[Delve Challenge: HORDE]
ACTIVATED!
Time remaining: 10:00
Eight-legged hell broke out in the organic chamber of the Festering Den’s second floor. Ethan saw the grey polyps lining the entire ceiling and walls burst open at once, releasing a torrent of jet-black spiders, each the size of baby elephants.
And as an undulating wave of leggy death, they descended on the hybrids below.
“Here they come!”
Klax barked orders at Tara to loose as many arrows as she could before drawing her shortswords and hacking away at the creatures’ limbs. The dog-man knew their weaknesses, and he wasn’t about to lose a second in exploiting them.
“Faun!” he shouted. “You know what we need!”
“F-fire coming up!”
Ethan wasted no time doing his part. Even with his [Hide] ability practically useless against a sea of eyes, he still managed a dive bomb that took out a slew of spiders before they even made it to the ground, splintering their bulbous bodies apart and splattering their ooze-like blood over the face of both him and his fine feathered host.
I HOPE YOU WILL BE CLEANING THAT LATER—THE SMELL OF SPIDER VISCERA IS MOST DISCONCERTING!
EVEN A SYSTEM HAS STANDARDS, YOU KNOW!
Little too busy to care at the moment, Syssy!
Ethan slammed into another section of the surging horde, managing to take down a whole front wave before they even reached Klax’s readied fists. He flew back up just before the chittering teeth of the next row managed to snap at his tail and heard a collective insectoid screech when he made it back to the ceiling.
“Have that!” Tara was screaming as she hacked through the bastards. “Ya creepy crawly fucks!”
The waves were unstoppable. As he looked around him, Ethan could see that the polyps were prisons for hundreds of spiders, which continued pouring from their depths with impossible speed.
“Fauna!” Klax shouted. “Any luck with that fire spell?”
The Hopla responded over the paralyzing scream emanating from her fingers—a thaumaturgical spell that managed to do nothing more than piss the spiders off even more.
“I-I’m trying!”
“All right then!” the Lycae responded. “Crowd control time, everyone!”
He pounded his fists into the earth and sent a shockwave into the entire left side of the arena, knocking the advancing waves of darkness back. Ethan followed suit, gliding through the dense air and unleashing a [Wing Buffet] and [Roar] combo that broke the horde on the right-hand side of the chamber, leaving them wide open for Tara’s swift strikes.
“Thank ya, Mr. Ethan!” the Minxit laughed as she pounced from insect to insect, jabbing at the paralyzed ones and ending their lives before they even knew what had happened.
Ethan and Klax kept up the pressure—their crowd control abilities synergizing well enough that the horde barely even had a chance to move a few inches on either side of the chamber.
TIME LEFT: 6:00
“Keep up the pressure!” Klax shouted as the timer ticked down. “And expect trouble! The second phase is starting soon.”
“Tell that to our illustrious rabbit here,” Tara shouted over her shoulder. “Hey, Faun? Mind hurrying the fuck up?”
Fauna grimaced as she launched a boulder from out of thin air this time.
“Almost! I—I think the next one will—”
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An explosion from above shook the entire chamber. Ethan’s eyes sought the ceiling and saw that the only polyps that had not burst above had just released their payload—seven green-coated spiders fell from above like bombs being dropped on an unsuspecting city.
Enemies Identified:
* Vena Spider x7
* HP: 80/80
* WILL: 50/50
By the oozing green liquid running down their salivating mandibles, Ethan could guess what payload these guys were packing.
Poison…
He shifted in the air, whipping up a [Wing Buffet] that sent three of the beasts flying back. The strength score of the others must have carried them through, for in the next second, one had clutched his tail and sunk its nasty fangs into his feathered plumage.
HP: 70/92
Status: POISONED
DMG: 2 HP/Sec
“Shit!” Ethan screeched, flying headfirst into a nearby wall to try and shake the critter off. When it finally let go, it was after he turned and gave it a harsh peck that broke clean through its thorax, throwing its blood across his face.
