Chapter 78: The Aether-Ray Ambush

Chapter 78: Chapter 78: The Aether-Ray Ambush

"Nature, red in tooth and claw." — Alfred, Lord Tennyson, In Memoriam

•••

The second day in the Shattered Heavens was dominated by clouds.

The expedition crossed a chain of floating islands connected by narrow paths of chained rocks.

Clouds drifted above and below them, remaining strangely still.

Nobody trusted them.

At this depth, even clouds could be living creatures.

And then the clouds opened their eyes.

Across half a mile of mist, countless glowing eyes appeared in neat rows, shining with the colors of the aurora.

A moment later, enormous wings spread through the vapor.

The creatures revealed themselves.

Aether-Rays.

Level 40.

Each was as wide as a large sailing vessel, with enormous wings resembling colorful stained glass.

Lightning crackled across their bodies, carrying energy absorbed from the surrounding storms.

There were at least thirty of them.

And the endless sky had more than enough space for them all.

[Ding!]

[Ambush logged: Aether-Ray swarm, Level 40, count: 30 plus. Attack pattern: dive-bombing from the cloud decks.]

[Note: the scenery is billing you.]

The first Aether-Ray let out a sharp whistle.

FWEEEE!

It dived out of the clouds like a falling blade, folding its enormous wings before crashing into the soldiers’ shield formation.

WHAM!

Several spears bent under the impact.

Then a second ray attacked.

KRAK!

A third followed.

KRAK!

The soldiers quickly realized how dangerous the creatures were.

They tightened their formation and fought back.

FWOOSH!

A burst of fire struck one ray, sending it spinning through the air with smoke trailing from its wings.

The siege engineer fired his ballista.

THOOM!

Another ray took the full force of the attack.

Meanwhile, the elite students were proving their strength.

The Warden twins raised their shields together, forming a strong defensive corridor.

An attacking ray crashed against their defenses, only to find the Sky-Lancer waiting above it.

Standing on hardened air, the Sky-Lancer drove his weapon straight through the creature.

SHNK!

He then rode its falling body two hundred feet downward before landing safely.

Nearby, the Spell-Colonel raised her hand.

A single white spell shot forward.

The ray it struck instantly split apart along its natural seams without making a sound.

The glowing lines remained visible for another minute.

The battle continued, with both sides exchanging powerful attacks.

Valerius fought brilliantly, at least while his mana lasted.

His golden aura illuminated the battlefield, attracting the Aether-Rays like insects drawn to light.

The creatures loved radiant energy, and Valerius was producing plenty of it.

KRAK! KRAK!

Two golden slashes struck separate rays, folding their enormous bodies in midair.

Valerius even paused to pose between attacks.

But every movement consumed more mana.

And Joel was carefully observing how quickly his reserves were dropping.

Because Joel was fighting differently.

PK!

An Aether-Ray dived straight toward him.

But just before it struck, Joel disappeared.

The creature passed through his previous position and continued another thirty meters toward the shield formation.

The soldiers immediately raised their spears.

PK! PK!

Joel repeated the same trick.

Throughout the first hour, he changed his position eleven times.

Each time, an attacking ray missed him and flew toward the soldiers waiting to intercept it.

Twice, the creatures came so close that their wingtips struck each other in the empty space where Joel had stood moments earlier.

FWAP!

The rays pulled away in confusion, spreading their wings as they tried to understand what had happened.

But whenever they changed direction, they found themselves heading toward another target.

Usually something brighter.

"He’s drawing them away!" a soldier shouted in admiration.

He was almost correct.

Joel wasn’t simply drawing the creatures away.

He was deliberately positioning himself so their attacks would carry them toward Valerius’s golden aura, the shield wall, or the ballista line.

And whenever the rays reached those positions, the soldiers were ready to attack.

As for Joel, he was never there when the creatures arrived.

[Ding!]

[Skill in use: Void Step. Dives evaded: 11 of 11. Damage taken: zero.]

[Aggro analysis: the swarm prefers the bright, the loud, and the stationary. You are none of these.]

When Joel couldn’t dodge, he stood his ground.

The rays that struck him with their wings found armor strengthened by a year of surviving the Deep.

Their glancing blows bounced harmlessly off him.

TAK! TAK-TAK!

[Ding!]

[Charge banked: 3. The Sovereign thanks the donors.]

[Micro-stat logged: Vitality +0.3. Absorption is earning interest.]

Joel deliberately stood where the rays’ wings and tails could graze him near the edge of the formation.

He let each glancing blow strike his armor, absorbing small amounts of kinetic energy.

TAK!

Another hit.

Little by little, the stored energy continued to grow.

[Ding!]

[Charge banked: 5. Micro-stat logged: Endurance +0.2.]

[Micro-stat logged: Strength +0.2. The armor is acquiring opinions.]

The second wave attacked more intelligently.

After losing so many of their own, the surviving Aether-Rays stopped targeting the brightest fighters.

Instead, they went after the expedition’s supplies and equipment.

Their new targets were the tether ropes, the chains connecting the floating rocks, and Roan’s three wax-sealed beacons.

