Deserts Of Naroosh

by Bradford Bates

  Was this really going to be so easy? He should have known better than to ask himself that question. Of course, it wasn’t. This was the last fight before they took down the big baddie. There was no way they were only going to have to dodge some farts and avoid becoming a snack.

  Something else was coming. They had to be ready.

  He pulled up the Goliath’s stat sheet to take a quick look. The boss wasn’t carrying any buffs right now, but he was starting to wonder if there was a window where he might be able to stop the feeding or the farting for an extra moment of opportunity. Whenever a boss was stunned in this game because their group dodged or broke a mechanic, it made the bosses more susceptible to damage for a short time. It didn’t happen in every fight, but when they did receive a moment of opportunity they had to make the most of it.

  Goliath’s health hit fifty percent.

  Jabari rose from his seat screaming, “Enough!” He pointed his scepter down at the group and made a sweeping motion.

  Tim let out a startled shout as an unseen force picked him up off the floor and flicked him to the side like an ant off a picnic table. That shit fucking hurt, and he didn’t think anything they could have done would have stopped the attack as he flew through the room. Of course, Jabari’s attack made sure that each of them passed through the fart cloud.

  Tim tried to hold his breath, but it was like when his mom cooked chicken on Monday, and he forgot to take out the trash until Thursday night. That stench of rotting chicken bones and bacteria was exactly what Goliath farts tasted like. The fucking smell was so bad by the time they got to the other side of the room, all of them had a debuff, and their health was rapidly plummeting.

  It was the perfect time to break out his Cleanse.

  He took care of himself first, then Cassie. Cleanse was a good spell to have but it could get pricey with five casts in a row. As soon as the tank wasn’t coughing out green mist, she ran back into the battle, and Tim got to work on the others.

  His mana pool didn’t look so great now. Jabari had nearly wiped all of them out with one simple attack. This fight was winnable, but how would they face off against Jabari in the next one? He’d almost killed all of them, and Tim wasn’t sure it had been an attack. If Jabari could repeatedly cast that spell, they’d never get within ten feet of him.

  What a fucking day.

  On the plus side, the room was now clear of gas. Not that it made up for having to eat a buffet of Goliath farts. Nothing would ever make that right again unless it never happened to him, and everyone else still had to suffer. Then he could sit back and enjoy that fart without a mouthful of stink. Instead, this would become one of those “We never talk about it again” moments that the best of friends often shared when out on adventures together.

  Their DPS was rolling now. None of them wanted a repeat of Jabari’s attack and the fart-tasting incident. Tim started wondering if they could kill all the servants to stop the Goliath from snatching one of them and releasing more gas, but they didn’t come here to slaughter children.

  They were here to make sure no one tried to eat them again.

  When the Goliath's health hit thirty-five percent, he shimmied and jumped. They’d seen this mechanic before and were ready for it. They still mistimed a jump now and again, but overall the group did much better than the first go-around. All they had to do from here was avoid the stun at the end.

  “Get ready for it!” Tim called as he watched the boss bounce.

  The Goliath jumped into the air and came down hard on his ass. A little extra gas squirted out at the end. It was almost enough to make Tim laugh, but they had timed their jumps correctly and missed the stun. This was their chance to do as much DPS as possible, and all of them were going all-out.

  It didn’t look like they were going to be fast enough to end this before Jabari swept them across the room again, so Tim slowed his DPS in the hope he’d have enough mana to heal them through another round of the worst attack possible.

  Watching the boss for a buff he could dispel, Tim prayed to avoid their second pass through the land of unimaginable farts.

  Jabari stood as the Goliath came out of his stupor. The servants ran out to help him back to his feet, but the boss looked pouty.

  “I’m hungry,” he roared. “More.” He moved his hand to his mouth almost like a baby.

  Jabari’s eyes almost bugged right out of his head. “There are five meals down there right now. Eat one of them.”

