(Second Book Complete!) Runeblade: A Delving & Skill Merging LitRPG

The gorespike was vitality bent to war; an unyielding behemoth that twisted wounds into weapons. The briars had torn open its flesh, blood roaring like a river under the profane influence of Vainblood. Yet it cared little for the dagger-like thorns in its flesh, and its blood did not drip. Red rivulets crept up its body, fueling the whipping tendrils that cut through the briar like forged steel.

Trotters ripped through the muck, the demon-hog rocketing forwards.

The sight of the surging hunk of dripping meat made Kaius’s heart pound in his chest — fiery clarity erupted. He needed to move, lest he test the sharpness of the creature’s Skill against his own body.

Driving his feet firmly down, Kaius quested for the solid ground that lay a fingerlength beneath the mud. He kicked to the side, unleashing a spray of Hateful Nails on pure instinct.

“Not sure if that’s a good idea!” Porkchop warned, a basso growl rumbling through his chest as Breaker of Men sent him hurtling towards the gore spike.

Kaius realised the truth of his brother’s words a moment later. A handful of twisted spikes of steel punched into the chest and flank of the rapidly approaching beast. Sinking a handspan deep, they tore open — and rent the flesh of the beast.

More blood flowed, trickling upwards. The tendrils on the beast’s back grew thicker and longer. Kaius clenched his teeth, frustrated at the result. The beast seemed almost immune to the normal effects of bleeding, and the actual wounds they’d left were but small scratches when compared to its bulk.

He barely got a moment to sit with the feeling before Porkchop barreled into the creature. His Skill-backed charge brought the gorespike to a deadlock at the edge of the briar. Jadecrash coated one of his paws in jagged hunks of orichalchum. Bone cracked as he smashed the beast in the jaw, rocking its head to the side. Kaius could see the blow had rattled it — and most importantly, the attack left little more than grazes.

The gorespike’s retribution was far more brutal. Whipping tendrils lashed Porkchop’s back and shoulders, each one falling upon him like iron bars. Chips erupted from his armour, his defense holding as he battered the beast again and again, forcing it deeper into the briar.

As thorned canes punched into the creature’s flank, tangling its footing just a little more, the tendrils suddenly shifted. Pointed tips lanced down, flowing through the seams in Porkchop’s armour. He let out a bellowing roar of pain as new blood erupted. It streamed, flowing away from the questing tendrils — it seemed the beast could only command its own red ichor. Thank the gods.

Seeing their plight, Kenva did her best to help. As soon as the gorespike had sprouted tendrils, she’d halted her constant flow of arrows that peppered its back. Instead, arrows plunged deep into the earth around the creature, Ensnaring Seedburst causing vines to erupt. They bound the beast, slowing it just a bit more — but it had a savage strength, and every movement tore through the Skill. She had to keep up an almost constant volley just to keep it pinned.

Kaius' thoughts raced as he hurled a bolt of lightning towards their enemy. Arcs crackled between its spines, potent energy driving deep into the creature’s body. Stormlash still worked — the smoking wounds it left in its wake barely bled. But he couldn’t rely on a single spell for a battle at this level. His blade was all but useless, as were his Nails. Starfall was similarly limited. It was explosive, sure, but it was just as much of a physical attack as anything else — the wounds it left bled just fine.

Porkchop was keeping the creature locked down, but the cost…

A growing tide of blood oozed from his brother’s body as the gorespike lanced him again and again with its tendrils. All Kaius could smell was iron — it went deeper than the scent of the mana on the air, like he had jumped into an ocean of it. The gorespike seemed almost untouched by its bloodloss, but Porkchop couldn’t hold forever. He needed time for his wounds to heal — they needed to finish this battle as quickly as they could.

Ianmus’s solar magic would be perfect — but the man was still building his second keyseal, and his first was still gathering mana. They would have to wait before he could use his Preeminent Halo to deal some real damage. That spell burned far hotter than his own Starfall.

An idea came to him. Kaius gripped his blade, a Shunt rocketing him towards the gorespike’s flank. Soaring towards the creature, he used Hymnfocus to infuse his blade with Stormlash. Normally, he preferred the ripping brutality of an infused Nail, but he had to try something.

