The cavern echoed with the heavy steps of the insectile monster's legs, the strands of its muscles bulging. Hector tightened his grip on his war pick, sweat clinging to his furrowed brow. The others were poised around him, ready for the impending clash.
"Follow me!" Hector bellowed, his eyes never leaving the monstrous creature that loomed before them.
Hector charged forward, his shield held high, the war pick gleaming in the cold light. Hector deftly deflected a blow with his shield, feeling the impact reverberate through his arm. He retaliated with a powerful swing of his war pick, aiming for one of the monster's limbs. The creature blocked the heavy blow with one of its hands and countered with a scything strike that could take Hector's head clean off.
He heard a shout from behind. "Hector, duck!"
Without hesitation, Hector dropped to one knee, his shield raised instinctively. The air above him stirred, and in the split second that followed, Frank soared through the air. Hector felt a momentary impact on his back, and before he could process what was happening, Frank vaulted off Hector's back, somersaulting through the air
Hector looked up, but he had trouble believing what he was seeing. Frank should be crushed to a bloody pulp but instead he managed to execute a flawless mid-air maneuver. Using the incoming arm as a springboard to perform a half-cartwheel that left him upside down right before their enemy’s face.
“Are you insane like me?” Hector heard Frank say and laugh just as the rogue used his daggers to slash at the monster's eyes. One of them exploded with a shower of blood and the other was set on fire. The monster roared in pain and covered its face with all four of its arms.
Hector, recovered from the surprising acrobatics, charged forward once more. He used Wound on his enemy’s inner thigh hoping to counter at least part of its regeneration. Then he targeted the knees again to help disable the monster. He swung his weapon with all his strength, but the creature was faster. One of its eyes has already regenerated. It caught his arm with another claw and squeezed hard, making Hector drop his pick and cry out in pain. His armor broke and he felt his bones cracking under the pressure.
He looked up and saw the creature’s mouth opening, ready to bite off his head. He raised his shield instinctively, but he knew it was too late. He closed his eyes and waited for the end.
But it never came.
He heard a loud explosion and felt a blast of cold air. He opened his eyes and saw a wall of ice between him and the creature, blocking its jaws. He realized that Diana had saved him with her magic. He felt the pressure on his bone lessen instantly and he saw that the explosion Diana caused had torn the monster's arm off.
Using the opportunity Hector picked up his weapon and winced with the pain of using his arm. The bones were fractured for sure, it hurt like hell to even hold the pick. He broke into a cold sweat as the thought of losing his other hand occurred to him. Hector ran back to Diana.
“Heal my hand!” He said.
“I need my mana and the effects would take too much time to take hold!” Diana contered.
“HEAL ME!” Hector shouted in anger. This caused Diana to shut up and heal him at least. To hell with the look she gave him. His arm still hurt but the spell took the edge of the pain.
When Hector turned back to face the monster he saw Frank fighting it with the help of Mia’s arrows. Frank danced around the creature, jumping in and out of range, his daggers striking with precision. The monster seemed angered by the rogue's attacks, its pincers snapping in frustration. To Hector’s surprise his friend was enjoying the fight, laughing loudly. His attacks triggered weird effects like ice or fire. Hector realized it was the Aspect Frank was talking about, he never imagined it would look so… insane.
Mia changed tactics and instead of a storm of arrows was attacking the monster's joints. Hector quickly realized that it was a good idea since the arrows impeded the creature's movement, and stopped its regeneration. At least until it pulled the arrows out.
Hector made the first step to rush back into battle but the pain in his right arm stopped his cold.
They were doing good enough without him, maybe it would be wise to stay here and protect Diana…
He felt the icy tendrils of fear grip him but we willed himself forward. He joined the fray just before the monster finally caught up to Frank.
Hector felt a surge of terror as he saw his friend fly away from the blow. Frank’s body hit the ground with a thud, and didn’t even stir. The way the rogue lay down was exactly like in Hector’s dream. He knew it was the end. He knew they were all going to die. He saw the monster approaching Frank.
