Chương 306: A mere instant

"Damn it!" Cala thought as she slid around the shifting maze of force barriers that kept barring her progress through the air, almost colliding with a few segments that had suddenly changed position in an attempt to box her in.

"Damn it all to some blasted netherplane!" One of the Pathbreaker's attacks managed to land while she slid out from another three, the odd projections rippling through the air. At first she had thought that she could use the man's own barriers as cover, a notion that had quickly been disproven as he had brought forth some kind of spear that seemed capable of simply ignoring his own shields, projected attacks or not.

The blow that landed stole more of her mana and life force, and Cala kept swerving and counterattacking even through the slight stunning effect; evasion being her best and only viable option or she'd risk simply being punished in a different fashion. WWJS: Congratulations! Your power [Undeniable] has reached Gold 0. [Undeniable] has gained additional effects. - Undeniable (Balance) - Special ability. Cost: None. Cooldown: None.

Current rank: Gold 0 Effect - Iron: Each time your effects are resisted or do not take effect, deal a small amount of transcendent damage to the target. Examples include an opponent being immune to one of your attacks or damage types, or one of your effects failing to dispel due to a lack of magical effects on the target. Effect - Bronze: The damage is now also dealt when one of your attacks are blocked, such as by a shield, interposed weapon or magical barrier.

Effect - Silver: The damage is increased in proportion to the target's missing stamina or mana, whichever is lower. Effect - Gold: The damage is slightly increased for each time the target has recently suffered damage from this ability, the additional damage capping out at a certain limit.

Cala remained a skirmisher at her core, excelling at hit and run attacks to build up her toxic powers, but she also had enough more spectacular spells to dare to try to use melee rushes of great speed to act as further distractions from her more potent powers. That had quickly proven a risky approach against the man currently striding across the air in pursuit, as each blow Cala had blocked had only further added to a rising stream of transcendent damage.

The intensity had been manageable, but each time whatever power the man possessed had triggered, the flash of blue, gold and silver had increased in potency, and Cala did not want to find out how far it could rise. This, unfortunately left her fighting down both fear and frustration as it felt like she was out of options. If she closed in, she was punished.

Her teleportations were locked down, and even with his seeming lack of accelerating powers, the Pathbreaker could keep up his relentless pursuit and attacks even at the greater ranges now available to them since the innermost layer of constraining arrays had fallen a few minutes back. Her spells were sluggish and started falling apart within that eroding aura of his, and her more potent direct attacks risked being turned against her.

Worse, the Pathbreaker had even started sending the occasional interrupting attack the way of Mistress Sessante, proving that he had apparently not found himself needing to direct his full focus upon Cala.

"Damn you!" Cala snarled, conjuring another set of toxic water tendrils that each struck like scorpion stingers towards her pursuing foe. This at least forced him to stop briefly and use both his barriers and weapons to defend himself, but another swing of his chiming staff sent a wide dispelling pulse through the conjurations, shattering them with a rebounding reward of disrupting force damage.

However, that was also when some of the shimmering smoke all around them - which Ametrine at least had the decency to let Cala see through without effort - condensed into an opportune strike as a thin dagger blade of hazy light formed inside the Pathbreaker's defenses and plunged into his side.

The man did seem to have eyes in the back of his head, managing to somewhat turn the blow, but it was just the kind of distraction Cala needed proving that blasted socialite of a sister of hers to be good for at least something beyond this frustratingly ineffective smoke of hers. She quickly cast a spell to further intensify the venom already eating away at the Pathbreaker's life force before changing directions and dashing in.

Not into true melee range and the punishment that awaited her there, but close enough that her toxic projectiles would be hard to deflect even with his rotating defenses. Ametrine struck again, but this time the Pathbreaker was quick enough for a spectral arm to reach out and snap the hazy blade, causing some kind of effect to rebound back to its caster in the distance as Ametrine's form briefly lit up with transcendent light.

This let Cala slip two more attacks through to further build what meager advantage she had going for her, and she was just about to retreat a bit when she realized the trap she had been goaded into. All of the scattered panes of force that had previously been shifting around them suddenly moved in towards her and the Pathbreaker at once with speed hitherto unseen, closing into a cube around them of around twenty strides per side.

