"Guys! I think I figured out something. Whatever it's doing has something to do with illusions. Once I thought it was not real, I was dispelled and sent hurdling down. Some parts of it are real and the others are illusions."
What she managed was to dispel most of the illusions, but without truly figuring things out, the battle would only keep getting harder. All of it is an illusion, thinking any of it is real, after a sufficient amount of belief had built up, eventually made those parts real.
The thing is that now parts of the illusion were being dispelled, but the lingering scene of watching how easily Rasde was easily disposed of, made them sure of its strength, which was the part of the illusion that became real, the part that mattered. "I don't think flanking him will be a good idea, Zasde, how fast can you prepare a spell?"
The individual elements are more powerful on their own, combining them makes then less lethal, that is if you don't possess mastery over the main six. It is arduous to practice with all six, it could even be deadly. Zasde had not mastered all six, but she had been taught a spell by her grandfather, who had. She had not grasped the concepts, but before she started adventuring, her grandfather wanted to make sure that she could protect herself.
Chaos spells are even more dangerous than learning them, messing up can result in a full out disaster for all present. She had gotten steady at the other elements, but her use of this chaos spell had always been shaky, and this is why it is usually the last resort. "Just a couple of minutes would do."
Attempting it in the state of mind she was, was not advisable. Nonetheless, she agreed. Fowour activated his own lure skill, pulling the monster's attention towards him. Then the mallet changed to become a mace. The hits he kept throwing were landing, but his mind was stretched thin trying to figure out which parts are real and which weren't.
Then something powerful sphere from his hair, it was glowing. He was trying to see if he could dispel the illusions this way, not use it to attack, and his belief became reality, thus the specific parts of the illusion he was aiming for were dispelled. He had thought that there was a skill that this thing was still hiding, and as such this gave it the opportunity to make one up.
It suddenly jumped away from the strike from the mallet, kicked Fowour back and distanced itself, right then a focused beam of fire pieced through its right leg and moved trying to sever it, but then it had moved. Carnage was not healing the leg, the burn was that bad, that even the non-illusion skill was not working on the half-severed leg, the burn had reached the soul.
It then stabbed its claws into the ground, worm like roots and tentacles spread out, going deeper into the ground like a tree growing roots at an accelerated pace.
Then limbs grew out of the protruding roots. Thin membranes were tearing, and from these roots emerged skeletal bones, assembling from splinters. They then grew hair, flesh, nails, and even the clothes the monster had eaten along with them were growing on them. Every target it had ever eaten was there, soulless as ever, even Rasde was there, but no matter how hard you look, the monsters first target was nowhere to be seen.
Fowour started attracting them towards it and began ploughing through the crowd, he could see the way the monsters were, so his skill helped. He was able to grow stronger the more opponents he faced in battle; he was still trying to buy Zasde some time.
Ferris kept scorching them, but they refused to fall. After they became ash, they rose again. The monster kept adding other beings it had never killed in-between all of them, and they would soon become real soldiers, this was because they were all convinced that it had given up on using illusions, as such they thought they were as real as the rest. They were partially right, the skill to summon its food – victims – is real, it's just that it keeps adding members to the army, continuously making it larger than its total meals.
Watching your brother fall and rise over and over again like he was worth less than this existence, really did not help Zasde calm down. She is an experienced adventurer, so she was not going to lose her temper over this, so she did not.
She had remained calmer because of what her grandfather told her; 'losing control of this spell will end you, your enemies and your companions, remember this before using it in haste.'
She had gained control of the spell, but she still had clouded judgement, there's something she had missed, she was supposed to be in charge of analysing her enemies, so on that front she had failed.
She knew how to do the spell without saying the incantation, but today she wanted to make sure that this one was as powerful as possible.
"Fere chaos se afti tin taxi
Katanaloste opos epithymei i akataponiti orexi sou
Min afiseis kanenan na xefygei apo ti sagini sou
Se deno
Se sfragizo
Sta splachna tou diastimatos se exorizo
Mesa ston keno tou mazi me ola osa einai gyro sou
Opou boreis kapote na fereis taxi sto chaos."
The sky became dark, it then liquified and drooped down, like a dew drop about to fall, and formed into a sphere of bent space.
The sphere that had been shaped into a single drop which was a kilometre across, and for its size, it fell at a speed slower than an actual droplet of rain. As it moved across the sky it looked like a distortion in space, bending light around it, forming an accretion disk. Then the closer it got, the smaller it got, until it was smaller than a rain droplet. A whole ring of light formed around it, as space scarted swirling and getting consumed.
