Ascension of the Primalist [A Tamer Class, LitRPG]

"That's the most ridiculous plan you've ever suggested," Elena whispered as she shook her head. "If my timing is off by even a single second, or if they possess some spell that can shatter the ice, we'll get killed in a matter of seconds."

Seth adjusted his stance, eyes locked on the shimmering blue spirits patrolling the cavern. "You told me yourself that no Silver-tier should be able to get through your spell. As for the timing, I trust you. Worst-case scenario, I'll buy enough time for both of us to trigger our Escape Scrolls and leave this place."

Elena let out a sharp breath. "Fine. But if I die, I'm going to haunt you for the rest of eternity."

"I'd die first, but sure," Seth answered, a small, confident smirk playing on his lips. "Now let's go."

He didn't wait for her to reply before he paused Illusionary Emptiness and lunged out of the tunnel's shadow, boots kicking up crystalline dust as he sprinted toward the center of the ice village.

The reaction was instantaneous. Several Astral Wraiths let out discordant, metallic shrieks, their featureless faces snapping toward him. Almost ten of them detached from their patrols, gliding across the cave like cerulean streaks of lightning as they gave chase.

Seth pivoted on his heel so he could race back toward the narrow entrance of the tunnel, the high-pitched hum of the pursuing Wraiths growing louder behind him.

"Now!" Seth roared upon crossing the threshold.

He felt the sudden, massive surge of Ice aether behind him. The ground groaned as a towering wall of translucent, jagged frost erupted from the floor, sealing the tunnel entrance with a violent thud. Three of the chasing Astral Wraiths had managed to slip through the gap just before the barrier reached the ceiling, effectively cutting them off from the rest of the hive.

Seth smiled. "Perfect!"

Not wasting a second, both teardrops of his necklace flared. Colossus manifested in the cramped space and unleashed a Chitinous Taunt. The compulsion ripple slammed into the three trapped Wraiths and forced them to focus their erratic aetheric blades and lances on the scorpion's shell, now reinforced by Desert Aegis and Quartz Armor.

Almost simultaneously, Nightmare materialized beside Seth, dark, corrosive smoke already dripping from his maw. Seth didn't hesitate, and the shadowy blades of Dusk Scythes appeared as he lunged forward.

Astral Wraith

Potential: Silver Tier

Rank: 53 (High-Iron)

Affinity: -

Strength: 103

Arcane Power: 139

Toughness: 90

Well Capacity: 99

Agility: 130

Regeneration: 77

Astral Wraith

Potential: Silver Tier

Rank: 55 (High-Iron)

Affinity: -

Strength: 104

Arcane Power: 144

Toughness: 91

Well Capacity: 101

Agility: 136

Regeneration: 79

Astral Wraith

Potential: Silver Tier

Rank: 66 (Low-Silver)

Affinity: -

Strength: 184

Arcane Power: 204

Toughness: 131

Well Capacity: 181

Agility: 196

Regeneration: 159

The Ice Wall behind Seth shuddered, the translucent surface spiderwebbing with cracks as a barrage of aetheric spells hammered it from the other side. He braced himself, expecting the thing to shatter under the collective weight of the attacks, but it held.

Seth allowed a smile to cross his face. "Great!"

With only forty-five seconds before the wall dissolved, there was no room for hesitation. Seth and Nightmare rushed forward like twin shadows, focusing their initial assault on the two Iron-Tiered Astral Wraiths. The creatures tried to weave through the narrow space, though Colossus' taunt left them barely any chance.

Nightmare's Gloom Fangs tore through the first entity's flickering torso, the corrosive darkness unraveling its aetheric structure in seconds. Simultaneously, Seth lashed at the second Iron Wraith with a flurry of strikes and used Dusk Scythes to shear through its core with surgical precision.

Elena stood farther back, her staff glowing with a fierce blue light. She unleashed a wave of absolute-zero frost that slowed the remaining Silver wraith before trapping its legs in a cage of ice, even as it struggled to break through Colossus' defense.

