Chronicles of the Exalted Sun Child

Book 13-22.3: Storm: Dominion

As they took shelter within a shallow cave, Gwendith stared at the cloud-covered skies. Lightning danced amongst the clouds and was beset by a feeling of foreboding. Snow suddenly started falling, which quickly turned to hail.Ptak! Ptak! Ptak!

The ice shattered against the barren rocks around the cave mouth, but most of the hail was actually absorbed by the thick layer of snow blanketing the Vallavega Pass. From the looks of it, the snowstorm would last for hours yet.

“What do you want to do?” Heron asked.

“Eh?”ic force, she moved through the loose earth and stone like sand taking less than a minute to dig several paces into the hillside.

“What do I do?” she muttered to herself. She could feel the Storm Domain intensify its focus into the earth, then she felt the frost creep downwards as it fought the heat her Radiant-infused Anima gave out. “Ah, he’ll locate me that way.” She dug deeper into the earth even as she furiously made more sunblades.

If only she could fuse more than three blades at a time! Perhaps she’d be able to cut deeper into the rotter’s flesh! She had no Eli’Theria to even the odds, and even with Fri’Avgi she couldn’t bridge the gap of two levels.

What could she do?

Boom! Boom!

Thick bolts of lightning slammed into the ground several dozen paces above her. Lightning worms wriggled into the soil, and somehow, she knew those things would find her and…they’d probably force her to surface. Where was she? She didn’t even know how far she flew.

Yet, despite the danger, despite the desperation, she couldn’t help but feel the thrill of the challenge. She could feel her Intent and Will slowly grow, and her Anima, once it recovered, might jump several paces in reach.

Deadly battle, powerful challenges…it seemed that the way to grow stronger, faster, but the danger and risk may not be worth it in the end. She was gambling terribly here, even if this hadn’t been exactly her idea.

No, who was she kidding? She joined the Reclamation Army because she was bored, so this was entirely on her. Still, she had to find a way to even the odds or simply escape.

She continued to dig through the earth, heading west and north. The lighting blasts followed her movement, and since she was moving far slower than if she were flying through the air, the rotter didn’t have any trouble keeping up. If she flew, she would be subjected to his control, but if she didn’t, she’d eventually be exposed.

What to do?

Boom!

The lighting blast reached within a few paces of her. The distance between her and the surface was lower now, as she realised she was moving off the hill.

She was back to a thousand sunblades, but was it enough? If she merged them by threes, she might stand a chance.

She did so while moving deeper into the earth. A couple of minutes later, the booming ceased, and she wondered if the rotter had given up. Her digging abruptly threw her into an underground cavern.

It wasn’t too big, but she could see the tunnel that led outside. And if she saw that, there was…

“There you are~”

Torrents of lightning flowed into the cavern from the tunnel, and Yuriko cursed. She could go back into the earth, but the beastman was already there!

“Come here~!”

This time, the Guardian lunged for her, hands outstretched and claws gleaming.

“Die!” Yuriko yelled and she swung her merged sunblade.

But that wasn’t all that attacked. The thousand blades she made had been fused together three by three, dropping the number to three hundred thirty-three. There was barely any room within the cavern for all of them, and they collided with the rotter’s defences.

“Argh!”

The sunblade she held slammed into the man’s claws. The other sunblades stabbed into his back. But the Domain around him constricted and built walls of lightning, which soon turned into familiar plasma. The burning heat from the collision spread explosively, and the next thing she knew, the cavern’s ceiling erupted and the walls and floor had turned to magma.

The beastman reeled back from her blow, and there was a cauterised wound across his palm.

It suddenly occurred to her: was this man even a Magi? He was too tough to be one, yet he was able to cast several spells to disrupt her movements earlier.

What was the Guardian?

“Ah~ So naughty!”

“Shut up!” Yuriko roared.

She flung more sunblades at him, reasoning that if the several dozen failed to hurt, then she needed to throw more. It looked like it was working as the beastman dodged away. With the cavern’s ceiling blown off, he escaped to the skies.

What should she do? His Storm Domain was similar to her Anima reach. Everything within it that wasn’t under his control was weakened. Her Anima was pressed down, and could barely function as it should, and her sunblades weren’t damaging him quickly enough. Already, the man had turned himself into Elemental Lightning to recover his wounds.

The area around him was replete with Lightning Elemental energies, and it fed into his power. As long as he had that, it was nearly impossible for her to get the upper hand.

So why don’t you change that? Fri’Avgi’s voice sounded in her mind.

Yuriko blinked in confusion for a second before she realised what the artefact spirit wanted to say. Then she grinned and called the greatsword to hand.

Then she tore apart the fabric of reality and let Chaos inside.