Legacy of the M'Zee Chapter 26

*** AUTHOR'S NOTE ***

Thanks for all y'all's help in liking/commenting on Facebook posts. I got selected for the next part of the beta, so keep on going over and clicking things if you can. It's not a ton of money, but it can hopefully become something useful. 

In other news, if you have feedback you want addressed in Energy Barons, Friday is your last day to provide it. Either Saturday or Sunday I'll be making the copy to send to my editor, so I need a bit of time to address what y'all suggest. 

Once Energy Barons is done, I'll be focusing solely on Legacy, though I did spend some time plotting/planning on where I want to take Stormy Mountain Sect through the first book. Hoping to finish up Legacy's first draft by the end of August or mid-September.  Hope y'all are having a great summer!

*** AUTHOR'S NOTE ***

The room that extended beyond them was immense. I stood on a ledge that was four meters square, extending out over a drop that seemed endless. Pillars rose out of the depths, with dozens of meters between them. The pillars made a scattershot pattern across the endless expanse. In between the massive pillars, blocks of Earth and Air made steps, though they moved around in a dizzying variety of speeds and directions. Other than the wall the ledge I was on stuck out from, there was no other boundary to the room, the sides and front extending into a misty haze. I had no idea where the light was coming from, since it felt omnipresent.

Flashes of movement directed my gaze to a gaggle of bird Beasts that zipped across the expanse between the platform I was on and the nearest pillar. I had a run of nearly thirty meters, with six tiny steps moving sideways like an old-school platformer game. I grasped at my waist, only to find that my weapons were gone, leaving me bare handed. My backpack had vanished as well, but I had expected that.

“This is your last individual challenge,” Spirit said, appearing in front of me. “Make it to the end of the pillars to claim a prize, and then begin the next set of challenges.” They vanished again.

“You know, you should pick a method of communication and stick with it!” I yelled at the air. The nearest bird, an (Air) Hawk, turned towards me as it heard my words. It shrieked into the sky, diving at me. It was much too far away to feel how strong it was, at least at first, so I decided to meet it with overwhelming firepower. A beam of Plasma reached up to meet it, and utterly obliterated the Beast.

“Okay, so only level two or three,” I said. “Don’t waste Aether like that again. They’re not strong enough to really hurt, but they could knock me off a step into that,” I looked down over the edge of the platform. The depths were shrouded in darkness, extending too far down to see the bottom. “Yeah, I’m strong, but that fall will kill me, unless Spirit intervenes. Even if they did, I doubt they would let me try again, and I would have failed out. I refuse to let that happen.”

The first platform wasn’t that far away, maybe ten meters, with six steps in between the ledge and platform. Each step was moving perpendicular to the path to the platform, lazily sketching out a straight line five meters long. “Platformer level,” I laughed. “Did you see this in my head as well, Spirit?” No answer was forthcoming. “Should be simple enough. Only a few Beasts nearby, so I need to keep an eye on them, but making the jumps here would be doable for a newbie Gatherer.”

I waited a few seconds, then jumped. The steps here were a meter square, easy to land on, with only a meter between them. I could almost step it. I counted to five, then hopped to the next one. My eyes snapped from the tiny platform to the pillar then to the Beasts that flapped slowly above me. When they didn’t move, I glanced back to the next jump, then leapt.

A caw sounded above me, and I dropped to one knee while extending a hand over my head. Three Night Crows were dive bombing me, with the closest nearly upon me. My immediate ducking made it miss, and a quickly thrown ball of Fire sent it spiraling into the mists below. I quickly gestured, sending a blast of Air upwards and knocking the other two away. Eh, I should’ve done that better, I thought while building an Aether Blast in my left hand. Way too big of a breeze. I need to practice using longer-ranged attacks when not using my trisula. You know, just in case.

The bird I was targeting dodged the Aether Blast, then sent a beam of Darkness that I narrowly dodged. It cut into the Earth and Metal Aether of the step, but only shallowly. I glared at the Beast, then sent a wave of Lightning out, the electricity arcing into the bird when it tried to doge. It took three times as much Aether as a Blast would have, but I was annoyed at it.

