Abyssal Road Trip

From a distant perch, Julia observed the efforts already underway to clear the collapsed Temple. Figures circled the rubble, and sections floated free, or sometimes the stone liquified before it flowed away. The work detail, from what Analysis told her, comprised Demons and mortal Priests alike. Besides the common Dretch providing raw muscle power, there were Demons she’d never seen before adding to the list Julia had encountered within the Abyss.

Like the Succubi entertaining Setau, all the Demons she observed were from regions of the Abyssal plane Àluga. Red squid entities with ridged hides set with metallic spines floated above the debris. A swarm of long tentacles extended from each one's lower body, casting spells or plucking body fragments for a snack from among the rubble. Analysis showed them as Xhaliáma, and all the ones Julia spotted had possessed a wizard class with a combination of Air, Earth and Water affinities. Though occasionally there were Xhaliáma with extras, all possessed the same initial three.

[Name: Quil'qon

Demonic Species: Xhaliáma

Class: Wizard

Level: 6 / 40

Health: 799

Mana: 5,856

Melee Attack Power: 61

Magic: 78

Defence: 34

Combat Skills: Grapple [Ad] (2), Bite [Ad] 1, Various spell forms - Air, Earth, Water

Details: Xhaliáma are native to the oceans of Àluga and a few other Planes with large bodies of highly salted water. Though innate Flight allows members of this species to operate in the open air or overland, they prefer to settle and live in aquatic environments. Their class progression tends towards various forms of casters, of which the Wizard class is racially preferred.]

While they worked, a group of semi-humanoid demons called Kralcí served as guards setting a perimeter that extended outwards from the rubble. The troops made for a strange sight, and Julia watched their headless forms set up in a wide circle around the top of the Pyramid’s plateau. The setup making it clear they planned to stay sometime. With large clusters patrolling about as if to offer quick support to the perimeter line. Sheathed in armour fashioned of golden scales, not a centimetre of flesh was visible.

They presented very distorted figures beyond the missing head. Whenever they moved, their odd gait showed knees bending in reverse. Instead of a single forearm extending from where a human elbow would be, they possessed dual forearms; supported by a softball-sized elbow joint and bloated shoulders. They had a stocky build, broader than any human, yet barely more than Julia’s petite mortal form in height. Thick legs ended in long sickle-shaped claws that anchored them at toe and heel alike.

The armour provided no sign of how it unsealed or anywhere that looked like eyes or mouths on their bodies. The majority armed with polearms, and they constantly shifted the weapons between their four hands as they moved about. However, smaller groups armed with massive crossbows kept a station closer to the Temple. Except for the business end of weapons, the makers had sheathed those in the same golden scales. Yet regardless of weaponry, all were uniformly fighter with no variation in their level or combat skills, and nameless, they moved with eerily synchronised motions.

[Demonic Species: Kralcí

Class: Fighter

Level: 8 / 42

Health: 1,239

Mana: 0

Melee Attack Power: 97

Ranged Attack Power: 112

Defence: 68

Combat Skills: Polearm [M] (3), Ballista Bow [M](1), Daggers [Ad] (5)

Details: The Kralcí are a predatory species that spawn on several planes and operate in units that meld to form a Hive Mind. It is rare to find units operating independently of service to a greater power. Till their destruction, they will always remain in service of whatever entity dominated them at the time of their pod's spawning. Units will only take on new members at this Master’s command, and all members blend their skills and experience. This Hive Mind is native to Àluga and is part of Set's armies garrisoned on that plane.]

Groups of Xhaliáma that moved near or among the Kralcí drew open hostility. The nearest Kralcí would turn on mass whenever Xhaliáma drew near, and weapons that were always in hand raised ready for instant use. When their course seemed intent to bring them within tentacle reach, the entire group of Kralcí would focus on them as if about to spring. Whenever it occurred, the squids would abort whatever they were doing to move away in clear haste. The change in the patrol's pattern afterwards made it clear the Kralcí hadn’t accidentally crossed paths with them.

[Sense Motive [Ap] (20->21)]

Even working on the same side, they do nothing truly together.

((Indeed, trust only yourself. ))

Are you also going to tell me I can’t trust you?

Julia couldn't keep the frustration from her mental voice, annoyed beyond words that she'd let her guard down with Usd'ghi, only to feel B's link eating the emotion.

{{Of course we can’t. He takes orders from the fellow that okayed our death. }}

((I can act on no order as I am, but regardless I can give you no help beyond words. ))

Groups of the Xhaliáma across the plateau looked to be busy setting runes across its top. When it became clear, the process was them setting wards, Julia changed form and Teleported, placing herself in the honeycombed chamber. Momentarily secured within the room, Julia sent an update to Yngvarr.

