12 Miles Below-Chapter 52Book 7. : Trust

The element of hiding wasn’t going to last long. To’Naviris was already having a small meltdown, both emotionally… and physically from the whole burning alive thing, so all the hiding spots were being steadily destroyed already.

All to say I didn’t feel that bad leaping out of my hiding spot and tackling Drakonis. The moment the Deathless advanced right past me on the way into the battlefield, I was already yanking him over my shoulder, and sprinting away.

One second later a massive bandage wrapped Feather’s hand tried to yank him from the spot I’d just kidnapped him out of.

Given I’d just saved his life, I’d expect some gratitude. Maybe a few thank you’s and some completely factual comments about how fast and strong I am.

“Goddess’s golden fucking tits Winterscar!” Drakonis cursed, his occult cut off from the sheer speed I roughhoused him off his feet before sprinting away. “Where the hell did you even come from?!”

“I’m very good at skulking around, don’t ask why.” I patted his back as I raced. “That said, less talking, more fighting back. Start throwing rocks at him if you have to, but do something!”

To’Orda was only inches behind me, equally trying to chase after. I allowed Cathida to take over the running part for me while I focused on pulsing out occult image after image to keep the giant at bay. To’Orda had that golden shield covering half his body, and he was getting his money’s worth from that thing. Impervious to any occult blade and didn’t seem to take any damage or resource either. At least standard relic armor shields had an upper limit on how many hits it could take before breaking apart.

The golden shield would tackle any amount of hits and shrug it all off.

He’s clearly using his overclock to calculate the optimal movements for his shield. Ideas? I asked Superior.

Prime, I'll be honest, I don’t think there’s ever been a time in our life that we’ve regretted setting something on fire.

Agreed. Let’s say the machines did it if we’re questioned by the Odin later on why their stuff is burnt down.

None of the birds were around here right now, on count of the smoke. Birds did not survive smoke half as well as humans could. So that meant no witnesses to our petty crimes.

Occult images began throwing fire left and right, easily adding to the chaos of Wrath’s own napalm bombardment. In the soul sight, I could see To'Naviris was having a worse time of it now that To’Orda’s focus was on hunting down Drakonis and I, over keeping him out of the fire and moving around.

All the progress of trying to wait out the napalm was reset, all thanks to the Deathless showing up and mucking things up for the enemy. I’m used to things turning for the worse on my end, nice surprise to see something going wrong for the enemy this time around.

Unfortunately, To’Orda had a surprise of his own. His shield itself seemed to draw in any fire my occult images were throwing at him, sucking it into a singular point at the center of the shield. In the occult sight I could see a fractal etched within the shield on the inside end. The concept there was oddly familiar: Danger.

It drew danger towards itself. And fire was exactly that. In an abstract way at least, because to the shield was hardly even heating up the single point where the fire was being sucked into.

The Feather was an absolute menace now; ducking, weaving through my occult mirrors, swinging shockwave after shockwave to disrupt and disable images. When he pulled off a cartwheel that jabbed, kicked and splattered more images, I knew he’d given up trying to conserve any amount of effort.

Even trying to stab from within the ground upwards with the occult images wasn’t working. He’d leap over within the instant the sword tips were visible, hammer and shield swinging out in the same movement, usually breaking more than one image after him.

The last time we’d fought on the Valorant, he seemed more languid and still trying to avoid getting too caught into the fight.

Here? It was as if I’d stolen his ration bar and was planning on eating it in front of him. We needed to set traps and catch-22’s to force that Feather into the ground.

More than happy to do that. Superior said, You keep him from killing us immediately, and I’ll prepare the ground ahead.

Good talk. Then I tapped the Deathless on my shoulder, still shell shocked from being yanked up and kidnapped a second time. It had technically only been a few seconds since I yanked him up, but at the speed Feathers and I moved, we were already well into half-time. “Start hitting him with those occult shield sappers, the sooner we eliminate their shields the sooner we can put down a killshot.”

“No!” Drakonis hissed out, “Don’t kill him Winterscar, there’s another way.”

“What?”

“Throw me the other direction and focus on the other one, I can handle To’Orda. Trust me.”

If Cathida wasn’t already piloting the relic armor for me, I might have even missed a step in my mental reboot here. “You? Without relic armor or even a weapon? I left you only a day and some change out here and you’ve gone insane already?”

