Blade Over Magic

Growth Under Pressure II

A mace descended from above like a meteor, forcing Falael to step back and evade. The mace struck the floor and caused it to explode from the force, but Falael kept her balance and shot forward, her fist rocketing towards the Tetrarach’s center of mass. Yet As her fist neared, it moved its shield in its path.

A devastating impact occurred, yet the usual eruption of starlight and radiation barely happened across a few inches from her fist against the shield before sizzling out, as though canceled by an unseen force.

Falael clicked her tongue and rolled out of the way just as a black and purple magic circle bloomed above her and rained down void lightning. Yet mid-roll, one of the praying skeletons let out an unholy sound, and Falael found her body frozen, stopping her from avoiding the follow up strike of the mace which sent her flying.

Gritting her teeth through the pain, she flipped through the air, and as soon as her feet touched the ground, she exploded forward to meet the Tetrarach’s swing. Then she pivoted under the mace and threw a kick towards one of its legs. Yet the staff wielding skeleton moved, and space warped, making her leg somehow miss by inches while allowing the shield to smash down on her.

She raised her arms to block, but the other praying skeleton let out a sound, this one eerily blissful compared to the the unholy sound the first made, and suddenly she felt her muscles lose their strength, making her block unsuccessful as she was smashed into the ground.

Said ground was then blasted by an unending stream of Void lightning from the staff skeleton, the potency terrifying.

When the onslaught of attacks ended and the dust cleared, Falael could be seen in the crater that had been made, her body curled tightly into a ball as the remnant black and purple electricity sparked across her skin.

Yet despite this, the damage to her was actually pretty minimal.

’What an annoying bastard.’ She thought, straightening her body and standing as she rolled her shoulders to get rid of the stiffness caused by the electricity.

The Void lightning had both features of the lightning element and, naturally, the Void concept imbued in it. Lightning mana had the trait of burning other types of Mana while Void naturally unmade things. Yet Falael seemed more annoyed than anything else.

’The one with the melee weapons uses the concept of Stacking on its mace. With every swing, the power behind it climbs. And it uses the concept of Negation on its shield, nullifying any attack that strikes its surface.’ She looked at the two praying skeletons.

’Both use curses and enhancements. One can place curses on my mana as well as the surrounding concepts around me, and can enhance the same for itself. The other does the same for my physical body and enhances its own body. As for the staff one, its like a standard mage and can utilize several high level spells, though it seems to favor that lightning it has. It’s a real hassle, honestly.’ A moment after having that thought, Aubrey’s voice calmly sounded in her head.

’Can you handle it?’ Falael scoffed.

’I said it’s a hassle. I never said I couldn’t handle it. And besides.’ She cracked her neck and grinned. ’It’s pretty fun. This is probably the first time I didn’t immediately one-shot my target since we got done training.’

’If you say so.’ Aubrey gave a mental shrug and cut the connection, allowing Falael to focus on the the Tetrarach which advanced menacingly towards her.

”Hm, let’s see, then. You’re pretty durable. In that case, you won’t fall apart to quickly now, will you?” She said with a small smile, the halo behind her actually disappearing as she, seemingly, dispelled her current boosted state.

This happened at the same time the Tetrarach swung its mace down, bringing it down directly on her head.

It struck true, a powerful shockwave erupting from the point of impact as Falael’s feet were forced into the ground like she was a nail, and yet...

She was standing.

Blood dripped from the top of her head where she was struck, but she hardly seemed to care as she gave a low laugh.

”Heh, yeah. That’s it.” Her voice sounded from below the mace as her hand came up besides it, gripping the mace head.

Only, the swirling starlight aura around her was no longer pure white, but began to take on a deep blue hue.

”This much should be sufficient, no?” Before the Tetrarach could react properly, it was suddenly pulled forward with terrifying force, only for a blue tinged fist to smash into its chest, unleashing a torrent of blue heat that instantly vaporized the surrounding area while the Tetrarach was blown back like a comet, shooting through the basin in a second and smashing into a mountain peak, causing it to explode violently.

Through the dust, the creature struggled to stand, a glowing blue indentation the shape of a fist in its chest.

But then, a blue tint filled the air while the temperature suddenly soared exponentially, causing the surroundings to start melting, and it looked up just in time to see a blue meteor descending on it.

No, it wasn’t a meteor, it was Falael.

It raised its shield just in time to block the downward swing of her leg. But even with the concept of Negation, the mountain exploded as the Tetrarach was thrown deeper into the earth which promptly combusted into magma and promptly became plasma from the insane heat.

Falael was descending again, but at the last moment, the staff skeleton casted a spell, and space warped as the Tetrarach was teleported away, making Falael hit nothing.

Seeing this, she scoffed and turned around towards where the thing had reappeared.

”Oh, now you’re suddenly runni—” Her words didn’t get to finish as the magic circle the Tetrarach placed right before teleporting activated, creating a spatial seal of overlapping dimensional cubes that encased her.

And yet, not even a second after its formation, it started to warp and melt before exploding violently, revealing Falael whose aura flared.

Her hair and eyes had taken on the same blue color as her aura, her expression more amused than anything else.

She learned a lot about stars from Xander during their time dilation training, and one thing that stuck with her was how there were different types of stars depending on how hot they were, which also meant a stronger gravitational pull and faster nuclear fusion.

Her star was white but already possessed catastrophic power, so what if she applied what she learned and compressed it while also increasing how fast it burned?

The result was this.

Right now, her star was no longer an immolating white, but a deep, terrifying blue color.

It was the beginnings of a skill she long since had in development, and while she wasn’t quite there yet, this was a pretty big step forward. That being said...

’My control is still lacking. Compared to my base state, I’m wasting way too much energy.’ She looked at her hand as watched the blue starlight emitting from her body like vapor. Even though it looked cool, it was actually a sign of insufficient mana control.

One has to remember. When using magic, big attacks don’t necessarily mean stronger, and are usually a sign of lacking control. A mountain sized explosion would deal less damage than a house sized explosion with the same amount of energy. Unless one was intentionally going for scale over potency.

That was one issue with Falael’s path in general. Even though she had the highest output of the main 4 in the group, her raw control was probably the least impressive. But considering the state of her mana, it wasn’t super surprising.

Moreover, this wasn’t something insurmountable. After all, she already showed she was capable of controlling her output by keeping the detonations of her starlight punches confined within a certain area whilst in her base state. It wasn’t a talent thing, she had that. She simply had to train it more.

’And what batter way to train it than with the perfect targeting dummy? What’s more...’ She thought about the Behemoth.

Despite how she’d been fighting those Void creatures while Mary and Keir fought the titanic skeleton, she still put some of her attention on that fight specifically, as such, she saw how the Behemoth attacked and the raw strength contained in each of its blows.

Despite its strikes being capable of shaking this entire pocket dimension, the reality was that the vast majority of its strength was actually contained. If not, this entire place would have likely just exploded after its first strike.

It was quite enlightening, if she were being honest.

And so...

’Let’s try it.’ She took a breath, then entered a stance as she focused on her energy while remembering what she’d seen from the Behemoth...

And attempted to copy it.