CHAPTER 228

Keikain looked at them awkwardly. “Should I stay or… reinforce the others?”

“No point in you staying.” Everlyn answered him honestly. “We’re scouting. You crowding the entrance will only get in the way.”

He left, and when Tom observed the earth mage, he was impressed. Keikain was accomplished at moving silently even if he lacked stealth skills. Then again, paying attention to the basics was an important trait for long-term survival.

They gave him an extra minute to fully retreat, and then they looked at each other. Everlyn smiled her eyes bright with determination. She put a finger to her lips and then picked her way forward into the boss room and toward danger. A small part of him wondered if he was being foolish to have pushed for this.

Tom followed and made a point of stepping only where she had.

She smiled in approval.

The instant he left the nominal safety of the entrance, he felt exposed. The chieftain was strong enough to destroy him, and that threat had been sufficient that Everlyn had been willing to abandon the lair without even searching for alternative methods to kill it. Now they were in the actual cave. If it spotted him or learned of his existence, it would attack.

He felt incredibly vulnerable even as his logical mind rejected the concept.

Luckily, his Earth Sense gave him a wide net that would spot any goblins rushing to attack long before they got close. The fear was merely an instinctual one and so he was happy to ignore it.

The tension was also impacting Everlyn. She was not taking chances and despite it not being required she headed straight for a crashed rock. It must have weighed a tonne and was significantly bigger than both of them. The left of the room had been cleared. If a goblin came around the rock fall into the area while they were hidden like this, they would not be observed.

She peered around the corner to check and then relaxed when she saw nothing there. They had just killed the only two goblins who possessed a line of sight to this spot. Technically, they were not at any significant risk of being spotted. If they were, they wouldn’t be attempting it with the threat of that boss finding them.

With careful hands, she shifted away the loose gravel in front of her. Tom heard nothing almost certainly because of her skill, because her rushed technique should definitely have created noise. With all potentially noisy stones cleared, she shuffled carefully forward into the cleared spot.

She crouched and repeated the motions. She was no longer hidden behind an extra layer of stone just the main part of the rockfall that obscured vision from where the boss and its bodyguards would be positioned. That extra risk meant her head would drop for a second to flick stones away and then she would look up to make sure that no enemies were approaching.

Then she repeated the movements.

Tom put a cautious hand on her elbow. She did not flinch, but instead looked over her shoulder in confusion.

It was his turn to lift a finger to his lips and then lean around her to focus on the ground.

The issue was that the floor was polished stone. The collapsed roof had spread chips of rock over it. Grit that would make grinding and crunching sounds if you stepped on it. Her method of clearing the way was inefficient.

For once, he did not even think about training any skills. Instead, he flexed Remote Earth Manipulation. His consciousness shifted forward, and he remembered what he had read. This sort of thing once you got a domain was like moving a muscle. For now, it was anything but. He concentrated on the debris that covered the smooth stone floor. For each piece, he infused his mind and then twisted the energy not sufficient to turn it into dust but enough to make its substance malleable. The small bits of rock melted and merged with the stone underneath it. The process was perfectly silent. There was no heat involved no matter what it looked like so no hissing, steaming and bubbling that you would expect to go hand in hand with melting rock. Rather, he went from piece to piece and created patches of de-gritted stone. He was not cleaning the polished floor. In fact, it was the opposite. He was fusing rough, ugly patches onto the previously pristine surface.

Everlyn noticed his progress and then they started moving forward once more.

Tom’s full attention was on creating a path for them while Everlyn remained on furious alert. Her eyes stabbing the space in front of them as a crept closer to the middle of the room. They were continually searching for any signs that they had been discovered.

With every step toward the centre, the useful area he could view expanded. Pretty soon, at the edge of his awareness were monsters. It was beyond the rockfall and the owners of those feet would not be able to visually spot them. The stone felt their weight and the subtle shifts they made and even their heart beats.

Tom paused despite himself.

Everlyn tensed and kept half an eye on him while searching for additional threats.

He correlated the positions of goblins he could sense to what he had seen before the rock fall. It seemed like the chieftain and his bodyguards had not moved in response to the arrows and the ceiling collapse. It was the trial shoving how unnatural this place was down their throats. Low ranked monsters and specifically goblins were stupid and instinct driven. Between those facts, and them being caught up in a scenario, it meant they could not respond to environmental stimuli.

Tom had seen it often enough, and it was just an additional weakness to exploit. He gave Everlyn a thumbs up and they continued to move forward.

Two steps three, and then Tom’s perception had all nine of them in its range. The chief and its eight body guards. He caught Everlyn’s arm before she could take another step. They were safe while sneaking, but there was no point risking going any closer than they needed.