He grimaced as pain surged through him, feeling his vision go blurry. He tried focusing on his companions below, but all he could make out were a thousand dark shapes converging on the vague humanoid forms in the grey prison all around him.
Fuck this! He told himself. Ethan Hawke ain’t gonna be done in by some spider poison!
He flew towards the team and sent a [Roar] flying through the spiders’ ranks. As they fell, he landed and shouted back, “Antidotes! There are at least six more poison critters hanging around!”
“Way ahead of ya!” Tara shouted, tossing him a vial which he downed in the next second.
Status: Cured
HP: 30/92
40 goddamn seconds… Ethan realized. That’s all it took for the spit to tear through me…
“Incoming!”
The shout was Klax’s, who managed to intercept another torrent of Vena Spider spit that was aimed squarely at Ethan’s face. His punch actually sent the strike flying back at the spider that launched it, toppling the creature and knocking it prone.
Meanwhile, the horde simply didn’t stop coming…
Time remaining: 2:00
“Stay out of the way of the shooters!” Klax shouted. “They’re targeting Ethan!”
The team nodded, Fauna still fumbling with her spell while Tara sank her blades into the thoraxes of spider after spider on their right.
Another [Wing Buffet] kept the left flank back, and Klax’s punches were doing the heavy lifting of keeping the poisoned projectiles off Ethan.
“Fuck!”
Tara suddenly fell back, a patch of green ooze running up her arm.
“Tara—here!”
In the momentary lapse of Klax uncorking another antidote, a Vena aimed a spittle strike square at his back and knocked him down. He shivered as the poison worked its way through his system.
“Klax!” Ethan roared, flying off in the direction of the shooter and diving headfirst into the little bastard—sending its bloody, flailing form high into the sky of the grey chamber.
Then, without even turning, he could feel the five other spittle strikes that were now heading towards him.
“Protect the Archon!” Klax roared as he downed their final vial of antidote. “Someone get up there!”
Time Remaining: 1:00
Ethan closed his eyes to the sight of the impending poisonous death that was coming his way. But no sooner had he started writing his will than the poison fumes simply fizzled away, and he opened his eyes to see a haze of red enveloping him.
“What the…”
Status: Infernal Coating
* Attack Bonus: +25 PYRO DMG
* IMMUNITY: POIS, ICE
His juvenile smile was right back on his face as he saw these words. Except this time, it was the smile of a true demon, not that of a noble bird. He felt the fires of Fauna's enchantment flow through his birdly veins like a maelstrom of destruction ready to be unleashed.
He looked down to nod at Fauna who, through sweat and pure weariness, gave him a thumbs up from below.
“It’s… it’s something,” she murmured.
“All right, all right!” Tara shouted over the din of the still cascading horde of spiders spilling from their caches with even greater intensity. “Let’s finish this!”
Ethan took to the skies as a firebird now, tearing through all the spiders like a phoenix burning through the foliage of a once verdant forest. Each one simply popped and fizzed away to nothing—the damage from his Dives and infernal power now simply dissolving their bodies before they even had a chance to react or leave their chambers.
He managed to take out two of the Vena Spider shooters as the final seconds of the clock ticked down, blasting the remaining two away with a [Roar] that made him look like a real demon of the skies, coated in the fires of the abyss itself.
Time Remaining: 5 seconds.
“Ethan!” Klax shouted as the spider horde began to fizzle away entirely. “Be ready for the transfer!”
Transfer… you know, you could have mentioned that earlier, big guy.
Ethan nodded, though he was loath to tear himself away from his final targets. Like a comet sailing towards the earth, he sped right back down towards his team.
3…
Above, the spider polyps burst with a final spurt of energy—sending a whole blanket of the beasts down to weather the defenders.
2…
Ethan sent a fiery [Wing Buffet] right back up at them, noticing that the effect was enhanced—the entire wall of spiderlings burned to a crisp almost instantly.
1…
“Here, Ethan!” Klax roared, extending his paw just far enough to touch the tip of the diving Archon’s beak.
0.
As the beak of the Archon met the paw of the Lycae, the world vanished in a blur of brilliant indigo light.