Essence Wave Book 2 Chapter 35

*** AUTHOR’S NOTE ***

We’re camping this weekend, so I’m making due with the Patreon App. It’s not the best.

*** AUTHOR’S NOTE ***

David grinned at Colin, then dropped into his core cave. His mental projection moved to the edge of the area. The walls of his core cave resembled, well, a cave. They felt like stone, and his imaginary hands ran over the area. “Okay, I’ve got to flatten out an area, then carve. The larger the rune, the stronger it is, but the more Mana and Energy it’ll take to empower it.”

He nodded, “About as big as my current mental projection, that should be the best introduction to this, I think. At least, that’s what the Skill information indicates. Body, Strengthen, Enhance, those should be a good set of runes, and my Runic Inscription Skill tells me that I can combine them into a single rune, which should make it stronger.”

He reached out and willed a portion of his core cave’s wall to smooth out. The motion burned and it took a few subjective minutes to create the carving location. It ended up covering about a fourth of the height and ten percent of the circumference of his core cave when he was finished.

Once the carving area was ready, his hand moved forward, glowing with Mana and Energy as they flowed from his cores into his mental body. He didn’t really try to control it, just letting the combined resources pool at his fingers. Once they did, he stuck his hand into the wall and started to carve the rune.

It hurt, feeling like a combination of really bad heartburn and needles being stuck into his chest. He ignored it, focusing on the line he was drawing. His cores drained quickly, making him pause after every stroke to let them refill before continuing.

Each stroke made the pain grow. Each line made the Mana and Energy cost increase, but it wasn’t anything he couldn’t pay. Ninety percent of the way through the Inscription, he had to pause in the middle of the line. “Huh, guess, I, got, too, enthusiastic,” he panted, even his mental projection exhausted from the effort.

He focused on the flow of Energy and Mana, working to streamline the incoming gaseous resources, hoping to level his True Scholar’s Focus Skill or increase his regeneration in some other way. Everything seemed easier to manipulate, outside of the carving, from before his core’s evolution. “Totally worth it,” David said, turning back to the carving. “Three lines left.”

Each one took another five to ten minutes subjective, putting the total amount of Mana and Energy he’d put into the rune at nearly twenty thousand. Finally, he finished, and the rune blazed with light. Half of it glowed the blue-white of Mana, the other the red-gold of Energy. The very center, where both sections met, was brightly lit with a blue-gold glow, and that same blue-gold seemed to flow out of the rune and into his spirit.

Strength surged in him, and he opened his eyes. Immediately in front of him, Colin was fighting three Grunt Alphas to a standstill. David screamed, slamming his fist forward while leaping at the nearest. His punch pulped the Daemon, crushing its armor and sending the body flying over the wall.

“Holy crap,” he said, then summoned his sword and shield. “No time.” The next closest Grunt Alpha looked at him with wide eyes, only to stagger and collapse when Colin slammed his halberd into its chest. The last Grunt Alpha swung its maul at Colin, but Josiah was there to check the Daemon with a spear. Josiah then spun his weapon, deflecting the maul into the stone wall and stabbing the creature through the chest.

“Grenades, throw,” Josiah yelled. Two dozen people tossed System bought explosives over the wall, decimating the Gremlins and Grunts that were trying to climb over it.

David looked out, and saw that the Legionnaires were not involved in the attack, but the ground from the base of the wall to where they waited, nearly a hundred meters away, was filled with lesser Daemons. Grunts and Gremlins filled most of the area, but there were at least thirty Lashers and three Lasher Alphas pushing their way through the horrific crowd.

The explosions of the grenades stopped the forward push for a few seconds, the front most Gremlins freezing with wide eyes, until the Legionnaire Legate bellowed. A wave of Essence shot out from him, covering the Gremlins, and they surged forward yet again.

Two hundred Mana Darts flew over David’s head, each one blasting apart a Gremlin. The lower leveled people channeled as many attacks as they could, but they could only do so much.

David threw out Unstable Mana Bolts, keeping them weaker to maintain his Mana Pool. The evolution proved itself yet again, as each one detonated strong enough to kill its target and the Gremlins closest to it. He targeted the Grunts, leaving the Gremlins for the others, until the Lashers got within twenty meters of the wall.

The first one to reach that close took an Overcharged Unstable Mana Bolt to the face, with David pumping two hundred Mana into it. Its head exploded, bone and viscera coating everything nearby. The other Lashers sped up, and the next nearest leapt nearly ten meters. It crashed down on a dozen Gremlins, pulping them, but its tentacles were shortly able to reach the wall.

Colin grabbed one and yanked it to himself, meeting its body with a boot to the head. The tentacle was ripped off, and then his halberd shortened itself into a battle ax that split its skull open.

