Essence Wave Book 2 Chapter 32

*** AUTHOR'S NOTE ***

So, the rest of the chapters will be put up over the rest of the week, and I'll have an overall comment post up on Saturday. I'm going to be focusing on Legacy of the M'Zee for this week and part of next, to let y'all have time to comment and let everything percolate in the back of my head.  My editor isn't available until July 18, so that is my deadline for a second/third draft of Energy Barons. I'm hoping to have the first draft of Legacy done by August, to hopefully get it out October of this year too. 

*** AUTHOR'S NOTE ***

Six hours passed in a flash, almost all of it spent hashing out a plan with a dozen contingencies. Malcolm was a huge help, a retired Army colonel with years of experience planning campaigns. He’d also Walked the Way of the Leader, getting a number of useful Skills that buffed anyone under his leadership. Josiah and David immediately put him second in command of the Barony Military. The Skills only worked on people within earshot. “I can bellow pretty loudly,” Malcolm grinned. “Higher Constitution helps. We measured the Skill’s effect radius to four hundred meters.”

“That should be more than plenty,” David laughed.

Liz worked with a dozen people to create fifty health potions, and David spent five thousand credits on health, Energy, and Mana potions, giving him twenty health and fifteen each of the other two. The last two thousand he spent on a Knowledge Stone to raise Precast to Initiate seven, and the knowledge provided showed him how to use it for his Advanced Bodily Repair Skill.

Just before they gathered the people together to head north, he channeled every drop of Mana and Energy into the two Skills, locking in an instantaneous heal for three thousand, seven hundred Mana and Energy that would slowly grow stronger as time went on. It wouldn’t improve much, the Skill’s level too low to provide a large benefit, but it should be enough to take him from nearly dead to at least half health in  a single surge.

At the ten hour mark from when they received the Quest, David found himself standing on the bridge built across the Arkansas, looking out at nearly a thousand people. Every single person from Hope’s Refuge and Salida’s Revenge had volunteered, even the children, but David put his foot down and made four young mothers stay to watch over the thirteen kids under fifteen they had. That left nine hundred, sixty four people to advance against the Daemons.

“You have to give a speech,” Colin said, standing next to him.

David sighed, but nodded. He jumped up onto the railing. “Today, we stand free, because we fought for our freedom,” he yelled out. The throng of people quieted. “Our world ended with a flash of light and a blue box in our face. Daemons invaded our homes, killed our friends and family. Our computers, phones, vehicles all failed us, we don’t know how our loved ones from other cities fair, but we refuse to just lay down and die! We stood up, we fought back, and carved for ourselves a new place, Hope’s Refuge. Others crushed their invaders and made another place, Salida’s Revenge.”

He paused for a second as cheers broke out. “We have safety, but it is not guaranteed. Daemons conquered Buena Vista, and seek to create a new portal, a new connection to their vile realm. We will not accept it. Today… today we stand, ready to strike back against the evil beings who stole our lives. Today starts the beginning of the end for the Daemons. We will drive them out of our state, out of our country,  out of our planet!”

More cheers, with dozens of people literally jumping in excitement, fists pumping into the air. “There are more worlds out there,” David said. “I don’t know how many of you know the story, but my friends and I met an alien.  We called him Al, since we couldn’t say his full name properly. Al was coming to our world to warn us of the Essence Wave and to provide support so that we would make it through. He was joined by one other of his race. The Wave spreads and the wars go poorly, I think, or there’d be more than two ships sent to help us.”

The revelation of aliens quieted the crowd, everyone listening with rapt attention. “Al was betrayed, his compatriot delaying and then ambushing him. We were lucky, and were able to reach his ship before the betrayer. There, he told us of the Essence Wave and gave us the armor you see before you. He was broken, barely alive, but told us to flee when the betrayer was approaching. He chose to detonate his ship, sacrificing his life to kill the betrayer before they could do more damage to our world.”