“There’s more to him than just a Feather out to murder everything, I’ve seen it.” Drakonis said, “The other Feather there on fire yelling at everyone? Cut his head off and stab him until he doesn’t come back, I don’t give a fuck. But the big asshole chasing you down has potential.”

“Are you sure you should just blindly trust some enemy? He’s a Feather, he has a weapon, and he’s clearly trying to kill us both. And wait just a second here, aren’t you an anti-machine zealot who’s only question in life is how to kill more machines?! Since when did you even give Feathers a second thought?”

“Since I met one dipshit who’s badgered the fuck out of me about doing exactly this! Isn’t your entire motto in life to coexist?! Why are you getting cold feet now of all times Winterscar?”

“Yeah, but I meant that with Wrath's people!” I corrected, ducking under To’Orda’s next swing and used a series of occult grapples from my back to yank me under a follow-up swing, escaping the giant with a well timed juke. Cathida adjusted her movements to match that perfectly, both of us working like a flawless team. “That’s a Feather and he wants nothing more than to squash your head with a hammer.”

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“And Wrath wasn't? She’s over there fucking fighting one another, probably specifically to save your life given what you’ve told me about her and what I learned myself. So, if I can take a gamble on trusting the fucking warlord of Capra’Nor herself, you can take a gamble on my hunch too. Besides, if we die, we can try again after.” freēwēbnovel.com

Well. He can. I’d need to find some very convoluted ways around coming back from death. Wrath would too if she got ripped apart out here.

I took a breath to try and explain again how a giant Feather trying to swing a hammer with violent intent literally right behind us was probably not the best time for nuance but Superior interrupted me first.

No, no. He’s got a point. You did ask him to trust you about Wrath and on you earlier, right? Be a bit hypocritical to not give him the same option.

Except he’s the only one who can strip shields off targets! We lose him early on before shields are stripped, it’s back to an uphill battle in deep snow again.

But then Superior whispered some highly convoluted words like 'sound tactical planning'and 'strategy'.

“All right. Fine!” I called out, once more forced to dance my way out of To’Orda’s reach. The Feather was faster on flat ground than I was, and clearly doing everything in his power to stop me from outright escaping him. At this rate, I’d need to use some of my advanced tricks to escape, or I’d get smashed down into the ground. “First - you strip his shield for me, and then I’ll leave him to you. That’s my counter-offer.”

“That’s all I’m asking for Winterscar.”

If Drakonis managed to do his talking-things-out plan, then To’Orda’s neutralized. Knowing the giant was… different from other Feather’s I’d met, I was somewhat hoping Drakonis could pull off a miracle.

But if he didn’t pull it off and got squashed in the one-on-one fight he wanted, at least if he stripped the giant of his general shields in the process first, To'Orda would be semi-neutralized as a threat. Occult bullets had a lot of options here and there’s only so many ways he could dodge or use that golden shield to protect himself. Wrath and I could easily work around that issue. Even with all his... cartwheels, backflips, front flips, and every-direction-flips.

Seriously, how is that physically possible? He's a giant with an equally sized massive slab shield and an even larger hammer.

As for To’Naviris, even if we don’t strip his shields with Drakonis, that Feather was already burning down as it was. Caught without his army, emotionally stabbed in his heart due to his destroyed pipe organ, and already struggling against just Wrath - the only real difficulty here wasn’t killing the Feather, it was doing it with the true fractal of division on his soul fractal.

He’s certainly insane enough we could use some meta narrative plans against him, maybe around a musical instrument or another. I would not be surprised if I challenged him to an organ playing contest and he’d put aside all the fight just to contend with that. Plenty of options to cheat and stab him then.

To’Orda on the other hand? Way more dangerous, doesn’t monologue, goes for the kill as fast as possible, and seemed to no-sell a lot of my plans and tricks with that golden shield of his.

Also the giant is twice as tall as I am and probably four times heavier. He has no right to be moving like Teed in a simulator with weight turned off. No, I will not stop complaining about this.

…

Hold the airspeeder, To’Orda did have gravity powers. Was he actually reducing his personal mass or messing with inertia in order to move around like this? A personal fractal within his shell of some kind?

Less thinking, more juking. Superior reminded me.

“Can you keep yourself alive without relic armor against him?” I asked Drakonis, once more running a full lap around the fighting between To’Naviris and Wrath. Other than dodging an errant occult hand slamming down just a tad too close to me, and crushing through a mass of twigs the Odin called a home crumbling down from an explosion nearby, Wrath was keeping him really occupied.