David shot out more attacks, overcharging each one, his Mana dropping despite his massive regeneration, but the Lashers and Grunts got closer. He tried to attack the Lasher Alpha nearest him, but it grabbed a Gremlin and threw it into his Bolt before it could reach the beast.

Craig, Elijah, and others were on the wall, beating back the horde of Gremlins, but they were slowly losing steam. Josiah noticed, then called out, “Grenades!” Another set of explosions rippled out, giving the beleaguered front line a chance to switch out.

“How many more grenades do we have?” David asked.

“One more,” he answered. “But we should be out of Gremlins by then.”

The wall shook, two Lashers slamming their tentacles into it as they ran forward. “I’ve got it,” David yelled, leaping onto the gap in the stone. He then Charged down, blitzing past the Lasther’s weaving appendages to smash into its back. The force of his impact and the Energy wave that followed broke the beast, leaving it spasming on the ground. He jumped to his feet, holding his balance with his superhuman Agility on the back of the twitching monster, and saw the other one was cleaved in half by Colin.

The mass of Gremlins and Grunts had stopped moving forward, and even the rest of the Lashers had backed off. The Legate bellowed, and the Legionnaires marched forward. It only took them a few steps to get directly behind the line of Gremlins, and then the whole mass moved. “Here they come!” David shouted, turning and jumping back onto the wall.

A wave of Mana Darts met the onrushing Daemons. Two more shot out, but the last was lighter than previous. A glance told David that the back line had started to run out of Mana. His eyes went wide when a mass of Imps rose from underneath the bridge. “Watch out!” someone screamed, and the Defenders bellowed, Mana and Energy flowing from them to protect their charges.

“Ballistas, fire into the horde,” Alexander yelled, loud enough from his position overseeing the bridge that David heard it. The thrum of the ballistas echoed, even over the screams of people trying to dodge the Imps fire bolts. The Gremlins and Grunts were too close to the wall for the ballistas to reach the front of their line, but they were able to impact right in front of the Legionnaires. Their shield was still up, but the Lurker Alphas didn’t have the benefit of it. All three of them were split apart.

David rapid fired his Unstable Mana Bolts at their minimum Mana for as long as he could, until there were enemies trying to climb up right in front of him. His sword swung down, a Vanguard’s Strike cleaving a Grunt Alpha in two. It still screamed and swung its meaty paw into his shield, a discharge of Essence sending cracks spreading throughout it. Only David’s ridiculous Strength let him hold his balance, though the stone of the wall under his feet cracked slightly.

“Hold the line!” David yelled out, Inciting Shout triggering and adding a few more minutes to the buff. He slashed out, the Mana and Energy flowing into his sword. With a grunt, he forced the mixture to explode out of his weapon, and a blade of mixed resources scythed through a Gremlin before stabbing into the ground. That works, he thought, then swung his weapon again and repeated the attack. This time, he angled it to hit the ground at a shallower angle, and it ripped apart a Grunt before discharging into the dirt.

The Legionnaires stopped ten meters from the wall. A chanting call came from them, then the Legate screamed. “Get off the wall!” Josiah bellowed, just as the Daemons thrust their short spears forward.

On either side of David, the people fighting turned and jumped. David held in place, knocking a Grunt back before it could bash Steve’s retreating form. The front line of Legionnaires all shot out an Essence Bolt targeted not at the defenders, but the center of the wall, directly under David’s feet.

The stone exploded, and three meters of wall collapsed into rubble. David leapt upwards, letting the pile build up under him before he landed on the awkward slope. Two explosions behind him made him quickly glance backwards to see an older truck was on fire, its ballista shattered and the crew laying still on the ground. Dammit, he thought. The Imp cloud had been reduced to remnants, though, as the Defenders and ranged attackers cut them down.

Another ballista bolt shot out, the crew continuing to fire even with the attacks flashing around them. This time, it slammed into the third row of the Legionnaires, their shield down for another attack. The wall shuddered and collapsed to David’s right, and a wave of Gremlins and Grunts hauled themselves over the rubble. “We can’t let them continue to bombard us,” David shouted. “Vanguards, charge!”

He exploded forward, dropping nearly a thousand Mana and Energy into Vanguard’s Charge and pushing its effectiveness to extreme heights. The Legate screamed, but David slammed into the front row before whatever buff it was trying to provide reached the area. The Legionnaire he ran into exploded, bits of its armor piercing through the next row as the torrent of Energy blew through the Daemons to either side of David.

His momentum continued, and he found himself in the middle of the Daemon formation. Combat Reflexes kicked in to the highest degree ever, and he found the world seemed to slow down as he mind ramped up. He was down to half of his Mana and two thirds of his Energy, but he just sent another thousand into Vanguard’s Strike, creating a sword slash that went through the enemy to one side and the one behind it.

