4 days later:
I finally feel ready to face the ant queen. I made 12 nuke arrows, and about 16 more brooches. Though making them was a huge hassle, with me becoming a mindless bot to complete them.
I still think its worth it.
I head out of my home, I feel the sun in my face in the longest of time. 'I haven't touched grass in 4 days..'
Tom comes by every 6am to train religiously, he made the movements muscle memory, able to do them with his eyes closed, now he's working on essence control, learning to charge limbs with essence effectively and precisely. I watch him swing his sword, but not helping since my brain is too fried from a 4 day all-nighter.
He finally notices me and walks up, sweating a lot. "how was i?"
"you are doing pretty good, I think you need to add movement though." I summon Redscales, "your goal is to cut this guy's neck, do that and I say you can start to using essence." Redscales grabs a wooden sword and stands by.
Tom gathers his bearings and charges, a swift and efficient horizontal slash, I easily pull back. He tries again which is much more difficult. Currently I'm fighting without essence while the main body wears the monocle, so I can predict all his movements.
This might be cheesy but I'm too mentally drained to care, plus its good experience if he fights a seer, or a being that can read his mind.
15 minutes of high intensity sparring leaves Tom heavily drained and lying on the floor, while I'm barely breaking a sweat. I help him up with ease as I give him a review on foot work and give him basic tips and understanding on why feet placement is important.
"stances are a main point in fighting, it can be a great tell on what kind of fighter they are." I use my clone as a demonstration, "a wide stance like this one can mean they are a defensive fighter based on stalling or counter attacks." the clone switches his stance, "this stance has one foot out and the other behind, this means they are preparing for a dash, a fighter who throws the first punch." the pivot foot swaps, "depending on the pivot foot they can be left or right handed, but that tell isn't that important since most are taught with their right hand because of family techniques relying on such."
"try pushing him." he tries pushing Redscales which was kinda easy because of my stature, than I have Redscales equip his armor. "weight also pays an added role, try pushing him now." as Tom attempts to push him with all his strength, even with essence Redscales is barely pushed back. "another thing is reach, if your enemy has a much longer reach than yours your best goal is to stay deep within their reach, making it much more difficult to attack, but due to the great equalizer being essence its less important"
I teach him about size, length and how to hone these skills and say goodbye again heading off to attack the ant queen.
I reach there fast and see that the hoard has shrunk but not by much, I put on my monocle, which I really should name and see the amount of cores the ant queen has. "6" I sigh, realizing this is my only chance to end her before she eventually becomes a titan.
I summon my trusty bow, pull out 3 arrows, and shoot.
BOOOOM
[you have slain a fallen monster]
[you have slain a fallen monster]
[you have slain a fallen monster]
[you have slain a fallen monster]
Almost a thousand ants get annihilated by the nuke arrows, the sheer number of ant based memories are making him excited! He also feels the fragments entering his soul and as soon as he reached the limit, he sits down and starts building his 3rd core
[2000/2000]
[your soul is over flowing with power]
[a core is taking shape]
This time, the spell is interfering, it did address me as a monster but its getting altered as I speak. This time, my concentration on evolving my soul is more focused as I use my clones to fend off the attacks. We are swarmed by hundreds, after taking out almost a 2/3rds of their population the ant queen realises the size of the threat and tries to eliminate me, sadly it doesn't know that I'm not the only one capable as Silverworn summons my bow and grabs an arrow. Though not launching the nuke yet until my evolution is complete.
[your soul core has manifested]
I feel the power of a demon coursing through my body, my [Physically Gifted] attribute grows in potency allowing me to feel more of the affects of being a demon class.
[0/3000]
The pain that affects me vanishes as my clones are back to their full senses. Silver worn launches that nuke arrow again.
[you have slain a fallen monster]
[you have slain a fallen monster]
Almost 300 disintegrate immediately, as I feel the fragments pouring in I feel like I've reached a state capable of fighting a master with just one body.
