Dark Matter Ascension
Chapter 24 – Breaking locks and condemning the Conclave

Jace trudged along the path that Ollie had laid out in front of him. Saving Greg was something he was happy to do – despite it costing him the hypercycle's remaining fuel. He got Stardust and some of the vehicle's components.

The betrayal stung – but he had forgiven the trespass on the street folk code. That is what his last gesture to her meant; he forgave her. But not for nothing: a permanent 25 percent discount and trade-price improvement for going through Quinn to buy or sell goods. She paid for breaking the code, he thought.

Ollie flew above him – at his maximum tether height to keep an eye out as he turned in a circle. "We're about four days out on foot from your destination."

"We've got what, eight days left?" Jace asked.

"Yup."

Jace nodded and used the time traveling to practice. He wanted to figure out the exact amount of time it would take to drain his energy from the new Ranks of Dark Matter Cloak. Several hours of experimenting – with a few stops to catch his breath – resulted in him getting a rough estimate for each Rank. Rank 1 is about an hour if I sustain just that. Rank 2 is half that. Rank 3 is about ten minutes.

He found another one of the abandoned prey-holes to tuck into for the evening, repeated his tarp trick, and slept with sword in hand. The night was uneventful, and he took off again in the morning. "Hey Ollie, question."

"Go for it," he replied as he continued bobbing above Jace's head.

"Is there a way to increase my energy? A way I can use Skills more often without getting tired?"

"Cardio," Ollie replied. "The more endurance and stamina you have, the more you can use."

"How do my prosthetics play into all of that?"

Ollie floated around his head, "It should mean that your endurance lasts longer than most others because you are not using up energy from moving your legs or arm – well, you are using a lot less. Just the connective tissue." He smiled, "You could always use that Information Boon to replace out exactly what the effects are."

"I think someone in The Eternal City will have an answer to that. I'd rather save the Boon for something else."

The two continued on in silence, but Jace was wracking his brain for what he could ask with the Boon. I could ask about some type of secret. Maybe dig up information on a person? The Black Hole Conclave is still unknown.

"I want to use the Boon," Jace stated. "The guy at the top of the Black Hole Conclave."

Ollie nodded and waved his paws in the air as a screen filled Jace's vision.

<<<<<>>>>>

[Using Boon: Uncommon (Information).]

[Query: Information about Troxanir.]

[Answer: Known only as Troxanir, they are from Oblivion's Edge. They have the Cosmic Power known as Black Hole, and the Ascended Cosmic Power known as Singularity. Their Class is Warrior at level 100, and their Advanced Class is Archmage at level 80. Their species is unknown and unquantifiable. Current residence in Oblivion's Edge. Leader of the Black Hole Conclave. [HIGHER RARITY REQUIRED].

<<<<<>>>>>

So, some information is hidden behind a higher requirement. Interesting. Jace looked up at Ollie as the message faded from his vision, "Well, that was a lot of the same information we already knew. But knowing their Class and Advanced Class might be helpful if we end up going up against them."

Ollie frowned, "Yup. Looks like it. Warrior focuses on fighting up-close and personal – pretty versatile. Archmage means that he could throw around literal singularities or even age items through entropy until they turn to dust." His tone was somber and there was a trace of fear underneath it.

Jace felt the same fear, knowing that this entity would be able to obliterate him. "We have to be careful in Khrox, since they could attack me."

"Yup." Ollie smiled, "But you can become completely undetectable now. Plus, I am sure Xera can manipulate the city to keep you two from interacting. Troxanir will not even know we are the ones who mess up this operation. I think we just have to keep Wayreplaceers from identifying who you are."

"Easy enough. I Cloak, get close, and kill them." Jace replied.

"You're a killer through and through, aren't you?" Ollie said with a little wry smile.

"No," Jace replied. "I'm not just some killer. These guys? Sure. They want the literal death of everything." He grimaced, "I don't know much about science stuff, but I did like visiting the museum when I could, and the space exhibits were my favorite." He looked up at Ollie, "I know that everything turns to spaghetti-something when it hits the center of a black hole. This faction wants that to happen to everyone? It's a death cult."

"They don't turn to literal spaghetti," Ollie said with a slight chuckle. "It's called spaghettification. They get stretched out and all twisted up as they are compressed."

Jace shrugged, "My point is the same. They are people that want the universe to end. It doesn't feel wrong. I don't feel like I'm doing something bad. Hell, Xera is telling me I have to stop them with this Quest." He felt a sense of justification. Righteous justification. "I'm doing the right thing."

