Savage Awakening 559. Shard Farming (IV)

7-and-a-half hours in, and Zane found himself deep in a shard drought.

The past two hours had yielded nothing. He was stalled at 6 shards and pretty miffed about it.

He wasn’t sure what was up with this meteor shower. He watched shard meteor after shard meteor cascade into the valleys below—witnessed no less than three firefights between those fire-skull-necromancer people and the True Rocs over the same few meteors. But he could only watch forlornly from his perch, getting more antsy by the minute.

Then, around the eight-hour mark, a shard finally came his way.

He blitzed his way down the slope to meet it. Then he saw a ragtag group of humans gathered at the base. Stragglers from the loose cultivators, by the looks of it—they cut a sorry picture. Their robes were pretty ember-worn, and their skin burned too. One guy wielded what looked to be a fishing pole, another twin bronze daggers. A few had cracked flying swords. There was one guy with a stone staff topped with an orb crackling with lightning.

They were all T0 Empyreans, and they all seemed to be angling for his shard meteor.

But not for very long.

He narrowed his eyes, let out a furious roar, and charged.

He was pleased to see they scattered almost immediately.

At first, he’d underestimated the intimidation factor of a musclebound guy with giant axes charging full-speed down a mountain while roaring—all while his powers inexplicably skyrocketed. But after a few encounters with would-be scavengers, he’d learned to put his looks to good use.

He whirled back on the shard Boss and crushed through it the same way he’d done all the others. That made for 2 more shards of Destruction.

Then it was another half-hour of recovery. He had a full eight shards in hand now… none he could use at the moment. He wished there was some kind of way to get around that Minor God shard limit. He really would’ve liked it if he could throw in a few more Destruction shard power-ups. With another eight shards, he wouldn’t even need friendly fire to take down those Bosses. He was pretty sure he wouldn’t need to destroy his body every fight either.

He’d bring the issue up to Reina in his next letter—see if she could look into it a bit for him. He was pretty sure it wasn’t possible, not unless he broke through to True God. But he was hopeful. Maybe there was some kind of hack—like breaking through to half-step True God?

But if his understanding was right—and he was pretty sure it was—once he tried breaking through to the half-step, his Laws were locked in. He could probably go for it right now, but it’d mean getting to True God with only two-and-a-half Concepts, counting his semi-done Starfire Concept.

He was firmly against compromising his Foundation.

He supposed he’d just have to wait for now. He felt a bit iffy about it.

…At least he could console himself with the thought of what’d happen when he could finally make use of his stockpile. By the time he broke through and could finally crush all these shards… that power boost would be a doozy.

For now, he kept up his rampage.

***

A few more hours later, and Zane had a total of ten shards in hand.

Seven Destruction, three Creation.

Now he was feeling the exhaustion starting to set in. He’d been up all night, running the whole time—there hadn’t been a full minute where an Astrolith hadn’t been firing at him. The soul strain was getting pretty intense.

Even he had to find time to rest every now and again… he found a rare empty patch of mountain and took a knee. Just a thirty-second breather.

He was getting toward the end of the night now. He was looking forward to his last few meteor showers. He’d been quite successful already, by his standards. But the fissures at his feet, the fissures that went all through this land, were starting to brighten.

That meant daylight was coming. Night was waning.

He checked that event clock:

48 minutes remaining.

Just a few more meteors—was that too much to ask? 

On the one hand, his body and soul felt wrecked. On the other, he still felt a burning drive to go on, keeping him upright… even the dragon princess had taken a break down there, he noticed, two hours back. She was meditating down there in the valley, guarded by two fleets of the dragons’ best.

A few minutes later she stood, casting her eyes to the sky.

A shard meteor fell, but she didn’t so much as look at it, which surprised Zane. It’d fallen in her territory. But she seemed to be waiting for something. 

The meteors were drying up, shard and non-shard… the density in the skies was half what it’d at their peak and diminishing fast. It made her actions even more baffling.

Then, about ten minutes later, he got his answer. 

Meteors started filling up the sky once more. And they really were filling up that sky—there were much fewer than there were at the start, but each took up several times the space. 

Zane got the feeling he was witnessing this shower’s last big wave.

Then the biggest meteor he’d seen yet graced the center of the sky. 

By the time it was nearing landfall, it was easily the size of a mountain.

Even those fifty-odd True Dragon Empyreans had to make way for it. It smashed in so hard it raised dozens of new fissures. It sent a visible shockwave rupturing through the valley. Zane felt it even from where he stood—the force was strong enough to topple several nearby Astroliths.

