It is not often that a man of such mental fortitude as Kashi of the Daebens gives in to his emotions. But that night was one such night as the proud daeben could do naught but tremble, consumed by fright borne from the malignant glare of one he understood was his superior both in strength of mind and body – an opponent he had no hope against.
Rider glanced from the daeben to the silent mask, heaven, and earth still against their reunion. He knew not their relationship but could sense that it was one of great importance – a fate that could change the world itself. He was not alone in his line of thought, for across the continent, many bore witness to the terrifying mask, its owner seemingly less interested in entering the world, and more in an object that had grabbed his interest.
Cathek was one of such observers, and he too could not understand the reason for his Lord's strange actions. He knew the truths of their revered god and his indifference to the affairs of humanity. What then could have captured his gaze so much that he had even halted his advance on the earth?
A shadow appeared next to him.
"Find it!" Cathek ordered, and it promptly disappeared.
To further compound his increasing irritation, a multitude of mandalas appeared above them from which he knew they would arrive, and the portal from which Razznik looked into their world destabilized, slowing his entrance into their world.
"Graaa!"
Skyrm defiant cry drew his eyes, which expanded ever so slightly at what he saw.
Skyrm had bitten one of his fingers off, the sharp pain temporarily restoring his faculties. He panted heavily, each breath a struggle against the poison within that sought to take over his body.
"Why do you persist, Great One?" Cathek questioned. "Rest. In a few months, you will regain enough strength to expel that virus."
"A- urhg!" Skyrm winced. "And what would become of this world... this realm?"
"It would be as it should be," was Cathek's reply.
Skyrm closed his eyes in thought. "I care neither for this world, nor its inhabitants."
"Then you would not inter-"
"However," Skyrm said, cutting him off. His voice was like the last embers of a flame, smoldered, yet ready to burst with the slightest excitation. "She cared for this world and its inhabitants. Because of who I am, I can neither mourn nor exact revenge for her sake. But..." His scales burned black, then fell off, revealing a dirty gold interior. "I can make it my charge to protect the realm she loved against all."
"You still possess this much power. As expected of our Lord's herald. However..." The air around the fox-man grew cold with whispers of death. "You would betray your Durkin?"
A giant mandala appeared behind Skyrm, who stood majestic, despite the apparent corruption he suffered. His answer was harrowing, almost sorrowful. "I have no Durkin. The only man I called that met his end on the battlefields of K'iol."
"You-"
"Come mortal. Let us see who Fate graces today."
Kashi had always believed that whenever he met Razznik, he would be able to brush him aside as an impostor created by the game. But, staring into those eyes above, he could feel it in every fiber of his bones. That was Razznik Y'Terlow, no doubt about it. Shouyou that bastard had actually made the impossible possible.
Kashi was not sure how long it had been, but eventually, he shut his gaze from the looming figure above. And just like that, his fear and unease dissipated, replaced by a new-found desire to defeat the impossible monster. A slow grin crept up his face as his fingers clenched and unclenched.
He raised a hand to Razznik, then folded all his fingers, save the middle finger.
It was a message so clear and concise, yet carrying with it a multitude of emotions underneath: an acknowledgment, salutation, farewell, and final rejection of the man named Razznik Y'Terlow – messages Suzuki had not deemed fit to send before his death: You lived well. Now Fuck You, have a good life, and I'll bloody have mine!
The mask threw its head, whether, in laughter or rage, they could not tell. What happened next formed a quick opinion, though.
"Show off," Kashi muttered in amused, frightened excitement as he stared at the enormous portal that appeared above. He did not even bother running because he absolutely knew that by the time one saw that portal, it was already too late.
"What is he doing?" Rider called, breaking the daeben out of his trance.
"[Meteora]," Kashi replied, his voice low and distant.
No complicated explanation needed. One word. That was all Rider needed to understand the gravity of the situation. Like the name implied, [Meteora] was a high-level skill that transported one of the many rocks floating in space through a portal to their world where it would fall on a crash collision course with whatever its target was.
It was an extremely difficult skill to learn and even more to stop once it had been successfully cast.
But like all skills, its execution was left to the hands of its user. A typical caster might summon a meteor 10-20 meters in diameter, but Razznik, the asshole, had a mandala wider than 60m. If the meteor he summoned was anywhere near that size, it would annihilate anything in a kilometer radius.
Kashi grinned wryly as the rock in question slowly showed itself, knowing it would accelerate madly once through the portal. He turned to Rider and was stunned to see the older man calmly assessing the meteor.
