Parking Nightmare: Crydus attempts Crygenia Quest

When the geographical description for the area registered as ‘crystal spire’ Crydus hadn’t quite taken into account just how literal it would be.  The ‘clan of frost’ had no real city to speak of, and their best real estate seemed to be located within the massive spire of ice that made up the island that they inhabited.  Nowhere on the massive island would unfrozen land be found, and the altitude known as ‘sea level’ was not even an applicable concept given how high the ice had raised even the lowest parts of the island.  This would force Max and Crydus to disembark from the Phoenix as it hovered over the one of the more densely populated areas, floating down to the city beneath them while Gale and Aurianni took off once again and saw if they could land the Phoenix on the water below to conserve power.

As was his nature, Crydus would lead Max to an area heavily populated by the Ragnus as he searched for a leader or an elder.  As was to be expected, in such an anti-social species, there would be no determined leader, but Crydus would happen upon a rather old and powerful Ragnus to whom he would introduce himself.  At first, the Ragnus would simply take him as being presumptuous, but as Crydus explained that he had met and conversed with the Eldest of the Timeless Clan, he soon found that the rather large Ragnus stated to take him seriously.  Crydus would waste no time explaining that he was there to lend assistance with the Lurk, offering to deal with the situation before it made of pest of itself and forced the Ragni in the area to deal with it.

Hearing this, the elder would give Crydus what little information he had cared to ascertain with regards to the potential pest, pointing Crydus in the direction of its most frequent appearances to the south of the island as he detailed the odd phenomenon.  As Crydus had expected, the presence of the Lurk seemed to be warping and breaking down the spatial properties in the area, making that small part of the island particularly dimensionally unstable.  The creature also seemed to possess a number of social traits similar to the Ragni of the area, defending its territory with great hostility when approached and even at times attempting to expand its territory to the nesting area of other Ragni.  So far, they had managed to keep the entity at bay, but it would not be long before the local dragons descended en masse and ended the critter.

With this knowledge gained, Crydus would make his way off with Max to investigate the territory occupied by the Lurk.  Crydus and Max would approach the area with their energy levels as low as possible, both utilising their Sensory Codex abilities to track the ethereal and dimensional disturbances made by the creature, with Max utilising the bonuses of his Beta Drive to make his passive scans even more effective.  As they laid in wait, they would both realise that in addition to conventional energy manipulation abilities, the Lurks had a particular affinity for dimensional warping, which seemed to be the main cause of the problem with this entity.  This Lurk’s dimensional warping abilities seemed to be disproportionately strong when compared to its other abilities, and what made it worse was that it seemed to modify all of its other abilities.  Luckily for Crydus, the Lurk seemed to have adapted male characteristics, meaning that its Lioras traits were more in the line of strength and defense, rather than speed and stealth like the liora females, but its Crystal Mimic abilities seemed to allow it to copy and utilise foreign abilities without having to amalgamate the source into itself, something that made it extremely dangerous.

Crydus would sigh as he continued his analyses, this would definitely be a difficult task for him and young Max.  Max Deep Perception and Link Perception would notice something particularly odd about this Lurk, noting that his components seemed to be comprised of two different flavours of energy.  Given his relatively low awareness and technical capacity, Maxwell couldn’t quite put his hands on what the difference was, but it seemed as though this Lurk had assimilated another Lurk and amalgamated into the odd super dimensional anomaly that stood before the two.  As Max told this to Crydus, the Xelot would smirk, it would seem that he had found a way to if not permenantly, than at least temporarily weaken the Lurk when he actually mounted his assault.

The two would continue their ranged observations for quite some time before they decided to call it a day, radioing the Phoenix and having it pick them up so that they could plan their next move.

Crydus: 260 Exp
  Maxwell: 240 Exp