The forest was being consumed. "Now!" Screamed the tank. Then Ferris took them and started flying as fast as she could. As she flew, she heated the air around her, bursting the trail behind her to flames, making her fly faster than comet, nearly thousand times faster, they had done this before, so they knew how to escape. All of them were strong enough to survive at these speeds, but it was barely enough.
They passed this point in space, and instantly something like a universal barrier formed, shutting everything inside. There was no way to escape this if you had not left immediately and at speeds putting sound to shame. The monster and all of its entourage had not escaped.
Right at that point, the roots that had emerged from the claws hit the barrier. It had been closed, so it was stuck inside. This spell is so dangerous, that people have to even get permission to use it in some areas, since all around the area of effect, would perish along with the monsters. The person who made this particular chaos spell had made the fail safe.
Around the spell, an absolute field is produced, to limit its spread. It closes instantly and that would be how fast the caster would have to make it out. In all respects, this spell was more like a suicide spell in case of emergencies. Over the generations, the casters have learned manoeuvres to escape fast enough to live to do it again, like they had, making the suicide spell into a death trap.
Creaking which was followed by heavy snapping sounds. Some trees were fully uprooted, leaving small dents in the lands. The sand slowly rose, being absorbed. Soon the corpse soldiers were floating. The force inside this dome had completely counteracted the gravity of the planet.
By something so microscopic, only seen because it had a whole ring of bending light and debris being swirled inside into it. Then the whole atmosphere inside collapsed, forming into a dense field where light did not form correctly, making the whole area inside the dome bright, even the furthest of cities saw the light from that flash.
Then there was nothing…
The barrier vanished, and so did everything inside, even the air, creating a gigantic vacuum in space, which pulled everything towards the centre, then all of it clashed with so much force, it caused an explosion that decimated the entire forest, erasing the monster and its hunting grounds afterwards. And this time there was no doubt that it did not survive the chaos ensued, thus its illusions did not save it.
The party came back there a few weeks later once the heat around the site had become bearable. The things that had been in the field were gone. Where a whole entire forest once stood, laid a massive sphere, made of charred land and trees, as the blueprint to where the black hole had formed before it was extricated.
They weren't new to this scene, but seeing this specific one put them at awe, Zasde had really perfected the spell when she performed it this time. Fowour destroyed the black coal sphere, and flattened it, it even released heat as it burst open, heating the air to a searing intensity.
The city had requested they flatten the orb; it was a danger to those who passed due to how unstable it is. Including the previous value points and these, they had really made a small fortune, and unfortunately, they each had a larger share due to Rasde's passing. The diced to split the party, Zasde went back to her town, performing the spell had changed something in her. Fowour went on to form another party.
Ferris flew back to the island Dragonara, Pyre city in particular. Once she was there, she joined the dragon kin guard, even rising high enough in the ranks due to her experience as an adventurer. She was some kind of legend, her feats had even made it back here, the legend of 'Singe of Hell' and her party 'Bright Stars' was some of the stories passed around, even seeming like propaganda.
She had heard these stories, but the real funny part is that hearing how preposterous they sound, made her wonder if she even did them. The strangest one of them all is about the monster that had to be stopped with a perfected chaos spell, hearing it made her remember the conversation she had with her party before they split up, all those years ago.
***
"I never thought it would look so human, if I had to guess it had just recently become a monster."
"I say we don't talk much about it, that thing was strange, I even recognised most of those corpses it summoned. Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if we had not stopped it, anyway, Zasde, what did you say happens to the area formed in the spell?"
She had been spacing out recently, making her seem almost senile, but she had heard enough to answer Ferris's question. "I really don't remember…"
"What do you think that package in its chest even was?"
"I think we should just forget about that thing. Anyway, Singe of hell, Chaos cloud, see you guys later, I have to make sure to recruit at the guild before everyone finishes forming parties."
"Don't call me that. What do they call you anyway? Water tank? I remember… Is it aqua shield?"
As he ran out, he said, "You're doing it on purpose, we both know is shield of Waeria…"
His voice faded as she and Zasde walked away, Ferris left her at her town before departing. "You're headed to Pyre, right?"
"Yeah... why?" She then pulled a sealed letter from her pocket "Can I give you this letter to keep for me? I will come for it one day, just don't accidentally burn it. Okay?"
'I was getting a little worried, if she can make jokes, then I guess she's getting better.' Shortly she said, "I don't burn everything anymore; I don't even remember the last time I burned something."
Zasde chuckled a little, gave her the letter, and waved goodbye as Ferris flew off into the distance. She then walked into her house, closing the door behind her.