Rune Seeker

Hiral groaned as he opened his eyes, something drip, drip, dripping on his forehead. At least, he thought he opened his eyes, but it was still pitch black. Am I actually awake? His body answered the question by informing him just how much it hurt. That, and there was a pressing weight covering him from head to toe, his arms and legs almost completely immobile from it.

That’s right—the roof fell on me. Wow… yeah… that hurts.

He tried to shift, but there just wasn’t any give to the debris on top of him. He had a little bit of breathing room—the worst of the rubble had to be propped on itself—but it wasn’t nearly enough space to move. Still, he was alive, and despite the low, throbbing pain, it didn’t feel like anything was broken or severed.

Right!

Hiral managed to shift his head to the side a bit, the unseen water now dripping on his temple, but he still couldn’t see anything, let alone the body of his double. But, those injuries…

He pulled up his status window with a thought, and sure enough, Foundational Split was available to use. Right had vanished. No, not vanished. Died.

Died to save Hiral.

He’d have to thank his double next time he summoned him. Which… brought him to a bit of a problem. Hiral wiggled his fingers and toes—everything still worked—but when he tried to lift his arms or legs, he couldn’t move them. The weight was just too much, even with the extra physical stats from Right being part of him again.

A quick look at his status window showed his Str at 18 (6) for a total of 24. That put him in the Low D-Rank of average strength, but if it wasn’t enough to move the rubble on top of him… well… how much of the building had fallen? His best option—Right digging him out—was out of the question, so where did that leave him?

Foundational Split didn’t show Left having been reabsorbed yet, so that double was still out there. Would he be able to find Hiral? Even if he did, his physical stats were lower than Hiral’s, so he wouldn’t be able to dig him out on his own. If he brought the others…

The others. Cal!

Hiral stopped thinking about his situation, about all the weight on his chest and limbs, and instead focused on his hearing. With his eyes completely useless in the dark anyway, it wasn’t difficult. First, of course, there was the pattering of rain right above him, and the… distant boom of thunder. He couldn’t hear any voices, and maybe it was his imagination or how much stuff was on top of him, but the wind seemed to have died down.

How long was I out? Are the others looking for me? Are they even okay?

Hiral couldn’t answer those questions buried, and the possible answers to them meant he might not have any help coming. He needed to get himself out.

Okay. Think. Rune of Rejection,obviously. It should be able to take care of this pretty easily. Except… I can’t use it while Right is inside of me.

Just in case, Hiral tried feeding solar energy to his rune. Nothing happened. Of course not.

He needed to activate Foundational Split to summon Right so he could use his runes. A shift of his right arm, maybe an inch at most, told him there was definitely not enough room for two of them down there. Still, without other options, he didn’t have any choice but to try. Feeding just one percent—the bare minimum—of solar energy into the split, Hiral summoned Right.

The cramped area lit up briefly as the tattoos and Meridian Lines peeled off Hiral’s skin, hovering just above his body as the solar energy seemed to look for a place to go and condense. Finding nowhere to spread, the ability collapsed with a jolt similar to static electricity, and the light faded.

Confirms I can’t summon Right in here… but…

Hiral repeated the summons, again with just one percent, but instead of focusing on the solar energy and where it was trying to go, he turned his attention to his runes. Could he…? Yes—his Rune of Rejection was available to use—but the attempted split ability faded, another shock making his body twitch. One more time, he told himself, activating the ability again, and counted. One. Two. Three… The ability faded with another annoying shock.

Three seconds. That was how long it took for the ability to fail. Three seconds was how long he had to activate the Rune of Rejection and get the fallen debris off him. With the way it was propping itself up and not crushing him, he probably only had one chance at this.

Better make it count.

Priming his solar energy, Hiral pushed it toward his Rune of Rejection, building and building the amount of it right at the dam preventing him from using it. Then, while he kept most of his attention on that stream of solar energy, he fed another one percent into his Foundational Split. As soon as the ability activated, he turned his full focus on the energy rushing in his rune, and he pushed. Pushed as hard as he could.

