Die. Respawn. Repeat.

Chapter 156: Book 3: Patterns of Observation

There's something that begins to bother me as we fight the Seedmother. It's not our lack of progress—though we're learning enough about its patterns that I'm beginning to suspect that its tenacity is going to be a problem. It's something about the skills, about the way that circuitry rearranges itself on its shell.

It's not that there's anything wrong with them, it's just...

It feels like there's a pattern to them. A pattern I don't entirely understand yet. It's like an itch in my brain, and I find myself spending more and more time just staring at the Seedmother's carapace. I shouldn't, given we're in the middle of a battle, but I can't help trying to figure out exactly what's bothering me.

Part of me wonders if it's the structure of the skills—if a part of my brain is trying to figure out a way to copy them from the Seedmother—but I'm pretty sure that isn't it. I've already tried, and the complexity of these circuits isn't something I can mimic through Firmament Control alone. More than that, the skills in my core are fundamentally different; they're three-dimensional constructs, not two, and the way they take in and convert Firmament isn't compatible with whatever the Seedmother is doing.

It's not the structure, then. It's not the color of the Firmament it's using, either; there's no pattern to that I can identify. I'm pretty sure it's just drawing on whatever Firmament's immediately available through the network of vines and roots embedded throughout the City. It's not the amount of Firmament it's using, not the way it cycles or changes skills, nor anything to do with how each skill manifests.

I narrow my eyes as the Seedmother charges toward Ahkelios. A new circuit flashes into existence, just for a moment—bright red in color, triangular in shape, and although there's no apparent effect, the strength with which it swings its legs toward Ahkelios is suddenly amplified tenfold.

What was that? A Strength skill?

It's been using these the whole time, I realize. There's an entire other category of skills it's able to use that isn't quite as flashy as the ones that create Firmament constructs or directly manipulate its environment—it's why it's so much stronger and faster than I'd expect a monster of this size to be.

That's what I've been noticing, then. The inconsistencies in its strength and durability and reflexes. It's using skills from all categories, not just Firmament skills. That revelation tugs at something in the back of my mind, but it's hard to focus on that in the middle of the fight; as if on cue, the Seedmother chooses this moment to turn its attention to me, and I'm forced to call up Distorted Crux to dodge the spears it suddenly rains down around me.

This thing is pissing me off. It's not just the way it throws skills at us like it's nothing—the fact that it's apparently fuelled by the entire city's store of Firmament is patently unfair—it's the way it keeps running away whenever we manage to deal any significant amount of damage to it. That concrete-melting skill that lets it merge into the ground, whatever Durability skills it's using to heal itself... It makes fighting the Seedmother an endless battle of attrition, and considering it has an entire city as a battery, that's a battle we're going to lose.

We need a new strategy.

"Guard!" I call. He's struggling with a half-dozen vines, each trying to tangle him up and get into his systems; when he hears my call, he spins, a quick blast of Firmament tearing them to pieces. He's by my side in an instant, his core briefly sputtering from the exertion.

"We will not win like this." He says the words like nothing's wrong. I eye Guard for a moment.

"No, we won't," I agree. The Seedmother is retreating for the moment—Ahkelios manages to fly a circle around it, forcing it to stab itself with a few of its own spears before it forcibly dispels the skill. "I have a plan."

"What do you need me to do?" Guard's response is immediate.

"We're going on the attack," I say. "We're pacing ourselves too much. I need us to hit it as many times as possible, as hard as possible."

There's a flicker of hesitation. "Will that be enough?"

"Only one way to find out," I say.

If we hit it hard enough—fast enough—there's a chance we can overwhelm its regeneration.

But I doubt it. That's not my plan.

First: force the Seedmother to play defense. I watch with Firmament Sight activated as it desperately cycles skills to dodge Ahkelios's and Guard's relentless attacks; Ahkelios has left the Seed behind on a nearby rooftop. I'm keeping an eye on it, but we can't waste energy protecting it if this strategy is going to work.

Second: I need a boost. Inspired Evolution: Knight.

