85 - Book 2: Chapter 22: A Song of Change

85 - Book 2: Chapter 22: A Song of Change

Derivan didn't particularly have the time to figure out what the new spell or the new stat could do. It was easy enough to guess that the spell wouldn't be anything good, with the way the Patchers had twisted Misa's [Paralyzing Slash]; mid-combat was not the time to try to understand it. As for the stat...

He had a rough idea. But this wasn't the time to try it out he had one point in it, and was in the middle of active combat besides

A half-formed insectoid arm whiffed past his helmet, so close he could hear the whistle it made through the air; Derivan jerked his head away from the near miss, glaring at the Patcher attacking him. One part of him kept a close eye on what was happening with Vex, who was still dancing away from the strikes of his own Patcher, and Misa, who was handling all three of the ones she was fighting remarkably well, but was clearly taking hits.

He needed to take one of them off of her. Sev would be back soon, no doubt, as soon as he was able to find help. They needed to survive until then, or Shift needed to recover enough for him to push all of them back away from this plane of reality, or something

Derivan blocked the next attempted strike with the edge of his sword, using a sharp, twisting motion to crack open one of the Patcher's joints; he transitioned smoothly into a kick, heavy metal smashing into the center of the Patcher and sending it sprawling back. Before it could recover, he took three quick, large steps Visit no(v)eLb(i)n.com for the best novel reading experience

"Misa!" he called, and she seemed to understand exactly what he wanted. She shot him a grin.

"Kept me waiting," she shouted back.

Two Patchers attacked her at once; the last was still dizzy from whatever strike she had used against it, and swaying on its feet. She stepped past one of them, letting the momentum of that strike send the Patcher directly into her mace.

The crunch of false chitin shattering sounded in the air.

The second attack Misa dodged but she used her one free arm to grab the limb the Patcher used in the attack, and then moved with the Patcher, turning the attempted charge into a throw. It sailed through the air directly at Derivan, and the armor hefted his sword, cutting deep into the center, where all the limbs were joined together.

Up until now, the Patchers screamed when they attacked, sending out a wave of energy that somehow Shifted the air around them. This time, the one he'd cut into wailed, making a sound that was somehow painful and threatening all at once. This one didn't have the accompanying deadly wave, and yet...

In that sound was a song he didn't expect. A song he expected he wouldn't have been able to hear at all, if not for his new stat. Derivan would have frowned if he could have; as it was, his eyes darkened into concern and worry.

His understanding wasn't perfect. But the Patcher seemed like it was trying to finish something to do whatever it had come here to do to begin with.

Vex seemed to realize the same thing. "Careful!" the lizardkin yelled, and there was a flare of panic in his voice that hadn't been there before. He sounded just a little bit out of breath, but Derivan was more concerned in that moment with getting the Patcher he was fighting to stop wailing.

It was odd, though, that the Patchers' attacks could bite through the ground and even his armor, but blocking them with his sword didn't cause it to break in the same way. Derivan ignored the aching pain coming from the hole in his torso-piece, and considered what he could do.

The Patchers, of course, did not grant him the courtesy of time. One of them screeched again, the air rippling with that odd Shift that made the air pause and the stone flicker; the other was the same one that had hurt him the first time, and it had clearly seen that its methods worked, because it was just trying to stab him again.

An application of Shift to force the air and ground back into stability. His sword redirected the stab, sending chitinous arms into the wall behind him instead of into his armor yet again. The wall hissed behind him, whatever enchantments built in to protect the mana slivers not giving so much as a peep of a reaction.

Derivan went on the offensive.

He kicked off against the wall, using the boost it gave them to blindside the Patchers with a boost of speed. They could be hurt, he knew that much. His sword could cut them, and Misa's mace could crush them, and yet even as he burst out past the two Patchers, his sword aimed directly for the center of one of them

there was no shatter. No break. Whatever purchase his blade had caught with the first Patcher failed to manifest here, and his sword bounced uselessly off the system-box chitin instead. He had to duck under the followup attack, only the barest glimpse of a moving limb in the edges of his awareness warning him that it was coming.

He'd have to rethink his strategy.

Already, he was channeling mana into his gauntlet again, but drawing that glyph was complicated when two of the Patchers were fighting him he had to abort several times when they launched themselves at him and he had to duck out of the way. A few times he slammed his sword into the Patchers, breaking off bits and pieces of system-blue chitin, but never quite finding the same weak spot he had with the first one. Maybe Misa had weakened it in some way?

Derivan didn't quite get the chance to find out.

There was a brief flicker a jump in what he could sense with his Shift stat, followed by a flash of light from somewhere behind him. Derivan didn't have to turn around to guess what had happened, and in fact kept his focus on the Patchers in front of him; they suddenly seemed confused, their arms waving in the direction of the newcomers like they wanted to head for them, instead.

Derivan did turn around, then, to see that three mages and one priest had arrived. Sev looked out of breath, and was even now panting heavily; the other three mages Derivan didn't recognize. Otter-Noram wasn't among them, in any case

A Patcher staggered towards Derivan, apparently intent on moving past him and towards the mages, but the mages apparently didn't want to waste any time. Streaks of light burst out from their foci, piercing each Patcher several times over even as Derivan watched. Small pieces of the beams deflected off that protective chitin, but by and large...

Wait. No.

Derivan had assumed they'd solved the problem by cutting through the Patchers but while the magic had clearly done a lot of damage, the Patchers were somehow still alive.

This was going to be more complicated than he'd hoped.