218: Pursuit

Nicolai swung his anti-material rifle into position and squeezed the trigger. The process was effortless, the result of a merging between him and the Aiming Module. Though he aimed and fired with casual ease and fluid speed, the shot was dead-centre on target.

The gunshot blew the shield that sprung up around the Tier 2 into a great cloud of smoking Oma; as though God had leaned close to the man and breathed out a mist of pale blue. Nicolai thought it beautiful, as did the Aiming Module.

From Nicolai’s investigation of Symbiotes, he knew that when it came to Skin Shields there were two primary types. Standard Skin Shields, and Burst Skin Shields.

Kleos had told him that a Burst Skin Shield could only block a single hit or short burst of damage, but were very effective and could block very powerful hits. As soon as it was hit, the shield would activate a burst of defensive energy. If it had activated in response to a powerful blow, this burst would be used up instantly as it absorbed the blow. If it had reacted to a weaker attack, the defensive energy would protect against subsequent hits for roughly a second, after which the shield would need time to reform. These types of shield were quite cheap to upkeep and thus served as a standard precaution against surprise attacks, often kept active at all times.

Standard Skin Shields were stronger overall, but more expensive to upkeep. Thus it was typical to use a Burst Skin Shield at first, then switch to a standard Skin Shield.

As the blue mist of broken Oma faded away, the Tier 2 Cultivator was revealed to be unharmed. His Tier 2 Burst Skin Shield was up to the challenge of soaking a single shot from the anti-material rifle.

It had been worth checking regardless. If he’d been able to kill the Tier 2 in these first moments of the fight, the odds would have shifted dramatically.

Nicolai cranked the bolt as he danced backwards, fishing out a fresh round from his bandolier. There came a brief moment where the enemy froze, their eyes drawn to the instantaneous detonation of their leaders Burst Shield as the great boom of the M99’s gunshot washed over them. A moment of uncertainty, a typically instinctual reaction occurring when the body realises that death is near. Other than Nicolai, only two of them were unaffected by this momentary freeze.

One was the Tier 2 who did not look at all happy about Nicolai choosing to shoot him first. The ripples emanating from him told of numerous Symbiotes being used. His Soul Sense had formed a great arm which was stretching up and up, into the sky. Simultaneously a green glow covered his skin; a different Skin Shield—even stronger than the previous, from what Nicolai could tell—being activated. He was preparing some kind of powerful attack.

Nicolai didn’t need the urgings of Threat Analysis to know it was time to flee. But he couldn’t afford to turn his back and run, because there was one other who hadn’t frozen, who was attacking. This was one of the Tier 1’s, a man who had immediately sprinted forward. His body blurred as he activated some Symbiote that launched his body many metres in a snap, almost as though he had teleported.

As he came out of the first jump he was holding a hand towards Nicolai and the ripples in the Aura said that he would be performing another jump in the next moment.

Those ripples spoke to Nicolai. The moment froze and grew still as the Dark and the Thrill reached through him. The Aura of the world pressed tight around him, whispering its secrets.

The man had a burst shield, but it was Tier 1. A 50.cal round would overwhelm it, smashing through it with minimal loss of force and killing the man behind it. The problem was he hadn’t finished reloading.

The burst shield was a problem… but as Nicolai’s Soul darkened, and spiritual claws grew from him, he knew it was not an insurmountable one. He knew also roughly where the man would appear. It would be behind him, to block his route of retreat. That was the only sensible move. But he needed to know where exactly.

The Aura whispered: here, and Nicolai moved.

The Cultivator blurred, and appeared right there. Just in time to catch Nicolai’s fist as he completed the swing.

His Soul was boiled up tight within his limb; dark and writhing, a pure Soul attack designed to smash shields. The pressure of the Angelic Blade fought against the darkness, but Nicolai aided the dark and it swelled, giving him spiritual strength. He used his left; the bionic arm, which ended in a metal fist. It was eight times stronger and two times faster than a human arm.