"And that 'oblivion awaits all' mindset is why the other factions hate the Black Hole Conclave. Well, except the Nebula Alliance – they will sell or buy from anyone."

I bet I'll end up interacting with those two factions frequently, Jace thought as he shouldered his satchel and kept on walking. I'd also wager given the way Earth was heading, that the Nebula Alliance is going to take over. It'll just become more of a corpo-dominated place.

They continued onward, making camp three more times before arriving at another city as night fell. This city was not a resort like the prior one. The buildings were all uniform in height and distance from one another. Ten story-tall boxes lined up in a grid pattern. Side streets were big enough that a small car could drive down one. The environment reminded Jace of an office park.

And there was movement. Jace saw a group of people down the street. He quickly ran over to an alleyway and pressed himself against the wall. Ollie followed him and poked his head out around the corner. "Identifying," he stated.

Jace drew his sword and manifested the Dark Matter Shield (Rank 3), as well as his Dark Matter Blade (Rank 5) [Rending]. He poked his head around the corner and could only make out the vague shapes of upright people walking around, moving crates and boxes. I really need something like binoculars, he thought.

Ollie turned around and looked at Jace with a resolute expression, "Black Hole Conclave Signers. All of them. They have a variety of Cosmic Powers at their disposal." Ollie grinned, "They look like they're getting ready to set up camp for the night."

Jace nodded, "Then we wait until they go to sleep, strike silently, and take them out." He went down the alley and cautiously made his way forward towards where the Black Hole Conclave members were setting up their camp in the middle of the road. They aren't setting up in a smart way, he thought as he found a vantage point to spy on them from. They're just in the middle of an intersection. It's good for preventing ambushes if you have enough people, but they'd be safer in a building. Jace looked at the building he was next to and ran his hand along it. The substance was solid metal just like the other buildings in that resort city.

He jerked his hand away as he felt a beat inside the metal structure. As if someone had hit it with metal and the vibration reverberated through the entire structure. "Ollie, any idea what that was?" Jace whispered.

Ollie flew into the side of the building before coming back out a moment later. He had a look of sheer panic on his face. "Cloak. Now!"

Dark Matter Cloak (Rank 3), Jace thought. The purple light surrounding him from the shield turned into a near-black, purple hue as he was rendered invisible, untraceable, and undetectable. From his earlier testing, he knew he could keep this up for about ten minutes before he would be exhausted.

"Don't talk. Just let me," Ollie said, his voice trembling. "It is…You remember those nanite-covered Velenians?"

Jace nodded. Yeah, the zombie-like things. They were easy to deal with.

Ollie gulped audibly, "There are hundreds in that building. They are…weaker? But there are way more."

An idea went through Jace's mind, and he cracked a smile. Moving along the edge of the building towards the Black Hole Conclave members, he made it to the front of the building. Now that he was closer to the Aspirants, he could make out their attire and weaponry. All of them were dressed in some type of black, leathery armor with metal rivets and studs. They had cloaks on with a white, circular emblem on the back. Their weaponry was varied – but all of them were melee weapons. No ranged combatants? Jace mimicked shooting a pistol with his hand and then pointed at them.

Ollie seemingly picked up on Jace's confusion, "Projectiles are easier to block or dodge. And firearms are unreliable given the multitudinous worlds on The Cosmic Corridor. Most Classes focus on melee weaponry or Cosmic Power manifestation – like a Mage."

The Conclave members were setting up a perimeter – taking some type of foldable mesh out of their bags and pouches, planting metal spikes into the ground, and creating a barricade of some type. Jace watched in awe and jealousy as the spikes sent a beam of energy up into the air a good twenty feet before lines of deep, brown energy connected them. Electric fence. Smart way to make camp in the open.

Jace went over to the set of doors that led into the office building. They were sealed shut tightly, and placing his ear against them, he could hear the faint sound of shuffling inside. Time to let the horde out. He slashed at the lock with his sword, the metallic clang echoing in his ears – but completely undetected due to his Dark Matter Cloak. He made sure to catch the lock so it wouldn't hit the ground.

Slowly, very slowly as to not alert the Conclave members, he opened the door and came face-to-face with one of the Velenian zombie people. Jace threw himself back as the horde streamed out, shrieking and screaming.

The Conclave members began shouting in panic as tens, then hundreds of these zombie-like humanoids slammed into the barrier surrounding their camp. The barrier sparked and zapped with the deep, brown energy – and the Velenians were turned to ash.