  Tim realized his mistake at the last second. He was watching Goliath for an interrupt, but he should have been watching Jabari. As the ruler of Nar’ha lifted his scepter, Tim kept his eyes focused on him. He might have missed his chance this time, but next time he’d be ready to stop the attack. While he might not be able to keep them out of the cloud, this time he was going to keep his fucking mouth shut.

  No one should be forced to eat someone else's ass cloud.

  Tim started casting Cleanse as Jabari’s spell dragged them through fart central. The Goliath was back on his feet now, and the servants were dumping as much food for him to eat as quickly as they could. None of them wanted to be the next snack.

  So far the boss hadn’t been able to snatch one of the boys, but he’d come close a couple of times. His frustration at not being able to grab his favorite meal was starting to make the Goliath upset. When all of the servants made it out of the room alive, he roared in rage.

  Cassie ran forward, and the DPS went back to work as soon as she made first contact. The boss's health was at ten percent now. Tim reapplied Curse of Giving and made sure no one was suffering from any lingering effects of the fart debuff. Everything looked under control, right until the boss started shoving the food from the floor into his mouth.

  Then the fucker’s health started to go up.

  “JaKobi, burn the food,” Tim screamed, not wanting the boss to gain any extra health.

  A look of intense pleasure washed across the fire mage’s face as he went to work. “Any day I get to burn is a good day to be alive.”

  The Goliath screamed as his snacks disappeared. He looked up at Jabari, moving his hand to his mouth again. “I need more.”

  Jabari grimaced with disgust and waved his scepter again, but none of the servants reappeared. All of the Goliath's food was gone, and none of the servants was willing to become his next snack pack. Being killed for insubordination had to be better than getting eaten alive.

  While looking down from his box, Jabari jumped up and down screaming, “Kill them!”

  When the Goliath realized no more food was coming, he started to pulse with a red light. A small beam of the same light highlighted the floor, and Tim knew what that meant.

  “Keep doing damage, but remember red is dead.” Tim had the feeling whatever was coming next would be a one-shot mechanic.

  The Goliath ran from one corner of the room to the next with superhuman strength, using the walls like the ropes of a wrestling ring. Stones fell from the ceiling, forcing the team to dodge flying debris as each of his attacks threatened to bring the theater down on top of them. The Goliath charged toward Jabari’s royal box with one last scream. Right before the boss reached his destination, his foot caught on something, and he fell forward at full speed sailing headfirst into one of the pillars holding up the seating.

  The pillar cracked as the Goliath’s skull crashed through the stone, and Jabari’s seating area shook.

  When the pillar broke, Tim thought for sure they were all fucked, and the entire palace would crash down on them regardless of their victory. Instead, a large section of the roof crashed down, burying the Goliath and cutting off Khalid and Neema from any chance of joining the fight against Jabari.

  Their fight with the Goliath was over, but the one with Jabari was about to begin.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Khalid screamed in fury as he beat against the wreckage of the bronze slats trying to find a way through.

  “No! Not now. I was so close.” The old warrior smas
hed his sword's pommel into the metal until his arm gave out from exhaustion.

  Neema pulled him away from the barrier. “We’ll find another way.”

  “There is no other way!” Khalid cried in frustration, dropping his sword and pulling at the bronze slats with his hands.

  The scene playing out above them was hard to watch. Tim tried to imagine how Khalid must have felt at this moment. The warrior had spent most of his life waiting to take revenge on Jabari, and now circumstances had snatched his chance away at the last possible instant. It must have been devastating.

  Seeing how strongly Khalid felt, Tim knew they couldn’t let him down. Jabari would die here today, but not in the way he’d initially thought. If he had to find a plus about the upcoming fight, he doubted Jabari would fart on them. The Juggernaut and the Goliath had played out that gimmick, and the truth of the matter was the ruler of a city should have a little more class.

  “Let’s get into formation.” Tim moved toward the back of the room.

