Chapter 17-15 A Moment Most Feared (I)

Chapter 17-15 A Moment Most Feared (I)

+Kare. I, uh, I need to talk to you. I thoughtI asked them to be the one to tell you that oh, gods, oh fuck. Iit shouldnt have happened. She wasnt a soldier, they shouldntthe fucking Paladins were useless andand they shouldvethe fucking bitch just did it anyway and they let her! They let her! I was I couldnt get there without abandoning my post but they kept going! I had to listenthey made me listen to what they did. II+

[Shotin sobbing]



+...Uncle Sho? W-what wrong? What happened? Are you alright?+

+No no.+

+Tell me where you are. Ill get dad. Well come to get you.+



+No! No, you stay home! You stay protected. Where its safe. You have to. Youyou canits not safe. I cant she wouldnt forgive me if I let you get hurt too.+



+She? Whos she? Uncle? Uncle Sho? Listen, Im going to try casting mom. Dad says her post got hit by a disruption during the offensive but things should be be+ [SESSION NO LONGER EXISTS; UNABLE TO INITIATE META-SYNC] +I I what. I think that something might still be wrong with the Nether, Ill ask dad if he+



+Jaus, Kare, Im sorry Im so sorry. I couldnt. I had to stayI couldnt go to her. I heard her screaming for me and I still couldnt because I had to I had to protect. Fuck+

+...+

+Kare? Kare?+

+ImIm here. Im here. Im still here.+

-Thoughtcast between Shotin Kazahara and Kare Kitzuhada, Fourth Guild War

17-15

A Moment Most Feared (I)

All it took to shatter a cadre was a single vector of force. An angle they couldnt see coming. An attack they couldnt resist.

Avos consciousness was a symphony of minds, memories, and qualities manifesting and vanishing on the basis of task and need. Striking at the Paladins was a delicate operation. They were experienced and powerful, but unprepared, and that flaw made all the difference.

Draus acted as something for them to focus ona problem they could fire upon, tangible and dangerous in the material. Unbeknownst to the citys peacekeepers, however, Avo subverted the very ground beneath them, his blood worming through countless tons of matter as a complex system of tunnels formed in an instant. He kept his Woundshaper on the precipice of manifestation until the last moment, hiding his Sanguinity in the darkness of the underground as their assault began.

He waited until he was directly below Kae and the others before he signaled the next phase to Draus. She leaped over through the reflections of his blood, drawing the Twice-Walker back into her Frame in lieu of her forst-wrought miracles.

When they struck at the Paladins Porter, the breakthrough was sudden and immediate, and the cadre itself came apart in the chaos, granting him the opening needed to separate their forces. He pulled Chambers, Dice, Kae, and the kitten through a thin film of blood into his Zephyr while unleashing his Path-Hydras simultaneously.

From there, the encounter folded into its third phase: the fighting retreat.

The first entities Avo targeted were golems Kassamon identified as having spatial-altering Heavens capable of affecting tangibility. They were unraveled before their Heavens could manifest, and from there the rest of the Knots were left naked against further harm.

Piloted by combat mechs beyond the Rashs means to affect, the remaining drones and golems fought and reacted in accordance with basic parameters, but lacked the skill and cohesion present in most human pilots. Knots were slow and stupid, unable to react cohesively without human direction. They mightve had a chance if the mists were still up, but the Porter of the Paladins was dead and all were exposed to the unstable Nether once more; no conducive for coordination or communication.

The Path-Hydras surfaced across the skin of existence, falling upon the Rash-detail as the Woundshaper sealed the Paladins spatial gateway. Using its fortress, a cap of blood and light corked the metaphysical opening and Avo was tickled by faint impacts prickling at him from the other side.

Almost immediately, more gates tore into existence across the district, only to be blockaded as well.

Rend climbed across Avos Heavens as he set himself on eradicating the forces he could.

The golems and remaining drones were the first to be swallowed while each remaining Paladin was granted a path to themselves. The Straying Tempest was caged in a fist of light as Avo placed them on a collision course with ChambersLushburner fully manifested. The gun-layered snake that Avos cog-feed identified as the Bladegunner was taken off the field next, vanishing into a sheet of glass while chasing Draus Twice-Walker.

The last of the Paladins briefly unleashed their Unseen Bastion Heaven around the district, a flesh-coated net-like entity with inward-facing eyes, before a thread of black fire cut up into the air and their presence vanished. The bifurcated body of said Paladin soon materialized, and Avo melted the corpse to spare himself any surprises.

Yeah. Okay. Not really a normal day, but who was to judge him? Nobody, thats who! Especially since he just saved the cadre from a mega-high-uber spheragd fucker that was about to snuff em all.

Oh, they were going to appreciate him after this. He could feel it. The ghoul would be giving him Heavens, and the Agnos would smile more at him instead of giving those sad eyes from when he told her about growing up in the Spine. Hells, the Reg might even give him a nod.

