Trial and Flame
Page 18
[You have slashed a core crawler for 248 damage. Core crawler has been slain.]
[You have stabbed a core crawler for 253 damage. Core crawler has been slain.]
[You have gained 119 experience! EXP until next level 551/9,130]
“Hang tight, Roth!” Melee yelled, then turned her head to Mina. “Do it, girl!”
Cline provided what supporting fire he could against the small army of spiders now dropping on Roth in numbers so thick they couldn’t all bite the warrior at once, but he knew how important it was that the three core defenders remain perpetually stunned. He could take out 10 spiders with an arrow where they bunched up, but he conserved his mana despite the state of things.
Mina knelt down beside Jinx. Placing both hands on her growling pet, she began to whisper a new spell into the animal’s ear. Immediately, the right-most stalactite’s teal end began to pulse as it charged its caster-disrupting beam.
Cline swiftly fired his homing arrow at the defender threatening his ally. Before his arrow struck again, the third, orange, defender also began to charge up its beam weapon. Cline cast aside any thoughts he’d had about dividing his attention and loosed another arrow.
Roth held off the spiders as best he could, but after the first spiders had gotten to him there was little he could do. With Melee no longer at his side, and with Mina busy casting a spell elsewhere, crystal spiders swarmed around and covered him. He began to panic, trying to shake them off more than strike them as his health dipped to a dangerous 20 percent.
A huge cleave from Melee felled seven spiders leaping toward her at once. The sudden rush of experience was precisely what Roth needed. As spiders drained his HP to 12 percent, he leveled up—refilling his hit points to full.
Jinx let out a wild howl as the wolf’s body steamed. Once Mina finished casting her spell, Jinx’s body grew in length and breadth—his fur grew long and thick, as did his fangs and claws. Red light suffused the transformed predator and he sprang forward into action, rending the spiders latched onto Roth with powerful claws.
Roth had been healed. He flailed wildly, dislodging spiders. Though he was starting to get the assistance that he desperately needed, he was still partially covered by overgrown arachnids. Mina began to chant a heal while Roth’s health plummeted from full to 40 percent in seconds from the spiders’ bites. When he reached 34 percent, Mina’s double-casted heal surged through his body bringing him to full again—though at a steep mana cost for the druid.
When the number of crawlers on his side were thinned enough that he wasn’t being threatened, Dakkon worked on building the bridge while Melee intercepted the remaining spiders that leapt toward them. Their combined efforts managed to erect the bridge half-way across the river by the time Roth was at his most jeopardized. Unwilling to waste time that might bring any more danger to his friends, Dakkon hastily formed a supporting beam of ice from the opposite bank—freezing a portion of the river below in his haste. He needed to get to the ominous mound as soon as possible.
The bridge was long enough for him to leap to the other side and he hoped his last-second support would make the structure sturdy enough. Dakkon slapped Melee on the shoulder in silent thanks for her help, then turned to the makeshift half-bridge he’d built.
From the rear and center of the room, Cline re-dazed the moving stalactites each time their luminescent tips began to flicker; Melee returned to the right-side of the battle to aid Jinx and Roth; and Dakkon nimbly leapt to the other side of the river, keeping an eye fixed on the creature that still watched them all, unconcerned from its defensive perch.
Walking over and wading through the ankle-deep bones surrounding the mound, Dakkon rushed to the backside of the little hill and began to quickly construct a thick dome of ice. In his haste, water froze into ice jutting outward at various odd angles where it splashed.
Once he’d worked free from the spiders, Roth refused to be snared again, and the half-meter sized bugs were no match for the transformed Jinx. The altered wolf scarcely let spiders land before they were finished by rake of swift claw or bite from powerful jaw. By the time Melee arrived back on the right-flank, however, Jinx’s fleeting transformation came to its end and the wolf shrunk back to its normal size—the last wisps of steam wafting away.