But they kept swarming. Jace kept far away from the chaos, crossing the street. "Go inside this one," Jace whispered. "See if there's more."

Ollie poked his head through the wall before pulling it back and nodding, "Hundreds here, too."

Jace looked back and saw that the Conclave member's barrier seemed to be holding as the line of zombies trickled to a slim flow. I wonder how much that barrier can take. Jace cut through this locked door caught the lock, and let the second swarm loose.

They charged forward toward the barrier, and the Conclave members stood on the other side, weapons brimming with various energies. The barrier sparked, zapped, and thrummed…before fading. The swarm descended, and Jace observed as the makeshift camp turned into a chaotic mess. Raising his right hand, he grappled the side of the building and got up above the fray, clinging on with his feet as he saw the battle unfold.

The Conclave members were throwing around blasts of gravity – waves of purple that shot outward in a shockwave and forced the Velenians to the ground. The pressure increased even more, and they turned into a fine paste from the force of gravity weighing down on them. Another cluster was carved through with a line of grey-white energy that desiccated them before disintegrating their forms.

More splashes of colors and elemental energies – fire, water, blasts of air, shards of metal – all went flying into the horde of creatures and devastated their numbers. The energy threw off cascading arcs of residual power, and Jace could feel the heat, cool, wind, and even felt his energy drain slightly as metallic shrapnel reached him.

They're winning, Jace thought as the Conclave members held firm. He raised his left hand – now uninjured and fully healed, holding the sword – and focused on the eight targets. I'm assuming there is a horde in each of these buildings. Then, a thought struck Jace. These doors were locked from the outside. These people were locked in there to die. Jace felt a sense of unease at using these zombie-like figures that were condemned to such a terrible fate – succumbing in the dark.

But he shook the feeling off. They don't have higher brain functions. The magitech nanites took that away from them. This is setting them free. Dark Matter Dart (Rank 4). He had one spare dart that he sent towards the lock on another door across the street. The other eight sped to the Conclave members – one apiece, focused on their torsos. He felt extremely weak, and his Cloak faded away as the bolts of invisible-to-others, purplish projectiles flew out.

The darts blew holes through the armor of the Conclave members. The sudden injury that all of them suffered was enough to let the horde turn the tide. The lock he shot across the street clattered to the ground, and another group of zombie-like creatures swarmed out. The situation grew dire, and Jace saw the Aspirants struggling to hold off the rush of monstrous forms. They had seemingly expended all their energy.

One of them, with the Cosmic Power symbol of a Black Hole on his hand, screamed out. "Oblivion awaits!"

"Get up higher!" Ollie shouted. Jace aimed his prosthetic, fired up, and ascended. Glancing back down, he saw reality begin to distort and warp. A small, black dot he could barely make out appeared in front of the Aspirant.

And then reality collapsed with a roaring, distorted slurp sound. The space around the newly created singularity twisted and warped as everything within a fifty-foot sphere vanished. The horde was gone, the camp, all the Aspirants. There was nothing but a fifty-foot-deep hole in the center of the crossroads. "Ollie…what was that?"

"It was a Skill. I did not have enough time to figure out that one's Class, but I would bet that it was something akin to a Battle Mage. Think of that as a more generic Swordmage."

"Are they all dead?" Jace asked.

"Yup. Every one of them. Too bad this wasn't the main force with the drill." He crossed his little arms, "They would rather go to their oblivion than die to these things."

Jace felt disappointment. I was hoping to get a ton of Stardust out of this. "Do you think every one of these buildings is filled with more of these people?"

"Yes. But to verify? Only one way to replace out." Ollie made a swinging gesture, "Swing to another building and I can check."

Jace nodded, aimed the grapple at the next building across the alley, and swung over. He clamped his feet onto the new structure, and Ollie flew inside. He poked his head back out and nodded, "Yup, more in here."

"This would be an easy way to get a lot of Stardust," Jace replied. "I can just recover my energy, go invisible, and clear out every building."

Ollie nodded, "Yup. That would be a smart play. But we are on a time crunch. At this rate, we will barely make it to the Black Hole Conclave's site. We cannot spend long here just farming Stardust."

We can come back later. They aren't going anywhere. He looked out at the few still milling about the street, aimlessly wandering. I can come back through this way and rack up a ton of Stardust. He used the grapnel arm and his feet to keep swinging from building to building, making it to the edge of the city before he clambered down and continued the journey towards his Quest.