As Rory held his guard, the ape stared him down.

That was until a moment later, Rory found himself tumbling through the air, the wind knocked out of him.

Shit!

Tumbling onto the snow, Rory momentarily felt a flash of heat until he balanced his self-aura once more.

Fast!

That ape was already barreling down on him once again, as fast as his fellow founder when her attributes were inverted.

Swiping his spear through the air, the oversized ape dodged it before launching a leaping kick, once more sending Rory tumbling through the air, back slamming against a tree as he felt a rib crack.

The difference between low-tier-seven monsters and a strong mid-tier-seven monster was such that Rory felt as if they were in entirely different worlds.

Activating every float gem within his armor, Rory was finally able to avoid an attack as it slammed its arms down in a hammer swing that he barely dodged.

Even with his heightened cognition speed, it was pushing the limits of his capability to keep up with, an escalation that Rory wasn't prepared for. Every gem fully activated now, Rory was scrambling to avoid the monster as it sought to crush him like an ant, much less having time even to consider striking back.

I might have bit off more than I can chew.

While there was a real possibility of that, Rory didn't want to throw in the towel that easily. Gritting his teeth, he swept the flag portion of his banner through the air as dozens, then hundreds, of knives appeared, a soft, golden glow emanating from the space they emerged.

Hovering for only a split second, the shot forward like a storm of arrows. The ape attempted to shield itself with its arms, only for the knives to vanish. Confused, the ape lowered its guard.

Only for the knives to suddenly reappear, slamming into the ape's face and exploding like improvised explosives.

A simple trick, Rory had used illusions to briefly block the light reflecting from the knives, making them appear as if they had vanished.

As much as he wished it would be enough, when the smoke cleared, the monster was staring angrily at Rory, its face looking worse for wear but a far cry from dead.

"That sucks," Rory muttered as the ape began to glow green. "Enraged."

Rory's guess was spot on as the ape pounded through the forest after him, speeding up even more. It was all Rory could do to project a tight shield dome around himself as he was launched about like a ping pong ball, the projected shields groaning after only one or two strikes.

I don't think I'm winning this round.

It was a sobering consideration, but Rory accepted it. Things had quickly spiraled out of control -not that they were ever in control- as soon as the ape had begun to glow green.

Time to go…. But first, I don't want to leave without at least some sort of parting gift.

Dragon's Fall was out of the picture, the ape was rampaging far too much for him to lure it into a triple concentric bound circle, and not like Rory had the luxury of time to draw the circles in the first place. Seams Unseen was already being utilized to cut through air resistance; there wasn't much else he could draw from the skill that he wasn't already. His most reliable projection had done little more than piss the ape off enough to start rampaging.

Alright, Architect, time to get creative then.

Projections were most effective when applied to things with which he was intimately familiar. Still, as he had gotten experienced with projection magic over the years, he'd grown able even to project things that he hadn't stored within his Mind Palace, albeit at a heavily reduced efficiency. It was part of how Dragon's Fall worked to begin with; a split-second projection of runes surrounding the secondary ring would enable further shaping of the far more involved and larger projection that was the actual dragon's head itself.

Adapt the principle.

Dragon's Fall was great, but it was too wide-scale and too slow to attempt reliably.

Bow in hand, Rory slowly drew the string back as a green projection began to take form. As it began to take shape, the arrow that had started to manifest appeared like a corkscrewed pole, with a double-pronged point, almost like an oversized staple nail.

As much as Rory wanted to rush the attack, he decided to prolong it, folding and condensing pneuma into a higher grade. The projection was painfully slow, or so it felt to Rory. The reason was apparent, as the twisting pole of faux metal was marked with runes running down the sides, something Rory had never attempted directly in a fight before.

Still retreating, his shield dome nearly destroyed, Rory winced as another strike from the enraged ape battered him aside. Smashing through a tree, Rory felt the dome wavering, the projected shields perhaps one or two hits from shattering entirely, and any further reinforcement would require taking focus from his newest attack, something that wasn't feasible given he was already struggling to maintain the still-forming projection as the addition of runes along it made it damn near impossible to keep stable.

Intent matters.

Reminding himself of the fact, Rory's lips began to move, a thoughtless chant beginning to spill free.

"From my mind, all things imagined."

The ape smashed through several trees, splinters and branches flying everywhere.

"From my body, all paths traveled."

The ape seemed to notice a change, the energies surrounding Rory flaring.

"From my hands, all things may be forged."

The odd, corkscrew-style trident arrow began to form rapidly, the air briefly wavering around it as if its very existence was weighing more heavily on reality.

"From my manifest, universes are born!"

The chant was nothing more than words that came to mind, no specific significance or intent behind the words themselves. Instead, it was the act of chanting, of giving direction, purpose, that empowered Rory's projection. It wasn't even a new idea; most people who had combat skills had learned that by speaking their name out loud, it granted greater strength through or from a skill.

Rory had just never had much reason to bother, owning a grand total of zero combat skills.

