Ridcully's Fall
It was by now about the 6th clash with the Bloodthirster. His foes now consisted entirely of collar-blessed daemons, the rest had fallen to pyroclasms, assassinations and banishment. He was near out of tricks and surprises to play against Ashstrider as the Daemon hunted for him over and over again. Evade and play a sniper duel.
Charge Ashstrider, take him by surprise. Apply unhealthy and borderline insane levels of Choir-assisted Biomatic Enhancement to match him in combat. Decoy Ridcullies from willing volunteers subjected to intense Telepathy. Fractional c telekinetic assaults, made possible with phasing. - He was out of cards to use.
His body would mutate into a fleshy mess if he pushed Biomancy further, charging would not work without the surprise factor, without divination Sniping would be insufficient to injure Ashstrider, he was wise to the false Ridcullies who earnestly believed themselves so (and were dead), the Telekinetics and Daemonologists were exhausted and spent. And now Ashstrider came again, hunting for him once more.
Long past desperate ploys, Ridcully was reduced to standard biomatic enhancement, combat-farseeing Ashstrider (his talents still allowed vision against even the bloody collar, at the very least), telekinetically enhancing the Force-Staff while pouring power through it as he swung against the Bloodthirster's Axe, ensuring barely passable parries as the Daemon applied Daemonic strength and speed to drive Ridcully to corners and exhaustion. He was Blinking and Phasing far more than he liked, sustaining at least four different powers to the highest degree he could manage, mentally and spiritually draining to use in an extended fight and utterly vital for him to simply
lose slower.
The axe cut clean through the wall of the building Ridcully had phased into, slowed enough that Ridcully dodged. Then it came again, and he deflected, turning momentum into movement away from the creature, phasing through several more buildings. In seconds Ashstrider closed the newly-made distance, smashing onto ground and making an aerial cut as the Seer jumped back to avoid. This time Ridcully pushed his own body with Telekinesis, charging to land a strike with Force Staff, acceleration pushing blood from brain to legs, his consciousness maintained with biomatic maintenance.
A strike with Force-Staff with all of Ridcully's psychic might behind it would destroy many creatures. For Ashstrider, the blow was but a moderate injury, laughing mad. The Seer took it worse, bones cracking and muscles tearing from the sheer power exerted into that single strike, still so insufficient. Yet he had no time to rest or regenerate, again another blow and another blow and another from Ashstrider came, relentless and unceasing. Once again, he forced injured, tired arms to answer daemonic blows, moving more by forcing Telekinesis on himself than through any biomatically augmented bodily capability.
In fact the biomancy was barely enough to prevent Ridcully's rampant telekinetic abuse of his body from breaking apart. A mortal body would fleshy pulp already. Ridcully could hear his bones crack and snap under exertion as he added a crude biomancy healing to blindly reconnect tendons and bones. If he lived his mess of a body could be fixed, if he died it didn't matter. And all the while Ashstrider seemed to be stepping his pace even more, the Seer even more drained and exhausted.
Every human has their limit. Even psykers possess them. For Ridcully, it came when, exhausted and still having to maintain five different powers, the Bloodthirster came down on him again with another blow he could not answer by physically parrying or dodging. Blinking back, he evaded this one - And a backhand sent him crashing onto the ground. Immediately following up with a bifurcating swing to divide the Seer in two, Ridcully saw his impending doom, and pushed all his power to countering the single stroke of death, his soul screaming in protest.
And that blow, he countered. Through pure force and total desperation, he survived. He had drawn too deep to simply achieve survival, his body bleeding now bleeding profusely as he still tried to manage the injury while utterly spent, a hypovolemic shock ending his consciousness. Already he should be dead, but the unconscious Ridcully managed a forceful animation of the mind, neurons forced to stay in existence by will to live. He did not see Kurrun charge his dying body with glee, one answered by the Academy Guard making a suicidal countercharge.
So devoted were they to protect their charge that they used their own bodies as shield, clutching axe to their own split bodies, rigor mortis and strength of flesh buying precious seconds. Suicidal point-blank grenade explosions came by without regard of their own survival, a desperate heroism that somehow
pushed the honored bloodthirster back by sheer ferocity of their defense as reinforcements came, making willing sacrifices of themselves to protect the Headmaster, sacrifices the High Grandmaster himself would have balked at. But, shedding their own lives with abandon, they would buy Ridcully's survival today.
Ridcully, unconscious, did not see any of this. But he felt it.
AN: This should take place between this
omake and this
omake.
@Durin
