II-50 Core (II)

"I must confess that I'm not too fond of your Great London overall, or even New Albion as a whole. Your people wear masks, hiding themselves, but then again it also allows them to be who they are. Yet here, before the rushing currents of the River Thames, the sight of Great London in autumn, it dispels some of my distaste. Come, sit by me, owl. What do you think of this composition?"

"It looks immaculate, but… Unnatural."

"Unnatural?"

"Yes, there are no imperfections. It is like a recreation. A perfect recreation."

"Oh, and that is a failure, is it?"

"No. But failure is how you signal humanity sometimes. And you, with your skill, have gone a little too far beyond. It shakes the eyes of most, and when they are shaken, they are easily turned aside. They proclaim that imperfection and slight idiosyncrasies are at the heart of artwork. Mortal expression, if you will.”

"Ah, but what worth are they? What matter do they bear in the grand scheme of things?"

"For us? Not much. The minds of the masses are easy to direct even without magic. For you? I suspect everything. After all, that is how you became a forgotten god, isn't it? No more faithful. No more people to enforce your story. Only you and a select few cultists alone bear your Sacred Phylacteries, keeping you held, barely, within the realm of divinity."

"My, aren't you straight and bold. I thought you owls were supposed to be master spies. Where is the diplomacy.”

"Ssometimes diplomacy run counter to tradecraft, especially with you. We know why you are here. You've come to make us an offer."

"I've come to make you a deal. First, here, keep the drawing. It will allow me to contact your people easier. I suppose you know about the civil war that is fated to unfold within the Twilight Republic."

"Yes, a war of your so-called Ascendants. A rebellion of one god against another twelve. It seems hopeless for the Starhawk."

"It does seem that way, doesn't it? But then again, there were more than just the Starhawk. And should he fall, he wouldn't be the first god to be forgotten."

"Oh? Are you implying that he isn't alone?"

"I'm not implying anything. I am, however, going to tell you about a wonderful opportunity. How would the Stolen Throne like to possess a few sacred phylacteries? Or even have a stake in another government? An influential stake, if you will."

"It would fascinate us. But why would you, a god forgotten, betray some of your old comrades so easily?"

"Comrades? As if there were ever such a thing. Let me tell you, dear girl, the first thing you learn about being a god is that all the world becomes an enemy."

"But isn't that mostly accurate for a god like you? You are no true god, after all. Just someone who ascended through the skill of another."

"Ah, mock me as you will, but you understand the truth. Now, the offer. You Albionites will accept, of course, but we need to discuss what Sacred Phylactery will offer to you in exchange for an army to claim it... Starhawk's Perch."

"What?"

"I will give you Starhawk's Perch, and you will hold dominion over the sun and the sky. Or at least, a substantial portion of the sun and sky. It will spare you from more of the Legacy Empire’s stealth bombers, at the very least.”

"But the Starhawk is not dead yet. How can you promise something you do not even possess?”

"And, without my intervention, I suspect he may just be able to endure, or even wage a partially successful rebellion. This, I do not want. This is going to be troublesome for me, especially since his desire is to tear it all down and bring an end to our so-called unjust godhood. But the other ascendants, they are greedy as they are cowards. They will seek to destroy the Perch, or potentially subsume it into their own mythology. I would see it donated to one of your faceless nobles, perhaps. They seem to at least have some desire to make use of things great and powerful."

"And what do you get out of this bargain?"

"The other phylacteries. I will have need of them. This tome is deeply underfed and there are some ‘old associates’ I desire to contact.”

"Ah, I see. And so you are going to wage your own rebellion?"

"No, no, no. I am simply going to tell a new story. My own story. I've grown tired of being a god elevated by another. A god born of someone else's whims, as you said. I wish to go beyond this. I wish to become something greater, even if that means burning my own false divinity in the short run. But to ensure my rise to true divinity… I need more power. So, do we have an arrangement?"

"We do. But we trust you understand that we will not agree idly. There is a contract we require— 

“Of course. I am no fool. Prepare the ritual. I will be here, painting. And keep the drawing close to you. I will not illustrate another, unless you ask very, very nicely. And it will cost you a fee, next time.”

-Conversation between “The Educator” and an owl of Aviary

II-50

Core (II)

The Momentum Core discharge probably hurt Shiv more than his knife did the high vampire.

The massive Bloodspawn was screaming, and the screams only grew louder as Shiv channeled his Conduit of Dawn inside the beast's eye socket. As they sailed through the air, it felt like the left side of Shiv's body was being flayed off, and that someone was setting the exposed tissue underneath ablaze with acid followed by fire. 

Darkness crept along the corners of Shiv's vision as he gritted his teeth against the pain. 

For a moment, delirium took him, and he thought he was back in the Passage teleportation anchor with Uva and her team, enduring the flames of purification once more. Can Hu's call pulled him out from his stupor. "Shiv, to your right."

The Deathless reacted instinctively. He pulled himself back using his gravitic field, and he blasted off from the high vampire with a stomp. Still, he kept his beam focused on the Bloodspawn's face. Smoke and bubbling tissue swelled free from the high vampire's mangled eye. But its expression was one of pure outrage and surprise rather than fear. 

