Botan froze for a moment under the gaze of the wave boss.
The haunting orange glow in its eyes seemed to demand Botan's attention. Like a deer in headlights, he felt he couldn't look away without consequence.
Unfortunately, the boss was not the type of enemy to have faults when facing.
The queen shot off like a rocket, burning more grass and melting the dirt into crude glass. It appeared at his side and swung its body around, its claws ready to tear deeply into his flesh. Botan tried moving away the moment he realized it was attacking. The tip of a claw ran along the surface of his armor. Whether because of the quality of the armor or the shallowness of the grazing blow, Botan was unharmed.
"Shit!" Botan jumped backward blindly as several of the balls of energy launched toward him after the failed attack.
The flower hero moved fast enough to outpace the attacks at first, But a wall behind made him physically unable to respond to his screaming instincts to retreat. Several small explosions happened, throwing him through the wall and part of the roof where he landed. Botan didn't so much as catch his breath before the boss was behind him. He didn't see it, but the scorched roof and heat told him it was behind him. He went to jump away, unsure if he was going to dodge in time.
When suddenly Freona stepped in holding her staff up. Both claws slammed into the staff. The brute force of the attack sent a low ringing noise out for all to hear. However, she held firm due to her ability to make the staff stationary. This surprised Botan as much as it surprised the wave boss itself.
The large metal monster refused to believe that someone as thin and small as Freona had the might to contest its strength. It applied all of its strength and weight against her staff, yet it still didn't move. After that, it used its jets to propel itself to leverage its strength even more. Still, nothing. Freona's staff technique was not the type of thing brute strength was going to overcome. When the boss finally conceded the challenge of physical might it instead raised one of the claws towards her as if pointing. About a dozen of the spheres that shrouded the foe shot off at her.
"I got it!" [Sunray]! Botan pointed the attack at the wave boss, specifically just above Freona's head, where the magic attack was converging. It cut through them and struck the boss.
Botan expected the beam to bore a hole straight through the creature, just as it always had. However, that isn't what happened. With the magical orbs to soften the attack and the thick metal body to guard it, the damage was just a few cracks too small to see from their distance, and the area heated to a glowing red.
"Retreat!" Botan yelled as the two fell back. The monster pursued, burning more as it went.
Alder just stared wide-eyed at the traitor before him. In turn, Navarre seemed to wear a rather proud smirk. But after a moment both of their expressions changed. Alder's became a stern frown of disappointment. The kind a father might give a son. Meanwhile, Navarre's changed from a smirk to irritation, to finally a heavily pained expression as he kept trying to ignore the reality of what just happened.
He looked down.
Instead of impaling Alder, his rapier was passing through a [Gate of the Moon] from Cole's chakram. Behind Navarre was the second chakram where the blade exited, stabbing Navarra in the lower back.
"When did you…?" Navarre was as confused as he was in pain.
"You stabbed yourself in the back. Quite fitting." Cole said coldly. He and Selene both advanced towards him.
Navarre quickly pulled his weapon out of the spell and himself. The two chakrams stopped spinning and fell to the ground as the man staggered back a few feet.
"Cole always goes unnoticed. It makes him exceptional at scouting and acting in the field. You should have ensured he was preoccupied before trying that." Alder answered, checking himself for a moment.
"When the hell did he learn [Gate of the Moon]!?" Navarre was lost.
"He knew [Gate of the Moon] before I did. I'd say about 6 years now." He looked up at Cole with appreciation. "Going unnoticed helped him grow strong without others realizing…" He turned back to Navarre. "Why?"
"Don't order me around! You're just a bastard from a whore-" Navarre got no further. Selene took her glaive by the blade and swung the handle into him, crushing his left arm and breaking several ribs. He skidded across the ground before coming to a sudden stop against one of Mr Lokkan's large farm walls.
"Do not insult Tia!" She threatened.
After a moment, they turned to Alder. He answered their looks. "Leave him. We can't bother wasting time protecting him while he's down or arresting him. Botan needs us."
And oh boy did he.
