New Quest Received: Eliminate the Alphas

You have entered the territory of one of the Arboreal creatures that live in this Eldertree Forest. Eliminate this and all other Arboreal alphas to complete this dungeon. Eliminating an alpha will provide dungeon points and open a portal that can be used to exit this dungeon.

Progress - 0/6 alphas eliminated

The rustle of the faraway trees continued, but the tree on which Rahul and his friends were standing was oddly quiet.

Something is wrong.

Rahul thought as a sudden gust of wind flew by, prompting him to equip his twin daggers.

Ivan must have sensed something too, as his body stiffened and he gripped his sword tighter.

Then, in the blink of an eye, the tank disappeared, and Rahul heard the sound of metal clashing against metal.

Five times in a row.

He searched for the source of the sound and saw a flabbergasted Daniel sweating and shivering, Ivan standing right at his back with his sword raised.

Rahul felt his heartbeat quicken as he realized that this time, there was no zone of battle that they would get to survey from outside before they went in and started the Boss Battle.

The fight was already on.

And the alpha was hunting them.

He felt another gust of wind, and this time his eyes tracked a disturbance in the air, akin to the shimmer one would see above tarmac roads on hot days.

The shimmer was moving impossibly fast, toward Maya this time, but Ivan still managed to get there before the invisible enemy, and this time, Rahul could see the exchange that had caused the metallic sounds.

Or more accurately, he saw half of the exchange, because all that was visible was Ivan's sword moving to intercept some invisible attacks.

Just like Daniel, Maya too stood completely frozen as this all transpired right behind her back.

Rahul looked toward the former manager and found that he was still sweating buckets. As he looked back toward Maya, he realized that neither Ivan nor the shimmer was there anymore.

Shit. I lost track of it.

He thought and decided to look around and take stock of the situation.

Before he could turn that thought into action, Rahul felt a mind-numbing chill run down his spine, locking him in place and threatening to shut down all his faculties in one fell scoop.

He tried to struggle free of the paralyzing fear and could feel Momentum struggling alongside him. It was all they could do to retain awareness of their situation.

The ringing of metal against metal happened only a few feet behind Rahul's back this time, and then the fear gripping him loosened.

Not enough for him to turn around and face his nightmares, but enough to realize that Matt hadn't been shielding him or any of his friends from the mental attacks they were being subject to.

Fury threatened to overcome fear in Rahul's mind, but he pushed back.

Matt would never abandon us. But then what's he doing?

The answer became obvious as he paid attention to the Empathic Knight.

Matt's eyes were continuously tracking Ivan.

The area of effect skill Aegis of Protection must not have been strong enough to guard us against the mental attacks, forcing Matt to use the stronger and targeted skill Intent Resistance instead.

Ivan was the obvious choice. In addition to being our tank with numerous life-saving skills, he also has more innate resistance to intent attacks due to Immutability being an evolved presence.

Rahul understood as Matt continued to track Ivan, who was now approaching the knight head-on, while the shimmer moved to attack his back.

It all happened in the blink of an eye, as Ivan passed by Matt's side too fast for the knight's eyes to follow, and came face to face with the invisible beast right at the back of a now frozen Matt.

Ivan is no longer under the protection of Intent Resistance.

Rahul realized as he noticed Ivan struggle to block the invisible attacks now that he had to fight off the mental attack at the same time.

Targeting Intent Resistance on Ivan had left Matt himself vulnerable to the mental attacks, and he was now struggling to turn around and get a line of sight on Ivan and activate the skill again.

There is a cooldown before he can switch targets. Due to his innate resistance to mental attacks, he isn't anywhere as helpless as the rest of us, but given the sedate rate at which his head is turning, that isn't going to make a difference.

Rahul thought as he saw Ivan's desperate attempts at block attacks he could not see.

Every second that passed saw more and more wounds open up across the tank's body.

The only thing that's saving Ivan is his reinforcing intent.