“I can grapple around if we leave the outpost and go out into the forest. I think I can lead him away even.” Drakonis said. “Knock on gold first.”

“Great! No time to talk shop, he can overhear us anyhow so improvise.” And I threw him wholesale behind me, far up into the air, in the direction of the forest. Then yanked out the knightbreaker in one swift turn, twisted on myself so I could line up a good aim at the giant only a few steps behind me.

I fired point blank, trusting Journey would understand and help auto-correct the aim.

It did, and my shot was perfect.

To’Orda knew about these rounds. And he knew if he got hit with them, he was dead. Only thing that had a chance of surviving a full on knightbreaker round was going to be that golden shield. He also knew he had two different targets and only one golden shield.

Drakonis soared above, one hand wreathed in occult blue, aimed downwards at To’Orda. The other hand already extended out an occult grapple to continue his momentum forward.

To’Orda could block that shield stripper with his shield. But then he’d be exposed to the knightbreaker round. Or he could block the knightbreaker round, and be caught in the open with the shield stripper from above.

He decided in a split second to do both. His golden shield lifted upwards, ready to block Drakonis’s orb toss. At the same time, his hammer was blindly swinging down where the knightbreaker would pass through, preparing to just outright catch the round from the top point, and crush the entire thing into the ground. I could tell he was also angling for a backup plan, feet positioning himself to dodge the projectile in case I had some occult scrapshit that would speed up or slow down the projectile to mess with his aim.

I did have exactly that, not from occult scrapshit but technical scrapshit. The rocket propelled explosion behind the round detonated and increased its velocity by a significant factor only one second into it's flight forward, but I knew that wouldn’t be enough because Feathers were powered by pure ratshit and I didn’t have the giant covered in flames right now to prevent that ratshit.

But that's fine, because I never said I wasn't going to use occult scrapshit on top.

Sixteen occult ghosts lit up around the clearing, diving for him. They’d already been positioned ahead, jumping him like an army of muggers in a perfectly coordinated circle, using his own lifted shield to keep safe from the occult implosion that was going to happen just above everyone. To’Orda might be able to dodge or crush the knightbreaker round, but by holding his shield upwards against that incoming orb while having his other hand occupied handling the knightbreaker, it would force him to expose his shell to sixteen occult handguards slamming into him. And they’d also be right under the shield’s shadow, safe from the detonation.

This is how I deal with Feather ratshit: Put them into a no-win situation.

"Nnnn.... bugger."

He changed his mind in a split second, golden shield slamming down in the direction of the knightbreaker. Occult pulsed out from within the shield, drawing danger to itself. The knightbreaker adjusted its trajectory slightly, colliding dead center against the golden material, crushing itself inwards, extending out the chains and slipping around on the surface of the shield without any good grip.

The images were also slightly forced off track, but not enough to alter things significantly enough. They’d never reach the Feather however, because Drakonis.

The orb detonated above To’Orda, occult imploding inwards, sucking all the mirror images upwards along with To’Orda’s own personal shield. The mirrors evaporated like mist, power drawn away from them. Even the fractal of danger seemed to flicker inside his shield, while the Feather himself seemed to reset his behavior, violet eyes looking almost empty for an instant. The implosion exploded, sending all of us flying in different directions, except for To'Orda who was only pressed down into the ground a little, his legs already absorbing the damage.

That only lasted for a second.

He grunted to himself, then leapt upwards.

But not after me.

My grapples reached out behind my back again and yanked me out of the fight, while To’Orda slammed his heel down into the ground and leapt after the Deathless flying away. I wasn’t sure why he’d want to do that now that Drakonis had already done his part in the fight, but I wasn’t going to complain either.

Instead, I made a mad rush to To’Naviris, aiming to finish him off fast before the big giant could come back. Drakonis could run around from him for a little while, sure, but I had zero expectations that a Deathless like him could escape a Feather without relic armor to help him move. He was going to get caught soon.

I lost sight of Drakonis almost immediately as he grappled out of the way, deeper into the forest, with a stone cold To’Orda rushing after him at full speed.

“Gods give you speed Drakonis. If you keep him occupied for even two minutes, I’ll buy you the first round back home.”

As for me, I had a Feather to assassinate.