Shiv realized he was faster than it, but he wasn't much faster than the owl present in the room. And that's where the first attack came from. A thread sliced through the space where Shiv once was. It was a fine thread, so thin that he almost mistook it for one of Uva's mana strands. But it only glistened rather than glowed, and it cleaved across the air at such speeds that Shiv saw a whip-crack shudder right in front of him before a shockwave followed. His gravity field let him muscle through the shockwave, but it still slammed against him slightly, and even that light jostle was enough to make him bite back a whimper.

Fighting with a soul wound was pure hell. But Shiv wasn't going to let pure hell hold him back from being in a fight.

He immediately went for the owl next, only for them to disappear before his very eyes. The last thing he saw of the owl was of them reeling a thin, glistening wire under their sleeve. Then, A gust of wind swept over the owl, and then they were gone. With only a quiet gale hinting at their possible location.

Shiv reactivated his Silhouette in response. Just in time, a tendril of blood shot through the air, but misjudged his exact position. Shiv turned, sweeping his kukri across the room, his Conduit of Dawn constantly flaring. A beam slashed through several groups of high vampires. The weaker ones were split in half, and he guided the stream of light through their chests. A few detonated their lineage cores, the things they had for hearts, exploding in small oceans of gore. 

Most of the others, though, survived. 

Even split in half, Shiv could see them rapidly healing, rebuilding their body, and once again, he was offended by the very fact that vampires could do this. His Woundeater allowed him immediate reconstitution, but the vampires could ignore cancer, could shape their own bodies like clay, just because of the unique nature of their hearts. Shiv was going to rip the hearts out from them, if nothing else, because of spite.

Warning indicators and icons lit up as he scanned the room through Can Hu's sensors. "There are still at least sixty-five vampires. I counted twenty Aviary agents and six unknown dimensional entities."

Shiv blasted upward into the air as a series of spells smashed into the ground where he used to be. Massive pustules of blood erupted. Sections of the floor turned from solid matter into jagged clumps of teeth that rose up to bite at nothing but air, and from a withering wind thick with sickness and decay came a swarm of horrific winged maggots. Comparatively, Shiv's Biomancy was practically plain—very effective, but plain, focused on transferring or removing damage. 

I can see why Ekkihurst is such a disturbed individual now, Shiv thought, and once more his evolved stealth skill proved its worth.

It took a few moments for the first vampire to trace his exact position, but even then they had to move their mana field until they finally sensed him. 

“There! He’s up—” The vampire didn't manage to finish his words as a bone drill punched through his chest, pinning his heart to the ground below. Three other high vampires were staked the exact same way, and Shiv tested a new technique. Ignoring the searing pain burst across the left side of his body, he chucked out pieces of skull and shattered them with his Biomancy, using them as fragmentation grenades. 

Immediately he started dividing the enemies in the room into separate groups. The ones that endured and remained unharmed were Master-Tier for Toughness or well armored. The ones that took minor wounds were High Adepts at least. The ones that fell apart and died in pieces were inconsequential.

Before he could chuck a few more bone grenades out, however, another warning came from Can Hu. Shiv spotted the problem a half second before Can Hu even said anything. The penitent had kept up a thin shroud of hovering debris to use as a proximity field against unseen or hidden threats for Shiv. That field was pierced. A small gap formed in the orbiting pebbles. 

Shiv twisted right with a redirection of his gravitic field. Something scraped across his armor. His bones adapted, but not before it left a particularly deep cut along his chest. Then a shockwave spread out and it impacted him. This time the blast was close and heavy enough that it broke Shiv's focus. His next spell shattered. Pain erupted across the left side of his body and he clenched his arm with a roar.

"Shiv!" Can Hu said, but the Deathless didn't need to be warned; he reacted. He pulled himself backward, just not nearly fast enough. Something caught his leg and he felt an immense impact smash into his body, but also his Biomancy at the same time. He was dragged down to the ground and slammed. The room shook from the sheer force of the impact. The ground cracked as many of the lesser vampires and Aviary agents were flung into the air. 

Clutching Shiv by the chest was the high vampire he stabbed in the eye just now then. The damned Bloodspawn were leaning over him, drooling with malice. The high vampire’s expression was a mask of absolute rage, his mouth lined in rows of twisting, gleaming teeth. 

Through the haze of immense pain, Shiv briefly observed his adversary, feeling them reach into his armor, cracking the front of his chest piece with contemptuous ease. But the high vampire didn’t do with just strength. No, it was like their physicality was fused with their Biomancy, everything they did twisted and warped biology. Their very moments ground against Shiv’s mana field, and the high vampire itself felt like an enduring spell made solid.

Shiv triggered the Song of the Vigilant as his focus immediately reasserted itself. At the same time, he clutched his adversary's arm and pushed back. He pushed back with his Biomancy as well, ignoring the pain flaring across his entire left hemisphere. A brutal struggle ensued. His adversary was strong, and far larger than any other high vampire he'd seen before. More than that, the high vampire was covered by dense armored scabs, scar tissue forming something akin to disgusting organic plating.

"You will pay for my eye," the high vampire growled. By this point, he had already regrown the eye. There wasn't even a hint that Shiv had boiled the socket from the inside. Damn vampires and their regeneration. Most other enemies would have died from Deepest Edge, Momentum Core, and Gravitic Wrestler working together.

