Apocalypse Redux

Chapter 88: Strange Beasts and Horrific Combinations

Name: Isaac Thoma

Class: Bladewraith

Species: Human

Level: 31

XP: 8,129 /9,300

Health Status: Healthy

Mana: 600/600

Stats

Fortitude

50

Perception

95

Strength

60

Agility

105

Magic Power

60

Magic Regeneration

80

Free Points: 0 Stat, 9 Skill

Aura

Aura of the Crimson Dawn (short range, combat, blood, regeneration)

Aura of the Desperate Seeker (long range, sensory, mental, projection)

Central Skills

Form of Horror XIX

The Chosen Weapon XXIV

Skills

Hundred Faces XIX

Stealth XIX

Power Strike XXVIII

Piercing Strike XXVIII

Sundering Strike XXV

Blades XXVI

Sneak XIX

Sweeping Strike IX

Far Strike XXI

Manifold Strike XVII

Hunter’s Gaze XXIV

Phantom Step XV

Unknown Fear XVI

Bestial Regeneration XVIII

Undying Focus XV

Tools of Terror XIX

Fleeting Presence XI

Crippling Blow VIII

Absolute Blade Mastery IV

General Skills

Gralloch IX

Alchemy X

Aspects

Aspect Skills

Poltergeist (2 stack)

Poltergeist’s Flight

Poltergeist Shift

Hydra (2 stack)

Hydra’s Regeneration

Redundant Organs

Dunkleosteus

Shark’s body

Wave Charge

Fata Morgana

Improved Basic Illusion

Perception Block

Blade Tempest

Blade Control

Eternal Blades

[Empty Slot]

His [Skills] were coming along nicely, and he was within spitting distance of the next Level and having enough [Skill] points to buy the first [Central Skill] of his second Evolution.

And now was the time to get that XP.

Isaac strode onto his property, walking through the woods as he swept the place for anything that didn’t belong with his [Aura]. He’d bought quite a bit more land surrounding his original purchase so he had space to expand, but that also meant that it was now large enough that he couldn’t check over all of it from his home, he actually had to get off his ass and move around a little.

Sadly, it wasn’t just paranoia driving him, he’d been given an actual reason. People had snuck in bugs and cameras when he wasn’t here, and given how much time he spent at work, that was easy enough to do.

Actually keeping the surveillance devices there was a whole other story, though. There was very little technology out here and he knew exactly where the each and every device he’d placed here was, so anything foreign stuck out like a sore thumb. From there, it was a simple matter of obliterating them with a [Far Strike].

Also, other than that one dupe he’d shot with paintballs filled with a paint that was quite literally impossible to remove from one’s skin, no one had dared show their face around here.

… which might have something to do with the fact that he’d started leaving while invisible, making it very difficult to ascertain whether he was actually gone or just out of sight.

An eye in the sky was always a concern, of course, but that was why he’d had a roof put over his summoning area.

Drones were always a possibility, of course, but once he became aware of them, their lifetime was measured in milliseconds.

His privacy wasn’t something he could be assured of to an absolute level, but there was a limit as to how far people would be willing to push this. He was a pretty famous scholar, an expert, no, the expert when it came to [Aura] use, but he was also a powerhouse and the kinds of people who spied on someone like him knew that. In the end, forcing the issue could backfire in far too many ways.

After a whole two minutes, the bug sweep was done and he was back in the summoning area, tossing a dice and some mixed ground beef and pork into the Tier 3 circle.

The meet was from the supermarket and was the most stupidly simple way to grab a part of two different animals, literally no mixing needed.

This would summon a Chimera made from a cow, pig and one other animal, chosen at random, combined in an optimal way.

In the past, the team had summoned a couple of Tier 1 and 2 Chimeras, figured out that there was that element of random chance to their form and basically left it at that. The sheer variety of combinations would take an actual lifetime to explore, so they’d decided to move on to other things.

They’d published a very bare bones article on the phenomenon, and then left the entire field to someone who wanted it, while the materials they’d gotten had been distributed among the more crafting inclined of their colleagues and acquaintances.

Isaac had decided not to try and press the point, because the Chimera rabbit hole went really fucking deep and would take for-e-ver to properly explore. Instead, they’d researcher several other, and far more important things and learned so much more while spending far less time.

Now he could ‘stumble across’ the various fancy materials while summoning for himself and pass them out for the crafters to play around with, but still maintain that someone else should take care of thoroughly researching the topic. He knew that, while rather interesting, this was a dead end branch of study that would lead to some discoveries as to how Chimeras worked and some interesting things in the biological field, but nothing on the same level as their other discoveries.

The real use for Chimeras were their bindings, which were a basically a knot of magic given physical form that could be used to combine two things and were mostly used in crafting. That use would be for said crafters to discover, not Professor Bailey’s team.

