Overseer's Rise: A LitRPG Apocalypse, page 33
“We’ve got no time,” Viv shouted through the pandemonium as her black scaled arm flashed with red electricity. “I’m going to distract it for as long as I can. Find a way to deal with it.”
And with that, before Rory could protest, she threw out a bolt of lightning and disappeared.
Chapter 40
Rory’s worries about Viv were unfounded. Initially, at least.
When she had teleported out of the truck, the assault upon them by the construct had ceased almost immediately. As Ned slowed the truck down thanks to the reprieve, Rory turned to stare at his wife’s display of power.
Viv had thrown herself right before the upside-down glass pyramid. There couldn’t have been more than ten feet of space between them. Too many panels were flashing red, building up energy to throw down those deadly lasers. Rory shouted in warning, but he didn’t really need to.
As soon as the lasers fired, another blast of crimson lightning changed Viv’s position once again. When she reappeared this time, she was right on top of the construct’s flat surface.
“Okay, she’s got that thing distracted,” Ned said. He was right. The construct no longer paid attention to the pickup. All the glass panels atop it glowed red and fired a gigantic steam of deep orange lasers, which Viv easily avoided with another teleport. “So what do we do?”
Rory swallowed down his unease. He had to get his roiling emotions in order, he had to tackle the situation logically. Worries and anxieties had no place here. “Arelland, you’ve faced this thing before, right? Do you have any suggestions?”
The elf was silent for a moment, watching Viv deftly dodge more attacks from the construct. “We must attempt various assaults against it. There is a shielding mechanic that will protect the construct from any obvious damage, so we will need to discover a way to get past it.”
“Great. Like the lasers weren’t bad enough. Now it’s got shields too. A weird alien space pyramid with lasers and shields is so original.”
“No point in waiting,” Rory said. “So here’s the plan, as far as I see it.”
He quickly told them what he had come up with on the fly. Arelland had good mobility thanks to his mech-suit, so he could move around as needed to avoid the construct’s lasers. Ned had his Burnwing appendages to do the same as well.
Rory had no such skill. Instead, he was going to take the truck. It would be a pain to drive and use his Staff of Deadly Winter at the same time, but he would find a way to compromise.
“We ready?” Rory asked. His eyes were fixed on where Viv had dragged the construct to. She wouldn’t be able to keep her teleports up for long. Her Mana stores were bound to run out before long.
Ned and Arelland nodded. It was time to get going.
“Alright, go.” Rory revved the truck’s engine, having switched to the driver’s seat after Ned had left. “I’ll cover you with Barricading Blizzard.”
They headed out. Ned was the first to strike. He had risen high into the air on the rocket-ended wings provided by his Sigil of the Hooktongue. Pulling out his crossbow, he fired off a bolt at the construct’s “back”.
But Arelland had been right. The dark glass panels on construct’s rear face turned a brilliant blue as soon as Ned fired. His bolt crashed into a sudden translucent hemisphere that popped up in front of the blue panel he had targeted. It seemed the construct really didn’t have a blind spot.
“The shielded area is small,” Rory shouted at them. “We’ll just have to spread out our attacks.”
He summoned his blizzard as he said so, throwing out the wintry storm at their enemy. It would be interesting to see how the glass panels reacted to freezing cold.
The width of his blizzard’s area of effect made a bunch of the panels turn blue. More shields materialized all over the construct’s surface, preventing anything of the blizzard from reaching it. Experimentally, Rory threw a bolt of Frozen Lightning as well. It was also repelled by a shield as well.
Lasers started firing in their direction as well. It seemed once the creature was certain that Rory’s blizzard wasn’t going to trouble it, some of the panels had switched from blue to red, throwing out the deadly beams of burning light instead of shields.
“Move!” Rory shouted.
He drove off the truck even as he spoke, hammering the accelerator with his foot. The lasers had been aimed haphazardly however, and he wasn’t in too much danger of being hit. They missed him, making the road explode.
Ned and Arelland were able to avoid them all even more easily. They also counterattacked. Ned fired off more crossbow bolts, adding splashes of water to his attacks as well. Meanwhile, Arelland threw a harpoon-like spear connected with a chain at the construct. Unfortunately, they were all repelled by the shields or the lasers firing right back.
“Rory,” Arelland shouted. “There is an opening we can take advantage of.”
Rory had to pause his rather frantic driving for a moment to hear what the elf was saying properly. “Oh yeah?”
Thankfully, Arelland was coming towards him as well, though that was probably so he didn’t keep yelling his plan and let the construct know about it as well. Though, that made Rory wonder just how intelligent their enemy was.
“The rays,” the elf said. “Every time the construct fires one, it needs to pause for a moment before firing again or switching to a different coloured pane of glass.”
Rory’s eyes widened. “So we can use that in-between time to strike!”
“Exactly.”
“Can you estimate how long that is?”
Above them, Ned was doing well to keep the construct distracted from their end by throwing more bolts and water at it. Rory’s blizzard helped too. But he and Arelland couldn’t stand around talking for long.
