Chapter 90

Altruism

Sometimes we come up with plans to save a loved one from a problem they put themselves in. Normally this is something simple like knocking on the door and then awkwardly handing roll of toilet paper through without looking. You know, not the hero you wanted, but the hero you needed at the time.

Then there are times when your friends and family get so deep in shit, that you wonder if this water treatment plant melted down and started flooded the streets with turds. Oddly enough, either of these scenarios would be better than the option before us, currently.

The moment my blood and essence contacted my signed form, as expected, the warding came to life. The only thing was, this was not warding, rather than having the runes designed so they would repel dark monsters and entities. This one instead summoned dark monsters and entities. At least, that was what this was supposed to do. I managed to modify my form and allow limiters to immediately be put into place for my portion of the once warding, now summoning spell that was going live.

Why did I do this? Why go into something that is clearly a trap?

Simple, I wanted to see what we were ultimately up against. From my perspective we were playing with house money, which meant I couldn't lose and still not lose. Maybe this made my decision making a bit reckless, but if you had a chance to go back in time to fix everything, wouldn't you want to know how badly things can break, before you go back? Also, I would be lying if part of my decision making process wasn't at least affected by the presence of Jess.

I know, I know. If Jess was on a bridge and jumped, would I jump after her? I’d have to say I probably would. That is assuming I couldn’t just grab her with Telekinetic hands or create a cushion of air for her to land on. At the very least I think I could arrive in time to administer healing aid just in time.

Would I do the same for the new sexy warrior Guardian Jess? Likely no. My reasoning? I would give her the benefit of the doubt and assume that she could stop her decent with her wings.

That said, sexy Guardian Jess is not the one jumping off the bridge in this metaphor. Of course, in this metaphor, the bridge is a giant summoning circle, and the jumpers are Jess, General Fellina, Rayquel, Rayquel’s team, and a few other doctors and the like that came over to tend to Guardian Jess’ wounds.

Of course, the wounds were all fixed by my earlier healing attempts. Then when I was merely checking to see that the healing was successful, I was yelled at my Jess for gawking.

Okay, maybe I was, just a little. But sexy guardian Jess never missed ab day, and it showed. How did I know this? Well, half her shirt was missing, right where a slicing wound was on her stomach. This was of course one of the wounds I healed, and thus I wanted to make sure it healed properly, you know like those healer people would.

But of course, Jess got super jealous and then chose that to be something to be angry about. Not that she said anything. Well, she did say one word.

“Typical.” Then she harrumphed away, as she began angrily filling out her summoning portal form.

See, totally a victim. I was doing the right thing by making sure all wounds on sexy Jess’ stomach were fixed. Then by the time I was done, Jess had already filled out her form and made it a point to move far away from me.

Again, this goes back to that whole using silence as a weapon thing. After that, I wanted to just sign my form, so I could go talk to Jess and work things out. The only problem? You guessed it, that is when I noticed the forms were altered and meant to summon not ward a greater evil spirit. I like to think that this has to do with my Rune Crafting skill that is quite high.

Skill Specialty Rune Crafting: 99+% Reading/Writing: 99+%

But seriously, no one else noticed the changes? That seems highly unlikely, that or there is a short distance from the person who altered these forms and handed them to us. Meaning, there was likely another Prolaxian Herald nearby. At least that was the good news from this whole situation. Yes, the good news is we found signs, that there might be another deeply embedded enemy in our midst. Huzzah!

The bad news of course, is that while this summoning circle is going live, I only have a few seconds to work on locking down this summoning circle. Remember what I said earlier, about it being almost impossible to take over a summoning circle from the outside. Well the odds of taking over a summoning circle from the inside are also low, unless everyone in the summoning circle wants the same exact thing you do.

“What? What is going on?” General Fellina asks as a giant black portal begins to appear before us. The portal begins at about the size of a black basketball chest height. Then Slowly begins to spiral and expand as more and more energy from the different people linked to the summoning get pulled out. The energy begins to spiral out from everyone, then forces the portal to grow and expand larger and larger.