  The rest of the party moved into their usual spots, with Cassie at the tip of the spear. Tim didn’t know when the fight would start, but they had to be ready. It looked like Jabari was heading toward the doors at the back of the royal box, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t signaled for help. After their fight against the Goliath, they knew there were a ton of hidden doors.

  Jabari reached out and grabbed the door handle, but he couldn’t wrench the door open. He kicked it a few times with no better result, then pulled his scepter free. He waved it at the door, and nothing happened. He cursed in frustration while trying the trick one more time. This time the wooden door disintegrated in a shower of splinters, revealing a slab of stone blocking his exit.

  “It’s not possible.” Jabari reached out and touched the stone.

  Neema rattled her bow against the bronze slots to get Jabari’s attention. “Not so funny now, is it fucker!”

  “Your opinion on the matter is of little importance.” Jabari turned away from the blocked passage and slowly made his way back down the aisle toward the railing.

  Stepping onto the railing then off it, Jabari fell thirty feet to the floor below. When he landed, the asshole barely even flexed his legs. When he looked at the band of adventurers, his eyes burned with the intensity of a caged rat. “Would you be so kind as to step out of my way?”

  “Not going to happen, fucknuts,” Cassie growled.

  Jabari smoothed out his robes and gently brushed some dust from his shoulder. “It seems when you stop killing people on your own, people forget that you’re capable of doing the deed yourself. Maybe it’s time for me to give them a proper demonstration.”

  He moved toward the group and stopped about twenty feet from them. He stood with casual grace, his body not giving away the slightest hint of nervousness. It was too bad Jabari’s eyes couldn’t do the same.

  “I’ll give you one last chance to walk away with your lives.” Jabari’s back was straight as a rod, his chin tilted at just the right angle to say fuck off, and I’m better than you all at the same time.

  JaKobi moved to stand next to Cassie. “You heard the lady, spunk bucket. You’re not going anywhere.”

  Tim was getting a rough idea of where all Cassie’s improved one-liners were coming from. If the only person she bounced ideas off was JaKobi, she was bound to run into some recycled material at some point. He did give them points for sticking with a theme. Insults seemed to dig a little deeper when they came in bunches.

  A look of utter shock replaced Jabari’s sneer. Tim got the feeling it had been a long time since someone had said no to him. It was funny how such a simple word held so much power.

  The sneer and the attitude of confidence returned as he quickly recomposed himself. “You must take me for some great fool. Many dared to think so. All of them are dead now.”

  The scepter he held clattered to the floor as Jabari started shaking. His body followed it a moment later as he fell to his knees and hunched over onto his hands. He looked up at them as a scream tore from his lips and he spat a gobbet of blood onto the floor.

  Tim watched in growing horror as Jabari convulsed. Two black limbs tore out of his sides, and all he could think about was The Thing. At this point, if Kurt Russell walked in with a blowtorch and lit the man on fire, he wouldn’t have been surprised, any more so than if those limbs turned into wings.

  It turned out they weren’t wings, but something much worse.

  Hanging in the air supported by his four new limbs Jabari looked down upon them with a hungry expression. His body continued to twitch as another set of legs appeared, and finally the last pair, giving him a total of eight massive legs.

  Jabari’s eye twitched as if he couldn’t control it anymore, but his voice was firm when he spoke. “You could have left, but now you will meet the monster. I do so hope you enjoy it.”

  Black fog swirled about the man—if Tim could call him a man anymore. He had a decent idea of what was about to happen next, but like when he thought Jabari would sprout wings, he could have easily been wrong. Whatever was going to come out of the fog, it would be big, have eight fucking legs, and a bad attitude.

  They had to be ready.

  “JaKobi, get back in formation. Cassie, be ready for anything, but especially something with eight fucking legs.” Tim hoped it wasn’t a scorpion.

  Hearing about Lorelei’s and Neema’s encounter with the Guardian left him a little jealous but also happy he didn’t have to fight it. Scorpions were like cockroaches with extra armor and a big pointy stabber. People always said roaches would rule the world after people wiped themselves out, but he always thought it would be the scorpions.