He wanted to scream, to run, to fight, to do something. But he couldn’t. He was frozen in fear. It was like he was frozen in ice. His breath caught in his throat, the cold seeping into his very bones. In that moment, Hector's mind raced, desperate for a spark of warmth, a flicker of courage to thaw the icy grip.
Nothing came.
Despair joined his fear, visions of pain and defeat ran through his mind, he couldn’t focus on anything else.
“Hector, we need you!” Mia shouted trying to distract the monster enough to give Frank time to get up.
Time stopped for Hector. He had a perfect view of the situation. In that crystallized moment, he realized he had a choice—to succumb to the fear and be a coward forever, or to shatter the ice that bound him and become a hero.
The sound of Mia’s shout echoed in his ears, that was who he was! That was who he wanted to be! He proved that he was a hero when he sacrificed himself to save Mia and he would do that again if he had too. He was Hector and he would do anything to protect his friends.
With a fierce roar, Hector summoned every ounce of strength, breaking free from the ice that sought to imprison him. Gripping his war pick tightly, he rushed forward and stood between the monster and Frank.
“I will NOT run away this time! You have to go through me to get to him!” He shouted his defiance in the face of approaching horror. The arm it lost before was already growing back with a disgusting wriggle of muscle. Nothing seemed to work on the nightmare monster.
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THE ASPECT OF THE JUST HERO APPROVES OF YOUR ACTIONS. CURRENT POWER OF THE ASPECT: 11/100.
YOU HAVE GAINED A NEW ABILITY. HERO'S AURA, AS LONG AS YOU HAVE COURAGE IN YOUR HEART IT GIVES ALL YOUR ALLIES BUFFS TO ATTACK AND REGENERATION.
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Someone shouting woke Frank up. He raised his head and he saw Hectors back, but his vision swam enough that he had to put his head on the floor again. It was wet and cold. What the hell was going on.
He managed to focus on an object laying a couple of yards from him. It looked like a severed claw. Then he remembered, he was playing… no not playing, fighting! With a large monster and someone blew its arm off.
But the appendage looked weird, like it was being dissolved and consumed by the ground. Which shook by the way. Ground should not do that. He lifted his head again and saw the cavern and Hector trading blow with a huge creepy monster.
Oh? He looked to the monster and back to the arm on the ground. It was regrowing in the same pace as the one on the ground was dissolving. That felt important.
Then everything came back to him.
He needed to help his friends, he stood up and his vision swam again. He stumbled, it was bad but it was clearing rapidly.
“Diana! Look at the arm on the ground! Freeze it!” He managed to say before stumbling again.
Hector needed his help, no matter how strong he was it was not enough to trade blows with such a monstrosity. He pulled one on the throwing daggers Mia prepared for him and aimed for the monster's eyes.
“Lets see if you absorbed the lesson about not blocking with your face” Frank quipped, he needed the effects to trigger and it felt like laughing would make him throw up.
The daggers proved enough of a distraction, the monster focused on breaking off the ice from its face.
“Fall back Hector, Mia buy us some time.” Frank shouted as he pulled his friend back. His armor was cracked in places and the shield was a sad shadow of its former self.
“Man you run through those things, you need to slow down” Frank said.
“You’re up? Thank god!” Relief flooded Hector’s face.
“I’m up and I have a plan” He glanced at the severed claw. Diana listened to him and froze it. Frank checked if he was right. Of course he was, the monster's arm stopped regenerating.
“Looks like its time for some bug kabobs.” He looked at his daggers, “Ready Pain? And Killer?”
He felt the need to slice and dice from his weapons. He approved.
The time they bought with daggers and arrows ran out. The monster pulled out all the arrows and got rid of the daggers in its face.
“Hector, Mia! Distract it or cut parts of it off. Then Diana can freeze them, it stops his regeneration!” He shouted as he flanked the creature.
However, opposite of what he hoped happened, the supporting fire from the ranger and enchantress lessened for some reason. He and Hector were hard pressed to dodge the attacks of the enraged monster, his full focus on the fight, he couldn’t spare the time to look if everything was fine with the women.