That giant meteor cracked open. It revealed the colossus inside.

King Astrolith [Monster Emperor]

Essence Level 749

The thing had to be at least five hundred feet tall. It let out a roar, a roar that rippled through space for miles. Everything those sound waves passed through slowed down, imbued with that same spacetime Concept. He watched a dragon try exchanging fire with it. The thing opened its mouth, and what could only be described as an ocean of starfire blasted out. That Empyrean dragon was wiped from existence, just like that.

But the King only seemed to just be getting going. It stomped into the ground, and it seemed to provoke the continent itself into a fury. Walls of Destruction-dense starfire tore through the fissures, blasting dragons right out of the sky… the rest of dragonkind moved to engage.

That… was definitely not a first-year-here kind of Boss, he decided. He’d let the dragons have that thing to themselves. This year, at least. 

The King Astrolith only one of several final Bosses making landfall. A dozen other chunky shard meteors rained down. One—a dual Destruction-Creation meteor—was making a long arc for his side of Mount X.

He went for it instantly.

It crash-landed when he was four steps in. 

Shard Boss: Maker Astrolith

Essence Level 724

He gave it the same treatment he’d done to all the other Astroliths that night. But this time, even with a full eight Overlord Annhilation Charge steps, he only managed to hobble the thing. His slash sent cracks rippling down its whole steely frame, but he only managed to crack its prow and put a crater into its head.

He instantly saw why. No less than eleven armored shard plates were welded to its giant body, including its head. A full two Creation shards more than anything else he’d had to face that night… those two shards made a massive difference.

Then the Astrolith groaned and started its own counterattack.

Its prow lit up with starlight; a new mini-universe formed over its head, Creation-meteors burgeoning fast… 

If this had been the start of the night, Zane would’ve been quite concerned.

But he’d just spent a full night taking down Bosses just like this—a little less hefty, maybe, but he felt confident he knew how to take it down. 

He lured the Astroliths behind him into potshotting at their Boss, like he always did. Though this time, it wasn’t nearly enough to kill it. 

He didn’t mind that. He was just getting going.

He stomped down Red Giant step after Red Giant step, running a circle around the Shard Boss. He was too wrecked right now to finish this thing off. But he didn’t need to do it himself.

There were something like seventy Astroliths in the surrounding few miles. He’d only made use of the ones behind him.

Now he dashed around, making sure to get in range—aggro-ing every one he could find.

Instantly the beams started blasting behind him. He strained his soul to keep up, keeping an ‘eye’ on forty, now forty-five, fifty Astroliths as he kept up his circle, turning more and more attacks in the Boss’s direction…

Soon he had nearly sixty Astroliths friendly-firing on their own Boss from every which way. 

This thing was chunky. But it wasn’t that chunky.

Five rounds of friendly fire in and even that final boss Astrolith had to call it quits.

It crumpled under one last cluster of starfire.

This was great news for Zane, since by then he was on the verge of going down himself.

It wasn’t just the soul strain, which was getting pretty immense. Tracking all those Astroliths, even for just this little stretch, had given him a splitting headache.

He’d also gotten clipped quite a bit. He did know exactly when and where the shots were coming, and he was trying as best he could to dodge, but there wasn’t really a way to aggravate a whole mountain’s worth of Empyreans without taking at least a little damage yourself. 

Getting clipped quite a bit, in this case, meant he ended up getting slammed for over 60% Health. That was on top of the 20% damage he’d self-inflicted from his Slashes.

There were a few minutes after the Shard Boss fell where he had to walk a tightrope. He couldn’t even pick up his Destruction shards; he was too busy trying to stave off a few dozens blasts a second. He kept stomping around until the Astroliths whittled themselves down to manageable levels. Then, over the course of five minutes, he managed to pick off the stragglers with Red Giant slashes.

By the time that was all done, he was pretty wrecked. 

He just picked up his final prize—three shards of Destruction, his biggest batch yet. Then he just dropped to the ground, exhausted. 

He lay there, chest rising and falling, just trying to catch his breath. His vision was filled with black spots, and his body a splotchy lump, smoking badly. 

He stayed there for a long while, eyes closed, and grinned. He wondered how a lumpy mountain slope could feel so nice. With how much he’d pushed himself physically all night, it felt like he’d collapsed into a warm feather bed.

The cracks were brightening. The sky had cleared.

Special Event: “Shard Shower” is now complete.

In the end, his total for the night was 10 Shards of Destruction and 3 Shards of Creation. Not bad at all.