  Webbing shot out of the cloud and wrapped around Cassie, pulling her forward. Then there was always the other kind of eight-legged monster. Some might have called them eight-legged freaks. It’d been a while since they’d faced a spider of any kind, but he wouldn’t be surprised if this were some kind of new monster with eight legs and webs. Since they’d entered the palace, the only thing Tim was sure of was that he didn’t know what to expect next.

  Tim tried casting Cleanse on Cassie, but it didn’t do anything to the webbing. If he couldn’t Cleanse the webbing, there was only one other solution. “DPS the web!”

  Flames rippled down its length, and their tank staggered backward as she broke free. “That was fucking gross. Why can’t the bosses be people-sized people and not giant spiders?”

  “I think what you meant to say was, why do all these bosses shoot things at me with their asses?” ShadowLily tried to hide her grin as she helped Cassie strip away the last of the webbing.

  “That was going to be my next point of emphasis. I swear to God if something shits on me in this game, I’m going to break the servers.” Cassie whipped some webbing off her bō staff.

  The group slipped back into their standard formation as the black fog cleared.

  Jabari, ruler of the most beautiful city along the river, had transformed into an abomination. It wasn’t as if he turned into one of the famous Driders, half-spider, half-human creatures that were almost like centaurs. He’d turned into an actual spider. There was no humanity left in the monster before them unless you looked at the face.

  Tim had never seen a spider with a human face.

  Jabari had eight fucking eyes. Two very large, very human-looking ones on each side of the spider’s head. Under each of the much-too-human eyes were three very spider-like orbs of blackness swiveling around as they took in the room. His mouth was now a grotesque mashup of lips and pincers, but at least there was some humanity to it. The rest of his body was gone, cast aside like a tarantula’s shell, and in its place was a spider so big Tim wished JaKobi could burn the entire theater down to the ground.

  Then they could nuke it from orbit.

  As far as he knew, spiders weren’t supposed to have legs ten feet tall or a body the size of a bus. But what was considered shocking in a world of magic? A few moments ago, the spider had been
a normal-sized man. Now it looked like it could eat an entire village.

  If these were the perks for working with Vitaria, why would anyone ever do it?

  If the best she had to offer was gut-wrenching pain and a transformation into a creature so hideous even its mother would try and eat it, what was the point? Even if the only benefit of working for Eternia were that he would never end up looking like Jabari did now, he’d pick that choice over the other every single time.

  Thankfully, besides not requiring him to turn into a spider monster, Eternia had been incredibly generous.

  “You should have let me pass.” The Jabari monster’s pincers twitched, and saliva leaked from his mouth in anticipation of a meal.

  Tim looked at Cassie. “He’s all yours.”

  “Such a gentleman.” The tank turned and looked at the spider as a tiny bit of poison leaked from his pincers. The droplets hit the floor and sizzled.

  Cassie took a moment to look at where the poison hit, then looked into all eight of Jabari’s eyes. “And you, I don’t know what the fuck you are, but I’d suggest asking for something better next time you barter your soul for a little power.”

  The spider arched its back and shot another web at Cassie.

  JaKobi was on this one the second it slammed into her. It seemed that dodging the webs would be a real problem for them, but as long as they could DPS them down fast enough, they would be able to overcome the obstacle. Still, time spent on the webs would take away from DPS on the boss. It would be better to have a dedicated person on web duty. Their job would be to burst down any webbing that showed up before going back to the boss.

  The task would be a mess for ShadowLily. Having her run all over the place was out of the question. Lorelei’s arrows weren’t nearly as effective as JaKobi’s fire. So that put the fire mage on Team Webby until further notice.

  Tim cast Curse of Giving and Behold My Power on the boss. “JaKobi, you're on web duty. Everyone else, focus on the boss.”

  “What looks like a spider but talks like a man?” Lorelei quipped.