Outrage of the Ancients (LitRPG Apocalypse)

Tristan

Twenty days. Almost three weeks. It could feel like an eternity, or it could go by at a truly glacial pace, depending on what was happening.

Under the circumstances we found ourselves laboring under, with another cataclysmic fight awaiting on the far side of that timespan ... it had somehow managed to do both.

Every moment excruciatingly extended, unbearably long, yet simultaneously slipping through our hands like water, bringing us ever closer to a fight that might spell the end, time passing impossibly quickly, as though reality itself were telling us to "just die and get it over with."

And now, mere hours from the monster's appearance, the freezing cold of the Arctic was making the situation feel so much worse.

As bad as it was, though, I, as well as anyone over Level 60, was tough enough to ignore it in terms of actual negative consequences, but that didn't mean we didn't feel it.

Perhaps the act of moving here should have been delayed; waiting in this weather sucked, yet at the same time, people did need some time to familiarize themselves with the surroundings.

The main idea behind the plan was relatively simple: if Cipactli, the Earth monster, was able to shut down earth magic in its vicinity, then there was very little chance of the Air monster allowing anything to share its airspace, or the use of any kind of air magic either.

Ergo, everyone was bunkering down. Even the Mongolian cavalry they were sticking to specially-built underground shelters, waiting until we knew what was what with this new monster.

And that was basically how this whole thing was built, covering much of the island Mageroya, at the northernmost edge of Norway, right in the path the monster would likely be taking, a series of bunkers connected by underground passageways, magically reinforced to the nines, hopefully capable of weathering the coming storm …

Because the actual spawn point was too far out in the ocean to be easily engaged, especially not safely. Though there were quite a few ships out there, poor bastards, there hadn't been enough available to act as adequate platforms for combat.

No, the goal was to call this entire mess down on our heads, then call in Zerzura to wedge the monster between the city and the bunkers.

Of course, how well that would work was quite literally up in the air. If the monster flew at a sufficient altitude, it was quite possible we might not be able to reach it with most of our weapons; it may even be able to categorically interdict ranged weaponry …

It felt painfully inadequate.

That was my main gripe with World Boss battles. We could easily get information on it in general terms, just enough to be concerned, but nothing truly actionable outside of the location.

I sighed and stepped up onto the top of the nearest hill, [Dimensional Sidestep] taking me nearly five hundred meters in an instant, a small smile creeping onto my face.

At least I'd finally gotten the hang of using that particular Skill. One week of falling flat on my face every time I used it, a second of only losing my balance every other time I tried, and then, finally, I'd started gaining the ability to precisely aim it and keep standing.

I looked out across the sea ahead, watching the waves crash down on the rocky beach, sending more salt spraying into the air.

A thought and a step, and I was there, still phased out of reality, watching the water wash through me, only to march back out onto the water, striding nearly half a kilometer from shore in a heartbeat, standing atop the water, "ground" being more of a concept in this state.

I mean, in theory, nothing said I shouldn't be able to walk on air or, hell, nothing at all, but I hadn't been able to pull that off just yet. Whether it was a matter of insufficient mastery, a lack of imagination, or a general issue involving my subconscious being unwilling to accept that stepping on air wouldn't work, I didn't know, but I was convinced it was possible. Eventually.

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For now, mastering the basics would suffice, especially since I still had a few seconds' worth of uptime on [Dimensional Sidestep] left, and those would go to waste if I didn't use them prior to ten o'clock.

Yeah, unhappy as I was at it being this cold in summer, at least the air World Boss had had the general decency to appear in the same time zone as the Untersberg.

Another step planted me atop a nearby wave, which flashed out beneath me, this time also taking out my footing, yet even if I was unable to stay up there, somehow, I was able to move away from it, returning to shore with two seconds of uptime remaining.

I was confident im using the Skill, but I wasn't that confident, even if stranding myself a couple of hundred meters out in the ocean would have only resulted in me having to swim a little, rather than anything more damaging.