I don't need the Knight's full power at the moment, but it'll be easier to fight with it than without. My Firmament usage is a lot more efficient when I'm merged with the Knight, I realize, even if the Inspiration itself consumes a massive chunk and strains my systems to the point where repeating it is difficult.

It's here that I encounter the first significant change as a result of acquiring Adamant Bones. The Knight transformation hurts.

Much, much more. And it already hurt before.

I have to grit my teeth and hold back a shout—my bones are everting themselves, inside to outside, forming the plating of the Knight's armor. It makes sense that the transformation would be different. The fact that the new bones are virtually indestructible means repurposing them for my armor is the best possible thing to do.

But fucking ow. This new variation of the transformation better give me some Durability credits. I grit my teeth so hard I'm pretty sure I taste blood in the moments before the transformation completes and I no longer have a mouth to taste with.

It's more reflex than anything else that makes me reach out to the Knight. "Was that necessary?"

"Yes." The Knight replies. The fact that it responds at all surprises me—it's given me the impression that it doesn't like talking. "You have a plan."

"I do." It shares a mind with me, so I don't have to explain any of it.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

"I will help." I feel the Knight's determination. It surprises me—so far, its attitude has been obstinate at best, and our tentative truce has never been anything more than that: both tentative, and a truth. It wants more, I know that much, but it hasn't been able to let itself trust me just yet.

Except now, something seems to have changed. I'm not sure what, or why, or if this has something to do with how I've been fighting. It's like the Knight has decided that I'm worthy. Or that I'll keep my promise to it, that I won't abandon it and end our partnership.

"You know what to do?" I ask. No point questioning this now.

I get the impression that the Knight smiles savagely in return, though there's no physical expression it can make. "I must fight."

Well, it's not wrong.

We... split, for lack of a better term. Once more, I allow the Knight to take control of our shared body so it can focus its efforts on fighting and doing as much damage to the Seedmother as it can; in the meantime, I withdraw deeper into my core, working on replenishing our Firmament stock and making sure I have enough for what I have planned.

The process of actively converting environmental Firmament into a usable form is different from anything I've done before. Gheraa's talked about this being possible—about the fact that a skill construct can be converted into something that takes in Firmament and refines and purifies it—but after what happened during my last phase shift, I don't want to sacrifice my skills like that. They're worth more than this.

But he gave me a gift. That vestige of Gheraa turned himself into something I can use for exactly this purpose. So that's what I do—I reach out with Firmament Control, pulling on the environmental Firmament around me and carefully feeding it into the golden construct within my soul.

It actually looks and feels a lot like a spinning wheel. Its internal mechanisms are far more complicated than that, of course, but the basic process of using it?

I compress ambient Firmament into a thread. I feed it slowly into the construct, massaging it so it changes from one form of Firmament into another. Then I allow the newly purified Firmament to diffuse into my soul, empowering me.

There's a sense of warmth in me as I do this. The aches and pains from the ongoing fight fade away; even the pain of the recent transformation fades from memory. I don't let that distract me.

This is an opportunity.

The Knight is handling the complexities of the battle—dodging, attacking, and retreating every time the Seedmother tries to counter. Every hit it manages to land cracks the carapace apart and leaves a bleeding crater of shattered shell and flesh behind.

That creates weak points in its shell. He-Who-Guards takes full advantage of it, blasting the wounds with lances of burning Firmament that sears deep into its body. It roars in pain.

Ahkelios can't do quite as much physical damage as the other two, but he doesn't have to. He's incredibly mobile. Every time the Seedmother tries to target him, he swoops around, forcing it to abort its attack lest it accidentally hit itself again; if it doesn't target him, he harasses it by turning into a bright spark of Firmament flying repeatedly into its eyes. It doesn't even have the chance to try to target the Seed.

Me? I observe. I examine. I look at every skill the Seedmother tries to use to save itself—and I'm right. Strength, Durability, Reflex, Speed, Firmament... It has the full set of skills, and the simplified, two-dimensional nature of its skill circuits reveal something to me that's much harder to observe within my own skill constructs.