He could picture the scene in his head now: hed be walking down the tunnel into the George Washington with dead homunculi hanging from him like a cape. There, Denton would gasp and the Faither would be like holy shit, I didnt think anyone would be that powerful. That strong of spirit. Then, Draus would put a hand on his shoulder, and her lip would curl because she always has a solid brick up her ass, but finally she nod, and everything would be great and

Chambers reverie came to a halt as the biggest godsdamned spider he ever saw came into view.

Well, kind of a spider. Its legs were like crackling with lightning or some shit, and its body burned as he did. He could actually feel its Domain pressing on his as he approached. The part where it stopped being so bug-like was how all its little pitch-black beady eyes lined its entire body and the giant ball of clasped hands that made up its head.

Little dead babies were dangling from its midsection; no running from the Rash, fuckers.

He couldnt lie: Heavens looked weird as fuck a lot of times. Made his mind do backflips when he stared too long. Still remembered when they used to crash against his wards thoughthose were the days. Soft and weak Chambers. Not-Godclad Chambers. Victim Chambers, owned by Mirrorhead, just doing this and that and letting life pass him by.

A twinge of discomfort flared up inside him, but he felt better as he shit out another gaggle of screaming infants. He charged these ones with his fire too, priming them like meat explosives, leaving them burning like embersdangling candle tips about to go off.

He'd die before he ever gave up his Frame. This was the best of him. This was the most he would ever amount to. He wouldnt survive going back. He couldnt.

WARNING: FOREIGN SOUL DETECTED

UNIDENTIFIED GODCLAD DETECTED

CLASSIFICATION: SPHERE IV [EST. 6712 THAUM/c]

->STRAYING TEMPEST

Pushing the clouded thoughts from his mind, Chambers studied his foe and came to a hovering halt as he coated himself using all his little friends. Swarms of insects, warped creatures of bone and wing and flesh, Sang bio-drones he burned that day when Nu-Scarrowbur got fucked all clustered around him, forming a barricade of bioforms.

The Straying Tempest, on the other hand, was skittering across cracks of lightning, dashing from place to place.

Oh, so this was gonna be a fast one. That was cut. Chambers hated people who were faster than him. Or stronger. Or smarter. Or better looking. Or had longer dicks. Or nicer legs.

The point was that Chambers had a lot of hate to offer, and this half-strand was going to catch a thick spray of his loathing in the form of dead babies. Exploding dead babies. He was going to do to them what he should have done to that burned Silver cunt earlierboom!

A pregnant pause hung in the air between him and the Tempest. He tried shouting a slur at them, but the Nether wasnt working well down here and his Lushburner didnt have a mouth, so the bitch-bird he was just started squawking.

The ribbed folds of darkness lining the path wheezed with the passing wind as the Tempests many eyes blinked. IS-stop!

Chambers frowned somewhere in his Soul where his actual face should be. How the fuck were they talking? That was bullshit. They didnt have a mouth! Did they have a talking Heaven? Was that a thing he wasnt getting? And they sounded kinda nice too. Soft and shaky, but very crisp and measured. Deep for a non-Scaarthian girl too. At least he thought it was a girl or something.

Actually, he wasnt sure. People had all kinds of voice box modulators in New Vultun. She could be like the cock-thief of floor twelve back in his childhood mega. Nasty case, that one. Before the Rash. Big, ugly Kosgan fucker hiding in alleyways with a medical saw, a voice changer, and a holocoat pretending to be a young woman. That motherfucker stole and sold so godsdamned many testicles that Chambers found over a hundred thousand imps on the psycho after snuffing him

Paladin was still talking. He completely missed what she just said.

--by the powers vested in me under the Accords and recognized by the city and its Great Guilds. Will you comply?

Shit. What did she say? He accessed his Metamind and pulled the moment back but found himself losing focus the moment she started talking about legal bullshit.You know, I always hated you glasser-fucks. He summoned a stream of nu-pigs from his fire and let them fall into Avos shadows, squealing. Hopefully, the Paladin caught the insult. Its always Accords this laws that, but at the end of the day, youre just like all the others! A fuck! A shit! A half-strand. A murderer of us little guys because some of us just wanna feel good or something. Its bullshit!

It was only after his rant concluded that he realized he still had no mouth. At least the Straying Tempest was staring at all the falling pigs. Are are you calling me a pig?

Holy shit she got it! Chambers made his Lushburner nod in excitement, the bird bouncing and wood breaking as it did.

I The Straying Tempest sagged, seeming exasperated. Alright, I guess. Then, if you wont comply

Chambers promptly flung his collection of homunculi, the cluster of burning infants sailing through the air.

They promptly exploded before getting anywhere near her.

The Lushburner sagged. The Tempest just stared. Idid you just

Chambers charged.