From there, I decided to zap over to my original position, running out the clock for [Dimensional Sidestep].

Mastering it had been how I'd spent the break in between World Bosses.

Mia, meanwhile, had finished training the knights who'd be fighting under her, though "fighting" didn't seem to be an adequate description of how she planned on using them; instead, they'd likely be acting as living batteries for her Sword Arts, including a couple of newer ones.

[Sword Art: Skypiercer] for flinging herself across the battlefield while leading with her sword and ripping through almost anything she hit, and [Sword Art: Golden Meteor] for bringing herself back down to earth in the most destructive way possible, cancelling all forward momentum and inflicting massive damage to whatever she landed on.

The Ancients, in the meantime, had been focusing on acting in concert with each other. I'd almost made a joke about them planning out anime-style combination attacks, since that was what it often wound up working out as, but managed to hold my tongue.

Ultimately, though, the real make-or-break of any plan they could possibly have made was the shape of the World Boss itself.

I began to pace, until Dietrich gave me a look that quite concisely communicated, "sit down, you're making everyone nervous."

So I sat and waited, eyes glued to my watch, though that was likely a waste of effort. A World Boss could not enter reality in a way that was missable. At least not by the logic of this world, for what little that was worth, considering the general insanity of the current age.

After another minute, I stopped looking at the watch and instead stepped up to the window-slit of the bunker, though it really was more of a WWII-era pillbox, if I was being honest.

Would I be able to see the monster emerge, or would it be too far away?

Really, it would be a cruel joke if the monster decided to run off in a different direction while we were waiting here …

Those were the kinds of thoughts that crept into my mind when the most productive thing I could do was stare out into the dreary grey of an overcast sky.

And I knew exactly how long I was staring out there, simply because I'd stood up at 9:47 and everyone had already known the World Boss would show its ugly mug at 10.

So when the sky cracked open and the first serpent's tail tore through the air at the very edge of the horizon, it hardly took a genius to figure out it was go time.

Wait … serpent?

And why was it emerging ass-firs- …

That was when the second serpent tail cracked through the air like a whip, flaming embers hurled everywhere, plumes of steam erupting from the ocean as though to greet the monster.

And now it was getting even weirder. Had [Catastrophe Sense] made a mistake?

The two snake tails dangled from the sky for a couple of seconds, connected to some unseen beast, leaving my feeling of "what the actual fuck" to only grow stronger.

Yet when the monster actually showed itself, it emerged in an instant, a colossal body that looked like it could use your average great redwood as a toothpick was launched from the sky, going from being above the cloud layer to plunging into the sea in not even a single second …

I couldn't see the ocean where it was due to it being hidden behind the curve of the planet, yet when the water rose up to the monster's chest, hiding it from sight, yet the details were burned into my mind, the way those serpent tails transformed into legs just above where a normal person's legs would have been, scales giving way to a craggy hide that seemed to be halfway between weathered leather and volcanic stone, while immense arms that would not have looked out of place on a gigantic gorilla, muscled beyond the point of believability, hung down almost past the "knees."

Yet it was the head that had me transfixed.

Eyes that burned like coals, jagged fangs that looked like they could chew through stone, and a mane of serpents with heads that looked more like dragons than regular snakes, several into whose maws I could look, appearing on the verge of breathing fire, an orange glow building at the back of their throats.

Yet even before the time the nameplate formed, I knew who this was going to be.

Well, now I felt stupid.

Yeah, Typhon might not have been a truly primordial being, being born of Gaia long after the cosmos had been established, but otherwise … the way he'd challenged Zeus fit the Chaoskampf motif that had titled the sixth challenge to a T.

Still, the next World Boss was pretty much known, and recriminations about this one wouldn't help.

And now, we'd see how effective our preparations had been … starting with the tidal wave that was rushing our way after Typhon had plunged into the ocean.