As the ogre amalgamations charged a huge white bear appeared in front of the group. The name tag said [Ice Bearoness]. It hit the ground, looked around, said, “Oh hell yeah,” and raced right for the ogres.
Rick targeted the enormous, stark white bear and triggered his Protection, but Gambit had lunged forward, swinging his razor sword. The shield landed on him instead of the tank. The translucent bubble formed around him, doing nothing to stop his swing.
The first ogre’s fist slammed into the bear’s head. The bear stumbled and the knife wielding ogre plunged its curved knife deep into the bear’s side. The bear roared and lashed out, knocking the punching ogre back, but the one with the knife stayed close. It grabbed the bear's shoulder, pulled the knife out of its side, and stabbed it again. The bear's health bar dipped wildly.
Rick triggered Soothing Mist and followed up with a Force Wave, but the bear shifted as he triggered it, and both the bear and ogre were sent tumbling. They rolled straight into the rest of the attacking party. The skinny man with the remote control went down, and they all ended up in a tangle of limbs behind the two ogres at the back of the squad.
Gambit was on top of the punching ogre, slicing his razor sword down over and over. The monster's health plummeted to almost nothing. From behind Rick, Daniel's bowstring thrummed. An arrow whistled past his head to catch the knife-wielding ogre as it climbed back to its feet.
The bear lunged up, scrawny overseer clutched in its jaws. It shook him back and forth like a terrier mutilating its favorite chew toy.
The remote control box flew into the stone wall and shattered into pieces of sparking electronics. The ogres all stiffened, then let out a [Horrifying Roar]. Ability bars appeared above their heads as they channeled the two-second spell. Rick felt the tremendous urge to run. He fought, but against his own will, he turned and ran.
Rick couldn't turn his head to look, but he could see his allies in the party interface. Daniel’s health bar had a “terrified” debuff over it. Rick’s own said "fleeing." Gambit's health was almost half down, and before Rick reached the bend, he targeted him in the party interface and threw a Healing Mist on him.
[Ice Bearoness]’s nameplate read: immune. At least the tank wasn’t getting feared. That was good. Her health was lower than Rick liked. He needed to get back to the fight.
Rick ran around the corner and straight into a squad of what looked like classic imps from various video games, except they had six arms like deranged spiders dancing on two legs. In the center of the dozen or so bizarre creatures stood a goblin, holding another remote control. Rick's fear-induced run took him straight into the center of the pack. The rest of the party's health bars turned gray as they went out of line of sight. This was not good. Very, very not good.
"Who are you?" squeaked a voice. It didn't sound like the goblin. Rick realized it came from one of the imps. A dozen more voices joined the chorus. "Who are you?”
“What are you doing here?”
“Why is there another big person?”
The fear ran out just as Rick reached the goblin. The small, green, big-eared creature looked up at him wide-eyed. It lifted the remote and reached out a finger to press the large red button in the center of it.
Rick reached down and plucked the remote from the goblin’s hand. He threw it hard at the nearest wall, then turned and raced back the way he had come.
As he rounded the corner, he heard the remote shatter and impish voices babbling.
“What’s going on, boss?”
"Do you want us to go after him, boss?"
"Hey, you're not our boss anymore.”
“Get him!"
He spared a quick glance at the health bars. His party had stabilized; Bearnoness’s health had even gone up. As he reached them, they were finishing off the final ogre.
"Look out, we've got company!" he shouted.
The bear looked up. Its eyes widened. "What?” it asked in a gruff but feminine voice.
Rick glanced behind. The gibbering horde of imps was pouring around the corner. "What the hell, man?" the Bearoness cried
Rick cast Force Wave, knocking the imps back as Gambit charged past him. "Light them up!" he yelled.
The bear was hot on his heels, growling in dismay. "No, don't! My taunt is only single target!"
Daniel's first arrow was already in the air. It thudded into the mass of imps, followed by another and then another.
Gambit waded in them, swinging his razor sword. All around him, imps stopped in place and started waving their arms. Their tiny hands glowed with trails of rainbow light and a casting bar appeared over each of their heads.
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The bars were tiny and all overlapping. Rick couldn't make them out, but whatever they were casting couldn’t be good. He didn't wait to find out. Rick targeted a Force Wave into the horde and let fly. Imps were scattered in all directions, their casting interrupted.
“Heal me, damnit!” the Bearoness roared. It was down on all fours, tearing into the imps with claws and fang. Its health, low from the ogre fight, was dipping into dangerous territory.
Rick threw out a Soothing Mist, and then another Force Wave to pick off two imps just outside the melee who had almost completed their cast.
There was one imp more on the far side of the pack, out of range. Its spell completed and a swirling vortex of rainbow light poured from all six of its hands. The lights came together at a point in front of it, then speared into the ice bear. Rick targeted the bear and triggered Protection.
The bear jerked and staggered. Its face swelled like it was about to puke. Rick’s shield landed, just too late.
The bear was surrounded by a translucent orb. It gave a tremendous *herk*, and rainbow-hued puke splattered the inside of the orb.
"Holy crap!" Daniel said, momentarily was distracted from shooting.
"Don't stop! Kill the imps!" Rick reminded him.
The orb vanished and the rainbow-puke-splattered bear staggered out. Rick threw a Soothing Mist into the bear and knocked away several imps that were preparing to attack with one more Force Wave.