David took a deep breath, “We found out that Al’s people made the System, that they fought the Daemons without its help. The System gives us more ability to fight, and through it I have personally seen, through the help of Knowledge Stones, a number of other worlds, with other species that need our help. They fight every day, because they didn’t drive the Daemons from their worlds. We will free our planet from the Daemon’s oppression, and then we will journey to other worlds and free them too! Today starts the battle. Today is the beginning of the tidal wave the breaks the Daemons from our universe forever!”

The massive sound wave of the cheer that followed would have deafened him before the Essence Wave. A notification popped up in front of him.

Congratulations! You have evolved Inspiring Shout to Inciting Speech [Limited]

Skill level advanced to Apprentice 1

Description: Give a speech to minorly improve the Statistics and Regenerations of your followers. Costs Mana and Energy. Buffs last for a substantial amount of time. Buff amount increase with length of speech, Mana and Energy expenditure, and Skill level.

Synergy with Lead from the Front! While in front of your people and visibly fighting for them, Buff expiration reduced significantly.

“Well, that worked out,” David said. “Just evolved a Skill.”

“I’ll say,” Colin said. “I’ve got a new buff called Incited. My physical stats increased by four, my mental stats by three, and a bonus ten percent to regeneration for the next six hours.”

David turned and walked past him. “Now how long?” He asked.

“Nine hours,” Colin said, “what changed?”

“If I’m closer to the enemy, it looks like the buff lasts a lot longer,” David said, his eyes wide. “I wasn’t expecting a fifty percent increase in length, though.”

Josiah bellowed from behind him, “Move out!”

David set a slow jog, one that even the lowest level people following could do for hours on end. The massive boost to Constitution that humanity had received, when coupled with the infusion of Essence, made it so they would just keep going. They ate the miles up, the road built between Hope’s Refuge and Fortification dropping their Energy usage enough that no one had to stop and take a break. Most of the people following received numerous levels to their Running Skills.

It took three hours to reach Fortification, and David breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the walls manned with the guards who’d been assigned to the fort. “Alright, everyone, you have ten minutes to rest!” Josiah bellowed out. “Eat, meditate, most of all, hydrate!”

A couple of laughs came out of the group, mostly from the few military veterans they had in the group. Everyone in the rough attempt at a formation either started to stretch or sat down. David nodded at Josiah, who joined him heading inside the fort.

“Elijah, your people ready?” Josiah asked.

“Yes sir,” the young man in charge of the guards answered, having met them at the gate. “I’ve got six people cutting trees now, making a straight line northwest of here. It’ll intersect two-eighty-five about five hundred feet from the Arkansas River. They’re catching the trees as they fall so they don’t make too much noise.”

“Good job,” David said. “After the break, have Steve and his crew go help out.”

“I’m taking Dylan, Caleb, and a few other Scouts out to the highway,” Aly said from beside David. “I want to see if they’re expecting us or not.”

“Okay,” David said. “I’m going to join the woodcutting crew. We need to move quickly to maintain surprise and stop the portal formation earlier.”

“I’ll get everyone moving shortly,” Josiah said. “And send the muscle heads over. They’re all high enough level that this little jog shouldn’t have bothered them.”

“What should the rest of my people do?” Elijah asked.

“Join in,” David said, walking towards the other gate. He looked around the interior to find that they’d managed to put up a Log House and another building inside the walls, along with the Keep. The Farms had already started to sprout, the Essence in the air speeding everything up tremendously. “We’re all in right now. If we can’t stop this portal from forming, we’ll be overrun. We just have to hope that we can make it through.”

“With you to lead us,” Elijah said, “we’ll win.”

“Thanks,” David grinned at him. “Come on.” He took off with a Sprint and blazed through the fort to find a crude road had been pounded into the dirt. It led to the tree line, where a four meter wide corridor had been cut. David could see the six guards hacking away at two trees about a hundred meters ahead, and he reached them only a few seconds later.

