The cloud beneath them rumbled. The surface grew black, and the sky darkened to match it. A jolt of anxiety shot through Ayn as her sight blinked out. A bolt of lightning light up the area in blinding white. More strikes chased the first until the boss arena pulsed like a strobe light.
The crab struggled to its feet. Ayn rushed in, eager to end the fight, only to have a lightning strike nearly take her out. Kayara cursed from somewhere nearby, and Bren shouted from a spot much closer than Ayn remembered.
Bren had been next to Sheyric and Miit. Anxiety turned to fear as Ayn sought the healer. The boss could wait. Sheyric was still near Bren. Both mages had come dangerously close to the boss, and it was obvious why. The edges of the arena had become a cascade of lightning, the sound of it all hitting the storm cloud rumbling like an avalanche. The bolts striking the center were even louder.
One exploded mere feet from Sheyric and Miit. Sheyric stumbled back. Ayn was at his side, steadying him before he fell. Another bolt chased the first, striking all three of them.
Ayn’s shield shimmered away.
AEGIS OF AGILITY ON COOLDOWN
FIVE MINUTES REMAINING
Damn it. Ayn gritted her teeth as her mind worked itself into a frenzy. The lightning strikes seemed random, but they were hitting every few seconds. Even if they kept moving, one was bound to hit them again, and soon.
The constant rumbling of the storm gained a steady backbeat.
Sticks and stones may break my bones
But only if they touch me
Skin so soft is now like rock
So come on and try me
The Stoneskin spell raced up Sheyric and over Miit, until both looked more like the gargoyles guarding the Dungeon than living creatures.
“I—covered—” Bren mumbled from his own stony mouth, half of the words lost in the noise. “He—Kay—”
Ayn stared at him. She’d pieced together what he’d said, but she didn’t want to leave Miit’s side. Surely, she could help, and Kayara could handle the boss.
Bren lurched forward and shoved Ayn. “Help her!” One arm creaked up. Ayn reluctantly looked where he pointed.
The King Crab had gone all in trying to stab the ranger. Somehow, damaging it a second time seemed to have made it faster. Its legs were hard to follow as it stomped and whirled. Kayara, as Ayn had been, danced underneath the crab’s belly. With each dodge, she moved closer to the outside, only to have the boss shift to keep her under.
Lightning struck the crab. The boss didn’t flinch. It lit up in arcing currents, electricity surrounding it like a hedgehog’s quills.
“Kayara!”
Ayn was back in front of the boss before her brain caught up to her.
Kayara blinked into existence beside her. “What’s up?”
Ayn growled in frustration. She’d rushed in, worried even the agile ranger wouldn’t be able to dodge a blanket of electricity, only to forget Kyara had a literal teleport on a short cooldown.
“Hey, what’s that for? I’m glad you came to help. The bastard’s being slippery as hell and won’t let me at his back. The cracker—”
A sonic blast from the King Crab cut Kayara’s explanation short. Ayn and Kayara dodged in different directions. The crab scuttled toward Kayara, jumping over her and pinning her underneath once more. Ayn used the boss’s one-track mind to check on the cracker. What Kayara had wanted to tell her became clear. The entire mechanism buzzed with electricity. That’s why the ranger hadn’t tried to use it. It also meant the boss’s back must have become vulnerable, or there was another way to hurt it they hadn’t noticed yet. Ayn hoped it was the first.
Ayn yelled at the boss and charged. She was done with the floor. She wanted out, and if it took getting electrocuted again to do so, so be it.
The storm grew more intense, the lightning more active. A muffled shout came from one of the guys. Ayn blocked it all out. She couldn’t keep them from getting hit. She had to take out the source of danger. The crab still had its electric quills.
AEGIS OF AGILITY ON COOLDOWN
THREE MINUTES REMAINING
Ayn jumped anyway. She sailed over the back of the crackling boss, which was still focused on hitting Kayara, with her sabers pointed at the sizeable chunk of pink flesh exposed on the boss’s back.
She dropped like a rock.
