Overpowered Wizard

The corrupted creatures ran into the giant ditches and the walls Hannah had shortly made. The ones at the center ran into Gilbert and Naomi who waited at the end of a narrow killing corridor.

Gilbert yelled, “Come get some!” while Naomi screamed, “OORAH!” as the roaring, gnashing, and clawing corrupted aberrations slammed into them. The impact was like a torrent of meat hitting an impenetrable wall before getting pulverized by a rapid-moving piston of fists and thunderbolts.

Gilbert stood his ground behind his legendary tower shield. He had solid traction under his feet after Hannah had paved and enchanted the floor at the choke point.

Despite him being Level 80 and facing a tide of powerful abominations that had more levels than him, some reaching as far as the early Level 90s, all of Gilbert’s hard work and growth leading to this point were on full display.

He didn’t retreat.

He didn’t back up.

The roaring tide of corrupted abominations couldn’t push him back.

Gilbert held his ground like an immovable giant. His traits and stats synergized together as he stood in the defense of others. This lent him the power he needed to work some real magic with his skills.Nôv(el)B\\jnn

He used Adrenaline Jolt +2 on himself to grow his physicality and remain immovable and strong. He used Tranquilizer Touch +2 as a spreading field to slow and weaken the aberrations.

Unified Monk Force +2 shone around him in a myriad array of colors that shifted and glowed magnificently, upping his physicality in the face of an endless stream of horror.

He was going to need every buff he could get. The corrupted creatures were an unstopping legion, and even Naomi couldn’t punch them fast enough before more came charging and screaming into the choke point between the slanted walls.

Despite their enormous numbers, the corrupted couldn’t move Gilbert back. He kept holding his ground.

Better yet, the corrupted couldn’t stop Naomi from fighting. She did the work she loved doing best, crushing all enemies in her way, like the equivalent of a machine gun nest, but from up close.

Her punches, kicks, hand chops, and many other melee techniques came out in a rapid stream. She pulverized, hacked, and pulped aberrations into minced meat as soon as they appeared in front of her.

She swept from right to left, left to right, and back. She cleared the choke point of challengers and lightened the load on Gilbert.

Every now and then, after Naomi built up enough static, she unleashed a powerful blast of thunder and lightning, demolishing dozens of aberrations at once.

Then a measure of calm settled into the choke point, easing the pressure. At that moment, Naomi used her Psychokinesis +3 to lift the bodies. She threw them back at the charging tide to prevent a pileup.

It was a smart move. A pileup of bodies could lead to the corrupted monsters lunging over their heads and trying to get over Gilbert.

Some were trying to do that already, but Loner blasted them down while riding on Slip’s back. The Runic Enforcer Expert and the Sleipnir stayed mobile by bouncing about above Gilbert’s head.

Once the split second of calm ended, the corrupted creatures closed in again, and Naomi went back to being a human meat grinder.

It wasn’t particularly hard for her. She was so strong she could one-punch each of the aberrations and kill them despite their toughness and vitality

But their numbers were too plentiful for this to remain a completely leisurely activity for Naomi. Eventually, she had to push herself a little more to trim them away and clear the choke point as more and more corrupted threw themselves at Naomi, Gilbert, or the bounding duo of Loner and Slip.

Things improved a little more once Hannah set herself a few hundred feet behind the choke point and switched Mystic Rush Tank +2 into alpha with Rune Scan +2 going into beta. With Mystic Rush Tank +2 becoming alpha, Hannah used the glass cannon advancement with the two hovering cannons at her sides.

She specifically aimed for aberrations that found a hole through Naomi, Gilbert, Loner, and Slip at the choke point. The aberrations couldn’t, however, make it past Hannah.

One shot.

One kill.

Her dual cannons blasted aberrations out of the air, punching straight through them and leaving a massive hole in their bodies.

She struck with so much force and thunder, she sometimes popped aberrations like they were dark and oily pimples. She made their bodies rain in a splatter that got whisked away by the wrathful winds of the storm.

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The moment she shot one cannon, she created a new magical round to insert into the chamber at the back while aiming and firing her other cannon. Then she switched to the freshly loaded one while creating a new round to load into the second cannon.

This was while Hannah’s little orbital golems shot powerful elemental lasers as another layer to the choke point defense.

The duality of construction and destruction worked well for Hannah as long as she stayed further back from the front line the others established. Better yet, her combination of Aura Generator and Aura Mechanic made it so that she could improve everyone’s aura recovery from her position, which helped Naomi most of all.

Meanwhile, Gilbert used his Healing Force +2 to overcharge everyone’s vitality, which bled into their stamina and kept them energized.

They could’ve held for hours if things remained like this.