Seth and Nightmare joined him an instant later. The direwolf leapt through the air and buried his fangs into the Silver wraith's back. The creature screeched in pain, and Colossus seized the opening to launch a Scorpion Charge and stun it. He followed up by injecting a concentrated dose of venom into its aetheric form to sap away some of its defense.

Elena didn't miss that window and summoned a jagged ice lance that whistled through the air. The spell pierced the entity's chest and anchored it to the frozen floor. Seth blurred forward and with a final, violent arc of his scythes, he severed the creature's head.

The blue light of the spirit dissolved, scattering into harmless motes.

A heartbeat later, the dark aether of the Dusk Scythes flickered and vanished from Seth's arms as the spell's timer expired.

Ten seconds until the wall dissolved, Seth thought, moving back Nightmare and Colossus into the teardrops' pocket-realm.

He turned to Elena. "Let's disappear."

The noblewoman nodded and activated Professor Reat's Vanishing Pocket Watch. Her body blurred into the surrounding blue shadows until she was entirely gone as Seth himself phased into Illusionary Emptiness. They then both backed away from the entrance while hugging the tunnel's sides.

Right on cue, Elena's Ice Wall reached its breaking point. It first began to groan, then the structure turned into a slushy slurry before shattering into a thousand crystalline shards. Half a dozen Astral Wraiths surged into the tunnel in a chaotic swarm, their featureless faces glowing with a deep anger.

The creatures halted, confused.

Their aetheric gazes searched every corner of the dark tunnel, scanning for Seth and Elena, who had slain their kin. Seth prepared himself to protect her, half expecting a blind barrage of attacks to flood the passage and force them out.

But it never came.

After a moment, the Astral Wraiths turned—and drifted away.

The moment the creatures disappeared in the distance, Seth and Elena shimmered back into sight.

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Nightmare's voice rumbled from Seth's necklace: "When arcane beasts are this dumb, it makes me feel ashamed of being one of them."

Elena let out a soft chuckle, and Seth also found himself smiling, though his eyes remained fixed on the cavern entrance. The direwolf had been linked to him since he was a pup, so it had caused the direwolf to think more like a human than a wild beast most of the time.

"They have a singular focus," Seth said, adjusting his gauntlets. "But I doubt they'll be fooled like that every time. If we do this repeatedly, they'll realize we're using some form of concealment. They might start blindly throwing spells into the whole tunnel just to kill us."

"Then should we change tactics right away?" Elena asked.

Seth shook his head. "No. Let's try it once more. If they adapt, we'll switch tactics after."

They managed to recreate the Ice Wall bottleneck, trapping another trio of Astral Wraiths—but not without cost. A volley of blind spells, just as Seth had expected, nearly tore them apart in the process. The tactic now burned, Seth and Elena adapted.

The next few hours became a lesson in pure guerrilla warfare.

Using Illusionary Emptiness, Seth and Nightmare moved through the shadows, hunting the outskirts of the "village." Isolated patrollers disappeared one by one. Seth would emerge from nothingness, his Dusk Scythes delivering a flurry of lethal strikes before Nightmare followed with Gloom Fangs to finish them.

Then both of them were gone.

The moment the kill was confirmed, they would vanish, leaving nothing in their wake.

Before long, the once bustling cavern grew hollow—its eerie silence stretching louder than any battle cry.

Seth and Elena crouched behind a massive, translucent stalagmite, peering toward the center of the sanctum. The vast majority of the Astral Wraiths had been slain, leaving only five of them left. The problem lay in their positioning; the survivors—two Irons and three Silvers—had now gathered in a tight, protective circle directly around the Ice Tulip.

"Three Silvers at once," Elena murmured, her breath hitching. "Even with Colossus, that's a lot of offensive pressure to handle in an open space."

Seth's gaze moved to the glowing Copper Seed. "We'll be fine."

Elena reached out, her fingers brushing his sleeve. "No need to take such a risk. We should just wait until their vigilance wavers. Eventually, they'll have to shift their formation, and then we can ambush one or two more."

