Thud. She lands.
The zombie slayers turn to her.
Unarmed, they had been drained of their ability to wield normal weapons by whatever had taken over their minds.
Growling, they charged towards her.
Some of them fell on top of each other.
Hikari backed off, drawing them farther and farther from the spire they guarded.
She jumped backward towards a cliff face.
Anchoring her boots on the stone, she thrust herself over the horde of slayers.
She tossed her sword like a javelin at the base of the spire.
The sword plunged into the stone wrapped in the strange flesh.
Turning, she drove the sword deeper with a drop kick from both boots.
Her momentum drove the sword past the spire, shattering the entire structure.
A wave of aether flame spilled over her as the spire's crystal shattered.
Next.
She counted six spires as she surveyed the area.
She picked up her heavy sword and held it close to her chest.
The next slayer horde funnels towards her.
She abruptly switches direction, dashing out of the ring of spires to draw the slayer horde away.
Ke… Ke… Ke…
A clicking sound follows her.
Strange humanoid beings emerge from the fog.
Their sizes vary; the smallest are about the size of normal people.
The largest ones matched hers.
Their bodies appeared to be made of bark, much like ents.
Vines wrapped around them from top to bottom.
Tiny pink flowers bloomed on their bodies.
Their swords were made of crystallized aether.
Their faces were empty, but their presence expressed their dissatisfaction with the commotion Hikari caused.
Hikari had never seen anything like them.
She drew a throwing dagger and ignited it with RazenHeir flame.
The hollow creatures advanced towards her.
They did not charge or lunge or attempt to surround her.
She tossed it at one of them at full speed.
As her dagger flew, she noticed the creature trying to lift its sword to parry it.
But it was too slow.
The dagger plunged into its chest.
Its force knocked it back.
The creature bent its knees to stabilize itself, avoiding falling onto its back.
The RazenHeir flames ignited its insides.
But the creature still got up and marched mindlessly towards Hikari.
It managed several more steps before the flames consumed its body, leaving only its legs as dead stumps.
The mass of enemies converges on Hikari.
Her RazenHeir flame flared.
She ran her flaming palm along the broadside of her sword, then brandished it.
The mass of zombie slayers and other worldly creatures closes in.
Thud! One boot in front. She anchors herself.
Grabbing her sword with both hands, she swings it in a sweeping arc.
Her sword smashes through the strange creatures' bark armor and through their flesh.
Her swing releases a wave of RazenHeir flame, igniting the packed mass of enemies.
Ke… Ke… Ke.. The clicking got loud.
Clank! Hikari parries the camouflaged creature, sending it flying.
Its invisible body bashes against a cliff face, leaving a visible chip in the stone.
More enemies converge on her.
She circles them, herding the mindless foes into a tight pack.
Her RazenHeir flame flared.
A flaming arc slices through the herd, igniting them.
The RazenHeir flames burn, slowly eating through their flesh.
The mindless creatures feel no pain.
They keep crawling towards Hikari, running around them in circles, falling over each other as they are herded into a confined space.
Ke… Ke… Ke…
Hikari parries the invisible creature with her flaming sword.
She senses its mana as it closes in, neutralizing its camouflage and leaving its fragile body to crackle like twigs under her flames.
Its piercing spears of crystallized aether dropped to the ground.
She turned to the herd.
Mana crystals dropped as the RazenHeir flames burned through their flesh.
Pitch black with a hint of pinkish aether glow.
More and more creatures emerged to replenish their ranks.
Despite her burning through the herd again and again, it only grew.
"This won't do."
She backs off further and jumps up onto a cliff.
The mass of bark warriors pushes against the cliffside, clawing at it, unable to reach her.
A stream of the bark creature emerges from the fog.
Then, a creature wielding a staff appears.
It stops and glares at Hikari, perched atop the cliff.
It waves its staff, aether flame gathering at its tip, and hurls a bolt right at Hikari.
Hikari shuffles her boot to avoid the slow-moving bolt.
More mage creatures appeared.
