These creatures are too deceptive, too united, too intelligent, too manipulative, too cruel, too cunning, too everything. I don't trust them and my best guess is that they are isolated at the moment which means now is the best as well as perhaps only time to eliminate them.

I experience a sinking feeling in my stomach at these thoughts but cannot shake them because, unlike the Rykz, I do not have any sense that they can be negotiated with in goodwill. Maybe that is because their shapes are too foreign to me but I feel no connection to them.

“Even if it is secret air and metal, others know of it.” The hexagonal-sphere declares without a single high or low to its tone but I read a threat in its words.

“That is true.” I acknowledge while taking care not to project my intent to attack.

I activate the perception construct I prepared atop the hill and accelerate my perceptions to ten times what they normally are, which is my current limit. I then launch my ten air-blades which fly out towards the cables their targeting segments locked onto while throwing my umbrella up in the air at the same time.

Less than a second after the constructs launch, which is the tenth of one with my current perceptions, the creatures react. Their shimmering shields appear so fast that, if I had attacked them first, the air-blades wouldn't have reached them.

Oddly, the silvery veins on their bodies grow thicker and more intense as if their blood-flow intensified. Are my eyes the only ones seeing this? It might be energy comparable to the Lake's blessing, or the blessing itself applied differently.

The creatures controlling the small spiky things turn towards us all at once. They reacted within the first tenth of a second as well but it'll take them perhaps three tenths to aim at us.

I assume they didn't do so before to keep an eye on their surroundings and avoid frightening us. Their confidence in being able to turn and attack us at this range almost instantly is justified as I had never expected these things to be as quick, in fact quicker, than me.

They need to be destroyed now so that they do not bring news to others of their kind. I instinctively realize that the horses cannot be saved and likely won't survive so I base my reaction on this assumption.

I reach out to my companions with thirty of the fifty portions I have left because I have no time to split hairs and propel them off their horses with a half-thought to have them land on their feet.

Having burned four entire portions to do this fast enough to possibly save their lives from the unknown threat, I then launch myself off the horse while beginning to shape a sundering construct on my claymore and encasing the weapon's hilt in a hard shell of air that'll allow me to propel it.

As I do this, my horse's head explodes from what I suspect to be an invisible projectile, the draft horse is split in half down the middle by a thin blue wave that looks similar to an air-blade but causes the air around it to waver.

The Templar's mount, on the other hand, turns into a mass of mangled flesh. They're no match. I launch the three, who haven't even yet landed, far back with no care to protect them from the abrupt change in momentum while moving myself a single meter to the side.

Split seconds later, the space they occupied is pierced by red, blue, violet, and white rays as well as more invisible threats I've likely not caught. It is clear to me by the relatively minor damage done to my horse that they want me alive and in speaking shape.

For now. A crooked aggressive smile stirs at my lips from how easily my sister read my mind. As my air-blades travel towards the cables, before my dead mount or I even hit the ground, I launch my sundering claymore at the hexagonal-sphere.

The creatures slides away to dodge as soon as the weapon moves by itself. It feels like cheating on that thing's part, both its ability to detect the threat and the negligible delay before it reacts, but then again its acceleration and speed are incapable of keeping up no matter when it begins dodging.

My claymore smashes into its shimmering shield as my left foot touches the ground. Khszzkrk. The hexagonal-sphere's defense flickers, buzzes, and finally snaps in front of the large blade enhanced by my sundering construct.

Shrriikriik. The point plunges into the creature's skin, projecting a strident sound most definitely originating from metal shearing through metal. My sundering construct shuts down after piercing twenty centimeters in despite being powered by enough energy to sever even a layer of Vuskyt armor.

I scowl and mentally snap the shell of air surrounding the hilt back to my hand while also recalling the bundles of energy I've sent to save my three current cute little minions.

Tiny points of light appear on the sharp points of the weapons platforms once more so I lion's leap to the side while activating the runic construct on my cuirass. Lake, let me dodge in time.

No such luck. Liz' comment arises as tiny lines of white light instantly shear through the air, drilling themselves into my three limbs and belly. Intense burns appear from a half-dozen holes in my body, causing me agony. Terror seizes my heart, causing it to painfully contract.

Full of nostalgia about this emotion and experiencing desperation towards my sudden change in circumstances, I bring the full force of my crazed mind to bear and shift these feelings into a furious madness directed at these things. Tear them apart!

“You're going to regret that! My sister's already begging me to use her newest toy.” I joyfully erupt, caring none about the intelligibility of the words spoken under the perception construct.

