Chapter One-Hundred Ninety
The Harbinger
The Harbinger glares across the battlefield at the opposing force. Rage threatens to overwhelm it, but it cant let itself fall to that. There are three scions arranged against it, as well as an army of mixed denizens. Seeing the opposition, it has to admit the least are not to blame for having failed to overrun everything.Ñøv€lRapture marked the initial hosting of this chapter on Ñôv€lß¡n.
It can taste the mana of the surface forces, and there may be as many as four dungeons fighting together. A large portion of the denizens are from one dungeon, along with at least two denizen types from a different one. The fewer numbers feel older, so it will have to be careful around them.
The scions all feel fairly young, at least. The wolf is the leader of the forces, and so probably from the oldest dungeon. Loath as it is to admit, the Harbinger is at a disadvantage when it comes to forces. With the wide variety of denizens, he can only rely on the numbers of the least, and the wolf across the field has taken great steps to limit that advantage. For whatever reason, the wolf seems to be trying to hide its origin, but the Harbinger can feel its true source differs from everything else present.
The bee scion has traces of some other dungeon on it as well, perhaps as some ploy to make the Harbinger underestimate the forces. The Harbinger grins at the scions having to drop the facade and embrace their titles. Most of the forces are from a young dungeon, so pretending to be so inexperienced could have been a gambit that would have paid off, if not for its own presence here.
The strength of the denizens are bolstered by the wolf, and guided by the information from the bee. Without those two, the denizens should fall easily. The lich scion also seems to be trying to hide its source, but it cant hide its weakness. The wolf and bee have embraced their titles, but the lich has not, so it must not have any.
Four dungeons, two sending only denizens, one sending two scions, and one last one sending the wolf scion. Destroy the wolf, and the others will follow. Without their Leader of the Pack, they will fall before the Harbinger.
It flexes its mind affinity and starts directing the least, its affinity making it trivial to handle the immense rush of information from the senses of the least. The cavern is a mess and it will be more difficult to join the fray properly, but the numbers of openings mitigates that somewhat.
The Harbinger roars and the wolf howls, and the tides of forces rush to meet each other. But the Harbinger is capable of so much more than just directing the least. It flexes its mind affinity once more, seeking to confuse and disable the forces of the surface.
The leading edge of wolves and bears stumble for a moment, before a soothing buzz settles over them, the Seeker of Truth girding their minds against the assault. The Harbinger may need to remove that one before it can focus on the wolf.
Searing pain pulls its focus back to itself, and it sees the denizens arent limited to only the surface after all. Magma wyrms harass the Harbinger and the least still in the cavern, even as the mammalian denizens clash on the surface. The least have difficulty dealing with the wyrms, as the odd dragons can burst from the earth with little warning, and dive back into it just as quickly. The Harbinger, however, can easily deal with such pests.
Minds are so simple to detect, even with the unique biology of the wyrms. Those minds the Harbinger cant crush find themselves crushed more literally in its tentacles when they try to attack.
Thats not all the coalition of dungeons has to throw at it, however. Before it can truly savor the pain of the worms in its mental and physical grip, elemental attacks rain upon the tentacled scion. It roars, destroying some wyrms and tossing aside others, before it regains control of itself. Even that small lapse lets the coalition drive the least back some, and forces the Harbinger to do more than simply direct the least.
It drags itself towards the front, even as it snuffs the minds of the fliers and hands that get too close. Its a devious tactic of the surface dwellers, to take advantage of the open space to attempt to attack with impunity, but the Harbinger is no least to be picked off from afar. Nor are the least to be underestimated in melee, especially with the Harbingers direction and assistance.
The bee cant blunt the intrusive thoughts as thoroughly as before, and so the wolf and lich both are having their own focus tested as they try to avoid not only grasping tentacles and shrieking mouths, but maddening thoughts whispering at the edge of their consciousness.
The wolf slips up first. Just a little nudge to try slipping through a few tentacles, a whisper that hes fast enough, the Harbinger has lost its focus the wolf doesn't see the wide maw until its too late.
The bee follows a few moments after, the grief giving the Harbinger all the opening it needs to capture the diminutive scion in a tentacle and crush her.
The Harbinger laughs like a chorus of the damned as the sandstorm disperses, leaving it and the lich standing alone. This battle is all but won, now. It could torture the weak lich to death, but it has so much to do. No, its a better show of its dominance to simply snuff its mind, then move on to the denizens huddling under the ground now.
It reaches for the mind of the lich, only to find the attack batted aside. With a snarl, it repeats the attack, but the defenses move, letting the attack hit only air. Only when it turns its full attention on the lich does it realize a difference.
Its embraced its title. The Affinity Savant glares at the Harbinger, teeth grinding and fists clenching around the staff. Very well then, little lich. Tentacles and teeth should be more than enough to remove the final obstacle in the Harbingers path.
Whips of flesh with perversions of mouths lash at the enemy scion, yet they find no purchase. The lich almost seems to dance around the attacks, avoiding harm with little apparent effort. More attacks pile on, and one finally makes contact.
The Harbinger reels from the burst of mana. The attacking tentacle should have snapped the staff in half, yet the tentacle now lays as shattered ice, the connected tissue cauterized through to the ground.
Not even the Redcap ever struck a blow like that to the Harbinger! It surges forward in a tide of teeth and flailing tentacles, intending to rip the lich apart for its insolence, and confident its low on mana after an attack like that.
The very air around the lich vibrates as it proves the Harbinger wrong, giving it a name to put to the devastating attack.
Resonance Cascade.
The leading edge of the Harbinger shatters into ice as it feels force ripple through its entire self again. It tries to regenerate the damage, but the waves of power keep coming, keep striking and building more and more damage. The edges of the Harbinger keep shattering, and the wild movements of its entire body only keep growing more and more erratic. It bellows in pain as a piece tears itself away from the wild undulations, and its many eyes can see the fragment get incinerated to ash a moment later.
It feels more and more of itself torn asunder by the rampaging waves through its entire being. Its vaguely aware of each rent piece being burnt to cinders, but its difficult to concentrate through the pain of its body tearing itself apart. Somehow, it manages to focus on the lich, and it almost wishes it hadnt.
Heat shimmers around the lich, baffling the Harbinger for how it could have that much mana to produce such an attack as this. As the heat condenses into the final portion of the attack, the Harbinger gets only one hint as to how it could be possible: the lich had a second title to embrace.
No Kid Gloves is seared into its mind as its flesh is seared away. It will have to try to consider the meaning of the strange title after it respawns.