“Epochē has become a Demigoddess. Currently in the Necropolis, waiting for things to settle, the first phase done. Staircase results were excellent for destruction, but reinforcements are clearing debris and setting wards in place. I hope all is well.”

[Mercury’s whisper [Ap] (4->5)]

With Mercury’s whisper cast towards Yngvarr, the progress notification Julia could only hope was a sign that he’d received it.

When Julia drifted down the shaft towards the circuit, the noise of Demonic thoughts brushed against her Telepathy’s net. More Xhaliáma were on the ledges and stairs, clearing up debris and setting wards. Not reaching into the nearby minds, rather Julia let Telepathy and Harmony sip the broadcast noise of thoughts. Details seeping through as the Xhaliáma focused on setting wards within the Temple.

It quickly became clear they had misunderstood the attack as they set wards to block against human, elves, celestial, and elemental forces. The ball bearings had ended up melted and smeared across the debris, and the result misdirected the Demonic attention with the material’s nature. Where Julia had intended the balls to both distract and become projectiles within the Shockwave. The Demons' minds made it clear they believed its presence showed the incident was a revenge attack by forces from the material plane.

These reinforcements weren’t planning to stay, rather they were just to secure the structure. They were intent on returning home once done and other Dedicated had arrived through a Portal. With the details she picked from their minds, Julia extended her plan further and set about to wait.

{{Look, it’s a magic mushroom, sitting in the dark and feeding herself bullshit. }}

Julia rolled her eyes at the acidic edge in B's mental voice.

Gee, thanks.

{{Meditating and practice in mini-me form. This is you avoiding thinking about how fucked up things are. }}

{{Dancing! You could practice that. Erotic dancing is the closest skill I found.}}

You can see skills as well. So what dance of the seven veils? I’d prefer to meditate, but I agree to learn dance.

We’ll split the practice time while eavesdropping on their activities and plans. You better not make me regret this B.

Julia felt for the skill name B had provided, mentally spending a point to start things off.

[Erotic Dance (1)]

{{Yes!!! Not seven veils, more like some of those got talent clips Rach showed you. I bet you will make eyes pop out.}}

Fuck. The stuff that looked like gymnastic floor routines mixed with pole dance style teasing?

At B's bubbling excitement, Julia sighed and started practicing, all the while keeping a mental ear out for any intent from the Xhaliáma to depart.

The Xhaliáma named Quilsa was glad to be out of the Necropolis' dry air and return to its home within the fortress Setimet. As they drifted through the wards of their chambers, the echo of their entry was strange; almost as if the barrier had sensed a guest entering with them. Its lazy, self-indulgent leanings towards learning magic to bully pod mates and lesser species not helping it in the slightest. They had no time for their lazy thoughts to puzzle the meaning. A piece of dust that had hitched a ride suddenly grew to encapsulate them. In form a skin-tight iron maiden that didn’t even allow the explosions of blood caused by spikes laden with Ki and blackness to leak away. Quilsa’s concentration fractured by its unseen enemy’s willpower. It proved unable to get its focus past the sensation of having its shell repeatedly ripped away.

[Combat Summary

Xhaliáma x1

Demonic Shards gained: 1

Total experience to distribute: 2,352

Monk: +1,171

Succubus: +1,171

Protean [Ad](24->25)

Silent Kill (2->3)

]

Julia reformed to appear in a Sisterhood official body and drifted in mid-air within the entry hall, experimentation having revealed ways to set shapes without the tattoo showing across her stomach. Her vivid memories of Naz’rilca had allowed her to form the lush body contained within the leathers of the Order’s official uniform. With the remains of the Xhaliáma absorbed into inventory, she studied the wards, wondering why they weren’t reacting to her presence.

I need to learn more, I didn’t spot the wards till it drifted through its door's energy. Why did they treat me as a guest? Were they lazy in how they set the wards up or something else? Setau’s wards as well let me in easily. Let’s see if they let me back out.

Teleport carried Julia back out to the corridor, testing the wards of home and fortress alike. When she reappeared without issue, Julia started retracing the route to the Portal room Quilsa had used on their return. Telepathy drifting in a net to learn about the interior of the fortress. With two spare jars of Nisnohe, Julia was intent to make the best use of them. The air in the corridor was ripe with the odour of brine, every surface encrusted with a salty residue.

While exploring Julia moved past an exterior balcony which explained much with the rolling black sea filling the horizon. Ships of a strange quad hull design floated nearby, anchored with their red sails furled. The crews that Julia could see about the decks from her vantage appeared to be species nearly physically identical to the Kralcí. Though none of them wore the golden scale and lacked the long sickle claws on their feet.

