Chapter 22: Round 2

Chapter 22: Round 2

Hiral watched as Seeyela and her party gathered up their equipment, only the occasional dirty look shooting his way as they found something broken or torn.

“Wow, they’re really holding a grudge, huh?” Yanily said from where he stood beside Hiral, leaning casually on his spear. “Ooooh, that was Balyo’s favorite spear too.”

“How well do you know Seeyela’s party?” Hiral asked.

“Seeyela is five or six rotations older than Seena—I always forget which—so we’ve actually been training together almost as long as I can remember. Big sis was always watching over little sis, if you know what I mean. Made her kind of like a big sister to our whole party, I guess.

“You probably don’t know, but we pick our parties pretty young, after we get an idea where our classes and abilities lean. I practically grew up with those two.” Yanily pointed at the two sisters. “Had a crush on Seeyela most of my life too, until she met Trev. Ah, Trev is her husband. He’s in a different party, D-Rank.”

“Do Growers have a lot of different classes?” Hiral asked.

“Not exactly. There are only six, but the abilities within them can vary a lot. Take Wule and Cal, for example. Wule can cure debuffs, which Cal can’t, but Cal can do broken bones, even though they’re the same class. Balyo and I are Spear Wardens, so our abilities focus on spears. But that’s about where the similarities end. We use different abilities, and have different strengths and weaknesses.”

“Wow. Up in Fallen Reach, we only have three classes. Shapers—those big, tattooed folks. Artists—they’re the ones who actually ink the tattoos. Lastly, there are Academics, but that one is kind of a catch-all class for people who don’t have the affinities to be either a Shaper or Artist. Ah, that’s not actually a fair way to put it. The Academics do a lot for the city, and it’s not like they’re washouts or something.”

“Only three classes? That’s insane,” Yanily said, and it certainly was when Hiral really thought about it.

Odd—why didn’t I ever read anything about Grower classes?

Another dirty look in his direction answered his question.

Right. Growers and Makers don’t much get along.

“So, which of the three are you?” Yanily asked. “You can’t be one of those Shaper folks, unless you just need to drink more milk. Though, now that I look at you, you’ve got something on your earlobe there. It’s small... but...”

“Just decoration,” Hiral said quickly, his hand going up to his ear to rub the Perfect Sense tattoo there.

“Oh, man, you guys do those things for decoration too?” Yanily asked, thankfully already past the topic of class.

“Yes, but it doesn’t give me any abilities like it would a Shaper,” Hiral said, the words painfully true.

“Gotcha, gotcha. Do Shapers have any abilities other than the tattoos?”

“Nope,” Hiral said. “Their tattoos are their abilities, or magic, or whatever you want to call it. Well, their Meridian Lines—their PIM—boosts their physical stats by quite a bit too, I guess.”

“But, let me get this straight... Those big guys, the Shapers—they actually have to get the tattoos put on their bodies by that other class you mentioned? The...”

“The Artists,” Hiral finished for Yanily. “You got it right. They’re really dependent on each other. Shapers have no abilities unless an Artist tattoos them, using a special ink made with the Artist’s own blood, and drawn with a Quillback quill.”

Tink... tink... tink, tink, tink. His swords bounced off the crystal monster not even bothering to defend itself, and suddenly, three hands reached for him, palms glowing. The memory of Velina’s exploding Disc of Passage—and the way the monster had tossed around the other Shapers—had Hiral scrambling backwards at the same time Vix and Yanily hit the monster from both sides.

Solar energy pulsed with every strike, but the monster stepped forward to follow Hiral despite the twin barrages.

“Clear!” Balyo shouted behind the monster, and Yanily and Vix immediately backed off.

Oh, this can’t be good.

Even though Hiral couldn’t see Balyo behind the monster, the sudden rush of solar energy clearly meant something big was coming. Well, it wasn’t like his attacks were doing anything anyway, so Hiral spun to the side and leapt away—just in time. A giant spear of light slammed into the monster’s back.

The force of the impact added to Hiral’s own leap, and he flew uncontrollably through the air, pinballed off one tree, then another, before hitting the ground in a bouncing, rolling heap.

“Ugh,” he groaned, pushing himself up to his hands and knees, broken branches and leaves cracking with each movement, his swords both lost in the flight, and his body aching. The ground tilted sideways—no, that was Hiral tilting—but his shoulder hit a nearby tree, and he somehow stayed upright. Mostly upright. “That hurt,” he mumbled, though his End had taken the worst of it. He shifted so he could look back the way he’d come.

Man, that attack was way stronger than E-Rank. Did the monster...?

Forty feet away, the monster stalked toward him like nothing had happened. Vix danced in on its side, his form a blur as he landed blow after blow after blow, constantly moving, never slowing. He might as well have been standing still for how casually the monster slapped him aside.

Fallen’s balls.

Thirty feet. Hiral used the tree at his side for support as he pulled himself to his feet, but he wasn’t in any shape to fight or run.

Too bad. That thing isn’t going to give me the chance to catch my breath.

“Come on, then,” Hiral shouted as he charged—mostly stumbled—forward, three glowing palms rising as if to catch him.

Twenty feet, and a black-and-red ball of sparking energy appeared beside the monster. Nearby trees creaked and leaned toward the head-sized ball, and debris from the forest floor shot up to get sucked into it. Even the monster momentarily paused. Then one of its hands simply slapped the ball of energy, and it exploded in a shower of perfectly symmetrical cubes of energy before dissipating. Just like the Disc of Passage.

But that maneuver had taken the monster’s attention off Hiral, and he leapt as it turned back to focus on him.

“Hyaaa!” he shouted, snapping his hip around in the air as he put his entire 18 Str into the spinning kick.

Heel colliding perfectly with the side of the monster’s face, Hiral’s other foot met its chest. He let his knee bend, then kicked off back the way he’d come in an acrobatic flip that would get him safely out of range.

Except, as soon as he landed, two hands struck out like serpents and closed around his forearms like a vise. With unbelievable strength, the monster pulled his arms out to his sides so quickly, it almost popped his shoulders out of their joints, and then the third hand lifted between them.

Hiral looked down at the palm, at the glowing rune etched into the crystal. That... that was the same hand that had made the Disc of Passage explode.

What will happen to me if...?

The monster pushed its palm against the center of Hiral’s chest, right over his central Meridian Node. A brief, slicing line of pain ran straight down his center. There was a pull on his arms, and then the monster ripped him in two.