noct
patreon
326. Take Down a Mountain
🕑 Added 2025-03-08 15:00:05 +0000 UTCThe hand rushed down at them. Mag swept around it and flew upward, angling his claws toward the mountain’s towering eye. The further he flew, the smaller he looked against the mountain. At first, Ike would’ve said that he could’ve gotten both eyes with his claws, but up close against the mountain’s face? Mag looked like a wren, a tiny songbird. He couldn’t stretch his legs far enough to reach both eyes.
Wisp darted out from under the hand. Ike stared up at it, his mind made up. He charged a Shockwave Punch, waiting as the hand plummeted toward him. His steel hands, his empowered body, his Storm Clad and Shockwave Punch. With all of them together, he could take down a mountain. After all, what was that hand, but a lump of fragile, shatterable stone? It was empowered by mana, but at its core, it was still stone. Stone was hard and dense, but it wasn’t good at standing up to powerful single blows. It would shatter rather than flex. If what he faced was a human hand, he wouldn’t have taken the bet. But given that it was stone, with the properties of stone? He was willing to roll the dice.
The stone hand smashed toward him. It blocked out the sky. Wind blew ahead of it, stirring Ike’s hair. He watched it come, his hand tensed, green light flickering around his hand. He surged Storm Clad as well to empower his body further. The lightning shock would do little, but more power to his fist was more power.
He hammered upward. His fist flew forth. Green waves raced ahead of him and smashed into the stone, chipping away at its surface, but more importantly, making the whole stone thrum. It rattled, creaking dangerously as the shockwaves weakened it. Green energy rushed through the entire hand and back, and cracks bit through the stone.
And then Ike’s fist hit. His steel hand dented the stone, and chips flew in all directions. A spider’s web of cracks pierced the stone. He kept punching, putting his all into it. With direct touch, he could hammer the shockwaves directly into the material, to even more devastating effect. More and more cracks spread through the stone, biting deeper and deeper, racing to the edge of the hand.
A sharp snap rang out. The cracks cut all the way through the stone, all the way through to the other side of the hand. The stone broke in two. One piece fell to the right of Ike, while the other piece remained attached to the mountain’s wrist.
The mountain stared. Almost in disbelief, it lifted its severed hand and stared at the broken rock. Ike stared as well, then started to laugh. He let forth a scream of exhilaration and pointed at the mountain. “That’s what you get! That’s what you get!”
“If she were a true mountain, you couldn’t have done that. It’s only because she’s been weakened by the attempt to puppetify her that you succeeded,” Shawn said, ruining Ike’s high.
Ike glared. “Oh, come on. Let me have fun for just a moment.”
Shawn shrugged. “I just wanted you to know, before you do something stupid trying to fight a real mountain.”
Ike looked up. This entire stone construct felt… manageable. There was none of the deep fear he felt when he faced Mont, or even the invulnerability he felt facing Shawn. He knew instinctively that he could fight it, because it was no mountain. Or rather, it wasn’t anymore. “No, I know. I wouldn’t have tried that if it were a real mountain. I would’ve just run away.”
After all, what had fallen toward him was only stone. A real mountain would have reinforced that stone with mana to the point that it no longer had the properties of stone, or to the point that it didn’t matter, anyways. The whole construct felt… empty. It was full of mana, yes, powered by mana, but that was it. It didn’t have the connection to the mana vein that a real, or perhaps less weakened, mountain would have.
And what’s weakening her… Ike latched his eyes on her face far above him. On the shining white half of her face, the part that had been replaced by porcelain.
If he was right, then not only would he un-weaken her by removing it, but he’d also remove her hatred toward non-puppets. If the mask made her appreciate puppets and hate humans, and her natural state was to appreciate humans and hate puppets, then breaking the mask would end this battle.
“Wisp!” Ike shouted.
The giant spider scuttled over the mountain’s shoulder. “What?”
He lifted his hand. “Pull me up. I have a plan!”
“Things always get exciting when you say that,” Wisp replied. She turned around, and a white thread anchored itself to the floor right in front of Ike. He grabbed on. Once, he’d needed specialized shoes to walk on Wisp’s webs, but now, he was so used to her, and beyond that, strong enough, that it wasn’t needed. He clambered up the webbing like a spider himself, reflecting on his past self as he did so. Back in the Abyss, when he’d desperately set up that trap with Wisp’s help… he’d been so weak back then. So helpless. But now…
Now I’m punching mountains, he thought with a smile, though he knew Shawn would admonish him for taking this monstrosity as a true mountain if he said it aloud. It was true, she was greatly weakened. But he was nonetheless far more powerful than the scared boy he’d been back in the Abyss.
When Ike was halfway up the spider thread, the mountain roared. She reared back, and the thread’s anchoring snapped. Ike swung freely, hammering against the mountain’s chest. The mounds that formed her breasts weren’t soft at all, but were stiff, dangerous rock. He smashed into them, bruised and battered by the promontories of her chest.
“You enjoying yourself down there?” Wisp called, grinning down at him.
“No,” Ike replied miserably.
She stopped for a moment, and Ike seized it. Whipping around, he planted his heels on her chest and grabbed onto the cord. He threw his weight backward and hauled himself up one step at a time, using the rope as a counterweight.
“Ike, watch out!”
He turned over his shoulder. The mountain’s hand hurtled toward him, slapping like she might slap a bug.
“Pull me up!” he shouted.
Wisp leaned down over the edge of the mountain. Reaching out her front claws, she pinched the thread and yanked it up. Ike flew toward her, still hanging onto the thread. She reached her claws up and caught him out of the air. Her mouth opened.
Ike’s sense of danger spiked, rather than diminishing. “Wisp!”
She closed her mouth and set him down beside her. “Oh… right. Usually when I reel in a string like that, there’s prey on the—”
The mountain’s hand slammed into her chest, making her whole body rock from the force of the impact. Ike and Wisp swayed with the impact. Wisp’s feet stuck to the mountain’s shoulder, and she clung on without issue. Ike stepped forward, then back to maintain his balance.
“—other end. Like a delicious version of that ball-string-spike game you humans play. Muscle memory.”
“Ball and cup? Kendama?” Ike suggested, quickly releasing the string she’d pulled him up on before she ‘instinctively’ wrapped him up into a snack.
“Yeah, those.”
“Right, well, I’m not a snack. Or a toy. Just so we have that clear,” Ike said.
“Don’t sell yourself short. You could be a snack or a toy if you wanted,” Wisp replied.
Ike opened his mouth, then shut it. He gestured. “Come on. Let’s go smash the monster’s mask off. If that doesn’t un-puppetify it, nothing will.”
“Got it.” Wisp reached for him, only for the earth under them to move. The mountain’s shoulders flexed as it lifted its arms to smack at Mag. Ike staggered sideways, barely keeping his feet. Wisp moved with the motion, completely holding her balance, but as a result, Ike stepped out of the range of her forelimbs.
“Come back here,” Wisp muttered. She snatched him up and jumped off the side of the mountain.