Dakkon rounded the mound, snapping bones beneath his feet and pouring extra mana into the freeze to ensure no water seeped down into the mound and disturbed whatever lay beneath. Working his way to the front, the stream of his water sputtered and died. Finally exhausted of their deep magical reserves, the Dousebinders were merely decorative wrist wraps. He had run out of water with the dome only two-thirds complete. As it then stood, the dome was useless. Desperate to finish what he’d begun, Dakkon hurried to the nearby edge of the river and plunged both his forearms into the water as he tried to envision the Dousebinders sucking up water to replenish themselves. After 20 seconds of soaking, the battle on the right-side had finished in annihilation of the crystal spiders and Dakkon stood up to hopefully finish his task.
Dakkon held his hands forward and tried to summon restocked water from his Dousebinders, but they remained spent. If the wraps could be recharged, he didn’t know the trick of it. From where the creature sat watching within its raised nook, came a sound not unlike a deep, wet cough.
Despite their perpetually stunned state, the three core defenders simultaneously fell from the ceiling, shattering their glowing ends against the ground below. Then, the ground trembled with a mass of underground movement.
“I’ve got a really bad feeling about this!” Cline yelled out.
“Get your asses over here!” Dakkon yelled. “They’re coming!”
Dakkon inspected the mound for a brief moment, locked eyes with the ominous lurking creature at the back of the cavern, then doubled back to his half-finished bridge. He jumped back over, slipping on the ice of the other side in his haste. He slammed his backside down atop the bridge causing it to crack and the unfinished bridge beneath him crumbled. Even before the ground had quaked, the completed version likely wouldn’t have been able to take the shock it just had. The helping hands of Roth grabbed Dakkon’s cloak and the leg of his pants, pulling him up rather than let him fall into the water.
Cline fired arrow after arrow at the first few exploratory shriekers that poked their heads from the partially-covered hive. When he did, the creature in the back of the cave howled in anguish.
“They’re coming, but that dome might keep them grouped up!” Dakkon shouted. “I need you guys to brace me!”
Without delay, Roth and Melee set their backs against Dakkon’s and Mina leaned against them for added strength while Cline continued to pick off the odd emergent bugs to the vocal displeasure of the monster lurking in the back of the room. Bursting forward out of its impartial nook, the swarm queen landed at the end of the room and howled as it waited for the arrival of its skittering army.
Fully visible for the first time, the creature looked like the product of a horror workshop. Slug-like, its form was much thicker and more bulbous in the front—and broader than two men. Around its yellowed eyes was a horizontal band of puffy, soft-looking flesh that was sectioned-off between bands of tighter skin. The pattern of alternating tight skin and puffy flesh continued along the length of its form. The tauter areas looked like double-stitched seams, binding together some sort of horrendous, fleshy fabric. Below its large, rounded head were six thin, black, spindly legs which hardly looked adequate to support the creature’s own mass. If it was a burrower, as they’d been led to believe, Dakkon couldn’t see how.
Dakkon leaned against his companions and raised his arms toward the mound on the other side of the river.
“Ready?” Dakkon asked.
The mound in front of them deformed itself with a sudden, volcanic exodus of fleshy forms, nearly breaking Dakkon’s concentration when he saw them. Unwilling to let the opportunity slip by, Dakkon focused on pouring mana into and out of his hands then double-cast Afterburner.
<
br /> Nearly immediately, Dakkon was lifted off his feet, at the mercy of his friends’ stability. The long, powerful jet of fire incinerated the partially-trapped bugs as Dakkon shifted to cover them all, then it immediately bored a window through the back of the ice enclosure.
[You have burned a shrieker for 411 damage. Shrieker has been slain.]
[You have burned a shrieker for 420 damage. Shrieker has been slain.]
[You have burned a shrieker for 395 damage. Shrieker has been slain.]
…
[You have gained a level in your secondary class: Evoker (Fire)! Current level: 11]
Melee, Mina, and Roth struggled to keep Dakkon in place against the unrelenting force, failing on the beginning of the sixth second. 18 shriekers were roasted. The four party members were knocked to the ground—with Dakkon tumbling back behind the rest. Cline moved to help Dakkon to his feet as the boss monster charged, propelled forward by its inadequate-looking legs, and howled its displeasure.