Analysis showed they were a species called Kralqui and showed them with the classes of Sailor and Warrior spread in level from the mid-20s to high 40s. Their minimal clothing had most of each crew member's light green flesh exposed to air. If the Kralci were a similar species, it answered why their armour lacked openings for eyes or mouth. Since the Kralqui form seemed to have neither, they wore broad loins clothes and not much else there wasn’t space to hide them. Large deep scars formed an X crossing the chest of all the crew that she could see. Whatever injury had caused them had left almost identically shaped marks.

Her form changed again, and a new Xhaliáma drifted back along the corridors to the Portal. Once in the general area, Julia set about exploring the passages above it, hoping to find a suitable spot. Once she got things set up, Julia was looking forward to having some fun.

A faint scuffing sound on the stone behind it caused the Kralcí to turn in place. The Succubus’ features were welcome enough to its senses before it noticed the wings' jagged spikes, instead of the singular dagger point on the main joint. Julia learnt they could indeed speak as a wave of sound bellowed out from its chest. A step put her in close and an open hand deflected a blow from its closest limb and drove an elbow strike wreathed in power into its chest. The Kralcí tried to step back with the motion and lower its horns towards her in return.

#Sisterhood Agent#

The thought came across loud from the Kralcí’s monitored thoughts and Julia felt distant minds respond. Julia spun under its horns and pressing her back against its body, grabbed the horns and used their leverage to flip it over her shoulder. Muscles groaning under the weight of it made her glad for having put free points into strength. The impact of metallic scales against stone rang the air even as its hands released its weapon and struck towards her face. Its forceful blows reverberated against the black flames that guarded her flesh, even as return blows broke through its armour and wrecked flesh rained down. As its mental death cries rippled through to the rest of its unit, Julia rose to her feet. Quickly snatching up the broad crested dagger from its belt and storing it, she spun away. Julia fled the scene with haste, the sound of every booted impact deliberately ringing loud on the stone, the notification of its death ignored.

[Combat Summary

Kralcí’s x1

Demonic Shards gained: 1

Total-experience to distribute: 2,892

Monk: +2,169

Succubus: +723

Ki Strike [Ad] (44->45)]

The room door burst open, and Julia froze in apparent shock. The floor slick with syrup-like fluid shimmered in the lights the guards held aloof, and a wave of fumes rolled out the door. Julia flowed upright with a teasing smile, and daggers appeared in her hands, their lights reflecting off the emblems of the Order.

[Acting [Ap] (25->26)]

Only one? Did I mess up the smile?

“Your Order will pay,”

Even as the air rumbled with the Kralcí’s words, Julia reappeared past the patrol along the corridor’s junction. The trailing guard spun with no cue needed; attacks from its polearm stabbed and slashed. Yet the guard had no advantage other than its weapon’s length, and the corridor didn’t allow full use of it. The narrow corridors in this section only letting it fight one on one robbed it of numbers to overwhelm. Julia focused on Harmony and Battle trance in defence as she kept to her plan and watch for a glimpse of fumes spreading across stone for what came next. A stab slid along Julia’s turning hip and sparked off an emblem. As it landed in the fumes unheaded by her attacker, flame wicked through the saturated air to ignite both the passageway and room she’d exited.

Guards screamed as burning fumes ate through armour, continued into flesh and bone. With Julia’s immunity, the flames didn’t even warm her skin. While the patrols’ Demonic fortitude aided their attempts to get clear, the floor shuddered, and its collapse spilled most of the patrol into the room below. Burning fumes and syrup having eaten through the stone, yet they were still burning when they hit the floor of the portal room beneath. Inlaid runes set with precious metals and gems didn’t fare any better against the Nisnohe's consuming heat.

Julia had fled the flames and as a sole guard surged after she spun again, deflecting the pike’s blade aside, a planned casting unneeded. The first attack she used in the confrontation was a spinning heel kick. It caught the guard off balance with its sudden force and smashed him into the wall outside the burning flames. A deep snarl rumbled from it as it surged upright and found the Succubus somehow gone. Wards in the area that the guard was sure would stop the Succubus Teleporting away, having proved useless in preventing its escape. Its focus fell on a piece of metal gleaming on the ground as it got to its feet. Thick fingers picked up an emblem that showed its weapon’s mark and clenched tight about it. With its weapons secured in its other hands, it left the fire below to others' care and raced off to bring it to the commander. Completely unaware of the dust that dropped from its leg and vanished once it was clear of the inner wards.