There's a pattern. The Strength skills it uses all look similar to one another in overall shape, though not in the details; they're triangular circuits, originating at a point and spreading out. Durability looks like ripples in a pond. Reflex looks like the branches of a tree. Speed looks like the spokes of a wheel.

The only exception is Firmament. There's no rhyme or reason in those skills. But it doesn't matter: I've learned what I needed to learn.

The Seedmother doesn't allow us to harrass it like this for long, of course. It interrupts by study with a roar of pain and anger, then activates that concrete-melting skill; it takes a little longer this time, its shell so damaged it needs an extra few seconds to create a working circuit, but it still escapes before we can kill it.

That's fine. It's expected. "Keep going," I say, speaking through the Knight; the metallic distortion sounds so different I almost don't recognize my own voice. Ahkelios and Guard glance at each other.

"Are you sure?" Ahkelios asks. "If we fight like this, we're going to run out of Firmament."

"I'm sure." I feel Firmament churning within me, eager to be used. I think I've actually managed to gather it faster than the Knight is expending it—which is good, because we're going to be using a lot of Firmament.

The Seedmother re-emerges. Predictably, it goes for the Seed, still sitting on its rooftop—but the Knight and I are there in an instant, our intents merging into one. The entire minute Seedmother has been healing, we've been building up a blow with Concentrated Power.

The moment the Seedmother begins to re-emerge, we strike, an Amplified Gauntlet warping our armor into a purified weapon and nearly doubling the force of the blow. It's strong enough that I have to rapidly construct several Crystallized Barriers just to protect the Seed from the shockwave, and the massive Seedmother is sent physically flying. Half its face is shattered.

It won't be trying that again.

Guard and Ahkelios go back to hitting it with everything they have. With the Seedmother on the back foot, it's easier to get past the cracks in its shell. Meanwhile, the Knight allows me control, and I begin using a skill I haven't used in a while.

Timestrike.

The skill that lets me land a hit at some point in the future. I fill a roughly Seedmother-sized section of the air with them, allowing the time setting of the skill to fluctuate mostly at random; I don't need to hit it at a specific time. Not for what I'm planning.

I keep harassing the Seedmother while I do this, of course. A blow to its shell every so often to keep it on its toes, to give Guard and Ahkelios the space to keep hurting it. To force it to use more skills and observe the shape of each of them. I'm not sure what to conclude yet, but my gut tells me it's important.

The Seedmother retreats again, as expected. Guard and Ahkelios look at each other—they're both starting to look exhausted. The pace of the fight is wearing on them. But we have a minute to recover, and this will be the last time.

I'm really hoping this works.

"One more. Bring it to that corner. Guard, I need you to chain it down if you can."

I take the lead. The Seedmother is far more cautious as it re-emerges this time, a Speed skill prepared on its back so it can dodge my first blow; clearly, it's smart enough to learn. The teleportation skill it uses takes it away from me...

...directly toward the area I've filled with Timestrikes.

"Got you," I mutter. The Knight grins savagely within me; Ahkelios and Guard aren't sure what I'm talking about, but they follow the plan, harassing it with attacks, corralling it fully into that pre-prepared corner. Guard flares with power, drawing out the chains I've seen him fight with, and I watch as they expand in size.

One leg. Two. Three. Ahkelios keeps it distracted until all six legs are chained down and Guard's panting from the exertion in an oddly human way, his core flickering between bright and dark.

I'm going to need to talk to him about that. Before I can complete that thought, though, a Premonition strikes. I see the Seedmother's shell glowing, see the entire thing shine, feel a powerful sense of danger, and realize—

"It's got a second phase!" I swear under my breath, wrapping Distorted Crux around myself and pushing forward with everything the Knight has. I'm not doing this fight again—bad enough doing it once, and I don't think Guard is going to be able to repeat this without a loop or two to recover.

I only need one blow to make this work. I just need to hit it once.

The Seedmother's shell reaches a peak of brightness, nearly blinding—

—and my fist meets its face.

Causal Shattering.

Time to see if my plan will work.