Can Hu cried another warning. Shiv felt the Penitent cast a Geomancy spell. It condensed a layer of stone that intercepted the whistling whip used by the owl. The string punched through Can Hu's stones with contemptuous ease. An Adept had no chance against a Master or above. However, it was just long enough for Shiv to sense what was coming. 

Shiv used his field to drag the high vampire into the place where he used to be. And the whip struck the beast in the temple. The high vampire let out a furious cry. And while he was distracted, Shiv activated his Chrono-Anchored Strike. Immediately he rematerialized within the high vampire's eye socket, driving his blade deep, triggering Conduit of Dawn again. Blood exploded out from the back of the high vampire’s skull as he roared in agony once more.

His blade dimmed and flickered. He would need to feed it more light before he could use that again. But for a final burst of brightness, it did its work. It set the insides of the high vampire's skull on fire. It cried out in genuine pain this time, and Shiv promptly kneed him in the throat. As he gagged, Shiv seized him by the head and flung him like a missile at his nearby allies. They were strong, but they really weren't that fast, yet there was a sense of tension building inside him. 

Something told him the high vampire hadn't truly begun to fight yet—was holding something back.

"Focus on the weaker enemies," Can Hu said, "remove them from the equation, then concentrate on bringing down the elites."

"Got it." Shiv pointed his field at another portion of the room. He crashed down against the ground, a shockwave exploded around him, pain flashed through his left side, but his Composer-blessed song kept his focus, kept him centered even as he nearly blacked out. 

Spells went wide as the vampires lost track of him again. Shiv's kukri flared out, its glinting edge flickering through flesh, slicing and cutting at arteries, tendons, eyes, and wrists. Blood sprayed out, splashing against Shiv, but his silhouette remained active; only his outline was stained red. Adam was right, a skill that focused on concealment rather than outright evasion was perfect for him.

Silhouette > 74

Deepest Edge > 61

As he advanced on the group, he drew out three bone drills and fused them together. He turned them into a curved length and sent them spinning through the room as if a bone adamantine boomerang. It crashed into several groups of enemies, and Shiv pushed it hard with his Biomancy, its spin dismembering, decapitating, ripping open armor, and lifting even hardier foes off their feet. 

And then he decided to add to the confusion. He launched out another set of his bone armor, flinging it to the other side of the room. Suddenly a series of spells crashed against it, and immediately the bone armor disintegrated into maggots, into spraying mist, into tumorous pustules that burst and popped.

And that was the annoying thing about fighting other Biomancers. They could manipulate his armor as easily as he could, sometimes more.

Shiv smashed through a group of unprepared, distracted vampires, and he got to his first Aviary agent when he drove his elbow into the crow's face. Its helmet shattered, and its skull burst apart on the inside. Yet as he drank in momentum, something shot through the space mere centimeters to his left. It whisked by his head, and Shiv thought he dodged another strike from the owl. 

But this time, instead of the string simply sailing forward and detonating in a shockwave, it twisted unnaturally, zigzagging in his general vicinity until it ended up crashing under his left rib. 

Shiv grunted. The blow barely affected him. It didn't even fracture his armor at all. The shockwave, he shrugged off with his gravity field. But the necromancy corrosion on his badly burned flesh, that he screamed. It hurt so bad that Shiv folded over to clutch at his sides.

The interruption lasted just long enough for the scar-armored high vampire to smash into him again. 

This time, however, the high vampire didn't just strike Shiv's flesh. The Bloodspawn shifted his own. His clawed hand exploded forward, lengthening strips of uncoiling tissue. The high vampire's skin tore and from below hatched new scabs, new layering to his organic armor. Shiv felt himself crash against the opposite wall, and a howl of absolute agony escaped him as his soul-wound was exacerbated.

He managed to shape a spell of his own, pushing back against the high vampire's intent, stopping it from flaying his body apart. But he could feel his bone armor shuddering and cracking. They were a stronger Biomancer than he was. The high vampire’s Skill Fusion was pressing him hard, and before he could react, the owl was back, the zipping, hissing string striking him over and over again on the left side of his body. And then came a sea of other spells. Every vampire in the room pitted their Biomancy against his, and he felt his mana field crack and bend inwards. He was Master-Tier, but he needed a lot more levels—perhaps even another evolution if he wanted to sustain this for long.

Can Hu responded by shattering all the stones around Shiv, spreading dust into the air and forming a protective cloud. Just then, a gale pushed through the dust, flinging it aside as the owl emerged. They swiped at Shiv, not with their string this time, but a blade, a blade covered in dimensional mana. The blade phased through his armor and then rematerialized halfway against Shiv’s ribs.

But to the owl's surprise, the blade shattered after only inflicting the slightest of nicks against Shiv's torso. 

Raw Instinct took hold of the Deathless. He pulled himself in the direction of the owl. He slammed into their chest just as they turned to air. The impact was brief, but Shiv definitely felt something crack. But the high vampire was still clinging to him, and it pulled him back. It twisted his Biomancy mana, and Shiv cried out more spiritually than physically. Some of his armor shattered apart, the bones fracturing before the High Vampire's will. Mana strain was setting in faster than ever before for Shiv, and then he activated his Chrono-Anchored Strike again, and once more buried his knife into the vampire's eye.

