A level 7 shopkeeper gnoll.
That’s what he was stuck with for now. His most powerful transformation was a gnoll highly skilled in Calligraphy. How the hell did it do calligraphy anyways with these giant claws?
Jerome looked at his hands and saw that the claws had been filed down.
Could this get any worse?
The ockdine was momentarily confused by the fact that Jerome had turned from Krystyna, an incredibly attractive human, into an ugly ugly gnoll. Not that the ockdine would have good taste, but the contrast was large by any standards and that gave Jerome a couple seconds.
Maybe if he transformed into one of the other humans he could get another couple seconds confusion. And then….
There it was. He had a plan.
He ran towards the ockdine, seemingly oblivious of their vast power differential. It grabbed at him with a tentacle and he swatted it away with his unclawed hands… but right behind that was another tentacle grabbing his torso and another one grabbing his arm.
He transformed into a random human. That freed him from the ockdine’s grasp long enough to do the thing he had planned: laying hands on the creature.
It worked. The thing showed up in his transformation menu.
As soon as he transformed the ockdine’s eyes went wide. It pulled its tentancles away from Jerome’s slimy new body and backed up quickly. Jerome flung himself forwards at it, wrapped his tentacles around its throat (the thinner area right below the head from which the legs sprouted), and prepared to squeeze until it died… but before the pressure took hold the creatured gurgled out a single word: “branch-brother”.
Whatever that meant in their twisted octopus-world, in battle it meant that the thing was going to let Jerome kill it. Just like the first ockdine he’d fought, it seemed horrified at laying hands on something that looked just like it.
Now all he had to do was finish this strangulation and repeat the process on all three of these ockdine. After that he could kill the gnolls they were fighting and escort the humans to saftey.
The ockdine wore a face of pain and betrayal yet it did nothing. It couldn’t even bubble out anything in their weird speech.
But that didn’t stop the other ockdine. Jerome felt two strong tentacles wrap around the one he was using to choke, and then they pulled hard, ripping his tentacle away.
No, ripping it apart. The bulk of his tentacle flailed on the ground while Jerome stared aghast at the stump. It only took off 23% of his health, but he was bleeding, in pain, and losing health by the second.
“You dare take advantage of his branch-honor?” said the attacking ockdine. It ignored the three gnolls scratching at it. “You take this face and pervert our order? Whoever you are, you have turned the whole of society against you now. If you were truly an ockdine you would know the shame and horror of such a thing… But you are not ockdine, so you will simply know death.”
The one he’d almost strangled had its back up against a wall. No, it didn’t have its back against the wall; that was human-speak. Its tentacles pushed against the wall, climbing it via strategic use of the suckers that lined its tentacles. The point, however, was the same — it was getting as far away as possible from the hostile thing that bore its face.
Could he repeat the trick with the ockdine that attacked him? He would find out soon. But first he wanted to learn the basics of ockdine combat.
He had the advantage that gnolls were attacking his opponent and not him. His disadvantage: he was half as good at all the relevant tentacle-fighting skills, had no experience or knowledge of what was coming next, and he was already bleeding out and slowly losing HP because of the destroyed limb.
Fighting in this body was all about multi-tasking. A human body had to have at least one (preferably two) of its four limbs on the ground to keep balance, and then it could only generate sufficiently damaging force in one of the remaining limbs at a time. An ockdine body could balance sustainably with three limbs on the ground in a tripod arrangement, but it could also hang from one limb or stick to a wall. It could even “sit” and have all eight limbs available, although that meant that the range of each tentacle was limited to the arc right in front of it.
However many limbs were available for battle, all of them could move separately, seeking out a weakness in the defensive position.
Jerome tried to ‘punch’ with a tentacle, but it flopped with little force onto the other ockdine, which used the opportunity to wrap up the tentacle with one of its own and yank, bringing Jerome off balance.
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Being boneless changed the dynamics of battle.
The other ockdine knew these dynamics and took full advantage of them. It grabbed Jerome’s outstretched tentacle with two of its own and tore it apart before Jerome could regain his balance, all the while fending off strikes from Jerome’s other tentacles and using the two remaining tentacles to keep the gnolls at bay and minimize damage from that direction.
This thing was a battle machine.
Sure, it would dry up and become less effective over time the longer it was on land.
Sure, it would shrink back in fear and let itself be killed if Jerome transformed into it.
