Zac barely had time to release another set of leaves and activate a defensive charge of his robes before the Captain was once again in front of him, his fist crackling with power. However, just as the captain appeared in front of Zac the two slivers decided to once again try to destroy the Miasmic Cage, and a massive wave of wild energies blasted out from Zac’s body.
Everything within fifty meters was destroyed in an instant. Some parts had been annihilated or at least destroyed with complete prejudice, whereas some of the surroundings had been twisted and transformed beyond recognition. A dozen large crystals had also appeared out of nowhere, making the area look like a quartz mine.
The Captain wasn’t unscathed either, and his chest lit up as a wave of dozens of shields spread out around him. However, these shields obviously hadn’t been augmented by Dr. Fried as they proved utterly incapable of hindering the aura of Creation and Oblivion that radiated out from Zac.
The shields cracked like brittle glass and the Captain was suddenly inundated in the energies of the two remnants. His body twisted and mutated as other parts just withered away, but he immediately shot back with enough speed to break the sound barrier. The wave subsided and Zac once again found himself in control of his body, and he looked up with bleary eyes only to see the captain’s body quickly reforming itself to peak condition.
It looked like killing a D-Grade warrior wouldn’t be so easy.
The captain had learned his lesson though, and he no longer seemed interested in getting up-close to Zac. Perhaps he had wanted to minimize the damage to his ship that way, but the detonation seemed to have been too dangerous for comfort. Instead, he raised his arm toward Zac, and a dozen miniature drones were released from his arm and created a circle in the air.
Streams of power emerged from his arm and connected with the drones, and a simile of an array was formed. A ball that seemed to be a mix of electricity and plasma was quickly formed within the circle, and Zac’s danger sense once again startled him awake from his muddled state.
Zac was still dealing with the aftermath of the shockwave himself, and fleeing from the captain was out of the question. He just hesitated for a fraction of a second before he sent the command to his specialty core, and he almost fell over again as a surge of Miasma joined the chaos within his body.
But the transformation finished in time, allowing Zac to barely erect [Immutable Bulwark] before a terrifying beam of energy slammed into him.
The captain was going all out to take him down, and his latest attack was causing even more damage to the ship than Zac’s own efforts. Everything around him melted as he was pushed back over a hundred meters, but his defensive skill had protected him from getting incinerated at least. However, Zac saw that the shield was about to break after just a second of defending, and he unhesitantly jumped out of the way at the last moment.
He had hoped that the beam would shoot past him and blast a hole in the hull, but it winked out immediately after Zac dodged it. His Danger Sense screamed again, and he re-summoned the large fractal bulwark to block his upper body as the Captain, or rather his detached arm, appeared in front of him.
[Immutable Bulwark] cracked in an instant under the pressure of the D-Grade warrior’s punch and Zac was thrown through two walls before he slammed into what could either be a massive pipe or some sort of tunnel.
Scorching pain suddenly radiated from his leg, and Zac miserably got out of the indent that he had caused. An almost blinding light drowned the area the next moment as the dented metal was incinerated from the contents within. A beautiful yet terrifying stream of light coursed through the conduit, and Zac’s eyes widened at the display.
The light didn’t give off any heat or aura of power like a Cosmic Energy, but it still almost amputated his leg by just grazing it. His usually impervious body had proved wholy incapable of stopping it and the pain was excruciating. The good news was that the captain had stopped over a hundred meters away, and he didn’t seem to be readying himself to activate another beam.
Was it just fear of another shockwave, or was it fear of damaging the power conduit behind him? It was probably one of the main lines of power that ran this whole ship as far as Zac could guess. What else would require this much power in a reclaimed old freight vessel?
His first instinct was to blow up the pipeline, but the problem was that he had sort of already done that by slamming into it like an infuriated Barghest. The thick metal tubing was dented and twisted, but the stream of lights seemed wholly undeterred. The parts of metal that blocked its original path had simply been incinerated, allowing the energy river to continue on its intended trajectory.
It made him believe that the piping itself might actually be there to protect others from getting themselves killed, or prevent things from getting into the energy feed. The stream itself was rather controlled through some other means, which made it much harder to blow up.
He had a sudden bout of inspiration as he quickly stabbed his shoulders with two knives as he stared into the eyes of the technocrat. The Fragments of the Bodhi and the Axe poured into the two fractals on his shoulders, and his whole body felt some reprieve as a lot of the back-up energies inside his body poured into the fractal as well.
An extremely large blob had formed in his chest in an instant, and it started expanding at a shocking pace. Zac frantically pushed it out of his chest and into his arm as usual, but the ball of creation was as large as a beach ball by the time it reached his elbow. Zac grit his teeth and pushed half of his left arm straight into the stream of energy with one instant motion.
The pain of getting his arm singed off up to the elbow was almost enough to make him black out, but a spastic mess of flesh grew out and replaced the lost forearm in an instant as Zac repeatedly wished for a hand just like before when his arm was destroyed.
“What have you done!” the Captain screamed with fury before he launched toward Zac with murder in his eyes.
A billowing wave of killing intent caused his whole body to shudder, and he unhesitantly reached for the Token again. However, his eyes widened when he realized that his newly created hand was completely without strength and coordination. It flopped around like a wet noodle, and he couldn’t even grip properly.
