Chapter 53

Chapter 53

Matt paced back and forth, with scenarios racing through his mind.

There was a chance that fully powering up this space they were stuck in would deactivate the ruins defenses.

It wasnt a good chance, but it could work. It entirely depended on the default state of the shields. Matt didnt think they would all be on by default. He assumed that they would normally be deactivated, and only turn on when encountering an enemy capable of triggering something.

Charging the ruin up could end up being disastrous, but Matt held out hope that it wouldnt be that bad. It was only a Tier 6 rift that had inverted after all. That would limit its power after all.

According to some quick analysis from his AI, they had a shot at getting out if Matt directed all of his 40 MPS into a single area. It wasnt something he had thought of with Keith and Travis, but Matts mana output was far beyond the capacity of any conduit of his Tier. Even a Tier 6 mana conduit could only handle that much sustained throughput for so long. After a point, his mana would essentially start melting the more delicate power channels.

Matt walked up to the vault door and tried to pull the handle.

Nothing.

He tried to push through the thick metal with his spiritual sense. He couldnt see more than a few inches past the vaults walls, but he discovered that it would be impossible to gain access without copious amounts of mana.

He turned to the other three and said, So we have three problems.

Camilla cut him off. No shit! Were trapped.

Nodding, he continued, Excellent assessment. The snark in his voice didn't seem to reach Camilla, We are trapped, but thats not the end of the world. Im fairly confident that we can get out of here by frying the power conduits in the area. Thats the first problem, but we have a solution for it. Our second problem is that the vault is using splitting runes to stay shut. They...

Whats a splitting rune? Camilla interjected again.

This time, Matt gave her a flat look in response.

You know, I was getting to that. The splitting runes are a pretty standard method for making anything you want to lock up, stay that way. On any side or face of the object or room youre storing the valuable in, you put the splitting runes along the outline of your desired opening. You use the runes to make the shape of a door or hatch, and when mana is run through the storage space and runes, the material splits along those lines, as if it was cut. When no mana is present, it returns to a solid wall or face of whatever is being used for storage.

Wed have to power this whole place up... Matt trailed off, lost in thought. If were lucky, this ruin functions exactly like a rift. If it does, there should be an item or something that will help us attune the mana to unlock and open this door. Theres even a notch in the door for something to fit. So if we find it, we should be able to run mana through it, and itll be converted. There also could be some item like that already built-in. If thats the case, just giving this place power should open the door up. I cant see much through the higher Tier materials, so its hard to be sure.

Liz looked up from teasing Aster and asked, Whats problem three?

Problem three is that this shield was powered by the unstable core, which had a lot of mana.

Camilla jumped in again with, And it reacted to the vault. She paused before adding, Or maybe something in the vault.

Matt pointed at her. Exactly. If we do open the door, were pretty screwed if something strong is in there guarding its contents. The core reacted to something. The question is, did it power that something up?

Everyone looked around, and Matt sat down to ponder that last question. Aster came over to curl up in his lap.

With one hand idly stroking his fluffy fox friend, Matt waited for one of the other two to speak up.

Camilla rolled to her back and said, Well, the whole point of delving is to explore the unknown, right?

Ehh. Not normally. Most rifts in developed areas have been delved at least once, and you can almost always get some general info. These unexplored worlds are different, but that lack of knowledge usually means better rewards. The problem is the risk that comes with it, which is why were stuck in this shitty situation. Liz didnt seem very interested in the conversation from her tone.

Camilla asked, So we should just try and leave then?

That was the million mana stone question.

Matt presented another problem he had been thinking of.

Weve been here for a couple of days now, and we really havent gotten any good loot. It might be better to leave and explore more of the planet as a whole. But Im somewhat partial to the idea of powering this place up and seeing what happens. This is a Tier 6 ruin. It should be bursting at the seams with loot.

We already struggle against one of these golems. If they get to full power, how will we fight off masses of them? Well run out of mana and get killed. Speaking of running out of mana, wouldnt it take weeks to fill this place? If we just sat here for as long as it would take to fill, the barriers would run out of juice, and we could just waltz out. Camilla didn't seem vehemently opposed to Matts idea, but she wanted to test his thinking.

