"CHASE! COME ON! CLASS IS OVER!" Bo screamed in my ear. I opened my eyes and turned to look at Bo.
"OW!" I yelled back and covered my ears. I glared at Bo, who was smiling devilishly at me.
"Class is over." He said again quietly.
"I heard you…!" I growled, then uncrowded my legs and got down from the table. Bo scurried down and grabbed his backpack. "So we can leave?"
"Yeah. The guardsmen at the front desk said we could all leave. Everyone else had already left. I was trying for a few minutes to wake you up." Bo explained. I frowned and started up the stairs towards the door.
"I wasn't asleep. I was talking with my evos inside my crystal." I said.
"Oh! So you were inside that station looking place." Bo said from close behind me. I opened the door and headed toward the front door.
"Yeah. I was using body modification to help heal that divine gold qolitz I got from the evo fights." I said.
"That's the thing you did in order to make Alpa'nagia and Grimm-Guard the overpowered monsters that they are?" Bo asked. I frowned at Bo as I pushed the door to the tower open and stepped outside.
"I wouldn't call them monsters…" I grumbled.
"That's because you're an American…" Bo sighed.
***
As Bo and I walked into the lab, I heard a loud alarm screeching throughout the building. The alarm sounded familiar, but I couldn't remember why. Bo and I both covered our ears to try to muffle the sound.
"What's that?" Bo asked.
"A containment alarm, you hear them in techno-splicing factory when a…" I froze mid-sentence as I suddenly remember why it sounded familiar.
[BOSS! MOVE!] Bone-lasher screamed in my head. I grabbed Bo and leaped forward a split second before something crashed into the ground where we both were. I didn't stop moving as we were by the door to the lab and very vulnerable to more attacks.
"Ahhhhhhh!" Bo screamed. "Evo behind us!"
I channeled volt attribute mana throughout my body and jumped high into the air just in time to dodge another attack by whatever evo was chasing us. Switching to float attribute mana, I spun around to look at what was chasing us.
"The primordial!" I yelled. The primordial looked up at me and Bo with azure feline eyes. A crystalline structure shot out from my crystal and landed on top of a nearby shelf, and Bone-lasher emerged from it and let out a ferocious roar.
The primordial looked up at Bone-lasher and licked its massive saber canines and crouched to a predatory stance.
"Ah…a worthy challenge…" The primordial said in a soft and hard voice.
"It can talk!" Bo exclaimed.
"Bone-Lasher, keep it busy!" I ordered.
[Happily!] Bone-lasher growled then leaped at the primordial.
I channeled blast attribute mana into my legs. I propelled Bo and I to the lab's front door then tossed him through it and stopped channeling mana.
"Head home now and get Sin!" I told him. Bo shook his head and started to run towards the door.
"I can help you!" He yelled.
"Go get Sin! NOW!" I roared, causing Bo to skid to a stop. I summoned Alpa'nagia and flung his structure behind Bo. "Take Bo home and get Sin!"
"Yes, Star Shaper!" Alpa'nagia replied and quickly snatched Bo up and then shot into the sky and flew off towards the shop. I turned slammed the door closed, then raced through the lab, following the sounds of fighting.
I reached the storage area of the laboratory when I heard Bone-lasher's pain scream echoing through the building. I looked up in time to Bone-lasher fly into one of the shelves in the aisle in front of me, then fell to the ground in a wet, bloody thud.
"BONE!" I screamed and raced to him.
[BOSS NO! STAY BACK!] Bone-lasher roared through the mental link as he struggled to stand. His body was covered in multiple deep gaping gashes that were bleeding heavily. The most worrisome of them was a long gang that ran the length of his belly.
I heard a loud thundering roar as the primordial landed on top of Bone-lasher's back, knocking back down and making Bone-lasher howl in pain.
"BONE!" I roared as I channeled volt and blast attribute mana into my legs and dashed towards the primordial. A sonic boom reverberated behind me as I flew towards the evo and punched it in the gut as hard as I could.
The primordial went flying. It rolled across the floor, rag dulling a few times before righting itself and slamming its claws into the concrete. They screeched across the ground as he slid to a stop, more than fifty yards away. The primordial looked up at me and licked its fangs.
"Strong…" The primordial said with an amused tone. I kept an eye on it as I placed a hand on Bone-lasher.
"Heal up! I'll handle this!" I said as I started to recall him.
[BOSS NO! I CAN…!] Bone-lasher pleaded, but I interrupted.
"That wasn't a request! You're hurt, so sit back and heal!" I snapped.
[Yes boss…] Bone-lasher replied sorrowfully. His head dropped slightly before he was fully recalled back to my crystal.
While I never took my eyes off the primordial, my attention wavered a bit as I conversed with Bone-lasher. The primordial didn't take that opportunity to attack me. Instead, he watched me like a toddler intrigued by something new. The two of us stood still as statues for several moments as if a single twitch would break the calm before the storm. The primordial was the first to move, I readied myself for a frenzied attack. However, the primordial only stood to full height.
"I see…you are the one called a splicer…" The primordial said calmly.
"A very pissed one." I said sternly. "Why did you attack us?"
"Because you were there and awake, and I couldn't use the others in that darkness as practice while they slept." The primordial said in a matter of fact voice. "I expected that Bone-lasher to be stronger. Sadly, he's weak trash."
