The Legend of Randidly Ghosthound

After favoring Huang Li, Paolo, Dinesh, Glendel, Lyra, Alana, and Hank each with a few seconds of a long stare, Randidly glanced downward toward the churning clouds beneath. He felt like he was walking a tightrope above the eye of a tornado, with the howling maw of the cloud dragon yawning beneath him. He could see disturbingly far down its throat. And each second that he delayed, it rushed upward with an ever-growing fury. Randidly suspected that the longer it pursued him, the faster it would become.

It seemed like one of those Skills.

Yet simultaneously, he was walking a tightrope of image usage that was some of the best training he’d experienced in a long time. Although they opened with the announcement that this was an assassination attempt, Randidly could read how false that was in their images. They weren’t here to kill him; rather, it felt more like they wanted to prove to Randidly Ghosthound that Expira didn’t need him. This was a strange attempt to frame their parting as equals, rather than Randidly being in such a dominant position.

And at the moment, that framing did have merit. Randidly might only be using one of his images, but they still managed to threaten him. Encountering this fight was enough that Randidly would take care not to act too unilaterally paternal toward the planet in the future. He wasn’t the only person that could protect it.

Yet all that was for later. The fight wasn’t over yet and Randidly was ascendant while the ambushers adjusted their position in an attempt to strike a decisive blow. With the energy he was able to steal in the last several seconds from Donny and Lucifer, his physicalizations were blazing to life. The world ember in his chest released heat through the pounding of his heart, reddening his skin. His exhalations were thick with steam as he spread out his arms and flexed his muscles. His skin tightened and warped, its defensive properties strengthening every second.

The Grim Chimera’s grin at the surrounding circumstances was wicked. A dull roar reached his ears as the cloud dragon approached from below. Let’s see if you can catch me, then. Reaper’s Mantle of Catastrophe.

Congratulations! Your Skill Reaper’s Mantle of Catastrophe (L) has grown to Level 159!

…

Congratulations! Your Skill Reaper’s Mantle of Catastrophe (L) has grown to Level 164!

The Skill Level was relatively low compared to Randidly’s other abilities, but the haze of ash, ill will, and heat waves that spun outward from his body combined with the steam he already released to form a thick blanket that shrouded the surrounding area. With his glowing emerald eyes at the core, Randidly gritted his teeth and forced that Mantle to explode outward. The thick particles of the Grim Chimera’s Mantle twisted and deflected energy away, making it difficult for anyone to locate him within the grey smog.

Congratulations! Your Skill Reaper’s Mantle of Catastrophe (L) has grown to Level 165!

Of course, compared to the mouth of the ravenous cloud dragon, Randidly’s fifteen-meter cloud was the size of a skittle thrown toward a human mouth. But it did make the fighters above hesitate. Hank Howard held his revolver at the ready, his eyes narrowed for any movement. Lyra continued whispering quietly to the dagger of violet light she was shaping. Sweat was dripping down Huang Li’s forehead as he maintained the huge working of the cloud dragon. His hands on his sword were only able to resist trembling because of how tightly he gripped the weapon.

Alana drifted downward toward the smog, her hair fluttering as all of them continued falling toward the ground. Her spear was held loosely in her right hand. Despite the fact that her image had been damaged in their prior clash, the tight expression on her face meant that Randidly wouldn’t take her lightly. In terms of determination, few could match Alana Donal.

Which was why Randidly sensed the strange desires of Alana’s image and was confused. There was a deep longing there, but she didn’t attack. She just stared intently at his Mantle.

Why try to do this, Alana…? Randidly wondered, even as the roar of the attack rushing toward him grew increasingly loud.

In spite of the tense situation, Randidly spared a glance downward, then back up toward Huang Li. He’s someone worth watching. I’ll have to get Tatiana to invite him to some Order Ducis training sessions to keep him on the right track…

But then he forced himself back to the task at hand. The haze around him continued to spread outward, but he noticed with distaste that the cloud dragon would catch up with him before any of the others were at the fringe of his Mantle. Even Alana was too far away. Randidly weighed his pilfered cache of mental energy but decided it was ultimately not worth it to challenge the cloud dragon directly. So instead, Randidly opened his mouth and shouted. “Man is Proud, But the Chimera Takes.”

Most of the opponent’s flinched and Hank’s revolver barrel twitched side to side, searching for Randidly’s presence. But Alana continued to calmly regard the murky depths of Randidly’s Skill without the slightest hint of fear. Those strange desires that swirled around her grew more intense the longer she stared. “It’s a feint. Remain calm. He is the one who needs to move.”

Congratulations! Your Skill Reaper’s Mantle of Catastrophe (L) has grown to Level 166!

…

Congratulations! Your Skill Reaper’s Mantle of Catastrophe (L) has grown to Level 172!

Grimacing, Randidly maintained a tight grip on his Mantle around him. The wind continued to nip at the edges, attempting to pull it apart and reveal his form. But Alana was right, that shout was mostly a distraction. Using the principles he had learned from his extensive experience weaving Nether, he used those few seconds to weave together the caustic strands of his mantle into an even more dense barrier that he could carry around his person. There was no avoiding making a move here, but the Grim Chimera was gradually learning subtleties to its stubbornness. There was no shame making some preparations for unavoidable setbacks.

