Unchosen Champion-Chapter 337: Platinum Progress

A flurry of narrow beams lanced from beyond the heavens, piercing the target almost simultaneously with their appearance. It was as though the stars themselves were turning against the invader, sending a volley of thin astral blasts in defense of Earth.

Streaks of pure light traced their trajectories, forming a glowing cascade of hail as they crashed into the angular shell of the metallic Siege Boss. Each collision sounded like a needle-sized bullet smashing through an aluminum sheet. The resonant, thunk, thunk, thunk repeated until a final silver beam penetrated the hardened shell with a slightly different pitch, after rising from below instead of crashing down from above.

The boss hesitated, struggling to defend itself against the asymmetric attack. It had failed to reestablish its area control before the quick strikes bombarded it once again, and it seemed to grow frustrated as a result. Every time the boss attempted to establish its laser artillery swarm or fire the rotating energy cannon, the solidlights threatened to pierce its exposed weak points.

It was aware that its life was being chipped away and it was obviously weakening as the fight went on, struggling to repair faster than it was damaged. However, with desperation came volatility. The fight wouldn’t necessarily be won based on who had the initial advantage.

Platinum, as someone who could almost guarantee a first strike but didn’t necessarily have the firepower to win outright without coordinating a combination attack with Neon, knew that lesson well enough. Still, it was her job to establish herself as a threat in the eyes of the boss. She accomplished that goal by unhesitatingly going for the kill when the opportunity presented itself.

A second after the bombardment, she flung herself across the temple of the Primal Construct, pulling the anchor she had established from below. The lightblade that she wielded carved a straight tear through the side of its triangular face with a metal screech before her momentum carried her beyond the monster. The glowing weak point in its forehead was barely spared, but two others were still in the process of regenerating as her repeated assaults raked the oversized anti-personnel boss with recurring powerful volleys.

Another moment passed while Platinum flew through the air, wind whipping through her silvery ponytail, with her eyes protected by a glowing visor. A streak of white light lingered in her wake, blurred by the speed she had reached after yanking herself across the pyramidal head of the gigantic boss. She drastically increased the distance between herself and the enemy as she executed the second half of her hit and run strategy.

She contorted her body while flying through the air, fearless toward the potential fall, twisting so that should face the back of the boss and aim another solidlight anchor, just in case she had to make another pass before her allies were ready to follow up. She turned just in time to witness the mechanical manifestation turn toward her, struggling to match her speed with its torso so that it could aim a deadly blast in her general direction, determined as it was to stop her strafing assaults. But that was the point. Her distraction had to be threatening in order to truly grab its attention. If given enough time, she might have been able to defeat the boss on her own if her stock of solidlights held up, but in this case, she wasn’t by herself.

“Tumatauenga!” She heard the roar over the gusts of wind as cataclysmic clouds billowed across the sky. “Witness our strength!”

The battlefield shook in response, sending another upheaval of mana through the turbulent clouds that had collected overhead. Platinum let herself be carried by her momentum, abandoning the idea of making another pass and opting to leave the battlefield behind. The further away from the boss the better.

Instead of returning, she flew near the edge of the Appalachian forest, planning on circling back along the beach on the landward side once the coast was clear. Behind her, a vortex of fiery orange reached from the sky, hinting toward a transcendent form. Spiritual energy twisted and churned within the clouds above, having been gathering in anticipation of this moment.

The energy rapidly coalesced with Sila Tupua’s roaring invocation, apparition looming behind him. The fiery orange mana that had spread high into the air cracked as it formed a colossal fist, gripping a massive ghostly wahaika. As the raw energy fused, it was already in motion, dragging the traditional maori club crashing straight toward the Siege Boss from directly above.

The avatar of war plummeted through the atmosphere, the broad edge of its weapon catching fire as it went, and the actual scale of the attack became obvious. A Siege Boss was already an enormous monstrosity of alien metal, like fighting a robot the size of a skyscraper. The manifestation of violence that threatened to crush it was at least ten times the size.

The Siege Boss sensed the danger, turning and leaning backwards to spot the attack. It had reacted promptly enough to raise both arms in an effort to protect its core, but the manifestation of spirit energy was a portent of impending doom, channeling the raw fury of ancient battles into a single mighty blow. It plummeted into the monstrous Primal Construct and smashed into the dark sand with earth-shattering force. The flash of light that sparked between the two forces was blinding, washing out the landscape for a brief moment before the sound reached her ears.

With a massive ‘boom,’ a shockwave radiated out from both sides of the spiritual weapon, tossing dark sand and soil in tidal waves as a gargantuan scar formed in the beach and the club dissipated. Dust joined the clouds that had drawn landward, thickening the atmosphere such that Platinum’s visibility was greatly reduced at the distance that she had built, even after the sand returned to the ground. She squinted back into the battlefield, trying her best to assess the damage.

