Savage Awakening 496. The Lost Ruins (VII)

A/N: Sorry for the lateness, folks! Just managed to get this one out

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They even managed to throw Zane off, making him stumble back.

“Tricky bastards,” said the Sage, frowning.

For a second, Zane looked a bit baffled.

Then the Sage saw the lad’s eyes narrow. He saw the moment the lad decided to lock in. He could guess the kinds of thoughts going through Zane’s head, and he grinned.

“That’s it!” said the Sage.

That was the thing with the lad. His disciple had a way of figuring things out—he was quite eager to see what the lad came up with.

Zane raised his fists, letting his hammers flare out to either side. Then he took a step and started down an Annihilation Charge.

The Sage scratched his beard. Solid instinct, in his view. The lad knew he could break through those minions. He just needed much more firepower—he had to build up a strong head of steam and go for it.

The trouble was, that damned dwarf was onto him, and fast.

The dwarf raised its wrenches, and the Golems started shifting again. Their shields collapsed, splitting off, bulging out, studded with spikes—cannons sagged out of the Sun Golem. And its arms became two flails thick with white lightning.

The Density Golem dropped its shield too. In its place lay two hammers that were almost a little too big. It was whirring, ready to wrecking-ball at any moment.

The Sage frowned.

Could be some trouble.

Zane, though, wasn’t daunted in the least by the sight. That gave the Sage a burst of pride. Three half-step Empyreans was a tall order for most legendary True Gods. But to think you could take them down as a Minor God...

That took real guts.

It was nice when that confidence was grounded in fact. Zane’s body could stand a solid good thwacking or two from these bastards. He already knew he could take what they had to give.

The lad straight-up went for it. Each step made a greater earthquake, every muscle fiber in his body burning up with momentum—even his steps came with explosive might now. That new Concept of his was at work.

Zane was three steps into his charge when the Density Golem burst into motion.

It moved like a wrecking ball. A counter-charge—putting the two of them on a collision course.

At the same time, the Sun Golem kept firing those ion blasts—trying to throw Zane off, trying to herd him into the Density Golem’s path... Now—Zane was durable. He drank his milk, alright. But the Sage still didn’t like him charging face-first into Divine Profound infinisteel like that.

He had the sneaking feeling the lad had something up his sleeve, though.

Sure enough.

Five steps in, and Zane roared—stomped—and made a massive leap, dodging a pillar of an ion blast. At the same time, he burst out of the way of the Density Golem.

He didn’t mean to go through ‘em after all.

Only trouble was, now he was going the wrong way—the lad was shooting for the roof!

About then, Zane dropped his hammers.

They fell so heavy you could see them ripple reality. Stacked heavy in that moment—he didn’t throw them at the Density Golem.

Just dropped them straight to the ground. There wasn’t even any fire loaded in ‘em either…

The Sage burst into laughter.

“You damned brat!”

Straight heavy weight sank into steel—at the same time, the lad bellowed. And yanked with his whole back.

The Sage watched him burst along a semicircle, wrenching around that pivot point—bursting right around that Sun Golem, so fast he damned near gave it whiplash.

He landed right in front of the Dwarf.

The lad had some damned good instincts, that was sure. He did take a few blows getting there, usually, but the Sage didn’t mind that. He didn’t even really see it as a downside, as long as it got the job done.

Meanwhile, the Density Golem was trying to barrel back around. The Sun Golem was turning too—all too late.

Zane let out a roar—and slammed down a sixth step.

“LETS GOOOOOOO!” howled the Sage.

The lad charged that dwarf, hammers descending—in that moment, exploding with so much raw power, so much firepower—he looked damn near undeniable in the Sage’s mind.

But the dwarf’s eyes didn’t change at all.

Instead, it coolly raised its wrenches. Its universe smashed over the lad’s head, but he kept on charging, barely slowing.

The hammers made contact.

CLANG!

Two blasts obliterated the night.

The raw force alone was a sight to see. It shivered cracks down the whole of that dwarf’s Divine Profound plate armor, sent cracks racing down its bones too—its arms trembled so violently they seemed on the verge of exploding. It even cratered the Divine Profound ground just beneath.

A fissure raced out too, splitting the ground for hundreds of miles, thousands of miles deep—making the whole forge teeter.

It was a hell of a hit—no doubt about it.

But for all that…the dwarf did not fall.

The thing caught two of Zane’s full-force hammers, backed by Nuclear Fusion and an Overlord Annihilation charge—

And held him to a standstill.

The Sage blinked. “…Huh.”

He thought the little fella would’ve gotten blasted off its feet, honestly.

But the dwarf staggered just a single step. It should’ve taken an Empyrean to withstand a charge like that.

It had to be some new Skill. The Sage did some investigating.

Reality bent around it differently now. It’d been a heavy bastard before, but right now its gravity turned the air into a halo of blurred colors. That had to be something like ten times the weight it’d been.

At the same time, great big dents went down its minions’ bulbous forms. They felt lighter too.