More bugs swarmed out of the mound and beyond the charred remnants of their slain. Fortunately, Dakkon’s mana had been fully recharged when he gained an evoker level.
“Again!” Dakkon cried out as he ran back to the front—but before the group could reform their attack, the swarm queen leapt clear across the wide river, landing threateningly close to the fire mage who threatened her kin. A tight strip of flesh on the front and bottom of its round head spread apart into an open mouth with an oversized version of a shrieker’s mandible. The queen let out a furious, deep roar in Dakkon’s face.
[You have resisted: Fear]
Though Dakkon had resisted the urge to outright run, he was shaken up enough not to take a free swipe at the monster with his dagger.
The swarm queen tilted its head sideways and stared at the party before it as if casually deciding how it wanted to go about killing them.
Melee made the thing’s decision for it as she brought down her sword with a powerful swing.
A taut strip of flesh on the queen’s back parted in an instant and a large, curved crystalline shard appeared to defend against Melee’s strike. The crystal shard was bladed like a sword and, to everyone’s surprise, withstood and completely halted their warrior’s powerful attack.
Thanks to Melee’s quick, defiant action, the others’ focus returned to the battle at hand. Cline moved back and lined up a shot with his bow while Melee, Roth, and Dakkon encircled the boss monster. Mina prepared to cast spells where they were needed. All the while, more and more shriekers amassed on the opposite side of the river, unable to cross.
Cline fired a shot and the three in close quarters made a concerted strike. Rather than block these attacks, however, the swarm queen accepted them all and used the opportunity to retaliate. The monster brought down its crystalline blade on Melee’s exposed side—cutting into her—and simultaneously bit into Dakkon with its mandibles, injecting him with acid.
[You have stabbed a swarm queen for 225 damage.]
[You have been bitten for 335 damage. Remaining HP 705/1040]
[Acid courses through your veins! Your health will slowly drain away.]
Melee withdrew at once, having lost a third of her life from a single hit, while Dakkon and Roth plunged their weapons into the creature once again. Mina began to chant.
[You have stabbed a swarm queen for 215 damage.]
[You have stabbed a swarm queen for 219 damage.]
Though damage numbers were registering, the swarm queen seemed unconcerned with the blows it took and swung its sword-like appendage at Roth who barely managed to get out of the way. Another of Cline’s arrows ineffectively struck the creature, and just before Mina finished casting her spell a taut line of skin above the queen’s eyes separated to reveal a flashing red crystal orb.
“Oh no,” Cline said as a beam of red light shot out at Mina’s hands, throwing them apart, shattering her beads, and interrupting her casting.
The surprise beam had reduced Mina’s health to 48 percent, then the flaps of skin closed around it once again, obscuring any light.
“Our attacks aren’t working on it!” Roth called out. “I’m already deep into Plan B!”
“Shoot the bugs on the other side!” Mina called out.
Without hesitating, Cline fired a piercing shot and skewered through three densely-packed shriekers on the far side of the river. The queen wailed indignantly before focusing its gaze on Cline. It began to dash toward him, dragging its girth forward with its six spindly legs.
The creature’s dash was impeded by Roth and Melee as they laid into the charging monstrosity. Dakkon, convinced another anti-magic beam was being charged up in retaliation against Cline’s piercing shot, used Burning Sigil to draw a long line along the creatures on the other side of the riverbank.
As the queen revealed its red crystal once again to fire upon Cline, Dakkon ignited his skill, causing the creatures he’d painted to writhe in flames. The queen fired its laser-like beam at Cline, who shielded his bow against the attack with his body, knocking him tumbling backwards.
[Acid consumes you from within for 110 damage. Remaining HP 595/1040]
[You have burned a shrieker for 65 damage.]
[You have burned a shrieker for 67 damage.]
…
Dakkon’s screen filled with the damage notifications from the burning bugs as his health drained away due to the queen’s acid. Screaming from the pain it felt through some unseen bond with its brood, the swarm queen halted, abandoning its chase of Cline and forgetting about the others. The only target it saw now was Dakkon.
