Chronicles of the Exalted Sun Child

For some reason, the bridge that led towards the cluster of pillars in the distance was broken. She could see the thing as it flapped against the wind, and the broken off part was well within her perception range.

The cut was smooth, even the wooden planks didn't reveal any splinters. The metal cables looked more tattered than the planks. Yuriko didn't wonder what made it since the huge monster was quite visible, though it was currently retreating into the mists.

The distance between their current pillar to the next one—that being a cluster of seven that she presumed was the centre of the biome and where the transitional portal to the next layer would be—was still about a league or so. Too far to really see, but the boss monster was just huge. It was also quite agile, and was either quick enough or simply that massive, because the mists eddied around its body and left cloud vapours trailing behind. Those being upwards to the pillars’ plateau.

The bright lights, the roars, and explosions came from the plateaus and were clear signs of battle. Only, who were they fighting if the boss was retreating? Vapour cones formed over the tip of the boss’s cone shell.

“Artillery?” Yuriko wondered aloud, which attracted Heron’s attention. He grunted in reply while he used a pair of binoculars that Ilvara had bought back in Shangria Station. Or maybe she brought them over from Dragon Fall? Part of her gear from Millenium State Conglomerate?

“It’s not,” Heron said as he passed the binoculars over. Yuriko squinted at the lens and peered through them. She’d used Enhanced Sight earlier, of course, but the fog and cloudy atmosphere obscured her sight. She could only see general shapes in the distance, and little detail. Enhanced Sight provided some magnification, but she hadn’t specialised her technique in that way. Rather, she was better with dynamic vision than distance perception.

She blinked when she realised that she could clearly see the giant monster’s features. And just as importantly, she could make out the features of the things it shot out of its cone tip hole. They looked reasonably aerodynamic, but as soon as they landed on the plateaus, they unfolded into huge, lumbering crab-human hybrids. Two pairs of arms, the upper arms were large pincers, while the lower arms were smaller and more delicate. Ah, they shot some kind of grey thing at the people fighting them.

The streaks of light came from a different plateau, one at the far side of the cluster. They slammed into the huge snail thing and the projectile penetrated the shell. Not too deep, probably, but she also noticed shockwaves and fragments had erupted from the penetration point a half second later. Another streak crossed her sight and she was able to identify it as an arrow. Impressive.

Though she was more impressed with the binoculars than anything else. Somehow, it managed to cancel the effect of the mists through her vision. Her perception covered the machine, but she wasn’t sure how it did that. She couldn’t identify any runescript lines nor was she able to detect any esoteric energies. She did find a thick cluster of electronic circuits but she had no idea how to decipher them. She supposed it housed a computer good enough to put together a vision of what she looked at without obstruction, though she was uncertain how the relatively tiny thing could hold it. Although it wasn’t as tiny as a smartphone, so there was that. This was much tougher than an Astorian phone, however.

“What do you want to do?” Gwendith asked as she sidled up next to Yuriko. She then turned to Carina, “What’s the etiquette for coming across a boss fight?”

“Depends on the boss monster,” Carina said after a moment.

She produced her own set of binoculars though it was made of wood composites and etched with runescript lines on the inside and the outside parts as opposed to the metal alloys that made up Carina’s version. That runescript enchantment was something Yuriko could decipher, and probably reproduce if she wanted to, though she was uncertain how effective they were compared to Irvala’s version.

“Field bosses are often left to whomever found them first, though that doesn’t always happen. Boss level shards are quite valuable. Cross layer guardians are fought by whomever happens to be there at the time it emerges, and by whomever comes across the fight in progress. Since they block passage to the next layer while active, it is understood that taking them off the board as soon as possible is best.” She hesitated, then added, “Loot distribution is another thing entirely, and unless predetermined by the participating fighters, often becomes a secondary fight afterwards. Unless one party is clearly overwhelmingly stronger.”

“Then let’s join the fight,” Yuriko said succinctly, “I wonder if that thing is more than just tough.” Over the past couple of minutes, the giant snail had already retreated below the thicker fog line, which was too much for Ilvara’s tech. “Do you know anything about this boss monster?” Yuriko asked Carina.

The greenette shook her head. “This isn’t the layer terminus closest to Node 626, so I don’t know.”

“I suppose the only thing we can do is cross over and help,” Yuriko shrugged.

She gathered her companions with her Animakinesis, though Sir Blue fidgetted against her grip. She loosened her hold and extended a tether for him to tug upon and he settled down. Fluffington’s tongue lolled as she lifted him above the obsidian platform. He settled into a loafing position and from an outsider’s perspective, he looked like he was sitting on a transparent golden square. The others were more or less comfortable with this mode of travel, although the two newer members still showed some nerves when her Anima covered them. A minute later, they flew over the gap.

