Домагой Курмаич - Mother of Learning

Almost immediately after he started his own summoning, Jornak, Quatach-Ichl, and Silverlake stopped their dramatic march and just plain rushed at him, hoping to stop the spell. If he hadn’t been distracted by the strain of the summoning, Zorian would have found the scene funny. As it is, he just watched as the enemy trio started hurling spells at him, only for them to be stopped cold by Daimen and Mrva. Quatach-Ichl did his best to hit him with a multitude of his signature red disintegration beams, Jornak was showering the entire area with blindingly bright arcs of lightning that dodged through any static shield and obstacle in the way, and Silverlake was trying to copy Zorian by launching various potion bottles at him with the aid of telekinetic spells.

Nothing worked. Daimen recklessly burned through his mana reserves to erect massive golden shields in front of them, tanking most of the damage, and occasionally dispelled incoming projectiles by hitting them with pale blue beams and invisible waves of disrupting force. Anything that got through him was stopped by Mrva, who was tough and warded enough to simply intercept incoming projectiles with his body.

Mrva also frequently went on the offensive, picking up any rocks and boulders from the craters exposed in the fighting and throwing them with surprisingly good accuracy. He also sometimes suddenly charge at them and tried to stomp them flat – a crude but effective tactic that frequently interrupted their spellcasting and forced them to dodge.

In general, the metal colossus was far faster and more agile than its looks would suggest. It was no slow, lumbering giant. It was a golem equivalent of a dragon, and Zorian was very pleased it was performing as well as he had hoped. It was just a shame he couldn’t figure out how to make Mrva fly as well.

Something to tackle when he started building version two of the colossus.

At some point, Jornak seemed to have gotten enough of the massive golem, and tried to get rid of Mrva the same way his simulacrum had gotten rid of Zorian’s bodyguard golem back in the tunnels underneath Cyoria. Jornak threw a bunch of bombs at the charging golem and they erupted into a web of hair-thin spatial cracks that enveloped the area. Mrva was completely submerged in the spatial cracks… but he emerged completely unscathed.

The metal colossus was a lot bigger than his bodyguard golems, and had a lot more time and money invested into him. Zorian had equipped Mrva with the finest wards he could set up, and it would take more than that to take it apart.

Surprised at the fact the golem was still whole and rushing at him, Jornak panicked for a moment and tried to cast a short-range teleport to evade the threat. That was a mistake. One of the wards Zorian placed on Mrva was a teleportation ward that could be amplified to extend a fair distance from his body. The ward was a really malicious sort, too – one that didn’t just disrupt the teleportation but also tried to do it in a way that made the spell go haywire and try to kill the caster.

Jornak’s body shuddered and lurched as his teleportation spell was violently disrupted. He was good enough to stabilize the failing spell, enough that he didn’t get himself torn to pieces by the dimensional stresses, but he wasn’t good enough to escape all consequences. Dazed and unable to react in time, he was almost stomped by Mrva’s foot before Quatach-Ichl gestured with his hand and pulled him out of the way of the charging golem.

Pity. But no matter. Quatach-Ichl and Silverlake were perfectly lined up at the moment, so Mrva thrust both of his hands towards them, causing a huge wave of wind and kinetic force to barrel towards them.

Self-casting items were largely disappointing. They could only really produce crude blasts of force, fire and the like. For some uses, however, that was enough… especially if the blast was big enough.

Quatach-Ichl was too experienced to fall for this, and the blast only caused him to be momentarily distracted as he focused on counteracting it. Silverlake, however, wasn’t that much of a fighter. The blast caught her entirely by surprise and she reacted too slowly, causing her to get knocked back into the distance.

She would be back soon, but it didn’t matter. In this kind of battle, every second counted. Silverlake was the weakest among the three enemies facing them, but still very dangerous. Having her gone for a while was great.

Sadly, Mrva and Daimen had been unable to take advantage of this opportunity because two giant spheres of black bones suddenly burst out of Iasku Mansion and came barreling down at Mrva. As they got closer, they unrolled into familiar skeletal crocodilians. Zorian had seen one of them in action when he and Zach had gone to rob Eldemar’s royal treasury with Quatach-Ichl, and knew exactly how powerful and resilient they were.

Back then, Quatach-Ichl said the crocodilian skeleton beast was his pet . Of course he actually had more than one…

The two skeleton beasts quickly pounced upon Mrva, tying him down.

"What great allies I have," the ancient lich said, bending his skeletal neck sideways as it he was cracking his neck. His voice was amplified, allowing everyone in the vicinity to hear him. It was probably intended primarily for Jornak and Silverlake, though. "Better than nothing, I guess, but only just. You’d think literal time travelers would be better than this."

"What?" Daimen asked, confused. He had been preparing to keep the ancient lich tied down, but Quatach-Ichl’s statement made him hesitate.

"Oh, he didn’t tell you?" Quatach-Ichl said, sounding surprised. "Aren’t you his big brother or something? Looks like family doesn’t mean what it used to these days."

Before Daimen could say anything, two more simulacrums of Quatach-Ichl suddenly appeared right next to the original. Or at least Zorian guessed the lich they had been fighting thus far was the original. All three Quatach-Ichl’s immediately hasted themselves and turned into a blur. A split second later, each of them cast three spells each.

Nine red stars, each smaller than the tip of Zorian’s finger but shining bright, immediately shot towards Zorian with blinding speed.

Daimen scrambled to block them, but it was too little, too late. The first five slammed into Daimen’s golden, multi-layered barrier, blocked by it but ripping it to shreds in the process. The sixth one was stopped by Daimen himself, who retrieved a small mirror from his pocket and physically intercepted the projectile with it. His brother’s prized divine artifact lived up to its divine nature and stopped the projectile cold. Unlike the time it stopped Princess’s attack beam, it didn’t break in the process. There was a flash of light and the red star was just gone, Daimen standing unharmed behind it.

The other three stars rushed towards Zorian completely unopposed.

Up in the sky, his three allies realized he was in danger and tried to help him, but Oganj realized what was happening too and suddenly launched an entire swarm of blindingly bright white beams to intercept them and make them unable to render aid.

Although aware of the incoming attack due to his simulacrums, Zorian did nothing to evade it. He kept stabilizing the summoning spell with all his might.

However, the large metal cube he was resting his hand on wasn’t as passive. With a whirring sound of shifting metal plates and internal mechanisms coming to life, it flew in front of him, placing itself in the path of the incoming red stars.

Two of the stars swerved to the side, making sure the cube could only physically intercept one of the stars, but it didn’t help. The cube seemingly fell apart at the seams, suddenly separating itself into eight smaller cubes. They positioned themselves into a rough sphere around Zorian, and a faint blue sphere of magical force, almost invisible, encased the entire area around him. The smaller cubes didn’t even try to intercept the red stars after that, and the three projectiles slammed into the barrier completely unopposed.