Thinking as Dakkon had, and despite her low health, Mina attempted to heal Melee once again when Cline fired his shot. To everyone’s relief, the spell took as blue light repaired the damage to Melee’s body, leaving Mina unpunished for her spell.
“Cline!” Mina called out. “Keep blasting ‘em!”
[Acid consumes you from within for 110 damage. Remaining HP 485/1040]
[You have burned a shrieker for 71 damage.]
[You have burned a shrieker for 65 damage.]
…
Dakkon’s screen continued to fill with damage notifications, both for himself and the bugs over the water. At nearly 25 percent, his health was getting awfully low. He really wasn’t built to take a hit on the front lines from some boss monster, but with the swarm queen barreling down on him, it was clear that he didn’t have many options.
Before the creature made it to him, Dakkon placed his hands at a right angle from the charging boss, channeling his level-restored mana down into them—squinting against the pain he knew he was about to cause himself. He aimed his Afterburner at some screeching bugs across the riverbank and double-cast the skill.
The sudden force of Dakkon’s skill threw him careening backwards, tumbling back into a wall, out of range of Mina’s healing. As Dakkon narrowly dodged, Cline’s double-cast penetrating arrow expertly pierced through six bugs on the other side. The sudden empathic shock that the queen felt sent her sliding into the river.
[You have burned a shrieker for 418 damage. Shrieker has been slain.]
[You have burned a shrieker for 410 damage. Shrieker has been slain.]
[You have burned a shrieker for 399 damage. Shrieker has been slain.]
[You have slammed into a wall for 212 damage. Remaining HP 53/1040]
Shocked that he was still alive, Dakkon clutched at his Equis Medallion, activating its second ability which set his health and mana to half of their maximum, a second before the next wrench of acid could finish him off.
[Acid consumes you from within for 110 damage. Remaining HP 410/1040]
[You have burned a shrieker for 72 damage.]
[You have burned a shrieker for 63 damage.]
…
The swarm queen was half-submerged in water. Scrabbling at the bank with its six thin legs, it pierced the bank with its crystalline appendage. Had Melee or Roth been close enough to strike, perhaps they could have exploited the creature’s predic
ament and sent it down-stream, but they were too far away, and it pulled itself out from the swiftly-flowing water.
Another arrow, curtesy of Cline, eliminated five more shriekers. Mina rushed over to cast a heal on Dakkon.
“I’m almost out of mana!” Cline yelled out.
“I’m low, too!” Mina stressed. They needed to end this fight soon.
The queen shot a red beam of light through its own flesh toward Cline, neglecting to open up its concealing flap of skin, and leaving its glowing red orb exposed for all to see. The boss howled in frustration after Roth intercepted the red beam intended for the archer who had dared to harm the queen’s clutch.
Dakkon pointed at the still-thick ranks of shriekers, impatiently waiting for their chance to snare and gnash the intruding humans, and drew a new line of red across them by focusing on the sensation of casting the spell. When he thought the words to activate Burning Sigil, he failed again to double-cast the skill. The line he drew burst into regular flame, and he immediately began to draw another.
[You have burned a shrieker for 66 damage.]
[You have burned a shrieker for 65 damage.]
…
Before he could activate his second skill, he was blasted sideways by the queen’s red beam, then immediately bathed in restorative blue light.
[You have been blasted by a swarm queen for 130 damage. Remaining HP 280/1040]
[You have been healed for 465 hit points. Remaining HP 745/1040]
[Acid consumes you from within for 110 damage.]
Determined not to let Dakkon cast another spell, the queen advanced. It moved more slowly than the time before—due perhaps to newly-gained caution or collective damage sustained—giving Dakkon the time he needed to get back on his feet.
Behind the approaching spider queen, Dakkon could see Melee run for the river at full sprint—but his partial bridge wasn’t there any longer. Dakkon panicked. Did she not know it had collapsed? It was too late. Dakkon opened his mouth to cry out to her. “Melee! No!”