B3 Chapter 396: Hunt, pt. 2

Ianmus stared off the cliff with a pensive expression.

This biome was one of the weirder ones they had seen. They were on a flat plateau that stretched as far as the eye could see in either direction, at the very lip of a cliff that had to rise half a league or more into the air.

It didn’t seem like a mesa, or any spire erupting from the ground — more like the world had been cut in half by some godly being and stitched back together. Badly.

Far below them, rolling hills, wet rivers, and green forests stretched all the way past the horizon. All too different from the barren, sun-baked rocks they now stood on.

There was nothing else up here. Well, nothing except the biome entrance. A small hut, made from marble in a style similar to the overrun city they’d just left.

He did have to admit that it was an awfully good biome for what they wanted to attempt. It had the exact kind of sightlines Kenva wanted. Hopefully, it would be enough for him to make an attack at an extreme distance. Even with his elven lineage and inflated mental stats, the ground below them was minuscule — too far off for him to even clearly make out individual trees and bushes, let alone the beasts that must live down there.

Hopefully it wouldn’t matter too much. He was confident in his aim, and he had a plan.

With the control that had come with levels, he had more options. There were some niche spells that he knew the theory behind — more things of utility than anything else. They weren’t that expensive, at least the one he had in mind wasn’t: bending light so that it acted like a lens.

It did, however, require fine control, so it would take time and patience to weave.

Since leaving the Crucible, their descent had been relentless — an onslaught of battle after battle, only ever stopping when they needed to rest, recover, or prepare. They pushed themselves hard, but they’d been rewarded for it.

After four Guardians, they had a wealth of tier-two items, and that wasn’t even counting the motley collection they’d pilfered from Champion after Champion.

He gripped his new staff. It was fashioned from the rib of some naturally solar-aligned beast — at least its description said so. Straight and thin, it sat comfortably in his hand — its tip flaring out to a five-pronged point, almost like a fishing spear.

A crystalline disc lens was set in its tip, inscribed with faint runes.

A great addition, especially now — not only would it increase the speed and control with which he could weave all magic, it would focus the potency of his spells to give them even more punch.

That, and it would ameliorate the loss of power that normally occurred over distance. It even gave him something of a weapon of last resort. With but the barest trickle of mana, he could summon a stride of cutting light from the staff’s tip, turning it into more of a spear or halberd than a pure casting implement. Likely not something he would use often, considering his role and lack of Skill — but it was something he could practice with, none the less.

It wasn’t the only artefact he had gained, but it was among his favourites. Staff of Lightfang, the System had called it.

“There, I spot some,” Kaius said, peering over the cliff’s edge.

He pointed down to a thread of blue that wove through the ground below, fed from a spring in the cliff beneath them. Kenva hurried over to him, shading her eyes from the bright sun above.

“They look good to me — at least, they look relatively fragile. Better than those crab things we saw before.”

“Yeah, those things looked rough. Too big.” Kaius agreed, nodding. “Too strong as well. I watched one of them cut a boulder in half.”

Ianmus narrowed his eyes, trying to see what his friends saw. All he made out were a series of dark smudges meandering by the river’s edge. They just as easily could have been trees swaying in the breeze.

“Do you want to go first?” Kenva asked.

Ianmus thought about it for a moment, “The lensing spell I’m going to create is slow to move. I won’t be able to track them, so I suppose it’s best if I have the opening shot in case they scatter.”

Kenva nodded.

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“Do you think you guys will take long? This biome is boring. Everything seems to be down there,” Porkchop huffed from beside him, his head resting on his paws.

Ianmus chuckled. “I imagine Kenva will be quicker than me. I’ll need a bit of time to channel my spells, but we should be able to move on swiftly — head back to the biome we left and try to find another.”

Of course, it would be a slight detour to do that, but none of them were particularly equipped to descend the behemoth of a sheer cliff they found themselves on. Kaius could, of course, just jump off — but not all of them were blessed with a spell that would let them arrest their descent so easily.

Porkchop groaned but nodded, before going back to peering around the rock-strewn plateau.

Keeping his focus on the section of river that Kaius and Kenva had pointed out, Ianmus reached for the mana that now settled deep in his bones, urging it forth.