The third Beast extended its claws as it reached for my back, but the Air blast had slowed it down enough that I was able to turn and grab its legs before it could get to me. I slammed it down onto the platform, and then tossed the bird over the side. It didn’t move again. “Those are just annoying. Why are Beasts that weak fighting to the death anyway?” I grumbled to myself, then leapt to the penultimate step.

No more Beasts attacked, and a couple of jumps left me standing on the top of the pillar. This cylinder was barren, though I could see the next one, nearly thirty meters away, had a bunch of plants on it. A line of silver etched itself through the center of the pillar’s top. I approached the line, looking down at it. There was a tiny amount of Aether running through it, but nothing that looked dangerous. With a shrug, I jumped over it.

Aether surged through the metal and down the pillar. The steps behind me, leading to the platform where I started this challenge, crumbled into dust and fell into the abyss. “Well, uh, crud,” I said. “Guess I can’t go backwards. I just know that there’s going to be a dead end path that I run into. Alright, next pillar.”

I examined the next gap. Between this pillar and the next was about thirty meters. The pillar was also maybe five meters taller than this one. Ten steps moved between us, four at my level that were moving back and forth. The fifth one rose up and then dropped down every thirty seconds or so. It rose well beyond the top of the other pillar, though, and the last step moved down from the upper location to the pillar, leaving me with a three meter jump to safety. Actually, I might be able to leap from the third upper step, I thought, looking at it. It shoots diagonally towards what would be the corner of the room, and it ends up only five meters from the edge. I can easily jump that far, even from a standstill, and dropping ten meters or so is nothing. Might be worth it if those birds attack again.

A dozen Beasts floated over the rising step, turning lazy circles in the sky, and I was sure they would attack. A quick hop had me on the first step, and the next three was just a matter of waiting a few seconds each time. I kept glancing upward, and noticed that several Lightning Hawks were now focused on me. “Bring it,” I whispered, then jumped to the rising step.

Two second later, it rocketed upwards, and I channeled the General Strengthening Technique with Air and Metal Aether, giving me a massive strength boost while maintaining my flexibility. Just before the step reached the top of its path, I leapt straight upward. The Hawks had started to dive at me, covering their feathers in electricity, but I jumped over where they were aiming. “Ha!” I shouted, slashing my hand at them and sending an Air Aether Slash that took out three of the five Beasts.

Of course, my now predictable body was the perfect target for two Night Crows. Beams of Darkness shot at me, one at my chest and another at my head. I blocked one with my hand, covering my face, and just took the other. My armor was still there, and I reinforced it with more Aether.

The beam tickled my hand, grinding away at my Aether shield as I channeled more there as well. Thankfully, it didn’t change my momentum, and I ended up dropping straight down onto the rising step. I ended up falling nearly five meters, but it absorbed my weight without breaking. I flexed my legs, dropping into a squat. “Superhero landings are bad for your knees,” I said with a laugh, then reached out and grabbed the fourth Lightning Hawk before it could run into me.

The Lightning Aether it was channeling over itself tickled, nowhere near strong enough to actually hurt me. “Leave me alone, and I won’t kill you,” I told it, only to be screeched at as it tried to bite and claw me. “Fine.” I squeezed, and it broke. I threw it hard to my right, slapping a Night Crow out of the sky as it tried to reach me. The other Crow was still blasting away at my chest, so I sent a reply in the form of a pillar of Fire Aether that overwhelmed its attack and burned it to a crisp.

Two Iron Ball Falcons dropped on me, and only a quick twist let me land on the step as I collapsed under their weight. The two pint-sized birds uncurled from the wrapped shape that gave them their name, then tried to hop away. One made it, but I kicked the other, shattering its wing and knocking it off the step. The step dropped moving down faster than the Falcon fell, but a field of Aether held me to it.