Her return to the Necropolis and entry into the Pyramid went as smoothly as previous journeys. Exploring the stairs showed the new Dedicated reinforcements were present, but Julia avoided messing around with them any further. Instead, returning to the honeycombed chamber, she set about making some adjustments. The circuit she had cut above the dome was raised to above the chamber’s top nearly all about the circuit, only thin regular sections securing the cylinder in the middle to the circuit’s exterior. In each honeycomb niche, she burrowed finger wide shafts downwards till they breached the dome’s top. As the expansion continued, the extra stone joined the material from the earlier excavations.

Then new steel canisters filled with the dwarven fluid were positioned, latched tightly onto the edges, and into extra spots carved around the airshafts. Each adding time as Julia had to wait far longer to heal than from any cloth, testing the valves positioned in the base and top of each to ensure it would be worth the wait. The planned payload at the end was lighter by a jar, its contents used in coating lines down each shaft and along the bottom of the circuit.

With the work complete at last, Julia stood in the passage watching the Ankh as another Soul approached it. At the sight of fumes leaking out of the edges of stone caps, she cast a flame shield positioned to ignite both sides at once. Stone about her shuddered and groaned, and as Julia retreated further from the artifact, the passageway in front of her dropped. A long moment after the dome's peak forced the Ankh downwards, the top of the cylinder, its edges lit with burning rock, raced past.

Burning fumes and droplets filled the air as the air through the shaft raced upwards through the canister's valves. Air pressure forcing the fluid out through the nozzles on their top. The extra fluid adding to the inferno that sprayed towards the walls, and she could only hope across the forces on the many ledges. The stones above no longer supported soon began plunging afterwards, and Julia soaked in a spray of burning fluid teleported away. So high up that only eagle eyes provided the details, Julia could make out the sinkhole that consumed the Temple. The building hadn’t yet disappeared when the essence of the plane around Julia shuddered, and notifications burst across her awareness. The ground far underneath her, shaking in time to each pulse.

[Achievement: If you break it, you'll pay for it.

Condition: Destruction of a Deity’s prized Artifact

Reward: It worked. What more do you want?

Additional condition: Deity, who is a declared enemy, created the now destroyed Artifact.

Reward: Tier 4 class option(s) now unlocked for selection at level 60.]

[Achievement: No plan survives contact with you.

Condition: Intentionally undo a declared enemy’s long-term goal

Reward: + 1,000 experience for primary class (Monk)

Additional condition: Enemy a full tier higher

Reward: + 4,000 experience for primary class (Monk)

Additional condition: Enemy two full tiers higher

Reward: +16,000 experience for primary class (Monk)

Additional condition: Enemy three full tiers higher

Reward: +58,000 experience for primary class (Monk)

Reward: Tier 5 class option(s) now unlocked for selection at level 70. (For interfering with a Dark God’s plans)

Additional condition: (Reward range exceeded)

Reward: You won (for now). Count yourself lucky.

Reward: Tier 6 class option(s) now unlocked for selection at level 80. (For interfering with a Dark God’s plans)

Reward: Tier 7 class option(s) now unlocked for selection at level 90. (For interfering with a Dark God’s plans) ]

A Portal split the air above the collapsing Temple as another notification pinged across her awareness. As the front of a vessel like a broad river barge peeked through the opening, Julia read the next notification.

I thought you said there are five tiers?

((As far as I knew, there were only five. ))

The tone of V words within her awareness baffled and yet oddly amused.

So he likes secrets, even from his highest servants.

((The four of us are not his highest servants, just the ones he set to hunt. ))

Even as V replied almost coyly, a new notification pinged within her awareness.

[Achievement: Awaken the Giant within

Condition: Titan's Servant - Eleftherios - awakened from their Torpor.

Reward: The Titan will grant a requested consideration.

One request pending status update: Granted]

((He wasn’t dead. But his energy felt so faint. How? ))

{{Silly, didn’t you say the link restricts you? Haha!}}

The barge continued coming through as the ground under the Pyramid started buckling upwards. The cliff shape of the chin tilted downwards and the rock covered ridges of its features cracked and fell away. As the rock surface shuddered, the glacier that had been climbing its side shattered and fell away, spilling bodies through the air as the mountain range sat upright. Its motion driving the Pyramid’s top into the bottom of the flying river barge and forcing it upwards against the Portal’s top edge. The pressures on it shattered the spatial forces ripping the barge's front apart as the Portal collapsed. As the landscape continued to fracture, a visible aura of light rose from beneath her, and struggling against the wavefront of its pressure, Julia teleported away.

