The Pinnacle Warrior

All of the shimmerbugs, from violet to orange, looked much the same. Six legs, the body of a beetle, thick protective wings, and heads with beady eyes. Their faces bore a pair of mandibles that were large, but proportional to their body, and the only real difference from the weakest to the strongest was the color of their shell and their size.

The red was different. If Astrid was asked to say what the difference was in a word, she’d call the red a royal. It wasn’t much larger than an orange, about her own height of a bit over two meters, and its bulk wasn’t much larger than an orange’s, maybe a 10% increase. However, instead of the very simple body shape of all of the other shimmerbugs, the red had thick plates of armor, not so smooth, but bulky and tough. From its head protruded a horn, maybe sixty centimeters long, which came to a sharp point, making her very grateful that she’d blocked the monster’s charge just a moment ago.

More than any of that, the red carried itself with presence and power that no orange could match. The red in front of her seemed to have almost person-level intelligence, and its head pulsed with a crimson glow as Astrid felt its mental Skill slam into her. Fortunately, with Heroic Aura and Mental Fortress, she didn’t have any issue dealing with that, and she looked at the rest of the battlefield as she tried to figure out what she needed to prioritize.

One of the oranges was working with most of the healthy yellows, throwing itself madly at Felix. Three yellows currently fought at its side, and the frontliner was handling it, but he would take a short while to be able to make any meaningful headway on killing any of the four. Astrid saw him toss a mana berry in his mouth as he continued to fight, and another two yellows pushed towards him.

On the other side, Muti blitzed through the other yellows, slicing legs and sending the limbs flying. Three already lay on the ground, their regrowing legs slowly poking out from under their fallen bodies. However, even so, Muti paid them no notice, continuing to break shields and cripple the yellows. As soon as her work was done, pillars of lightning smashed down into the struggling, recovering monsters. With most of their magical resistance from their shield Skills gone, Muti and Skandr had been working together perfectly to reduce the numbers.

Benedict was behind them, keeping his Skills up, but Astrid couldn’t look there any longer.

The red arrived, its long horn covered by its shield Skill, charge aura, and even the arm-slicing Skill somehow strengthening it as well. With a flash of intelligence, Astrid stepped slightly to the side to keep from taking the charge directly once again, instead pushing a heavy amount of mana into Indomitability to keep herself grounded. Her feet carved deep furrows in the ground until she was slammed back into a vine-tree. The breath whooshed from her lungs, and her ribs ached as the tree bent but didn’t break beneath the force of the charge.

Astrid shouted with effort and shoved the bug back just enough to lower her stance. Then, with her shield underneath its head, she lifted with her legs and threw it backward. Again, the surprisingly light weight of the shimmerbug worked against it, and, with so much power and fury behind her throw, the bug sailed back half a dozen meters.

“Who needs help from Physique!” Astrid shouted, sparing another glance back at her party as a buzzing sound filled the air.

“We could all use it!” Benedict replied. “How many?”

“Still got five!” Astrid answered, turning her head towards the buzzing noise and then cursing.

The red flew through the air, having recovered from her throwing it and charging towards her once again, its wings flapping in a blur and keeping it aloft. Though Astrid hadn’t been hurt much so far, she was tired, and her mana was getting chewed through at a prodigious rate. As she tried to get back to the party, the Champion ducked under another charge from the red. It flew overhead and crashed into the tree that had trapped her, its horn piercing through the braided vines and ripping through the yellow tree.

Astrid pushed some of the last of her mana into her greaves and, with the increase to her Alacrity, sprinted back towards the party. The buzzing of the red’s wings filled the air behind her, and Astrid told Muti to wait her turn. The party understood that she didn’t want to easily bring the red into the center of their backliners, and Astrid turned and faced the red once again once she was close enough to Benedict, Skandr, and Felix to include them with the use of Physique.

Five meters was not far for Steel tiers, especially those at their level and with their Alacrity, so Astrid was already introducing enough danger with what she was doing without actually standing in the middle of everyone. That said, she spent a charge of Physique and helped her party. Skandr and Benedict were tired, but that stamina drain wasn’t notable. Felix, however, had dozens of tiny scratches all over his body as remnants of the attacks that’d managed to pierce through his defenses.

“If we can figure out what you want me to kill with this next attack,” Astrid grunted, taking the red’s charge into her shield and then having to remind herself not to waste her boost from the charge of Physique on breaking the Red’s shield, “I’d like to get that done sooner rather than later.”

Muti answered, though not verbally. She ducked behind the fight that Felix was embroiled in and towards the orange that had gotten left behind by the faster red. The Lethal Shadow slammed her swords into the orange’s shield, dispelling it just before the red turned its attention on her. With a puff of shadow, Muti disappeared and reappeared behind Astrid.