Rahul thought as he kept struggling against the mental attack that was gripping him. Now that he wasn't the primary target, the magnitude of mental coercion he was struggling against was much lesser, and he finally overcame it.

The struggle had the fortunate side effect of getting his intent up to 3 points, and he burnt some of that to immediately close the distance between himself and Matt, positioning himself on Ivan's side.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

As he turned to face the enemy, Rahul realized that he could still not see anything beyond the shimmer.

Shit, I didn't think this through. If the alpha targets me, I won't last anywhere as long as the tank.

He thought as he saw Ivan's wild swings failing to block most of the attacks that came his way. Even as a dodge tank, he was a tank, and that came with a high health pool, which coupled with the use of reinforcing intent was keeping him alive now.

For now.

Rahul thought as he decided to expend some intent to buy the flagging Ivan some respite.

Getting close to the shimmer, he swung his dagger in a wide arc and unleashed nearly a third of his gathered-up intent in a kinetic cleave.

The intent investment wasn't even a tenth of the attack that annihilated multiple beast bastions worth of enemies on the island as the tutorial ended, but it didn't have to be.

Rahul hadn't just been racing up trees and doing team-bonding activities with his friends these past three days.

Competing their way up the trees was one of the crudest ways in which they fought, and was more about earning a lot of quick XP and getting familiar with each other's new fighting styles. Their real skill gains came when they had gone solo against entire trees, and Rahul had learned several tricks on those adventures.

One of which was the ability to make his Kinetic Arcs more focused, that is to say, more targeted and deadly.

The Kinetic Arc that left his blade dissipated after traveling for only a few seconds, covering just over 10 feet of distance. But while it lasted, the Arc contained a deadly concentration of sharpened kinetic intent.

The intent expenditure wasn't the only factor in determining the threat of the cleave either. Rahul's stats played a role too, and those stats were nothing to scoff at.

The creature they were fighting was wise enough to understand the threat the cleave posed, and wisely dodged the attack, coming back in to attack again now that it had found Matt, the only enemy he had to defeat to incapacitate the rest of the team.

Unfortunately for that creature, the brief distraction had let some pressure off Matt. Enough for him to completely turn around, and reactivate the Intent Resistance.

He must have noticed that Ivan can get by without the help, and decided to favor offense over defense.

Rahul smiled.

Because I can now see the damn lizard clear as day.

Rahul inspected the now quite visible creature.

Chameleon Lurker Alpha (Level ???)

The damn thing is as big as a truck. Damn Maya, what level are you, and what disaster have you brought upon us.

He muttered as he noticed the alpha's continued attacks on Ivan.

He hasn't realized that I'm the one who is immune to his intent attack now.

I can take advantage of that. But how?

Before he could delve too deep into the chain of thoughts, the alpha managed to score a deep gash across one of Ivan's thighs, which started bleeding profusely. Realizing that the alpha won't sit around and wait while he strategized, Rahul went in with his blade and started slicing the nearest limb of the massive monster.

With his 140 strength further amplified by a myriad of stat modifiers, his blades had no difficulty cutting through the chameleon's skin. But the creature's limbs were taller than Rahul's, and his skin thick, which is why Rahul's small daggers had only managed to scratch the surface when the monster shook the limb and tried to kick him away.

But now that the chameleon was visible, Rahul was more than a match for it in terms of dexterity and dodged the haphazard kicks easily, his Footwork II skill helping him time his dodge in ways that gave him openings to counterattack.

With all of the alpha's attention on Rahul, his friends were able to rally behind Ivan, who had downed two healing potions and seemed to be in good shape again.

He also seems to be watching the exchanges between me and the alpha very intently. Is he able to see it without Matt's help now?

Rahul wondered as he kept on fighting, slowly battering the alpha down. He had picked a particular spot on the alpha's calf and started digging with his tiny blades, treating it like the grand escape in the Shawshank Redemption. His endurance was more than up to the task, but as time went on, Rahul had a sinking feeling.

