Liberty and Death, Chapter 61
[Tanya] [Level 7 Spite Tulpa]
[Str:14(1)]
[Dex:28(1)]
[End:12(1)]
[Vit:12(1)
[Agi:28(1)
[Int:4(4)]
[Will:32(1)]
[Cha:1(10)]
[Class Actives: {RIP AND TEAR}]
[Class Passives: {UNTIL IT IS DONE}]
[Skills:{Knife Proficiency}, {Karambit Mastery I}, {Favored Enemy-(Slaver)}, {Natural Weapon Mastery II}]
[Titles: [387.44 MILLION MILES]]
[Stat Points:0]
[Skill Points:2]
Cora couldn’t really reconcile Tanya’s stat block with the absolute carnage the girl could wreak on a group of Chains. Conceptually, she understood that her title and passives gave her a truly monumental boost to her physical abilities when encountering slavers. However, understanding that, and watching an 80 lbs. girl rip a Link’s head off and shove it through the chest of the guy next to him, were two very different things.
In a fight, Tanya rarely stopped screaming. It sent a chill down Cora’s spine, and the girl was on her side.
The living embodiment of spite leapt off the shoulders of her fresh kill, and into the window of one of the buildings still peppering Luxholme’s walls with gunfire. Soon, her haunting howl was only one in a growing chorus.
Well, looks like she’s got that handled, Cora thought, sprinting past to make a crashing leap through the window of the next building.
Her knees hit a Link in the chest, and Cora rode him to the floor, sliding [Rib Cutter] into his neck as his friends turned to her in surprise. Two quick shots with [Vector Driver] before they could get their guns up, and they fell to the ground, just a pile of limbs and a head.
Why the fuck does this thing shoot through three buildings, but when I shoot a boy in the chest with it their whole torso just kind of disappears?
It wasn’t something she was going to waste brainpower on right now. As she sprinted for the stairs up, she caught a glimpse of Kyra.
The girl had apparently popped out of Addict flesh behind Donovan, and was now chasing him around his gibbery steed, in a disgusting game of cat and mouse.
Good a time as any.
C: Hawk, Fern, heads up!
C: [BS], have Lux open the gate!
Cora burst through the door to the second floor, quickly dispatching another group of Links, then watched out the window as Hawk taught Micheal Bay a lesson.
Cora had seen a few critics describe her movies as ‘explosions of violence’. They hadn’t known the meaning of the term. As Hawk charged out of the gate, roaring like a tornado, full head of steam, and new horns lowered, Cora learned she hadn’t known it either.
{Unstoppable}: when charging, receive a major Damage Reduction, and your momentum is treated as 10x actual.
Hawk was big, but the Shimmer addicts were at least 16 feet tall. She slammed into one at the hip, and then straight through it, the limb ripping free in a burst of gore. It screamed, the first time one of those screams had really sounded like pain, as it toppled and fell into Luxholme.
Cora wanted to take a moment to appreciate how fucking funny it was when Lux started slamming the front gates on its head, but a charge like Hawk’s didn’t stop easy. She surged ahead, volleys of bullets bouncing off what, far as Cora could tell, was a shield formed of pure, insensate rage.
Right into the building Cora was standing on the second floor of.
She felt the impact like an earthquake, impossibly heavy, and knew in an instant this place was coming down whether she liked it or not. For the second time in as many minutes, she jumped through a window, this time out instead of in.
She dashed towards the fallen Addict. It was down, but far from out, the gonging blows of the gate against its head only slowing it as it clawed it’s way into Luxholme’s grounds.
“Get some!” Cora heard Fern roar from inside, before the familiar deafening racket of [Bertha] burst out from the open front door of the house proper.
A torrent of lead slammed into the Addicts head, but this thing was big, it just groaned, covered its face with a massive hand, and kept pulling itself forward with the other. It just regened too fast for chip damage to matter. Shit, its fucking leg was already back to being a nubbin instead of a bloody mess.
Big hit, c’mon, Casanova, think, Cora urged herself as she jumped onto the thing’s back, running up its spine to the base of its skull.
She placed [Vector Driver] where she hoped its brainstem was, and pulled the trigger.
“Shoulda used the handicapped ramp, motherfucker.”
REPREHENSIBLE!!!! +1000%!!!
Whatever this thing had where its brain should be splattered over Cora’s front steps, and it fell still, its massive stores of Shimmer surging into her.
NORMALLY I DON’T DO THIS DURING A FIGHT, BUT YOU HIT LEVEL 10!