Seth shook his head. "We can't afford to wait. We don't know how long the absorption process will take you." He tightened his fists inside his gauntlets. "I'm going to use my rage spell. It should provide enough raw power to take them head-on."

Elena hesitated before finally giving him a sharp nod. "Fine, but please be careful while in the melee."

As Seth looked at her—at the concern in her emerald eyes—something in his core surged. The memory of the skirmishes against the empire flashed through his mind: the sight of the Rogue holding his dagger at her throat, the cold dread of seeing her nearly killed while he was too far away to intervene.

His heart began to crash against his ribs.

A realization followed just as fast, and his jaw tightened. "I'm going to try something," he told Elena. "Be ready to move the moment I go."

He seized that rising tide of protective anger and fed it into his core before forcing aether out of his Well and into the deep, structural grooves of Beastmaster Rage.

The energy slammed against the limits of the spell's channels, forcing them wider with brutal, searing heat. Pain tore through his chest, sharp and blinding, enough to make any sane Wielder stop.

Seth leaned into it.

To him, the pain was merely fuel. It fed the helplessness he felt at the thought of failing her—of failing someone he cared about. He pushed harder, molding the very architecture of the spell with the fire of his will.

Beastmaster Rage flared with a primal might more intense than before, and a dark, crimson veil fell over his field of vision.

Without wasting a single second, Seth surged out from behind the stalagmite.

Though still shrouded in Illusionary Emptiness, the sheer velocity of Seth's movement created a blurry distortion in the air that immediately drew the gaze of the five guardians.

Astral Wraith

Potential: Silver Tier

Rank: 53 (High-Iron)

Affinity: -

Strength: 100

Arcane Power: 137

Toughness: 91

Well Capacity: 101

Agility: 123

Regeneration: 82

Astral Wraith

Potential: Silver Tier

Rank: 52 (High-Iron)

Affinity: -

Strength: 92

Arcane Power: 137

Toughness: 94

Well Capacity: 98

Agility: 128

Regeneration: 85

Astral Wraith

Potential: Silver Tier

Rank: 61 (Low-Silver)

Affinity: -

Strength: 174

Arcane Power: 224

Toughness: 120

Well Capacity: 161

Agility: 187

Regeneration: 139

Astral Wraith

Potential: Silver Tier

Rank: 66 (Low-Silver)

Affinity: -

Strength: 184

Arcane Power: 204

Toughness: 131

Well Capacity: 181

Agility: 196

Regeneration: 159

Astral Wraith

Potential: Silver Tier

Rank: 82 (Mid-Silver)

Affinity: -

Strength: 184

Arcane Power: 254

Toughness: 141

Well Capacity: 231

Agility: 216

Regeneration: 189

The highest-Ranked Astral Wraith reacted with terrifying speed. It didn't manifest a blade or a lance like all the others had and instead summoned a longbow of pure, blinding aether. It drew back the shimmering string and loosed an arrow of concentrated energy that hissed through the freezing air. Seth sidestepped the projectile by a hair's breadth, the heat of the arrow singeing his face as he lunged into the center of their formation.

The teardrop necklace at his neck pulsed with a blinding golden light, and Colossus erupted next to him.

Chitinous Taunt exited the scorpion's mandibles and reverberated through the cavern, seizing the attention of all three Silvers and forcing their attack toward him.

Nightmare pounced next, his fur bristling with the crimson aura of the enhanced Beastmaster Rage. The direwolf cast his still-evolving Mantle of Terror, and just like it had in the past, the ghostly wolf head appeared far larger and more malevolent under the rage spell. The following roar physically startled the Astral Wraiths.

Nightmare then vanished with Shadow Step to materialize behind one of the Iron-Tier foes. His jaws clamped shut, dark smoke eating through the entity's midsection and scattering some of its body into the cave's breeze.

Seth didn't slow down. He summoned Dusk Scythes, and the shadowy blades extended two feet from his forearms as he pivoted toward the second Iron Astral Wraith.