I'm making progress, but why do I get the feeling that the alpha is buying for time? It makes no sense. The way I see it, the longer this goes on, the better it is for us.

Even under the protection of Matt's skill, Rahul could feel a small amount of the alpha's intent attacks reaching him. Momentum was fighting that weakened version of the attack, thereby building up his resistance to the alpha's intent attacks.

Sort of like how vaccines work.

Rahul considered, having a lot of time for thoughts now that the battle was in a stalemate, one that he expected to turn in favor of the humans any minute, given that they were all learning to deal with the alpha's mental attack.

In their own ways.

As this went on for another minute, the alpha's movements became more and more unwieldy, and the limb Rahul had been digging through started showing noticeable damage.

This is like a deep rotten cavity in an otherwise healthy tooth.

A bit more, and the limb might buckle under the creature's own weight. But I still have a bad feeling about this.

I'm sure turning invisible isn't the alpha's only ability, so why is it holding its cards so close to the chest even when it risks losing a limb?

His friends were likely also wondering about the same thing, as they look worriedly toward the swarms of flying birds that had left the far-off trees and were slowly flying here.

Rahul of course had noticed that too, but had dismissed the birds as flying XP bags that weren't going to make any actual difference in the battle.

His friends either thought differently or decided that they had built enough resistance, because Ivan charged in, attacking another one of the alpha's limbs, while Maya and Daniel started hurling spells.

While Daniel's fireballs all hit the target, half of Maya's fire bullets missed completely.

This was very surprising given how large the enemy was and how they simply had to aim at a shimmering space between Ivan and Rahul.

That's when he saw that her hands were still shaking.

The mental attacks are still hitting her hard. She's the only one without a presence. She probably doesn't even see a shimmer in the air like I did.

Rahul realized.

He got no time to ponder further on it, as he saw the combined pressure from Ivan, Daniel, and himself, coupled with the occasional hits from Maya, finally put enough pressure on the alpha for it to switch tactics.

And run.

Showing remarkable dexterity for its size, the chameleon rapidly ran.

Vertically up the tree trunk.

"Don't pursue."

Matt said before anyone could even take a step.

"If it catches any of us alone, we're dead."

He clarified.

As Rahul considered that statement, he found it to be true. Even though they had all developed some amount of Immunity to the alpha's attacks, it wasn't perfect. It was only because of Matt's Intent Resistance that Rahul could occupy the alpha's complete attention, letting the others attack the highly distracted foe.

One-on-one, no one except Matt himself has a chance against the chameleon. If he hadn't noticed the alpha on time, or not had the presence of mind to use the spell on Ivan, who could use his Timeweave Tank skills to get where he was needed, things might have gone very badly in that first sneak attack.

Matt continued speaking, more or less mirroring Rahul's thoughts.

"That ambush and the early part of the battle were the toughest parts. Now that we know its tricks, we can beat it as long as we don't make any stupid mistakes. That means no one should be outside my line of sight at any time."

Everyone nodded.

"So, the enemy has retreated, but what's its end game?"

A shaky Maya asked the question.

Rahul looked around, and with the urgent threat gone, really thought about it as he looked around.

"It's either building up intent, similar to what we often do ourselves."

His eyes caught something off in the distance, and his keen sight skill kicked in.

"Or it's waiting for reinforcements."

He added, drawing confused glances from everyone.

"Alpha reinforcements."

Rahul clarified, pointing to an enormous bird flying off in the distance. It was surrounded by a swarm of regular Talon Guardians, but once you knew what to look for, it stood out.

As he kept looking around, Rahul noticed more such distinct forms. Some were airborne and flying among the guardians, while others were on land.

The only thing they had in common was that they were all converging toward their position.

He started counting them on his fingers. All five fingers of his palm were open by the time he finished counting.

"They are coming here... All the remaining alphas. "