If he was going to tell her, now was the time.

I can fill this place up in a few hours.

Her response was a single raised eyebrow.

My Talent basically allows me to put out a lot of mana.

Camilla didnt say anything, and Matt gave her time to chew on the revelation.

After nearly five, long minutes of silence, she asked, It really depends on the vault, I guess. You dont put unimportant things behind a locked door. The question is, is the prize behind the door worth the risk? Our lack of information here doesnt exactly put my mind at ease.

He was pretty happy that she seemed to be ignoring the comment about his Talent, and moved past it without comment.

Matt offered a possible answer. We may not know whats behind that door, but we should be able to escape from anything that a Tier 6 ruin could throw at us. Even if powering up the door means that everything else is powered up too, we all hit above our Tier. We should be able to handle it.

Camilla chewed that over, and finally nodded.

Liz asked from her back, Can we fry this shield and try to power this place up?

Matt liked the suggestion, and after getting everyones approval, he moved to the still glowing barrier.

How long do you think itll take for Malcolm to get out of here?

His question made Liz sit up and rub her chin.

I dont know. Maybe a couple of hours? A week or two?

With that, they sat and waited. The fool didnt have much of a chance with fully powered golems running around, so they decided to extend him one final courtesy.

Matt did some more math with his AI.

He was guessing that this place held reserves for two million mana at most. That would only take him about twelve hours to fill. He also didnt believe that he would need to completely fill the ruins mana reserves to start everything up. It would be ideal if they only needed to put a quarter of the power in. That would put the monsters at peak Tier 5, which would be easy prey for the four of them.

After giving Malcolm some time to exit the ruin, Matt started dumping mana into one of the runes responsible for projecting the shield across the wall.

It only took ten minutes and around 24,000 mana for the rune to give out, and the shield flickered and dimmed.

Camilla, whose jaw was essentially on the floor at this point, asked, How much mana can you make? Thats not normal. I dont enchant, but melting a rune shouldnt take a few minutes.

Matt grinned. He could tell it came off as cocky, but her reaction was satisfying. His Talent gave him an advantage that few, if any, could even dream of. He might not hit as hard as others, but he would always be able to take those hits and keep going.

He was endless.

Lets just say that I can put out a lot of mana over time.

She didnt press, and Matt repeated his actions on the far wall, where the other rune was embedded.

Ten minutes later, their whole section of the hall was brightly lit, and the barrier was down.

Matt turned and said to his party, Nows the time to decide. Do we leave? Or do we stay for the larger prize?

Liz got up, and with a grin, asked, What are the chances that a certain scepter is the item that would fit that hole?

Matt returned her grin. He just had the same thought.

Everything they came to this ruin for was so close. They just needed to put the puzzle pieces together.

As everyone prepared to move on, he reactivated [Cracked Phantom Armor], and they retraced their steps back to the two golems working on the specter. Matt carefully watched the golems and the surroundings as he stepped up to the platform.

Ready to dodge at any moment, he slipped the scepter out of the golems hands, after checking for traps.

When nothing happened, he jogged back to his friends.

Liz had her blood and spear at the ready, prepared for anything to spring to life. Despite no enemies presenting themselves, she didnt lower her guard. She said, Well, that was easy. Almost feels too easy.

Ambient mana and ambient essence tried to equalize themselves across a planet. The only exceptions were rifts that pulled in ambient mana and expelled essence. Ambient mana was created when anyone cast a skill, or was at their maximum mana. Any mana regeneration that would put an individual over their cap was expelled into the surroundings.

All of that mana, built up for however many years that the planet sat unexplored and Tiering up, was being dragged into the ruin. As the predicted mana consumption crossed the five million mark, the draw began to slow. The planets ambient mana stopped rushing towards the area near the ruin to fill the void it had created.

Matt and Camilla let out audible sighs.