For a pair of iron-rankers, this would have been a limiting but still rather spacious arena. But with the speed of gold-rankers?" Cala immediately dove towards one of the panes of force, conjuring one of her most potent spikes with shield-corroding poison covering it to punch through the trap and escape even though it cost her precious mana.

Contrary to what she had previously learned of the Pathbreaker, he had proven quite capable of whittling away at her life force too, but it was mana that he had truly devoured from her during their clashes. But as long as Cala could create some distance and at least not be stuck with him, then she should have a chance to– Cala's spike struck the segment of barrier only for her to almost slam violently into it as the conjured implement failed to punch through.

Even as she briefly transitioned into part-liquid to absorb the impact and change direction, Cala could see that the barrier had indeed cracked somewhat, but not as much as it felt like it should have, but a glance around proved that all of the others had been damaged to a similar extent as well. WWJS: Congratulations! Your power [Leyline Warding] has reached Gold 0. [Leyline Warding] has gained additional effects. - Leyline Warding (Wall) -" Wall" Spell. Cost: Moderate mana. Cooldown: 30s.

Current rank: Gold 0 Effect - Iron: Create a solid, translucent barrier anchored to a surface. The length and height can be split among multiple sections. Only one casting of this spell can be active at a time. Strength of barrier increases with the [Power] attribute Effect - Bronze: Barriers no longer need to be anchored to a surface.

Effect - Silver: This ability gains a separate, alternate mode of casting, which allows the user to continually create smaller segments of barrier around them without a chant, changing the cost to low mana per second. These barriers have good carrying capacity, but will immediately disperse when attacked and can only be conjured very close to the caster. This alternate mode may be used even while the original is in effect.

Effect - Gold: Upon casting, the user may now choose to have parts of or the whole of the conjured barrier share damage dealt to it, no matter if it is made in one whole or in different segments. Cala only had a moment to readjust her tactics before the Pathbreaker was upon her, one swift sprint through the air carrying him into close melee range.

Weapons of white jade started to descend upon her in a relentless barrage, switching up pure contact strikes with those projected attacks as weapons came and went from whatever dimensional storage the man possessed. Cala countered as best she could while she kept moving away, filling the now enclosed space with her toxic fumes in an attempt to use the constraints to some kind of benefit, but there simply wasn't enough space to move around properly.

Even as purple veins had started appearing to complement the glowing tattoos across the Pathbreaker's face, he seemed unperturbed or at least confident in his ability to outlast her. A swift dual stab with her wielded toxic spikes was punished as thoroughly as before, if not worse, because conjuring them again so many times had now started taking its toll in more ways than mere mana expenditure. WWJS: Congratulations! Your power [Pattern-Shattering Counter] has reached Gold 0.

[Pattern-Shattering Counter] has gained additional effects. - Pattern-Shattering counter (Shards) - Special attack (Mana drain, stamina drain). Cost: Varies. Cooldown: None. Current rank: Gold 0 Effect - Iron: Strike an opponent's active attack or magical effect in an attempt to negate it and drain an additional amount of mana and/or stamina, depending on which energy was fueling the attack.

Some ongoing or very powerful effects might not be negated entirely, and will instead be suppressed or reduced for a short duration. Cost increases with the cost of the negated attack. Effect - Bronze: Dispelled effects suffer an increase in cooldown in proportion to their cost and original cooldown. The minimum cooldown for such an effect is 10s. Effect - Silver: The target suffers transcendent damage proportional to the potency of the dispelled magical effect.

Effect - Gold: The target is afflicted by an instance of the [Shattered Pattern] affliction linked to the ability that was dispelled (if applicable). [Shattered Pattern] (affliction, magic, stacking): This affliction is linked to a specific power or ability. When the afflicted uses the linked ability while under this effect, they suffer an instance of transcendent damage proportional to the cost of the magical effect.

This affliction cannot deal damage again until the same power has gained another instance of the affliction, but the damage dealt increases with each instance. Even with her increased mana pool - courtesy of her elven racial gifts - Cala was really starting to feel the strain. Her body wasn't in much better state either, the negated healing and constant barrage of various damaging powers and chunks of transcendent damage leaving her riddled with glowing cracks beneath her combat robes.

This last sundering of her weapons caused something within Cala's spirit to crack, the fear that had been steadily rising suddenly ripping loose from its mental constraints. She was a gold-ranker, a league apart from the vast majority of people in this world. She was meant for greatness inside her church. She couldn't fall here. Couldn't. She had to get out. Away. Anywhere. Anywhere but here. Stolen novel; please report.