"Trash!" I hissed. The primordial cocked his head from one side to the other, then let out a huffing breath.
"That voice…the voice in the darkness…you're my creator." The primordial said. His eyes scanned me with an intense gaze, and then he let out a dismissive hiss. "I expected you to be larger. Stronger looking, your voice sounded so commanding in the darkness. You're just a skinny whelp. I was prepared to follow the glorious orders of a strong creator, and I will not stand a weakling as my master!"
The primordial lunged at me with its claws outstretched and fangs bared. I channeled freeze attribute mana into my right foot and stomped it on the ground, a wave of ice speed across the ground in front of me, and a wall of ice shot up from the ground suddenly. I stepped to the side and watched as the primordial slipped and slid straight into the wall, crashing through it and tumbling several yards down the aisle.
I didn't give it a chance to recover and popped my claws and channeled volt attribute mana into them then fired a lightning bolt at the primordial hitting it square in the chest and sending him flying back another couple dozen yards.
That lightning bolt was stronger and more concentrated than the ones I fired from my hands as it was fired between my two claws.
As such, it did more than just shock the primordial. The smell of burnt flesh and fur filled the air. As the primordial struggled to stand, I saw a large burn wound on its chest and embers dancing in its fur. I started to take a step towards it when I felt a wave of energy start to pour out of the primordial.
The signature felt familiar, and as I watched the burn on the evo's chest, he started to heal in front of my eyes. The skin and fur grew back in a matter of seconds, and the primordial looked at me with cocky eyes as he dashed towards me again. However, instead of running in a straight line, it jumped from one shelf to next, moving at blinding speed.
I barely had enough time to rest as it jumped from one last shelf to one of the ceiling supports and used it as a kickboard to propel himself down and slashed down. His aim was for my head, but by jumping back at the last second, the attack missed but not completely. His claws caught my left arm, severing it from just above the elbow.
Before I could scream the primordial spun on his heel and backhanded me so hard, I saw stars. I was sent flying through the aisle, tumbling back. I didn't even know how far until I slid to a stop and crashed into the shelf.
"WEAK!" The primordial roared then stalked towards me.
[MY LORD!]
[PRETENDER!]
[STAR BOSS!]
[BOSS!]
[STAR SHAPER!]
I could hear my evos all screaming inside my my head and feel Bone-lasher, Grimm-Guard, Empress, and Fours all struggling to get out of my crystal. Something was holding them back like chains, keeping them locked inside their biomes. I pushed myself to a seated position and looked down at my arm.
"SUCH WEAKNESS!" The primordial roared as he neared me. "To imagine such a weak individual could produce such a powerful creation such as myself and to then think a lesser creature could contain me!"
'My arm….he cut off my arm…wait…lesser creature….LESSER!' I thought as what was keeping my evos inside my crystal suddenly became clear. IT. WAS. RAGE! Pure and simple.
The moment I realized that I felt a rush of energy and power coming from seemingly everywhere. My farm crystal glowed a bright red color as I stood and locked eyes with the primordial who had stopped when he noticed the glow.
"How…fucking dare you!" I growled in a low and gravelly tone so sharp it cut through the laboratory and made the primordial flinch and silenced the overlapping voices of my evos. "You! A whelp that's been alive all of fifteen minutes is going to tell me I'm weak! To say that an evo that's seen more death and bloodshed in the first five minutes of his life than you will in your entire life is weak! Bone-lasher has survived a hell that you can't even begin to fathom in the microscopic viewpoint that you have of this world! The only reason you are alive right now is because I told him to hold you off and not kill you…!"
As I spoke the energy, I felt coming from everywhere, collected in my crystal, and then turned into mana. That mana went straight to my left arm and started healing and regrowing the missing limb. In a matter of seconds, bone, muscle, cartilage, and spine grew back, making my arm whole as if it had never been injured. Scared by this, the primordial took several steps back.
"…since you seem to think that me and my evos are weak, we'll have to change your worldview a little! BONE-LASHER!" I roared.
Bone-lasher's crystalline structure shot from my crystal and landed in front of me. Bone-lasher erupted from the structure with his wounds only mostly healed.
The red light in my farm crystal glowed brightly, and tendrils of red mana shot from my crystal and enveloped Bone-lasher. The wounds and scars that covered his body hissed and steamed as they healed and closed. Bone-lasher shook and growled as black rocks started sticking out of his skin around his head and lower jaw. The same rock sprouted from his from paws, around his back fin, and tail fin.
The rock smoothed out aroud his head like armor, becoming jagged and sharp around his mouth like a second jaw. The stone around his paws became sharp, jagged, and curved into razor-sharp claws. The stone on his back fin covered the whole fin and curved like a sickle, then spread to cover most of his back. The stone on his tail fin curved into a sharp scythe shape and covered the while length of the tail in overlapping plated that connected with the stone in its back. The stone armor now complete Bone-lasher reared his head back and let loose a thundering roar as purple thrums of energy pulsed through the black rock armor.
"BONE-LASHER! FUCK! HIM! UP!" I roared as the tendrils of red mana dissipated. Bone-lasher took a predatory stance, and his rock armor bristled and spiked like a cat's fur.
"YES, BOSS!" He roared.