She didn’t know?
That wasn’t right. She absolutely knew. The bloodstain smearing her fingers told her everything. The little breathing thing on the desk, wrought from a divine mixture of alchemy, was as much a creature of that world as she or Marché. She had created life - the grandest goal of all alchemists.
“Ugh…” Lieze wiped the remnants of gristle from her hand, “For every thread of wisdom I unravel, two more knots of mystery are tied in its place.”
Marché was stunned by her poignant nonchalance. He had a habit of inaction whenever something truly disturbing happened.
“This quicksilver is useful.” Lieze retrieved her Bag of Holding, “I’ll perform some more experiments with it when the opportunity presents itself.”
Shaking the fear away, Marché padded over to the far end of the room and busied himself with scouring the bookshelves while Lieze used a shard of glass to scoop the quicksilver into her Bag of Holding.
Secret Quest ‘Materia’ Complete! Description - Collect a sample of quicksilver Reward - 3,500xp
“A quest?” She thought, “It must be something important…”
Ideas buzzed in her head, threatening to burst forth like the larvae of some parasitic creature. If she could combine quicksilver and Mercuria to create ‘life’, there were untold possibilities waiting to be discovered.
Marché brushed his fingers along the pages of the tome opened at the far desk. Its scriptures were elegant, steeped in the flowery prose of a scholar. He took note of the archaic language - corrupted letters, appendices and structure - concluding that it was an especially old document.
His fingers found the corner of a yellowed page, and then there came a shout from the main chamber.
“It’s moving!” Came Drayya’s voice, “The Manticore’s moving! Get out here!”
The crumbling of rock accompanied her words. Lieze and Marché sprinted out of the hidden room to see shelves of dusty stone shedding from the statue like a second skin. Fluffy, ginger hairs stood on their ends as a semblance of animation was returned to the beast, allowing for a precious few seconds of preparation.
“Marché.” Lieze said, “Take your thralls and prepare to attack from the rear. We’ll use the Rot Behemoth and Briarknight to distract it while you strike.”
She readied herself for a pointless rebuttal, but no such resistance came.
“I understand.” Marché nodded, before rounding up his thralls and rallying to the other end of the chamber.
“Lieze!”
Drayya’s voice came too late to be of any use. As the Manticore struggled against its prison of stone, great fragments of granite were thrown off from its body. One such fragment found itself careening towards Lieze, striking her chest and forcing her into a kneel.
Lieze’s HP - 212 / 310
If the stone chunk had been any larger - or heavier - she would have almost certainly been flattened. Drayya rushed over to help the girl up while the Manticore shed the last of its petrification. Lieze’s gaze rose to examine the newly-materialised rectangle above its wailing face.
Manticore Level 56 Abomination HP - 11,909 / 11,909 MP - 1,309 / 1,309 BODY - 35 MIND - 18 SOUL - 3
The mind struggled to comprehend the creature’s form - a cruel abstraction of nature, forged by the hands of power-hungry alchemists. A pair of bat-like wings shunted clouds of granite dust into the air as the Manticore’s forked tail curled in anticipation, its rows of jagged teeth glistening with cloudy saliva.
New Quest Received! ‘The Warped Beast’ - Raise a Manticore as a thrall Reward - 4,000xp
“It’s powerful…” A dull ache assaulted Lieze’s body, “Stronger than the Drake…”
-But during her encounter with the Drake and Stürm, Lieze was a novice. She had only a foundational understanding of high-level necromancy. Since then, she had proven her victory that day to be more than mere luck.
“Watch that tail!” Marché shouted, “The legends say it’s venomous!”
“-You’re not suggesting we shouldn’t be mindful of the teeth and claws!?” Drayya replied, “Get up, Lieze!”