Hikari couldn't dodge all the bolts by moving her large body.
The bark creatures clumped up below her, leaving the space behind them empty.
It was her chance.
She jumped high, heading straight for one of the five remaining spires.
Aether bolts whizzed past her.
One hit her on the leg.
There was no heat.
She felt only the sting of her mana combusting.
She smashed through the spire with her boot.
The sudden mana surge staggered the creatures around her.
She recovered quickly, seizing the opening to smash another spire.
Three down, three to go.
With every spire she smashed, she sensed the mana within the fog destabilizing.
A horde of bark creatures and slayers stood behind her and the next spire.
She was surrounded. The hordes she skipped over now close in.
Bolts of aether fire fly at her from all directions.
She drew her sword, took a thrusting stance, and charged.
Her boot cracked the smaller bark creatures as she powered through.
She plunged her sword into a bark giant.
She crushed its knee with her boot, forcing it to the ground.
The bark creatures around her tried to smother her, beating their swords against her wyvern skin.
Incinerate, a wave of RazenHeir flame, staggers them, giving Hikari space to leap towards the spire.
The spire crumbles as her boot drives her sword through its base.
The wave of aether fire stings her mana.
She endured.
Two more to go.
A giant bark creature twice her size emerges from the fog.
Thud. Even she feels the ground tremor as it moves its giant stump.
A giant pink flower blooms on its trunk.
It was the size of seige cannons, large enough to punch a hole through Carla's wall.
A large build of aether fire.
She dashed under the bark giant.
Her hand flared with RazenHeir flame, igniting one of its stumps.
A massive aether-flame explosion erupted behind her as the giant flower unleashed its attack, incinerating its own minions skittering behind Hikari.
Hikari dashed past the giant towards the spire, using its body as a shield.
The same drill; the spire crumbles.
"One left."
More than a dozen mages stood in her way.
Hikari darts forward in a zigzag path, dodging their aether fire.
She senses the giant vine sprout from the giant that she just bypassed.
She turned her head and saw the crystal spikes on the vine.
The giant swings the vine.
Hikari jumps to avoid it.
The vine swept away another swath of its own minions.
Mid-air, Hikari was still too far from the spire.
More mid-sized bark giants gathered, blocking her way.
A surge of telekinetic power shot through her body, pushing her over the horde toward the last remaining spire.
She twirled her sword, using telekinesis to cover the distance.
Her sword smashed into the spire's base, cracking it.
It wobbled.
Hikari landed in the middle of a horde.
Incinerate. She unleashed a wave of RazenHeir flame.
It burned the smaller creatures, but the giants were unfazed.
They swung their crystal swords.
Hikari drew her daggers and parried.
She released more daggers in a whirling steel.
The whirling daggers pinned down the surrounding giants as she snapped one giant's joints at a time.
Some distance away, the spire cracked.
Its damaged base could no longer hold up the structure.
The crystal sitting atop it shattered without its support.
"Nice."
Hikari celebrates as the last spire falls.
The mana surge staggers the giants.
Hikari endures through the mana burn.
Her boots crash through a giant's leg.
A jump followed by a stomp crushes its body.
As she tears through the bark creatures, she feels the spell in the area unwind.
It spills its mana everywhere.
The smaller giants ignite with their own aether flame.
Hikari grits her teeth and endures.
Suddenly, she senses an immense presence.
The fog was masking it.
Run. Her instincts scream.
She breaks into a run and dashes away from the fog's center.
A wave of searing heat followed her.
She pushed herself into the air with a telekinetic blast, rolling a good distance before landing on the cliff top.
A wave of searing fire swept the ground below.
Hot. Searing hot like the core of furnaces.
She recovered and found the entire ground littered with charred bark.
Even some loose stones glowed like lava.
The fog cleared, revealing the tower's gate.
A summoning circle.
Acolytes knelt around it.
Ritual daggers pierced their stomachs and emerged from their backs.
At its center, an armored knight rested on its sword.
The mana stones on the ground chatter.
Shattered pieces of the spires gravitated toward the knight.