The moment the Cultivator arrived the man was activating some Symbiote, launching some kind of spiritual attack.

It came too slow. Nicolai’s metal fist and his Soul smashed into the man’s burst shield. The Burst Shield detonated, a sudden blast of force designed to nullify and incoming attack, as the Tier 2’s had succesfully foiled the 50.cal round. This Tier 1 Burst Shield would have thus nullified a standard punch from a bionic arm. But with the heavy reinforcement of Nicolai’s Soul, to turn the attack more spiritual in nature, the vast majority of that nullification was defeated by his Soul strike. The bionic arm continued, barely slowed, toward the man’s head.

For a frozen moment Nicolai saw the man’s snarling face deform. Red lines crawled through the side of his eye as the fist crunched into his skull. Then time resumed and the man was whipped away, launched spinning. Blood and bone sprayed across the grass.

Nicolai let the momentum of the swing carry him forward while activating the Grasping Finger, reaching with the Symbiote and seizing at a nearby tree. The moment the Grasping Finger had locked on he pulled, activating his Pegasi ring. His body began to float as he slingshotted himself forward with the finger, moving with desperate speed. He could feel what was coming for him.

The other Cultivators had swung into action. There were six Tier 1’s remaining in total and three of them fired powerful projectile attacks at him while the Tier 2 continued to send his growing spiritual arm into the sky. The three who weren’t attacking were beside the Tier 2, focusing on forming a powerful shield before themselves and their leader; wary of Nicolai’s next attack.

The attacks from the Tier 1’s were not the simple blasts of Blue Lightning or Crawling Fire. He could see it in the size and shape of them, feel it in the Aura. These were attacks forged from combinations of Symbiotes, all acting together. They launched all at once and his world narrowed to the energy pursuing him.

A great arrow of silver energy flashed past him as he dodged, only to turn midair, preparing for another run.

A ball of fire turned the area behind him into an inferno, flames reaching for his retreating form. Where they touched on his Soul Sense, they burned it away.

A rustling snake of roots sped over the ground, curved and came after him, snatching at his legs. This one was quick and it redirected adroitly to avoid the fire, then it was on him. His own basic Burst Shield Symbiote, which he’d managed to fashion using items from the Trade Link and others he’d found in the jungle these couple of days, did not react as the vines wrapped around his legs, grabbing and slowing him down as he tried to continue pulling away with the Grasping Finger.

The arrow was coming for him again, and with the vines dragging on him he wasn’t going to be able to avoid it. Would the Burst Shield be enough? It seemed like it should but he felt something dangerous from this arrow. It wasn’t as simple as it looked.

But Nicolai had finished reloading the anti-material rifle. Snarling, he set his stance, tense and strong, remaining balanced even as the vines pulled on him. There, directed Aiming, pulling his gaze to the current Target.

The one controlling the vine-root had moved forward and sunk to a knee, hand on the ground, eyes fixed on him.

The M99 came around like Death’s own scythe. The gunshot broke the air and caught the Tier 1 dead between the eyes.

Broken Oma from a Tier 1 Burst Shield that’d been found wanting sprayed in all directions. The remains of the man’s head added a stroke of red into the picture. Nicolai ripped his feet away from the now-limp vines and dodged sideways. The silver arrow’s strike, which would’ve hit him solidly, became a glancing blow—and he used the Sheltering Glove to turn that glancing blow into a deflection.

This proved good, because the moment it impacted on his gloves shield, it tore his glove’s weakened shield apart while also splintering into a dozen smaller arrows. These split into two clouds, one left, one right, that circled him for a second then then launched, crashing into his burst shield which soaked them and popped. A tricky attack, with two stages. If his Burst Shield had taken the first hit, he would’ve been left open to the second attack.

Meanwhile the Cultivators were crying out in shock at the sudden death of their companion.