Botan ran a bit, hoping to get all his skill cooldowns reset, but both [Heatray] and [Boom Bloom] still needed more time than he could buy. The queen was flying. She was both faster and more maneuverable than they were. Botan thought he could outspeed it, but that'd just leave Freona behind and he needed her aid.
Once he knew he was about to be caught, he grabbed Freona and dodged out of the way one last time. Botan looked around. Everything was either on fire or curtained in smoke.
He wanted this over with, fast, and readied himself to renew the fight.
[Sickle Throw]! Botan launched the spinning blade at the joint of its right arm. As expected, the magic orbs on that side of her converged and intercepted the skill. Only the slightest bit of the skill managed to make it through and did nothing against the metal carapace of the creature after being weakened so much.
Botan knew this would happen, he had an objective. "3, 4, 5-It's 5…" Botan was counting as a new orb was created by the enemy. The answer was 5 seconds. It lost about 15 orbs from his action. "15, so 1 minute and 15 seconds to recover the cost. [Sickle Throw] had a cooldown of 45 seconds. So, I'll be gaining ground with just this skill. Removing more and more each time. If it'll let that play out." Botan reasoned. "Wait, that's another thing to check."
"Freona, block this next attack again." Botan asked. "Misk…" Myskel tried cheering with a tug on his neck and a slight pur but her enthusiasm seemed dampened for some reason.
"Understood." She didn't falter. The claw of the monster barreled toad Botan but was again halted by Freona's staff.
"..." Freona waited for Botan's skill, but it never came. Instead of retaliating, Botan stared for a moment.
"When I aimed for the wave boss' arm earlier, those energy balls swarmed at this distance. But before that, Freona blocked it and the energy balls didn't shoot out at her until the monster gestured by pointing at us. Meaning it's only used automatically when responding to an attack. It's reactive, not proactive." Botan reasoned. "I could switch to that one shield flower. It has a counter skill… but I'm unsure if the power of that weapon form can pierce this thing's armor."
Botan pointed his weapon to the boss and fired. [Spring: Seed Strike]! Predictably, the skill was intercepted by two of the orbiting energy balls and taken out.
"It'll use more or less depending on how many are needed to fully stop the attack?" Botan received more information based on fewer orbs attempting to block that skill than the others.
"Misk…" Myskel stopped buffing Botan with her supportive magic and just let out a small chirp of pain. Botan switched his attention to Myskel, lifting her head from under his chin to see her eye-to-eye. She was tired, dazed, and not very responsive.
Before the boss could act further, new participants in the fight made themselves known.
"Knob, use [Debris Discharge]!" A series of rocks ranging from the size of a grain of sand to the size of an adult's head fired off as a torrent—nearly an artificial sandstorm in appearance.
[Double-Barrel Colliding Pistol]! Alder arrived, spinning his nunchucks and nearly releasing his grip to allow both sets of handles to collide, creating a fast blast of energy similar to Botan's [Spring: Seed Strike].
The attacks forced the monster to slam into the ground, its head planted firmly down. There was a pause.
"You guys came? Thanks." Botan said in a tired but thankful tone, sweat dripping heavily from his brow.
"Wait until it's finished. Betty! Tear it in half!" Lokkan called.
His faithful yoklan barreled toward the downed monster with surprising speed. However… As it got close enough, the many jet-like holes throughout its lower body began to glow red rapidly.
"Shit! Betty, abort!" Mr. Lokkan yelled.
But it was too late. A single large pillar of heat erupted from the bottom of the wave boss and pierced Betty from front to back, charring nearly her entire body. A single blood-curdling scream escaped the monster as it was thrown back. The hole was so large that there remained no hope as to Betty's fate.
"No, no…" Mr. Lokkan couldn't believe what just happened.
Botan lost his attention with the abrupt death of Lokkan's yoklan. It had saved him earlier in this wave. It was like the mom that kept all the other monsters on the farm behaving well. It was a sweet creature, and it just died brutally. His distraction gave the queen a chance to recover. The wave monster performed an omnidirectional heatwave to free itself from the ground and reorientate itself into an upright position.
Seeing its friend killed in front of it, Knob uncharacteristically didn't act on orders and began firing more debris at the wave boss. But now that it was aware of Knob, it strafed the attack, deftly dodging it. The attack damaged several homes and the noise created by the attack was so loud that it had to run out of small debris to fire before it could hear Mr. Lokkan shouting.