Well fuck.

Lizs curse summed up Matts feelings perfectly.

Then, the ruin started to move.

It wasnt moving directly at them, but near enough that Matt didnt feel comfortable. So, he flew to the side. As they watched the ruin move through the air like a castle given wings, several groups of the humanoid golems broke off from their patrol perimeter.

They were heading directly towards them.

What do the golems want with us?

Matt started to fly, but Liz, who was turning her head over her shoulder, shouted, Go faster! Theyre gaining on us!

Aster started yipping over the heavy winds, and Matt felt the added cold of her launching [Ice Spear]s at their pursuers.

From his HUD, Matt watched the red dots grow closer.

How are they faster than us? This is a Tier 7 flying device. Theyre only Tier 6. They should be slower by my calculations! What did we awaken?

The terror was building in Matts stomach, and he was starting to fear that they had set something in motion that they couldnt undo.

A flash of light brightened the entire area, and while checking Lizs perspective, he saw a beam of light lance straight into the sky. The beam from the ruin burned a hole through the sparse cloud cover. It had to be an attack at something above the sky. Three more shots of the beam brightened the sky in the next few moments, and the sinking feeling in Matts stomach grew deeper.

There was only one thing he could think of that would be that high in the sky.

He corrected himself. Not the sky, the atmosphere.

The ruin was taking down the satellite coverage.

That was a declaration of war if he had ever heard of one. The ruin was proclaiming that it was the master of this planet, and dared anything to challenge it.

I hope a Tier 25 comes and makes a move. There has to be one here, right? I saw Driver fight. He was so fast, even if they needed to come from the city, they should be here already.

Wait, what about all the Tier 20s going to the world next to us? Cant one of them slap this thing out of the air?

There was only one answer that Matt felt explained why no one was reacting. This was within their expected limits.

The ruin was only Tier 6, so they would have to deal with it.

Before he could think any further, he felt a jolt, and a cry of pain escaped his mouth.

The flying golems had caught up, and they had crossbows. One of them had landed a shot in his lower back, and it was everything that Matt could do to not collapse from the pain.

His HUD flashed. The bolt had punched through both his physical armor and [Cracked Phantom Armor], and was lodged in his small intestines. Going into evasive maneuvers, Matt tried to make them a harder target to hit.

Being able to see from Lizs perspective was helpful, but the golems were fully charged with mana, and were using the crossbows to great effect at their maximum range.

With the two teams of six golems each steadily gaining on them, Matt let their altitude slip, aiming for a hole in the canopy of the forest. They didnt have a speed advantage, but Matt hoped that all of his time playing tag with Travis would give him an edge in flying through a dense forest.

Another bolt missed him and slammed into Camilla, who took it much better than he had, and barely let out a whimper.

If he wasnt mistaken, he thought he saw a grin on the womans face.

Just before they sunk down into the trees, Aster let loose a barrage of ice. Matt watched as two of the golems on their left went down.

Camilla called out, Cave ahead! We can hold them off there.

Matt noticed the area and weaved between the trees. As they made a turn, Matt felt a bolt skitter across his back, and cut a deep furrow along a line of ribs. Even Liz called out in pain, and his AIs status reading for her indicated that she had a bolt in her upper thigh.

As they crossed the threshold of the cave, another bolt bounced into Matts side. Unlike the crossbow bolts that bounced well in the ruin itself, this one had no power left, and didnt penetrate his armor. He breathed a sigh of relief when the wave of pain he anticipated didnt come. He didn't need to add a second bolt to the budding collection of wounds on his torso.

With shaky movements, Matt landed the flying sword, and pulled out his longsword. These enemies were already fully powered, and he wanted to be ready to blast them.

The four of them followed the tunnel, stopping just after a bend that would prevent the golems from pelting them with their crossbows.

They waited with heavy breaths, and Matt channeled [Endurance]. He needed as much healing as he could get before the fight began.