“Got it,” Astrid laughed as she stepped forward and ducked under the charging red. It nearly sent her sprawling, but now that she had more mana, she could spend it on Indomitability to keep herself on her feet. Then, with a scream, Astrid jumped forward and smashed her hammer into the body of the orange shimmerbug that Muti’d exposed, the strike landing just behind its head.

The monster exploded in a shower of gore, and Astrid smiled as the red shrieked in rage and threw itself at her once again. She had enough time to spend another charge of Physique, targeting Muti, Skandr, and Felix, taking note of the second wave of scratches and wounds from Felix as she did so.

“Fine, I’ll do Felix’s job,” Astrid shouted the joke as she pushed back into the red. She didn’t have any Skills to force its attention, but with the number of yellows dwindling between Skandr and Muti’s focus, Astrid had as good a chance as anybody else to keep it occupied.

Unfortunately, as soon as she thought that, the red seemed to take notice of Skandr. It activated its charge Skill towards him, and Astrid shouted a warning to him.

She didn’t need to.

Skandr thumbed one of the rings on his left hand and was suddenly surrounded by a circle of wind that blew upwards with gale-force winds. The flying red was thrown a dozen meters into the air as Skandr deactivated the spell. Then, without delay, he sprinted towards Astrid as the shimmerbug recovered quickly and flew back towards him.

With a scream, Astrid pushed more mana into her greaves to boost her Alacrity and jumped forward, intercepting the red. Her hammer smashed down into its barrier, the first hit destroying it for the first time. The echo smacked down into its body, doing only a little damage, but she was finally in melee with it. Its jaws stretched out around her shield, twisting her back and forth as it dove down and smashed her into the ground. Not for the first time, Astrid’s breath was driven from her lungs, and she gasped as the monster’s forelegs sliced down at her.

With its mandibles holding her shield still, Astrid took a dozen shallow but painful cuts along her ribs all the way down to her knees. A part of her wanted to stop, to attempt to deal with the pain when one leg found a minute weakness and sliced deep into one of her ribs.

The rage in her heart refused that.

Her hammer, though awkward to use while lying on her back on the ground, fell against the bug’s front left leg. The first hit didn’t do much, and that leg slashed at her shoulder in response. Fortunately, her pauldron held, the reinforced manasteel only shrinking in response. The next three attacks came fast, and Astrid managed to crunch through the chitinous defenses on the third hit, finally shattering the armor on that side.

That leg hung limp, unable to hit her, for now at least. Astrid could see the armor there reconstituting itself, and she screamed in challenge as, on her left side, the attacking leg rose high and then pierced deeply into the space between her ribs and hip.

Her breath went short and her vision went white as the bug chittered in victory. It lifted her shield arm up with its mandibles before then slamming her back down into the ground. What little breath had remained in her lungs was knocked out at that, and Astrid almost went limp.

Almost.

With a scream and a mental apology to anybody else who might need healing, Astrid spent two charges of Physique and got herself back into peak condition. Her blood mixed with the dirt under her to make mud that sucked at her hips, but Astrid was right where she wanted to be.

The bug started to rear back to slam her against the ground again, but she dismissed her shield, making the red stumble back half a step as what it was pulling on disappeared. That was hardly enough to put it off balance, but Astrid surged to her feet with the brief opening. Then, pushing as much of her mana and stamina as she could manage into it, she created a Spectral Graviton on the head of her hammer.

Seeing what she was doing, and feeling the mana in the air, the bug started to attempt to retreat, but being close enough to attack meant being close enough to be attacked. Her hammer smashed into the crippled arm and crunched through defenses. Then the echo strike carried her hammer even deeper, allowing the Spectral Graviton to ripple and tear inside of the monster’s body.

Instead of visibly recovering, the bug twitched, but stayed on its feet. Then, it used its stun Skill on her, leaving her unable to make another attack on it as it flew backward. Its left side hung limp, legs unable to support it, but its wings still worked.

Astrid struggled for a brief second, but succeeded in pushing off the stun Skill, wanting to chase down the red, but she was beaten to it. A pillar of wind smashed into it from above, crushing it into the ground. Its wings fluttered, trying to get lift off, but Felix jumped and landed on its back. Though he wasn’t nearly big enough to crush it, with Guardian’s Avatar he kept it on the ground as his axe fell and smashed into its head twice.