Those were not the eyes of someone panicking in the presence of danger. They were more the eyes of someone pondering how best to deal with minor irritation.
Rider sighed, took off his jacket, and rolled up his sleeves, revealing a tattoo the daeben instantly recognized on his left arm. He placed a finger on one of the broken swords and 'slid' it down along his arm. It appeared in his hand as a broken dagger, then melted into blood, which pooled to form an orb. "My apologies, little one, but I will be borrowing your power."
Fladnag glared at the figure that had eclipsed the moon, air around him charged with electric rage. The tattoos on his back glowed, then shattered. This phenomenon pulled him out of his murderous reverie, his expression a mix of shock and amusement. "Ho, ho," he muttered as he peered across the horizon. "It would seem the old man finally decided to make his move. Still," he said, wincing in pain. "I wish he would choose someone else."
Rider swallowed the orb, and his countenance changed instantly. Rough dark hair grew out from beneath his arms and along his face. His eyes morphed, so his cornea was like blood, and his iris the fields of the earth. His teeth grew out and sharpened as his features wrinkled.
A stage 1 werewolf!
However, that notion was quickly abandoned when Rider raised an arm to the sky and summoned a portal beneath the meteorite's, its purpose to swallow and transport the meteorite to the forever sea.
Werewolves could not use any form of magic even in their most basic of transformed states.
Hobgoblins jumped out of portals that appeared around him – Razznik's method of dealing with the unwanted interruption. These nasty beasts were nothing like the Orneks he just fought. They were the ultimate henchmen of evil. Intelligent, yet deadly, with a sickening love of torture and destruction.
Kashi looked to Rider.
The werewolf (?) did not seem too bothered by them. He looked to Kashi, his eyes conveying a clear message: Deal with them yourself or die.
Kashi had a mixture of emotions as he drank an elixir from his inventory. On the one hand, he was elated for a more challenging fight. But on the other, he was irritated because of Razznik. Then there was the fact he knew that Rider could easily deal with the monsters while maintaining the portal.
Kashi counted fourteen hobgoblins. Three were mages, four were archers, and the rest were warriors.
Kashi activated Ferulic's Spirit, a move which drew Rider's attention, nocked six arrows, and shot at the mages (two per mage), assisted by [Drill]. No sooner had those six taken flight, that he released another barrage, this time aimed at the warriors. The final torrent were homing arrows aimed at the archers.
The arrows reached their respective targets at almost precisely the same time.
The warriors blocked or struck the arrows out of the air with their clubs while the archers scattered. Finally, the mages, knowing the warriors and archers did not require their help, first released fireballs to burn the arrows. But the bolts had been dipped in Salamander blood, making them mostly immune to fire, so they simply zipped through the flames.
The mages, caught off-guard by this, barely erected shields in time. However, augmented by [Drill], the arrows did not bounce back as expected. Instead, they doggedly tried to penetrate the stubborn shield. In return, instead of a full-dome, the mages concentrated the shields to stop the stubborn arrows.
Within the two seconds which all his transpired, Kashi activated [Angel Step] and zoomed across the wasteland. He grabbed six arrows from his quivers as he sped past the mages, stopped, activated [Drill], and then bolted to their exposed backs.
The mages intelligently kept distance between themselves to prevent being routed all at once, but that was of no consequence once Kashi got behind them. He flung the arrows into two of their exposed backs, then crashed against the third, knee sinking deep into its spinal cord.
All three released their shields as a result of the shock and were subsequently skewered from the front and back by arrows.
The triple cries of pain drew the attention of the other hobgoblins, and they realized they had been tricked. Roaring with madness, the archers shot relentlessly, while the warriors tore towards him, clubs raised high.
Kashi shielded himself from the barrage of arrows with the mage's body, which he pushed towards the nearest warrior once they got too close for the archers to continue their bombardment.
Kashi raced toward the warrior who smacked the mage out of the way with his club, only to see three arrows advancing on his face.
With surprising speed, the hobgoblin raised his club, and the arrows could only get stuck in the durable wood. However, the act of raising the club blocked his vision, and he failed to see Kashi's agile approach.
The daeben leaped, flat in the air with his chest to the sky, and kicked against the arrows' tails, launching them right through the club and into the beast's head. Still suspended in the air, he wrapped his legs around the beast's neck and threw his weight towards the earth.
The motion guided the brute through the air in a half-circle, where it crashed skull first against the earth.