The ground around the Necropolis’ Pit was bouncing as she appeared in midair. Still wrapped in flames from the burning fluid, Julia watched the undead swirling about in life-like panic. Even though the sky here was completely different to that above the Pyramid, massive tremors also shook this region of the plane and moments lengthened into minutes. Buildings by the hundreds collapsed in a destructive chain reaction. Then finally, as if existence had caught its breath, the shaking ceased. Within the ruins, the already badly damaged buildings finished crumpling to the ground. Julia moved away from the air directly over the Pit, and unlike last time, nothing moved to attack her burning form.

{{Hot time in the old town tonight! }}

((My thanks for waking him before Set reached his heart. My brother is alive!))

Through the link, the sense of his presence clearly one of rejoicing, their usual detached tone having vanished.

I can’t claim credit, I just wanted to collapse the Pyramid. Why did all the shaking cease?

((He likely headed back to the Titan’s realm to receive new orders. ))

Why did the Ankh get destroyed? I just figured it would get buried.

((My brother is Titan’s order made manifest. When Set’s Ankh touched the fluid leaking from his wound, it would have shattered. ))

You mean I could have poured some of that fluid over it?

((Who says you would have survived touching it. Plus, these events roused him, which I hadn’t believed possible. ))

After waiting for the surrounding flames to die away, Julia was glad to open up the conduit and climbed to Ternòx. The air about the Necropolis plane had grown unsettling in the stillness that followed the planar quake. The storm shrouded sky high above darkened in the moments before the conduit closed.

Pending request, is that about Andre or something else?

The conduit portal let Julia out on a ledge high above a cavern floor; a touch and a word closed it up. Once it was away, Julia settled to let her vision adjust to the dim light. Sounds echoed upwards from the cavern depths, metal striking stone, and steel squealed against steel. Whatever was far below her sounded as if it was a mining operation, but Julia held fast, waiting till she could see more.

Dim lights dotting the cavern floor slowly drew out shapes to her gaze. The only mining being conducted was workers cutting channels in the rock floor of the cavern. Among the nearest groups of labours working on the extracted stone, it seemed clear why. Rough blocks were being shaped and runes set into each side before pulleys loaded them onto a transport wagon. Though she might have guessed wrong, it seemed clear they were working on a construction project wherever the transport was heading. Quads of horned Skëll stood shackled to massive wagons, the scars deep into the scales of all four showing their mistreated state.

Hümsi guards appeared here and there, apparently patrolling for trouble, but not from among the workers as these they mainly ignored. Unlike the others Julia had encountered previously, these wore metallic armour. Their helmed humanoid form making it appear as if medieval armoured knights were patrolling the cavern's periphery. Their concealed state making her wonder if they still possess the deep red skin of the others she'd killed. The guard’s had their attention fixed on the cavern’s edges, and whoever was in command had stationed guards at every passage that Julia could make out. The workers hauling the stone seemed primarily Dretch and Hymadan, though the outline of some others carving stone in the deep shadows fitted neither.

As she crouched, watching the activity below, the rock stacks collapsed as the ground under the worker’s feet flexed. By the time the quake, similar to what she’d experienced in the Necropolis finished, the cavern was a literal snarl of angry demons. Despite the quakes’ strength, the cavern looked intact, and Julia breathed a mental sigh of relief, hoping the Grotto and places like it also survived.

{{Rock that body, baby! }}

“Hope things are okay with the Lómë. If they experienced shaking, I believe it was because of a Titan's servant waking up in the Necropolis. It was the strangest thing.”

The spell carrying her thoughts to Yngvarr was harder to keep together than the one she’d sent from the Necropolis cycles earlier.

[Mercury’s whisper [Ap] (5->7)]

“Take it you’re actually on the material plane and not in Ternòx. Or at least I hope since sending the last message proved hard to hold together. So casting this one for practice because I’m sure the last one actually woke you up knowing my luck.”

[Mercury’s whisper [Ap] (7->10)]

{{Send him another, and he’s going to block your spamming arse. }}

Fine. I was hoping for an update. Elves had thought them dead for eons. It seems weird if Yngvarr is already back on the Material Plane. What’s going on?

When the Demons ushered the next transport out of the cavern, a loose pebble joined the top of its load.

“You are to return to the Stronghold as quickly as possible.”

The Castellan’s voice whispered with a dispassionate edge across her awareness.

{{Well fuck!! But you still need to practice dancing. }}

I agreed. Just we might have to delay the show and see if I can make this next stage at least.

Even as Julia planned the delay, the order ground through skin, muscle and bone and the pressure of it clawed within her mind. Against the force of its challenge, Julia set her will in place. Even as she set herself to resist, there was a sense of the Mental Hardening adding to her efforts. Internally groaning, Julia settled into Harmony and Ki Meditation as she reached within herself.