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Edge of apocalypse 105
🕑 Added 2023-08-09 18:03:37 +0000 UTC105 – Fight against elves (1/2)
Hyvrlat’r grinned as he sent forward an illusory copy of himself to talk to the humans. He observed them from high above, hidden by the thick foliage of the forest, camouflaged like only a Tracker could be. There was no way they knew he was actually there, and not on the ground.
“Choose, humans. Surrender now, and you will be granted a swift death. Or don’t, and die suffering.”
He studied their reactions. The young one was about to speak, but the big human – clearly the leader of the two – put a hand on his shoulder and came forward. For a moment, it seemed like the young one had trouble even realizing that the illusion was there, and Hyvrlat’r wondered if the boy could see through illusions or if he was simply reading too much into it.
What mattered, however, was that as the boy muttered some words his eyes became vacant for a moment and he cocked his head, and at the same time the big man spoke with enough force and hatred to make Hyvrlat’r’s blood boil.
“What makes you think you have the jump on us this time, eh?” The man said. “We’ll just beat you up, send you back crawling like last time.”
Hyvrlat’r made his illusion scoff, widening his grin. “Because this time you are not fighting lowly Elves from these backwards woods. This is the Elite Guard: ten high elves, trained and bred for war.”
The man theatrically looked at the elves on the trees and laughed. “Bet we can kill them all before—”
Suddenly, before the big man could complete the sentence, the abomination of a young partially human boy spoke.
“Interesting. Thank you.” He said.
Then, without warning, the tree Hyvrlat’r was standing on – the one where his real body was – exploded.
***
Albert had been keenly aware that what was before him was an illusion, and was more than happy to let Kainen deal with it while he studied it with Analysis Mode. His Perception skill allowed him to immediately recognize the illusion as such, something not even Kainen had managed, but what Albert saw went further than that.
And now, thanks to Analysis Mode, he had all the data he needed to finally approach one of the hardest Psionic skills in his arsenal: Solid-State Manifestation.
First, however, there was a fight to be fought.
A quick appraisal revealed the true problem of the matter.
[Elite High Elf. Level unknown.]
There were ten of them, plus another.
[Hyvrlat’r. Elite High Elf Tracker. Level unknown.]
Albert did not need to see the expression on Kainen’s face, although his spatial awareness meant that he could somewhat make it out. He knew what the man wanted to say to him.
Without hesitation, Albert unleashed the full might of his Telekinesis in the form of the attack that officially started the fight.
The tree exploded, and both parties sprang into action. The lone elf that had been hit by the blast was flung to the air, but by the time he hit the ground not only was he still alive, but he was also perfectly capable of fighting. The others too dashed around immediately, and none were hit by the initial salve of fireballs shot from the middle of the clearing.
As Kainen dashed at the closest tree, looking to demolish the natural advantage of the elves via brute force, the fifth fireball Albert shot appeared right behind one of the high elves. Albert could make it appear wherever he wanted in a range of 200 meters, save for the inside of their heads, making it the best tool to take out the extremely mobile opponents.
The hard part was gauging how not to kill the elves in the blast, which was much more powerful than a normal blast. Unfortunately this meant that the first empowered fireball went to waste against the higher than expected resilience of the high elves, and four more normal fireballs had to be shot before another was ready.
Even in bullet time, the window was not very large. The elite fighters were fast, and deadly, and there were ten of them. Albert jumped around with teleportation as much as he could, sometimes trying to appear right behind his enemies to cut them with his sword, or shoot at them with his guns, but they kept slipping away.
Tree after tree fell as Kainen unleashed his rage against the only thing he could hit. He provided very good cover with his massive shield but despite his speed, he could do nothing against ranged attacks from above, nor could he react fast enough to the assaults of the elves who descended from various directions on him.
Albert could react, and he did. The first thing he always did was pinpoint where the attackers were coming from, pull on them with telekinesis and teleport out of the way. Unfortunately his ability to use the psionic skill was not precise enough, and while he had no problem turning the elves into a red mist – or so he thought – when he tried to apply a force to stop them in midair, all he managed to do was push them away from him.
Which gave him an opening. He used the opening together with his knowledge of martial techniques, and performed a chokehold enhanced by his skills to disable an elf. He had to let go when he almost got pierced by an arrow in the process. He kept trying, though, eventually making the skill gain a level.
Another jump. Albert finally decided to use some more force in his attacks, and employed the use of a new skill he had never used in battle before. He invoked the power of electricity and used Chain Lightning and in a flash of bright light, living lightning erupted from his fingers and chased down his opponents, striking them one after the other, arcing between them.
It barely managed to slow them down. One of them lost his footing when a branch exploded due to the electricity coursing inside the wood, but he disappeared mid-fall, never even reaching the ground.
Albert decided to switch to machine gun fire. The speed of the elves made it a bad choice. True Shot helped, but it was impractical when he could barely even see his targets. The skill was better used when trying to be stealthy, and with a bow rather than a gun.
Earth shard was useless.
Then he tried to incorporate Dash and Strengthening, using his sword to hack at their limbs. While he was fast enough to do it, his technique was lacking, and the elves were too nimble on the trees compared to him to allow for clean strikes. They were fighting with a natural advantage which, despite Kainen’s destruction, was still very much in their favor.
The battle continued without pause. The elves whittled down Kainen’s impressive defenses, and cornered Albert into ever slimmer windows to escape, seemingly learning his patterns and strategies.
“Albert!” Kainen roared, for the first time choosing to use Albert’s real name. “We are getting manhandled here. Stop being a fucking pussy and bring out the heat!”
Albert grit his teeth, jumping in and out of reality to dodge what Kainen instead simply tanked with his armor and body defenses. The former master was right, and the fact that Albert struggled to find a viable alternative irritated him to no end.
For all their fighting, the duo had been reduced to pure defense, and it was not going to last long. The elves, on the other hand, were still as brutal and aggressive as they had been at the beginning of the fight. Errors on the side of the humans were piling up, and Albert’s stance on lethal force had to change if they wanted to have a chance to win.
It was clear that fighting without trying to kill anyone was a serious handicap that would soon cost Albert his life.
