883 T.D.o.N.B: My apocalypse
Obviously, the plan to go had to be: close the distance while avoiding his attack, as step one, and as step two, kick the shit out of that asshole.
I proceeded with that plan, relying on my flying speed and the shadow walking, to dodge the hammer mainly. Why? Because I wasn’t completely sure the dot was actually the ghost, and I didn’t want to go all the way back somewhere else if I was wrong.
I may have wasted a couple of seconds in this way since I confirmed my first assessment very soon, but I’m still gonna protect my laziness in this approach. Knowing the target was actually the target, I decided to accelerate, and instead of flying started running up makeshift stairs created from the void essence.
I reached him fast, but he actually didn’t seem to even plan to keep me at a distance. The hammer was still annoyingly trying to blast me away from behind, but that was all. When I actually tried to kill him, I found out why.
I got close enough to strike. Just in a regular way, up from above, vertically down. One clean powerful swing, but my weapon got blocked by dozen of blades popping out of nowhere to protect the ghost.
Well, at least I was able to have a good look at the guy.
He had a torn dark blue cloak on, covering most of his bulky body. There were some uncovered places though. Through those, I was able to notice the heavy armament under. An armor of sorts, that seemed to have layers assembled upon layers. Like a sarcophagus on a living, breathing, walking guy. Inches thick.
He was basically a mech pilot. Even the head was protected under a helmet and a long mask, showcasing a stern face of what I only assumed was a depiction of a Bahumdabar.
The helmet itself was rather simple. Kinda reminded me of a bucket.
But back to the fight. Since he blocked my attack, the most obvious choice of action was to attack again, just from a different angle, and that’s why I shadow walked behind him, just to repeat the same thing. Unfortunately, he also repeated the same thing, blocking me with those blades-out-of-nowhere.
Then the hammer tagged along, and I had to evacuate.
I needed another solution to the problem. I ended up doing something which probably most people would do in my case. If your hit didn’t land, just hit harder.
IO flew a bit away, changing the angle, and avoiding the hammer. The ghost didn’t just sit idle, he summoned like a million blades out of nowhere, then threw them all at me, so I had my hands busy with blocking, and avoiding it all.
It rained steel for several minutes while I tried my best to change the angle and make a room for my own attack. It involved some shadow walking, a few barriers, and a bit of ‘Telekinesis’ but eventually I got close enough for another try. I swung with all my might, adding ‘Void strike’ to the mix.
On his part, the strategy hasn’t changed. He just tried to block it by summoning more stuff, which this time didn’t work. My pudao went through, breaking the magical steel protection, then dug deep into his armor, but it wasn’t enough. Thankfully the void essence tagging along my blade was there.
It was able to penetrate deeper, reaching the undead body. He turned to dark smoke.
I tried to catch a deep breath, just as I caught the stone he left, but the air froze in my lungs. Why? Well… Maybe the fucking army of undead warriors storming the place I was in, completely out of nowhere, had something to do with that. Maby.
The freeze wasn’t enough to stop me. I just shadow walked away, then dumped a heal into myself while the magic failed to kill me.
What happened next would be best explained with a single word – armageddon.
The flames burst from everywhere. Weapons and other objects flying at me. Ice shards, electricity, and earth literally boil below me. It was hard to even comprehend. I had to squeeze every little bit of what my body was able to do to escape, and I had to continue escaping because they chased me.
I remember shadow walking like a madman, then using random magic every time I possibly could. I definitely summoned a lot of firebirds to blow up any target, in range, which I was able to spot while escaping.
It was literally hell on earth. The world turned red, with occasional bursts of white, here and there. I saw shapes everywhere, and couldn’t really tell if I had the sky above me, or if was it the ground. The directions mixed too. There was too much spinning involved.
It was horrible, and I knew I could do on with that only for a moment longer. There simply was no room for any mistakes and in such an action-packed brief period of time, those were definitely going to happen. I made a tough decision. Very tough, considering that I just lured out an army of monsters that would look around for me if I were to disappear.
I shadow walked to Loistavadvaar after dropping an anchor.
I quickly replenished my strength, because even two seconds were too long in the situation I created. Arc was at stake.
Then I started casting a single spell, but before I finished, I jumped back. Right in the middle of the army which was looking for the target that just disappeared from them.
In a fraction of a second gained thanks to the surprise, I released the spell, dumping most of my magic into that damn thing. From my hand, I released a white, scorching ray of energy trying to cut with it as if it was a freaking laser.
I just swung wide, seemingly in a random direction where I could spot many of the enemies, and that’s also when I noticed something.
Something very big.