The rubble on top of him didn’t even shudder, no—it simply spewed off him in all directions like ten of the Scholar’s fireballs had erupted under it.

Debris shot high up into the night sky, bouncing off the walls and pinballing away, while the sudden slight glow of roots was almost blinding to Hiral’s sensitive eyes. But, as the energy from his rune faded, Hiral’s thoughts turned quickly to another rune, and more importantly, the force it represented.

Gravity. What goes up…

Hiral forced himself into a sitting position, body complaining with every motion, then flipped over to hands and knees and crawled through a hole in one of the walls. Probably the one I made coming in. Light rain splashed on the ground all around him, and then pieces of wood and rock began to join it. After a small piece clipped his shoulder, he pushed himself up to his feet and then lunged under a leaning stone wall.

Rocks and chunks of wood—some as big as Hiral—slammed to the ground around him, deflecting off the wall he huddled under and making it shake ominously.

If I get buried under another wall…

And then it was over, the street in front of him covered in debris. He let out a breath. Doing a quick inspection of himself, he was covered in minor wounds, though nothing looked too serious for the moment. Need to watch the bleeding. A lot of small injuries could add up. Another check had both of his RHCson his thighs, and the Emperor’s Greatsword on his back, by some miracle. All in all, he was in pretty good shape, but that didn’t mean the others were.

Rolling his left shoulder—a bit stiff from having a building fall on it—he stood up and activated Foundational Split.

“Hey, thanks. You saved my life,” Hiral said as soon as Right formed beside him.

“No problem,” Right said. “Sorry about the building falling on you.”

“Nothing you could’ve done. Come on, we have to find the others. Any idea how long I was out?” Hiral ducked out from the leaning wall and confirmed it belonged to the building the parties had been in.

“None. Honestly, last thing I really remember is something sweeping through the building beside us. Uh… yeah. This building.”

“Sweeping? It wasn’t an explosion?” Hiral looked at the ruined building. “No, never mind… I see it. Like a giant hand hit it from the other side over there, then just slapped straight through it.”

Just looking at the scope of the damage made Hiral gulp, and he glanced back up and down the street, even above the buildings. Something with the power to do that kind of damage had to be huge. And yet, there was nothing out there. With a shake of his head, he turned and stepped into the ruins of the building, quickly finding what was left of the hall he and his doubles had walked down, then came to the front.

“Cal had to be out there,” he said, pointing where the font door had been. The whole street in front of it lay broken and shattered, with most of the stone torn up and tossed aside. “See if you can find anything,” he told Right, then turned in the other direction and went into the room the others had been hiding in.

Though calling it a room was very generous. The ceiling and three of the walls were completely caved in, and the fourth didn’t look like it would be standing much longer.

Are you all under there like I was?

Hiral immediately rushed forward and started picking up and throwing off the pieces he could move by himself. “Right!” he called. “Going to need your help in here.”

“Didn’t find anything out there. I mean, nothing other than everything being trashed,” Right said a few seconds later, moving right away to help Hiral lift a massive crossbeam. “You think they’re under here.”

“I hope not,” Hiral said, straining with his end of beam. “This is too slow…”

There had to be a better way. Attraction and rejection were too risky… They were too sudden. One of the others could be impaled under there, and if he shot the debris off like he did on himself… No. Just no. What else?

Hiral pulled up his status window and looked at his runes… then paused.

The runes of Separation, Gravity,and Energy were right there with the others, but Gravity and Energy hadn’t given him anything like Foundational Split. What… what if he’d been wrong about them the whole time? He’d been expecting a specific ability like Foundational Split from the other advanced runes, but maybe Separation was an exception to that because it was his primary rune, whatever that meant.

Could he…?

Hiral reached out to the debris and pushed solar energy gently into his Rune of Gravity. Nothing happened. Was he wrong?

