Bjorn roared with indignation and also power. Monsters froze in place, some of them falling from the edges of the boiler into the chasm below. The fall wouldn't be enough to kill powerful ones but it would by time.
Intimidation Roar
Primana Cost: 1
Infuse Primana into your roar to paralyze anyone that hears it. Your roar can paralyze humanoid magic constructs as long as they are connected to a magic caster. Paralysis duration depends on distance and level disparity between you and the target. Those bound to you are immune to this effect.
Originally the ability had been indiscriminate. Anyone who heard the roar would freeze in place. With the Angel Core hanging around his neck, Bjorn felt a control over his magic he had never possessed before. He could shape the direction of the sound, focusing its force outward toward the invading monsters while sparing most of the dwarves nearby.
The paralysis would not last long.
Already he could feel the monsters straining against the effect, and more continued to pour from the rift. The town was roughly a mile in radius and built in concentric rings. If the streets had been straight he could have crossed the distance in moments. Instead he had to climb buildings, weave through pipeworks, and move across a city that had never been designed for something his size.
By the time he reached the edge of the Second Ring he could hear the creatures scrambling upward toward the Third. That outer district held the residences. People there had been struck hardest by the surge of corrupted mana and maya. Many lay unconscious across walkways and plazas, completely defenseless against the approaching monsters.
Bjorn leapt from the edge of the ring and landed on the roof of a narrow townhouse. Tiles shattered beneath his weight. He did not stop. There was no time to linger, only to move and constantly assess where he was needed next.
His focus shifted to one of the creatures closing in the square where people lay strewn across the ground. Primana surged through his limbs and launched him forward like a living projectile. He struck the creature head-on in an explosion of force that splattered it into wet ruin across the stone.
Only after the impact did he truly process what the invaders looked like. They were hunched creatures with grey fur, oversized jaws, and clawed hands that gouged deep trenches into the reinforced stone of the city. Their bodies were scorched from the unstable energies of the rift and the heat from the boiler but the damage was already repairing itself. Blackened bone pushed outward as new flesh crawled over it, growing with the relentless persistence of weeds in fertile soil.
He had no idea what these monsters were and Identify useless with everything but the levels of the monsters. That meant they didn't match anything from the monster hunter books Failsafe based the Identify descriptions on.
It didn't matter to Bjorn as he found the next monster was clawing its way towards him. Bjorn Breathed out Poison Cloud which expanded from him like a thundercloud. Poring over the edge of the third ring down into the other monsters still climbing their way up.
Another head gathered Primana forcing it into water and shot out a razor thin stream at the monster charging him. The monster was cut in half at the waist and fell over. He directed the slicing stream at several others that were now bleeding from the mouth as the poison in the air took hold.
Then one surprised him, it dodged the beam of water and used a flash step to appear at his side in angry fury as it attempted to slash his side with its claws. It hit him but with the sharp clang of a sword against armor. Bjorn answered instantly. His own claws tore across the creature's face and chest, shredding it into wet ribbons.
The battle intensified from there.
Monsters fell one after another to poison, slicing water, fang, and claw. Bjorn moved across the rooftops like a living storm, shifting positions constantly as new threats emerged. Somewhere behind him the dwarven defenders finally rallied and joined the fight. War horns sounded through the city as armored warriors poured into the streets.
The tide began to turn once they organized. Monsters that threatened entire neighborhoods alone were suddenly facing coordinated ranks of shieldbearers and rune-armed fighters.
Individually the creatures were not especially dangerous to Bjorn, but the dwarves struggled far more against each one. What unfolded across the city was a brutal war of attrition. The question was no longer whether the monsters could be killed.
The question was which side would break first: the endless flood pouring from the rift, or the magic reserves of the defenders holding the city together.
"Bjorn, are you okay?" Tanisha asked as she appeared at his side.
"I am but the monsters are endless," Bjorn said.
Tanisha twisted her body to avoid a lunging strike. She slipped past the creature's claws with a smooth weave of movement, then drove an uppercut into its jaw. Maya flared along her arm and detonated on impact. The monster exploded into fragments that rained down across the rooftop.
Thick, foul-smelling ichor splashed over both of them.
"Eww," Tanisha groaned, wiping some of the slime from her cheek. "These things smell awful."
The fight continued as the two of them continued to fight off the endless wave.
"Dad!" Anasuya called out as she flew over to him. "Can I eat it?"
"Ana? What are you doing out here?" Bjorn questioned.