As for the monster that emerged from the circle now, it was incredibly odd to behold. It’s base form was squat and low to the ground, somewhat reminiscent of the stereotypical pig you’d find in a child’s book about a far, but that was where the resemblance ended.

It stood on four pairs of legs, each ending in a split hoof with claws at the end, courtesy of whatever additional creature had been mixed in. That was the issue with the chimeras, really. You could add in parts belonging to creatures whose strengths were mutually exclusive and hobble the resulting creation, but there would always be an additional, random creature mixed in and you could never predict what it was. In this case, it had clearly been some kind of bird, some kind of seabird, perhaps, judging by the feathers that stuck out all over the place.

Massive tusks and a pair of horns adorned its head, drawing on the natural weapons of both the animals he’d added in while a dual layer of hide with feathers in between created a durable natural armor that could cushion even decently powerful blunt impacts and even do somewhat well against cutting attacks.

In other words, for a Tier 3 summon, it was not only an absolute monster, it was a monster no one could properly prepare for … but it was only Tier 3.

Chimera (Procellariidae-Suidae-Bovinae) (Lv. 6) has been slain. 50 XP gained

Isaac hadn’t even bothered to use any [Skills], he’d just summoned Old Reliable in its Zweihänder form and chopped it in half. A second strike exposed the binding, which was located near the heart, then the pushed the tip underneath and flicked it out of the body, then drew it into the spatial storage.

Then he repeated the process, over and over, all the while barely paying attention to it because he was also typing away on his laptop, ever so often tossing the summoning materials into the circle to summon the monsters.

Because even though getting stronger was important, this work was to be his Magnum Opus, the single most important piece of literature he would create. It was a proper, structured way for regular people to summon and get stronger.

He’d made sure the world knew the basic realities of summoning, such as summons tracking the summoner and autonomous summoning, with the team.

He’d implemented the first proper summoning programs with the local police department withing weeks of the Initialization, showing everyone a proof of concept.

And now, he was creating the structure for a massive, near universally applicable Level-up program with all the proper precautions, to be published by the team once the last few preparations had been completed.

Said preparations were going on even as he was writing this stuff down. In the summoning areas at the university, a member of the team would be killing monsters someone else was summoning until one dropped an Aspect, then have the summoner absorb it for a combat [Skill] so they could, in turn, start killing monsters on their own. It was their idea for allowing people without combat [Classes] to grow in power through combat.

With that, hopefully, things would start to seriously look up for humanity as people gained magic power without leaving a bunch of monsters of middling strength running around all over the place.

That just left a few people to deal with. The assholes, the opportunists, the assholish opportunists, the opportunistic assholes, the nihilists, the idiots, the greedy bastards, the dark god worshippers, the fools who thought they could use monsters as weapons of war … yeah, the vast majority of issues in the other timeline hadn’t been caused by Joe Shmoe, but a few extraordinarily destructive people, but this would help a bunch.

Once he’d gathered enough bindings to last the craftsmen, those at a high enough Level to make use of them, at least, a good while, he stopped and took a look at his current available XP amount. It was more than enough for the next Level.

All ten Stat points went into Magic Regeneration, as he’d need it, now that he’d spent ten of his accumulated [Skill] points to pick up another cooldown-[Skill], and oh boy, it was a good one. A good and proper ultimate attack.

I Am The Sword (legendary)

In the right hands, a sword can be a devastating weapon. But sometimes, the hands themselves can be a weapon far more dangerous than any mere hunk of metal.

And with this Skill, both is the case. For 0.1 seconds, increasing by 0.01 seconds per Level, the user’s form will become indestructible, immoveable, and inviolable while their momentum will be maintained for that period, tearing through or pushing aside anything in their path while this Skill is active.

This Skill can only be activated every 60 min and cost requires 750 mana to use, which it siphons off from the user’s mana regeneration so long as the user’s mana pool is full.

Cost: Major Stamina Drain, 750 banked mana

A literal split-second of invincibility was nice, sure, but that was nowhere near as useful as the fact that his momentum was maintained.

If he body-checked a monster with this [Skill] active, one of two things would happen. Either it would take more force to pierce its hide than it took to move it and it would move, or the hide would break before the monster moved and he’d go through it like a hot knife through butter. If he focused that force on a smaller surface area for the initial strike, like a fingertip, the edge of his hand or Old Reliable, he could practically guarantee the latter would happen. The same went for large monsters, which were far harder to shift than smaller ones.

In other words, it would do an absolute number on [Bosses], allowing him to tear a human-sized hole through their body with a single [Skill].

Unfortunately, when it came to [Bosses], redundancy was the name of the game. They all had something similar to his own [Redundant Organs] that let intact organs somewhat take over the function of damaged ones, mitigating the consequences of even serious injuries such as a destroyed heart to something not immediately fatal. They could channel nervous impulses straight through flesh in case of spinal damage and there was a certain degree of instinct that could let them fight on somewhat even if one managed to carve a large slice out of their brain.

