Akashic Records II [Mod]

[Layla Amare]

"No luck, huh?" Layla asked after a few minutes of looking through the remains of the blasted bookcases. If any of the books that had been there before the wizard shadow hit them were still in good condition, Layla couldn't find them. Sighing, she stood up again and moved on to the intact bookshelves next to it. With no immediate shadows around, she pulled out a book at random and flipped it open to skim through it. Other than the language (one she couldn't quite put her finger on, though it looked to be of Chinese origin), it looked like just an ordinary book, that could be found in any other library anywhere.

...Well, that was underwhelming. But with how huge the library was, there were probably more bizarre books deeper in. Setting the book back on its shelf, Layla continued down the aisle.

[ChromaticTruthsayer]

A pack of Shadows appeared!

Spooky Book

• Death's Chill
• Evil Smile

Absorb: Repel: Null: Dark Rs: Wk: Light
Not-so-Spooky Book

• Agidyne
• Bufudyne

Absorb: Repel: Ice, Fire Null: Rs: Wk: Slash, Pierce

[Layla Amare]

First was a wizard with the look of a librarian that attacked Layla, now the books themselves were coming after her. Or...well, there were books, inside the crowns of disembodied heads. Or...something like that. Layla was just going to call them books anyway. Whatever they were, one of them looked rather menacing, like something she would expect out of a horror story. Maybe it was a horror story. The other...not so much.

As usual, Layla was left to her usual guesses as to what was weak to what. Dark things were usually weak to light, so that was a good guess for the spookier of the two books. For the other...darkness, maybe? She didn't have it, so she couldn't test that. Hopefully it wouldn't nullify light though. Layla called forth Vajrabhairava from the depths of her mind, targeting both books at once. Lines of brilliant white light appeared on the ground, tracing out a symbol made from four concentric circles, divided respectively into one, two, six, and twelve parts. Panels of light rose out of the ground, surrounding the wheel symbol and enclosing the two shadows within it. An explosion of light followed, damaging both shadows. As Layla thought, the more horror-themed book took much more damage, but slightly less expected, the other book didn't seem to resist it at all.

Both were still raring to go, though, and retaliated with darkness and...fire? Huh. That was unexpected. Unable to move much in the narrow confines of the aisle, Layla was forced to take both attacks, resisting the darkness but taking normal damage from the fire. Layla pushed through it, creating an abstract representation of the Wheel of Life a second time on the ground and hitting both shadows with the power of life and death itself. The spooky book dissolved into the light, but the other book held on, this time attacking with a blast of ice.

...Crap.

Layla braced herself, but could only do so much against the freezing attack. She dropped to one knee, shivering. The shadow moved in and loomed over her, clearly preparing to hit her again. At this range, it was too close to effectively aim a wide-area attack, but it was still just far enough to be out of quick striking range. ...So Layla pulled her other weapon out instead. It was a simple training weapon, but it still had much more range than her otta. Layla lashed out, quite literally, with a training whip, and caught the shadow off-guard with an attack that it was clearly weak to. It spun around as the whip hit it, and the ice attack went flying straight into the bookshelf next to them instead. Layla took advantage of the opening to stand back up, distance herself from the shadow, and drop a series of lightning bolts on it, finishing it off.

[Erithania]

Beep.



Went the ATM.

[Layla Amare]

Well...that was over. The books had managed to do quite a bit more than Layla had expected. In fact, as much as she hated to admit it, she was at the end of her endurance. Several fights, almost in a row, and the last one had given her a rather nasty hit from an ice attack. Yep. She was going to have to turn back now. She hated that she had to slow down even for a minute, but there wasn't much choice. She wasn't going to die out here. She wouldn't allow it. Not anymore. And that meant that for now, she would have to turn back.