As the chant completed, the arrow he had been projecting fully manifested, runes integrated into its very being, as Rory stared at the giant ape, which had briefly backed off, viewing the sudden swell of power as a sign of danger.

Wrong move. Rory snorted as he watched, before finally releasing the arrow.

Projections grew more powerful the more intimately one understood the projection. What Rory had done was to emulate an idea in a new form, rather than a direct one-to-one projection.

And the emulation was of none other than Eia herself, given form in the shape of an arrow, twisted corkscrew body representation of her constricting coils, and pronged arrowhead, a reimagining of her forked tongue.

Flying through the air, a massive twister of whipping green wind rushed forward as the ape slammed its arms down onto the ground. The arrow raced forward, the winds proving little obstruction before piercing straight through. The giant ape had time for only a single moment of surprise before the arrow reached it. Fast as it was, the ape just barely managed to block it with one of its arms, thick as a tree trunk.

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Or attempt to block it. The arrow ripped straight through, tearing the arm off from the elbow down as the massive limb crashed upon the snow-covered ground. Recoiling in pain, the ape grasped the suddenly amputated stub.

And that's my signal to bail out.

As much as he would have loved to admire the damage the attack had caused, Rory could feel his head explode with pain, suddenly unstable on his feet. Dragon's Fall worked as well as it did because it had a multitude of bound circles to help capture and channel a large amount of pneuma. What Rory had just done was instead use himself as the primary source of the power behind that attack, the only way he could against a highly mobile enemy.

Pneuma-wrecked, one hundred percent guaranteed.

If he attempted to drag the fight out any longer, the enraged ape would crush him like a bug; he didn't have anything left in reserve to keep the pace up, whereas the ape had plenty to give, even if it was down an arm.

Reaching into his inventory, Rory whipped out several gems as they exploded, smoke and noise distracting the ape as Rory made a break for it, slapping on a suppression ring onto his ring finger as he ran. Snatching an ossified blood gem from his inventory as well, Rory popped it into his mouth, the small trickle of essence enough to keep him on his feet until he escaped.

The following two or three minutes were tense as Rory half expected the ape to follow him. Still, the suppression ring did its job, masking his presence so that the ape would have had to guess where he was if it wanted to catch up to him. Clad in an aura of self, the inversion effects of the trail were unable to latch on as he soon made it back to his exit. Scrambling up the rock wall, Rory heaved himself through, lying flat on his back as his chest heaved.

"Didn't quite go as planned," Rory huffed.

He'd intended to collect some monster cores if possible. Instead, he had learned a new way to manipulate the concept of 'himself' within his aura to overcome weird, esoteric, reality-altering effects, which was all well and good until a giant ape kicked his ass, only to seal the deal and escape by creating a new form of attack on the fly while also learning the importance of chanting and attack callouts.

"Productive, but in a different way."

Lying flat on his back for a day straight, when Rory finally mustered the strength to shuffle his way back to the main workshop, he found himself grumbling the entire way.

"Needed to nab some cores."

Aside from the boss of the trial, the monsters within had only been tier-six; they had been fodder for learning more than actual threats. Hell, Rory wasn't sure if they were even real, or if that space that the trial occupied was even real.

Trials are weird, man.

Valuable lessons had been learned, but ultimately, he'd made no progress regarding his actual goal.

Somewhat annoyed, Rory finally returned, only to pause as he considered a sight before him.

"I don't suppose those appeared out of thin air," Rory questioned, turning to look at the nascent elemental that was currently floating on its back within the magma whirlpool, like a retired father lounging in a lazy river.

The elemental waved its nubs, vaguely in what Rory assumed was meant to be an emulation of something long.

"So, Eia dropped off some monster cores. Very damn convenient."

Monster cores weren't something Eia had much use for. As far as Rory understood, they were dense with energy but also highly nauseating to Eia. Attempting to 'digest' the cores filled with the traces of foreign monsters left a bad 'taste.'

Or so Eia communicated, Rory himself was in no rush to take a bite out of a monster core.

Rather than force herself to digest them, Eia instead made it clear she'd rather leave the cores to Rory, who could use them just as effectively.

"An extra three cores… Yeah, probably enough."

Rory actually had no idea if it was enough, but if it saved him from having to go on another side quest, he would take it.

Now that he had cores to work with, Rory found himself momentarily stumped.

So…. How to best begin?

The idea was to remove all traces of the former monster the core had belonged to from the core itself. It was easier said than done, as even a single echo of those traces would disrupt his plan to refine the core into something more than just a monster core.

The problem wasn't that Rory had no idea whatsoever; it was that he wasn't sure which route he preferred.

"Alchemy, at the very least," Rory muttered to himself. "It's probably the best bet."

Thinking about how best to continue, Rory found himself debating between two schools of thought. First, the idea of 'acid removal' using a brew concocted to harness the concepts of acid, he would bathe the core in said brew to burn away all lingering conceptual traces. The other school of thought was to 'burn' away those same concepts, purification through flame. The benefit of that school of thought was that, as far as fire and magma went, Rory was in no short supply.

