[CYA] Chapter 156: Clash in Engineering (Patreon)

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https://docs.google.com/document/d/13bApHbDZY006DpHFEeDUcDrv_tDtsxm-ctpxH2yzXRw/edit?usp=sharing

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<Alex, Real - Dorgon Calls for Aid, Innominate Engineering-Bay>

Alex was stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Well, no, he had the proverbial snake by the tail and was swinging it around, his arm getting more and more tired as it struggled to bend back in to bite him.

…Analogies are dumb. He held an invisible creature as it tore at him through his clothing and cover-all, his trump cards from the previous scenario seemingly useless.

He couldn’t see any incoming attack to properly catch and negate them with Life’s Active Defense.

There was no longer a multiplier on damage his HP could do, so he would be hurting himself more than he hurt any opponent. His dadao was currently broken, and the sparing one would only really be good for defense.The whole point of that weapon was to be able to hit others without doing permanent harm. Moreover, he didn’t have enough time to properly spin up a Shaped Force Burst.

I am training speed on that spell, as soon as I freaking can!

He let go with one hand, pulling a utility knife from his Inventory into place before he stabbed forward… the tip glancing off something.

It could have been the thing’s skin; it might have been wearing armor; he couldn’t tell. He did know that the defense wasn’t magical in nature as he couldn’t sense any magic from the thing save its continued, ‘I cannot be seen. I’m not here. Alone here.’ and so on.

It clawed at him again, and the curved tips caught on his shoulder, hooking on but not able to penetrate the bone—thank the heavens. What it did do was give the beast leverage, and with that, it began drawing closer to him, despite his resisting left arm.

With a cry of alarm, he put the knife back in his Inventory and returned his right hand to the thing’s neck—he hoped it was the neck—momentarily arresting its progress.

Think, Alex. Think!

He didn’t have a real weapon.

He couldn’t kill it with HP transfer.

It began drawing closer once more, overpowering his already worn-out arms.

Stupid sparring! Maybe they had fought a bit too intensely. In his defense, he would be fully recovered in another few minutes.

He hoped that he had another few minutes…

He was spinning up a Shaped Force Burst—gritting his teeth through the infantile limits—but he wasn’t going to finish before it forced itself so close that his strength gave out.

The pain from the thing wenching off his bones didn’t help.

An extra second or so.

That’s all he needed.

He kicked out, aiming for roughly where a groin would be.

He impacted and—

Alex groaned in increased pain as his shin hit something hard. The creature didn’t react to the hit.

Think!

Then, it came to him. He released the hold on his power, and it flooded back into his throat once more. “Halt!”

The actual word didn’t matter, but the wave of dissonance washed over the thing again, stuttering its magic and clearly causing it momentary discomfort and disorientation.

Alex seized on the extra seconds and scrambled to finish the Shaped Force Burst spellform, suppressing the part of him that rebelled against the toddler-esque nature of what he was able ‘say’, magically speaking.

The thing’s strength returned, and it surged forward, straight into an overcharged blast of force.

The sound of crunching bone and a dog-like yelp mixed with a pig’s squeal preceded the thing being torn from Alex’s grasp and sent sailing across the room.

He saw through the flickering magics for a moment, seeing in-human proportions and details on a humanoid frame.

Too-long arms and oddly spindly, back-bent legs. Clawed hands and a rounded, fanged maw. At the same time, the head and body were larger than expected and somewhat rounded.

Alex blinked in confusion. If he had to describe it, he’d say it resembled the unholy offspring of a werewolf and a capybara… and it was mad.

The fact that it wore what was undoubtedly armor of some kind meant it was likely intelligent in some regard as well.

That was when Grant arrived, gaze jerking around the room, clearly unable to see the threat now that its magic was up and running again.

“Nice of you to join us. I thought you had a skill to tell when you were needed?”

Grant growled around ragged breaths. “It only triggered after Juba reached out, and you all started getting closer to this thing. Apparently, either the skill doesn’t work to protect the ship, it’s not a threat unless discovered, or I’m not using it right.”

Alex frowned as he noticed an odd haze around Grant, even extending around his warhammer. The magic spoke of a form of heat used defensively, while also augmenting his weapon.

Before he could ask about it, he sensed the cloaking magic drawing closer once more.

Grant’s eyes widened, and he sprinted toward Alex as well, swinging at what seemed to be empty space.

A growl filled the air as Alex sensed the magical source twist away, but Grant must have sensed a change too.

Alex felt magics of change and transformation, which barely preceded the effect.

Mid-swing, Grant’s warhammer extended into a sledge as he held the very end of its handle, the head practically whistling through the air before it crashed into the side of the beast with a wet thump.

The magic cut off and the feral-werecapybera-thing bounced off the engineering-bay floor, clearly already dead, its blood and viscera already making a pool around it.

Its armor was obliterated where Grant’s blow had caved in its chest, and now Alex was able to see that he’d caved in part of its face with his own force hit.

You assisted in the killing of:Capy-were-it (Uncommon), Level 20 x 1Danger: Extreme

Reward:Experience to be granted when in a safe location.

Grant was panting still, clearly having sprinted from wherever and whatever he’d been doing when the danger was noticed. “Is that it?”

He took several more deep breaths, glancing at the corpse… He’d get his Life later.

“Are there any more?”

Alex opened his mouth to say no, but he hadn’t gotten the experience…

This place wasn’t safe?

Then, he sensed it.

‘I’m not here. He was alone. Nothing here but empty air.’

Alex sighed, locking eyes with Grant and giving a slow nod. So slow that it would be easy to mistake for an affectation of weariness.