“Hector! The jumping maneuver again” He yelled.
The warrior nodded and Frank ran towards him, at the last moment Hectorr ducked and Frank placed a foot on his back. With a corner of his eye he saw a single arrow bury itself into the monster's shoulder joint. Support was back. Hector provided additional lift by straightening up just as Frank jumped high into the air.
The whole thing didn’t go as well as last time though. The monster was ready for it this time. Its clawed arm was heading straight for Frank, about to pierce him. Frank didn’t expect that and was out of position to dodge.
“Well, shit” He said as a stoic should.
Just as he was in the middle of his last words the monster's shoulder exploded with a meaty thud. The claws were sent outward due to centrifugal force, missing his side by inches. Mia had exploding arrows now?
“What the fuck” Frank screamed, the explosion threw the monster to the side and the rogue found himself high in the air without anything to bounce off of.
He fell to the ground and using all his Acrobatics tried to soften the landing. He partially succeeded, he performed a perfect roll that absorbed most of the energy. However he didn't take into account a large piece of ice that was left from one of the previous spells Diana cast. It hit his head pretty hard. Again.
Blackess enveloped him.
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After the explosion, reacting on pure instinct, Hector rushed to the fallen monster. It was struggling to get up with its one arm, which meant that its head was in the warriors range for the first time.
Hector smiled and said, “Gotcha.”
He swung his pick at the creature’s head, hoping to finish it off. But the monster was not done yet. Using its last claw it slashed at him, drawing blood. Hector felt a sharp pain in his side, but he didn’t falter. He swung even as the claw was tearing through his armor, and this time he hit. He felt his pick sink into the creature’s head, making it scream. He pulled it out and swung again, and again, and again. He didn’t stop until the creature stopped moving.
The flesh was still moving trying to knit back the bloody mess Hector made from its head.
“Diana blow the fucker up!” He shouted as he ran for a safe distance, picking up Frank on the way. He felt the rush of air from the explosion, and collapsed to the ground, exhausted. His friend seemed to be alive, just unconscious.
“Is it over?” He asked no one in particular.
“Looks like it, after we exploded the head it stopped trying to regenerate.” Diana said.
Everything was silent for a while.
He looked at it and saw that it was dead. He had killed it. He felt a surge of triumph and relief. He had done it. They had done it.
He heard a shout from behind him. He turned and saw Mia running towards him, tears in her eyes. She checked on Frank and when she saw he was breathing the woman hugged him and started crying in earnest.
“I was so worried. I’m so glad you’re both okay” She sniffled.
Diana was already casting healing spells on Frank, when she offered the same to Hector he motioned her to focus on Frank first.
“Couldn't have done it without you” He smiled at Mia, he himself didn’t know whether he meant the arrow that created the opening for him to finish the monster off or the shout that broke him out of his fear. “How did you make your arrow explode by the way?”
“Diana had an idea, she cast the Explosive Rune of the arrow, it took a couple of tries before we got it right” She wiped her face “I was sure you would die before we could finish”
“Finish what? Did I miss anything important” Frank said without raising his head.
“Yeah, we killed the monster while you were out” Hector said, a smile playing on his lips.
“Oh that's good then” Frank said and closed his eyes and started breathing deeply.
“Concussed or not he’s the only one who could sleep right now.” Hector felt laughter bubble up inside of him fueled by the achievement as well as immense relief. Even when so many details fit from the nightmare he had, it turned out to not be true. They were all alive and the monster was dead.
He felt something wet on his side, when he checked his armor was pierced right through and he was bleeding heavily from the wound. He felt dizzy, it was the last attack, just before the end. His hands instinctively pressed against the torn armor, trying in vain to staunch the flow of blood. The cavern spun around him, and the distant sounds of voices became muffled as if heard underwater.
The wounded warrior's vision blurred, the metallic tang of blood filled his senses. As consciousness slipped away like sand through his fingers, the world dissolved into nothing, leaving Hector to surrender to the merciful embrace of unconsciousness.