Chapter 9 (S875)
Even with the Kusanagi's active armor piercing ability enabled, Azure still met fierce resistance when he sank it into the thick head. Even with the blade sticking out of its head, it didn't secure the instant kill that Azure had hoped for. So he released the trigger on the Kusanagi, and let a charged shot ravage its head, causing it to literally explode before him.
Azure jumped to his spot at Rin's side, and shook off some of the clear blood hanging off of his weapon. "So… What're these things?"
"Porter went over these in class a couple months ago. They're Elementas, a somewhat rare species of Grimm. They usually avoid people, but you managed to drop me off next to their nest."
"Hmm… They probably weren't happy about that, were they?" nervously laughed Azure. "Sorry, I didn't drop you there intentionally."
"Nevermind that. They're excellent targets. Have fun, I'll cover."
Rin slowly retreated to safety as Azure remained in his guard stance. He had no intention of making the first move now that they had a lock on him. If they were going to engage in direct combat, he wanted to know what they were capable of first, and hold back the use of his semblance for as long as he could.
Several formed what looked like a firing line formation while the rest crept up on him. Something pricked the back of his head – This kind of organization was unheard of for Grimm. The most they seemed to be capable of was working together on occasion, but this was different.
The advancing ants gradually picked up their pace as they got closer, turning into a stampede by the time they finished accelerating. Azure was taken back by the stampeding wall of armor, and fired a single round into each ant. It didn't have any effect, but moments later a barrage of assorted bolts saturated the rushing legion of ants, enveloping them in a cloud of smoke.
He had signaled Rin for a round of fire – There was just no way he could stand against the stampeding wall of armor. This was different than anything either of them had encountered before. Rin was good at suppressing large amounts of targets, but she had trouble with armor. That was where Azure came in – He could stand up against armored targets, but getting rid of them still took time.
Through the settling dust emerged several football sized bolts of assorted colors. Azure took a sharp breath and leapt to the side just in time for them to crater the ground that he was just standing at. "Rin?! What was that?!"
"That was them! They're casters!"
Delightful. They weren't just well-armored, but they were also capable of outranging and outgunning him. He'd honestly rather be fighting a Deathstalker, because those at least couldn't shoot back at him if he chose to.
The dust continued to settle, revealing a still-standing formation of ants. It stopped them, but most of them still looked relatively untouched. Realizing he had to do something, he began his own charge, targeting an ant on his left missing an antenna.
A burst from the Kusanagi kept the lumbering insect suppressed while he slid under it and raked its belly. To his unpleasant surprise, even that was well-armored. When he made it out the other side, he immediately tried to thrust it into its abdomen, but the armor deflected the strike, letting it slide along it.
Rin had already noticed that even Azure was having trouble with them, and had started bombarding the Elementas opposite from where Azure was to keep him from being overwhelmed. But the firing line in the back had begun to return her shots. It was annoying – Every round they threw at her shook the ground like an artillery shell, forcing her to keep moving. If she concentrated on firing back, then Azure could get stuck in a bad situation without support fire.
Finally, Azure got a break – The legs while still durable, were less armored than the rest of the body. He'd managed to dismember a couple, but his would-be victim had caught on, and was beginning to move. By now, the others had scrambled out of formation, unwilling to give Rin the opportunity to splash them with damage.
With another charged swing, Azure removed the legs off one side of an Elementa, rendering it an immobile platform. Recognizing it was disabled, it switched to trying to fire at Azure with bolts cast from its antennae. Since he wasn't quite comfortable trying to chop those off, he fired a burst into its face, stunning long enough for Rin to bombard it with heavy fire.
"Incoming!" came Rin's voice.
Azure hit the deck, slamming into the ground with his a hand over his head. A flash of light brighter than the sun emerged from one of Rin''s daggers, illuminating the forest. Then a beam of light the diameter of a dust crystal raked across the firing line before disappearing as quickly as it had appeared.
Most of them had been stunned by the sudden burst of firepower, having sustained deep gashes in their armor. But a couple had been outright killed. Rin anxiously searched for a pattern among the dead, trying to figure out what exactly killed them. The two that she eyed had lost their antennas, and had their eyes blown out.
Rin made eye contact with Azure, almost telepathically communicating her findings. He looked over at the corpses, made notes of his own, and then looked back at her. She nodded – Now they could get to work.
But they were cut off by another sudden flurry of attacks. Azure had to put his left hand up against the prying pincers of an ant that had managed to get in his face. Rin fired a round off to cover him, but an incoming shot pushed her out of view.
They had the knowledge, but not the means to take on so many of them.