“Man.” The bear’s voice was dazed and thoroughly disgusted. “You suck at healing. I can’t believe I’ve been waiting for a dungeon invite for three weeks and I get whatever the hell you lot are.”
The imp who had gotten its spell cast off was starting another channel. This time swirling darkness formed around its hands.
"That one, hit that one!” Rick called, indicating the one in the back. There were too many targets in the way for his Force Wave but Daniel's arrow arced over their heads and plunged into the small creature. The second arrow killed it, and Rick let out a sigh of relief.
In the meantime, Gambit had dispatched two of the others and the bear had overcome its debilitation, loping back over to the imps and tearing into them. After that, it was a fairly straightforward job to mop up the rest of the group.
Gambit bent to loot the imps as Rick caught his breath. He realized he hadn’t looted the ogres and turned to check if the others had.
One of the bodies still glowed faintly, indicating it had loot. Rick headed for it.
"What the hell? You guys are humans?" the bear growled, as if noticing them for the first time. "I just thought you were badly geared galactics."
"Yeah, we're humans!" Rick called over his shoulder. He reached the ogre and leaned over to loot. "How do you know about..."
He was interrupted by a bone-shakingly loud voice.
"Interlopers! Who dares enter the lair of Fleshcrafter Snithers!?”
"What the fuck? Who started the boss?" the bear asked. “This party is a joke, I don’t know what you’re playing at but you guys suck!”
"We have a hunter!" Gambit offered as an explanation. “But we don't know where he's gone."
"A hunter? Aw hell, say no more!" the bear growled. "That's the flesh crafter boss. We better get over there quick." The white-furred oversized beast turned and dashed away through the pile of dead imps. Rick and the others set off in pursuit.
"How do you know about--?" Rick called, wanting to ask how the bear knew about humans, but another announcement shook the walls and cut him off.
"Fools! I don't need to kill you myself. My creations will do it for me!"
[Phase Two Start]
“Holy crap, he's fast! How geared is your hunter?” The bear went around another bend in the corridor.
Rick rounded the corner. The tunnel entered a much larger cavern and continued across in the form of a catwalk over the wide-open space. The floor was fifty feet below and covered in large bubbling vats of multicolored fluid. Goblins could be seen walking between the tanks and stirring them with long sticks. Noxious vapors rose from them. As they ran along the walkway Rick felt alternately lightheaded, giddy, and incredibly angry as various debuffs hit him. The party slowed as their footfalls rang off the metal grating of the catwalk.
"Don't worry, this phase takes a little longer. I've run this place dozens of times,” the bear tossed back. It had also slowed. They were almost caught up when the catwalk ended at a large platform. The floor here was metal mesh, with wide holes showing the cavern floor far below.
Around the edge of the platform stood various tanks of fluid with creatures swimming around inside them. Two of the tanks were cracked open, their contents spilled out. As the party arrived, a third tank split apart. The fluid inside gushed out as a wiggling shape splattered onto the metal grate. The liquid poured away through the cracks and splashed down into the cavern below while the creature staggered to its tentacled feet and rocketed towards them, limbs flailing in all directions.
It was an amalgamation of creatures. Disparate eyes and mouths protruded from the body. The wiggling tentacles ended in hands, feet and claws, seemingly at random, like it had been made by a mad scientist reaching into a grab-bag of spare limbs and pulling out whatever was on top.
The creature made it three yards before an arrow of light speared it through the center.
Its health bar appeared and vanished in an instant. The monster flopped to the floor. As it hit, it popped like a water balloon and its blood or protoplasm gushed out. The liquid was apparently acidic because it burned away the mesh all around, and the body fell through to splash into a vat of fluid yards below.
Rick noticed two large holes in the mesh near the other two opened canisters. Even as he spotted them, a fourth canister started to crack open.
The hunter stood on the far end of the platform against the railing near several of the tanks. He was tall, far taller than any of the Rorks had been, wearing a cape that covered most of his body. His enormous bird creature bobbed up at down at his side, shifting from one foot to the other as it eyed them.
On a smaller platform, high above, an oversized humanoid was standing in front of a control panel full of dials and levers. The figure writhed. At first it looked like someone was being attacked by a number of those tentacled amalgamations. Then Rick spotted the nameplate. [Fleshcrafter Snithers] This was the boss.
The fourth tank popped open and its amalgamation splashed out and started wiggling towards the group. An arrow from the hunter sizzled past Rick and skewered the creature. It deflated, its leaking contents burning yet another hole through the mesh, close to but not quite touching the hole left by the previous amalgamation’s death.
The hunter, Arthax, moved slightly to the side. “Get to the center of the platform,” he called. His voice was deep, with a strange resonant quality.
The bear was already standing in the center of the platform. “Come on guys! He's going for the achievement!”
Rick and Gambit jogged over to stand close to the bear. Daniel stopped just short.
“So what do we do? Shoot these things as they come out?”
The fifth canister popped open and Daniel raised his bow.
"No don't!" the hunter yelled, but it was too late.
Daniel's bowstring twanged. His arrow streaked across to thud into the amalgamation. The creature's health bar appeared, down less than a quarter. It hissed and started for Daniel.
“You idiot! No don't shoot it again!”
Daniel nocked another arrow.