Those beacons were the only things helping the expedition map the Tenth Stratum.

SHNK!

One ray sliced through a causeway chain, causing the rocks beneath forty soldiers to shift dangerously.

Joel immediately stepped toward the nearest beacon.

PK!

Another ray came diving toward it.

But before the creature could reach the beacon, Joel stopped its momentum just two feet away.

The ray froze in midair.

THOOM!

The siege engineer fired his ballista, striking the helpless creature.

Joel wasn’t going to let anything destroy their only way of mapping the Tenth Stratum.

But the swarm wasn’t finished.

It sent its largest member.

Five hours into the battle, an enormous Aether-Ray emerged from the highest clouds.

Its body was as wide as a barn door, covered in scars from countless storms.

It folded its wings and dived straight toward Joel, with brilliant light crackling along its edges.

FWEEEEEEEE!

This time, Joel didn’t dodge.

"Inert."

The enormous creature stopped instantly.

Its wings spread wide, frozen in midair barely a hand’s width above Joel’s head.

Lightning continued crackling along its body.

Its mouth hung open, revealing rows of sharp teeth.

For a moment, the battlefield fell silent.

The soldiers stopped attacking.

The ballista crew stared.

Even Valerius paused in the middle of a golden slash.

Everyone watched as Joel stood calmly beneath the frozen monster and examined his fingernails.

"Release. Absolute."

The enormous ray suddenly shot away.

Joel had redirected the force of its dive toward another Aether-Ray flying past the shield formation.

KRAKOOM!

The two creatures collided with devastating force.

Both were instantly killed.

Their broken bodies spun away from the causeway and disappeared into the endless abyss.

The wreckage continued falling long after the battle had moved on.

Then the soldiers erupted into cheers.

"The mascot kills by bookkeeping!" Sergeant Voss shouted approvingly.

The soldiers cheered even louder.

And that was when someone started a chant that would follow the expedition all the way home.

"The floor holds!"

"The floor holds!"

"THE FLOOR HOLDS!"

[Ding!]

[Settlement delivered: one (1) dive, reassigned. Rays retired: two (2), one motion.]

[The swarm is reconsidering its portfolio.]

By dusk, the Aether-Rays finally retreated.

The surviving creatures folded their wings and disappeared into the clouds, leaving the battlefield to the expedition.

Eleven rays had been killed by the escorts, two by Valerius, and another two by Joel.

The remaining creatures had fled.

Then came the damage report.

Two soldiers had suffered bruises from attacks against the shield wall. One banner-mage had injured his shoulder.

And Valerius had suffered the worst damage to his pride.

The escorts had around sixty percent of their mana remaining.

Valerius was down to thirty percent.

Meanwhile, Joel had barely spent anything.

His Domain consumed no energy, while Void Step required almost nothing.

And every ray that struck or grazed him had only added more kinetic energy to his reserves.

Victor Kole had spent most of the battle tied to the causeway ropes, pale and almost motionless.

The rays had largely ignored him.

But when a soldier began floating away near a gravity seam, Victor grabbed his ankle and pulled him back with one hand.

His face was white with fear, but he saved the man.

He asked for no praise and received none.

Joel noticed, however, and quietly added the incident to his records.

Victor’s file was beginning to contain some unexpected entries.

That night, Marshal Halden gathered his officers.

"Thirty enemies repelled. Fifteen killed. Casualties: light."

He looked around the table.

"The anchor maintained our footing, protected the wounded, and secured our flanks. That will be included in the official report."

He paused.

"The anchor also killed two rays without consuming any resources the quartermaster can calculate. That goes under observations."

"He deliberately sent them toward us," Valerius complained from the far end of the table.

His tea had gone cold, and his golden aura was barely glowing.

"I watched him. Every time he disappeared, the rays changed direction toward our formation. Toward me."

He frowned.

"Because I was the brightest target on the battlefield."

"The formation was supposed to hold its position," Halden replied. "And you were supposed to attract attention."

He folded the report.

"Both of you did your jobs, and everyone survived. If you have another complaint, submit it with a requisition form."

He stood.

"Dismissed."

Later that night, Nyx emerged from Joel’s shadow as the camp lamps grew dim.

Her crown pulsed slowly with violet light.

"You deliberately made the soldiers waste mana fighting those creatures," she observed. "That wasn’t very kind, Architect."

"It was an audit," Joel replied.

He looked toward the dark sky.

"The deeper we go, the more dangerous things will become."

"I needed to know how much the army could handle before running out of mana."

He paused.

"And how much I’ll have to cover when they do."

Beyond the distant storms, something enormous moved within the lightning.

Even the lightning seemed to avoid it.

Joel and Nyx watched silently for a while.

Neither mentioned its size. The expedition needed its rest, and there was no reason to frighten everyone.

"It has a shape," Nyx finally said.

"Everything down here does," Joel replied. "Everything here is still falling. And whatever fell must have come from somewhere, with a form of its own."

Joel decided to investigate the mysterious shape later.

For now, he recorded the day’s gains, stored the kinetic energy he had collected, and went to sleep.

Everything he owned remained safely within his fifty-meter Domain.