Great, so I've got the concepts of ideas. Now what?

Thus was the problem with always being at the cutting edge; ideas had to be made up on the spot more often than not.

Concocting the brew would require the use of his Alchemical Chemistry skill, but applying it correctly would lean on Alchemical Transmutation.

"The idea is conceptual reduction at the core of it all. If magma functions like Liquid Fire, it's probably cationic in nature. Going to need an abundance of anionic ingredients if that's the case."

Mumbling to himself, Rory snatched a notebook from his inventory, jotting down thoughts. He could have easily kept track of things purely in his mind, but there wasn't anything quite like taking notes the old-fashioned way.

"Now, suppose I were to take some ash, and test for signs of anionic properties. If that were the case, I'd have one method of balancing the overall nature of the brew. That said, I'll also need ingredients with elements that could be used for the actual conceptual reduction process…"

Zoey was, for once, not annoyed.

That was partially because she had vented a good deal of her annoyance as she had traveled between nearby delves and even a trial, punching monsters in the face where she could, running away where she couldn't. She had even managed to replace the worst of her armor so that she no longer looked like she was one hard fight away from being in rags.

Seated atop a dead oversized moth -it had the nerve to attack her when she'd just finished clearing a two-floor delve- Zoey had time to think.

What should I do?

Zoey wasn't sure how long it had been since she'd had her scuffle with the Architect. Still, she had reasonably assumed it had been a decent while, at the very least a few months.

Should I return for round two?

She wasn't actually sure if the Architect was still on the same volcanic island, but at the very least, it was a good place to start.

I could try to lure him out by getting the jump on his snake again.

It wasn't a terrible idea, but it wasn't one that Zoey was super fond of. She wasn't trying to make an enemy of the man. A rival? Perhaps, but that was a given based on everything Aelia had told them. With that said, she would prefer if after she kicked his ass, if they could have a somewhat amicable relationship.

Scratching at the back of her neck roughly, Zoey groaned.

"Uck. Seriously, messed up big time with that first impression."

The fact that he wasn't an alien also meant that he was from Earth. Not too surprising, given most of the founders were humans, but it was nice that the first fellow founder she had met was also human.

"So, I return, track him down, kick his ass a bit, then explain I'm not trying to start a blood feud. That seems acceptable enough, right?"

Her only audience member, the dead moth she was seated upon, luckily did not respond.

"I know not to take him lightly this time around. I'll feel things out for a bit, use my durability to see if he has any new tricks, then I'll hammer him right after. Probably best to avoid standing in one place or not paying attention to what's underfoot, I'd rather not have a meteor dropped on me again."

Their battle had forced Zoey to consider a few things she hadn't before, trusting far too much in her durability. It was one thing for a mid or high-tier seven monster to overwhelm her durability, but for someone of the same general level, punching through had been a wake-up call. Also, just the way he had summoned that meteor, she was reasonably sure that it hadn't been from some skill.

Gifted with that knowledge that perhaps she had been limiting herself, over the last… however long it had been, Zoey had been pushing herself, forcing herself to learn and rely less on her combat skills.

She hadn't had some grand epiphany in that time, but ironically, it had earned her a new combat skill entirely.

Strong Counter

Rarity: Uncommon. Skill Level: Low.

The best defense is one that opens an opponent to attack opportunities. Builds attack potential the longer you go without being struck inopportunely. Loses attack momentum if damaged by an unaccounted attack or removing oneself from direct conflict.

The skill had been a result of forcing herself to fight with greater patience and attempting to teach herself ways to overcome her more glaring shortcomings. It wasn't some mighty skill in the grand scheme of things. Still, it did allow her to deliver some powerful hits even while in her durability 'form' that she preferred to start a fight from. If there was one thing she had noted about the Architect, it was that from a physical attribute standpoint, they didn't seem to stand out in any meaningful way. Sure, a surprise hit had the kinetic energy needed to toss her flying, but that didn't mean it had inflicted any real damage she couldn't recover from in a second or two. He was fast, but there was something about it that felt artificial, a 'weightless' aspect that seemed to accompany the sudden speed. His durability wasn't awful, or at the very least, he didn't crumple like cardboard. Still, not awful and good were two very different things, and Zoey felt confident that if not for his armor, only a few of her attribute-inverted strikes would drop him like a sack of potatoes.

It was her fight to win; she was sure of it.

But.

But Zoey was an adrenaline junkie, not an idiot. She wasn't about to rush off this very second and attempt to search him out. She would take her time, polish herself up a bit, and then search for the man.

And maybe then, I can finally get out of here.

It was something that had occurred to Zoey sometime after their initial conflict, and part of the reason she wanted to avoid making a true enemy of the man. She needed him to help her willingly, if possible.

Because while she couldn't fix her Horizon Mirror, somebody called the Architect could.

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