Fates of Grenora: Return of the Night

Aldrin skimmed through the rewards as they approached the very, very outskirts of the Jade Carver Village. They hid themselves in the brush to observe them and come up with a plan. A plan that Aldrin had the beginnings of and it would depend on everybody's strengths, but first he would distribute his points.

After exchanging his points for those three Skills, he dumped the remaining 6 SP into his Strength, bringing it from 41 to 47.

"Evie," Aldrin whispered, moving to crouch beside her. "How big can you make the lightning net from your runestones?" he asked.

Evie furrowed her brows first, then a wide, sly grin split across her face. "Big enough," she answered.

Aldrin matched her grin, then beckoned Pierre over. Jared stared between the two, wanting to ask but stayed quiet and kept watch on the village. When Pierre came over, Evie handed him a large, smoothened oval-shaped white runestone that crackled with light blue streaks of energy beneath its surface.

"How many of those do you have?" Aldrin asked, entranced by the dancing and flickering lightning strikes within the runestone.

Evie rummaged through her satchel that sat on her right hip, then pulled out smaller versions of the lightning net runestones. "Will this be enough plus that?" She pointed between the two different sized runestones. "These are all the net-based runestones I have until I can make more."

Aldrin looked between the smaller ones and the big one Pierre held. "No. Keep the small ones actually in case of an emergency," he said.

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Evie looked at Pierre, "Take the runestone and put it in the most centered building you can find that has a clear view from here to there," she told him, who simply nodded and vanished into Stealth. "Jared, would you mind giving me one of your arrows?" She asked.

Jared came over not a second later, holding out one of his arrows to her. She took it and held her pointer finger over the steel arrowhead. A thin stream of concentrated magic emerged from her fingertip, sharpening itself to a point. Evie then traced a pattern on the arrowhead first, then carefully retraced it until it stuck and blazed into the metal with a dim pulsating light. She held it back to Jared. "When Pierre comes back, shoot this at whatever building he says."

Jared looked from their spot to the village in the distance. "I love the confidence you have in me, but there is no way I'm making that shot from here without exposing myself by getting closer," he said, carefully eyeing the rune on his arrowhead.

Evie softly laughed. "I've enchanted it with two runes. One for proximity and one for weightlessness. The arrow should fly fine from here." She said, patting Jared's arm.

Jared gripped the arrow tightly, then looked at them both with a fire burning behind his eyes. "I won't fail then," he saluted, then looked for the nearest tree to climb.

Aldrin could only laugh and shake his head before settling down to wait for Pierre to get back. It took what seemed like half an hour, judging from the artificial sun, for Pierre to return to the group. He was pale and sweating profusely.

"What happened?" Aldrin was the first to ask, his eyes scanning behind Pierre for any surprise stragglers.

Pierre wiped the sweat from his forehead. "Nothing happened. Just a few jump scares and a chase, but the stone is fixed in place. Where is Jared?" He asked, looking around.

There was a rustle from above as leaves fell in between the group. "I'm up here. Are you ready?" Jared asked, popping his head down from the low-hanging branch.

Pierre nodded and climbed up next to Jared, pointing out the building that they could see from their vantage. "I'm locked on," Jared said, readying his bow and nocking the runic arrow.

Evie looked at Aldrin. "What's next?" She asked, her grin never faltering.

Aldrin rubbed his hands together, then stood up, "Time to go fishing," then he transformed into his swarm of bats, taking off toward the village.

They watched as the black mass flew through the village, garnering the attention of all the Jade Carvers. Their blackened skeletons with sharp jagged jade edges that protruded from their joints chased after Aldrin's flying form. Their eye sockets holding the green flames blazed hotter and brighter out of frustration. They screeched as they ran after the black mass, tripping and tangling into each other as none could catch up.

Jared finally caught on to what Aldrin had planned and laughed, then pulled back the bowstring, activating Snipe, Trickshot: Multi-Arrow, and Trickshot: Power Arrow. The Skills layered onto the runic arrow, turning it from a dim blue glow to a rainbow of blue, orange, white, and green. He waited for the moment when Aldrin made his way to the center building, then let loose the arrow.

It flew across the field and distance at breakneck speed, shooting for the village like a falling star. The Jade Carvers reacted too late when Aldrin reformed himself at the top of the pagoda building that held the runestone. He smirked down at them as he saw the shooting star of an arrow cut through the Jade Carvers and split into a multitude of arrows, each puncturing the building with impressive thuds and chinks.

One arrow hit close to the oval-shaped runestone and Aldrin watched as the rune from the arrowhead reacted to the runestone beneath his feet. It didn't take a genius to figure out the exchange of energy between the two was forming when Aldrin saw faint sparks dance between the two runes. The screeches pulled his attention back, but not for long, as a searing bright blue light engulfed his entire vision. The electrical heat from the net made the hairs on his arms stand to attention and when the light faded, he saw the hundreds of Jade Carvers tightly packed into a large lightning net.

Seeing them squeezed together like sardines, Aldrin wanted to test out another one of his new Skills, the second level of Bloodletter Slam. He dropped a few feet away from the trapped Jade Carvers, taking out Sin-Screamer from his inventory, and plunged it into the ground. His movement only incited more rage within them as they screeched and clawed in his direction, desperately trying to escape their confines. One even tried to squeeze itself through, but it didn't last long when the ground beneath them erupted. Massively jagged crimson and black blades tore from the earth and into Jade Carvers, skewering them and pushing them tighter into the net. Their screeches of anger turned into howls of pain as the further they were pushed into the net, forcing them to kill themselves by being diced into pieces.

Aldrin watched dispassionately as more chunks of Jade and shattered bones of the Jade Carvers were being pushed out. He pulled Sin-Screamer free, and that made the blades retreat into the earth. The net flashed once, signaling the magic within was tapering off but it wasn't cause for concern as another one of Jared's multicolored arrows crashed into the net in a dazzling display of power, and then another zipped forth not a moment later adding more to the explosive display.

He couldn't help but whistle in admiration at the destruction when the power faded. All that was left was a smoking crater and whatever ashes remained of the Jade Carvers. He was a little disappointed as well since they had scared them half to death after the first encounter, but now they didn't even hold a candle to him and his friends.

He sat down and waited for the others to come and thanks to his vision, what would be little dots to mundane eyes, he could see them as if they were standing in front of him if he focused. Luckily, it didn't take them as long as he thought it would as they raced across the open field.

He stood to greet them, "Jared, excellent shooting my friend," Aldrin smiled and clapped him on his shoulder.

Jared bowed. "I couldn't have done it without your confidence," he said with a teasing smile when he came back up, earning chuckles from the group.

Aldrin took out the pulsating orb from all the statues. He let it go, allowing it to hover in the air. The orb vibrated, then shot off deeper into the village and the group followed closely behind, passing dilapidated homes, rundown shops, and other ruined buildings. The orb came to a stop in the middle of a wide circular stone path, forcing the others to skid to a stop out of fear of triggering a trap.

The orb bobbed up and down three times, then sank to the ground. The stones that covered the path fell apart like a cascading waterfall, revealing at first a pointed structure that grew into a towering obelisk. Green runes lit down the obelisk before it split open with a swirling green vortex at its base.