He slapped himself in the forehead, then pushed two streams of solar energy through his body. One to his Rune of Gravity, and the other to his Rune of Decrease. It was just like with his sword.

The debris in front of Hiral shifted—all of it—then began to rise off the ground, some pieces floating further and faster than others, but even the huge crossbeam he’d struggled with shuddered and rose. The rain, meanwhile, seemed to get caught in the gravity field as well, most of it stopping and forming something like a curved layer of water. The few drops that made it through that first coating halted midflight, then became the opposite of bubbles—little spheres of water floating in the air. Within seconds—his solar energy draining at an alarming rate the whole time—he could see the floor underneath, as well as the remains of the ruined packs floating above it.

Thankfully, bodies were noticeably absent, and the relief of it almost made Hiral lose his focus on his runes. Almost, but not quite. He caught himself before everything dropped back to the ground. “Right,” he started.

“You’re going to ask me to go under that floating death trap to get something, aren’t you?” Right asked, practically glaring at Hiral. “Dying to save you and dying to save your lunch are two entirely different things.”

Right… had a point, but Hiral was already using two runes at the same time. Could he do a third?

No harm in trying.

Keeping solar energy flowing into the Runes of Gravity and Decrease, he extended his left hand and gently pushed a thread of energy into his Rune of Attraction. The closest pack, one that held the crystals they’d gotten from The Mire, zipped over to his hand, and Hiral practically cheered.

Then he lost his control on the entire pile of debris, and the whole thing went tumbling to the ground with a large splash. Still, all things considered, he couldn’t help but stare at the wreckage. If he could do that with the Rune of Gravity, what was the Rune of Energy capable of? Or even the Rune of Separation? Was there more to it than just Foundational Split?

“And that’s why I didn’t rush in,” Right said, bringing Hiral’s attention back to the present while he picked the pack up off the ground and flipped the top closed. “What’s next? They weren’t under there, fortunately.”

“If I were them, I’d head for the next dungeon. The Troblin Throne. It’s where we were all going anyway, so maybe they’ll think of it as a rendezvous point. As for Left…”

As if it were a cue, the tattoos on Hiral’s left side emerged from his skin, and Foundational Split became available. Hiral used it.

Left peeled off him, forming within a few seconds, then immediately stepped out into the street and pointed. “You were partially right. They started for the dungeon, but it seems like the Enemy caught up. They’re hiding in some kind of watchtower on the border between this swamp and more forest.”

“Did you see the Enemy?” Hiral asked, following Left out and looking in the direction he pointed, for whatever good it did—it was still dark and raining. “Did it kill you again?”

“No to both of those questions. I don’t even know for sure it is the Enemy, but something seems to be waiting out in the rain for them, crashing around through the trees and searching. It won’t be long until it smashes through the small watchtower like it did the buildings here. When I realized there was no easy escape for them, I burned off my solar energy in hopes of finding an option with you.”

“How much of a head start do they have? How long was I out? Are Cal and Fitch okay?” Hiral loosed the rapid-fire questions while his brain worked through options.

“You were out about thirty minutes,” Left explained. “Cal was badly injured when this building was attacked, though Nivian was able to pull her back just in time. They escaped through the back door and managed to mostly get away unnoticed until they left the town.”

“If they have that much of a head start, shouldn’t we get going?” Right asked, standing in the light rain with the other two.

Hiral shook his head. “What good would we do even if we caught up? Look at this.” He gestured to the ravaged building. “And you saw what it did to Lonil…”

“I’m sorry about Lonil,” Left said. “Don’t beat yourself up over it. There’s nothing you could’ve done to save him.”

“Maybe,” Hiral said, a spike of pain in his chest at the simple word. They’d been risking their lives nonstop since they’d arrived on the surface between the dungeons and the monsters. Still, somehow, it’d all almost felt like nothing more than one time trial after another. Like a game.

