Chapter 51: Bone-Golem: Groundskeeper
Darius
Darius had to admit he felt a little unprepared. It was not a sensation he was exactly familiar with and he didn’t like it. Darius might seem on the surface like he treated both hunts and fights with the same tongue in cheek, seat of his pants nature he treated everything else but it wasn’t quite true. What allowed the eldest Knots child to act like that and get away with it was an almost obsessive level of practice and preparation. Even now he drilled with his spear or went on little practice hunts in the early mornings before Alley woke up.
On top of that was the nature of his spear itself. The weapon was versatility incarnate, effective at multiple ranges including thrown. It was the perfect weapon to harass a foe from a safe distance while still possessing enough stopping power to threaten almost any type of monster or enemy.
Almost being the operative word there. The huge creature of bone and rusted iron looked like a strong reminder that even his Ancient spear needed organs or flesh it could target. It hadn’t been an issue against the zombies and Darius had overlooked the possibility that when hunting Undead he might encounter something with no active weak spot at all.
How exactly was one supposed to hurt something like that? A really big hammer maybe? The creature wasn’t anywhere near the largest thing Darius had ever fought, even the MuckDwell Dragons dwarfed the thing. Those were all living beings though, this was ten feet of monster bones mashed into the vague shape of a person and then reanimated. Not to mention the four-foot iron blades extending from its forearms and knees.
The pair of boys crouched low on the staircase watching the bone-creature stride back and forth on the grassy plateau before the towering columns at the entrance to the ancient-looking mansion. The monster had yet to spot them, and unless Darius missed his guess the thing had a rather small field of vision in general. There might be something there. A potential weakness to exploit.
“Any thoughts on how we bring that thing down?” Asked Darius playing with the little Dealer piercing the top of his ear.
Alley slowly turned his head to give his friend an incredulous look.
“Me?!” He whisper-yelled. “You are the hunter.”
Darius made a little ‘pweh’ sound. “I don’t hunt Undead, and you are the one who has the Deck with Undead in it!”
“Are you kidding?” Alley hissed back “I’ve had this Deck for like two and a half weeks.”
Darius wasn’t going to admit that his friend had a point, though he did. Especially not when he had the perfect strategy to bait Alley.
“So you…don’t have a plan?” Asked Darius raising an eyebrow. Alley went silent and tongued his cheek for the better part of thirty seconds.
“I might.” He eventually conceded. Darius was all but certain that his friend had simply spent the time he was quiet coming up with something but whatever it was probably beat crouching here all afternoon while they got absolutely mauled by mosquitoes. Something he had actively warned Alley would happen. Being right didn’t make him any less itchy and Darius was keen to get inside the massive building.
“Well, what is it?” Prompted Darius. Alley’s face split into that annoying grin he did when he thought he was being particularly funny or clever.
“Don’t worry about it, I just need you to get and keep its attention.”
Darius looked at his friend flatly.
“So your plan is I’m the bait.”
“Yep.”
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The hunter sighed and slipped his pack off.
“Yeah, Dad likes that plan too.”
Concentrating briefly Darius activated his Deck. The Pursuit Resonance in his Dealer and inside himself wasn’t exactly geared towards defense. It was in the name after all ‘Pursuit’. Darius honestly thought he was just a tiny bit faster when chasing something than any other time, his mind felt clearer in those moments too.
Still, he wouldn’t be much of a hunter if he couldn’t mix things up when the situation called for it. He glanced down at the four Card images that hovered near his left hand.
‘Top Of The Food Chain, Bone Tooth Necklace, Dawn Hunter’s Tusk Breaker, Perfect Instinct’
It was a strong draw and if he had been fighting a person or a monster with fucking organs he would be extremely confident in his ability to win and win quickly. Against this thing, Darius still wasn’t so sure, though the nature of his hand had boosted his confidence a little.
Top Of The Food Chain and Bone Tooth Necklace probably weren’t going to be much help, as the first Card drove away Predators and the second gave him a boost in power for each creature he had run down in the last day, at present that number was zero.
‘Gotta remember to start charging that in the future.’ He chided himself. It was the last two Cards Darius had drawn where things started to get special.
Trotting up the stairs surprisingly didn’t attract the attention of the bone monster but the moment Darius set foot in the grass of the lawn plateau it turned towards him. Somehow the stiff mechanical way it reorientated itself was creepy in the extreme. It also reminded Darius of the movements of clockwork Mechkin that was in desperate need of maintenance.
“Well come on then,” Darius called to the monster. “ Show me what all the fuss is about.”
The monster exploded into motion at the same time that Darius began to sprint to the right, away from both the monster and the stone stairs Alley still occupied. While its movements were stiff and a little awkward the bone thing’s long legs allowed it to cover ground with deceptive speed.
Once he had drawn the monster far enough away from the stairs that he felt Alley could do…whatever it was he was planning to do Darius let the bone creature almost catch up to him.
Predictably the monster lunged the last few feet, reaching out in an awkward attempt to stab at Darius with both rusty arm-blades.
Ducking low the hunter changed directions and easily slipped past the attack, but before he could take advantage of the opening the monster launched into a furry of mechanical thrusts. Darius danced directly backward for two steps as he activated a card.
“Dawn Hunter’s Tusk Breaker!” He declared bending his knees and digging his feet into the ground to halt his backward momentum. It didn’t work as well as he hoped as his boots slipped a little on the damp grass but the Card activated and Darius managed to avoid falling over. Even it once more cost him the opportunity to begin counterattacking.
https://i.imgur.com/lbGenPG.png [https://i.imgur.com/lbGenPG.png]
While it wasn’t the hammer he thought would be the best option against a monster like this, the Dawn Hunter’s Tusk Breaker had a much better chance of being useful than his spear. Shifting like rushing liquid in his hands the ancient spear rearranged its components into a thick-headed, bone-handled axe almost instantly.
With this Darius felt confident he could crack and eventually shatter the bones of the monster. He just needed to survive long enough to find another opportunity. Easier said than done. The skeletal monster’s attacks might be jerky and awkward but they were mechanically relentless.
Hopefully whatever Alley was doing would work soon, but the hunter wasn’t willing to rely on that for now. Besides what could be a better distraction than a genuine attempt to kill the creature?
Gripping his axe two-handed Darius smashed one of the thrusting blades out of his way. Using the shift in momentum granted by the collision with the bone-monster’s arm blade the red-headed boy launched a huge swing at the chest of the tower creature.
To his irritation, the bone monster possessed more sense of self-preservation than the zombies he had been fighting this morning. With an audible creak of its joints, the monster brought one of its legs up so the blade on its knee could intercept the axe swing.
Bone and stone met rusted metal with a clang then shriek as the knee blade was bent out of shape by the far superior [Ancient] Weapon. That was encouraging, the way the monster didn’t react other than to realign its bladed arms and begin its stabbing assault once more.
Darius’ eyebrows rose sharply and he found himself on the backfoot once more. What a frustrating enemy, it attacked constantly with the arms while leaving the leg blades ready for defense. So even as Darius knocked aside attack after attack he found actually landing something significant on the creature. The axe was just a little too cumbersome to truly take advantage of the brief openings he could create, but the spear likely wouldn’t have the stopping power he needed.
Darius was working to create a little bit more distance between himself and the monster so that he could make use of his superior agility to attack the monster from more favorable angles when Alley’s plan finally kicked in.
It was a good thing too as Darius was beginning to consider using 'Perfect Instinct' the Card he considered his Deck's 'final emergency measure' and would cost him far too much life-essence to activate again should they encounter something even more serious inside the mansion.