Kashi had no time to admire his work, however, and got upright by pushing against the earth in an explosive push-up, barely dodging a downward swing by another hobgoblin. Though he dodged the first, he was off-balance and could only block another's strike with the back of his arms.
The swing, however, launched him towards the fountain (which was now functioning again), and the archers fired their arrows, finally having a free target.
Kashi could not see but heard the arrow's feathers rustling in the wind and conceived their flight pattern. The first grazed his arm, but he caught the other two mid-air and used their added momentum to back-flip into the fountain.
The archers were far from done and released a skill exclusive to the archer class: [Rain of Arrows.]
With this skill, one arrow fired into the air multiplied into several that rained down on a particular area.
Seeing this, Kashi could think of more than ten conventional ways to dodge the attack, but Razznik's display and the existence of Skyrm, augmented by the amount of fun he was having, inspired him to risk it and attempt something new.
The daeben spun around in place, cutting the waters of the fountain, speed, and power augmented by [Angel Step] and [Gaia] respectively. His rotation increased rapidly as he descended and ascended in turn till the waters began to form a spiral around him.
With one final revolution, he kicked towards the heavens. A dragon of water shot towards the sky and smashed through the arrows that would have hit the daeben.
Kashi's grin was brighter than the moon as he released another wave at the shocked archers. He saw the warriors charge at him, and then kicked the ground, raising a slab barely an inch over the earth.
The first two tripped warriors tripped over, upsetting the rest of the company. However, two made it out of the confusion and charged towards the daeben, clubs poised for a strike.Kashi's grin was brighter than the moon as he released another wave at the shocked archers. He saw the warriors charge at him, and then kicked the ground, raising a slab barely an inch over the earth.
In reply, Kashi charged to meet them. He fired three arrows in quick succession at one of them, and then rushed the second.
The second had anticipated this move and swung down its club with considerable speed.
Kashi, unable to stop his charge, crouched low and accepted the blow with his right arm raised above his head. The strike forced him down, but he instantly retaliated by jumping high, knocking the hobgoblin's club arm above its head. He caught its head during his ascent and delivered a crunching blow to its chin with his knee.
Rattled, the beast staggered away from the daeben.
Kashi was prevented from finishing him off by the approach of the first hobgoblin, which attacked with a malicious roar because one of Kashi's arrows had pierced its eye. The daeben boosted to the side with an enormous force, and his elbow sunk into the fiend's belly, lifting it slightly off the ground. To his horror, it doubled over and vomited a good chunk onto him.
Kashi quickly repositioned himself and slammed the beast onto the earth. Its weapon rolled out of its opened hand, and it was used to bludgeon it to instant death. Not forgetting the earlier which now attempted to escape, Kashi flung the club, and it rammed into its back, felling it.
In the minutes it took Kashi to dispose of the remaining hobgoblins, Rider successfully transported all of Meteora and to some other dimension or location.
The daeben returned to his side, smile dampened by the older man's relaxed countenance. That spell which would deplete the mana of most Master Mages did not seem to have fazed him at all.
Upon noticing Kashi's return, Rider asked, "You have been to see Fladnag, have you not?"
Kashi glanced at the mask above, which seemed to have gone still as if contemplating its next move. "Yes, I have. How did you know?"
"You are of Ferulic's Spirit then?" asked Rider, completely ignoring the daeben's question.
Slightly irritated, but wise enough to know not to provoke the older man, Kashi kept his retort to a simple, "Yes."
Rider closed his eyes, seemingly in deep thought. "I suppose that would explain how you came to know of Razznik, and why he is interested in you. The spirit within you calls out to him."
At this time, Kashi had no desire to correct him, nor was he entirely sure his corrections were a hundred percent correct. He listened as the werewolf debated some matters with himself.
This slight pause was interrupted by three giant portals, out of which three Mutogres came. The unworldly beasts were stories large and wielded terrifying axes of the utmost quality.
Kashi, excited for the prospect of a new fight prepared to meet them. But in the shortest of seconds, all three lay dead, clutching their throats in confused horror.
Rider, weary of another pointless battle, ended their lives with nary a flick of his finger. He did not stop to gloat, however, as he had important things to do. He seemed to have come to a decision as he resolutely got down on one knee and placed his palm on the earth.
A mandala appeared below his palm and expanded until it was almost two meters wide, after which it began spinning in place.
Faroff, in a temple abandoned by the passages of time, a similar mandala appearedon its sacred grounds. Seven shards laying on the forgotten marble stones weresucked into the mandala, whereafter, it promptly disappeared.
Rider's right hand gripped the shard he knew the other six now held in their hands...