On the other side, the furious exchange of lasers and scarlet lightning had slowed down. Viv had to be trying to conserve her supply of Mana.
“I cannot tell for certain,” Arelland said. “But it is longer for the switch to a different colour than for refiring the rays it emits.”
Rory nodded. “Alright. Then I guess we know what we have to do.”
They settled on the plan pretty quickly. It was simple, really. All they would have to do was keep up their attacks, or better yet, increase their intensity even more to force the construct to focus on defending itself. After which, lulling it into thinking they had exhausted themselves and left themselves open to retaliation would give them the true opening.
They got to it as fast as they could. Arelland headed out, waiting in the wings as their trump card. Meanwhile, Rory yelled at Ned to fire everything he could at the monster to force it to do nothing but defend itself.
Rory restarted the truck and quickly drove towards where Viv was stationed. “Viv!” he shouted, leaning his head out through the window. “Attack it with everything you’ve got. We know how to stop that thing for good.”
She heard him. There was no answer other than an immediate blast of lightning shooting straight at the construct. It had been attempting to fire its lasers but several of its glass panels turned blue to pop up protective shields instead.
Of course, lightning was far too fast for its switch. Several red arcs struck right on its face, though without leaving much damage.
Now that Rory was close enough to see the evidence of the construct’s fight against Viv, he could see that it hadn’t been her first strike against her enemy. Several of the construct’s glassy panels had strange, dull grey splotches that showed where it had been hit by Viv’s lightning.
However, the panels were recovering. The grey spots were slowly turning oily black again. It seemed Viv’s attacks weren’t having much effect on the construct. Maybe it was shockproof. Who knew.
All Rory did was assist by throwing out more of his Barricading Blizzard to keep the construct on the defensive. They had to force the issue against it.
“How long are we going to keep this up?” Viv asked. “I’m running out of Mana.”
There were some extra packs in the pickup. But Rory was hoping they wouldn’t need them. “Not long now. We just need one opening.”
He could see the grimace on Viv’s face. She looked unharmed, if tired, but he realized that she really couldn’t keep this up for long. All part of the plan.
“Rory,” she cried out. “I’m almost out.”
“Just a little longer.”
Ned joined them as he landed on the roof of the truck. “I’m almost out too. You got more Mana inside, right?”
Rory nodded.
Viv growled all of a sudden. Instead of the gigantic construct, her next bolt of lightning landed just in front of the pickup. She had teleported to safety in the nick of time.
There. Now was the time. He pulled his staff back inside as he stopped the blizzard.
Viv looked up sharply from where she was rooting in the pickup’s back seat. “What are you doing? We can’t stop—”
“We can,” Rory said. The construct had realized that the tables had supposedly turned. A bunch of its panels were turning from protective blue to threatening red. Rory took in a deep breath. “Arelland, now!”
The elf shot in with blistering speed. His sword was out on one arm, the little harpoon with the chain attached bared on the other. He came in from an angle, right through that little hidden view where the edge of the pyramid was. That was a direction the construct wouldn’t be able to “see”.
It worked perfectly. By the time Arelland came into position just in front of the construct, he had already struck true with his chained harpoon. The short spear punched through glass panels, shooting deep into the construct.
Of course, the enemy was bending to retaliate. All the surrounding panels that hadn’t been struck started turning red, readying to shoot their lasers.
Arelland didn’t give it the opportunity to counter. He activated his Sigil, its image glowing a virulent red under the armour around his hand. A mauve ball materialized in the same hand, little spikes dotting its surface. Rory’s eyes widened. He had seen that before, and had witnessed just how devastating it was.
Just as the construct fired its lasers, Arelland’s chain began pulling him closer to his target at an incredibly rapid pace. He slammed against it faster than the lasers could hit him.
Then he rammed his spiky ball of energy into the hole in the construct’s side.
It wasn’t surprising at all to see what became of their enemy. Immense red spikes burst out of the glass panels lining the side of the construct that faced them. Black shards fell everywhere in a deadly rain as Arelland wheeled himself away from the site of destruction.
“Now,” Arelland said. “Attack!”
The rest of them didn’t hold back. Rory summoned his barricading Blizzard and made the wintry storm strike at the opening the elf had gifted them. Viv and Ned joined in too, throwing their crimson lightning and crossbow bolts respectively.
Rory’s breaths came in faster and faster as he saw the construct actually retreat for once. It careened, wobbling as though it was about to fall on its die.
Then it began sinking out of view.
“Hey!” Viv threw out several more lightning blasts, but they only struck the top of the construct, which hadn’t suffered from Arelland’s red energy spikes. “Stop running.”
Unfortunately, the construct didn’t heed her. Just like before, as though the ground was nothing more than a hologram, their enemy sank in and disappeared from view.
Rory’s arms and legs were shaking with the buzz of battle. It took a little effort to shut off his blizzard. “It’s gone.”
Of course, they couldn’t be sure. The construct could pop out from anywhere, so they kept an eye out, not moving from their positions. After several minutes, when there continued to be no sign of the thing they had faced, Rory finally let himself relax.
