A dormant sage.
Ivory skin gleams faintly in the gloom.
It rests heavily upon its ancient staff.
An eldritch crystal at its tip.
An aura of aether swirls around it.
It sits in the center of a summoning circle.
Mysterious runes spiral outward in circles.
Scorch marks of aether flame are on the ground.
Three black spheres perch atop ivory stands.
Dead acolytes kneel around the circle.
Dagger handles jut from their stomachs.
Hikari catches the whisper of its silent incantations.
A sage of Eon stands before her.
It is one of the dead god's most powerful vessels.
Its existence is only mentioned in the rarest parts of old records.
Hikari senses its immense mana, enough to level entire cities.
It stirs, sensing her presence, and its incantations swell.
Hikari suppresses her mana and holds her breath.
She hides the gauntlets of Silora behind her back to hide their aura.
Slowly and quietly, she shuffles
It goes back to sleep.
She studies the sage from a safe distance.
The massive otherworldly being matches her sense.
Its aura was strong even at this distance.
Runes and crystals were embedded all over its body.
An overwhelming aura emanated from its staff.
It was not a foe to be taken lightly.
She checked her weaponry.
Stocks of throwing daggers and ballista bolts were still good.
Her sword and armor were in good condition.
After some rest and meditation, she had recovered her mana and stamina.
Her salamander skin was filled with extra energy.
The wyvern scales embedded in her armor ring with energy.
The gauntlet of Silora appeared to have taken no damage despite her punching with her weight.
She studies the terrain.
The pillars of grey salt disrupt the flow of mana.
But it'll work against her opponent as well.
She looks up at the zeppelin city of Carla above the elevator shaft.
The observatory tower where Ria was.
The remains of the titan leaning against the city.
A titan that would have destroyed the estate if allowed to rampage.
Her stomach rumbled.
The ration pack only filled her up halfway.
The taste of ivory berries filled her mouth.
The food supplies and the wars had been getting worse recently.
"Ria… For our future…"
She jumps back to the ledge of the mist.
She drops her harvest sack so that it will survive the battle for her to bring back the spoils.
She draws her bow, three ballista bolts in one draw.
She reinforces the bow with her mana to withstand her draw.
This won't be an easy fight.
The ballista bolts flared with Silora's aura and wyvern frost.
The power of the goddess she borrowed disrupts her foe's mana form.
The wyvern frost turns their flesh brittle and shatters them.
It was the deadliest combination she discovered against the mist entities.
It should work well against a sage.
She charges up her mana, the grey salt formation masking her buildup.
A clear shot to the slumbering sage.
The projectiles flew.
The mist cleared from the blast behind her shot.
A blinding explosion of light and frost.
No sound.
Hikari felt time stop around her for a moment.
The sage vanished into thin air.
It couldn't have been that easy.
Her instincts screamed.
She ducked into the orchid of salt pillars.
The sage appeared out of thin air above her.
A sigil of pure mana formed on Hikari's arm, marking her.
Hikari threw a dagger coated in RazenHeir flame towards the sage.
The sage freezes it mid-air, snuffing out the RazenHeir flame.
One of the sage's many hands snatches the dagger from the air.
The steel dagger crumbles to dust.
A storm of aether fire bolts erupts, homing in on Hikari's mark.
She dives low, weaving between grey salt pillars for cover.
Aether fire chars the pillars, but fizzles as the salt pillar disrupts its mana.
She rolls aside, drawing her bow as the aether fire storm fades.
She takes aim at the sage, now floating in midair.
One crystal embedded in its flesh lies shattered from her first strike.
Two of its arms hang as ruined stumps.
Another ballista bolt whistles through the air.
The holy light dispels its barrier.
The sage blocks the bolt with its hand.
The bolt disintegrates, but the frost shatters the hand.
A hollow and silent scream of pain.
The mage waves its staff, gathering a storm of aether fire.
Hikari releases her bolt and dashes away.
With the mark dispelled, the aether fire rained down randomly all around her.
Hikari draws her bow and aims.
She tanks the dispersed rain of aether fire, taking a small amount of aether burn for a chance to fire another shot.
Just before the sage was hit, it vanished into thin air.
The bolt flies past it into the mist, boring a hole into the red fog.
Hikari hoists her bow and moves, looking for a spot behind salt pillars to protect her from the aether fire.
The sage was nowhere to be seen.
She holds the gauntlet to her chest and raises her barrier.
Her daggers hover above her for a counterattack.
A sudden burst of mana from her side.
The sage appeared out of nowhere and charged her with its staff in a swinging motion.
She backed off, ducking for the salt pillar.
She saw the sage turning the projectiles she hurled at it into dust.
Without better knowledge of its powers, she dared not risk a head-on clash.
Her barrier flared as the wall of aether clashed against it.
The force of the sage's swing shattered the salt pillars.
Hikari channels her telekinesis as the sage dives at her for another swing.
The Eldritch crystal at the tip of its staff flared with aether flame.
Grabbing the shattered pieces of salt, she hurls them at the sage.
The shards of salt pierced its flesh, disrupting the flow of its mana.
