it.

Staring hard at her fingers, he could see the power building around them, but there was no rune taking shape. It wasn’t like when he put Impact in front of his knuckles. She was somehow controlling the power of the runes without forming them.

An Edict maybe? Or something to do with the squid inside her?

Hiral was out of time, though, with the Threnody pushing back his Rune of Time Dilation. He had to let the effect go… which meant he was about to be in a world of hurt. Except, now that he moved his eyes away from Banst’s fingers, he felt a second familiar power emerging there.

Oh.

Control over his rune faded as time jerked back to normal speed, a snap signalling the release of Banst’s power directly in front of his chest. From that range, and with the power she’d built into it, the shockwave bursting out had the potential to tear him in half. Even without his rune, he watched the displacement of air as if in slow motion as it raced for his chest.

Instead of trying to dodge, however, Hiral’s now-empty hand closed over the hilt of the Greatsword of Amin Thett. Solar energy poured into the weapon at the same time the attack reached his chest.

Or, would’ve reached his chest – if Seeyela’s portal hadn’t opened directly in front of him.

In one portal and out the other so fast even Banst couldn’t react, the Infested’s own shockwave slammed into her back. A split-second later, the fallen-star form of the Greatsword of Amin Thett crashed down on her like an avalanche.