"I'm getting real sick of you," Shiv said, driving the knife in. He picked the high vampire up. He tore them off the ground using his gravitic field. Surprised, the vampire didn't respond in time. Not for when he lifted them with a twist of his knife, not for when he spiked the vampire headfirst against the ground, slamming the bloodsucker over and over again in a series of violent choke slams.

Every blow sent pain blasting through Shiv's body, and he growled, "The hell with this." With so many vampires trying to rip him apart using their own Biomancy, his wasn't going to be able to focus on complex spellcasting at all. 

And so Shiv stopped his Song of the Vigilant, and he triggered his second blessing for the first time. Incredible pain exploded through Shiv as the Icon of the Paindrinker ignited on his chest. It resembled an orc's claw reaching into an open flame. But instead of being a static image, it flickered, it moved, and the claw clenched into a fist. Shiv stopped being capable of coherent thought then. Pain drowned out his deeper thoughts, so he let his instincts take hold. He slashed the scab-armored vampire twice across the face and practically beheaded the blood-drinker. The high vampire screamed and choked as his skull came apart in pieces—but the high vampire still didn’t die. Even as Shiv took his head off completely.

Before the headless high vampire could respond, Shiv tore the bastard from the ground and began using him as a club. He splattered one of the high vampire's soldiers using the scabbed bloodsucker's body. 

And even through the incoherence of his all-consuming pain, Shiv realized something. The high vampire couldn't easily pit its strength against his without proper leverage. And that was another major benefit offered by his Gravitic Wrestler Skill Evolution. Shiv was his own leverage. And with the gravitic field, he could effectively pit his strength against anything, no matter what size, so long as he had contact. 

The vampire could shapeshift, perhaps, but he still needed something to push off of to resist Shiv. And that was why it was so easy for him to fling the high vampire into a horde of his minions. Most of them were knocked over. The high vampire let out a growl of frustration as his arms shapeshifted again. Instead of becoming an extended limb, his fingers twisted into hooks that allowed him to grind himself to a halt.

But Shiv didn't get to focus on the high vampire for long, for the first of the golems unleashed a spell on him. A blast of blood erupted out toward Shiv. He tried to dodge it, but he was too focused on the high vampire and it struck him. He pushed back using his Biomancy, but for a moment he felt every bit of fluid within his veins quiver and twist. 

The blood-made golem was vaguely humanoid, and as it reached out using its mana to connect with Shiv, he briefly saw it morph into his form—a distorted, disgusting parody of him that twitched and writhed. Shiv briefly reacted the same way as the spell almost set in, but he pushed past it, and he slammed into the blood-golem. It staggered back, but it was composed mostly of fluid, and thus his blow was merely stunning rather than wounding. 

Without warning, the blood golem splashed apart only for a beast composed of nothing but jagged teeth to clamp itself down on him, driving thick, heavy fangs against his body. Thick heavy fangs that promptly burst and broke against Shiv's adamantine armor. 

He had adapted from multiple impacts. He wasn't going to be bitten in half by some high-tier golem. He reached inside and ripped the damn thing in half. A small pulsating heart, disfigured and lined with enamel, crashed down at Shiv's feet. He stomped on it, and off by his sides, the rising remnants of the fanged golem went still and died.

He felt the blood golem reach out for him again, but he shot high up into the air. He only made it approximately a meter before something pulled at the left side of his body. Shiv almost shrieked in anguish as what looked to be a very brutalized, battered mass of flesh reached out to him, extending a mutilated hand. As he was halted in midair, he saw the wounds dancing across the golem's body. It vaguely resembled a bunch of corpses stitched together, arms, legs, all sticking out at odd angles, but on its chest were a collection of faces, faces trapped in eternal torment, a voiceless scream as their tongues were all missing. 

And it was then that Shiv decided he was going to kill every vampire he saw, until they persuaded him otherwise. The pointless cruelty, the silly levels of violence, the endless blood, gore, carnage, and the horrible felling smell. 

He was fed up with it all, and he was fed up with them.

Shiv fed his gravitic wrestler with rage as he exploded through the air. His gravitic field was thundering around him, shaking his very outline, as if he were framed by a set of vibrating strings. The wound golem tried to take a step back, but too late, Shiv didn't care about pain anymore. He would hurt as much as he could endure before passing out, if it meant killing every single vampire in this room. 

When he struck the ground, he hit it with such force that the wound golem disintegrated outright. But not just the wound Golem. Two nearby high vampires turned to mist from the shockwave alone, and Shiv speared both of their hearts using his kukri. They still beat along the length of the blade, but he turned to address the rest of the room as he growled. "All right, I'm kind of tired of this. Stake yourselves. Or I'll do worse to you." His Dread Aura crashed against them, and he felt all of them shudder, all of them, including someone he couldn't see.

Dread Aura > 74

Deepest Edge > 61

And that's how he tracked the owl. A drifting section in the air came sailing above him, curling and twisting as if an invisible snake.

"Shiv," Can Hu said, marking the strangely moving air current.

"I see him," Shiv said. His Momentum Core was almost entirely full again, but he was going to keep this. Keep this until he absolutely had to use it. He shot upward without warning, but as he did, he launched another one of his expendable bodies out from his cloak. The diversion worked. 

