Edited by: flubbykin

Chimera Cellestialle. A demigod in a mortal vessel. Creation of Aira, one of two creatures that were supposed to face anti-creator at the World’s end.

The boy burdened with such powers decided to follow the path of a mage, from the one side - a splendid pick that perfectly compensated creatures lack of sophisticated tools, from the other - it forced him to spend more time developing his mind instead of a body, thus reducing the maximal potential of the vessel.

Spells he cast were unique - nothing as pathetic as book-chants that the other adventurer she killed days ago used. Magic of that nameless corpse was plane. Boring. Predictable. Weak on both formula and power.

His magic was sparkling, shining, he was using basic schemes and structures of spells which he changed mid-chant - pure essence of magic. And his “fire-power” was quite formidable. Even ancients would have a problem to reach this level without boosting gear.

Ah, if that boy was living eons ago, in time of her nation greatest glory, he would be one of “Apprentizare Elxeisis” of Academia - honor student that could choose his own teacher from Grande Technomaguses. Bah, she herself, the first teacher, would fight for the privilege of forming his development path. Such a rare, raw potential…

She wanted to see more of his skills… but what she wanted and what she needed were two separate things. First Teacher cast her desires aside, for a greater good, she decided to test his battle potential using nothing but his chimeric power.

He wasn’t the first Chimera Cellestialle she encountered, no, the first one alive, but the teacher of her teacher caught living individual, dissected and studied its body. And it was a breakthrough in science. The knowledge gathered from this operation gave the Ancients ability to create their own chimeras. Even children she designed recently were nothing more than the aftermath of these researches.

She knew quite a lot about this creature, in the end, she had access to results from first-hand, not only the official report but also to not-written thought and wonders of the person that carried on the experiments.

She knew, that the pure power of this creature could be considered from two perspectives: the number and power of vessels it can transform to, and individual intelligence of ability to adapt to new threats.

Technomagus that defeated first (recorded) divine chimera noticed, that the speed of transformation was greatly reduced the longer battle lasted. One of the possibilities was that the process greatly overburdened brain, which in conclusion needed more and more time to properly design a new vessel.

She had to check it - see the real predisposition of this individual. If he would fight at full battle potential if he would consider his life being threatened, this is why she forced combat and decided to sacrifice countless existences of her swarm warriors, even though it would greatly slow down her plan’s advances.

Much to her disappointment, up until now, he was acting like children reading strategy book copying every and each move.

Force a defensive spell to evaluate the situation, then after enemy would regroup and move onward in strengthened formation, he used the wide-area attack to cause greatest loses… giving up on his defense creating a gap.

Not enough. Data is lacking. Information corrupted. This battle would lead her nowhere. She had to force him into taking more chaotic action - to see the real-life adaptation.

In her swarm, though, Priestess had dozens of insectoids carrying different poisons. She decided to use stimulant which not only reduced the magical potential to almost 0, but also forces an adrenaline rush. With boiling blood and pumping heart he will have to make decisions in the split of an eye. Observation continues.

Yet, even now, what he used was “most-obvious-pick”. The best pick would be a fast vessel that would possess the ability to quickly set up traps. Run away - set a trap - lure enemy squad in, repeat. She was even leading her forces like a moron-commander in order to encourage him into picking this strategy… Unfortunately… he decided to once again “go-with-a-steam”.

Colossal vessel. He may be strong, he may be big. But even a dragon would fall if a whole kingdom would swarm him. Was he thinking that he could just trample all of her children? That’s… so very disappointing.

Apparently catching this specimen will be a much easier task than she previously thought. Shame.

The monster that Chimera turned into roared causing the whole dungeon to tremble. Her squads moved onward, like one body. Chimera took the first step, then next and another. Each and every step was a bit faster. His walk turned into a jog, jog into a run, and that turned into a crazy charge. Each time his leg would hit a ground it would cause s small tremor. He just forced himself into the middle of her squads kicking and pushing them aside with a power of impact alone.

That’s when she noticed - he wasn’t charging at her forces, he was charging at her.

The rules of war: taking down a commander greatly reduced the flexibility of command-chain, especially on the battlefield. A correct decision on his part. But, the same rules ends with the statement: this is why the commander can never be left unprotected. She was forced to summon her elite troops much earlier than her prediction stated.

The ground around her shook and trembled as four Hive-Templars emerged from the dirt. These giants were almost as big as his current vessel. Clad in extremely hard exoskeleton they required lots of energy to move, so most of the time they were lying dormant around the altar - around her.

Kid didn’t change his trajectory, even more, he lowered his head positioning his horns to the front readying for impact.

He rammed into one of her guardians directly, the power of impact lifted beast off the ground as if it was nothing but a rag-doll and kept charging onward pushing it onto one of the pillars supporting the ceiling of the cave.

Interesting. Was he aware of “structural weakness” of this chamber?

Chimera got up from the ground before he managed to start generating momentum again her children already dropped at him from all possible sides.