The problem was, he needed to charge his blade with more mana to get [Mana Charge] to 1000 mana. So, he stopped sending mana through [Endurance] and directed it to his longsword. Those thirty seconds were long and painful. But it had to be done to survive, so he pushed through.

Moments later, they heard the sounds of metal feet approaching, and Matts hand tightened on the hilt of his blade. This was a wide cave, and he would be able to use that to his advantage. He just needed to avoid getting hit with another crossbow bolt. He wasn't sure if he could fight through many more direct hits.

As the sounds grew closer, Liz whipped a large sphere of blood around the corner, and two bolts slammed into the far wall. Camilla followed that up with her extended mace head, and used its range to attack around the corner.

Matt ignored the pain and AI warnings that he would catch another crossbow bolt in the side, and turned the corner with his longsword fully charged with mana. He swung with all the might [Mages Retreat] could empower him with.

As he turned the corner, Matt saw a golem being tossed around while encased in blood. From the way the blood appeared more real than the surroundings, Matt gathered that Liz was using her Concept to empower her blood.

Matt's sword took a second, uninjured golem in the chest, and he unleashed his [Mana Charge] with a giant flash of blue light. It didn't get absorbed as he feared, but instead blew the entire top half of the golem into scrap metal.

Not taking the time to think, Matt pressed forward and engaged the third and fourth golems.

He saw that a crossbow was raised and pointed at him, but he didn't deviate from his attack. The bolt grazed across his shoulder while he chopped down on the golems exposed arm.

These flight models sacrificed the thick armor and heavy construction for their enhanced flight capabilities, and his Tier 5 sword had no problem cutting through them. There was a strain on his sword's durability rune, but it wasnt bad enough to worry about the blade's integrity. He could always use the repair rune if they made it out of this mess.

Shoulder checking the fourth golem, Matt lifted it and used it as a shield while charging the next line of golems. Two more bolts slammed into his newly acquired shield, but they were unable to punch through his repurposed golem and armor.

Matt cut into the next squad of golems with heavy swings of his blade, ignoring the pain from his many injuries, while doing what he did best.

He swung his sword and challenged the world to take him down.

More teams must have arrived, because there seemed to be no end to the golems.

After the first two rows, the next line of golems had mana blades that he had to contend with. As was the case inside the ruin, [Cracked Phantom Armor] absorbed the strikes from the mana blades without struggle. Matt made them pay dearly for each swing.

The cave filled with more and more dismembered metal limbs as Matt cut down the opposition. Camilla joined him after the archers were taken care of, and her mace struck out with his blade, crumpling golem after golem with each swing.

Matt stepped left, in between the shaft of the weapon and the extended head, and struck out at a golem that was trying to tackle Camilla.

Ice and blood dispatched any and every golem that tried to flank the melee fighters.

Soon, the momentum of their push through the golem ranks slowed, and it eventually turned into a standstill. Liz and Aster came closer to the front, and took any opportunity to use their magic. Liz even sent her spear over to harry the backline.

They were making progress while pressing forward as four, and eventually reached the front of the cave. There, they found another line of golems with crossbows, which took the chance to unleash their volley.

A part of him wanted to complain that the golems shouldn't have been smart enough to set an ambush like this, but instead, Matt's world slowed. Thoughts didn't matter. They didn't even happen. All that mattered to him was action. The instinct to protect his friends guided him, and he reacted without any thought or hesitation.

Reaching down into his Concept, he used its repulsion effect, and spread it out to cover everyone.

Unlike last time, he didn't need to slow a mana crystal. He needed to stop half a dozen crossbow bolts that could punch through [Cracked Phantom Armor] and his under armor. The rest of his team would be dead if something didn't change.

With the world turning white, the bolts slowed and then stopped, before reversing their direction and rotating to have their tips face the direction of their owners.

Reaching down for a final burst of power, Matt pushed the last bit of his will harder than he ever had before, and the bolts accelerated. He expected them to pierce and kill the golems, but they werent aimed, and only one had the desired effect.

His team wasnt slow to press the advantage, and as his world went dim, Matt saw them tearing apart their remaining pursuers.