Two women with axes turned and set themselves, jumping in front of the others at David’s appearance, only to slump in relief when they realized it was him. “Sorry, uh, Lord Black,” the one on the right said. She was a bit shorter than him, maybe a hundred seventy centimeters, with dark brown hair, lightly tanned skin, and green eyes.

“No problem. Better safe than sorry,” David said just as Elijah arrived.

“You’re too fast, sir,” he panted.

David shook his head, still looking at the woman. “We’re here to help.”

“Me too,” Colin said, rushing over. Behind him, David saw Steve leap into the air, clearing a dozen meters in a single hop. “Apparently, if your Strength is significantly higher than your Agility, you can move faster by jumping.”

“Good to know,” David said. “Come on, you all focus on moving ahead. Colin and I will take the stumps to the ground.”

“Uh, yes, sir,” Elijah said, gesturing at the others.

“That’ll make it easier,” the leftmost woman said, her ax glowing with Energy. With a grunt, she swung into the tree nearest her, cutting halfway through it. Two more strikes had the tree falling, only for it to be caught by its nearest neighbors.

David walked up to it, summoning and extending his Mana sword to be a bit longer than the width of the tree. Vanguard’s Strike ate a hundred Mana and Energy, and he cut off six meters of the bottom before kicking it into the trees to the side of the corridor. He bent down and dragged his weapon forward, his knuckles digging into the dirt as he sliced through the stump, making the last bit level with the ground around it.

Steve and the muscle heads leapt past him as he moved to the next tree stump. In between the trees, people were ripping apart the ground cover, clearing the way for the people following. Off to the other side, Liz had changed her Mana weapon into a scythe and was ripping through the stumps. Colin was at the front, each swing of his halberd cutting a tree down.

They continued like this for nearly an hour, proceeding quickly. Each time someone got tired, they were replaced, with a constant cycle set up to ensure continuous motion. “Only another two hours at this pace,” Alexander said, wiping sweat off his brow as he threw an armful of bush off to the side.

“Good,” David said, crouching to slice through the bottom of another stump. “We will hopefully be able to recover all this wood for use at Fortification or Hope’s Refuge. I need to figure out what Salida’s Revenge needs too, get them expanding as well.”

“They’re fine,” Alexander responded. “I talked with Betsy a bit, they’re already a Level one Village. They’ve got all the resources of a bigger town than Nathrop right next door.”

“Well then, we’ll have to push Hope’s Refuge ahead faster! Can’t lose our number one title,” David laughed, lifting the cut stump. With a grunt, he threw it to the side, only for it to deflect off a leaping Lurker Alpha that shimmered into view as it growled in annoyance. “ATTACK!” David screamed, slashing at the Daemon before it could land.

His sword bit into the beast, but it used the impact somehow to twist away. An Unstable Mana Bolt met it, but it shimmered, turning almost flat, and the Bolt flew through it. Screams sounded around him, and a quick glance revealed a dozen Lurkers pouncing among his people.

The glance away almost proved his undoing, as the Lurker Alpha seemed to teleport into his shadow, slashing at his hamstrings. His armor, which he’d been wearing under his skin, almost caused its claws to spark, with only a tiny amount of blood drawn from the attack. His Hit Points did drop by nearly four hundred.

His sword swiped down, deflecting the attack before it could do more. This time he empowered the attack with Vanguard’s Strike, and he sliced the attacker’s foot off at the first joint. It screamed, fading into blackness and seeming to turn into a beam of darkness that streaked away. David followed the streak, but it resolved into the Alpha before he could finish channeling the Unstable Mana Bolt. With the evolution of his SKill, he’d noticed it took almost a second to generate the Bolt.

“Here kitty kitty,” he said, then threw his hand off to his left, taking a Lurker in the side before it could flank Elijah. Elijah turned at the explosion, then his spear glowed red-gold and plunged into his attacker.