Her blades embedded into the soft flesh before she could react to the panic. White noise filled her ears. Her body felt heavy and slow, the sensations familiar, yet not.
The King Crab whirled and bucked. Ayn hit the storm cloud, all attempts at agility stolen by the weight pressing down on her.
“Good hit!” Kayara said. Her words warbled as if they were underwater. “Now get up and do it again.”
Ayn had no idea how she was going to accomplish that. The paralysis from the shocks hadn’t worn off yet. She was honestly surprised she could still see and hear so well, although the lack of pain worried her.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
“Don’t tell me you can’t handle a little Stoneskin? Even Sheyric’s stumbling around in it. Stand up, O Great Leader, and help!”
Stoneskin? Ayn pushed up into a sitting position, her leaden limbs fighting her all the way. Sure enough, a thick layer of plated stone ran down the length of her body. Her not paralyzed body. Ayn scrambled to her feet. She didn’t realize the spell could block electricity.
Kayara shouted an obscenity at the boss, dragging Ayn from her confused thoughts. The ranger continued to dance with the electrified crab, staying a hair’s breadth out of range.
Ayn leaned forward to run to her side and realized why the mage had waited so long to cast the spell on her. The weight of the rock nearly negated her agility. The best she could manage was a slow jog. Dodging was out of the question.
A volley of lightning crashed down. One collided with the cloud a few feet away. Ayn stumbled, only to have a second strike hit her on top of the head.
HEALTH AT 323
The stone plates crumbled, leaving a sharp tingle across Ayn’s skin. It seemed a direct hit was too much. Just as well. Ayn dodged a third strike, testing her returned reflexes. All there.
The boss, too, had lost its protective covering. The crackling field was gone, revealing a steady stream of blue ichor pouring from the wound she’d inflicted.
Lightning crashed faster. The storm was gaining strength. It seemed they were on a timer, and The System was getting impatient. Oh well. She’d just have to give it what it wanted. Ayn closed in on the boss while lightning struck in clusters, aiming for each of them. The volley cut Kayara’s cursing short as she twisted between the strikes with a dancer’s grace. Ayn watched in awe, which turned into horror as the King Crab took aim at Kayara’s exposed back with two of its legs.
Ayn lunged, her arms wrapping around Kayara and leaving her own back exposed to the incoming attack.
AEGIS OF AGILITY ACTIVATED
157 POINTS OF ABSORBTION REMAINING
The second leg hit. The shield shattered. A sharp pain trailed down Ayn’s back.
HEALTH AT 298
AEGIS OF AGILITY ON COOLDOWN
FIVE MINUTES REMAINING
She’d dived in without thinking. Now that the boss’s attack had bounced off her shield bubble and she realized what position she was in, she’d have rather died.
Kayara whipped around in surprise, pushing Ayn away in the process.
“I…uh…sorry!” Ayn’s body went cold as Kayara’s swords flashed.
The ranger leaped around her and shoved her to the cloud’s surface. “Watch out!”
The pointed tip of a giant crab leg embedded itself deep into the spot Ayn had been standing. The storm took a breath, and in that breath, Kayara had scaled the crab’s leg and disappeared from view. A second later, the boss let out a sharp whine and collapsed into glitter.
PRIMARY QUEST COMPLETED: KILL KING CRAB
DUNGEON FLOOR THREE CLEARED
PARTY WILL BE TELEPORTED FROM DUNGEON IN TWO MINUTES
The storm died with the boss, leaving bits of static in the air. Clouds faded to blue sky, and the cloud they stood on paled until it looked no different from the white clouds they started on. All was serene, clear, and bright.
“Good one,” Ayn mumbled in Kayara’s direction. She stood up, purposefully avoiding looking at Kayara as she trotted over to check on Miit.
She got to him just as the last bits of Stoneskin fell off him. He lay loosely across Sheyric’s shoulders, eyes half-closed and ears drooping.
Ayn’s breath caught. “Miit—”
Her attempt at a question was answered before she got it out. Sheyric mumbled something, while Bren hurriedly assured her, he’d kept Stoneskin up the entire time. Most importantly, Miit mewled at her, lifting his head a bit to look her way.