These things were not meant to go down easily, and had been designed to be functionally immune to being one-shot.

Still, having this meant he could inflict massive damage in a single attack, targeting whatever he would reduce the monster’s capabilities the most, making the rest of the fight considerably easier.

And now, it was time to test this nasty little piece of work.

Isaac walked over to his Tier 6 circle, and tossed in a single dice, some more of the mixed minced meat and a bit of chicken from his pantry, some salmon he’d had left over from the sushi he’d had for dinner a couple of nights ago, and summoned the creature. He wouldn’t even be properly fighting it, he’d just be smiting it with his new ‘Ultimate’.

The beast rose every natural weapon its component animals held wreathing it, the salmon’s scales facing the world, edge-first, ready to cut right through anyone who came too close, several layers of hide making it tough beyond imagination … and precisely none of that helped it in the slightest.

Isaac activated [Wave Charge], flinging himself forward far faster than he could have ever managed afterwards, holding out his right hand, open and with the fingertips pointing forwards, straight at the monster.

Then, a split-second before impact, he activated [I Am The Sword]. His skin turned a silverish-grey, just like the blade of Old Reliable, and then the world vanished in a haze of crimson,

Another moment later, Isaac was on the other side of the monster, once again able to move his limbs, and, surprisingly enough, clean. Thankfully, the blood, gore, and other icky shit had sloughed right off.

Chimera (Geckota-Suidae-Bovinae-Salmonidae-Phasanidae) (Lv. 27) has been slain. 500 XP gained

He turned, looking at the large body behind him, lying dead on the ground with a tunnel carved straight through and a massive pool of blood beneath it, dead before it had even had a chance to bring its [Aura] to bear. That was the power of a legendary, second Evolution cooldown [Skill].

Unfortunately, that kind of power came with some serious drawbacks, namely, he could only use it once an hour and even that required him to regenerate 750 mana while his pool was full during that hour or it wouldn’t have the power to activate.

Isaac walked over to the body and began to hack into it with his sword until he’d retrieved the binding, a ball of weird, wormlike, glowing strands located near the heart.

As a Tier 6 binding, it could be used to hybridize [Auras], or temporarily make them feel more like certain Aspects, whether said Aspects were slotted or on your person didn’t matter.

That meant, he could add the ‘desperate’ portion of the [Aura of the Desperate Seeker], which he’d been successfully managed to avoid properly being sensed by others, to the [Aura of the Crimson Dawn] to make it feel like the emanations of a powerful vampire, hungry for blood.

Or he could aspect the [Aura of the Desperate Seeker] with blood, making it seem like something was seeking the blood of the living.

Of course, merely having a different [Aura] would not be enough to make him seem innocent if his [Aura] was registered while doing something illegal, because as far as the world was concerned, if anyone could falsify their auric signature, it would be him.

But this was still a very important development.

Isaac began to channel his [Aura of the Crimson Dawn] into the orb, which began to glow red, and then added in his [Aura of the Desperate Seeker]. Rather than both [Auras] glomming together and becoming unusable, only the sensory [Aura] remained, spreading out as normal but with a noticeable red tint. Nice to see that the instructions on how to falsify your signature when you had two [Auras] had been accurate.

And now, on to the next one so he could practice with his woefully neglected combat [Aura]. He’d stuck with the sensory one for the most part, it was the one that was familiar, it was the one he was good with, it was the one that felt right. But he’d grabbed a second [Aura], one meant for combat, for a reason.

While his mana regenerated so he could start the fight with full mana, he continued to write the plan for safe summoning, then kept going once it his full so [I Am The Sword] could recharge as well.

This time, sadly, the beast got really lucky with its random addition. It had ended up gaining the parts of some kind of squid or octopus, long tentacles lined with claws on the inside whipping through the air.

Its build was also far more like that of a cow, built for charging and running down its target while the tentacles would ensure that merely sidestepping the attack wouldn’t be enough to dodge.

The Chimera pawed at the ground like a stereotypical bull while its [Aura] fully extended, slamming into his. The beast’s [Aura] was similar to Amy’s in that it could fuse things together, but far cruder. Mostly, it could bog you down by attaching your shoes to the ground or thicken the air to impede passage, but it also had the inconvenient ability to bind things to the physical realm, meaning phasing wasn’t going to work here unless he could push the [Aura] back.

It slammed into him, hot, heavy and oppressive, running into a field of dark red that wrapped around him. He grinned and pushed it back out, stopping the attack cold.

They charged at each other and moments before impact, Isaac jumped, creating a wedge of [Aura] right in the beast’s path.

Tentacles whipped up and around, aiming to intercept, bind and tear him to shreds, but he forged a shield out of his [Aura] over his head, kicking off it to rocket straight back down onto its back.