A frenzied motion had Cala create a few meters of distance for a moment; enough to unleash her most devastating spell." Plunge into the depths of vitriol and toxin, oh offering to the great corrosion!" A sea of venom burst from Cala's form, filling up the inside of the force cube in an instant before shattering the constraining barriers.

The Pathbreaker was enveloped in the expanding spell domain, one that would deal heavy ongoing damage that was further increased for each poison affliction the affected was already suffering from. Normally, most opponents would be slow moving husks by now, allowing the domain to work as an area finisher as they would be trapped, but the Pathbreaker had been frustratingly resistant to the movement reduction that would normally accompany Cala's spells.

Now, her most potent power was instead used as a mere diversion and smoke screen as Cala shot off in a random direction. Anywhere that was away from the Pathbreaker. Anywhere that did not lead to her demise.

"Dissolve the patterns of power!" Cala felt her spell mostly disperse in her wake, but did not look back as she shot towards the outer layers of their trapping arrays that were still standing. Away from the battle. Away from that coward Ametrine and the mistress who still fought. Away– Then there was a surge of the Pathbreaker's aura, followed by what sounded like a flap of giant wings. And after that, only darkness.

Ametrine glanced up from where she had been guiding several of the unseen blades inside her smoke to strike and harry Obsidian Crow, who fought with Altessia in an increasingly frantic series of blitzing attacks. Cala probably needed the assistance more, but ever since she had been closed inside that barrier cube there had been little Ametrine could do unless she was willing to get up close. Which she definitely was not.

But the shattering of that cube of force caused Ametrine's attention to be drawn back to that part of the conflict. She felt Cala shooting away, her aura unstable both from injury and emotion while leaving behind an intense toxic domain which had emerged from within the cube like a sphere of death. But a moment later another sphere expanded inside it, eating away a good chunk of it as the Pathbreaker used his frustrating dispelling powers to shatter the magic of the priestess.

He was also glowing with the fading light of some kind of potent self replenishment power, seeming to undo most of the damage and poison Cala had managed to leverage upon him. Even as Ametrine was about to redirect her attention towards him once more, a few things happened in a succession rapid enough that it could only stem from a previously agreed upon plan. The Pathbreaker's aura surged in a brief pulse that all but screamed 'now!'

, and in the next instant Obsidian Crow suddenly vanished from where he had been clashing with Altessia. The foreigner priestess seemed to understand that this was no ordinary reposition, shooting off towards Cala's position in a dash of screeching metal only to come to a sudden and abrupt halt when the Pathbreaker crashed into her from the side which sent Altessia tumbling off course for an instant before righting herself. But as it turned out, that instant made all the difference.

A pair of midnight wings unfolded, stretching out far enough to seem to blanket the sky for a moment as the form of Obsidian Crow - who had appeared above the fleeing Cala - was enveloped by a much larger image of a dark bird that devoured all the light around it while spreading a murky haze.

As soon as it appeared, it descended in a vicious dive that ended with its long, dark beak impaling Cala through the back, causing the bird to vanish and leave Obsidian Crow in its place, the dark claw of his left hand making a ripping motion.

"Thieving Magpie Steals the Heart." The hand that had appeared in place of the impaling beak retracted, and with it came a flickering red image akin to a hazy heart. Then the claws flexed shut, and Cala's budding scream was abruptly cut short as her body was torn apart much as if a much larger clawed hand had done the same to her, each segment disintegrating into shadowy fibers that joined the flickering threads around the Tengu clansman.

"No!" Altessia's scream was joined by her aura blasting outwards in pure fury and loss while Ametrine mostly felt the chill of shock pass through her system before the calm rationality of her mind swept it away. Several of Altessia's metal blades were suddenly turned towards the nearby Pathbreaker, who was forced on the defensive by the sudden onslaught even though he seemed to manage disturbingly well as some of her incoming attacks soon began to unravel.

Ametrine was also extremely aware of the fact that there were now two combat-competent gold-rankers on the field against their one, as she herself had no illusions of her own capabilities. Ametrine did pride herself in being perceptive and extremely hard to pin down if she put her mind to it, but this kind of open combat was not where she thrived, and she knew it.