‘To me,’ called the Tier 2. ‘Behind the shield.’ He had raised his other hand, and now he and the other three all touched on the great shield they were forming, a powerful dome. The one who’d thrown the fire and the one controlling the silver arrow hustled over to join them.

The Tier 2’s upraised finger fell and fixed on Nicolai, and his Soul Sense fell with it.

Nicolai was moving away as quickly as he could. He’d stuffed the anti-material rifle into the Big Mouth so he could sprint full out, and used the Grasping Finger with the Pegasi ring, but it wasn’t enough.

The Tier 2’s great spiritual arm slammed into him, and even with the dark, even with full readiness, even recognising it was a kind of crushing attack and even forming his defence as perfectly as possible; it wasn’t enough. This Cultivation’s Soul Sense wasn’t as strong as the Bird’s, but it was wielded with significantly more skill. Nicolai managed to resist the first blow, but the second broke his Soul Sense which retreated into him. The spiritual arm gripped tight around him.

Nicolai had worried that it would grasp and pull him through the air, as the Bird had, but instead the hand simply stayed attached to him, preventing his Soul Sense from reemerging. He attempted the same counterattack as he’d used to free himself from the Bird’s clutches, ripping with spiritual claws at it where it clutched him, but to little effect. The Cultivator didn’t appear to feel the pain, due to the medium of the spiritual arm rather than standard Soul Sense.

He felt the ripple of another Symbiote being activated. The Cultivator spat out a streak of something red that fell onto the spiritual arm and wormed into it. The red grew into a vein-like line, an infection running through it. The red vein reached all the way through the arm, into the hand, and from there into Nicolai. A spiritual needle that slammed into his Soul. It felt like a kick from a stallion. He stumbled, staggered, threw himself to the ground to avoid the silver arrow which whistled over his head.

At that moment the Soul Sense tendril around him flexed. Through this link, spirit-to-spirit, he sensed the Cultivator shifting. The first attack had been applied, now came the second. The Soul Sense around him turned yellow, and he found that a formless force was grasping at him. Just like with the Bird, and of more immediate danger than the infection.

Nicolai struggled, his Soul tearing at the thickening clutches as he struggled to get away. His body moved slowly, and he felt how the formless force was tightening around him.

A ball of fire passed him by, a clear miss, detonating in front of him. A zoning attack, aiming to further seal his fate by blocking his route. His eyes narrowed, then Nicolai tore himself all the space he could manage and dove into the fire.

His Soul sustained damage, but his body at least was fine. His Skin Suit was designed to resist such environmental hazards. It wasn’t good for it but it’d survive, he wasn’t in the fire for long. What it did do, was get the Tier 2 Cultivators Soul Sense arm off of him, as the spiritual component in the flames burned at it. Through a drone he saw the Tier 2 cursing at the man who’d thrown the fire.

Now able to extend his own Soul Sense and use the Grasping Finger, Nicolai sped away into the brush. So long as he could keep distance from the Tier 2, he should be okay. From further away the man’s Soul Sense tendril would be weaker. But inside of him a problem was growing.

The needle was dug into his Soul and it was pumping a red venom into him, more and more with each passing moment. He reached for it, grasped it with the fingers of his Soul and tore it free. The venom left rushed through his Soul and into the nearest Nodes. His heart, lungs, and kidneys Nodes were filled with it almost instantly.

Within those Nodes, Nicolai’s Symbiotes froze up as the red energy covered them. They shook and twitched, and he was unable to use them.

The red energy kept going, moving up towards his head and down his arms and legs.

If it got to his right hand he would be in deep trouble. He needed the Grasping Finger if he wanted any chance of making his escape; it was his only method of moving quickly.

His lips drew back, baring his teeth. This was a bad situation, the worst he’d been in for a while. But his teeth were not bared in a grimace of dismay. No, his was a grin of joy.

Difficult situations like this, situations where he could win only by the skin of his teeth, through vicious and bloody combat… these were what he lived for.