“We should head back to the palace,” he said. “Hopefully, there aren’t more of these things.”
“Oh, there are more.” Arelland was still looking around. It seemed he wasn’t satisfied by the sudden disappearance yet. “At least several more. I am unsure how far it or any of its fellows have travelled.”
“Their trajectories are unpredictable,” Ned said in as close an approximation of Arelland’s voice as he could manage.
“Correct.”
“Be that as it may, we still need to get going,” Rory said. “No point in wasting time here.”
They agreed. The tension didn’t leave the air as they got back into the pickup and prepared to head off. And they learned exactly why it wasn’t gone in just a second.
The construct reappeared right beneath them.
Rory’s heart thundered as the pickup began to rise, the construct’s glass panels smooth as an oily mirror under the tires. The ground proper started getting out of reach as their enemy rose higher and higher.
“Oh, crap!” Ned’s hands were gripping the steering wheel so tightly, he was either going to crush the wheel or his fingers. “Do I just drive off?”
Before anybody could answer, before Ned could even hammer the accelerator and attempt to drive the truck off the side, the glass panels started glowing red.
“No time,” Viv shrieked. Then she threw out her red lightning around them.
Just in the nick of time. When Rory could see again, after closing his eyes, he found that he was once more on the ground. With him had come the rest of them. Ned, Viv, and the entire pickup too. Behind them, the construct finished summoning its almighty lasers and firing them off into the sky.
Rory stared. Getting hit by that would have likely obliterated them.
“Are you all right?” Arelland asked as he joined them. He had apparently avoided the rising construct altogether.
Rory nodded. “There you go. It’s back.”
“How do we take it out, then?” Ned asked.
“Same strategy as before,” Viv said.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t going to work. Apparently, the construct was now wearier of them than before. It had spotted that they had evaded its surprise attack, and now it was sinking back inside the ground once again.
“We should keep moving,” Rory said. “Head towards the palace.”
Viv turned to him with a sharp look. “We can’t lead that thing there.”
“We have no choice. We didn’t come equipped for a big fight, at least not against monsters that would need a ton of Sigil use. We don’t have enough Mana, but we can replenish our stores at the palace.” Rory turned to the front before Viv could argue. “Ned, get going.”
Ned didn’t wait for any further instructions. He drove off. Rory was simply glad that, after all that had happened, the pickup was still in good enough of a condition to keep going.
“I don’t know about this,” Viv muttered.
Rory was trying to steady his troubled breathing. “I’m sorry. We don’t have any other choice.”
“I’ll accompany you,” Arelland announced, following alongside them.
Rory was hoping that a better plan would come to him on the way to Belcourt palace. There was no telling what the construct’s speed underground was, but hopefully, as long as they kept moving, it wouldn’t catch—
Viv cursed loudly. “It’s ahead of us.”
Rory stared. The construct really was coming out of the ground several yards ahead of them. It was insane. He hadn’t thought it would be this fast underground. What sort of madness had Alex sent them?
Tools to survive… it didn’t look like what tools he had would be enough.
Arelland positioned himself in front of the pickup as a white-faced Ned pulled it to a halt. “I will hold it in place. Use the opportunity to return to your domicile.”
Rory shook his head. “Are you nuts, Arelland? Even you can’t take that thing on by yourself.”
“I do not intend to take it on. I will merely anchor it in position, thus allowing your escape. Unfortunately, that will require my active presence.”
Viv didn’t look any happier than Rory at the idea, for which he was grateful. “It’s too dangerous. It’ll kill you.”
“We’ve got no other choice, though,” Ned said.
Arelland started heading towards the construct. “He is correct again. Go. I will hold it, and I will survive. I promise. And if I cannot… it was a good to meet you all.”
Before Rory could protest, Arelland charged at the construct. At the same time, Ned floored the accelerator.
The construct attacked the pickup with its many lasers once again, turning the entire injured face into a gigantic face of gleaming red. When Ned accelerated the pickup away too quickly for them to get hit, the construct tried to give chase.
But Arelland threw his harpoon at it like a rocket and held it back. It tried to sink into the ground, but the elf had anchored it in place.
Rory stared back, unable to keep his worry down. They had to hurry. The strange new threat that Alex had sent might have been stymied for now, but it wasn’t done. They had to rescue Arelland still.
Chapter 41
Rory couldn’t stop looking back on their journey back to the palace. Even after they long left behind where Arelland and the strange construct was, he couldn’t stop himself from wondering, hoping, worrying that the elf was still all right.
“How far are we now?” he asked. He had lost count of how many times this time made that he had asked the same question.
“Almost there,” Ned said.
After the first time he had replied with a more concrete answer, he had resorted to saying the same thing over and over again. Rory didn’t really mind. As long as his attention was focused on getting them to the palace as quickly as possible, he couldn’t fault it.
“Dear,” Viv said. She placed a calming hand on his shoulder. “We’ll reach him in time. I’ll make sure of it.”