Seeing Lonil’s body… what was left of it, though… no, it was all very real. And this Enemy wasn’t something he could fight and win against. If he went to help the others, even with his increase in power, it wouldn’t make a difference—other than the fact they’d all die together. This wasn’t something having a class or their level of strength could solve.

“Hiral, you’re not thinking of leaving them, are you?” Right asked.

“It’s not a fight we can win,” Hiral said slowly, eyes drifting back to the destroyed house.

“So, what? We give up and let them die?” Right asked.

“What? No,” Hiral said, the pieces of a plan finally clicking into place. “It’s not a fight we can win, so we need somebody else to fight in our place. At least long enough for us to get away.”

“He has a plan,” Left said.

“Somehow, I’m more concerned now than I was a few seconds ago,” Right mumbled.

“I do, and you should be,” Hiral answered.

He climbed over the rubble of the room and past the one wall still standing. There, on the other side, after tossing aside a bit of fallen wood from the ceiling, he found the stairs leading down into the basement.

“You’re not thinking what I think you’re thinking,” Right said, but Hiral was already climbing down the stairs, an RHC coming out in his hand.

As soon as he got to the bottom of the steps, he took one look at the creepy totem, and then blasted it to smithereens with a bolt of impact. “You hear any angry roars?” Hiral called, climbing back up the stairs.

“Nothing but the rain,” Left said. “What did you expect?”

“Was hoping the other totem was already destroyed,” Hiral said. “I’ll have to go do it myself.”

Left was already shaking his head.

“If we can get the Prince to wake up, that’ll get the Enemy’s attention,” Hiral said. “Buy us the time we need to escape.”

“I agree,” Left said.

“Not sure I do,” Right interrupted. “Waking up the Prince—assuming it’s still even there after all this time—might just create an even bigger problem.”

“I don’t see any other good choices,” Hiral said. “We need to do something dramatic to get the attention off Seena and the others. This is it.”

“But you’re not going,” Left said. “Right and I are.”

“We are?” Right asked.

“Yes,” Left said, and looked at Hiral before he could object. “When the Prince wakes up…”

“…if…” Right interjected.

“…you don’t want to be anywhere close to that,” Left went on like Right hadn’t spoken. “If you’re over in the King’s court, or whatever it’s called, you’ll be too close. You might even lead the Prince right to the others. Right and I, we don’t need to run back.”

“You can just burn off your solar energy and you’ll be right back with me,” Hiral said, nodding. It would save the trip, and removed the risk of leading the Prince to the party. “Right, give me the pack.”

“Here,” Right said, handing over the pack full of crystal. The weight settled comfortably on Hiral’s shoulders just behind the Emperor’s Greatsword. “In the meantime, you go to the others and explain what’s happening. As soon as the Prince gets the Enemy’s attention, you make a run for the next dungeon. I suspect the border tower they’re hiding in is a remnant from when Lizardmen and Troblins fought for territory. The Troblin Throne can’t be too much further. And, if nothing else, at least you’ll have the forest to hide from the Enemy in.”

“Okay,” Hiral said, nodding. “And this tower, how far?”

“They were carrying an injured Cal, so they didn’t move as fast as normal. If you hurry, you should be able to get there in fifteen minutes, tops. As soon as you see the treeline, look to your right. There’ll be a stone tower there. Almost impossible to miss.”

“Any way I can get in without the Enemy spotting me?” Hiral asked.

Left just shrugged. “Before you go, leave us with less solar energy. Ten percent at most. I need to use the Wings of Anella to keep up with Right, but no more than that.”

“You sure it’s enough?” Hiral asked, and both doubles nodded. “Okay,” he said, absorbing and then resummoning them, his own solar energy up at around seventy percent. “Good luck, you two.”

“Don’t die,” Right said. “And watch out for exploding buildings.”

“I’ll do my best,” Hiral said, and then all three turned and dashed off.