Savage Awakening 450. Armor Break (II)

The scene ended. A notification took its place.

Shard of Destruction Integrated!

H. Red Giant [Mythic+ (P) -> Common (D)]

Buff gained! Armor’s Bane I [Common (D)]

Grants the user 100% more damage against all armors, including armors of Creation. Stacks on top of all other boosts.

Zane’s heart was still racing.

He never knew how the Barbarian Sage got those scars. The old guy was in such a good mood most of the time; it was hard to imagine him down.

Then again—Malzareth never really got him down, even there…

He sat with that for a little while. The scene of the Sage, laughing in the face of certain death. He’d respected the Sage a great deal before, but you never really knew a man until you got to the bone of him, in Zane’s view.

He was proud to call that man his teacher.

Then he stood.

He looked forward to seeing the old fellow again.

In the meantime...

He made a Red Giant in his palm—just a small one. A good fifth of it was streaked white. Each time he took in a shard, that share only grew.

He clenched his fist.

Just a few months now until that final challenge—until the last phase of the war.

Plenty of time to see what he could do. To climb the ranks and stack on more credits. One last Shard of Destruction to go.

After that—onto the 10 Million Year Bone.

***

He met Evan and Avery soon after. They’d already gotten back by the time he made it home.

Evan was going around fishing, baking, and otherwise living his best life. Running through all his side quests before things started up in earnest again. Just yesterday he caught a 3,000-pound marlin, which he proudly showed off to Zane.

Avery, meanwhile, hadn’t left the couch in 48 hours. Evan was getting a little worried.

Evan poked her. “Are you okay?”

“I shall sleep for 10,000 years,” she announced. Then she pulled their hoodie strings shut and flopped facedown again.

The second challenge was just her frantically casting illusions for four hours straight. They almost died 138 times.

They just left her be.

“We were such a good team! You should’ve seen it,” said Evan. He was buzzing. Chomper barked in agreement.

It mostly consisted of Avery hanging on for dear life, Chomper bull-rushing anything in sight, and Evan running after them, blasting as fast as he could.

“I really think we’ve got something here,” said Evan happily. He was optimistic.

Now that they’d gotten their reward, the two of them could both afford an instant Tier-7 breakthrough. Evan showed him his new Tier 6 Law—the Law of Starry Skies.

“Look!” he cried.

Evan could now fire out storms of shooting stars and beam attacks down from the stars themselves. His range had gone interstellar. He’d gotten a whole lot faster too.

That earned him a few head pats from Zane.

Avery attempted to get off the couch to show off her new Tier 6 Law, the Law of Mirror Reality. She failed.

“Next we’re gonna go for Signature Title upgrades,” said Evan.

He was quite excited about it—they could both afford their upgrades pretty soon if things went well.

Reina did say that in the coming weeks, the Planet Ranking bonus would hit.

Then all the work he'd put in—all the work Earth put in boosting their rank—would pay off.

He still had a few weeks to pump that number up.

Right now, it sat at #480.

***

A few days before the next horde hit, Zane got an invitation to tea. Noughtfire was coming to visit—something of a surprise.

They met on a beach. He’d just been sitting there on his lounge chair, waiting, sipping from an orange drink, when the void cracked open. And there the old fellow was. He stepped out casually, took a look around, and was bemused by some seagulls.

Zane gave him a wave. “Hey there.”

Noughtfire settled down on the next chair. Zane offered him a sip of the orange drink, which Noughtfire tried. “It’s… good,” said the old Sage, blinking.

“Reina made it.”

“Ah.”

They sipped for a bit.

“Before we get to business,” said Noughtfire.

He brought out a package of steamed buns.

Zane blinked. “You knew I liked these?”

“You'd be surprised how quickly news spreads in Astra. You made quite the scene the last time you went… who knows? You might just get to see it again.”

It was nice to know it was real. Zane vaguely thought it might work like a dream—something that stopped after he left. Guess not.

He took a munch, swallowed—then sniffed. Something was off.

“That wound you took when I broke through,” he said, brow furrowed. “You’re still dealing with it.”

Noughtfire waved it off. “It doesn’t bother me. The Creations of Malzareth can be fickle to dispel. It takes a great deal of time, usually… at this stage in the cycle, that Monster can only use a small fraction of its powers. It will pass.”