A string twisted out from the strange gale that hid the owl, just as the scabbed high vampire crashed down on Shiv's decoy cropse, ripping it in half. But the owl was unprepared for Shiv to blast by exactly where they were.

The Deathless slammed his fists together, creating a massive shockwave. The winds were disrupted. The owl was flung out, launched back into the air, but he didn't make it for long. Shiv caught him by the ankle, and he drove a elbow into the owl’s knee. The Aviary agent screamed. The entire limb folded inward, and then Shiv twisted it sideways, breaking the bones and mangling the tissue so bad it was little more than a bloodied, dripping clump of flesh.

"You should work more on your toughness," Shiv growled.

And he took the owl by the throat and ripped off their mask. He saw a man, a man perhaps not much older than he was. His eyes were wide, and inside, his courage shattered. Shiv wanted to crush the owl’s neck or rip them in half. But even through the rage, Shiv knew this one was valuable, alive. Uva could get plenty of information from the owl’s mind. 

And so Shiv decided to be a disciplined monster. He hit the owl, not hard enough to break the man’s neck or cave in their skull, but just enough to give them a concussion and temporarily knock them out. Then, he folded three skin decoys over the owl as they lurched through the air, avoiding attacks and spells. Shiv bundled the owl tight, leaving only room around his mouth so that the man wouldn't suffocate.

Then, Shiv promptly tossed the owl down into his cloak.

This wouldn’t typical work. The way Shiv's cloak functioned made it easy for someone inside to escape. It was more spatially wide than it was truly deep, and it didn't stop people from wiggling out from the spatial distortion. He found out when he'd put a few living crickets inside for storage later while exploring the umbral wilderness. For now, though, he just had to hope that the owl didn't hop out.

Just then, a few more Biomancy spells crashed against Shiv. He grunted as he felt his mana field begin to tear. 

A few more of that and I'll be beyond strained. They'll just pull me apart after that, Shiv realized. 

But he had an opening now, without the owl constantly striking him. He could rip through the rest of the room while avoiding the scabbed high vampire for now. That one he had to save for last. And so Shiv worked through a priority chain of vulnerable targets. The first people he struck were the surviving agents of Aviary. They weren't like the vampires, they died when their bodies broke. He didn't need to rip out their hearts. 

He crashed into them in a frenzy of pain and violence. And as he tore, ripping bodies asunder, constantly moving, using his pain to fuel his primal violence, he could hear the challenger chuckling. And that just annoyed Shiv even more. He poured a little bit of rage into his Momentum Core, and even the fastest of the Aviary agents began to slow before his eyes. His knife flashed out, and he cut them. He cut them with no more skill, no more dexterity. He hewed and cleaved at them like a butcher. Even the ones with durable armor perished as his Deepest Edge caused his slashes to pass through their bodies. As such, many were mutilated within their armored shells, blood welling out from behind their helmets and masks. 

His focus on attacking the Aviary agents also paid off in another way. The vampires didn't much care for their Aviary allies, and began indiscriminately unleashing Biomancy spells in their direction. A good few of the agents burst apart, turning into viscous pustules or died howling as winged maggots crawled out from inside their flesh.

Silhouette > 76

Shiv's Silhouette jumped multiple levels in that moment. It was the main reason why most of the spells didn't strike into him. The other was from just how fast he was moving, and for a single moment, during a brief lull in the pain, something occurred to Shiv. Something about the sublime beauty of having multiple Master-Tier skills working in tandem. 

Adamantine Adaption made him hard to kill directly. The Magebreaker allowed him to parry spells, but his Biomancy allowed them to be outright resisted. His Gravitic Wrestler granted him unsurpassed control, and pairing that with Deepest Edge, even a titanic monster could be cleaved in half as his gravity-amplified blows passed through them. And then there was Silhouette, a mere Adept-Tier skill, mere, but when granted to someone with multiple Master skills, Shiv wasn't just fast, he wasn't just strong, he wasn't just resistant, he was also hard to track.

And it was this combination that collapsed the collective morale of every lesser fighter in that chamber. 

As the last raven of Aviary died beneath the tip of Shiv's blade, he flung them, launching them so hard that they bifurcated one of the vampires along the middle. Just then a dimensional rift pulsed as the spellwork surrounding the dead Jealousy's teleportation anchor triggered. Shiv exploded across the room. His blade slicing in wide arcs, bodies split in half, and with them lineage cores dropped in pieces as well. A spreading spatial bubble popped, unleashing another group of vampires along with a new tooth golem, or whatever it was called, into the teleportation anchor. They died in an instant, unprepared for Shiv's onslaught.

"Shiv, multiple spellcasters, creating a spell to your left." Shiv didn't think, he just followed Can Hu's direction. He shot into them and the spell broke, and just then Shiv felt a sting, a spreading, vaporous cloud of hissing, dissolving blood splashed over him, seeping under and through the cracks in his armor. He pushed back with his Biomancy, but not before it melted some of his skin, distingated all of the surrounding vampires. 

As he shot free from the deadly cloud, Shiv twisted to a halt on the other side of the room and slammed against the wall. The teleportation dented and deformed from the inside. Some spell patterns began to flicker and fail. And at that, a loud roar came from the other side of the room. Shiv saw the scab-armored vampire rising into the air with his head regrown. And now he had wings now too. Jagged wings that were lined with thick tissues and edged with jutting teeth.