The Prime Construct was like a grand shadow within the chaos. Its silhouette had fallen to one knee, both arms terminated above the elbow. As the dust settled and her eyes readjusted, she could see that its outer shell was scuffed and warped. Though it had survived the grand assault, it hadn’t gone unscathed, losing another half of its remaining weak points in the process. Each shattered core leaked thick streams of reddish mana while the turbulent clouds of dust and smoke started to disperse, allowing more color to return to the otherwise black and white scene.

The Siege Boss attempted to rise from the center of the perfect imprint of the club, finding itself in the middle of a divot that was nearly a football field long. That it could still move proved its unbelievable durability.

As far as Platinum had seen, the Prime Construct Siege Bosses were the epitome of invader manifestations. That humans had already gathered the strength to stand against them was a testament to their own competence with mana. If what the representatives of Ghost Reef shared was true, such pinnacle bosses were meant to only appear much later in an assimilation, and yet even a small group of humans could match its unreasonable power.

Water from the Mississippi Sea flooded the indentation in the ground, wetting the spiked feet of the construct with whitewater foam as it teetered back to an upright position. The Siege Boss had taken a devastating blow, but it wasn’t ready to surrender its life, and it proved it by turning toward the culprit of the grand attack, laser cannon already spinning to life, glowing with increasing heat and energy.

“Fire in the hole!” A muffled warning rang out in response, seeming to be muted after the shockwave of rumbling sound from the spiritual weapon slamming through the atmosphere and into the earth.

“Oh!” Platinum’s eyes widened as she quickly tried to find the exact source, hoping to make sure she was out of the way.

A blast of energy scorched a straight line through the smoke clouds and haze, burning as bright as the sun for a brief moment before fading. Mateo’s lasers carved a perfectly round wound straight through the center of the Prime Construct, then continued over the sails of all the ghost ships further off the shore and beyond Platinum’s sight. It burned everything in its way.

Thankfully, Platinum was far from the trajectory, having moved more north from the boss when the laser attack had come from the east, but she wondered what the heck was the point of a warning if the attack left no room to react. While the thought crossed her mind, the boss wobbled. It still wasn’t completely dead, but Imara had already moved to finish it off.

She blasted herself off the ground with a powerful gust of wind at the same time as Mateo fired his laser, her arms lit with fire and lightning as she emerged from the plume of sand kicked up by her propulsion. The combination of elemental fists exploded the last of the weak points with a series of pummeling attacks bolstered by blasts of air that allowed the Aeromancer to navigate the battlefield in short bursts of quick speed.

While Imara had the firepower that Platinum lacked, she was far more vulnerable. Platinum’s skills gave her more dynamic abilities, allowing her to defend and attack simultaneously. Imara was pure offense with the mobility to keep her in melee range. It wasn’t necessarily a tradeoff Platinum would willingly make, but she saw the benefits pretty clearly. It made her want more levels in order to overcome the perceived deficiency of her skills.

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By the time she made it back down to the beach and started walking instead of using up more of her regenerating solidlights, the level 250 Siege Boss was almost completely dissipated and they had all received their allotment of experience. She scoffed at the two levels she had gained, a bit disappointed by the haul. Two extra wouldn’t even be enough to catch first place, but it did give her a choice of skills.

She barely took a second to decide what to do with her choice, adding another rank to her solidlight production whenever the option became available. The only thing that would have been better would be another upgrade to her primary shaping ability since each one multiplied the overall effectiveness of her constructs, but those only seemed to appear when she ran down the larger selections. She checked her status to see the changes.

[Status]

HP - 4120 (3980)

Solidlight - 116/200

Class - Lightshaper (Level 350)

Profession - Basic Smith (Unspecialized) (Level 110)

Affinity - Auralight

Race - Human (Rank 1)

Faction - The Lighthouse

Strength - 332

Agility - 1033

Body - 412

Mind - 398

Intelligence - 256

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Acumen - 244

Unallocated - 25

Titles - Slayer IV, Dauntless V, Defiant III, Luminary

Skills (Active) - Astral Detection, Arcane Mark, Sonorous Silence, Solidlight Shaping+++

Skills (Passive) - Common Language, Solidlight Production (Rank 10)

Quests - Defeat Ancient Drones III (112/250), Defeat Ruin Scuttlers IV (52/5000), Defeat Ancient Serpents III (17/250), Defeat Ancient Sparkers IV (267/5000), Defeat Primal Defenders IV (176/5000), Defeat Ancient Chargers IV (22/5000), Defeat Ruin Golens IV (802/5000), Defeat Primal Golems IV (2287/5000), Forge Journeyman Specialty Astral Equipment (0/10), Apprentice Crafts (2/100)

Basic Credits - 55,850

It all looked pretty much the same to her, though her solidlights hadn’t been as squeezed as she had expected. She figured she’d put her points in later as she rejoined the group.

“Nice job Platinum! Nice job!” General McCallister proclaimed, congratulating her on completing the most critical role of their strategy as he and Neon disembarked from one of the larger cannon-laden ships that had been waiting to join the fight. “Next time we find one of those bastards we should have you take it on by yourself!”

