Universe's End

“Alright, starting to have less fun,” Rory groaned to himself as the SFAH listed to the side after being slammed by another squad of the endless Tianlongs, which detonated a moment later in a lightning explosion.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of the Tianlongs had been slain by now.

But.

But there were still thousands more.

Rory’s mental calculus had rapidly changed throughout the ensuing sky battle, and not to his benefit. Even with the heavy armor, damage-redistribution systems, and shielding, the SFAH was taking a beating as they began to understand better what it could do.

The main issue was a lack of area denial. Oh sure, it was excellent at saying ‘Delete everything in that direction.’ Still, it lacked the omnidirectional firepower needed to maneuver around the monsters that had wisely begun attacking in swarms from multiple directions. With enough acrobatics, he could somewhat emulate it by pulling off a cool trick called spinning really fast, but there were still limits to just how much use he could get out of that.

The other problem was that, while being constantly hounded, there was no extra wiggle room to prepare another pseudo-nuke.

Side note in case we don’t all die: they need a better name.

Phosphorus continued to float menacingly, though Rory was beginning to suspect it was more about Phosphorus being limited in the direct action it could take for now, Eon being the big fan of ‘relative fairness’ and all that jazz.

As much as Rory wanted to do more for the time being, it was just taking everything he had to keep the flying brick airborne, what felt like history's longest dogfight.

Well, pre-Collapse no longer counts, so fuck yeah for technicalities.

Barrel-rolling the flying brick out of the way of a massive, half-mile-wide spear of lightning produced by the Tianlongs' greatest ritual magic so far, Rory grimaced.

“Only one thing you can do, Maverick,” Rory said to himself under his breath, eyes briefly glancing far away to where the other Founders were on the move. “Just have to put my belief in them.”

That said, the real question of importance… Kickstart My Heart, or Shoot to Thrill?

While Rory was off answering the tough question of what music he’d set as a backing track if he were starring in a movie, the other Founders were having less fanciful thoughts.

“God damn, you are annoying,” Zoey grunted through gritted teeth.

She’d decided to stay behind and deal with the ceaselessly reforming twin-headed cloud, Tianlong, but it was as if nothing she did could put it down. Even her trick of using her durability as a resource to expend to burn up others' durability did jack squat against the cloud dragon.

“Please,” Zoey sighed, unable to move beyond the island. “Please hurry up.”

Tom wouldn’t qualify himself as having a good time. Now, in fairness, he would qualify it as a great training opportunity, so much so that part of him was considering how he could reimagine what he was going through as a trial or training method for his people.

Really does a great job of refining one’s aura like a rock under pressure.

But a good time? No. Being slowly ground into paste as a segment of Phosphorus’s ‘attention’ remained squarely on his shoulders, pushing him further and further into the ground as he held up the world upon his shoulders, was far from what he would have called relaxing or fun.

But.

But he could feel his aura being refined, naturally folding upon itself like a bar of metal, folded again and again, becoming stronger with each cycle. With enough time, he felt he could take his aura a step further, and, coupled with his pendant gifted by the Architect, he would be able to harness it to terrifying degrees.

Except.

Except for the fact that, being crushed under the pressure of a Kaiser’s attention, he didn’t have forever.

So as much as it was a great training opportunity, Tom found himself mentally tapping his foot to the ground, his legendary patience put to the test.

Please. I would appreciate it if you all made haste.

“The plan is simple,” The Spear shouted, her aura interlaced within her voice, making sure the Rogue could hear her clearly. “As long as either of us reaches the final platform, we should be able to pull something off.”

“Pull something off is rather vague,” The Rogue yelled back.

“I choose to believe in the fairness doctrine of E.O.N.”

“You do you,” The Rogue shouted. With only one final ‘challenge’ platform left, even if one of them ended up stuck there, they wouldn’t be out of luck, since The Rogue had managed to ‘cheat’ an earlier platform. “Anyway, heads up.”

Reaching the final ‘trial’ platform, the two suddenly halted; even the glider that the Rogue rode upon seemed to freeze.

“Problem,” the Spear said as the visage of a serpent rose from beneath the cloud platform, its amber eyes staring them down.

“Significant problem,” The Rogue agreed. “I can’t even shadow step. It’s a total lockdown.”

“You certain?” The Spear asked.

“I’ve been paralyzed by a serpent before. I think we’re supposed to overcome it gradually.”

“But?” the Spear asked, hearing the unsaid word.

“But you don’t have to,” The Rogue smirked. “Go.”

“Are you-”

“Go,” The Rogue repeated, his normal mannerisms muted, focused on the task at hand.

“Alright,” The Spear said before taking a deep breath and reaching toward the sense from her armor.

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Unshackled. My spirit may not break, not for time or space, not for cause or effect, for nothing.

Her armor radiated a spectral glow; suddenly, the hold laid upon her shattered as she shot forward, straight past the paralyzing gaze.

For a moment, the Spear swore she saw the eyes of the disembodied serpent head widen. Whatever the power behind the paralyzing gaze, it wasn’t supposed to shatter after only a second; that much was obvious.

But who was she to listen to what was ‘obvious?’

The last platform was only miles away, and sprinting at her max speed and leaping between the floating cloud platforms, the Spear could all but feel it looming. If not for the Tianlongs that still attempted to stop her, she would have reached the platform in under a minute. As it was, it took her nearly six minutes straight as they hounded her in an utterly massive swarm; perhaps the only thing keeping them from totally burying her was a sort of suppressive effect of her armor, as if they were unwilling to commit in bulk lest it somehow reveal some special technique.

While it did have special abilities, they weren’t the type they were being cautious of.

Trying to be tactical, a group banded together, forming a triple-layered circle as a ball of lightning coalesced at the very center, with five entire Tianlongs sacrificing themselves to unleash an utterly ridiculous Dragon Lightning attack.

And while the Silvermere armor lacked abilities capable of harming a massive swarm at once, it did have abilities for exactly such an attack.

Bracing herself, The Spear let the lightning wash over her, as the armor began to feast, drinking in as much excess energy as possible. Adding in her own innate lightning resistance, the utterly massive attack felt like just a rather painful shock, not something that would have reduced most others to ash on the spot.

“Thanks for the charge.” The Spear grinned before inverting the energy gained from Quicksilver’s Absorption, as Quicksilver’s Grace left her crackling with electrical potential.

Taking a pose with her spear pointed forward, low to the ground like a leaping tiger, a solid beam of light ripped through the swarms of Tianlongs as the Spear moved at unheard-of speed, second only to Apostolos’s lightspeed sprint.

The key difference between the two speed showings was that, unlike the former Chief Protector of Ehkorrus, the Spear could use such speed in combat.

Grinning with a warrior’s glee, Allison landed only a hop, skip, and a jump away from the final platform, upon which stood what looked like a blue gem, with clouds passing through its interior, all the while crackling with neon-blue electricity.

“Now, who wants to bet that this is important?”

Not needing a full explanation, Allison raced the remaining dozen or so meters to the unprotected gems, laying her hands upon them without concern, having felt no real sense of danger from the odd gem. The instant her hands touched the item, a notification appeared directly in front of each of the other Founders, including Rory, who was doing his best to shake off a few hundred Tianlongs that had begun crawling all over the SFAH.