I slam my heel down to stop my fall. My defensive runic construct didn't even slow the attacks down, they didn't even consume flow so I abandon it. I lion's leap to grab the claymore, seizing the hilt and dissolving the air construct.

My air-blades finally land on the cables, severing them and causing all the shimmering shields on the weapons to flicker and disappear. I extend my will and, all at once, redirect the air-blades' targeting constructs towards these offensive towers.

While it seems that other attacks take longer to reload than the bright ones that burn through things in a line, I fully expect another round of projectiles to be thrown at me very soon so I sent flow to course through my muscles.

I release all the tension in my knees to suddenly drop to a very low stance, causing me quite the agony, while also throwing myself to the left to drop at an angle that is at odds with the direction the claymore is pulling me towards.

Another volley flies past me, several aren't even aimed towards my body. Possibly tragically, I have absolutely no time to spare so I do not even try to save my three naive underlings since it is already too late.

I throw my right side forth to give myself forward momentum and charge with lion's steps at the hexagonal-sphere since its shield has yet to recover, counting on these erratic moves to both evade counter-attacks as well as surprise the thing which has been flying away from me.

The tripods are moving in on me but, surprisingly, an air-blade slams into the one to my right while a dull black Vuskyt spear with an armor-piercing construct and a golden javelin slam into the one on my right.

The former is not damaged in the least, its shimmering shield seems to easily block the air-blade. But, the latter's defense is disrupted enough by Idali's spear throw, which had to have been launched from mid-air to arrive at this timing, that the javelin construct pierces the torso.

Unfortunately, the attack does not penetrate very deeply into the tripod with four thick arms and it does not appear to slow it down in the slightest. The two things soon block the way to my prey.

I throw a glance to my air-blades rushing at the turrets and spare a slight pulse of intent to dismantle them. I estimate that the result of the attack won't be worth the spent flow considering how little the air-blade and javelin achieved.

While I may disable the weapons since they lost their shields, those crewing them would not be affected. I spot a dot of light and urgently trigger lion constructs to shift position.

I swing the claymore, bare of constructs, at the tripods and try something crazy. I send two sets of two portions of flow at the creatures while also shaping them into lightning constructs because it does the most damage out with the least amount of energy.

The constructs go straight through their shields while their eight thick arms bend at improbable angles to cut my movement options. I spot dots of lights in the distance and use lion constructs to just lightly shift atop my current position.

More lines of light tears through my armor to pierce my body. Whether chain-mail, hard leather, or the interlocked steel bands of my cuirass, none of it even slows these attacks.

Agony courses through my bones and muscles as new scorch marks appear, three to my left calf, one to my right thigh, and one in my left shoulder. That does it! They have something against one-armed bad-asses!

The pain I'm experiencing is mind-altering, especially from what feels like punctures to my bones, but unfortunately for them, the thought of tearing them apart drives me.

As my claymore narrows onto the one which is trying to recover its shield while grappling at me, I assemble lightning constructs within their bodies and trigger them.

The two tripods start convulsing and my claymore hits one, flinging it to the ground where it stops. The other soon drops by itself as well. One of the platforms launches a blue-violet wave of energy towards me, four different other projectiles are thrown soon behind it as well.

Thankfully enough, the thin blue wave that bisected the draft horse seems slow to reload. As I rush after the damaged hexagonal-sphere, I assemble a thick air-shield to hopefully block the next round of attacks.

As it barely takes shape, six lines of light impact it. The construct burns through a small amount of flow but they make it through it. Oddly enough, only a single one grazes me while the rest fly past or bury into the ground.

As this seems to indicate the air-shield was successful, I leave it in place to protect me and twist my waist to launch the claymore forward towards my prey with a few portions of unstructured energy guided by intent.

The weapon swirls through the air. One of the hexagonal panels of the sphere flips opens and a tiny, improbable, limb pops out to try to block. It, again most improbably, succeeds to stop the heavy weapon's momentum with its thin frame.

Unfortunately for it, my energy acts upon impact to gather and redirect the area's kinetic force to launch it deep into the creature. Kwiihrkz. The metallic creature is torn asunder down the middle and both half drop in the dirt, leaking a dark-purplish liquid.

Impacts shake my air-shield and I witness a tiny projectile twirl wildly off the edge. It looks like a minuscule rock. I frown and reactivate my armor's runic defensive construct because this seems like a type of attack it would block.

I focus on my link to the close to a hundred portions of flow cruising back to me and send it back towards the ten creatures crewing the weapons as well as those spread out around the bulbous skyship. I take special care to take out those repairing the damage.