In three savage slashes, the creature was reduced to nothing but fading sparks—his hundred-and-eighty Strength and sixty Toughness penetration had turned the humanoid beast into a Copper opponent Seth could crush without any real effort.

With both Iron Wraiths neutralized, Seth lunged toward the three Silver ones, which were currently bogged down in a desperate struggle against Colossus, who had anchored himself in a defensive layer of Quartz Armor, Desert Aegis, and Explosive Bastion. The scorpion didn't miss the opportunity to poison all three of his opponents.

Just as Seth was about to leap into the fray, the bow-wielding Astral Wraith let out a piercing, dissonant chime that shattered the mental tether of the Chitinous Taunt. It glided backward with a weightless grace, its aether bow shimmering as it prepared to rain destruction from a distance.

Elena reacted instantly. She slammed the base of her staff into the cave floor and a cage of thick, frosted bars erupted from the ground to encase the retreating enemy. Seth rushed the trapped creature, his crimson-tinged aura trailing behind him like a bloody mist.

The Astral Wraith loosed two arrows of pure aether in rapid succession; Seth twisted his body mid-stride, the projectiles humming past his ribs to shatter against a distant pillar. He reached the cage and lashed out with his scythes. The creature manifested a shimmering plate of aetheric armor to block the strike, yet Seth's enhanced Strength and the penetration of his blades tore through the defense without issue.

Sensing its imminent doom, the creature's form flickered and vanished. It reappeared twenty feet away.

"As if I'll let you flee!" Seth roared.

He immediately switched the bond of Share from Illusionary Emptiness to Shadow Step, then he leapt out of the creature's shadow. In a flash, he unleashed another flurry of half a dozen slashes. The dark blades on his arms sizzled as they carved through the creature's bright torso. The Astral Wraith screeched in pain, then its body pulsed with a fierce force as it began to channel a desperate spell.

Seth didn't give it the chance to finish and activated his nameless Null-aura spell.

The starving energy burst outward, devouring every trace of aether it touched. The Astral Wraith's channeling collapsed, its spell guttering out as the power feeding it was stripped away.

With its defensive spells all exhausted, the creature tried to run away—but Seth pounced like a predator. He plunged both his Dusk Scythes into the creature's back and crossed them in a violent, shearing motion.

The spirit dissolved into a cloud of blue motes, leaving behind a glowing crystal. Seth ignored the drop for now, instead pivoting on his heel to rejoin the fray.

Colossus, Elena, and Nightmare were already overwhelming the two other Silver Wraiths, though the spirits were fighting with the desperation of cornered animals. The moment Dusk Scythes disappeared, Seth felt his aether beginning to dip, so he tapped into his Fine Storing Ring to cast Armored Phantom Fists next. He felt the refreshing rush of stored aether flood his Well, so he funneled parts of it through the Link to help his partners.

With Nightmare, Colossus, and Seth still under the offensive boost of Beastmaster Rage and the protection of Desert Aegis, the group took down the remaining Astral Wraiths in less than a minute. Nightmare tore through the side of the one wielding a sword while Seth delivered a crushing blow to the axe-wielder's head, ending the struggle in a final explosion of blue light.

Seth sat heavily onto a jagged shard of ice to catch his breath. He then handed a beaststone to both Nightmare and Colossus before moving them back into the teardrop necklace to benefit from the Essences within.

A few feet away, Elena brushed a bead of sweat from her brow, her chest rising and falling as the blue glow around her robes faded.

"That rage spell is absurdly strong," she said. "Especially when combined with your offensive spells."

"Yeah," Seth answered, the crimson veil of the spell vanishing from his vision. "It certainly makes a big diff—"

He stopped abruptly when his eyes landed on the crystal that the highest-Ranked Astral Wraith had dropped. It didn't have the standard aura of a beaststone.

Without wasting a second, he cast Intermediate Identify.

Restrictions:

- Elementalist, Primalist, or Rogue

- 95 Arcane Power

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