Darkness and Hellfire

Chapter 68 Encase. Solidify. Harden.


Lenna woke Isaac an hour before midnight on the night before the full moon. It was the best time to contact Lua, if she was available and willing to respond. "That time?" Isaac asked with a yawn and a stretch. Time had long since blended together into a mess of forgotten dreams and black oceans.

Lenna nodded her head. "Yes. Where should we go?" She questioned her mate. They had talked about it a little, here and there, but all they realized was that the best places to gaze upon Lua were locked and sealed off at night.

"The uppermost concert hall. It'll have the best view of the night sky. We'll just have to figure our own way in." Isaac told her and then shrugged. "If we set off any security measures, well, we can just make the guards take us to the top. We are sort of a big deal. I think we can order some guards around if it comes to it."

"The power definitely went to your head." Lenna commented.

"I thought you'd learned that already." Isaac joked back.

Lenna shook her head. "Oh, I did, I just had refrained from speaking it aloud until now."

Isaac and Lenna casually walked the street, after telling Lord Ashborne that they would be back in a few hours but needed to speak to Lua. The street was the one that made sure everyone gave the spire a wide berth. There were dozens of guards either on patrol or standing midnight vigil over the wide open space between the spire and the rest of the city. The duo walked arm in arm, entirely unnoticed by all but the most sensitive of guardsmen. Even so, those that knew that someone was watching them weren't entirely sure where from.

"Is this alright?" Lenna asked her husband. Just a few weeks ago, trying to do something like what they were doing would have been ill-advised to say the least.

"I feel like I am working a bruised muscle." Isaac explained. "It is a little uncomfortable but I am completely positive that it isn't doing me any harm. I'd say that I am about as strong now as I was when I fought Jallen, effectively anyway. I could probably fight Fable right now and win, even if he went all out, as long as he didn't use any special items or gear."

"That is good to hear." Lenna told him with a warm smile that shone brightly in his eyes under the moonlight. "But you still need to be careful."

Isaac nodded. "I will." He promised as they stopped in front of the entirely sleeping building that housed the concert halls. "Now, how do we go about this?"

"We could climb it from the outside." Lenna offered.

Isaac turned and looked at her like she was crazy. "Free climb a twelve story building?" He requested clarification with no small amount of incredulity.

"Well, we could." Lenna replied. It was clear that she was aware that it was not a good plan, but it was a plan with a decent degree of success, if it wasn't for one small thing, neither of them liked heights very much. They could deal with it, more or less, and in the heat of battle it wasn't thought about very much, but a ten minute climb was plenty of time to realize exactly how high they were by the time they reached the top.

"If we go around to the back, and I summon Shamesh, maybe he could take us to the top?" Isaac wondered.

"Wouldn't the standard defensive array, which each of these buildings have, cancel something like that?" Lenna asked in return.

Isaac hummed in thought. "What if our shadows just carried us to the top?" He wondered.

"Do you have enough power to spare for that kind thing?" Lenna wondered. "We aren't very light, you know?"

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"I think it'll be fine." Isaac told her with a shrug. "I'll find out right away at least and if it doesn't work we can try something else."

"Okay, just don't push yourself too hard." She said with slight worry in her voice.

Isaac and Lenna walked around to the backside of the concert building and Isaac released his control over their shadows. "Everyone nearby is bound to feel this…" Isaac realized right before he was about to do it.

Lenna shrugged. "Weren't you the one who just mentioned 'ordering some guards around'?"

"Fair point." Isaac replied and nodded. He took a deep focusing breath to help hone his mental image. Isaac was fairly certain that the clearer his mental image was, the less power his order required and the more accurately it would be followed. "Encase. Solidify. Harden." He ordered the shadows beneath them. Their purest shadow, the one sealed beneath their boots where they made contact with the ground, reached out and covered their boots completely. The shadows then became rigid and solid though not enough to carry them. After that, more and more power was taken before it even reached Isaac's core in order to make the encasing shadows hard enough to stop a swing from a club. The flexing of Isaac's willpower and authority came easily enough, but he could feel the load that it had put on his still injured soul.

"How are you feeling?" Lenna asked after Isaac had been silent for a moment.