However, the whole thing became moot before the captain had a chance to arrive. A scorching pain enveloped him as a huge explosion of pink and blue flung straight through a meter-thick wall. Multiple bones creaked in pain, but he had thankfully been able to infuse his body with the Fragment of the Coffin along with expending a defensive talisman.
One explosion after another rocked the whole vessel, but he unsteadily got back to his feet in case the captain would show up again. But the only thing he saw was blue and pink flames spreading in every direction, and immense structural damage. Zac’s eyes lit up at the scene, and he quickly looked around for a Teleportation Array.
Fleeing from the captain had already caused an excessive amount of damage to the ship, and he refused to believe that the chain of explosions that he could feel in his bones wasn’t enough to get the job done. Just as expected, just twenty meters away a Teleportation Array had appeared, and Zac lunged at it as he knew he was running out of time.
However, just as he was about to step onto the platform the whole ship heaved as a massive crack opened up beneath his feet. Zac desperately tried to reach the array, but his surroundings turned to a blur as he was flung away from the spaceship decompressing.
A distance of hundreds of meters was opened up between Zac and the technocrat ship in an instant, and the momentum kept pushing him further and further away. He panicked for a second, but he soon enough realized that the Miasma in his body was keeping him safe, though the expenditure was pretty taxing.
Another shockwave from the distance caused Zac to spin out of control as he was pushed even further, and he started to flail his arm to regain control. And surprisingly enough it worked. He realized he could actually shoot out a burst of miasma to somewhat mimic the effect of a propulsion engine. It allowed him to right himself soon enough, and he finally got a good look at the surroundings.
Pieces of metal were spinning about all around him, and in the distance a series of explosions harried the gargantuan vessel he had just fallen out of. The dome of the bean in the middle of the ship had completely buckled, and the shockwave he had just felt was no doubt one of the enormous thrusters in the rear exploding.
A beautiful wave of the radiant destruction was currently spreading outward like a supernova explosion, but he seemed to be far from the blast zone. But guilt rather than happiness filled Zac’s mind as he witnessed the scene. He hadn’t really considered the implications of his actions when he infused the unknown pink spark into the river of energy.
He had subconsciously compared it to pouring sugar in a car tank to stall the engine, but this was much worse. Tens of thousands of people lived and worked on that ship, and he had turned it into scrap metal. Thankfully, the vessels had some fail-safes installed as blue shields spread across the breaches that leaked atmosphere, meaning that most of the technocrats were probably safe.
Zac breathed in relief as he thought of his next move. Usually the Teleportation Array followed you if you kept moving, pretty much urging you to move on to the next level. Would it be the same in outer space though?
There was nothing to lose from trying, and he quickly looked for any clues. Thankfully the familiar array was just a few dozen meters away from him, attached to a piece of wreckage from the Little Bean.
A sudden collision inside his body forced him to puke a mouthful of blood that instantly turned into an ice sculpture, which rudely informed him that two slivers in his body wouldn’t even take a break after being thrown into space. He ignored the pain as he propelled himself toward the array with the help of a burst of Miasma expelled from his hands.
The array lit up the moment he floated into it, and a brief bout of darkness provided some reprieve to the chaotic war that had resumed in his body. But the struggle for supremacy between the two artifacts immediately started up again the moment he appeared in the next world.
Zac tried to get a grasp of the situation at the 72nd level, but another clash made him double over and puke another stream of blood that this time turned into sanguine butterflies. The little bugs flittered about for a couple of seconds before they exploded, causing widespread destruction to the area around him.
He tried to rouse a response to the reignited war, but he knew he was in pretty bad shape. He had plenty of Miasma and ichor to spare, but his constitution and soul were drained after being inundated in Creation over and over again. The adrenaline coursing through his body during the escape had kept him going, but the brief sojourn into outer space had cooled him down.
A quest prompt appeared in front of Zac’s eyes, but his fuzzy mind couldn’t make out what the screen said as his body suddenly expanded ten meters before shrinking back again, the agony enough to make Zac scream out loud. Another burst of energies threatened to burn his pathways clear, and he desperately pounded down on the ground with enough force to cause a massive explosion that caused gravel and dirt to fly in all directions.
Zac zealously clung on to the parting words of the cultivator in the vision, using it as a foundation to steer back on course. The cultivator had told him to restrain himself and not wish for anything, and by now he understood all too well what he meant by restraining desires. The moment he had an errant thought it was immediately fulfilled, but the results were seldom what he hoped for.
It was like the Shard of Creation was an evil genie that sort of fulfilled his wishes, but in a way that seemed to backfire while also draining him of longevity. Should he try releasing a couple of flashes to tire out the Shard? The Splinter was also causing trouble, but it was still contained in its cage even if the fractal was leaking pretty badly by this point.
But releasing flashes was like putting band-aids on a sinking ship, and he needed a permanent solution. Should he try to expedite their attempts at breaking open the cage? It would happen sooner or later anyway as they kept slamming into the Miasmic Fractal, and perhaps it would allow him to trap both remnants inside.
But something suddenly cut through both the pain and confusion as Zac’s Danger Sense suddenly screamed that his life was in danger. It was not from something within, but rather from someone or something attacking him again.
The Splinter brought forth an all-consuming fury that threatened to burn Zac alive as hundreds of eyes spontaneously grew on his body to see what had accosted him. But the vision scared Zac straight, and the eyes immediately shrunk back into his body.
It was an actual Dragon from mythology, a primordial beast over a hundred meters long.