I of course am not idle in this time. My first point of contention is to go about to the twelve different focal points for sources of energy and immediately put in limiters that completely stop the flow of mana and energies from the summoner.

Again, this is easy as no one is even aware of what I am doing, nor that I am doing anything. Instead, everyone else seems to have their eyes glued forward on the spiraling vortex of death that where a giant maw of an unfathomably large monster seems to exist.

Yeah, I need to remind people to read the fine print of the documents they are signing. Though that is the least of my concerns at this point.

With a summoning circle, unlike a regular spell, you have literally one spell to control per originator. I am trying to expand my focus to cover the twelve other casters, but I can’t. The whole thing seems to be too much. So, I break it down.

“Anyone else a Mage Breaker?” I shout.

“What? You trying to start a club?” Rayquel asks.

“Yeah, the club of I don’t want to die here. Now does anyone else wish to join?” I ask.

“I have the Spirit Affinity, one of the healers admits.” With that, my heart beats a little lighter. We can do this, or so I thought before he continued. “Though my affinity is only at 13%.”

And yeah, more goods news bad news.

“So, I take it you haven’t practiced?” I ask, as I am now finished with locking down the flow of mana to the monster, now I need to try to warp the way the monster can get here, hopefully flip enough of these summoning runes around to make them warding runes instead.

“What? No. I am a healer.” He says, then points at his emblem on his chest denoting himself as an Endarian healer.

Yeah, of course, why would anyone not want to just be a healer.

“Well, we are about to die, once this monster comes through this summoning portal that we just created.” I say, as I am frantically switching around the summoning runes to make them all warding runes now.

As soon as I am done, I look at the portal and see that the extra-large monster is pushing and clawing its way through the portal. It is manipulating its body, face, and vital organs to squeeze through.

Pfft. Pfft. Pfft.

Blasts and attacks are being fired right at the monster. Of course, this is after a long endurance match, meaning we were already at, or nearing our physical limits. That is why even though the monster is the size of a mid-sized hanger, people are still missing.

That or the monster is just that disturbing.

Of course, the monster being a galaxy, or most likely a universe ending monster, I cannot begin to grasp its mind with my Mind Rend-X. I don’t know what flames would do to the summoning portal. Would that cause ambient energy from my flames to fuse with the monster? Create an unstable rift that started a black hole, right here on the planet? I didn’t know. Nor did I want to find out.

That meant that while I was using Spirit-X to constantly modify the summoning circle around us, I could only realistically use Telekinesis-X to push and try to stop the advancement of the monster that sent shivers down my spine. Shivers that made me focus twice as hard on the goal at hand.

While the summoning circle is effectively now a true warding circle, that will have no effect on this creature before us. As far as the wards are concerned, the entire summoning was just meant to get this one to join us.

Again, this goes back to the fact that the spell, not knowing any better was a success. The monster it had been designed to summon, appeared. Now that it was changed to prevent other monsters from coming, didn’t matter, the spell was inanimate and thus didn’t care at all.

We had a few things going for us. First, I managed to stop the flow of energy to the portal when it was only around four feet wide. There was no more energy going to the hole, meaning that the hole would only shrink from here. Especially with the rest of the energy being used to ward enemies like this monster away.

The only problem, we needed to stop this monster from squeezing its way through. It was almost like the monster was made of slinking tendrils of slime that could grow and decrease with practice.

You know at a time like this, I wonder, where is an Orbital Bombardment when you need one?

I use Air-X in conjunction with Telekinesis-X to continue to push the monster back. The others are also doing things as well. Rayquel is using some type of lightning attack that works with her blaster.