"Fine, right now." He explained. "I am a bit worried about once we start moving but I think I know how to do it. Just give me a moment."

Lenna nodded in reply and looked around without even trying to move her boots. She knew that they were locked in place with enough force that she would have to use either mana or aura enhanced strength to rip them free in the event of an emergency.

Isaac closed his eyes. He felt for how much power, authority, and soul integrity that he had to spare. He knew how far he could push himself before it started to deal actual damage instinctually at this point, not by a quantitative output but by the amount of pain in relation to his actual maximum power output. Using that knowledge, Isaac extrapolated how much 'effort' he could put into his next order. Using that amount of 'effort' as his energy output value, he then imagined them going upwards directly against the face of the wall. With the path and available energy specified, the rate of their accent was left for the mana to decide. He knew that it wouldn't be fast but it would be better than free climbing because of one simple reason, he didn't have to try to find finger holds that weren't slippery from the dew that had settled over the entire city.

"Rise." He spoke aloud his order to the shadows and both of them started to lift into the air. Both Isaac and Lenna reached out to touch the exterior wall of the concert building as they rose like one of Walter's moving room contraptions. Isaac took a steadying breath and opened his eyes. Both he and Lenna watched as the building went by at a rate of about a foot and a half per second.

"Well, it's working at least." Lenna commented.

"This is as fast as I can push it." Isaac informed her. "If I had another week to meditate, I could probably triple this speed."

"So this isn't too much then?" She questioned the man known for pushing every limit he came across. His own physical and magical ones, the patience of others, etc.

"I'm riding the red li-" Isaac winced and grabbed his head. It took everything he had to keep from instinctively harnessing any of his power. He took a few deep calming breaths as they continued their ascent. "If I do anything else, it will be." He explained to his mate and breathed in and out slowly and deliberately. "This is fine."

Lenna looked at him with no small amount of incredulity. "Uh huh." She replied with sarcasm so thick it could've doubled as the safety line they were missing.

Both of them took a quick glance downwards just in time to see a full team of guards reach the point where Isaac had spoken his orders. One of them looked up and shouted something. The rest of the squad then also looked up at Isaac and Lenna. There was some deliberation and then one of their number ran off somewhere while the rest stayed behind to watch Isaac and Lenna, the two black spots floating up the side of the concert building.

Soon enough, they were at the top and their abrupt stop almost made them both lose their balance. "Woah." Isaac whispered. "That was close."

Lenna nodded slowly. "On 'three', lean forwards, on 'now', release the mana." Lenna told her husband.

Isaac nodded subtly as he tried to maintain perfect balance without a wall there to stabilize them anymore. "Okay." He agreed.

"One, two, three," Lenna spoke and leaned forwards in perfect time with Isaac. "now." She finished without slowing her speech. Isaac mentally dismissed the mana as its job was now finished. They both fell straight down onto the top of the wall that they were hovering over with enough force that if it weren't for their armor, there would've been bruising and maybe even a fractured rib. They pulled themselves over the top and dropped half a dozen feet to the ground where they both collapsed, breathing hard from how close they had come to plummeting down twelve stories. They would have survived, probably, they were both resourceful enough to figure out a way to keep from going 'splat' on the pavestones, but it would've still been a near death experience to say the least.

"You know, it's always scariest the first time." Isaac told her with a grin.

"So help me Lua, if you ever try to make us do that again, I'm going to hit you." Lenna swore and then chuckled as the tension released from the entire event. "Well, we're here."

Isaac forced himself back up into a sitting position. "We should either make sure the guards can't get in here or hope Lua shows up before the guards make too much of a fuss." He told his mate and partner in the crime of breaking and entering into a government owned building. She was also a partner in plenty of other crimes over the course of the last ten months, but that was neither here nor there.

Lenna pushed herself up into a sitting position and locked eyes with him. They both just chuckled at how much fun breaking the rules could be. "Weld it shut?" Lenna wondered. "We have half an hour until midnight."

Isaac thought for a moment and then had a brilliant idea. "No, let them come. We just won't be here when they arrive." He added with an ever widening smile.

Lenna smiled and shook her head at the mind games Isaac was about to start playing. Everyone was going to think that either the entire squad had gone crazy or there was a pair of black ghosts lurking about their 'Celestial City'.

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