Shiv sighed, "What the hell is wrong with you people? Why is everything gore and blood and teeth?" Through labored breaths of pain, he spat his incredulity. "You have any idea how bad you all smell?" Shiv chuckled. "You know that's the worst thing about fighting you, it's the smell. My entire life, slaving in a kitchen, and I now you attack my sense of taste. Bastards.”

Dread Aura > 75

His Dread Aura leveled again as he felt several vampires take a step back, several. He looked at them. There was only a small group now. Twenty-seven, two blood golems flanked them, and above, the scab-armored high vampire glared down at Shiv. He was shaking with frustration and fury.

Damn, Shiv thought. I didn’t realize I killed so many people already.

"You will regret these mocking words," the scab armored vampire growled. "I am Hero Novor Kraid. I am system favored. And I will show you the meaning of pain.” Kraid clenched a fist as blood began to twist around his arm. "I will show you—"

Shiv fired a bone drill into the vampire's face. The high vampire swatted it aside. Then Shiv dropped his Silhouette charged the vampire recklessly. 

Or at least that was how it appeared. 

A body clad in dense bone armor soared through the sky, arms reared back as if preparing a punch. But “Shiv” was slower than before, and the texture of the armor was wrong, more like glossy crystal than metallic shine. The high vampire snarled and backhanded what he thought to be Shiv. The body splattered apart with ease, and it left him open for a kukri stab straight into his heart, or at least what Shiv thought his heart should be.

Then it was Shiv's turn to be surprised. His Deepest Edge went all the way through. Blood burst out from the back of the high vampire, but he merely reared his head back with a shout and then seized Shiv with his long, hooking claws. 

Shiv blinked. He was pretty sure the heart was there. He stabbed the vampire twice more, all across its chest. More blood ruptured, but the vampire squeezed inwards, trading damage with Shiv. His bones began to creak, his mana began to strain. He cursed as he slashed at both the vampire's arms. Things split within the limb, ligaments, tissues, and bone, but the vampire healed as fast as he was cut. 

Then a series of spells soared through the air. Biomancy spells that were certain to send Shiv beyond the point of sustaining his mana field. And so he made a choice. He shifted out of context. Once more he splashed back into his own Vitae. The world turned grey, and the spells impacted nothing but open air, and in one case the high vampire. The beast blinked. Shiv felt a coldness rush through him, and he descended first, rushing down as Rose whispered behind him.

"They are all, they are all being used, they are all being used against, against the Republic, against, against Sullain. They are, they are the chess pieces of the Educator. But she doesn’t see… there is another… she doesn’t see…”

She kept whispering things to Shiv. Her words coming like the mutterings of a mad oracle. Shiv rematerialized in a burst of white and red as he beheaded another vampire below the scabbed one. He pulled them in half, he crushed their core, and then he tore through several of the others, and just then a shine returned to his kukri.

 He activated Conduit of Dawn again, and he slashed through the two blood golems. They split in half, blood hissing as it turned to steam, and there, as they were momentarily discombobulated, he saw the cores within them, and he blasted through, slicing both. The blood golems collapsed into puddles thereafter, and with a final, contemptuous backhand, he obliterated the entire body of the last surviving vampire.

Momentum Core > 88

Silhouette > 75

Now it was only Shiv, and only the scarred vampire. Shiv looked at the remains of the vampire’s forces and just shrugged. "Your soldiers," Shiv licked his lips, "they need a lot more Toughness."

Shiv drove his Dread Aura against the high vampire, and the vampire sneered as he sent a spike back.

 "Pathetic," Kraid said, looking at the mangled, blood-splattered remains of his own forces, and especially of Aviary. And slowly, slowly the anger fled from the high Vvampire's eyes, replaced by curiosity, and for the first time, caution. "What is your name? Tell it to me. You are system favored, too. I can feel it. No one else could give me such a fight. No one else."

Shiv simply snorted. "Well, Confriga calls me the Corpse Shredder."

"Corpse Shredder?" the High Vampire muttered.

"Yeah, it's a stupid name, but I'm not telling you my real one. I don't tell people I'm going to kill who I am."

The vampire snorted. "Very well. Then Corpse Shedder it is. I want you to know that it will please me to tear you asunder. To rip another champion in the system's eyes down to feed my own glory."

Shiv scoffed. "You didn't do so well in our previous rounds. I don't think this is going to go your way."

"Before? Before this room was filled with pathetic, weak, and vulnerable vermin. I agree with you. They should have made themselves stronger. Armor," Kraid spat, "their pathetic reliance on armor was their undoing. We are Pathbearers. We should need to rely on anything but our own strength, our own body, our own scars."

At this point, the Vampire's body began to transform. A nest of bloody strings erupted from him, spearing out at all sides. 

“What the hells,” Shiv muttered tiredly. The smell got even worse somehow. It was like an endless sea of offal concentrated in a single place.