"Enough, Knob!" Mr. Lokkan's words finally reached it. For its part, Knob stopped and moved itself between its master and the wave boss.
Now having an opening, the wave boss' jets flared as it rushed toward Knob and Mr. Lokkan. Alder and the others went to act, but the first to do something was Botan. He moved without thinking and did something no one expected, not even himself.
[Launching Palm]! Botan slid forward with an open right palm and his left arm supporting his right. The fire that had begun to spread everywhere from the wave boss gathered together along with the smoke and fired off a larger shot than Botan intended. The spell struck the wave boss mid-air and shifted it off course. With the speed it was going, it crashed through a building and was buried into the house behind it.
"Did the Evergreen just use geomancy? Proper geomancy!?" Selene was struck dumb at the sight.
Cole eyed Alder suspiciously. "Alder, did you know he could do that?"
"No… And I bet he didn't know until he did it just then." Alder admitted.
"Geomancy in less than a month… he's a damned monster." Cole said aloud.
"Good. We need a monster right now." Alder responded.
With the short exchange over, everyone started gathering up, while Botan looked at his hands. He only just now realized he skipped the first step in casting that spell. His eyes quickly shifted to the surrounding area. Most of the fire nearby was gone, used in his spell. Botan wordlessly walked himself through what he did and why it worked, understanding what just happened.
"Mis…" Myskel made a tiny noise. She was weak and sick. She felt warm, too warm.
Botan looked at her to see her eyes were red and her breathing ragged. "What hit her to do this? I avoided all their attacks, right?" Botan thought.
In a moment of concern, Botan looked around. Fire in the immediate area was nearly snuffed out from his attack, but the fire throughout the town raged on. "Maybe she breathed in too much smoke? I need to deal with this before the town and Myskel…" Botan knew he could not affect the whole town with his [Launching Palm].
He scanned the area and found something that took his attention. He began to run towards it with intense focus. The wave boss again freed itself from the home by releasing a burst of heat with traces of those small yellow explosions, shattering the home and burning what remained. It scanned the area, not unlike Botan did a moment prior. Once it caught sight of the one that just hit it, it shot off again at great speed.
Botan heard the wave boss approaching and positioned himself appropriately while turning around. While his magic attack was his greatest stat, Speed was the very next one. He readied himself. Once the wave boss was close enough, he leapt out of the way.
To the monster's credit, it did more to stop itself before it crashed this time. It was adjusting to these tactics. However, it still did what Botan wanted it to. It broke one of the corners of the village's water tower. It was quite large, even for a water tower. Likely they needed more water due to all of Mr. Lokkan's monsters. Well, today, it was going to help them in an entirely new way.
[Spring: Seed Strike]! Botan aimed and fired off his skill, hitting the mark. These few weeks had given him plenty of opportunities to get in some practice. Another corner of the water tower was damaged.
It was enough.
Several large snapping noises sounded off in rapid succession as the water tower collapsed, slamming into the ground. It ruptured open, spilling a large amount of water over part of the town.
"Good." Alder committed, he and the others closing in on the boss.
"That'll save this section of the town at least." Freona spoke.
"No, this'll give us the chance to save everything. Swella!" Mr. Lokkan called out.
"Swee~!" His floating orf came flying towards the water. Wherever it went, the water went with it. In just a few swift passes, it gathered up most of the water and began extinguishing the fire throughout the town.
Botan thought that tactic worked out well, but there was an issue.
Mud.
The ground was loosened from all the fighting and was now soaked in water. It left the ground caked in thick mud making moving around difficult. As things were now, Botan had traded away his mobility to put out the fires.
He tried to create distance between himself and the tower of steam before him. When the water spread, the heat from the monster caused so much steam that it left Botan unable to see the enemy. He fought through the mud a few steps, but then felt something. It felt sort of like the feeling he got when he felt he was moving along the path of a spell. This was a little different though. This felt more like he was feeling the path that the mud was taking towards a spell.