Fortunately, Altessia also seemed lucid enough to recognize this fact, waiting until Obsidian Crow closed in once more before creating a proper diversion. One of her familiars - a long mass of discordant energies that had previously been engaging the Pathbreaker's companion high above - was called back to her side before unceremoniously detonating in a spectacular discharge.

For a moment, it felt like space itself was starting to break down as the concepts present in a wide sphere around the exploding familiar started clashing wildly with one another. Ametrine could make out both the Pathbreaker's and Obsidian Crow's distorted forms inside even as Altessia shot out of the field while calling her last familiar back to her.

What was worrisome, however, was how she could also see the Pathbreaker moving even through the hazardous spatial breakdown, and as he seemed to have some way to lock down dimensional movement, Ametrine did not wait to see if her sister in faith made it, stepping back through her portal while her concealment still held firm. Fortunately, Altessia emerged a mere two seconds behind her, and Ametrine made sure to close the dimensional gate with a wave of her hand the moment after.

Their foes would have to be brave to the point of stupidity to charge into an unknown portal, but if today had shown them anything, it was that the forces arrayed against them had arranged for a lot more in the years since the Grand Proving than they had previously assumed possible. crash Altessia punched her hand through the nearby wall with a silent snarl that echoed in her aura, sending splinters of the old and venerable wooden building flying everywhere.

Ametrine was about to say something when the other gold-ranker turned and looked at her, her helmet retracting to show eyes filled with grief and fury in equal measure.

"Call the others."

"I-""Call the others. And our allies already in place here in the capital," Altessia said, speaking over Ametrine as if she wasn't even there.

"This changes everything. The timetable is off. We need to start making preparations with what we've got. Now."

"What? Now? Do you have any idea how long we have been preparing for this project, the delicate balances in place–" Ametrine began, but an armored hand closing around her throat once more caused her to fall silent even as she took some pride in keeping her equilibrium and calm posture even in the face of physical coercion.

"Do not let your misguided sense of ownership for this grand undertaking blind you to what just happened," Altessia replied softly, even though her aura still raged with the same emotions as before.

"They have gained not one, but two gold-rankers in the last year. Both now confirmed to be actively working against us."

"But with our allies–""Those are the only reason we still hold an upper hand right now. And if we wait the final year for all of the preparations to be finalized to the letter, who knows what else our opponents might be able to produce? The allies they might call upon? Favors they call in? They killed Cala, Ametrine. Something Obsidian Crow alone has been unable to do so far. But that other one? That is the one called the Pathbreaker?"

"Yes."

"He is too dangerous to be left to his devices, especially now that he still lives after seeing us. The way he can trap and suppress is too much of a threat. We start our final preparations one month from now. Start activating and preparing your assets. Use that little King of yours. Anything we can accomplish. The project is close enough to completion for us to begin. It will not be as perfect as imagined, but if our foes can use this loss of ours to start to truly push, picking our assets apart one by one?

That could risk it all. Now go." Altessia punctuated her words by literally throwing Ametrine out the door of her office, the other woman caught by a shroud of shimmering smoke and landing on her feet just as said door was slammed close. A mere instant did indeed hold the potential for such devastating change. Kite swung in seven simultaneous strikes the moment he broke free from the tumultuous sphere that had followed the detonation of the odd familiar.

Implacable motion had helped him make more rapid progress through the strangely distorting distances and destructive energies, leaving him in decent shape given the circumstances where the lingering recovery of Immortality was quickly repairing the damage to his body.

Its silver-ranked effect that cleansed even that which was usually resistant to such removal was once more a godsend, but even being in good shape once more had not let him move fast enough, as his projected strikes only impacted the lingering wisps of dissolving smoke which was all that remained of the portal.

Seeing that their enemies had already escaped, Kite did not dwell any further upon that at the moment as he instead sped around the still lingering discordant hazard that showed little sign of dying down on its own at the moment. A few scattered traces of aura that leaked from a patch of darkness within let Kite find the correct spot before he swung Immutable Echo, channeling a good chunk of mana into Disrupting Strike.

This scattered a chunk of the sphere into stray mana, not unlike an apple someone had just taken a bite out of, but as the discordant energies proved hard to affect even for Kite's powers, he had to make three additional strikes before finally reaching Obsidian Crow. Or at least Kite had assumed that the dark cocoon of shadow threads was his companion, proven correct as they fell apart to reveal the Assassin; slightly disheveled but in decent enough condition given the circumstances.