A silent, hollow scream.
Hikari hurls her daggers dipped in RazenHeir flame, piercing the sage's flesh and setting it alight.
It casts a mark on Hikari before vanishing into thin air.
She reels from the aether burn.
She knows there is a window of time before the sage could reappear from the void.
The gauntlet charges, dispelling the residual flames.
But the mark could not be dispelled.
The sage appeared above her.
The sky stirred as a whirlwind of aether flame gathered.
Hikari quickly drew her bow and fired.
A sorcerer is at its weakest when it's channeling a large spell.
Three shots shattered another two arms and a crystal.
Silent, hollow screams.
When its barrier was down and still channeling, the fourth bolt flared with RazenHeir flame, igniting the sage and eating away at its insides.
A hail of aether fire that would set an entire city ablaze rained down on her, converging on the mark.
Hikari dives through the salt formation.
The sheer amount of aetherfire floods through the salt formation.
Hikari channels power in her gauntlet as she dashes at top speed away from the flood of fire.
A blinding burst of light.
Thud! Her gauntlet slammed into the ground.
Hikari gritted her teeth as the aether fire burned her wyvern skin.
She got back up and took a stance.
The sage was nowhere to be seen, but it could phase into the material plane at any time for a surprise attack.
A surge of mana; it came from the summoning circle.
The sage was sitting in the center.
Its body was bruised; part of its body was dismembered by the wyvern frost.
Charred by the RazenHeir flame. Its mana was destabilized by the
The spheres around it were glowing with energy.
Its staff gathered power.
Hikari draws her dagger, twists her body, and throws it at the sphere with the strength of her arm.
The steel dagger shatters into pieces as it hits the sphere.
The destabilized sphere releases a wave of destructive energy.
The salt pillars around it crumble.
Hikari draws her bow and fires; the window where the sage channels is the window to attack.
The wyvern frost eats off arm after arm. The bursts of light destabilize its mana.
But the sage holds onto its staff tightly.
She senses the sage channeling something big.
Something she can't allow.
Hikari draws her wyvern blade and charges towards the summoning circle.
Cold.
Not the frost of her wyvern heart but that of the empty void.
Time stopped around her, shards of salt floating in midair.
The silence of the void beyond.
Crystals materialized around her, searing with aether flame.
Skittering sounds. Ivory demons emerged, materialized from the plane beyond.
Giant demons wielding massive swords.
Vines grew out of their heart over their twisted flesh.
They charged her.
Hikari's sword glowed with wyvern flame.
Swing. Swing. Swing.
She overpowered the giant demons, cleaving through them with one swing.
The smaller demons swarm up.
Incinerate. A wave of flame burns them to ash.
Bolts of aether flame converge on her as the mages show up.
Shards of salt hover in the air and rain down on the mages, impaling them against the ground.
Their deadless bodies squirmed, but the salt prevented their mana from flowing.
A giant charged Hikari and lunged with its sphere.
Parry. The shaft of the spear slid along the edge of her sword.
She cleaves the giant in half with a lift of her sword.
More and more demons materialized.
The crystals pulsed with power.
She has to take them out, but how?
She has no experience closing a rift to another plane.
She does the only thing she knows.
Thud. Thud.
She runs towards the giant crystal the size of a tavern.
Bending both knees, she leaps into the air, closes up her boots, and kicks the crystal with a drop kick from both her legs.
A wave of destructive energy tears through her wyvern skin.
The crystal crashes into the ground and shatters.
Skin of a wyvern.
Hikari braces for an explosion.
The energy stored in the crystal implodes.
The salt pillars around it disintegrate.
"Argh."
Hikari grits her teeth in pain as the destructive energy grazes her skin.
She feels the air brushing against her exposed skin as energy from the crystals tears slits in her wyvern-skin armor.
But it works.
She charges through the horde of demons, her whirling steel parrying the giant's swords.
She jumps into the air, legs tucked in, soles of her boots facing the crystal.
A thrust from both her legs shatters the crystal.
The horde of demons disintegrates from the crystal's implosion.
Skin of wyvern blocks the shards of flying debris and arcs of the crystal's energy.
It hurts.
The overwhelming energy.
The cold aether flame that combusts mana.
She feels the cold ground on her soles.
She discards her damaged boot soles.
One more crystal.
A horde of Eon demons closes in on her in all directions.
Heart of wyvern frost.
She releases the frost in an aura around her, creating a blizzard, freezing the demons as they come into range.
She charges, her massive body shattering the frozen demons as she charges through them.
A volley of aether flame.
Her gauntlet pulsed, neutralizing them.
The crystal was within range.
She channels her telekinesis; her power flows into her legs.
She jumps, the crystal burning with aether flame.
She feels her feet crushing shattered grass.
The crystal shatters.
Pain. Energy. Cold.
Without the anchors to this world, the demon hordes disintegrate.
But the sage was still alive.
Hikari approaches the summoning circle.
Her armor was in tatters.
Only the gauntlets and the sword of the wyvern order survive.
The summoning was not over.
She senses an immense being materializing.
She holds her sword in a thrusting stance and charges.