Chapter 143 143: Nest War VIII

Carnage marched into the tunnels that made up the darkling nest, their formations were messy and weak in some areas, but the tunnel was narrow enough that it's narrowness was what kept their enemies at bay as they unleashed attack after attack on wave after waves of darklings. And Cole and Cassandra were right in front of the entire thing taking charge of every single step and attack that the rest of the aspirants were taking. Cole would probably say that the fighting in the tunnels were the hardest out of every engagement that have had so far. It was worrisome but ultimately they pushed through and by this point the end was in sight.

The fighting intensified as Cole made for a final push that would finally get them out of the tunnels and into the cavern as a whole. But for some reason this was where the fight got even more intense and hard enough that Cole himself was beginning to feel the pressure. The Darklings were packed tight unwilling to move as they fought with as much power as they all could possible muster in order to make sure Cole and the other aspirants had no access into the cavern at all. The struggle was tough and it was something that was quickly mirrored by his compatriots as Cassandra let loose a loud curse and showed her bow behind her before pulling out a pair of dual swords.

Cole ignored her ranting as she tore into the darklings, hacking at them as bolts of lightning and fire and a multitude of other elemental attacks flew about, hitting the road upon rows of darklings in front of them. But for every darkling killed it was as if ten more took it's place and they were manic, wild and crazy and somewhat horrifying for some of the aspirants who couldn't understand the sheer berserk manner in which the darklings had suddenly started fighting, in order to keep them away from cavern.

Cole ducked, the breeds of darklings had slowly changed as now he was dealing with giant mantis's the size of men. 8ts claws slashed over his head as rammed black Malakai into it's chest, straight to the hilt and pulled the entire blade downwards, ripping the creature open. [Gravity] released a concentrated blast from his right palm, smashing a few darklings backwards as Cassandra crossed past his front, her blasted flashing as the heads of three leaping chitterlings fell to the ground with a massive thud. He saw an opening and quickly took it as he moved past her and lobbed a quickly conjured ball of [Chaos Blast] into the middle of the Darkling crowd.

It was a risk using that skill in such close proximity with the aspirants, but he was counting on the bodies of the darklings being enough to cushion whatever force or blow might come from it. And he was right, quite a few of them were blasted to pieces and a small opening was created for them. Cole took it and moved forwards in order to press his advantage and make more room for the aspirants to advance, but he was in for a shock when massive snake like darkling bowed everything or rather every darkling in it's path and used it's massive fanged mouth to snap Cole up by the chest, it's fangs sinking deep enough that they met each other within Cole's own body.

"Arghhhhhh!"

Cole was ultimately still capable of feeling and he would not have been able to escape from the snakes grasp as the darkling had attacked at a speed far faster than what Cole could possibly muster at the moment. Then to make matters worse he felt the thing begin to drain him, and it was doing it extremely fast whilst ignoring every attack thrown at it by the other aspirants. It quickly becoming obvious to Cole and to the others that beyond all reasonable doubt, the snake was trying to kill him. This was basically an attempt to get him off the board and leveling the playing field, Cole also knew that after they take him out Cassandra was next along with Farida and Thunderbolt-Jack who were all at the Frontlines and helping Cole ease up the pressure on the other aspirants.

If they take him out, then they would definitely destabilize the morale of everyone around here. This was targeted strike to eliminate the leader, making Cole think that their raid group functioned 0rettyu h like a pack of wolves. Without an alpha to lead they were all aimless, but it was not their fault. They had all just met recently and have not had enough time to grow stronger, strong enough that they would be cohesive and every one would fit a specific role on the battlefield and carry it out without any sort of problem. The darkling forces knew this, they had gleaned it, Cole laughed, they had the forces necessary to keep throwing bodies at them until they discover just exactly what made their army tick, and now that it has been discovered the nest was striking back, it was strategy at its finest. However Cole was not the type to just role over and die.

[Sin Eater]

It became a tug of war as Cole started pulling back on the energy that was being drained from him by the giant darkling snake. It paused for a moment and then increased the intensity with which it was draining him. It came prepared The nest already knew about his ability to drain them of their energy to empower himself, so they sent someone that could match his intensity and even perhaps overwhelm it, but the problem is even Cole himself had no idea just how far he could push his ability to drain energy, but this was just as good a time to find out as Cole to pushed and increased the intensity of his drain. The snake shuddered and powered on, but for every move it made, Cole had an answer for it.

The drain itself became more than just a tug of war, but rather a chess match. It was aiming to latch and draw out the energy through a variety of channels within Cole's body that even he never knew he had. But he followed it, he pulled back, pulled harder, shifted his intent according to the power of his imagination. He imagined his body to be a massive whirlpool right in the middle of an ocean, the force of it's suction so strong it seemed as if all of the four winds of the earth had come together to rage their anger at the effrontery and lesser being to assume it could take the energy of a being it was not even worthy of standing besides.

The snake shuddered and seemed to hit a snag, no matter what it was, the force and scope of it's intent was no where near what Cole could command. He wanted it's energy, and the whole world and every universe in existence be damned Cole was going to get what he damn well fucking wants. He opened his eyes an roared hard and long, blood spilling from his mouth and he raised his elbow up and smashed it right into the bone skull of the snake and utilizing [Gravity] in that very same instant to create a more powerful impact.

There was a loud boom as chips of home flew off the skull of the darkling snake, exposing the flowing storm of blue black and green energy within it's confines. And then suddenly Cole had a thought or perhaps it was not s9me thought but just reaction and instinctual move against the darkling in an attempt to defeat it. He thrust his hand into the skull of the darkling snake, still mentally engaged in the tug of war between both of their energies. It felt cool to his hand and a little deeper the energy was almost done right frigid. But he felt nothing else, no flesh or brain matter just and influx of energy connected to each other by metaphysical strings wound into each other in pretty mu h the same way you would expect a real brain to be.

It was an amazing discovery and it was one that left Cole with so much wonder, but it was quite unfortunate that he had to put an end to that himself as he fired off a [Chaos Blast] into the skull of the darkling snake. The explosion that happened next was spectacular and even more so as Cole received feedback through the tether they had created by draining each other's energy. Cole was blasted backwards much of his body bloodied as many of his blood vessels popped from the sheer impact of not just energy, but chaos running up and through his body.

The darkling snake on the other hand was a whole other ball game as it exploded in the direction of the tunnel, the home armor on its body blasting to pieces And taking out so many of the darklings that by the time it was over, there was already a clear path to the cavern. There was a wild roar as all of aspirants rushed forwards not at all ready to waste the opportunity that had been granted to them. And so they went onwards their blood thirst at an all time high.

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