It suddenly clicked for him. "I used the fire around me earlier, not the fire I made. I can feel the mud… I felt the ground to dodge that mercenary's spell!" Botan realized the truth behind the third test of magic.
He wordlessly followed the path of magic of the mud and found himself standing on top of the mud without sinking. He had to keep his feet moving oddly, but it was working.
"This still isn't good enough. If this was water, I'd be sinking. It's only because it's thick mud that I can do this." Botan would take anything he could for now.
"To think you'd come this far already." Alder said.
Botan looked over his shoulder to see his party and Mr. Lokkan near him. Everyone other than Mr. Lokkan was using the same trick Botan was, yet more refined.
"Seems it's not all that special." Botan commented.
"You do realize we've each been trained by Tia since we were little kids? It makes sense we have passed all four tests." Cole brushed off his words.
"But you nearly passing three of the tests in a month is psychotic…" Freona said.
"In a good way!" Selene added.
"Where's Navarre?" Botan asked with the realization of his absence.
"Safe. We'll discuss him later. First-" Alder went to speak further, but the wave boss shooting out of the pillar of steam took everyone's attention.
"The magical bombs around it only automatically move to block attacks, otherwise it needs a gesture!" Botan began, unable to say more as the fight took most of his attention.
They all had to leap out of the way to avoid the rush of the monster barreling past them. It turned almost instantly, having learned in this fight.
"It'll automatically use more to block a stronger attack!" Botan kept yelling information.
The monster's eyes began to glow red as several of the magical orbs retreated into the jet holes of the creature. Then at once, there was a rumbling noise followed by a loud burst. The wave boss fired off the orbs, now burning with fire atop the magic. The orbs did not travel together, each choosing its own path to reach toward one of the many human targets before it.
"It takes only five seconds to generate a replacement orb!" Botan kept screaming the information while everyone scattered. They used their magic to dance atop the mud while trying to position themselves on the other side of something to block the incoming attacks.
The orbs struck and their destructive capacity wasn't comparable to earlier. They exploded with great heat and were easily 20 times as powerful as before.
"I assume combining those two abilities like that is the best move it has… I hope anyway." Botan thought. He couldn't see everyone else. He went to call out their names but remembered he could see their HP and MP in the corner of his vision. Even being here for weeks, he was still adjusting to the common sense of this world.
"...Everyone looks okay. Roughed up, but okay. Except Navarre. He's critically low. Can't think about it. If it was important or something I could help with, Alder would have told me." Now knowing they were fine, he refocused on trying to see the boss.
However, even through all the mist, there was something he could see. A section ahead of him was growing darker, then clearer, then darker again. He realized at the last second that it was little Swella. She was returning with all the gathered muddy water in a large wave behind her as she swam in the air like a rocket towards the monster.
"Wait, but steam…" "Swella, don't!" Botan and everyone else were too late to warn it.
The wave crashed into the monster successfully, and looked to rough it up a bit. However, this only caused an even greater explosion of steam.
"No!" Mr. Lokkan screamed as the heat forced him to retreat.
Everyone had to retreat, except Botan. He switched to the [Lilypad Umbrella] and ran through the burning hot steam. The heat and pressure made Botan feel like he was running into a house fully ablaze. He ran in, the weapon fully blocking his vision, he had no other way of proceeding. He couldn't see, so he had to rely mostly on hearing. He was getting better at running on top of the mud and picked up quite a bit of speed. He reached the wave boss in seconds and opened his eyes while moving his weapon out of the way.
Before him, he saw the intimidating wave boss, an orange glow of the heat tearing through the mist. But he saw something else as well. He looked down to see little Swella lying on the ground next to it. Skin lighter in color in all the wrong ways. Botan took a step back, then two forward. The poor creature was cooked alive in an instant.
Botan had been trying to play it smart. Use his strengths in magic power and speed. But he wasn't thinking about that anymore.
As quickly as Botan had ever moved, he transformed his weapon back into the [Grass Reaper's Scytheflower] and slashed at it. The blade more than just connected. It cut through the monster's armor with only moderate resistance. Sparks flew as Botan passed the creature. A piece of metal the size of his forearm fell with a definite 'thud'. The monster was pushed back and the mist was knocked away from the two of them, creating a clearing.
