The air in the hidden passage became thick with menace, a tangible weight pressing down on Roric. The man he had kicked, a snarl twisting his lips as he wiped a line of blood from his mouth, was the first to fully reveal his presence. He was not alone. From the yawning, unlit corridor behind him, more figures emerged, peeling away from the shadows like ghosts shedding their cloaks. A dozen of them at least, all twelve wearing the same grim, determined expressions and the subtle sigil of the Azure Rose Knights somewhere on their person.
Despite the raw power radiating from them, Roric's mind remained a cold, calculating machine. He was a Saint amd so dealing with a group of men wouldn't pose much of an issue. The problem was that these men in particular were also Saints. Now that he considered this outcome, it was a proper bad bit of luck. A confrontation between even two Saints could be catastrophic, their raw power a force of nature that could tear a city like Blackhaven apart.
A dozen of them?
He was going to let that happen. As at that time,his goal was to detain, not to level a city.
He had already developed a way to go about this situation.
His Trait, 'The Lovers', gave him authority over bonds. It's first Resonant allowed him to see them, the second to manipulate existing ones, and the third to create entirely new ones. It was a potent combination, but against a dozen Saints, it was a gamble. He just had to hope their Trait classes weren't a direct counter to his own.
The Trait classes of Cosmic, Cognitive, Existential and Soulfire were the fundamental principles of the universe, each one a counter to another like a game of rock-paper-scissors, his mentor had said, but with a lot more screaming.
Cognitive traits beat Cosmic traits,Existential traits beat Cognitive traits,Soulfire traits beat Existential traits and
Cosmic traits beat Soulfire traits.
This was the law of Opposing Traits. There was also the law of Complimentary Traits where a pair of Traits from different Classes worked well with each other but that law didn't apply here. It wasn't like anyone with a complimentary Trait from among the 12 thugs suddenly felt moved to help him against the others.
The men didn't waste any more time with words. The one Roric had kicked produced a club from some unknown place and with a low growl, charged forward. The others followed, their forms blurring as they moved with supernatural speed closing the distance in moments.
Roric let out a sigh, a weary resignation settling over him as he focused his Flow. The success of his plan wasn't based on power; it was about precision. With a thought, his hands began to move, not in a grand, sweeping gesture, but in a delicate, intricate dance, like a master weaver at their loom. From the tips of his fingers, thin, shimmering threads of energy, his Flow, shot out, invisible to the naked eye but as clear as day to him. He was creating new bonds, spiritual ones, linking the men together. This,in itself was also risky move, a high-stakes gamble.
He was exercising the authority of his Trait to bind their very souls together.
He connected each man to the next, forming a small web of souls. The first man was linked to the two standing next to him,the second the three behind him,the third to those on either side and so on, until all twelve of them were a single, interconnected unit. The result was instantaneous. The men, who had been charging in a scattered, chaotic formation, were now tethered to one another. The ones at the front were yanked back by the ones at the back, and the ones at the back were pulled forward by the ones at the front. The force of their movements, so potent and so fast, was now redirected against them, causing them to stumble, to collide, to become a single, shambling mass of bodies.
It worked on most of them, anyway.
"Tch," Roric muttered under his breath, watching as three of the men, including the one he had kicked earlier, with some effort, shrugged off the bonds. Roric sighed.
He had known this would happen.
Their Cosmic traits had allowed them to break free of his authority as that Class opposed Soulfire Class Trait.
Roric had a thought of trying again, to reinforce the bonds on the three with more Flow, but he knew it was a futile exercise. They would just break free again and again. The other men seemed to have figured out st least achieved portion of what was happening and were speedily but cautiously approaching. They were manageable.
He would be wasting his energy and his time on them, time he didn't have. He had to deal with the three Cosmic Class first.
One man,the one Roric kicked,his face a mask of pure, unadulterated fury, was the first to attack. He raised his club, and the very air around Roric began to bend, to warp. The force was immense, a crushing weight that threatened to turn him into a pancake.
'Gravity huh?' Roric thought as the attractive force of the earth pressed down on him causing a net of cracks to extend from beneath his feet as the whole building trembled.
The man raised his weapon and aimed a strike at Roric's head but Roric was prepared. He was a hunter who had encountered beasts capable of a similar feat. He had recently considered ways to train Aina in the application of this power in hunting so this situation really wasn't that bad.
He used his FlowReinforcement to make his bones and his muscles harder, to make his very form a bulwark just as the strike landed,sending him flying into the main showroom. He was halfway to his feet when he was frozen in place by gravity again and one of the three men hit him with a powerful bolt of lightning, illuminating the room. The third threw a spear which accelerated and was about to strike Roric but he managed to move out of the way and the spear,after taking down several glass casses was pinned into the wall causing the building to shake again.
As Roric hid behind a table ,the man with gravity spread the area of effect to the entire room causing glass to shatter and the floor boards beneath his feet to crack and splinter, the wooden planks groaning in protest as they struggled against the immense pressure. The walls of the storeroom trembled, dust raining down from the ceiling. Roric could feel the force of the attack, a colossal weight that would have turned a normal man into paste, but he still moved through the glass casses and cabinets,closing the distance.
'If only i had brought my axe.' He thought. As the second man fired more bolts of lightning and shards of glass and splinters of wood accelerated towards him from all angles. He then released his Flow Reinforcement and allowed the attacks to land. In that split second before they did,he established a bond between himself and the three men. The moment the attacks landed, an echo traveled through the bond he had established thus affecting the men with thier own power with Roric serving as a conduit. He rose to his feet with a groaning. Even if he wasn't the main receiver of this echo,it still hurt like hell. He looked around the shop. It was beyond trashed but he had managed to keep the damages inside the shop. He was lucky that his Trait opposed that of most of the other men. If not he'd have been in serious trouble.
" Where are the others anyway?" He muttered. Just then the nine remaining men jumped at him from the shadows. Roric noticed that his bonds on them had been broken, probably due to the use of an artifact. His eyes narrowed as he dodged the first attack and started exchanging blows with the rest while trying to establish bonds between the men again in sn attempt to capture them.
For the next hour, the fight was a frantic dance of death, a brutal ballet of attack and defence.