Grant groaned, hefting his hammer even as it shifted back to the smaller form at the behest of magics which were clear to Alex’s sense. “What now?”

Alex… had no idea. “Your skill?”

The big demolitionist grimaced. “Only if one of us is in danger.”

Alex looked down at his torn shirt, seeing the smooth blue of the recovering coverall slowly reweaving over still-healing flesh.

His left arm felt weak, but the muscle hadn’t been fully severed and the damage to his shoulder had barely been more than superficial, piercing more than tearing or cutting. Enough time had passed for him to be nearly fully healed.

Alex had an idea.

He hated it.

It was also so ill-formed that he couldn’t even imagine how it might work. He sighed. “Please be ready.”

Grant lifted an eyebrow but simply nodded.

Alex began moving around the room, feigning checking various hatches.

Juba called out that he was going to take John to the med-bay and departed with the man.

Alex did his best to narrow in on the magic, finding the process incredibly irritating. In fact, it reminded him of trying to find a phone that was under a couch cushion.

He knew it was close by, but the exact location was impossible for his senses to pinpoint.

So, as he spun up a Shaped Force Burst, he did the only thing he could think of. He turned his back on the majority of the room, facing Grant once more.

At the same time, because he wasn’t a complete idiot, he put his hands on the back of his own neck and stretched his elbows up and back, giving out a great yawn.

It was reasonable cover and protected his neck from an instantly fatal strike.

He still might take a blow to the back of the head though…

The sound of running feet came from the hallway at the same time that the magic moved, revealing exactly why he hadn’t been able to pinpoint it.

It was oscillating… and coming from at least two other sources, rising and falling out of sequence. That’s why the source had never seemed to be in the same place for any length of time, while also seeming not to move.

Asynchronous alarms! He kicked toward the one he thought was closest, hyper-extending the leg as it hit nothing, but thankfully not hurting the limb from the miss because of his enhancements.

As his flailing kick hit nothing, a creature impacted him from the opposite side, and he lost hold on his Shaped Force Burst, causing it to trigger behind him in a lucky turn of events.

A third being was punched in the chest by his force magic, staggering it backward even if the armor absorbed most of the impact.

Grant was there, then, his heat-haze armor somehow not affecting Alex even as it caused sizzling and pained whines from the closest attacker.

Alex was still recovering from the hit he’d taken—staggering to regain his balance—when something latched onto his back, claws in his sides, jaws closing on where his neck met his right shoulder.

At the same time, sharp blades or claws began raking down the back of his legs in a scrabble.

He screamed in pain, gaining a moment’s respite because of the dissonance. In that pause, Alex punched at where the thing’s biting head should be with his left hand, but to little effect given his limb’s still weakened state.

Frantically, he dumped a quarter of his total Life into the thing, giving it the general command to wreak havoc and learn just as the Life in the last creature had.

He fell to his knees, his legs unable to keep him upright as the backs were torn apart.

Through the agony, he couldn’t help but be unbelievably frustrated.

Once again, the amount of Life he used would have obliterated an undead, but this thing barely seemed to notice.

Still, the results were better than the useless gesture using his HP had been. His Life acted like a self-replicating poison within the enemy, if not quite so effective as that seemed to imply.

The enemy growled, pulling back for another bite, likely one aimed to end him, and Alex’s frantic mind railed against the very idea.

His thoughts were a tangle of pain and panic.

With no clue where the idea had come from, he summoned a frying pan behind his head, eliciting a resonant dong! and a surprised whimpering-whine of pain when his opponent tried to snap its head forward in another bite.

The pan fell free, and Alex was frantically trying to find what he’d pull from his Inventory next when a wet thwack sounded behind him, the opponent becoming visible as it fell sideways, a spear embedded in its neck.

Alex turned to see Natasha mid-lunge, fully extended, holding the very end of the saving spear.

Alex gave a tired smile, heavily tinged with the… well, everything his body was telling him.

He opened his mouth to thank her, but before he could utter a sound, his consciousness fled.

<Maxim, Real - Sapience Lecture, Tutorial College #8,010,583>

Maxim sighed as his son fidgeted beside him.

While, in one sense, it was fascinating that there were now all sorts of sapient life that they’d likely encounter, from beast-men hybrid looking creatures to standard fantasy races, and on through to things and peoples he’d never have imagined on his own, he wished his wife were with them.

He let out a long sigh.

Vlad glanced at his father. “Thinking about mom again?”

“Of course.”

“She… She could be alive.”

Maxim glanced at his son with a sad look. “She was on the other side of the house when it split, Vlad, and she wasn’t in the list for reunification in this tutorial thing.”

Vlad grimaced. “She was probably just arguing with one of the administrators, and she got put in a penalty box or something.”

Maxim huffed a laugh. That would be like her, to take their new System—or its agents—to task for inappropriate behavior. “I hope you’re right. I truly do.”

Vlad decided to change the subject. “Did you catch that bit about many beast-like humanoids?”

Maxim shook his head.

“Well, a lot of them have sub-human intelligence and are pressed into slavery, either as laborers or warriors. Many System sanctioned powers outlaw this, but not all. So, we have war-slaves to worry about too.”

“Eventually?” Maxim was hopeful that such a time was as far off as possible.

Vlad slowly nodded. “True. Eventually, but not now, thankfully. I’d not want to fight them now.”

Maxim looked up to see the feral, animalistic, upright war-beasts and shuddered. “Not in the eyebrow, but in the eye.”

They nodded together in mutual agreement.

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