She froze glanced at him and slowly Tom turned around and started walking back the way he had come. When he checked, Everlyn was following him.

He made a point of being very careful with every single movement. Just because Everlyn was there to mute the sound if he made a mistake did not give him an excuse to be sloppy. The correct placement of his feet was obvious, but he also watched his swinging arms, shoulders and his shins and thighs. He would not accidentally collide with the surrounding stone and give away the position.

Their trip so far had been a success. He possessed all the information they required. Once they got to safety, he could use the data to confirm whether they could kill the chief without taking undue risk.

They reach the tunnel, and Tom sped up almost jogging to where the others were set up. He was impressed by the changes. Keikain had built a series of walls and spikes that would slow down enemies and let them defend easily. The fact the obstacle course was positioned right under a spot that could be collapsed simply did not escape his notice.

“System room?” He asked using party chat like he always did when in a hostile situation.

In a blink of an eye, Everlyn’s face lost its vitality. Then he stepped through into the war room she had constructed earlier.

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It was the boss’s cave but had been redecorated to include the results of the ceiling collapse.

Everlyn grinned at him. “I know that look. You’re about to suggest something outlandish. I’m going to say no to and then you’ll attempt to convince me otherwise.”

“Pretty much.” Tom agreed with a smirk. He checked his permissions and was relieved to find out that he had full access to make changes to the room that he was in.

He flexed his memory and began to incorporate the host of structural information that his new filter had extracted. There were many aspects of the system room that made them amazing environments for planning. Providing you knew the terrain accurately you could turn the place into a perfect training field.

First, the multiple spots that his magic could be used to bring down the roof were highlighted. Then he put in the footprints on the floor where the goblins had been positioned.

Quietly, Everlyn followed him and checked the changes. Once they were past the rockfall, the exact configuration was more uncertain and the stones had a deliberate misty look to highlight the incomplete information. For example, the complete consequences of the cave in was unknown. They knew the ceiling had collapsed, and the outcome was perfectly mapped for the areas they had explored. Beyond that, they didn’t know how far the stones had rolled. The spread of the fallen rock might end immediately, or if they rolled when they had landed, the debris field could stretch all the way to the goblin’s feet.

“Are you finished?” Everlyn asked finally looking around at what he had added. She was standing right next to the boss’s footprints.

“One last thing.”

Once more, he mapped what he had sensed into the constructed system room’s environment. A series of misty stones appeared, creating a pile that stretch closer to the boss’s feet and what either of them would have suspected was possible.

“Are you sure?” Everlyn asked, looking at the rocks he had conjured. “That’s a lot of spread and if these are accurate, it changes sight lines.”

“I’m certain.” Tom answered, being very thankful for his excellent memory. “I can only show you the footprints of the goblins, not their body positioning because of limited information. These debris, however, consist of dirt and stone that I sense explicitly.”

“Your range is twelve metres, right?”

Quietly, he kept up dating the room. He added a range generator to the rockfall and then updated what he could affect from different positions in the cave. “Let me show you.”

He selected one of the scenarios he had constructed and an illusionary glowing Tom appeared near where the goblin chieftain would be. Instantly bars of yellow fell from the roof demonstrating the killing field of a ceiling collapse.

“Great. You killed the chieftain, but that got you too didn’t it.”

“Yeah, it was just a demonstration. We’re not attempting that scenario.”

A different Tom materialised further back, and this time behind cover. Another rock fall was modelled. The size of the generated area of destruction varied to reflect the uncertainty of how the rock would spread when it fell. The display oscillated between the extremes and average spending more time on the outcomes that he thought were more likely.

“No good,” Everlyn muttered. The chieftain, given the spread of falling rocks would almost certainly have survived.

A green coloured Keikain replaced the Tom figurine. He possessed an extra three metres of range and it showed in the expansion of the killing field toward the chief.

“Better,” Everlyn said thoughtfully. “But the chieftain might still survive.”

Might, Tom thought. Would, was the better description while in some scenarios the killing fields overlapped the boss’s footprints. Practically it would see the falling roof and dodge backwards.

He kept playing with the scenario builder they had created. Testing different spots they could stand and how it altered the killing outcomes. Tom even tested strategies like collapsing one area and then using it to get closer to the chieftain.

It didn’t work.

Everlyn took over the controls, but after two minutes of flashing through hundreds of discrete scenarios she stopped.

“The best approach that I can see is having you run six metes from cover to here.” She demonstrated by walking to the right spot. “That ensures you’re close enough to ensure the area all the way to the wall is covered and you don’t get caught in the rockfall. It’s the only way to guarantee the boss’s death. If we do remote activation, there is too much chance that it dodges backward to escape.”

Tom examined the scenario. The timings seemed to only work if he could move instantly from cover to the attack point. “I don’t know whether I get into position fast enough.”