She was pulled to her feet and dragged into the group of thralls lingering near the chamber entrance. The Manticore didn’t waste a moment once its stone skin had been shed, pouncing forward to swipe its gargantuan claws clean through a line of Gravewalkers. Lieze recoiled as ribbons of rotting flesh coated her body.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
The singular Rot Behemoth was quick to react with its own attack. The monstrosity’s hulking mass crashed into the Manticore’s flank, tackling it into the wall with enough force to shake the cavern’s foundations, sending plumes of dust down from the distant ceiling.
Lieze scanned the Behemoth’s level - [42]. It wasn’t powerful enough to emerge victorious in a one-on-one bout with the Manticore, illustrated with karmic timing just a second later, when the Rot Behemoth had its body flung back by the Manticore’s animalistic thrashing.
Anything smaller than the twin combatants - Gravewalkers and Horrors - were merely decorations to the battle. There could be no hope of approaching either titan without a major risk of terrible annihilation.
“Was it wise to bring the Rot Behemoth in here!?” Drayya voiced a concern, “How sturdy do you think these walls are!?”
“The sooner we kill that Manticore, the less chance we’ll have of being buried alive!” Lieze replied, “Command the Gravewalkers to scale the creature’s body! We need to hold it down with as much manpower as possible!”
While the Manticore was preoccupied with the mountain of flesh pinning it to the wall, Lieze ordered her Briarknight to take advantage of its diverted attention.
Brandishing its greatsword, the undead knight led a procession of Gravewalkers towards the beast, waiting patiently for a prime opportunity to strike. Once the Manticore was backturned in its standoff with the Rot Behemoth, 3 Gravewalkers shambled forward with the intent of clinging to its hide.
With a lightning-quick lash, the Manticore’s tail whipped the three undead with such ferocious power that their bodies were sent flying back towards Lieze’s position. A second later, when they landed, she took note of their disfigured flesh, which seemed to be bubbling and melting.
“So it is venomous…” She muttered, “Attacking it from behind is a trap!”
For an instant, she considered the use of her [Heavenly Favours] to turn the tide of the battle, but her fears were dashed by the efforts of her Briarknight.
With greatsword in both hands, the former Acolyte sidestepped a lash from the Manticore’s tail, using the momentum to lift its blade in a skyward sunder. The greatsword’s keen edge severed the beast’s tail in a single stroke, leaving nothing but a barbed stump protruding from the Manticore’s rear.
Manticore’s HP - 10,881 / 11,909
The tuft spasmed on the floor, leaking an oil slick of fell venom from its cleft end. Whether enraged or simply impervious to pain, the Manticore paid no mind to the loss of its tail, content to sink its fangs into the Rot Behemoth’s flesh while the Briarknight continued its attack.
“Stand back.” Grabbing Lieze’s wrist, Drayya led the girl to the rear of the thralls, “We’ll need more than grit to see this beast dead.”
“What do you suggest?” Lieze asked.
Drayya nodded towards the ceiling, drawing her attention to the void of darkness looming over the battle. Within the shadows, she could spot torchlight reflecting from something metallic on the ceiling - a deprecated and lonesome chandelier.
“That looks heavy.” She said, “I get the idea, but we’ll only have a single chance to hit the Manticore with it. We’ll need some method of keeping the beast in place in exactly the right location.”
Drayya smirked. It was a telling and frustrating expression - one that Lieze despised seeing. Drayya always wore it when she was plotting something ridiculous. With a carefree hand, the girl took hold of the circlet Lieze was wearing and lifted it from her head.
“Allow me to control the Rot Behemoth for a moment.” She said, “Ready a [Blood Spike] to take that chandelier down. You’ll know when to strike - believe me.”
Lieze frowned as Drayya fiddled with the headpiece.
“I didn’t say you could take that circlet.” Lieze replied.
“Give me the chance to put it to good use and you’ll be glad that I did.” Drayya said, “Observe.”