Some strings crashed down on the ground before Shiv, and they began to spread. Slowly, the entire chamber was filled, swallowed by the twisting, growing mass of writhing flesh. The scabbed vampire hovered in the air. His body was more tattered than ever. It was like everything inside him had been drawn out. But now, now he was swallowing everything. His skin was spreading everywhere, lining every inch of space with new lattices of tendon and other tissue, firing pieces of scab-lined bone through the air. 

And Shiv suddenly realized his adversary wasn't lying. This wasn't something you could casually do in an enclosed space with all your allies, especially with vulnerable human allies. But the high vampire truly didn't care anymore. And Shiv didn't either.

He accelerated towards them, preparing to smash through some lattices, but as soon as he crashed into them, he immediately felt something impact him, impact his body and his frayed mana field. Shiv cried, and the pain made him rattle backwards. Pain spread through his left side, and more strands began to spear into him from all sides. 

More blades of bone, more teeth, more claws erupted from this twisting mass of shape-shifting tissue. And swimming through the insides of his very own spreading body, the scabbed vampire emerged, thin cords of muscle connecting him to the greater mass. He punched Shiv across the face, and the blow was both physical and magical. It shattered Shiv's outer helmet, and he went twisting back, spitting blood. It usually wouldn't have been enough to stun Shiv, but then the vampire caught Shiv by the left section of his neck. And that, that brought about a pain that Shiv wasn't in any condition to deal with, especially with the icon active.

Shiv killed the icon then, desperate to regain some measure of composure. But then he was slammed against the wall, and more of the tissue swept around him, coating him, holding him in place. Shiv went Outside Context for a moment, stepped around the high vampire, who was momentarily confused, and then Shiv drove his blade into the high vampire's back. Kraid cried out. Shiv slashed and sliced, splitting through several sinews around him, his Deepest Edge working to free him from this growing jungle of Biomancy and ever-swelling flesh. 

But even as he speared and staked the high vampire over and over, they refused to die. He struck no hearts. He split no vital organs. Kraid turned, swiping a clawed hand across Shiv’s left shoulder. Shiv twisted back and avoided the blow. He didn't want to take any more hits against his mana field, but that didn't matter because several more tendrils speared into his back.

Pain exploded inside Shiv, and he felt his field hit a point of no return.  Something inside Shiv ripped. He cried out, and then the vampire seized him by the skull. And Shiv sighed. The vampire imploded his flesh. Shiv disintegrated into splattering blood, mist, and gore in less than a second.

Woundeater > 75

Silhouette > 79

Gravitic Wrestler > 119

Striking Proficiency > 36

The high vampire laughed. Laughed as he mangled Shiv's remains into a smeared ball, crushing him more and more as Can Hu cried out. The armor was getting damaged too. 

"Can Hu!" Shiv growled. Shiv's friend was still in the armor, but Shiv had other means to fight, even if he was dead. He reached out. He took the high vampire by the neck. Shiv drained Kraid’s vitality. And this affected the high vampire more than anything else. The beast cried out, reeling back in surprise and momentarily dropping Shiv's badly mangled armor. 

And because Shiv's blade was bound to him, as was his Magebreaker, he struck the vampire across the back of the head while his Silhouette remained active. It kept his Revenant’s translucent form from being visible. And then he drove his blade again and again into the high vampire's back. It cried out, twisting and swiping. What remained of its tissue splashed over everything, choking the entire room within a dense mash of flesh. And there Shiv found himself briefly encased, still draining the high vampire.

The enemy dove back into the thick nest of flesh, swimming through his own twisted tissue as if it was mere water. Shiv pushed out with his strained mana. He cried out silently as he went after the high vampire, and he clutched their ankle. With a final surge, he drained more vitality and the vampire briefly stalled, halted, stunned by his sudden enervation. 

Shiv's shadowy cocoon formed over his body. But he thought about what he was going to do next. He was still in a lot of pain. And then Shiv realized something: He was within the dead Jealousy's den. How did the fight end last time? With him hollowing out a monster’s mind with his pain. And once again, Shiv felt himself inspired to repeat the deed for old time’s sake.

He reactivated his Icon of the Paindrinker. The symbol flared on his chest, and the vampire briefly let out a shout of surprise as Shiv pulled himself closer to the beast. A shadowy cocoon burst around Shiv and he dropped his Silhouette. Not because he wanted to break concealment, but because he wanted the vampire to see who was about to kill him. 

Who was about to break him utterly and completely, starting with his mind. Shiv reached out with his paltry Psychomancy and thankfully the vampire was stunned. But he wasn't stunned enough for Shiv to immediately pierce through. Rather, Shiv found himself smashing against High Adept Tier Magical resistance. 

And for just a moment, Shiv's mind reeled. He hadn't thought about this. He hadn't. And then he noticed his mage breaker, and he realized what he had to do. He planted the Magebreaker around the vampire's face, and the defensive gauntlet began to rattle and shake. Soon its vibrations grew to violent levels, and something inside the high vampire shattered. 

This was another benefit to the Magebreaker. Magical Resistance was still magic, and the Magebreaker hated all magic. Once more, Shiv drove his mind mana into the vampire, just as its tendrils and its nest of flesh bit down on him. 

At the instant he was pulled apart, he transferred every bit of pain he felt into Kraid and the high vampire's head reeled back as he let out a world-shaking roar of agony.