The problem with that was the aberrations’ ability to teleport through the shadows. The aberrations were so dumb and berserk they didn’t do the obvious thing right away.

Hell, they funneled themselves toward the choke point even after falling into the massive ditches or lunging face-first into the enchanted walls.

But it became a numbers game from there. The few out of the many tried to use their shadow teleport to get around the problem and rampage freely past the Floridian line.

Para couldn’t stop all of them, especially the ones that teleported far on the fringes. But she could stop most of them, especially the ones closest to the choke point.

With all the grimoires manifested, Para’s many arms unfolded from behind Zarian and grabbed each of the spell books regardless of their feistiness, which was the case for Morph.

The metallic pages and nearly nonsensical text of Voidling yielded to Para as she flipped through. She cast the spell that mattered most against teleportation.

“Void Authority,” she growled, stopping a plethora of aberrations from slipping into the shadows and reappearing on the other side of the ditches and walls.

Then she stopped even more than the last. Then she stopped another group of aberrations, some that were new, and some that were making repeat attempts to teleport across.

The sheer number of them was so immense, Para had to put all of her attention on this one spell to deny as many teleportation attempts as possible.

Para’s efforts reduced the risk of aberrations attacking from behind. A few still broke through, which Hannah dealt with quickly and efficiently with cannon shots and elemental beams.

The defense held.

The divine and wrathful storm howled and raged above them.

The paladins remained behind their divine barrier, catching their breath and taking stock of the situation.

Bianca remained inactive, standing on a platform of light beside Zarian and Para. Nobody questioned her. She was where she needed to be, even if Zarian and the others didn’t exactly know why she was inactive and waiting.

They had the situation in control, at least for now.

Zarian let himself concentrate on unsealing a power that could doom them all if he screwed this up.

After spending some time mentally preparing and getting into the zone, Zarian signed and chanted to unseal his One Percent Darkness. He did so at a slower pace than usual, deliberately so, as he tracked how his darkness acted as he summoned it forth.

Everything seemed to flow easily for him, and the stained darkness inside of his soul didn’t revolt or try to pull a fast one on him. Then, at the end of the unsealing sequence, Zarian chanted the words, “Controlled Darkness.”

From there, he felt the full truth behind his changes.

A cosmic hunger appeared inside of him.

The lust for domination and consuming entire universes flashed through his mind. He salivated as the darkness of the storm twisted and flowed in his direction. Every shade, shadow, and spot of darkness gave themselves over for him to command and bend and use.

It was as if the deepest shades were begging for his rulership, all so they could become one with his unending darkness that wanted to spread and feast forever. The darkest of shadows remembered. The darkness of the world remembered.

Shadowfell remembered.

The storm changed.

The howling winds laughed and cried in equal measure. The storms clamored and raged with the lunacy of a divine woman fully engulfed by her madness.

The wild and destructive boon concentrated to a point, becoming a thunderous and dark storm funnel boring down on the paladins. It seemed like Zarian’s evil goddess of a wife was pressing down her finger to crush the crusaders.

The barrier screamed. Cracks formed. The boon of a Good God couldn’t resist Evil Goddess Shadowfell, not while at the heart of her territory, not when she had prepared for them for all this time.

Maybe even without all of that, the Good Gods weren’t strong enough.

She was the wife of the Dark Lord for a reason.

Zarian could let her have her way and do away with everything. His cosmic hunger seemed more important than anything. His darkness seemed more important than anything.

But he took a glance at Bianca who waited at his side. Her presence reminded him of something simple and profound. He wasn’t a punk bitch. He refused to fail again and let his darkness beat him.

He buckled down, commanded his darkness intentionally and with purpose. He conjured rising dark towers from around the basin that were thousands of feet long and hundreds of feet thick.

The dark towers bent and flexed like tentacles. They wrapped around the funneling storm finger of Zarian’s evil wife. A struggle broke out, and for the first time in a while, Zarian’s darkness met an equal.

Shadowfell’s power resisted him.

“You’re going to force me to show off a little more, huh?” Zarian asked, his voice reverberating from every place where darkness existed.

It seemed like the entire basin and the mountain range beyond contained his voice. His words resounded with the power of a behemoth hidden under the earth.

It was the only way to be heard when dealing with a shadowy goddess who can wear an entire calamitous storm as an accessory. A goddess who bent the thunder and the winds and made them flow with her words so it was just as loud and clear.

“Of course, dear husband. Show us more. Or order me to stop like one who orders a slave. Unleash yourself of all restraints. Let yourself be corrupt. Demand whatever you want. Nothing else matters but your whims, oh master of mine.”

“Yes, but no.” Zarian moved his hands into a more advanced technique he had prepared for just this moment. “Two Percent Power Unsealed. Growing Darkness.”