Cora had been hoping for that, and banking on getting a new {Class Skill}. A moment looking at her stats page, and she found her hopes were not in vain.
Cora grinned, as she selected {Stunt Double}.
“Cora! Backup!” Kyra yelled, and Cora turned to see her painted over a backdrop of chaos.
Hawk apparently liked taking down buildings, and two more were in the process of collapsing across the street. In the other direction, a disembodied arm batted a head out of a window.
And in front of it all, Kyra was losing.
What the fuck???
Donovan swung around his Addict Titan’s neck, using his chain as leverage to deliver a devastating dropkick when Kyra popped out of the Monster directly behind where he’d been.
Kyra hit the ground with a cry, but even as she impacted, faded into it, popping back out behind Donovan, blades bared.
But he was ready.
He held a hand extended, and as Kyra appeared, chains shot out of it, ensnaring each of her her limbs. For one terrible moment, Cora saw on Kyra’s face a reflection of the girl she’d woken up to between her legs on her first day in Tyrinno.
“Her chains are broken!!!” Cora roared raising [Vector Driver], and sending a shot at Donovan, center mass.
VINDICTIVE!!! +350%!
Whatever his barrier was, it must be fucking expensive, because it blazed, but didn’t burst as the shot impacted him. That force had to go somewhere though, and it blasted him back off of his Titan, snapping the chains that held Kyra.
Cora dashed forward, readying [Rib Cutter] to finish Donovan on the ground, but the man landed like a cat. He yanked on his Addict’s chain, and a leg like a fleshy tree trunk slammed into the street in front of Cora.
“Get the fuck out of my way, cankles!” Cora roared, slashing at the leg, but even after a notification of LOL! +300%, that was a lot of leg, for not a lot of knife. Blood spurted freely from the wound, but Cora was forced to dive out of the way as an arm just as massive descended to crush her.
That arm turned out to be something of a blessing though. As it descended, her Reactimax activated, fully recharged, and as she dove, she could see Donovan perfectly framed between its legs.
In bullet time, it was child’s play to slam three more shots into his already overburdened shield, which finally shattered into the air.
As he staggered back, Kyra popped up behind him, driving a Karambit into the base of his skull.
His mouth went slack, lips working for air they no longer hand the nerves to take in.
But then he didn’t die.
Instead, the Addict let out a pitiable wail, and Cora could see embers began to flicker inside the leg wound she’d left it, which had already begun to heal.
What is with this guy!?
Cora focused in.
[Donovan Aces] [Level 9 Slavemaster (IV)]
What the fuck? He was a Slaver last time we met… did he evolve like Hawk? And is already back to level 9!?
He pulled himself off of Kyra’s blade with a sigh, sending the shocked girl tumbling with a backhand.
“I’ll hand it to you, Light,” he said, voice still cool as ever, mocking without so much as a change in tone, “you really know how to make bitches fight for you. Don’t know why the boss wants you dead instead of working for us. Too bad. It's a good gig.”
Cora raised her weapon, but before she could fire, Donovan was on her, closing the distance with inhuman speed.
He held his hand out again, palm directly in front of Cora’s face, and her vision filled with chains.
They were cold, on her limbs and neck, in a way that was bone deep. Deeper, like a chill on her very soul. A cold that didn’t kill cells, it killed hope.
Or it was supposed to.
[UNBREAKABLE]
‘Unbreakable.’
‘Un-fucking-breakable!’
‘Unbreakable.’
‘UnbreAkaBle!!!’
“UNBREAKABLE!”
She joined the chorus of her selves, and with a contemptuous strike, snapped the chains.
He snarled, and whipped his chains at her in whirling arcs, impossible to dodge, pointless to block.
So Cora didn’t.
Instead, those chains found Cadey, given flesh for an instant as {Stunt Double} activated, and using it to give Donovan the kind of smirk reserved for the victorious.
Cora was at Donovan’s side, driving [Rib Cutter] into his chest with a hammer blow.
“Looks like you’re plenty breakable, though,” she sneered.
GOOD! +500%
He coughed blood in her face, his own finally registering an emotion other than sadistic amusement.
Panic. And it was sweet.
He raised his hand, crushed something, and faded to smoke.
“Grahaaaahhh!” Cora roared at the space he’d occupied, shouting wordless fury into the ether. She’d fucking HAD him!
She didn’t have much time to mourn Donovan’s escape, because even with the Slavemaster gone, the slave remained, and it didn’t seem at all grateful to be free.