It took quite a bit of effort to counteract the biome’s flight prohibition. Her normal method of hooking into the fabric of reality was more difficult than simply shaping her Anima into a large pair of glider wings. Her ability to push off the air remained the same, though it took more effort as well as Anima volume—both to remain airborne and to secure the others. Heron and Gwendith couldn’t use their own levitation techniques to ease her burden, however. Well, Gwendith couldn’t use her usual technique, Heron managed it easily. Then again, that was the difference with their Truths.

Heron seized command of the winds around himself to buoy himself up and to push himself along. Yuriko’s tether kept him pointed in the right direction even if he wobbled along his route. Gwendith simply relaxed and allowed herself to be pulled along.

The boss had completely hidden itself in the mists by the time they were airborne. She flew relatively slowly, and it would take about five minutes before they reached the nearest pillar. There wasn’t really a point to rushing considering there wasn’t a target. She’d already returned the binocs to Ilvara and started fiddling around with her Enhanced Sight to see if she could filter out the mists, but the only thing she accomplished was to be able to see the fine particulate that composed the cloud. Surprisingly, it wasn’t just water Elemental energies, or as the Astorians called it, molecules. They didn’t quite get it though, since they could only see the particulate matter and not the…hmmm, flavour?

Well, flavour’s as good a descriptor to it as anything else. Intent too, if there was actually something sapient there, but since it was just ambient energy, it wasn’t quite apt. Of course, Shangria’s ambient energy contained a trace of Will and Intent, mixed in with everything else. It was how she knew that the place wasn’t random, even though it made a good showing of it. The planet’s Will and Intent permeated everything, even the monsters. The shards were solidified ambient energy that the delvers used to build and power their technology. And they made good currency too, certainly better than precious metals. They were quite like Chaos dust and crystals back home, weren’t they? Those weren’t stable outside of the Chaos Sea, however. She wondered if Shangria shards, unprocessed, would remain stable outside of this layer of reality.

Oh! She recognized some of the delvers! It was those muscle guys they ran into in one of the first layer biomes! What were they doing all the way here? She’d been under the impression they weren’t deep delvers. Ah, come to think of it, the second layer wasn’t exactly deep into Shangria, so perhaps they were just branching out?

There were five of them , and they weren’t exactly bare chested now. Clad in loose martial arts clothing—martial gi—they wielded an assortment of melee weapons ranging from quarterstaves, spears, one-handed straight swords of single and double edges variety, and the largest martial artist had a metal studded truncheon that was longer than she was tall. The majority of the boss’ minions had landed on their pillar, which was one of the wider ones amongst the assortment.

There were also another couple of delvers across another pillar, and one of them was the archer. She couldn’t quite make out their features, but as she approached, the elemental mists became less and less of an obstruction. The other delver wielded a one-handed weapon—either an arming sword or a rapier, perhaps a sabre—and was fencing with several minions, though the latter weren’t exactly wielding swords. The swordsman flitted around them gracefully and smoothly cut them down.

Yuriko was fascinated.

The fencer’s swordmanship style was…fascinating and mysterious. The longer she looked at them, the more puzzled she grew.

That sword shouldn’t have reached the minion during that swipe. She replayed that moment in her mind and dedicated a consciousness strand to examine it. Yes, she was sure. The blade didn’t emit an Arclight Crescent, though it was possible that the cut was transmitted through the air instead. She was too far away to properly examine it, and she might have mistaken the glimmer in the air. It wasn’t just that attack either.

The fencer’s footwork was both flowing and jerky at the same time, and he crossed more distance than each step should have made. It wasn’t too obvious at first glance, and after a bit of thought, she wondered if any opponent facing him head on would even notice. Of much greater interest to her was how they managed to remain at the perfect distance to remain engaged to a single opponent while still threatening the other minions. She could see it in how stiff the monsters moved, and how way they were of the fencer’s actions. She compared it with the minions fighting the muscle martial artists. Those monsters were much more aggressive and uncaring of blows sent their way.

Come to think of it, the muscle men’s melee weapons were wielded with great vigour and momentum, yet they left fewer wounds than the fencer’s bladework. It was quite clear that they were of different levels of Truth. She was also sure that the fencer’s swordsmanship Truth was more developed than her own, and that point drew her interest greatly, even if she saw little in common with her chosen fields.

Which also meant her swordsmanship Truths was either lacking holistically or it was just that the fencer’s were more advanced.

“Yuri?” Gwendith prodded her and Yuriko nodded towards the distant fighters. Then, she noticed another group of delvers some distance away, on the approach, and like her companions, airborne. Though that group were on vehicles rather than on foot.

With more than passing interest, she watched half a dozen mobile HQs—that looked like a bunch of rectangular blocks—cross the gap with little trouble.

Bluup! Bluup! Bluup!

And the boss monster fired a volley of minions at the convoy, only to be blocked by translucent, spherical force shields. The minions clung to the energetic surface, then got blasted by turrets that popped out of the things.

Huh, how much were those things worth, Yuriko wondered. Perhaps she could ask them after the boss monster got butchered.