Despite body covered in multiple layers of armor and muscles unlike her templars he wasn’t really slowed down… Of course, the effect of her venom. Did he pick this vessel because he decided to turn the effects of venom to his advantage? Indeed, it can boost physical capabilities but what were the chances that..

.. no. Each time you face your opponent that somehow manages to use random occurrence to his advantage always presume that he did that on purpose. It’s better to overestimate the power of your opponent and be disappointed than to underestimate him and be defeated.

A mistake on her side, it is then.

He shook the swarm off his leg, grabbed one of the creatures off his back and threw it across the room, then he leaped in the air and landed on yet another group turning them into a bloody pulp.

Casualties were getting bigger and bigger, yet still remained within an admissible range, nonetheless, in time a change in approach will have to be taken.

He lowered his body, forced his hand through the floor ripping a huge chunk of stone before tossing it at another Templar. The attack was slow, her guardian had more than just enough time to move off the trajectory… yet the stone hit the second pillar.

He marked attack on her just to mark attack on her guardians so he could actually focus the structures supporting ceiling? The idea was good, but unfortunately for him, a race of ancient constructors didn’t just make “structural weaknesses” in their buildings.

Her heart twitched. He wasn’t stupid. He wasn’t as stupid as he wanted her to think he is, just as she was playing with him, he tried playing with her. He wasn’t just a mad beast trashing the place, instead, his charges were supposed to relocate him into a different part of the chamber were fewer monsters gathered, he was gathering space and time to perform another focused attack on targets that to him appeared vital.

But that still wasn’t the peak of his performances, she knew that.

With the corner of her eyes, Technomagus looked in the direction of his companion. Warrioress was proudly standing her ground Fighting with few opponents at the same time. Her magical powers were almost non-existing, bit more than the regular non-magician person would have. She was limited to her physical performances providing no threat at all.

Templar used its colossal frontal limb turned into razor-sharp sickles trying to pierce through the exoskeleton of Chimera, and indeed, loud cracking noises could be heard as a single flaw appeared on white armor. The attack was aimed at magician's leg - trying to reduce his mobility. Using two of its hands Chimera was fighting off other attackers, using two lower arms he grabbed the head of templar and started crushing it.

brain tissue splattered everywhere, yet that was not enough for him, he jumped behind now carcass of her guardian, grabbed sickles-limbs of a dead body, places his leg on creatures body and started pulling sickles to himself while pushing the body away with his leg, tearing weaponized arms off the corpse.

He balanced sickles in his upper hands giving them a try with few quick swings.

Interesting. He couldn’t use his spear with his current vessel, maybe as a toothpick, but no a weapon, so he decided to use body parts of his fallen enemies increasing his battle potential.

Indeed - she wanted to see his adaptation ability… but that’s not necessarily the kind of adaptation she had in mind.

What was more frightening was the fact, that he showed no signs of losing stamina, neither he changes his vessel. Why?

Frequent changes were logical - they were reducing the possibility of enemy adapting to your battle style… on the other hand, currently he was causing just enough damage without suffering any losses on his side.

Was he trying to maximize the outcome from a single vessel?

Not enough data. Required more observation…. more observation… more…

When was the last time her studies brought her so much joy? Before the fall her last few years were simply boring. She would make a breakthrough after breakthrough… but she was doing that pushed only by sense of duty. There was no “spark” like she felt when she was a child building her first golems.

She knew why - she knew what was almost arousing her in her first works - it was getting dirty. When her genius was noticed she was quickly relocated to programming department - she designated models but building prototypes was left to mechanics and engineers, she saw her construct for the first time at testing phase…

… where was the fun? Where was the spark?

It was here. It was clearly here - being close with your experiment - feeling pressure and suspension. Did you calibrate the fuse core correctly, or will it blow in your hands?! Will the specimen you are inspecting free itself from its bondage and bite your head off?! Working! Actually working! Not only with pen and paper!

Normally, she would scold herself for such unprofessional approach, she kept telling herself she needs to treat her resources with greater responsibility… but that voice was only a whisper, instead, her heart was yelling, urging her to skip a phase, to enter the battleground…

… but why?

Was that an impact of the Chimera?

The beast of desires? It was told to possess an ability which would influence creatures around it… but that was supposed to affect only its followers, wasn’t it?

Next pillar collapsed, and another. Chimera became inpatient - must be an effect of the venom. He took a few blows that he could easily dodge or block as he charged at last column.

The last “supporting” pillar felt…

… and nothing happened.

“If you were thinking that the ceiling will collapse on my head… didn’t you notice that the ceiling is partly a dome? It perfectly spreads the weight on the walls, pillars were meant to serve a different purpose. You couldn’t know that without studying our architecture before, despite the effect, you have my praise.”

He grinned, barely as if trying to hide it.

Was that a bluff? Or did she overlook something?