Having said that, she stole through a gap in the surrounding Gravewalkers, disappearing towards the ongoing conflict between the Manticore and Rot Behemoth. When Lieze returned her gaze to the battle, Marché had directed a handful of his Gravewalkers to grapple the beast, though those with the grip strength to accomplish that feat had become little more than swaying ragdolls decorating the Manticore's fur.
Intrigued to see Drayya’s plan for herself, Lieze weakened her psychic control over the Rot Behemoth, transferring authority to Drayya. As the hanging Gravewalkers found purchase in the beast’s flesh with their yellowed teeth, a moment of opportunity was created for Drayya to approach the Rot Behemoth while the Manticore rolled onto its stomach to flatten its stowaways.
“Catch this, you lump of skin!” Drayya shouted, tossing the circlet towards the Behemoth. The abundance of misplaced hands studding its flesh made catching the circlet a simple enough matter.
Lieze couldn’t tell exactly what Drayya was planning to do, but she was more than willing to observe the result from a safe distance.
Following some unspoken mental command, a blinding light escaped from the circlet, growing to engulf the Rot Behemoth in its entirety.
Rot Behemoth’s MP - 0 / 0
!MANA BURNOUT!
When the light faded, there was no mountain of flesh in sight - at least, not for a few seconds.
Lieze raised her head just in time to see the enormous undead materialising near the unlit ceiling. The Manticore, too preoccupied with its passengers to notice, thrashed about underneath, blind to the fate that awaited it.
The Rot Behemoth fell like a bolt of lightning from the heavens, kicking up a whirlwind of dust as its bloated underside crushed the Manticore and caused the meticulous stone tiles to crack and sunder beneath its weight. A pitiful wail escaped from the beast’s human face as the screech of its bones snapping filled the chamber with a horrifying chorus of crunches.
Manticore’s HP - 2,117 / 11,909
Lieze was already syphoning blood from her Bag of Holding when the Rot Behemoth slithered off the Manticore’s crushed body. The creature yet breathed, though it was in no position to move for a good while. Above it, the jagged metal of the chandelier swung back and forth, revealing the rusted chain tethering it to the ceiling.
Lieze’s MP - 1,430 / 1,450
Her [Blood Spike] pierced the chain link with a screech, freeing the chandelier and forcing it to plummet towards the ground. Years of neglected maintenance had transformed the decoration into a rusted shell of its former self - all the better for piercing flesh, as far as Lieze was concerned.
The chandelier’s intricate construction disintegrated upon impact as its chipped edges and curls sank into the Manticore’s immobilised body. Blood poured from innumerable wounds as the beast’s primal snarls defied death to its final moments. Eventually, it could resist no longer, and the ticking countdown of its HP was depleted before Lieze’s eyes.
Manticore’s HP - 0 / 11,909
Lieze clenched her eyes as the chaos lingered in her eyes as a terrible ring. When it passed, the chamber was silent bar the incessant moaning of undead thralls. Drayya was kind enough to fetch the circlet from a pair of hands conjoined with the Rot Behemoth’s crimson mass before skipping over to Lieze.
“I told you.” She smirked, “It’s a bit smashed up - the Manticore, I mean - but when has a few shattered bones ever stopped a thrall?”
“It wasn’t a bad plan.” Lieze took the circlet, grimacing as she felt some kind of oily substance coating its frills, “I’m surprised it worked at all. Isn’t mana required to make use of the circlet?”
“Even those without talent in the realm of sorcery can cast a single spell if they try.” Drayya explained, “-Of course, they won’t be able to do it again for quite a while, since it would sever their spiritual connection to the Gods temporarily.”
The phenomenon Drayya described was one that Lieze understood well - [Mana Burnout]. The effect only came into play when a spell drove the caster’s mana to 0 or below. The Rot Behemoth had no MP to speak of, but it was still capable of expending mana once before entering [Mana Burnout], no matter how costly the spell was.
“Now…” Lieze began, “Let’s see if we can’t raise ourselves a Manticore.”