"I smelled the delicious tree." She pointed at the rift. "Can I eat it?"
"You want to eat the rift?" Bjorn questioned.
"Can I, please," Anasuya begged.
"Is that how you got us out of the other rift? The one that brought us here?" Bjorn asked.
"The tree that brought us here was fun. It tasted good." Anasuya said.
Bjorn translated his discovery to Tanisha and she was just as shocked at the fact that Anasuaya could literally eat a rift. The fact she called it a tree was something to look into later.
"Speedy, we have a plan!" Tanisha yelled.
In a flash of speed Aurelius appeared. Cutting down several monsters on the way.
"We need to get Ana to the top of the boiler," Tanisha explained quickly. "Apparently she can close the rift."
Aurelius glanced upward at the boiling column of heat surrounding the massive structure.
"You sure about that?" he asked. "Because the top of that boiler is extremely hot. That's why the weaker monsters burst into flames when they come through the rift."
"I might have a solution," Bjorn said.
He reached inward and touched the new reservoir of dark energy within his core. Maya surged upward and gathered in his fifth head. When he opened his jaws, a stream of red-black vapor poured from his mouth like smoke from a chimney.
The maya flowed across his scales and seeped into his body. It also drifted outward, wrapping around Tanisha, Anasuya, and even Aurelius before sinking into them. Bjorn noticed the effect immediately and filed the observation away for later experimentation.
Chthonic Communion
Maya Cost:
You exhale all stored maya in a searing infernal torrent. Your other heads may inhale this essence to unleash empowered, maya-infused breath attacks, while your scales harden and your venom grows deadlier. Infernal allies who breathe in this exhaled maya are strengthened, their maya based abilities amplified by your abyssal reserve.
"What was that?" Tanisha questioned.
"I will explain later, I will get Ana to the Rift" Bjorn said. Then he switched to the hissing language. "Ana hold onto me."
Aurelius immediately laid out the plan. "Tanisha, clear the ones further away with your lightning, I will worry about the closer one up until the edge of the climate control runes. After that it is you, two watch yourselves."
The group sprang into action. Lightning shot forward towards the monsters in the distance. Aurelius cleared the path forward and in a moment Bjorn used Juggernaut Stampede to launch himself forward.
The moment he left the protections of the Third Ring, the heat struck him like the opening of a furnace door. Waves of scorching air rolled off the massive boiler below the rift. Monsters clinging to the structure leapt toward him as he approached, but most were smashed aside as Bjorn slammed into the curved metal surface.
The heat licked around him as he clawed, bit and used venom, poison and water to fight his way through the crowd. Of the hundreds that came through, few lived longer than a few seconds due to the heat. The ones that did survive through themselves at him with the reckless abandon found only in monsters.
Once he was a few feet from the rift Anasuya jumped from his back. Her mouth opened wide, eyes sparkling with excitement. Then she vanished into the glowing scar in reality. The monsters stopped flowing from it as if a water faucet was finally closed. There was a final flash then a loud whoom!
The sky darkened only for a single heart beat as the lightning bolt vanished. Anasuya hovered in place for a moment before she returned to Bjorn landing on his back and as he fought the monsters away. The heat was getting to him so he jumped from off the top of the boiler and rejoined the defences.
The monster numbers dwindled quickly after the rift was, uh, consumed? Yeah, consumed. When the final creature fell, Anasuya spat something onto the stone.
A small metal ring clattered across the ground.
"That's my storage ring," Aurelius said, staring at it.
Anasuya spat again. This time one of Tanisha's daggers slid across the ground. It was one of the matched pair she had received from the Isi family.
Tanisha blinked in realization. "Wait… are our things still inside the rifts?"
She leaned down and patted Anasuya proudly. "Good job, Anasuya!"
"Auntie smells bad," Anasuya hissed, pulling away from the touch.
Bjorn chuckled. "We all smell bad."
"Daddy stinks," Anasuya replied proudly. "But I smell good."
A moment later Ironbrow arrived with a group of dwarven guards. His prana glaive still hummed with energy. When they realized the rift had been closed and the monsters defeated, cheers erupted throughout the Third Ring. Word spread quickly.
People emerged from their homes and workshops to celebrate the heroes who had saved the district from disaster. Music and alcohol appeared almost immediately as the cleanup began. Monster corpses were dragged away while Tanisha used hydromancy to wash the blood and ichor from herself and Bjorn in moments.
Aurelius somehow managed to walk through the entire battle without a single drop of blood on his clothing.