“Let’s not go too far.” Neon suggested, ready to point out what he and Platinum both knew. Their combination attacks would have really improved her firepower and allowed her to spend less time chipping away at the Siege Boss. Fighting one solo would be too much of a risk. Even this one had taken 15 people actively participating.

“They all deserve recognition! You made taking that monster down look at least as easy as Ghost Reef’s entire army.” McCallister continued, genuinely proud of the warriors that had taken on the Fallen Zone. Every one of his predictions toward their progress had been dramatically exceeded. Of course, what he wasn’t acknowledging was that Coop had set them up to succeed, taking care of the greatest dangers and throwing the hardened alien stronghold into chaos. Even the average level of the monsters had diminished by hundreds compared to what they had expected thanks to his efforts.

Safiri laughed at the comparison between them and Ghost Reef while Platinum shook her head modestly. “You only saw them take out Siege Bosses without their Champion, military man. I doubt they were anywhere close to as impressive.” The bare knuckle boxer observed. “No offense.” Safiri quickly added toward the party representing Ghost Reef, but Shane Peters just shrugged, taking a page from the subject of his point. Basically everyone they had met from Ghost Reef was abnormally modest given the lead they had over the rest of the world. Platinum thought it was probably something in their water.

“During the Underlayer Event he was destroying those things in a matter of seconds, with no one else helping.” Neon had to agree, having witnessed Coop clear out almost all of the Siege Bosses that threatened their territory.

In fact, when they discovered the Siege Boss attempting to halt the massive loss of territory in the Fallen Zone, the plan they formed was based entirely on how they imagined Coop would have engaged. Though they had split up the responsibilities, it was more or less the same, with Platinum representing the spear and Sila Tupua providing the critical blow.

“I also did not see him fight.” Sila admitted a bit solemnly as he gently massaged the palm of his hand, as if it had been burned with excessive power. “But he must have been significantly more powerful than I am today, to crush them so thoroughly. I will not be able to make another attempt for at least a full day and it was inadequate to begin with.”

“What’s up with that, big man?” Mateo butted in. “All that drama with the spirits and whatnot and I thought that tin can would be crushed. Maybe you need to concentrate the power more?” He suggested.

Sila shook his head. “It is a simple multiplication of my stats. That was my limit. A coordinated effort could bolster the attack further, but as I understand it, Champion Coop relies entirely on his own strength.”

“Is it true that he defeated the first Siege Boss almost six months ago?” Imara asked while Shane and his party could provide clarification.

Shane answered while the others nodded, all having witnessed it at the time. “Yes. After fighting 9 waves of frenzied Primal Constructs and a wave of the Elites we didn’t see again until the Underlayer. Then he defeated the first Icon of Mana and tried to knock the Avatar of the System down with one punch right after.”

The various people in the conversation all reacted with different levels of awe or incredulity. It was like hearing about the feats of Hercules or some other demigod. Frankly, it was unrealistic to anyone that hadn’t already seen Coop fight.

Safiri laughed again. “And we actually thought that monster of a man was dead?”

His comment earned a few chuckles, but it also made them all wonder how he had done it. Platinum was hundreds of levels more advanced than he had been at the time, but if someone made her fight for weeks straight then slammed her with a series of bosses, she would have no chance.

“Check out the leaderboards.” Mateo suddenly suggested. “Bottom 20.” He added.

Platinum checked, as much to see her own place as to see what he was pointing out.

Day 200

Charlie Seraphin (Level 357) Platinum (Level 350) Camila Alvarez (Level 349) Sila Tupua (Level 339) Imara (Level 336) Tzultacaj (Level 328) Sefu (Level 327) Layla Itunu (Level 326) Bao Nguyen (Level 326) Arthur Anonymous (Level 325)…

“How the hell?”

“There’s no way, right?”

Platinum looked at Neon, as if he could explain how someone could possibly level like that. He just put his arms out in an expression of bewilderment. It was like realizing they had been walking down train tracks, thinking they would make it to the end, but the train was already coming.

Imara grunted. “Even the others from Ghost Reef have more or less kept up with us during these battles.” She pointed out. “I would like to know what Charlie Seraphin and Camila Alvarez are doing.”

“Grinding monsters, just like us.” Shane answered on their behalf. “There is also a mana well that provides some Elite hunting grounds.”

“How about when we’re all done, we head to Ghost Reef and see what they’re doing down there?” Neon eventually suggested. “It shouldn’t be a problem since we’re all joining the Lighthouse, right?”

“Of course.” Shane confirmed.

“Sounds good to me.” Platinum approved, noting that most of the others were nodding at the suggestion.

“I suppose officially aligning with the Lighthouse is better than an informal agreement.” McCallister conceded, having always intended to get the ball rolling on a human alliance himself.

The grand summit had been his opportunity to invite people into his sphere of protection but it had only resulted in his own invitation to be supported. Platinum thought it was funny how things worked out.