[1136/3000]
I grin and summon my 3rd clone wearing full green plate armor resembling that of Mongolian descent, having thorns protruding from his gauntlets and chest and being of the ascended rank. "Thornhelm~" I feel my brain reconstructing, gaining a fourth line of thought as Thorn helm takes form in the physical world. I grin, as Thornhelm summons a battle axe, of ascended rank, that grants the user incredible speed and strength.
While my clones run into battle, I equip my 2nd ever memory of Transcendent rank.. A charm appears on my chest of blood red metal in shape of a wolf facing right, its eye a bleeding ruby its mouth wide open screaming.
[Bubbling Lust of Blood]
[the once benevolent wolf cursed and stripped of its mother, forced to watch as its mother was taken prisoner, the wolf, no longer being fully wolf, resembling a part of man and wolf but belonging to neither. Its hatred grew and corrupted cultivating itself to one day get revenge on the one who took its only family…
Though it met its end by a mad men, all wearing the same face… not only that, he is the one who recreated a forbidden art and path of power. Though the hatred and lust for vengeance continues to sprout through this last part of him]
I smile sadly, and take on its dream as I face the hoard of freakish ants in front of me. I summon my long sword, accompanying my clones in battle. Silverworn faces the swarm of ants with its new demonic strength and immense speed, grows even more ferocious and vicious in battle, its sword sharper, its strength greater and its mind more blood thirsty.
All of his clones feel it, and feel it double since charm memories affect all of the bodies, and since its also based on who the wearer treats as allies they gain another boost and an extra dose of bloodlust.
Only the main body feels slightly less, but the entire brain is fully steeped in the desire to kill.
Hours of battle pass, as the ants are culled continually, though I can't do anything but kill, kill, kill due to the charm.
But with my will power, I concentrate hard enough to unequip my charm. With a clearer mind my clones heavily damage regained their senses, and I realized I wasted multiple essence brooches while under the charms affects!
I quickly pull out an arrow and make my clones to back away. I blow up the remaining population being o little under 150.
[you have slain a fallen monster]
[you have slain a fallen monster]
I make Thornhelm to collect the shards on the ground and the carapaces and put it into the storage memory. With that I only have to face the queen, with only 3 brooches of essence and 2 weakened clones.
I sigh and stretch as the raging terror approaches. "Its my first time feeling like a yakuza or mafia~ after all, I raided the place killed everything and robbed everything worth of value~"
The terror sizes us up, concerned on its chances of winning it lets out its terror specialty. My brain grows numb with fear and a desire to run away, and since I'm experiencing it 3 times over its much stronger than expected. I bite my lip, now stalling rather than attacking, knowing I need Thorn helm to collect the shards and corpses before using Bubbling lust.
I make Silverworn join him, as making only half my brain experience the immense terror of the Terror. I sigh in relief and dodge its first attack, aimed at me. Using my grey tunics enchantment I jump away clinging on the wall of the nest.
Red scales attacks it with his azure spear, but the fear coursing through me makes it a weak hit. It easily kicks him away and screams. I try taking aggro again, attacking its leg. We continue this game of cat and mouse but each time, the injuries pile up more and more
It takes half an hour before we finally have a chance.
[1744/3000]
I save up the other 50 ascended fragments in my memory and finish harvesting the corpses. As I equip Bubbling Lust, the extreme fear is overridden by the charm. And as Silverworn and Thornhelm joins the battle I grin in victory as we clash with the corrupted terror.
Being overwhelmed by 4 simultaneous attacks it starts thrashing wildly, but it's of no use, being [Physically Gifted] and the added reason being of the demonic class, having more than half my core full, with a charm on top of that boosts its wearer and allies, AND the fact that all 4 posses these traits with the added reason of them feeling the affects of the charm TWICE over. We resemble the power of a crew of warrior masters that are extremely mentally connected than any crew of awakened.
We disarm, and rip apart the terror as gruesome as possible, by the charm's affects of course.
[you have slain a corrupted Terror, the earth dwelling queen of doubt]
[you have gained a memory]