Chapter 90: 90: Emptying Fort Cobalt

Give me the text for Eye of the Tiger again, Calvin thought as he headed for the

Sure, Elliot said, bringing it up.

Eye of the tiger: Enter flow state at will. Meditation Correction applies to combat and learning effectiveness. The inverse of a barbarian rage. May make the user overtired with extended use.

…just gonna point out the obvious here. Why didn’t I use that during the fight?

Because we didn’t think of it?

Calvin had put the ability in the ‘training’ box in his mind and hadn’t paid much attention afterward. Probably wouldn’t have gotten any freaking damage at all.

Calvin came up to the trap door, a gigantic stone plate looming over his head with a wheel beside it. Calvin wasn’t ‘seeing’ anything per se. he was using the senses of a tunneling manster to feel the position of everything on his skin. It would work a lot better if he didn’t wear any clothes, but that was a gulf he wasn’t willing to jump yet.

You ever wonder how a three hundred and twenty-four pound wasp with eighteen times it’s normal physical abilities would stack up against an army? Calvin thought as he began spinning the wheel.

All the time, man.

Calvin hadn’t tried Atom Ant against living targets yet, and the mass he was capable of producing with a single Bent was staggering. If the creature’s abilities were truly multiplied by eighteen, it should take a Legend to kill.

Not really cost effective in terms of kills, though. A swarm could kill hundreds or thousands at once, while a giant wasp could kill one or two. Plus the field was going to be rife with Warp, making Bad Penny come into play with the swarm.

I’m sure there’s a happy medium in there somewhere.

The stone plate moved silently on Knick-Knack crafted bearings, separating from the wall and ever so slowly opening, letting in the light of the fort.

Once there was enough room, Calvin crawled through, then gave Grant a thumb’s up.

The older man shook his head silently and began turning the wheel. The entire floor shifted as it resealed itself up against the wall.

Calvin reoriented on the hall leading to the courtyard, dropped low and began to creep silently forward.

Eye of the tiger.

The world came into sharp focus. The pain in his neck from stooping through narrow tunnels all day faded away, and the only thing he could think about was the task at hand.

“…is guar shit.” Calvin heard someone speak as he got to the edge of the next room. “We already looked over everything a dozen times. At this point I hope we find something so we can stop staring at the same twenty rooms, over and over.”

“You’d prefer we find a secret cache of devil powder and what, blow ourselves up?” another voice scoffed.

Calvin fished the mirror out of his belt an took a peek around the corner.

There were two men knocking on the walls and moving furniture around. Too tired, bored, and wrapped up in their monotonous task to notice the tiny mirror in the corner of the room.

They seem average.

That they do.

Calvin pocketed the mirror and stepped out into the room.

The one on the left, a little shorter than the other and facing the right way to notice him, froze in the middle of looking under the chair for the hundredth time.

“Where did you come from?”

The second Uleisan started, turning around to look at Calvin, eyes widening.

“Hold it right there,” he said, scrambling to unsheathe his sword before leveling it at Calvin. “Are you one of the Gadverans?”

Gadverans and Uleisans didn’t look particularly different. It was that accent that really allowed people to tell them apart.

“Do I sound like one of those cock-rots?” Calvin asked, waving his empty hand dismissively as he made it seem like he was going to walk past him.

“Oh, um. I guess.”

Calvin swerved at the last second and buried a knife in the man’s skull.

His partner took an enthusiastic swing at Calvin, over-extending his arm when Calvin dodged. He caught the back of the soldier’s elbow, violently folded the man’s arm the rest of the way over his body.

The man’s other arm tried to scratch at him ineffectually, hampered by his own arm as Calvin stuck the blade in one side of the man’s stomach and drew it up diagonally until he popped through a couple ribs.

The soldier let out a shuddering gasp, falling to the ground, his sword clattering to the ground as his hand busily tried to hold himself together.

He looked up, eyes watering.

“Wait-“

Calvin put him out of his misery.

That was a little short, Calvin thought as the corpse  slumped to the ground.

Sticky red blood pooled around his palm where the knife withdrew into his skin.

Calvin wiped the blood onto the man’s clothes, and headed for the outside.

He checked around the corner, then glanced up at the towers above.

Kala’s in that one there. If I get to her, she can help me overwhelm the rest of the men keeping the company under guard.

There were two full squads of soldiers watching Calvin’s unarmed men. The guards seemed to be as bored as their prisoners, playing cards as they whiled away the night.