Obsidian Crow nodded once in thanks before the two of them set off into the surroundings to help the silver-rankers from the Tengu clan to take down the three remaining agents of Discord. Two of the assassins had fallen, though Kite had not possessed focus to spare to know if it had been through the actions of their foes or simply the fallout of being caught too close to gold-ranked conflict.

This soon left them with three unconscious, collared and thoroughly tied up silver-rankers once they finally found themselves with a moment of proper quiet.

"The others? How did they retreat?" Obsidian Crow asked, turning towards Kite who in turn had been eyeing the devastated forest around them where patches of potent venom still lingered like pools of corruption that ate into the life force of the nature around it.

"The portal," Kite sighed.

"I was not fast enough, and with my dispelling wave unavailable, I probably could not have brought it down in time anyway. But still… I was so close to actually getting a visual on them. If I could, one of them would not have been able to escape so readily."

"Given their sudden reinforcements, I would say that one target taken down is something to celebrate," Obsidian Crow noted, glancing towards where his clansmen were taking care of their own dead.

"A good balance to that which remains to mourn."

"My deepest condolences to you and your family."

"Such is the life of combat and danger. They will be remembered, both for what they accomplished in life as well as the cause for which they died," Obsidian Crow replied while bowing briefly in thanks.

"However, the rest of the evaluation is best taken elsewhere. Given how we had to properly unleash our auras this close to the capital, I would be surprised if there weren't people on their way to investigate the commotion from the nearby sects. At least we can depart in triumph, Kite. We got one of them, after all. Hopefully the first of many." As Glint had already drawn close, ready to carry them back north, Kite couldn't help but agree. Victory. Even though it had cost their side, they had prevailed.

Their first true strike against the heart of Discord's plot had removed what would no doubt have been a key player, as any gold-ranker would be in a conflict of this level, as well as giving them some tells and identifying features of two others. Kite may not have gotten a good look at the one conjuring the shimmering smoke, but it was at least something. And, perhaps most gratifying to his budding ambitions, he and his path had made a difference. Just like he had prayed that he would be able to.

"The first of many, indeed." Anasta's face did not shift in the slightest as she read the report in her hands, but to Maximilian - her long time deputy - the slight shift in her aura that she thought nobody would detect was enough to give it away.

"Something concerning?" he asked from where he sat at another desk nearby. Even as gold-rankers, none of them were immune to the glorious and venerable tradition of paperwork. At least it was done rather quickly given their general speed and quickness of thought.

"Something has changed…" Anasta muttered, brows actually furrowing this time as her facade had already been seen through.

"Oh?" Maximilian prompted, knowing that his friend and superior would not make such a statement lightly.

"There has been a change in the pattern these last few days. Small hints that things are moving while we haven't seen even so much as a wink of their gold rank hunter. And yet it feels like some shifts are moving closer than ever before. Conflicts. Open, small ones, are blossoming even more than during the Proving. I would not have seen it had I not been forced to stick my nose into these reports each day for the last few years."

"It might just be happenstance, but…" Maximillian noted, feeling like it had to be said even though he did not believe it completely himself.

"It might… But it might also be related to that disturbance three days ago. That one which we have yet to receive any solid report on. Hopefully, Obsidian Crow will manage to send one of his people soon."

"Your tone tells me that you do not intend to simply sit around and wait for that."

"With the stakes we are working with? Not that chance. Those communications about reinforcements or some kind of assistance from the Continental Council might be glacially slow, but I fortunately do not need to match them. If you would please help me send a message to high priest Venerable Owl to meet me at this convenience? When in doubt about mysterious happenings, Lady Knowledge and her people might be able to give some hints. Maximilian?"

"Yes, Anasta?"

"I have a bad feeling about this. Please make all the preparations you can, and tell the others to do the same."

"Of course, Anasta. May Fortune keep us in her good graces."

"Oh, I'm not sure that the Goddess might have as much time to spare us these days as we'd like," Anasta said, her voice carrying a hint of finality as she laid the reports aside and rose from her desk.

"Given the forces that are behind the foes arranged against us, I suspect that all the gods who watch over the cities and kingdoms of man will have their hands full in the times to come."