The crystalline edge of his blade glowed a shocking azure, sparks dancing along it’s blade edge. He hit the ground hard. Two tendrils ripped out of Porkchop’s back, slashing towards him. Kaius burned a cast of Slipstep, warping through the first before he rolled under the second. He hacked at the creature’s flank. Moment of Flow warned of a third tendril, striking for his back. Side-stepping at the last moment, the lance of red shot past his cheek.

A Father’s Gift erupted in bright light, slicing through the beast’s wooden flesh. Flashes of blue-white light joined thunderous cracks as Hymnfocus flooded the passage of his blade with the Stormlord’s finest. The wound bubbled and smoked — but most importantly, it barely bled.

Kaius barely had a moment to grin in triumph before the three tendrils coiled and lanced to him once more. A sidestep took him past the first, while he warped around the second with Slipstep. The third still cut for his throat.

His blade came up from low to high, smashing into the living whip. Blood splashed — only to reform as his parry sailed onwards. The lance slammed into his pauldron — a boiling fluid surging under the seam to punch through his shoulder.

**Ding! You have been afflicted by Spraying Vitality - Bleeding! Affliction strengthened by Zone Effect!**

It was a pure shock of agony. An explosion of force sent him rocketing back, ripping the tendril from his flesh and bone. A thick flow of blood oozed from the wound, running down his arm to drip from his elbow in a steady stream. He bled like a mortal man, Rapid Adaptation working frantically as the foreign skill swelled grotesquely under the dense miasma that filled the reaches of Vainblood.

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His health plummeted, dropping like a stone to restore his lost fluids as the wound closed. Kaius felt the loss keenly, his eyes flicking towards Porkchop, and the dozen tendrils that stabbed him over and over — the ocean of blood that soaked their battleground. His brother was a mountain of fortitude, but even his reserves of health weren’t endless.

But the tendrils were thinner than they’d been only moments ago. Now that they’d avoided tearing open new wounds, the gorespike’s health was working against it. Its wounds were healing — cutting off the steady supply of fuel that empowered its skill.

Unfortunately, nearly two dozen of his Nails were embedded deep within the creature’s flesh. The tangled barbs were holding the wounds open. Normally one of the most useful features of the spell, that persistence now worked against them. At least Kenva’s arrows had a tendency to seal the wounds they were lodged in.

Smiting the creature with another Stormlash to buy time, Kaius drifted to the blackened wound he had left on the creature’s flank with Hymnfocus. He nearly jumped. What if they cauterised the bleeding?

Stormlash was too wild, it lacked the precision for the work. Even with Hymnfocus, there was little way he’d be able to deal with every wound the creature had. But Ianmus? His keyseal had been building mana for a minute or two now. Scouring Rays might have been a relatively weak spell compared to some of their own, but it was cheap and precise.

“Ianmus! How much mana has Rising Dawn gathered!” Kaius asked through their communication artifact as he dove back in. He needed to help keep some of the heat off of Porkchop.

“Almost enough for a Preeminent Halo!” Ianmus replied. “I’m almost done weaving my Keyseal of the Night’s Watch too!”

Lightning wreathed his blade, and Kaius thrust deep between the ribs of the gorespike. A burst of steaming viscera ejected from the wound, his lightning ripping through the centre of the beast's body. One beady eye snapped to him; he prepared to dodge the coming blood-tendrils.

They never came.

Bellowing, the gorespike stomped its foot — an ocean of mana burning. A warbling echo of its cry sounded, and a ghostly copy of the beast materialised mid charge — only a few strides in front of him. Kaius’s eyes widened before the copy slammed into his chest. His ribs fractured like cheap glass, chest caving in as four ephemeral tusks ripped through his armour.

“Kaius!” Kenva screamed in alarm, watching him from above.

The sound washed over him as he was launched clean across the clearing. He hit the ground, tumbling as he left a bloody smear in his wake. His very being resonated with the crackle-pop of his bones pushing back into position, an itching heat consuming his core. Planting his free hand in the muck, Kaius used the friction to roll onto his feet — still sliding backwards. The pain of it was maddening, his dragging arm pulling on his still-shattered chest. But that was battle.