Botan's eyes widened at the realization of what just happened. "I… hurt it?" Botan saw the blood flowing from it. "And this badly? But my [Sunray] and [Launching Palm] should be several times more powerful. My stats focus on magic power first and speed second. My physical attack stat is barely better than my defenses… So, why?" Botan asked himself.
That was when it hit him. "I get it! It has extreme resistance to fire! The only attacks that landed were fire-based. So I assumed it was much stronger than me." Botan again looked at how large of a piece of the wave boss he just hacked off. "You're dead." Botan finally spoke, and with more confidence than he had the whole day.
The monster picked up on the danger now coming from Botan and shot into the air.
"I have your number… as soon as I reach you… Which I can't…" Botan looked to the others. "Anyone able to ground it?" He called.
"Selene? Freona?" Alder called.
"On it!" They answered in unison.
Cole used [Gate of the Moon] again. One pointed at the girls running toward him, the other pointed straight up. Freona ran and jumped through the portal first, shooting a fairway into the air. She halted herself from falling using her staff's ability and readied herself with her hand held low and outreached. Selene then jumped through and grabbed Freona's hand. She pulled her up. They were now about 20' off of the ground.
"You'll have to use [Rattlemaster] to knock that bastard down." Cole cautioned.
"I'll use the royal version." Selene seemed raring to go.
"...You sure you can?" Cole asked.
"You aim, I shoot." Selene told him curtly, her face now an angry scowl.
Wordlessly Cole threw his chakram with all his might. He then kept the other spinning above him. He needed to maintain the spell for their plan to work.
The wave boss was waiting for more of the small yellow bombs to form around it so it could hit Botan with its strongest attack from the safety of the sky. However, it soon found out that even in the sky without any clouds nearby was unsafe.
Selene jumped off the staff into the portal just as it was above the wave boss. The moment she exited the portal, Cole stopped using [Gate of the Moon]. Selene pulled her glaive back and passed her weapon through the chakram and began spinning it around the shaft of her weapon as she fell.
[Rattlemaster]! The weapon let off a cacophony of version sounds, alerting the wave boss too late for it to dodge.
"We might not hit as hard as a hero but…" Selene began thinking aloud.
[Crush King: Kaxunaut]! Around Selene came the image of a large monster. Something akin to a large primate with rings loosely adorning its tail. The visage of the creature was made of orange energy of a brighter hue than the boss' own. Her weapon overwhelmed the few bombs it had managed to create, cutting through them and continuing toward the boss. She slammed into the creature with an audible crack.
"But the ways of the nine sovereigns can fell anything!" She finished shouting as the wave boss was ripped from the sky, crashing near Botan.
Botan wasted no time running toward the wave boss, who tried to pull itself from the ground in the opposite direction. Cole caught a falling Selene who was now exhausted.
"Not happening." Alder shot through the mist and slammed into its back. He did little damage, if any, but he kept it from running from Botan.
"I can finish it, just keep it from running away!" [Boom Bloom]! Botan began charging his strongest skill.
The monster again tried escaping, choosing a direction between the two to fly off in.
"I said, it's not happening." Alder said while both Botan and he ran along either side of the creature. Botan's water walking was good enough at this point and the mud was thicker, so he had no issue now outspeeding the boss.
The boss tried to turn left but was denied violently. The same happened when trying to escape any other direction, even straight up. As quickly as it tried it was just as quickly corrected by Botan and Alder striking it with everything they had. The pair threw the boss around like a ball, controlling where it went. Alder needed to use a spell to push it back on course, Botan could simply swing his weapon one-handed to do so. This meant MP was an issue for Alder long term. They raced from one end of the town to the other, striking the wave boss dozens of times, waiting for the timer.
It would try throwing a punch or slashing with its claw, but both could knock its claws away with their arms alone. When firing off a freshly formed energy ball, Alder dodged and Botan swatted the attack away with his weapon. Without a swarm of energy built up, it wasn't worth the title of 'boss' in Botan's mind. He knew Alder was stronger than most, but seeing a non-hero beating a giant robot bug in hand-to-hand fighting really put it into perspective that he had overestimated the boss. Or perhaps underestimated himself.