“I agree. But if Keikain triggers a rock fall there.” She pointed to the far right.

Tom stared at the spot in confusion. It didn’t make sense. “Why?… What?… I don’t get it, there’s no goblins there.” He scratched his head. “What would that achieve?”

“Distract them… maybe. You only need half a second or so.”

Tom, watch the scenario that she put together. He wasn’t sure if the goblins would react as much to the distant collapse as Everlyn was suggesting.

“Even if they don’t react to the distraction, the plan is not doomed. All we have to do is to keep them in the killing zone and ourselves outside it.”

“Easier said than done. We need a way to push the boss back…”

“Toni.” They both said in unison.

“And Keikain.” Tom agreed, imaging a wall of earth spikes.

The two magic users wouldn’t have to use their spells to target anything. Their job would be to alter the battlefield conditions in order to delay the chief for that critical half second.

In the next scenario Everlyn generated, the earth spikes appeared along with the gust of wind. She did more calculations to confirm that even if it responded instantly that it would be caught.

“Can you trigger the stone fall in two parts?”

“What do you mean?” he asked cautiously.

The modelling of the collapse was generated, and she stepped up to what was basically a cliff with no spread. It was the bit closest to them. “Can you start this falling while you’re running to your spot? Or even better before you move.”

“Before No. During?” He scrunched up his nose. The weaknesses he needed to exploit were fourteen metres from their cover. “Maybe while running. How about Keikain?”

“Do you really want to put your life into the hands of another? The timing needs to be exact for this to work.”

“No,” he conceded readily enough as he thought the problem through. He could probably do what she was suggesting, but it would make the secondary collapse more difficult. The complication was that the area above the boss was really separated into five different flaws. Each of them could be collapsed individually, but when the first went, all the stresses between the different areas would change. He ran the risk of having to adjust to what he was doing at the last moment, but his filter at least made that possible. Tom imagined the falling rocks and how the pressure and strength would change over time. He guessed a half a second difference between the separate areas wouldn’t overly impact his calculations. “I can do it, but,” Tom eyeballed the distances. “It’ll only be a quarter of a second of savings.”

“Perfect. That sounds like an eternity.” She replayed the scenario with the front rock fall happening a fraction of a second earlier along with the explosion of earth spikes and gale force winds. All of it directed at slowing the boss.

Everlyn nodded in satisfaction. “Providing you don’t overbalance and run too far this will work. There isn’t a modelled solution where the boss reaches you.” She grinned a brilliant smile. “Tom. It works!”

“Let’s do it, then.” Tom declared. The plan to kill a boss without fighting it directly was one that Tom could get firmly behind.

She nodded, and then he found himself back in the real world.

Everlyn quickly explained what they were planning to the wider group and then took both Toni and Keikain into her system room in order to walk them through the scenario.

“This is crazy.” Keikain complained when he emerged. “Absolutely ridiculous.”

“It’s worth the risk.” Everlyn told him simply. “And my modelling on the boss’s capabilities is accurate.”

There was another ding from the interface.

Michael, without being asked immediately ducked into check. “A second Sprite general has been eliminated.”

“And we don’t know what happens to the zone once he wins.” Everlyn pointed out. “We should push forward while we can. Now do you three remember what to do with the adds?”

They all nodded, and Tom checked his elemental. It had enough juice to do its job.

The four of them followed Everlyn and then they reached the entrance to the boss’ room. They reshuffled their formation to let Tom and Keikain go first. The two of them worked in tandem too smooth over the surface, and all too soon they camped behind the final rock. It was the last bit of cover they had available between them and the boss. This was where they were staging their attack from and while they stayed here, they were beyond the sight lines of their enemies.

They all knew their plan, and why? Tom rehearsed his part of it. His mind prepared to bring down the first layer of rock. He could reach it from here. Keikain was doing his thing, but he didn’t know where the weaknesses were, so took significantly longer.

Finally, Keikain nodded to indicate he was ready. Toni started preparing her air magic. Tom went over the plan in his head. Desperately going through it to see if he could spot any flaws. Nothing jumped out to him.

The magic in Toni’s hand consolidated into an almost physical presence.

Everlyn stirred and held her hand up.

Five fingers.

The first one was lowered. Then the next.. and… and then the last.

In his domain, he sensed the section of ceiling and wall that Keikain was targeting physically move. There was a massive roar as the stones began to fall and because that was the signal his elemental left his shoulder.

Tom exploded forward like a competitor in the hundred metre sprint. Electricity crackled under the soles of his feet. A teleport only five centimetres long helped redirect his momentum, and he rounded the corner.

Then he was in the open. It was the boss, or him. There was no retreat now.