lucifer

Sephirotic Synthesis Complete. The skills ‘Surya,’ ‘Agni,’ ‘Gravity Crash,’ and ‘Lux Aeterna’ have been combined successfully. The skill ‘Lucifer’ has been created.

At once, my Aura began to transform into matter, rising and falling and curling around me to shape an orb of burning light. The sphere itself was fairly small—no larger than my Aurora—but there was a weight to it, a depth that made it something more. To me, it seemed like a gentle warmth, as reassuring as a hug, but it filled the space with something almost blinding, even to my eyes, filling the spectrum with a riotous onslaught of illumination. It didn’t stop moving, either, constantly flowing and shifting even as trails of power curled around and through it. It began as a deep red color, but changed quickly, heightening to a hotter orange, yellow, and then to white.

For a moment, the sphere that surrounded me burnt almost the same color as my Aura, but I could feel the power growing within it light a heart beating in sync with my own; a third heart, I suppose, given that my other self was helping me add fuel to the fire. I opened my eyes and felt the plasma that surrounded me press against the orbs as though I were underwater, the touch gentle against my flesh—and something rose in me, burning behind my eyes and then through them as it came pouring out from the windows of my soul as liquid fire, adding to the sphere without making it grow. As my other self and I concentrated, the luminous sphere began to heighten to a blue coloration, a touch lighter than that of my eyes. Slowly, I began to filter my perceptions, blotting out the parts of the spectrum that were flooded and peering through what was left as I focused on the aspects of the world I could still see.

Around me, the world was burning. Not slowly, either—if anything, it was coming apart at the seams, the parts nearest me simply sublimating and ionizing. A massive hole was quickly melted into the ground as if someone had taken a blowtorch to plastic, swiftly annihilating all traces of life. It pushed to the edges of my Sanctuary before turning back on itself, keeping the heat contained by space itself as everything within was broken down to its basest parts as everything was consumed.

And at the center of it all was Gilgamesh. Whereas I’d materialized in the air as the artificial world formed around us, he had landed on the ground just beneath me and was now sinking fast as massive clouds of sublimated matter rose around him. They rose into the size, drawn towards me and the mass I’d created where they were quickly consumed. The same was true of everything around us, with the few things that managed to keep from melting immediately drawing into the air where they were quickly heated further.

The only thing that seemed able to resist the pull was Gilgamesh and he was clearly making an effort to push himself down and away from me—a process made complicated by the matter that was constantly slipping through his fingers, leaving him nothing to hold onto and sending him deeper and deeper into the ground with each passing moment. He was descending so quickly that he almost seemed to be falling, drawing further and further away from me.

But if he thought he could escape like that, he was sadly mistaken.

Abruptly, the earth around him ceased to vanish and he finally seemed to bottom out at the lowest point of a perfectly smooth crater—but if he felt any relief over that, it was short lived, because in the next moment, his hands, arms, and then entire body vanished as he continued to push himself down. At the same time, he reappeared directly above me, exactly above where he’d vanished, and began to fall quickly towards me.

Gilgamesh let loose an almost mechanical noise, raising his arms as if to protect his mass. The surface of his body had already begun to shimmer, liquefying in the heat. His armor was vastly more durable and temperature resistant than anything around him, but even it wasn’t designed for this. I saw black ripples flutter over his skin, trying to make repairs, but even they seemed hindered by their proximity to me, melting even as they worked.

After a moment, Gilgamesh touched the edge of my sphere and clouds of black smoke began to hiss as they escaped his armor. He made another mechanical sound and suddenly began to push away, carried by dark looking jets that came from the center and fingertips of his almost skeletal, dripping hands, as well as other points along his chest, legs, and mask. It was a desperate effort, that much was obvious—an unfocused, unprecise attempt to escape my range.

But it worked well enough, at least for the moment, pushing him back far enough to keep from touching the surface of my luminous sphere. Even so, with each passing moment, I could see bits of his flesh fall away in tiny droplets as he continued to melt.

He was in a bad position and he knew it. He couldn’t get away from me while we were still within my Sanctuary—or not far enough away to truly matter. At best, he could keep his distance slightly, paying heed to the edges so as to not wraparound—but there was nothing to hold onto anymore, nowhere to really hide.

And I hadn’t even begun to move.

“This brings back memories,” Gilgamesh said, carefully keeping to the edges. After a moment, he grew a pair of mechanized wings that connected to a backpack like structure, and lines of red circuitry stood out on his white armor. He seemed to stabilize himself them, more alterations to his hands and feet allowing him to better keep his distance as he watched me. “One of Gevurah’s tricks, wasn’t it? As severe as ever, I see…yes. This was Lucifer, wasn’t it? Helel ben Shahar.”

Lucifer (Active) LV1 EXP: 0.00% MP: 10000000
The Star of Morning—the Light Bringer. Created by the Archangel Gevurah as the flame of Judgement, it devoured and consumed the Fallen, rising in the heavens to show that a new day had dawned on a broken world. In time, it faded from the world and hid itself from the eyes of man—but though the sun sets, it also rises, waiting for the time to burn away the shadows of the damned. With this skill, the user may call forth the power of the Sun, searing his enemies with the flames of Gevurah. Effects increase with MP, INT, WIS, Fire Affinity, and skill level.
All things within 1 kilometer of the user are drawn towards them with a base force of approximately 28g.
All things within 1 kilometer of the user are afflicted by the user’s stellar radiance, manifesting in the form of tremendous heat and light.
All things drawn within 100 meters of the user enter the Star of Morning, with temperatures increasing dramatically with proximity to the user.
Additional 10000000 MP used per minute.

I tilted my head slightly, but didn’t answer. That it had been one of my fellow Archangels who’d made the skill wasn’t news to me, but the fact that Gilgamesh had seen it and survived the encounter was unpleasant. Admittedly, not entirely unexpected—I’d gone into this with a plan that almost no one had any right to survive…and then followed it up with a bunch of other plans, in the interests of making sure. Most anyone I knew would have died to at least one of the things I’d hit Gilgamesh with, but it the legendary Grimm went down that easily, they wouldn’t have survived long enough to make it into myth and legend. I’d brought everything I could to this fight; worst case scenario, I could actually reach into my Inventory and bring out a kitchen sink. It seemed unlikely that it would do anything, but I was going to get to use that joke someday.

“I’ve seen it before, needless to say,” Gilgamesh continued after a moment, as if to fill the silence. He was still melting and sometimes drops would fall through the bottom of Sanctuary, come back through the top, and land on his armor. “Though I can’t say it was a particularly enjoyable experience then, either. Gevurah was always so good at destroying things…it might have been better to call him Golachab, in the end. Are you familiar with that word?”

I continued to remain silent, figuring that if I had time to talk, I had time to do better things—destroying my enemies, for instance.

To start with, I Fluctuated right next to Gilgamesh, bringing with me the heat of a star.