[Form of Horror] activated and by the time he impacted, ten razorblades tore through its spine, then Old Reliable’s ability to triple its manifested forms activated, sending another twenty identical blades moving along at the same vector, at the same speed, flashing through the openings in the hide and tearing at its insides.

At the same time, the ‘cow’ slammed right into the construct and was stopped cold, blood trickling down its forehead.

Sadly, a severed spine wasn’t enough to cripple everything below the damage, as separate brains existed for each limb, as a quick check with his sensory [Aura] showed. Whatever the mystery addition had been, it was starting to get on Isaac’s nerves.

He switched back to the [Aura of the Crimson Dawn] and began to dodge, weave and dance atop the chimera, carving up tentacles with claws and auric constructs as he did so, blood flowing freely and being absorbed by the [Aura] to power it. Cuts began to accumulate on his skin, but they healed after a split second, the recovery part of the [Aura] working overtime to keep him safe.

All the while, blade control was directing the little copies of his claws to tear at the internal organs, shredding them. It was a hell of a lot less effective than it would have been if he’d had his sensory [Aura] to see where they were going, but the blades were inside the torso of a being with relatively normal organs, even if it had a lot of them. Something in there had to be important.

Two minutes later, the chimera finally fell and Isaac breathed a sigh of relief. These things were a fucking pain to fight, even if you tried to weaken them by tossing together a bunch of random and weak crap, they could still get a lucky bonus that turned them into a true threat.

Isaac phased for a brief moment, causing the blood and viscera that had splattered him to drop to the ground, and jumped back onto his lawn chair. His laptop appeared on his lap, pulled from the storage space, with a whisky tumbler appearing on the small table next to him.

He’d been writing for maybe a couple of minutes when his phone rang.

“Hi Isaac, it’s Raul. Do you have a time right now?”

“Sure, what’s up?”

“I finally settled on my third [Class] and now I’d like to learn how to use my [Aura] before work on Monday. And, well, we both know you’re pretty damn good at teaching that stuff.”

“Yeah, sure. I need a little bit of time to clean up here, but you can come over right now, the mess should be gone by the time you arrive. See you soon.” Isaac said and hung up.

[I Am The Sword] had come off cooldown by now, so he summoned another Tier 6 Chimera and tore it apart with his new [Skill], then began the long and arduous process of removing the giant carcasses.

His spatial storage wouldn’t have fit them even if it had been fully empty, but right now there was so much crap in there that barely a third of the body could be transported at a time. It took some doing, but eventually, they were all piled into the disposal pit and dissolving under the acid he’d poured onto them.

By the time Raul wandered onto the clearing, Isaac was back on his chair with his drink and was merrily writing down the secrets of the universe.

Using [Hunter’s Gaze], Isaac looked his colleague over. The results were … interesting.

At first, Raul felt like an ordinary huntsman, someone who worked outside and spent a lot of time in nature.

Yet he was also very, very different. Rather than the rifle he’d had when Isaac had first met him, he wielded magic that crackled under his skin and instead of his faithful hound, there was a dinosaur sitting on his shoulder and the friggin dragon in his breast pocket, currently doing its finest teacup chihuahua impression.

Likewise, instead of a nice and proper wilderness outfit, resistant to the elements and blending into his surroundings, he wore his [Skills] like a mantle resistant to all things he might encounter out here.

The [Aura] still wildly flickered around Raul, but Isaac could tell at a glance that that was partially down to its nature. It was suffused with power and magic, but its true nature was, well, nature. Raul’s [Aura] was the embodiment of the mystical aspects of the natural world, serving as a magical focus, sensory ability and even providing weak healing and phytokinetic abilities. It was a solid jack of all trades [Aura], with the tradeoff being that Raul would have the devil’s time trying to control it and it was only a mid-range [Aura], far too short for the sensory abilities to be truly useful.

“That’s certainly an impressive upgrade.” Isaac commented “You know, I can see it now: In ten years, you’ll have an entire nature reserve of creatures straight out of the old myths and ride a dragon to work every day.”

“Oh, that’s the dream.” Raul agreed “Getting out of the cities, away from the crowds, not to mention the magic …”

“Nature is good, nature with magic is better?” Isaac suggested.

“Yep.”

“And now, it’s time to see what that [Aura] of yours is capable of.” Isaac announced, spreading his arms even as his [Aura] swept out, wrapping around Raul’s, testing and probing.

It reacted immediately, instinctually, beating it back with a burst of power.

“Was that deliberate?”

“… er, maybe?” Raul said sheepishly.

“Yeah, first step, let’s make sure you’re able to control it enough to not lash out when provoked, then go from there.” Isaac said. This was going to take a while. It’d be worth it when Raul had it under control, but damn, it would take forever time.