Come to think of it, Calvin was fairly sure he could disable all of them with a single Bent, if he had to.

…Including the guys behind me.

Maybe Calvin would feel less inclined to murder people if he had more Bent.

Or if them testifying against you wouldn’t get everyone you know killed.

Fair point. Let’s just kill them, then.

It made Calvin feel a little bad, but watching Baroke or Kala get strung up outside the city of Uleis for something he’d done would feel worse.

There were a dozen or so men on the wall, and probably more cycling around from room to room

What’s the most effective way to get rid of them so none of the others notice?

Ooh, it’s like a stealth shooter. Here’s an idea-

Mass Shaping

15/16 Bent remaining.

Calvin put his thumb on the Web Component and created a thick cocoon of pressurized web proteins around the face of every man within sight, and similarly gummed up every alarm bell in the fort.

The webs appeared around their targets and immediately expanded outward, in a kind of wispy foam, equalizing with the atmosphere’s pressure.

There were faint groans and clatters as people fell out of seats and kicked furniture as they struggled to remove the web from their face and breathe. Their hands invariably stuck to the web, making them unable to do anything but wiggle on the ground with muffled cries.

How can I prevent someone from doing that to me?

Bleach dissolved spider webs. That base you got from Borus could probably make a breathing-hole.

Without burning my face off?

Pretty sure when Beli Ma becomes an aura it can disrupt spells in your vicinity. Hence why Kala gave it to you. Better than Dodge, in the long run.

I probably should keep practicing it, then, Calvin thought as he watched the men in the courtyard and on the walls slowly suffocate to death.

Probably. Oops, we got a runner!

Calvin spotted a man running across the wall, straight out of his blind spot behind one of the towers, aiming for the alarm bell.

Calvin pushed himself forward and broke into a full sprint, taking five ground-eating lunges before he leapt onto a steel cage and propelled himself halfway up the wall of the stone castle.

He dug his fingers into a tiny crevice in the heavy stonework, and drew himself up with every ounce of effort he could bring to bear.

Calvin flew the rest of the way up, grabbed the edge of the wall, taking a swipe at the fleeing soldier.

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the man let out a panicked squawk and swerved around him, avoiding the knife, but not the inches of invisible extra blade, suffering a cut along the side of his chest.

The soldier kept running and seized the alarm bell like a lifeline and tugged with everything he had. The mechanism refused to move, as it was full of rapidly hardening webs.

Calvin walked up behind the man desperately trying to ring the bell and put his dagger through his upper vertebra, causing him to fall to the ground like a ragdoll.

This is actually pretty easy.

A flicker of movement in the corner of his eye was all the warning he got. Calvin flinched back and raised his knife defensively.

He felt an impact against the blade that strained his wrist, and an instant later, he felt a searing heat on his face. Calvin blinked and noticed a red-hot section of glass wrapped around the invisible portion of his knife.

Where the hell did this come from?

You just HAD to think it, didn’t you? You just HAD to think to yourself ‘Man, this is easy’. What a freakin’ idio-

The enemy didn’t bother with words, simply moving on to the next attack. He tugged hard on the blade with the intention of forcing Calvin to drop a weapon or lose his balance.

Instead Calvin lunged forward. Closing the distance was the best way to deal with a whip-user, anyway.

He felt the man’s gaze land on his legs with a flash of amusement, which was all the warning he got before the whip writhed like a living thing and a red-hot segment of it rocketed towards his legs.

Between that and feeling it approach on his skin, Calvin was able to narrowly hop over the whip, which left him hurtling through space, with his feet off the ground, straight toward someone bigger and stronger than him.

Godsdamnit.

The man held out a hand almost lazily, intent on arresting Calvin’s charge in midair and probably breaking some ribs.

Let’s see how he likes this.

Calvin’s second knife jutted out of his chest, and sank a fraction of an inch into the man’s palm before he reversed course in a flurry of motion, withdrawing a hand and aiming a blow at the side of Calvin’s head.

Calvin threw up his arms before the overwhelming force of the man’s strike sent him tumbling to the ground.

Gods I hope my arms aren’t broken, Calvin idly thought as he desperately tried not to land on the scorching hot whip.

You need some help, buddy?

This feels familiar. Getting tossed around like a rag doll was an experience unique to fighting Karen…or those like her.