Kaius refocused on the gorespike, growling as he saw no sign of the creature’s ghostly copy. A second-tier skill, it had to be. One of many the creature would have as a mid-Gold. Even if they weakened the tendrils, the creature would still be a threat — but Porkchop would be able to handle hits like that far better with his armour.

“Fuck the Halo!” Kaius called silently to Ianmus. “Use your Rays to cauterise its wounds!”

Ianmus didn’t hesitate. The dark gloom of Vainblood vanished as glowing golden beams snapped down from the canopy above. They fell upon the gorespike in a constant rhythm, drawing hellish squeals from its throat. Each one deepened an already existing wound, smoke wafting as the creature’s flesh boiled.

Slowly, but steadily, the tendrils on the beast’s back thinned. Kaius raced back in, refusing to let the opportunity go to waste. He danced by the creature’s side, feeding Stormlash into his blade constantly. His reserves burned steadily away, but so did the gorespike.

The tides started to turn, the creature’s supply of fresh blood drying up as Ianmus blackened every weeping hole in its hide. The tendrils dwindled, first down to ten, but quickly dropping to five. Those that were left were thin — the wounds they left smaller and far easier to heal. Unable to maintain its unrelenting assault, the beast struggled to rebuff Kaius — its tendrils focused on beating back Porkchop. But they were thinner and fewer than before — it gave Porkchop the precious breathing room he needed for his healing to go to work. Bit by bit, the torrent of blood that seeped from his armour slowed. His footing steadied, and he pressed the attack. Ignoring the peppering of fresh wounds the remaining tendrils left on his shoulders and back, Porkchop bludgeoned the gorespike with his Jadecrash. Every blow shook the very earth, pulping the creature with blunt force trauma.

Yet the gorespike raged. More ghostly copies snapped into existence as it spent mana like water, each one ramming towards them before it vanished. Porkchop simply braced against the bone-rattling strikes, trusting in his armour and mass to see him through. Kaius was not so lucky. He danced through the slop, leaning on Moment of Flow to boost his speed and give him short windows of warning. Twice he was too slow — a glancing blow snapping his arm, and a second goring a hole through the meat of his thigh.

Every now and then, the spikes of the creature’s back would pulse with light, and it would ram them clean through Porkchop’s armour — though Kaius managed to avoid that skill by staying on the creature's flank.

With Ianmus sealing the creature’s wounds, Kenva switched her efforts away from slowing the beast with Seedburst. Brutal arrows, infused with the explosive power of Bare Thy Heart, sunk deep into the creature's flesh. Every detonation ripped open muscle and thick hide in a jet of viscera, only to be followed by a tight grouping of burning rays. Golden light burned the wounds deeper, exposing bone even as they staunched bleeds.

Then, an explosion of silvery mana filled the entire clearing. The lunar power solidified, the swaying stalking of Sanctified Lilyfield erupting in full bloom. Kaius slid through the hazy blooms, untouched by the magic — but they bent towards the gorespike. Stems coiled around its limbs, as stamens burned a bright white, the second-tier spell directly sapping the creature's speed.

It was no mindless foe. Kaius could see it staring up at his backline with hateful fury. But it was chained in the briars, and they were far above in the canopy. Safe.

Or so he thought.

Letting loose a feral squeal, power surged through the gorespike. The sheer magnitude of the mana was unparalleled — multiple times beyond any other skill the creature had used so far.

“Watch out!” Kaius yelled, readying a Shunt to reposition as he needed.

The gore splattered across the creature's body congealed, rising high into an orb of pulsing red. The thin tendrils that still stabbed at Porkchop pulled back, joining with the glob like umbilicals. It started to grow — siphoning every scrap of the creature's blood that had been spilled so far.

It took a bare moment for the orb to swell to full size. A heart beat later, it shot towards Kaius — as fast and brutal as a ballista bolt.

He paled, a burst of force shoving him to the side. The orb sailed on.

Splashing down in the centre of the glade, Kaius stared at it in confusion. Was that it?

The orb warped, morphing.

Kaius watched in horror as it twisted into a solid red copy of the gorespike. The blood-clone’s head snapped up — locking onto Ianmus and Kenva in the canopy above. It roared, racing for the trunk of the tree.

And ran straight up it.

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