Jess, my Jess, is firing at the beast non-stop. Every once in a while, I can see her trying to summon forth a flame, but she is clearly exhausted. She had pushed herself a lot during our practice. Then had a lot of her magical energy drained for this summoning, before I could get to her. Then now she was giving it her all to continue onward. I was so proud of her at that moment, that I almost lost control over my powers.

Fortunately, the world shifted its consciousness to me, at that exact moment. This was basically the world saying, don’t fuck this up kid. The only problem, we couldn’t do anything. Then an idea hit me, as I realized I could siphon the energy of the spell backwards.

I had never done this before, but if energy could flow out of a person, surely it could flow back in? Right? The only problem with this idea is that by now the different energies had already been merged into on form.

“Watch out. I am about to try something stupid.” I say, as I mentally prepare for how I can create a rune that sends cleansed mana back into someone. This is an entirely new rune, at least a new rune to me, so I need to focus. Especially if I want to do this quickly.

SLAM!

The monsters long alien appendage slams into the floor causing me to break my concentration on the rune. Of course, once I try to focus on the rune my Air-X stopped. This of course gave the monster the chance it needed to surge forth.

“What? Huh?” A confused, but familiar sounding voice speaks up from behind me. I turn my head slightly to see my Jess still there firing her ineffective shots at the beast.

POOF. POOF. POOF.

Laser beams the size of bread loves hurl forward.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Each shot having a clear impact on the creature. Each shot causing the giant monster to shift back slightly. Of course, it isn’t enough, but it shows the monster can be pushed back. At least with the right application of force.

I turn to the source of the bursts and see sexy Guardian Jess standing. She has a blaster in hand and is charging up more mana to be used in her next burst attack. For a second I wonder what magic she is using to do this, but then realize she is using light manipulation. A seemingly basic spell, but one that is being used in an extraordinary way by her.

Seeing that masterful use of what most would consider a waste or junk spell made me feel things.

“Focus on the monster idiot!” And that would be my girlfriend, bringing me back to reality. Yes, less gawking, more doing.

Just as I turn forward, I feel a tremendous burst of energy from behind me. I don’t even have time to turn and see what the new girl is doing from right behind me. As one second, I feel her energy building up. Then the next she is rocketing forward with a glowing sword in her hand. I wonder if she is one of those mystic order of knights, but then realize this is just a spell construct of light.

Man, she created a glowing saber? Seeing this, I almost did something stupid. Fortunately, she did far more acts of stupid than I could even dream of.

Zzz-lash!

The glowing saber of light cuts through the tentacles that have managed to squirm their way in, this far.

She is a flurry of flapping angry butterfly wings, glowing lights, and rippling muscles. To put it mildly, she was impressive. Death and fury incarnate.

Within seconds she manages to slice off the last of the giant tentacles that were woven together to form the beast’s extra-long arm. Then she continues to slice until she gets closer and closer to the portal.

Once the last tentacle is sliced off. She stops and begins panting exhaustedly. With the immediate enemy dead, or at least stopped from getting through the portal, the portal begins to close once more.

There is a slight calm, as she drops her blade. The energy required to make a glowing blade of light that can cut through any material is taxing on her. She turns to me, then her eyes grow wide as she realizes who I am.

Did she see me?

“You? You are still alive?” She asked.

Those were of course her last words, before a giant Cthulhu tentacle shot forward from the portal and impaled her in her back, right through her spine and in between her wings that should have been able to prevent such a strike.

In shocked horror, she looks down, only to see the tentacle quickly curl around her chiseled abs, then wrench her back through the dark portal.

“What the?” Was all we could say at that moment.

Only after it happened did the whole chain of events fully make sense to my mind. The monster, an unimaginable horror that we only managed to strike the arm off, well Guardian Jess managed to, the rest of us were useless against the thing. That monster then in retaliation, made one last cheap shot attack against Jess.

Without the form of alien energy forcing the portal open, the portal to an unknown dimension of space began to shrink rapidly. She was gone. At least for most she was gone.

Before I even had time to think, I was moving.

Poof.