“…Alright.”

“More to the point.” Noughtfire steepled his fingers. “I hear you've made great progress since we last met. Would you show me?”

He did. A Red Giant burst into his fist.

For a moment, Noughtfire studied it. Then he leaned back. “Armor’s Bane, already. That's... ahead of schedule."

Zane nodded. “That’s right.”

“Usually only peak True Gods can achieve that. And only the best of them. To gain this level of Destruction this early… It’s never been seen in a Red Giant.”

Noughtfire leaned back, stroking his beard. “It’s a good sign.”

It was always a little hard to tell with the old guy—he didn’t exactly wear his emotions on his sleeve. But he seemed quite pleased.

He took another sip.

“Destruction is unfathomably vast,” said Noughtfire. “Every fighting path has Destruction at its end. But they only comprehend a sliver of it. No one in this Galaxy has walked the path of Destruction to its end… even the most accomplished of us know only a small fraction. Though if you keep this up… perhaps you’ll show us something more.”

Zane swallowed his bite of steamed bun, and nodded. “I will.”

Noughtfire smiled. “Then I look forward to it.”

Something did still puzzle him, though.

“I saw a vision when I got my last Shard... the Monster Overlord used Destruction.”

The most high-level he’d ever seen.

“Yes,” said Noughtfire. “In this Galaxy, Malzareth is the closest to the end.”

“All this time, I thought its strength was Creation.”

That was what powered all those Corrupted Bones.

“It is. That is the trouble with that creature.” Noughtfire sat up. “The Overlord of Monsters is the offspring of the Origin of Monsters itself… it is a vain, scheming, immensely prideful creature. As a pure strategist…”

Noughtfire tapped his chair with a finger. “I would call it merely decent. It no fool. But it is not as clever as it would like to think. It is a creature of low cunning and great cruelty."

Zane nodded.

“But its true strength lies in two sober facts. The first is that it is unfathomably strong. The second—that it is very, very old… Malzareth remembers. It has forgotten more magic than mankind has ever known, and knows ten times more magic than that—magic of the most dangerous kind. Even if it were merely a slobbering, mindless Monster, it would far outclass any hegemon in this galaxy. As it is… the galaxy’s mightiest, combined, might barely hold it off at full strength.”

Zane considered this, brow furrowed.

“It is older than recorded time,” continued Noughtfire. “It hails from a place outside this Galaxy. Older than this Chaos Cycle, certainly. And in that time… its powers were already devastating when it first came to this Galaxy, aeons ago. It has only grown stronger since… it is almost more a malevolent force than it is a living thing.”

“I see.”

He didn’t think about it much—it seemed a long way off. But…

“Do we have what it takes to kill it?”

“No.” Then Noughtfire paused, considering Zane. “None of the old guard, at least. It would take the most destructive force Dragonspire has ever known.”

There was a look in his eye. “Something tells me you’d like to have a crack at it.”

It felt to Zane that the longer this war went on, the more Dungeons broke, the more personal this fight got. This thing had gone after both his teachers now. It was going after his friends. It had a crack at him.

It seemed determined to pick a fight.

“We’ll see.”

He’d protect his friends first. But if this thing thought it could come at them—could at him—for free…

It had another thing coming.

***

As he finished up his tea, Noughtfire brought news from further out. Malzareth had successfully killed two Grand Elders—and even badly wounded a Patriarch in an ambush. So much so he had to go into seclusion for the rest of the war.

“Which Patriarch?”

“Steelheart,” said Noughtfire. “The Barbarian Sage isn’t happy.”

“Hm.”

After that, the Sage stood. “If there’s nothing else, disciple…”

“No.”

“One last word of warning, then.” Noughtfire’s expression turned serious. “This is where planets die. Where civilizations perish. Keep vigilant. It only gets stronger—and when that final Wave comes… you know what’s waiting for you.”

A lion-headed creature flashed to mind. A creature stewing in the dark, waiting its chance to break free.

Zane nodded firmly. “I’ll take care of business.”

“Good.”

He took one last look around. For a few seconds, they just listened to the crashing of the waves.

“Those things,” he said at last. “What are they?”

Zane blinked. “…Seagulls?”

“Seagulls.”

Noughtfire shook his head, a little smile on his face, and strolled on out.