“It’s vulnerable!” he shouted, the bug’s shield Skill, ironically, flashing into existence after he used Guardian’s Amplification. The sphere of protective red mana pushed Felix away from the bug, but the ten centimeter gap was far from enough to get it free. Glancing around, Astrid could see that the party had dealt with the rest of the bugs, leaving only the red, and she smiled at the opportunity to get her revenge.

Grounded and surrounded, Astrid would have thought that the Red was all out of options except to die quietly.

She was wrong.

Astrid, Felix, and Muti all slammed their weapons into the shield barrier, and as soon as it broke for the second time, it activated its charge Skill towards Muti. Even in a few seconds, it had managed to recover from enough of the damage to its side to still be able to run. Though its protective barrier was gone, the aura of the charging Skill provided no small amount of protection as the Barbarian barely succeeded at keeping the horn from piercing her chest.

The bug managed to escape the encirclement at that, starting to flee. Before it could get far, a bolt of lightning struck it from the air, smashing it down into the ground once again. The fight devolved into a thrashing mass of blades and hammer, the three physical fighters throwing everything they had at the red as it fought desperately to escape. Its single charge, though, had been its hidden trump card, and it no longer had anything it could do to escape.

With a series of continued attacks, the bug was finally killed, and, as soon as the expected notification appeared, they all cheered.

Red Iridescent Shimmerbug slain. 4,560 experience gained, split among party.

Astrid groaned, exhausted, but stayed on her feet as Muti too left off the battle and instead looked out for whatever danger might be approaching. She looked around, her head twisting both directions as she took her position seriously, the rest of the party looking around the remains of the battlefield. The bodies of the shimmerbugs were all scorched, sliced, and crushed, but all four of the Wanderers that weren’t actively on lookout had plenty of valuable materials to harvest.

“Don’t do anything with the greens and below,” Astrid commanded as she took the blade from Skandr and cut easily through the carapace of one of the yellows. “It’s not worth it, and we don’t know how far the next swarm is.”

As a testament to how serious the situation was, nobody joked around or hardly spoke, except to quickly extract what they could from the corpses. The regeneration organs were the main piece they gathered, though with the red, Astrid just tossed it entirely within the large spatial pouch that Olafson’d given them. There could be plenty of parts of it that were valuable, so they might as well take the whole thing while they still could. Maybe three could fit into the pouch all together, and, if they managed to kill more than that in the next couple of days, Astrid would just have everyone focus on the regeneration organs. 

In just a few minutes, the party had stripped the valuable organs from the shimmerbug corpses and stood up. 

“That was what, like 60,000 experience each for that?” Benedict asked as they all gathered together. 

“About,” Astrid agreed. “A whole lot more dangerous than ever before, and that’s even without us all getting taken by surprise and going all out from the beginning.”

“Great danger is experienced when fighting against large numbers,” Muti said, nodding. “There are strengths afforded by having one hundred under your command.”

“And the shields that protect them from our greatest swarm killer,” Skandr said, washing himself off with a dense cloud, “are pretty frustrating as well.”

“Making sure not to waste resources against the weakest while keeping ourselves safe from the strongest is the greatest difficulty,” Muti added, her attention still on their surroundings. “The leader worked to exhaust us before it came itself. If it were to come in the initial wave, perhaps it would have posed a greater threat. But I do not know.”

“I think it would have been worse for us,” Astrid said, “if the largest, strongest ones had come in the beginning. Then, even if we’d focused on them, the others could have closed in on Benedict and Skandr better. It’s just nearly impossible to keep you two completely safe when there’s so many enemies all around us.” 

“Which is why I need to figure out this damn spear,” Benedict grumbled. “If I can use my flute and the spear at the same time, I can at least be a distraction, if not a full danger to swarms like this.”

“Remember, that leaning too hard into that runs the risk of tainting your path,” Astrid cautioned.

“I know!” Benedict snapped. “I just feel like I can’t do much when things are actually difficult. Yes, I know that my Skills are helpful and whatever, but I need to be able to do more than just sit in the back and play the flute. It’s infuriating to have to sit here and be useless, just hoping that my occasional use of Skills is enough to turn the tide.”

As Astrid tried to respond, he took a deep, calming breath and held up a hand to forestall any comments. He took another breath and then said, “I’m fine. It just sucks to be on the backline and, if I was in Skandr’s position earlier, I would have just gotten hit. I hate it. But it’s the path that I’ve chosen, and I don’t doubt or regret that. I’m also allowed to be frustrated by that reality, just like you can’t cast spells. It’s just life.”

There was nothing to say to that but a nod of agreement, memories of frustration and envy flashing through her mind. Any further conversation was delayed by Muti perking up and then scowling.

“Another swarm. Nearly as large as this one. It will arrive in two minutes at most.”