He ducked as a blade stabbed into where his head was, his shield almost moving without conscious direction to deflect two other spears and an Essence dart or three. He shifted his grip on the sword and stabbed upwards, tilting his body just enough to not get stabbed in the gut. His elbow came down on the spear, and he twisted hard. The Daemon lost its grip, and David threw the spear awkwardly behind him. It still stabbed a Daemon in the leg, as it wasn’t trying to dodge from behind him.

The spearless Daemon tried to tackle him, only to get a sword in the face. David spun around it, his shield rotating horizontal to smack back two Legionnaires before they could try to poke him. A spear skittered off his Mana Shield. Shield Bash cleared a bit of space, giving David room to use Vanguard’s Charge again, creating yet another gap in the Legionnaire line.

Screams and shouts sounded behind him, the other Vanguards and the Berserkers smashing into the lines he’d disrupted. A massive Fireball exploded only a meter to his left, the heat burning into his Mana Shield. David burned yet more Energy, a sword slash creating a crescent at waist height to cut down the Legionnaires stumbling back from the detonation.

Combat Reflexes flared, drawing extra Energy from him, and he dove forward. The Legate landed where he was standing, its massive greatsword cutting into the dirt where his right leg had been. “I will crush you vermin,” it growled out. “And cleanse your stink from our planet.”

“It’s not your planet yet!” David laughed, then an Unstable Mana Bolt flew into the thing's face. It blinked past the Mana discharge, the Bolt too weak to really hurt it. David wasn’t counting on injuriing, but it distracted the Daemon long enough for him to rush forward with a Shield Bash. “And you’re nothing I haven’t beaten before.” Omnicaster engaged as he pulled on Strengthen, Earthen Bulwark, and Swordsman’s Step to slip just to the side of a stab, the blade hitting and breaking his Mana Shield but missing his skin by a fraction of a centimeter.

He retaliated with a backhand turned slash that opened the Legate’s forehead, though its skull and horns deflected his attack away from its vulnerable eyes. Its blade slashed back at David, but it didn’t have enough force to cut through his armor. The Legate’s Strength, though, shoved into him. Earthen Bulwark held for a second, giving David time to punch the Legate twice before being flung backward.

David turned the launch into a roll, sweeping his blade out beside him to cut down another Legionnaire. “Thanks,” he shouted, then Charged back into the Legate. It bellowed in anger, its sword suddenly glowing and moving significantly faster. Strengthen flowed through him, Combat Reflexes and Shield Mastery guided his movements, and David ducked his shoulder to slam into the glowing sword.

The collision created a shockwave that sent a dozen Legionnaires and a few of David’s colleagues flying. A shattering crack followed the shockwave, as the Legate’s sword disintegrated, the Essence coating it blowing back into its face. David’s shield broke, the Mana Artifact dispersing under the impact. The Energy wave that was supposed to flow out of the shield instead detonated in all directions. David was picked up and thrown backwards, but the Legate had it worse. Its Essence corroded away the Daemon’s skull as it shrieked in agony.

The Legionnaires screamed in pain as well, the Legate’s control of them backfiring as they felt what it did. The distraction was lethal, the human fighters cutting them down as swiftly as they could. David felt a moment of pity, but he shook it off and stepped forward with a massive Vanguard’s Strike. The Legate’s piteous cries were silenced when David took its head.

A few minutes later, the remaining Legionnaires, Gremlins, and Grunts were killed. David was exhausted, even with Minor Muscle Efficiency and Earth’s Unrelenting Motion. The immensely high-intensity battle had drained him. Cheers came from the broken fortification behind him, though cries of pain and wails of loss were audible in them. David staggered over to the wall and watched as the few Earth Mages with Mana left over reformed the rubble into a flat area to walk through.

Colin lifted him onto his shoulders, and the cheers redoubled. “We successfully took out so many Daemons,” David yelled, the crowd quieting, “but we’re not done. This is but the first step, and next we will destroy the burgeoning portal, weakening the Daemons in our state. They will rue the day they chose our world as a target, as they find out we are not their prey. They are ours! Every sacrifice, every injury, every bit of danger we push ourselves into is in the cause of saving humanity, of saving not just our planet, but our universe!”

The group exploded into cheers. “If you’re injured, see the healers,” he continued. “IF you have Mana and Energy, to the front and start attacking the Corruption. We are unopposed for the time being, but we still have to reach the enemy headquarters. Spend your Essence, level and grow, and turn victory into further strength!”

Josiah walked up, a frown on his face. “David, check your quest,” he said, his voice worried.

David hurriedly pulled it open.

WARNING! Attempted upgrade of a subsidiary portal to a District Portal is underway nearby your Barony! Stop the upgrade and destroy the portal to ensure your people’s safety.

Reward: One Minor Upgrade for your Barony. Significant credit reward to all participants. Extra City Crystal.

NOTE: Every hour the difficulty increases. You have 2 hours to stop the upgrade.

“Well, crap,” David said