But if there was another ockdine nearby who could see through the transformation then that second weakness didn’t matter so much, and since ockdine only fought when freshly cannoned from the water the first weakness didn’t matter much either. These things were killers. He had several gnolls helping right now and he was still losing badly.
Time to go in for his trump card: transforming into the ockdine. It would let the other ockdine come back, now that it didn’t have a body double to fear, but Jerome didn’t see much other choice.
He transformed.
The ockdine he was fighting seized up, cursing. “By the lost crystals! By the diffusion below! I will not fall for your tricks!”
Despite its resistance Jerome still had a reprieve — not to mention a new body. He took the opportunity and got his tentacles around the other ockdine’s neck.
But it was still fighting back. It cursed the loudly (well, loudly for an ockdine), it fought with less vigor, but it fought.
Then Jerome remembered his combination trick. Through every sucker on the tentacles wrapped around the thing’s neck he pulsed Recoil Burst. 46 SP gone in a flash, 2 SP from each sucker that had used Recoil Burst, but it was worth it.
The ockdine lost 58% of its HP and wore a terrified look, like it had just seen a thousand future lives flashing before its eyes.
“You are powerful,” it said with haunted sadness. “After they take you there will be no stopping them.”
They? Who were they? Probably not the ockdines, since the dying ockdine showed no signs of triumphalism.
No matter. He could worry about that later. He applied another round of Recoil Burst and the thing died.
Two more left.
Two more ockdines and some gnolls, whose ineffective scratchings he had almost completely forgotten about in the heat of ockdine-on-ockdine combat. He reached a tentacle onto several gnolls in order to get their forms for later use, suffering a decrease of about 15% from his HP bar due to their scratches, and then pulled back from that front so they could focus on the ockdine he hadn’t yet engaged.
Five on one looked about fair (two had died).
He went ahead and grabbed that ockdine’s form for later transformation as well. He was down to about half of his SP, the first time he’d seriously worried about it since that first training session; switching bodies had always been able to recharge him long before it became a worry. However, this tentacle explosion move — using Recoil Burst from a dozen or more suckers while wrapping up a victim — could only be done three times with his current SP pool before he had to rest or switch to a new body.
The first ockdine he’d faced came crawling back, angry and ready for battle.
This time Jerome was ready. He knew the basic rules of the game and he’d thought up a couple new tricks.
First trick: channeling Crystal Overload. Well, trying to channel it. The two second startup time meant by the time the damage started the ockdine was already to him. It did interrupt the ockdine, making it more difficult for the thing to move, but it did manage it eventually… and a weak uncoordinated slap from the victim was enough to break the channeling. All told Jerome had taken off less than 5% from the thing’s health bar.
Hopefully the second trick would be more effective.
Whenever he made contact with the other ockdine’s tentacle, he used Recoil Burst… but only on one sucker. That kept the thing off balance, making its attempts at tentacle combat just as clumsy as Jerome’s.
He hoped to get to its neck and use the last of his SP to do explode it, but it didn’t work. With the addition of Recoil Burst as an unbalancing tactic they were evenly matched. Jerome watched his SP — the source of his fantastic damage — drain as they blocked and parried each other, five tentacles from each creature pushing, defending, seeking for any advantage.
Eventually Jerome gave up on the neck and was able to grab hold of a tentacle. He tried to rip it apart, but it didn’t work. Tentacles were pretty tough, considering they had no bone.
He had an advantage, however, and he wasn’t about to give it up. He used a mass Recoil Burst on the wrapped tentacle, using half as many suckers as when he wrapped a throat, and exploded the thing.
It was effective.
The horror produced by the newly detached arm gave him his biggest advantage yet. While the ockdine stared at its bleeding stump, Jerome wrapped up its neck and squeezed. He couldn’t do a mass Recoil Burst — not enough SP left — but he was in no hurry. He let the thing batter him ineffectively with its remaining tentacles while he choked the life from it.
And then it was done.
The five gnolls — down to four, actually — were finishing off the third ockdine.
Victory.
That’s when he heard the screaming.
The pack of humans was exactly where he’d left them, with one brutal exception: in the middle was a giant ockdine with metal-plated arms.
Three of its tentacles held bodies… but not for long. It whipped them against the wall, similar to how the ockdine had tried to whip Jerome into the floor, but these people were not trained. Not strong.
They died on impact, snapping at all the usual places.
It dropped the corpses and picked up another three.