The dwarf took their weight, somehow—and offset the damage to them too.

“…That’s some bullshit right there,” muttered the Sage.

Zane seemed to think so too, by the look on his face.

Then an ion beam whacked him from behind, locking up his muscles—he staggered.

A half-second later, a charging Density Golem smashed him from behind so hard it sent shockwaves rippling down the plaza.

Zane went face-first into the ground.

The Sage winced.

The lad tried getting up again—he looked a bit disoriented. That was when the dwarf smashed one wrench, then another, into his face—CLANG-CLANG!

Then they started beating him up in earnest.

It was a pretty tough look, the Sage had to admit.

Ion beams kept blasting him as he tried to get up, making him freeze. Then those wrenches and hammers would smash him flat again. He had to be wracking up some heavy damage.

Another thing—that Density Golem was a piece of work. Its hammers were stacked heavy with the Concept of Stellar Gravity, and it just kept smashing the lad. With all that gravity, he couldn’t even get out of the way—it yanked you in as it hit you. Three times now, the lad had gotten up, only to be yanked hard off-balance—and face-planted right into a hammer.

The Sage winced again—he heard a nose break on that one. He still felt pretty confident. A nose break to Zane was just Tuesday. He cupped his hands to his mouth. “Hang in there, lad!”

It was starting to visibly affect Zane. The Sage supposed running your face into a full-force hammer a handful of times would do that. He looked a bit unsteady. Blood was flowing thick from his nose and mouth now. Not to mention the wounds rippling down his chest and back—all from hard bludgeoning. His heart had to be taking a beating too, what with all those shocks.

He just looked disoriented—a little stunned.

The Sun Golem took the opportunity to keep hitting him with ion blasts.

That actually wasn’t the brightest move. They didn’t do much to Zane except annoy him. They actually seemed to wake him up, if anything; he roared and doubled his efforts, struggling harder.

“Just take it to ‘em!” roared the Sage, heartened. “They can’t take your blows—you keep on smackin’ ‘em!”

The hammers fell—CLANG-CLANG! But this time Zane managed to bite down hard, get up his chains, and throw up a block. He managed to deflect some of the force.

It still stumbled him—still sent his head snapping back, but this time he gritted his teeth, stomped down a foot. He didn’t let himself go down.

He had just enough in him to counterattack.

He hurled his hammers straight for the dwarf—a furious burst of a Red Giant Smash. Solid instinct there—he might’ve thought it’d be enough to get these things off him, back into defense mode.

But he was woozier than he must’ve realized. The blow flew a little off. The dwarf rolled right out of the way.

The Golems kept pounding him—CLANG-CLANG!

Zane groaned.

“Bah,” muttered the Sage. The lad needed a new plan. He had to admit—this looked to be a bit of a hiccup.

Around that time, the Sun Golem hefted up its biggest attack yet.

A great blazing ball of sheer plasma-lightning, right over its head.

A field of current blew out from it, and every gem, every house it passed sparked out. A shiver went through the realm; everywhere it went, machines spasmed. It ran up the walls and broke down whole kingdoms.

Zane just about managed to gather himself and look up.

Then it broke over his head.

The lad went down once again, twitching and spasming—every muscle in his big body locked out straight.

The Barbarian Sage grimaced as his disciple vanished under two smashing half-Empyreans. There was quite a bit of bone-cracking going on in there…

The lad roared again—tried shoving his way out—but he was getting a little buried now, it looked like.

…That was quite some heavy thwacking he was taking…

If the Sage didn’t know better, he might start to think the lad was in trouble. Not much, mind you—just a bit.

It was mostly to do with all the blood splattering, the Sage figured. A tooth flew out from the melee. These things could make a fight seem to be going worse than it really was. There was the quite distinct sound of ribs shattering too—that fed into it. Ribs breaking always sounded worse than it was. You could do without a few ribs, the Sage always said. Really, if you had to have some bones break, you’d like it to be the ribs.

The Sage considered all these facts, scratching his chin. Then—

“Bah!”

He cupped his hands to his mouth like a megaphone.

“JUST A DAMNED FLESH WOUND!” he roared. “ON YOUR FEET, LAD! YOU KEEP TAKING IT TO ‘EM!”

The main problem seemed to be that the lad just couldn’t get them off him long enough. Not enough space in there to really get a hefty hammer swing going. And he kept punching, even as he struggled his way up. But there wasn’t enough explosive force to really move those Golems. Wasn’t much space in there, either—it happens when you have three half-steps ganging up on you, he supposed…

Still—the Sage kept the faith. He felt pretty optimistic, actually.

…Any minute now.

The dwarf had started raising its wrenches. Its reality started thickening—that steely color dropping like an ocean of quicksilver, and the boost to the minions strengthened too, making them hit even harder.

The Sage had to admit—if this went on a little longer, he might start to get a little concerned.

He tried circling around to get a better look—it was hard to see through all that smashing.

…He was pretty sure the lad was still moving under there…

Hmm.

He was just starting to frown when he felt it.