The dead acolytes began convulsing.
The dagger through the stomach dragged upward, squeezing more blood out of their bodies.
The blood flowed along the ritual circle, converging on the knight.
Spheres of mana glowed with power, pumping mana into the knight through the circle.
Hikari drew a throwing dagger; she wouldn't let the ritual finish unfettered.
She threw it towards a sphere.
It exploded with mana as her dagger shattered it, destabilizing the ritual.
The knight in the center awakens.
As it tries to rise, parts of its armor fall off, hanging by loose straps of flesh.
The ritual was incomplete, leaving its flesh tattered and unstitched.
Its beating heart half exposed.
Hikari felt its gaze through its great helmet as it stared at her.
Flames gathered in its hand.
Its exposed veins turned golden with mana.
It unleashed a torrent of flames toward Hikari.
Hikari braced. The sheer distance between her and the knight dissipated the flames.
Her wyvern skin blocks out most of the heat.
Her salamander armor absorbed the rest.
Roar! The knight thrashed around.
Its summoners had chained it down to the circle before the ritual could be completed.
Hikari aimed another dagger.
Another sphere shatters.
The knight roars and thrashes around in pain.
It vomits raw mana out of its deformed mouth.
Clink! The abomination's armor was brittle from the mana blast.
It breaks free.
Pulling its sword from the ground, it leaps toward Hikari.
It misses, crashing into the cliffside.
As it pulls its face out, it feels a sharp knock to the back of its head as Hikari kicks before it can re-form.
She burns the staggered knight with RazenHeir flame.
Up close, the abomination was a head taller than her.
Roar! It breaks free and swings its sword.
Hikari backs off.
She recovers her own sword.
The knight moves its mana, extinguishing the RazenHeir flames sticking to its body.
Looks like Hikari has to beat it down properly.
She swings her sword to warm up her arm.
The abomination knight charges her.
Hikari accepts its challenge.
Overhead swing. Hikari dodges.
She counters, aiming for the abomination's elbow.
Clank! Her sword couldn't dent the armor like it did the slayers'.
The knight forcefully pulls its sword from the ground.
Hikari dodges.
Like a beast, the knight wields its sword like a chopper.
Hikari tilts her sword, making it slide off hers.
She sees its beating heart.
But she can't reach it as the abomination swings its sword wildly.
The beating heart changes color.
She senses the flames build up.
Her own flaming dagger stabs it in the stomach, throwing it off balance.
It unleashes the flames prematurely, burning itself.
Hikari blocks most of the stray flames with her sword.
Parts of her wyvern skin were charred from the attack.
She notices her sword glow.
She feels the heat.
No time to think.
The Abomination swings its sword.
Hikari counters, thrusting her sword into an exposed part of its armor.
Her searing sword burns its flesh.
The Abomination roars.
It works.
The Abomination's own flames power her sword.
Reverse flow.
The Abomination extinguishes her RazenHeir flames.
Its heart turned golden again.
Hikari readies another dagger.
No new moves.
The Abomination's sword glowed golden.
The stone below it melted into lava.
Hikari was dead focused.
A direct hit from the Abomination's sword could end her.
It raised its sword and charged.
Hikari's daggers stabbed into its flesh.
Dodge.
The Abomination's sword melted into the ground.
It got stuck.
A dagger sinks into its eye.
It pumped more fire into its sword.
Hikari plunges her sword into its sword arm.
Her own sword absorbs the flame.
She drags it through its flesh violently, severing its arm.
Her hands burn from holding the searing sword.
With the power-up, she thrusts her sword into the abdomen.
She feels the flesh melt.
Suddenly, it turns cold.
Her sword freezes.
Hikari backs off.
Her hands feel numb despite only a brief exposure.
Its heart turned bright blue.
The same color as in the mana vein.
Hikari found herself caught in a freezing vortex.
She saw the abomination's flesh harden; its heart stopped.
Its presence diminished as it summoned the vortex.
With a telekinetic blast, she pushed herself out.