Ayn carefully ran a hand down his back. Her hand stuttered as Kayara came close. The ranger’s hand eased up toward Miit. The System teleported them out before it got far.
*****
Ayn fastened the last of the bandages around Miit’s torso while her mother cleaned up the various ointments and tools they’d used to patch Miit up. Both of them had got quite good at taking care of him over the years, which was just as well, considering they couldn’t afford the local animal doctor, and the doctor wouldn’t know what to do with a declining familiar, anyway. They usually healed themselves.
Miit lay out on the kitchen table in Ayn’s home. Blood had seeped into the wood, a fact she intended on remedying until there was no trace left. The sight of it made her ill.
Ayn’s mother finished bundling up the medical supplies and slipped them into a cabinet. “I’ll have to thank your party again for buying all of this.”
“So will I,” Ayn said.
She scooped the limp Miit up. Among the medicines was an anesthetic which seemed to work particularly well on the familiar. He was sleeping more soundly than she’d ever seen.
“I’ll make them a meal, too,” her mother said.
“Yeah.”
Ayn’s mother sighed and went quiet, letting Ayn slip from the room without another word. She didn’t mean to be curt, but conversation wasn’t something she wanted at the moment. Too much had happened. Too many confusing and unpleasant thoughts rattled around inside her head. Most of them were about the familiar in her arms, and how much time he truly had left, but some of them were about the ranger who stood outside her house with her other two party members, waiting for news on Miit’s condition.
She settled Miit on her bed, remembering back to a time when he’d bound into the little room, launch onto the simple wooden bed, and wake her with a hit to the chest. It’d been years since he’d stopped. She’d hated it at the time. Now, she’d give anything to have him do it again.
Although her room was bare of all but the bed, rough cloth blankets, and a small wooden chest, it still reminded her of her father and Miit. Her father had crafted the chest, and together with her mother, had crafted the bed and sheets as well. At the time, they could have afforded furniture from the Crafter’s Guild, yet Ayn had insisted they make them. They were, and remained, far more valuable that way.
She’d rather had stayed watching Miit sleep, maybe even have napped beside him until he woke, but she was a leader now and had other responsibilities.
When she opened the front door, her party looked up eagerly. Bren stopped pacing across the front yard as the front door closed behind Ayn.
Sheyric stood closer, and his head bobbed up and down as soon as Ayn came into view. “Okay?”
“Sleeping,” Ayn said. “I think he’ll be okay. He doesn’t heal as well as he used to, but—”
“He’ll pull through,” Kayara said. She’d been leaning against the house’s brick wall, just far enough away from the door to not get hit by it. “I know stubbornness when I see it, and he’s got it in spades.”
“Plus, if he requires more medicine, I’ll get it,” Bren said. He closed in on Ayn, desperation in his eyes. “Even if we can’t afford it right now, I know a medicine maker—”
“It’s fine.” The words left Ayn’s mouth short and sharp, cutting off her party’s placations. They were worried, and at least on Bren’s part, feeling guilty about Miit’s condition. Ayn should have found comfort in their words, yet all they did was scrape across her ears. “He needs rest.”
Bren grimaced. Ayn could see the torrent of words building up behind his expression and steeled herself.
“Okay,” Sheyric repeated. He turned on his heel and left, bumping Bren on the shoulder as he went. The scrawny healer didn’t have the weight to do more than jostle the burlier mage. Still, the action seemed to knock Bren out of his spiral. Bren nodded, lips in a thin line, and left with Sheyric.
That left Kayara.
The ranger hadn’t moved from her spot on the wall. “Want to talk about it?”
Her eyes bored into Ayn. It made her want to run and hide. Instead, she shook her head. “Not now. I just…need some time.”
“No problem.”
Ayn nearly sighed in relief when Kayara started to walk off. She hadn’t expected the ranger to give in so easily. The sigh got stuck when Kayara stopped.
“I’m staying in the inn, room thirteen, if you change your mind.”