He landed on the ground and leaped away, leaving behind a crater of his own. Crystals still fell from the sky, seeking him, but he hurled himself after the lightning artist. The clawed sword-artist followed him in another silver blur of speed.
The lightning eagle had gathered up a powerful Striker technique, but she was vulnerable while using it. Then again, she would know that and account for it.
Dross had given Lindon a deeper understanding of these three. The Chief Guardians of Dreadnought City were ancient Archlords, each with a rich history of battles won and lost.
In experience, he couldn’t compare. They would be far more skilled than he was. Even if he could outmatch them in raw power, he would be hard-pressed to defeat any one of them in a fair fight.
But he had unfair advantages.
[She will have Forged spirits to defend her while she is vulnerable. They are only a distraction. The Remnant covering her conceals armor that makes her as tough as a Herald. But it has a flaw.]
Dross knew very little about these Chief Guardians from his own experience, but Emriss knew everything about them. And she shared.
When dozens of crackling lightning-sparrows spread out from the Archlady, Lindon drilled a bar of Blackflame through her stomach.
Her Striker technique dispersed, as did the Remnant covering her. The woman beneath was revealed, an older dark-skinned woman wearing a surprised expression. Her breastplate joined to her armored belt, but there was a weakness at the joint, and he had struck it dead-on.
She was only visible for a moment. She restored her Remnant a moment later and flew away on lightning wings, greatly weakened.
Lindon was relieved. He had been worried, coming here, that the Silent King would throw his drones away in waves to strike a single blow on Lindon. A rain of harmless Striker techniques from mind-controlled citizens still landed on Lindon or burst in the air, but Lindon wasn’t bothered.
As long as the Silent King didn’t put him in a position where he had to kill people who were being moved like helpless puppets, Lindon was happy.
[It’s enough to make one wonder,] Dross whispered, [why isn’t he doing that?]
Lindon supposed that the Dreadgod wanted slaves more than victory, but he didn’t have long to think. The sword-artist was next, and Lindon acted on Dross’ instruction.
He moved so that the Forged sapphire crystals were blasting toward the silver Archlady instead of him. The blue-crystal Archlord unraveled the technique before his ally was harmed, which lessened the pressure on Lindon.
Allowing him to send Wavedancer against the sword-artist. The sword clashed against one claw, then the other claw tore apart his dragon’s breath and the Archlady leaped at him. He dashed backwards.
They exchanged dozens of techniques in a second, flashing lines of madra slicing through buildings or lancing into the sky. Lindon crashed through a stone wall to dodge, hurled a metal carriage one-handed into the sky to intercept an exploding crystal, and burned a hole through the street to attack the sword-artist, who was trying to reach him from underground.
Dross couldn’t project an illusion into their minds while the Silent King controlled them. The Dreadgod of dreams would squash him like a wagon wheel rolling over a snake. But without that distraction, any Sage working that Lindon tried would be broken by the force of their combined willpower.
[Transfer construct,] Dross whispered. [Fifteen feet above us. The time has come to unleash ourselves.]
Lindon sent Wavedancer blasting through a Forged crystal overhead, spun around, and raised both hands. He sent Blackflame pouring through his palms. The madra obeyed him with only a thought, erupting into dark liquid flame that blasted into empty air.
But it wasn’t empty for long.
An instant later, the sword-artist appeared in the path of his Striker technique. Just as predicted.
Her silver Remnant carapace was struck full-force, and she shot backwards, blasting through another tall building.
She flew like a shooting star trailing black fire, propelled by dragon’s breath to smash through several walls. When she was out of the city limits, Lindon could see through a hole in three buildings that stared up at the corrupted white sky.
[He has prepared his next technique,] Dross reported. The stones of the street surged upwards like a sudden, razor-sharp wave. Lindon had already leaped onto a Thousand-Mile Cloud, flying toward the earth artist with the crystalline techniques.
Real stones flew at him from below as Forged ones crashed down from above, but Dross showed him the shifting path he could follow to his opponent. The Archlord covered in angular blue crystal, like a variant of the Akura armor with a pyramid over his head, shifted to face Lindon.