Then, he raised his leg and stomped the ground. A crack appeared, first small, then bigger, separating the floor. The crack kept following toward one of the holes he pulverized in the ground, then to another one, and another one.

He wasn’t aiming the columns - he just wanted her to focus her attention on those while every action he performed was actually damaging different part of construction - the ornaments on the ground which were holding the altar in place.

The altar was an elevated place, a bit like a small, tall, and thin pyramid in the middle of the room surrounded by the pillars, now, with damaged one side of the floor, the weight was shifted to another one tilting whole construction.

She started falling, about to be squeezed under the mass of stone and metal.

She had to act.

She raised her hand up - from different part of the room a single glove came flying enveloping perfectly around her slender fingers. Then, she squeezed her palm into fist.

And whole construction froze in place. Despite being tilted to the side - almost lying.

The crystal structure around the glove was shining with bright blue light. She had to use her gear.

Snap of her finger and the altar slowly started moving back into place, damages caused all over the place started auto-repairing. less than half of a minute, and a chamber looked even better than previously.

“My-my, that was close.” she panted reddened on her face because of excitement.

Her heart was pounding rapidly as she looked over the chamber.

Her monsters were lying decimated, most of them died merely trampled or splattered under the rocks.

The gauntlet of an administrator was empowered with an enormous amount of fuel and extremely complex chrono-magic which allowed one-time full reconstruction of the building, unfortunately, it didn’t bring her swarm back to life…

… mostly, because it wasn’t necessary.

Once again, her eyes rolled back into her skull as she connected with her swarm, she focused on finding each and every of her children - those which were still sleeping in eggs and cocoons. She send a single thought.

Awake.

And they all followed her order. They had no other choice. Despite that most of them were not fully developed, that some of the died right after their eggshells broken - it didn’t matter.

Regrowing her hive will take few days, maybe a week, and every generation will be only stronger, better adapted, especially after she would capture divine chimera and use parts of his cores in process of creation of a new breed!

For now, though, she had to become a little serious, and for that, she had to prepare herself. She needed time, just a few minutes. For that single purpose, she decided to sacrifice the rest of her children.

Swarm attacked, in the meantime, she raised her head.

From the bottom of the altar, a panel appeared that raised till it reached her eye level.

“Authorisation code required.” the robotic voice said out of nowhere. “Through study - perfection, through labor - humility, through wisdom - evolution.” “Access granted. Welcome, Priestess Aij’zzara.”

The whole altar moved, as if having mind of its own. Layer of rocks and metal moved apart revealing complex mechanical system glowing in cold, blue light.

“Awaiting your orders, Priestess.” unpleasant dead voice that couldn’t be associated with any gender rang again “Code AX-013. Experimental Specimen unleashed in laboratory.” “Code AX-013 confirmed. Starting cleansing procedure. Preparing Cleansers Mecha-Armor.”

Up until now, from waist-level and lower her body was that of an insect, yet, that was only a bio-prosthesis attached via neural addons. Now, greenish liquid burst from whole abdomen as she forced programmed apoptosis. She rested her arms on the disgusting insecticidal body and pushed, releasing her real lower body from prison of flesh.

Her lower body was humanoid in core, yet it definitely didn't belong to a human. unnaturally thin legs with additional reversed joints feet weirdly resembling that of a bug - perfect to perform a long leaps.

She stomped from one feet to another savouring the sensation of being able to walk again.

“Priestess Aij’zzara, prepare for receiving the Cleaners Armor.”

She raised her arms to the sides allowing mechanical limbs that appeared all over the altar to start attaching pieces of equipment to her.

Her children were jumping madly at the colossal, some were even self-destructing in process throwing their lives away just to buy another split of second.

By this time, her whole body was completely covered in black-metallic futuristic armor, crystals on arms and back started shining with deep red afterglow letting her know that the suit is fully charged.

“Pilot’s suit ready.”

The voice rang again.

The wall of the chamber moved to the side revealing a colossal golem with opened cockpit. The priestess headed in its direction with few long leaps, got inside, and strapped her body.

As soon as the black gates close behind her, the black giant shined with similar red light before starting to get up.

“Hey, big boy! Maybe you will face someone your own size?!”

She yelled from inside.

Creature that right now was killing one of the last monsters looked in her direction.

Golems were one of the most common creation of her times, but this one.. that’s something she was building alone, behind everyone’s back in her spare time. As Greatest Priestess of Evolution she was forbidden to create any dangerous materials and constructions - she was simply too precious to risk her life in accidental explosion.

The beast was far from done, not even a prototype, it didn’t even have a safety mechanism nor power-reducers which risked overheating vital components…

… but that also meant that its firepower was beyond every other safety mechanism of her times.

She had merely few minutes of working on 200% of power before something would happen. maybe it would turn itself off, maybe the reactor core would melt causing “small” explosion.

For now, it didn’t matter. She could test both the capabilities of chimera and her device at the same time.

Her heart was racing, her mind was blank.

She was stomping on the razor edge and she couldn’t be happier.