A few hours later, the rumbling noise of the skeletal wheel could be heard, and it was coming their way. This was the eventuality that nobody had wanted, but everyone had prepared for. This time they were going to attempt to give it a good fight. If it was coming back over ground that had already been altered, then that meant that it knew of their presence, and it knew that they had escaped last time. There would be no escape this time, only death for one of the parties.
“Alright. Ranged members, get in position,” Sam said as the monster came ever closer. Jeffrey and Addas leaped back up out of the furrow, and started charging up their ranged attacks. Sam and the other melee fighters jumped forwards, and started buffing themselves up with whatever strengthening abilities that they had. Eduardo started to pulse with a faint white light, Pyotr summoned his rock armor, and Sam used Girdings of the Arbiter. The wheel of bone sped up as it saw them emerge from the furrow, and Sam narrowed his eyes in preparation.
“Now!” He shouted. Jeffrey loosed a gigantic ball of blood from his gun, and Addas placed both hands together, creating a beam of reddish light that caught Jeffrey’s blood ball on the back, shooting it at vastly increased speeds. Sam did not know if that had been intentional or not, but it was pretty damn impressive regardless.
The ball flattened out in the air, becoming a concave rod of red that tore up the earth below it as it flew from sheer speed. It slammed into the skeletal wheel with a colossal bang, shattering bones and tearing a large chunk off of it. Of course, it was far too large to go down from such an attack, but a few of the larger bone fragments tangled up its other wheels, causing it to slow down. There was a grinding noise, and parts of the wheel grated on each other, tearing more and more of it off. Sam raised his eyebrow. Would the fight be over before it had even started? Then he saw what was actually happening.
The front of the monster was opening up and hundreds of skeletons poured out of it. They were all relatively weak, but still in the low thirties in level. The giant wheel started to shrink as the skeletons were produced and it moved backwards and away from the skeletons. It was waiting for them to engage. With a smile, Sam charged.
As he met the skeletons, utter carnage ensued. Bones were turned to powder with each strike of his mace, and he flitted through their paltry attacks like a ghost. He began to lose himself in his battle trance, not noticing that the bones behind him were starting to come together. As he pulverized the last skeletons, he wondered where the others were. Had he finished off the undead so quickly that they had yet to even catch up?
He looked around, and was tossed into the air by a warhammer made out of condensed bone. A massive skeleton, at least fifty feet tall,stood there, made up of the bones of the dismantled skeletons. There were no chinks in its armor, and its surface was smooth as if it had been melted into place. Sam’s front side throbbed, but none of his bones had been broken, so the damage was negligible.
The monster roared and charged Sam as he fell, preparing to swing its hammer again. A halo of dark energy formed around it, and Sam knew that this time he would suffer from more than just a few bruises. However, he was not planning to get hit. With a shout, he pivoted in the air, using his mace as a counterweight, and swung his mace to meet the head of the hammer. There was a crash, and then Sam flew backwards, away from the path of the weapon.
As the bone hammer traveled, it cracked down the middle, and then split into smaller parts. In the end, it was only a summoned weapon, and Sam’s mace was superior. Meanwhile, Pyotr was building up speed, and by the time he reached the skeleton, the inertia stored in his heavy plates of rock was transferred into the skeleton. Its leg bones snapped, and the monster fell backwards, bowled over by the still running form of Pyotr.
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Eduardo flashed forwards, and jumped up into the air, before stabbing the tip of his mace deep into the eye socket of the skeleton. A corona of white light briefly shone, and acrid smoke started pouring out of the eye socket. The skeleton tried to get to its feet, but Sam was already there, having run as quickly as he could upon landing.
He imbued his mace with power, and brought it crashing down on the skeleton’s face. Already weakened, the skull broke apart, and a faint black mist drained out of the monster’s mouth, heading back to the wheel skeleton in the background. Eduardo sniped it out of the air with a bolt of light, and it dissipated. The massive undead wheel started rolling again, growing larger and larger in their vision. Even weakened, it was still utterly gigantic. However it was moving slowly enough to easily dodge now.
Sam and the others split up, and he started running towards a gap between two rolling wheels. As the monster reached him, Sam rolled forwards and then latched his hands on a stationary bone that protruded out from the side of the wheel. Climbing up the side of the monster this way, Sam was able to reach the top in a few minutes. The others were still making their way up, but Sam was ready.
Standing on top of the monster, it was completely unable to detect him, and Sam started looking for weak points. Most of the monster was a tangled mess of bones, but in between the wheels there were joints made out of sinew that allowed for it to turn. This was where Sam was going to begin. However, he would start on the edges. Seeing as this was an undead, breaking it in half down the middle would allow for both halves to keep moving. One wheel on its own however would be unable to survive.
Sam ran across the top of the monster, making sure only to step on stationary bits. He had no wish to fall a hundred feet to the ground, only then to be crushed beneath the skeletal wheels. Bounding forwards,he reached the final wheel of the right side within half a minute, and he watched the rotations of it to get the timing down for what he was about to do. A few seconds later, he brought his mace crashing down on the connector in front of him. It split in half with a noise like a gunshot, and Sam felt the bones underneath him shake.
Sam slammed his mace into the next one, and that too snapped. He could feel the monster vibrating beneath him, and he smiled. It was now very aware of his presence, and it was completely helpless. By this point, the others had reached the top, and upon seeing what Sam was doing, they started copying him. It took three more segments until Sam was finished, and the wheel bounced off as it disconnected, leaving large scrapes in the ground. The others were less efficient, but by the time that Sam was almost finished with the second segment, Eduardo had succeeded in disconnecting to the furthest wheel.
The length of the skeletal construct was rapidly decreasing, and ten minutes later, there were only two segments left. Sam nodded at Addas, who severed the final segment with a sword made out of light. His abilities were random, but usually quite powerful. In any case, doing so let him get more of the essence from the kill, which he sorely needed.
The wheel that they were on fell to the side with a thud, and they stepped off, slightly rattled by the fall. Sam had cushioned Lao with his body, allowing the older and more fragile man to take less of the impact. Still, as time went on, Lao was becoming less and less physically weak. Because of his ring allowing for passive stat gains in Wisdom, he was able to invest in other stats instead. Sam felt a massive wave of essence wash off the barrier of his impending rank up, and he sighed. Wasted essence was always annoying. On the plus side, Eduardo seemed quite excited.
“Did you manage to do it?” Sam asked, fairly certain of what the man was so happy about.
Eduardo nodded.
“If you mean reaching level 49, then yes, I did. We’re in the same boat now.”
“What about everyone else? How much did you all gain from that?” Sam asked.
Lao checked the shared party sheet, and read off the numbers, which was more efficient than each person doing so.
“I am level 48, Pyotr is level 48 as well, Jeffrey and Addas are both level 47, and Rax reached level 41.”
“Good, we’re edging up there. Also, now that the monster is gone, should we not try to destroy the circle?” Sam said, looking at the pieces of bone strewn across the ground. The others all nodded, and started to get to work. However, as they began to tear apart the web of bones underneath the surface, a rumbling noise reached their ears, coming from the direction of the shrine.