But soon, his prep time came to an end. The open mouth of the cloud dragon brushed the bottom of his Mantle and physically ground it to naught upon contact; the invisible winds within its throat had enough force to rip the Mantle to shreds. Randidly’s evaluation of Huang Li rose another few notches.

Man is Proud, but the Chimera Takes.

Congratulations! Your Skill Man is Proud, But the Chimera Takes (L) has grown to Level 225!

While making a mental note to really work on the Skill Levels for this Skillset even further, Randidly shot upward at a vicious speed. Behind him, he felt the cloud dragon stir and ponderously pull its jaws shut. The motion appeared slow because of its immense size, but as the lips smashed together right behind him with enough force to ruffle his clothes, Randidly chuckled. Almost. Missed me by a full meter though.

Randidly shot directly toward the alert Hank Howard, who instantly trained his revolver on the three-meter orb of Mantle that Randidly had woven together in preparation for this. Hank narrowed his eyes. Then he closed them. Just as Randidly was bewildered by the choice, the man pulled the trigger.

Bang!

Of course, his damned instincts!

Because he was carefully hoarding his mental energy for his next trick, Randidly only relied on his physical body to dodge. But to his surprise, even as he cut sharply sideways and twisted, that bullet seemed to curve toward him as though it caught and rode a gust of wind. It smashed into his right shoulder, boring a hole through his Mantle and revealing his physical position within the grey smog.

Even worse was Hank’s image. Although it wasn’t flashy, the bullet that cut into Randidly’s flesh flared to life and fought against his image physicalizations immediately. The narrative leaning of Hank’s image tried to pull Randidly into the role of an overpowered villain. Before that could get any traction, Randidly gritted his teeth and squashed the image. The bullet flickered and was ejected from his body a split second later before it could inflict too much damage. But the sudden show of force did end up costing him much of his spare mental energy.

Just as he was about to recreate the Mantle, Alana Donal was there. Her eyes shone with a brilliant white light and met Randidly’s gaze. “The Third Revelation: Anguish.”

The blow was invisible and vicious. Everything was twisted and torn. Even Randidly, who was used to immense amounts of pain, grunted and froze for an instant as that invisible pain lashed across his body. And that moment of pause was exactly what they had been waiting for. Randidly felt the air around him become thin and filmy like glass. Then it shattered.

*****

Alana felt something close to relief as Dinesh activated his ability for one more massive usage. The strange smog that the Ghosthound kept close to his body seemed to twist in the air to try and escape it, but then it exploded outward and revealed that he had been successfully shifted. At the moment, he probably was slamming into the ground below. He would react quickly, but not quickly enough.

But that was just the smaller of the two workings that Dinesh accomplished. The bigger one was shifting the entirety of the massive cloud dragon that Huang Li manipulated, flipping it upside down. At the moment, it screamed down toward the ground where Randidly had been sent. It was a veritable bomb of tightly compacted winds, ready to test the limits of the Ghosthound’s physical resilience.

The wings of Alana’s Fate beat several times, slowing her descent toward the impact point. She glanced around and raised her voice to cut above the dull roar of the wind. “Prepare for landing! We will be going in as soon as the Sky-Slaying Sword dissipates. Hank-”

But then Alana blinked and glanced around. Where was Hank Howard? Now was a bad time for him to uphold his aloof Western trope of appearing only when they needed-

Then Alana grimaced.

A split second before the dragon hit the ground, Alana heard Dinesh shout. “You-! How?”

“I avoided it.” Alana could hear the grin in Randidly Ghosthound’s voice.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

Even twenty meters in the air, the impact of Huang Li’s impressive Skill hitting the ground shook Alana. Winds churned through the ground like teeth of an invisible leviathan, moving at speeds that they gripped huge slabs of rock and heaved them out of the ground. These huge pieces of debris were smashed against each other and then tossed by the air currents back toward the ground, smashing into their more stubborn fellows. Very quickly an area about one hundred meters in diameter had all of its rock of significant size reduced to spiraling sand particles.

Then the exterior winds ceased hitting the ground and the maw itself impacted the space.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMM!

This impact was a different beast entirely than the initial contact, manifesting as a massive concussive wave that slapped the surrounding space. Alana was tossed to the side, losing sight of her fellow attackers in the chaos. The ground rumbled and dropped as stone chipped and cracked. Behind the maw of the cloud dragon, its massive body began to collapse as its energy was spent. Then the air filled with a horrible hissing sound. The speed of the winds on impact was so fast that the sand that wasn’t blasted away was melted into gleaming glass.

Alana’s image had to flare with the aspect of inviolability in order to prevent her from crashing into the ground. Quickly, she steadied herself and began to glide. As the debris began to settle, the crater was revealed. It spread outward in beautiful waves, delicate sheets of overlapping glass giving the stone space the beautiful curve of flower petals.

However, this attack ended up being an utter failure. When Alana hit the ground and could effectively examine the area, she found that Randidly Ghosthound was holding the bodies of Dinesh and Glendel. Likely he had already tossed the unconscious form of Hank Howard to the side.

Only she, Lyra, Huang Li, and Paolo remained.

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