The drop made the last Lightning Hawk miss, and I sent a flick of Metal Aether at it, forming a spike that skewered the Beast from behind. I looked around quickly, but the last three Beasts ignored me. “Huh,” I commented, then shrugged. “And jump,”

The step had paused itself at the top, and the next one was perfectly aligned to let me jump to it. Three more jumps brought me to the drop step, and a glance showed the other two birds were still ignoring me. “Eh, don’t look gift horses in the mouth,” I told myself, then just jumped straight out. I fell quickly, then let my legs collapse under me in a roll to absorb the momentum of my drop. The grass on this pillar helped as well, the ground softer than the hard stone of the previous pillar.

Two cries sounded above me, but when I looked the Beasts were glaring at me unhappily, then they turned and flew off. “Whoa, those were much larger than their friends,” I said, my eyes wide. “Hah! I skipped the last step, so they couldn’t attack me!” I’ll have to look for places where that might be the case. They definitely looked stronger than the first set of attackers, so not fighting them will help me conserve my strength.

I looked at the small grassland that was the top of this pillar, with six trees making an enclosed area in the center of it. A quick scan didn’t show anything absorbing significant amounts of Aether around, with the trees being level one Aether plants and the grass having no Aether at all. I moved to explore the pillar’s top, since it was nearly ten meters in diameter.

In the very center of the trees, I found a small pitcher of water and a cup. I stepped into the tree line, and another wave of Aether shot out from the pillar. I looked back, but this time the steps didn’t dissipate. “Huh,” I said, “I don’t see what it did, weird.”

With a shrug, I poured water into the cup then gulped it down, even though I hadn’t really exerted myself yet. “Gotta keep hydrated,” I laughed, then continued on. There were two pillars that connected with this one, both of them lower than even the first. Past them, I could see another four pillars, but the distance beyond those was shrouded in mist. “You know, a really long platformer game can be annoying,” I grumbled at Spirit, who I’m sure was laughing at my complaining. “Oh well, nothing for it but to go on.”

There was only one set of steps out from the pillar I was on, extending out with five steps for fifteen meters before one moved vertically down. At the bottom, two sets of platforms extended out at a right angle to each other, leading to the two pillars. Again, the vertical movement went beyond the pillar, and the last step would move me to the same level as the pillar.

Below the lowest platform, a few Beasts floated, almost like they were in water, but I could see no distortion like there was liquid there. “Great,” I glared at an Air Shark, swimming through the sky, “not just birds, but sharks too? Really? Well, if I go left, I’ll avoid the majority of the Beasts.” I paused. “But is avoiding the harder path really better? Is this supposed to reward me if I analyze my path ahead of time, or punish me for not taking risks? Gah! Light, stupid mind games.”

I looked back and forth, but couldn’t see what the steps were doing beyond the two closest pillars. “You know what, this is a challenge. All I’m supposed to do is get to the other side, so dodging the Air Sharks is better towards that end. To the left.” I jumped out, landing on the first step. Four more steps were easy hops, though there was starting to be a strong breeze pushing against me. A tiny film of Air Aether prevented the breeze from changing my path, and I grinned.

I rode the vertical step down, my gaze locked on my feet as I tried to figure out how it was sticking me to itself. Metal and Earth Aether are merging here, I thought, adding more Aether into my senses meridian to see better, then Wood and Water, though in lesser quantities. That is an odd gray color they make when merged. I picked my foot up without resistance. “It’s gravity Aether, or something like it!” I exclaimed after looking at it for nearly five minutes. “Why those four Aethers only? And why three portions of Metal and Earth to one of Wood and two of Water?” I paused and took a deep breath. “Ponder the wherefores of Aether later. Now it’s time to finish this challenge.”

The step was just about to start back upward, so I jumped to reach the first step on the path to the left-most pillar. The second I stepped on it, I glanced over to the Air Sharks. The nearest one looked at me, opened its mouth, and chomped down before turning and swimming out to the side of the pillar. My path to the next pillar was simple, and I made it in short order.

I landed on the surface of the grassy pillar, looking around at the two Earth Apple trees standing equidistant from the center in front of me. This seems too easy, I thought, then grimaced. I hope I didn’t just jinx myself.