Momentum Core > 90

Shiv died again, but the high vampire slumped over, unconscious. He crashed down on the ground. The nest broke, receding into his body like reeling cords of tissue. The skin lining the wall splashed against him, as did the cords of muscle, tendon, and other sinews. As he fell, Shiv continued to drain him. Shiv continued to sap them of vitality. He stood over them as his shadowy cocoon burst apart. 

For a moment he thought about letting Kraid wake to see a final flash of fear in his eyes. But the pain Kraid suffered was enough to incapacitate him, enough to leave him a groaning, whimpering mass on the ground. And Shiv still hadn't discovered the mystery of where their heart was. He descended and used his kukri to split the vampire open. He vivisected them in seconds, using his field to pry free the dense tissues and bones protecting the vampire's insides. He looked and, to his surprise, he found nothing. It was just a gory mess. There was no heart there.

But how could that be? The high vampire... and then he noticed something. Lines. Lines, no, not lines, but veins. Very thin, very finely refined veins leading like wire-thin strands inside the vampire, running down to its pelvis. Shiv cut a little deeper. He snapped the vampire's spine with a roar of effort, and there he found it: The Lineage Core. Pulsing. Pulsing in the place where most people's privates might be found. 

Shiv blinked. "Huh, that's interesting." And just then, the high vampire groaned. His eyes blinked as Kraid managed to achieve a bit of coherence after the immense pain it suffered. He stared at Shiv. Shiv stared back at him. And then Shiv casually lifted his dagger and stabbed the high vampire where his balls should have been. The vampire cried out. Shiv twisted the knife. And with a pop, the scabbed high vampire, the system favored known as Elder Novor Kraid, died unceremoniously.

The large Bloodspawn twitched and spazzed a few times. But Shiv didn't entertain that. He gripped them, and he tore, ripping pieces and chunks out of the high vampire's body over and over until he was lying apart, scattered. Even with the bastard's heart crushed, Shiv wasn't taking any chances. That one had more regeneration and shape-shifting capabilities than anyone he'd met so far. 

He didn't want any more surprises.

And as he was done, Shiv rushed over to Can Hu. As he stood by, his armor was in a bad state.

"Shiv," Can Hu cried out. There was a slight crackle, a distortion to the machine's voice.

"Can Hu, you alright?"

"Minor damage sustained, mostly to the head area." Shiv winced. He reached out, and he bit back a groan as he forced his Biomancy to function. He peeled away his head armor, and there he saw Can Hu's slightly dented half-skull staring back at him.

"I might need to conduct some minor repairs," Can Hu said.

"Yeah, but you're fine, right?" Shiv asked.

"Yes. Are all the enemies dead?"

"Yeah." And just then the dimensional riftway opened up at the center of the anchor again. Shiv sighed. "Give me a second." He turned, and as another group of vampires came through, Shiv charged into them. Screams erupted, blood sprayed high, a golem was torn in half, and then its core stomped. A few moments later, Shiv returned. "Now, I think we're good." He was covered in blood, and then he narrowed his eyes at the surrounding spellwork, the light of that anchor around him.

Shiv bit back a sneer. "All right, then. I think we're getting out of here. But before that…” He flexed his gravitic field, and he fed it every bit of anger, every bit of frustration about how bad he was hurting, about how miserable he felt during that fight. "Let's see what it takes to crush a four-hundred-meter-long teleportation anchor." 

And then he drove his hands into the wall, and he began to pry. With a violent cry, Shiv slowly began to bend and rip through the titanium. The walls began to peel ever so loudly. Metal screaming as bolts became undone. Sections connecting the titanium snapped violently as bursts of metal and other alloy crashed against Shiv and bounced off without inflicting any harm. 

Finally, the twisting hit a point where the insides of the anchor couldn't take anymore. Shiv pulled with all his strength and began to crumple the Jealousy's teleportation anchor as if someone were bending a tin can around itself. The top sides tore open as massive rents formed where the spells used to be. Shiv gave a final ragged exertion of effort before he collapsed to his knees, gasping, spent.

Gravitic Wrestler> 120

"Now," Shiv said, coughing, "now I think, I think the teleportation is done for." Debris plunged into the badly damaged teleportation anchor through the massive tears he left in the titanium-reinforced hull, pieces of stone that once held the cavernous outside at bay.

Can Hu was silent for a moment.

"You all right?" Shiv asked, worry filling him again.

From within his cloak, he heard a loud muffle, as the owl tried to escape. The Aviary agent's head briefly popped out, and Shiv heard the owl cry out. Shiv shoved him back in. "Stay down, or I'll seal your mouth up and let you suffocate for a while."

Can Hu let out a brief crackle. "Shiv, that noise… did you just twist the entire teleportation anchor in on itself?"

"Yeah," Shiv said.

"You know you could have just deformed or badly reshaped the area around the spell patterns? That would have worked as well.”

Shiv paused. "Huh? No. I could do that? Well…”

"It was a very remarkable feat of strength," Can Hu said.

Shiv nodded. "Yeah. Yeah. I'll keep that in mind next time. Maybe…”

Can Hu paused. "Shiv, are you probably still just going to mangle the next teleportation anchor if you can?”

Shiv let out a slight laugh. "Yeah, probably. It felt pretty good doing so."

The Penitent responded with a slight static chuckle. "I imagine it did.”