The beating continued with the boss tumbling on the ground like a rag doll at one point. They would not let the boss come to a stop. They cared just as much about keeping it going as they did about it not escaping. Eventually, they reached the other side of the village and the timer was nearly up.
"Alder!" Botan called.
"Right!" Alder held his nunchucks by the rope and threw them at the wave boss with all four handles pointed at it. Immediately after, he leapt at it, all four limbs out. All eight strikes made contact with the boss simultaneously.
[Octopus Onslaught: Impact Harmonium]!
As the 8 impacts became 36, the image of an overwhelming octopus was created in the cracks forming on the wave boss' metal carapace. So many impacts happening all at once forced the wave boss toward Botan, as planned. Alder made sure that he used his own impacts to push himself away as well.
"If a slash did that, then this is checkmate." Botan simply raised the weapon high, pointing it at the wave boss. The timer of charging up his best skill was over and so was the boss.
Having never used [Boom Bloom] with his awakened weapon form, or even using it once since reaching level 30 with a magic-oriented weapon form, Botan was not prepared for what was coming. The resulting explosion threw the wave boss into pieces. The sound was the loudest Botan had ever heard, yet oddly, his hearing wasn't messed with in any way. Perhaps his stats overcame such a thing?
The large pieces of the wave boss were hurled far by the eruption power Botan unleashed. There was a short pause. The adrenaline kept everyone from stopping for a moment. After another moment, the sky began to clear. Alder and Botan caught their breath between sighs of relief.
"It's… over?" Selene asked, still too tired to do much. The previous spell taking everything out of her.
"The monsters that made it through remain. We are in the final stretch." Freona called.
Botan and Alder shared a look as they finished recovering their breath. Botan checked Myskel again. She was still sick, but less so. She'd be fine. They each flashed a grin and ran off to get the job done. Cole and the others followed as best they could, but the pair seemed to still be going at their full speed, leaving the other three in the dust.
The collateral in lives lost was unknown. The damage done would take a year to fix at the earliest. Navarre still needed to be dealt with and Botan needed to figure out why and how Myskel got sick. Still, the metaphorical daybreak arrived. The Flower Hero, Botan Nakaya, had defeated the first of many waves to come.
.
[Otherworld Index]
Today we'll be discussing Geomancy. Geomancy is considered a higher form of magic. Instead of using the movement of your body to cause magic, you instead use the environment around you and its changes as the means of casting magic. In some advantageous circumstances (much like how Botan found himself here) The environment could be changing on its own, such as a nearby fire, or running water.
These things could be used to cast Geomancy as is. However, most uses of geomancy you'll see are not so easy and hands-off. Instead, the user will force a change on the environment and then use that change to cast a spell. The elemental spells [Updraft] and [Backdraft] are such examples. This is also the logic behind walking on water as Botan discovers. Stepping into the water causes enough change to capitalize on, using Geomancy to keep one above water.
Geomancy is considered far more difficult to use because you still have to feel how and where the mana is flowing, but can't use your sense of touch the same way you do for changes in your own body. Using early/low-level Geomancy is considered the pinnacle of most combatants' career. Only dedicated dancers or the truly talented can go beyond this.
Technically, weapon-based spellcasting also falls under Geomancy as you are using the shape and movement of what is beyond your body to cast spells. Some disagree with this, pointing out that since the wielder is manipulating the object's movement so directly, many such people are casting magic without even feeling the magic.
Ultimately, seeing a combatant using Geomancy in any capacity says a lot about their merit as a fighter. As they either know Geomancy formally or have gone through so many battles that they picked up on things that'd take 100s of battles to understand.
.
[Author's notes]
So that's how the first wave ends. Botan, having gained so much power since his first day, didn't know how he stacked up against the wave boss. He misattributed the boss' high fire resistance as it just being much stronger than it really was. Botan's actions in rushing for a very strong awakened weapon form was the right one. Without the awakened version of the [Grass Reaper's Scytheflower], the fight would have been more even.
With the wave behind them, they have a lot of things to address. All of which are a lot more complicated and emotional than the straightforward fight against a mindless monster that just occurred.