The Alpha growled at him, an arrow of pure Shadow appearing in front of its mouth before shooting at David. Can’t dodge, he thought in the split second before it hit him, as he threw Mana into a Mana Shield. His Mana Artifact Shield didn’t form before the arrow shattered the Mana Shield and embedded itself into his gut. The Artifact Shield appeared on his forearm right as he knocked the Shadow Arrow away. Belatedly, he used Scholar’s Vision on the Lurker.

Name: Lurker Alpha Lord

Level: 10

Description: The Lord of at least fifty Lurkers and five Alphas, the Lurker Alpha Lord is a very strong combatant, able to control and move through shadow.

“Well, great,” he said, then threw an Unstable Mana Bolt at its feet. The detonation knocked it backwards, though it didn’t take any noticeable damage from the attack. He blasted forward with a Vanguard’s Charge, surprising the cat. Its eyes grew wide, and it tried to teleport away again, but David moved too fast for it. The burst of Energy from his shield threw the Daemon out of whatever weird field it was trying to get into and into a tree. David continued the motion, not stopping his momentum with the enhancement to his Skill so that he continued into the Lurker Lord.

It almost exploded from the impact before turning flat again just before David’s blade passed through its head. The creature snapped at him, biting into his wrist. His bones ground together under its powerful attack. He screamed as the bones in his forearm broke. With a roar, he ripped his hand back, and a loud crack exploded from the Daemon as he broke its neck.

He started to turn back towards the others, only to collapse to his side as his right leg refused to hold his weight. A look down showed that the Lurker’s rear claws had slashed apart his quads while it bit him. He looked out to see almost all of the Lurkers had been dealt with already, leaving only two still fighting while others collapsed onto them.

Aly appeared beside him, “I’m so sorry,” she said. “We got distracted by an Imp patrol and missed them completely.” She pulled out a healing potion.

He waved it away, “I’ll be fine. Got plenty of Hit Points left. Go see if others need help.”

She nodded, not looking happy, then turned and ran towards Alexander. David grinned after her, then dropped into his core cave to direct Advanced Bodily Repair toward his legs. He sealed his skin first, then directed the Mana and Energy to stitch back together his torn apart muscles, recycling the blood and random bits of flesh that had been deposited around to create new tissue. His bones had been scratched and nicked in a couple of places, and he finished filling in the pieces after a few subjective minutes.

His arm was still broken, and he only stopped the internal bleeding in his gut without focusing on repairing the damage, when he popped back out of his core cave and painfully pushed himself to his feet. “Josiah,” he croaked, “report please.”

“You shouldn’t be standing,” Aly said. “Finish fixing yourself.”

“Not yet,” he said. “What’s our status?”

“Sixty four wounded,” Josiah said, “though only twenty are still injured. Six dead.”

David cursed. If I had been able to take out the Lurker Lord faster, one of them might be alive. Aly put her hand on his shoulder, bringing him out of his spiraling thoughts.

“Hit Points saved most of the wounded,” Liz said, moving up to him. David relaxed a bit as a wave of relief spread through him. His gut and arm repaired themselves, leaving him whole. “Wow, heal yourself more next time. That took nearly two thousand Mana.”

“Sorry,” he said, “Wasn’t expecting a heal. Would have told you not to bother.”

Liz just looked at him, and then Aly slapped his head. “You’re our friend and ostensibly our leader,” Liz said. “Of course I’m going to heal you.”

“Well, uh, here,” he held out his hand. When she took it he dumped every drop of Mana he had at the time into her.

“That helps,” Liz said. “More healing to do.”

Josiah nodded, then turned to the procession. “If you’re not injured and on the clearing teams, get up here. We need to move!”

Dylan and Caleb walked out of the forest a minute later, both bleeding and limping but with grins on their faces. “There were two Lurkers who just watched,” Dylan said. “We got them before they could report.”

“Good job,” David said. “Hopefully we’ll still have some semblance of surprise.”