Oh hey, it’s Ussein, the guy who tried to blackmail us. I’m starting to think think the guy’s a Legend.

I think you’re right. Also, whip.

Calvin rolled to the side as the whip slammed into the stone wall with a heavy smack, then hopped over it as it tried to take his legs off again.

He was in the man’s range again and his arms…

They’ll be sore tomorrow, Calvin thought, struggling to make a fist.

Bent?

Bent. No sense holding back when your life is on the line.

Calvinian Summoning.

14/16 Bent Remaining.

Six dog-sized wasps with Atom Ant maxed manifested out of the green mist that Exploded from Calvin’s Palms.

Why not a swarm?

I wanted blockers, Calvin thought.

While a swarm might kill the other guy, they couldn’t actually stop a determined Legend from cutting him in half before they succumbed to the poison. Another Shadowboxing lesson learned with Karen.

That skill really pays dividends.

No doubt, Calvin thought as four of the wasps harassed the man, forcing him bodily away from Calvin with limb-shearing mandibles and dagger-sized stingers that could punch through steel.

They moved incredibly fast, the timing between snapping of mandibles and the heavy pounding of red-hot glass against carapace approaching the rate of a manic drummer on speed.

Calvin kept the other two wasps close by in case the man tried something.

One of the wasps got wrapped up in the red-hot glass, slowly sizzling under the heat, but not quite catching fire due to its unnaturally high Endurance. The other three forced him further and further away from Calvin.

“Gods damn it.” The Whip wielding legend was forced to let go of the one wrapped in glass or lose his whip. With a flick of his wrist, the whip writhed like a living thing, letting go of the wasp as he lunged out of the way of the rest of Calvin’s summons.

Ussein’s whip flew back to him at a speed that seemed like it would cause the man physical damage, but the whip once again shifted Itself seemingly following the man’s will as it wrapped around him.

Is he giving up? Calvin thought, mentally giving the order to slow their attacks.

He’s not giving up, that’s a transformation move. He’s going all power rangers on you!

What?

Then Calvin saw the red-hot glass spread away from the black core of the whip, covering the entire man with a thin layer of glass. Somehow without damaging the man’s clothes.

What in the Abyss am I looking at?

He’s getting serious and boosting his defense. Heeey, congrats, you can make a Legend get serious. Whosagoodboy!?

Well I don’t have to wait for him to finish, Calvin thought, directing his wasps to kill the man.

With a kick that fractured the stone he was on, Ussein leapt up to the top of the tower, buying himself the extra time he needed as the wasps hummed through the air to catch up.

I need to consider a stealth ability for the wasps

The black core of the whip ripped through the thin glass coating around his waist and straightened, folding in half to create a spear formed out of some kind of black metal.

Great, now he’s got armor, Calvin thought with frustration.

Ussein pushed off the side of the tower where Kala was held captive with a thud, hurtling down at Calvin like a falling star.

One of Calvin’s wasps tried to get in the way, but its stinger and mandibles slipped off the smooth glass coating he wore.

This sucks, Calvin thought, tumbling out of the way as the spear buried itself in the wall.

Without missing a beat, rather than pull it out, the man twisted the spear like it was made of paper and aimed the butt end at Calvin’s chest. The butt shimmered in midflight to form a wickedly sharp point.

Calvin directed one of his summons to get between them, and the wasp’s natural armor almost stopped the strike.

A fraction of a second later, an ichor covered spear exploded out the back of the insect and shot towards Calvin’s chest.

He managed to get the invisible extensions of both his daggers in front of the spearhead covered with rapidly dissolving Wasp gunk.

Calvin was forced back, and his head began to ache as the tightly controlled Bent in the blades was slowly severed.

Not good. Maybe I can distract him for a second with Mesmerizing eyes, then…

More wasps?

More wasps. I can’t exactly leave anyone who’s seen them alive, can I?

Calvin had more tricks in his arsenal, but so many of them made loud noise when he used them. That left poison, webs, acid, miasma, to name a few.

I’ll bet that bastard still needs to breathe.

As the two combatants faced each other down, Calvin formulated a plan to exploit the weaknesses of the human body.

“Calvin! Ussein!” A harsh whisper sounded from Kala’s prison tower.

They glanced up and spotted Kala in a sheer nightgown, leaning out of the window.

“Cut that out, you two, I’m trying to sleep!” she whispered at them before shutting the wooden slats again.

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