The shimmering shields protecting them are unable to block flow so I keep moving to ensure they won't take me out before I can take them out. The span of time that's passed is so minimal my heart likely hasn't had the opportunity to seize so I must end it quickly before that happens.

I lean down and propel myself forth with kinetic force and lion steps, using inclined platforms of solid air as footholds to maintain my maximum speed. I flash through the plains and cross the fifty to sixty-meter span within moments while more attacks either slam or are diverted by my air-shield.

One of those attacks, the thin blue wave, costs me a half-dozen portions to deflect and not even by much. The only other reason it doesn't cut my last arm off or a leg is my speed. The thing has the shape of a pear but with tiny spikes across its entire surface suddenly floats out from behind my air-shield.

“We do not want to fight.” It says in a rapid monotone.

I reach out with my palm to destroy it but, just before I do, I decide to use kinetic force to flick myself to the side. Naught happens for a couple of seconds, for two tenths of a second, but then I feel my armor's runes lose energy.

As I stomp down to fake the odd creature out, I spot a metal needle stuck on my cuirass. I rip it out with a thought. Kh, kh, kh. Liz chooses this moment to launch the blood she gathered at the creature in a thin red blanket.

The creature ignores this to try to launch a volley of small needle-like projectiles at me but they fail to get past my sister's blood construct which lands on its shield.

Kzzsss. Smoke arises but the shimmering defense quickly drops. The spiky creature begins spinning on itself to get rid of the blood but it begins constricting around its body, crushing it to Liz' delight.

She then melds this blood of ours to my air-shield. I hear explosions in the distance at the same time as a few of my links to my constructs fade. I hunker down behind my shield, changing dodging tactics to throw them off.

More and more of my constructs activate, destroying the creatures they found. I run my eyes across the area, piercing the night but unable to find any more of them despite the fact I haven't killed them all.

Of the original hundred portions I sent, there are barely ten remaining but I decide to use those to destroy their weapon platforms, leaving me with a mere thirty or so portions in total.

“We retreat, you say.”

“We retreat, you say.”

The flat voices arise from indistinguishable locations. At a first guess, it seems they're trying to surrender without preconditions. I don't trust this offer and don't even consider accepting it because, even if it's genuine, they cannot be allowed to live if there is even the slightest chance they'll communicate with others of their kind.

I glance to the back and find that there is now a pile of golden earth where my three companions were. I scour the area for targets to quickly end this only to find that the creatures are rushing back to their bulbous skyship.

I raise my air-blood-shield and find that some have already made it. I lower my defense with a scowl as I prepare to use the last of my energy to swiftly end this. A thick scorching line of white light flashes past my face and fades.

My construct shatters a moment later with a small splash of boiling smoking blood. I blink in fright at this unforeseen attack as my eyesight falls on the skyship. One of the bulbs is covered in dim silver veins but these are growing in intensity.

Because of the pain and the difficulty of moving my limbs, I use flow to launch myself towards the skyship's shimmering shield with my head held down while trying to dodge attacks I can't see coming.

I fail. My armor and helmet receive multiple impacts while an attack burns a hole into my forearm. They're no longer trying to get me alive but their weapons are terrible at defeating flow.

“We retreat, say what you want.”

“We retreat, say what you want.”

“We retreat, say what you want.”

The lie and their monotone voices grate on me. I extend my hand out and launch twenty-five portions of flow at what I suspect to be a weapon contained in one of the bulbous extremities of the ship.

The silver veins start flickering as if the energy going through them is destabilizing. I don't waste a single moment and shape my energy into a lightning construct that I command to detonate when it reaches its destination past the shimmering shield.

With that done, I hunker down to make sure not to expose any of my armor's weak-points to these creatures and keep my attention on the veins. The silver veins suddenly start retreating towards a depression in the skyship's hull.

An intense white light appears and gathers as the creatures evidently prepare to fire at me. I lion's leap to the right and stomp half-way there to throw myself backward at a diagonal.

A very thin white line shoots out of the depression and begins tracking after me at a ludicrous speed. My lightning construct activates a split-moment before it reaches.

The bulbous protuberance starts vibrating but the ingrowth where the weapon appears to be located produces a thick white pulse. Brrhm. A flash of light blinds me. My defensive construct strains and breaks.

The ground shakes and I hear projectiles pepper the ground all around. I crash into the dirt and roll a few times with a searing pain to my left side. I elbow the ground to shift on my back and wait for my eyesight to recover.

I'm painfully aware that I will soon be dead if they have anything left. One thing I know for a fact is that, at least, they won't capture me alive. Liz will make sure of it.

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