Jace was getting nowhere with his fight against the god.
Moloch had thrown fire at him twice to keep the shaman honest and see if his protection had worn off yet. Jace was glad he had recast his totem occasionally and avoided fire damage. The deity had also attempted his hold spell a few more times. It did freeze the orc for half a round before his ring kicked in, and he was usually sent flying backward by a crushing blow from the stone giant.
Jace stuck with what worked between those magical attacks: striking and blocking with his sword. When he made significant progress on chipping away at the monster, the god usually tried one of his primal magical powers. During Jace's recovery, the god did likewise and healed whatever damage the orc had done.
Snowy had joined the fight briefly, and even if Moloch wasn’t wise enough to know that Jace was a shaman with totems hidden around the battlefield, he knew what a winter wolf was. The one and only fire attack he threw at Snowy hit the ground just past the Dodging familiar, leaving a pool of lava behind. The wolf bounded away from the enemy to choose a different battle.
A few minutes after Draya had disappeared inside the volcano, Jace felt a tremor shake the mountain. Moloch stumbled, the fire in his belly diminishing briefly. As a stone shaman, the game told him that the volcano had almost erupted. Jace knew it had to be Draya. Reading Moloch’s facial expressions was challenging, but the orc thought he looked concerned.
The god took a moment to look into the air behind him, and Jace followed the gaze to see Lamashtu locked in a mid-air wrestling match with a familiar black-clad woman. The shaman had noticed increased organization among the troglodytes since Joe had regained his human form and lost control. It made sense that the flying demon was mustering the troops, and Jace had already seen her send half a dozen lizard soldiers into the volcano. Moloch must have felt his hold on this situation diminishing, and he wanted more attention paid to what was happening in the volcano.
Jace feared the colossal stone figure would leap down the crater on his own, so he increased his attacks on the beast, focusing his attacks to do as much damage as possible. The god responded by abandoning any defensive measures and only offered daring combat maneuvers. He swung his massive arms, tried to stomp on the annoying orc, and even Grappled the smaller fighter. Jace kept his Athletic skill high to aid his Parrying and avoided most of the desperate attacks. They weren’t really that desperate, either, for while they left him wide open for attack, Jace still couldn’t do any real damage.
Then the ground trembled again, and Moloch fell over. Now, the fire in his belly all but went out. His limbs stiffened, and his mouth opened in horror. It looked as if a ghost had fled his body, leaving behind a shell of a creature that was only half alive. Jace hesitated over the enemy and spent a moment analyzing him. Stats now appeared above his head: Level 25 800 HP. Before, the game had registered him as “God: Moloch.” Now, it simply called him a lava-enchanted stone elemental.
After a round of confusion, the creature picked itself up off the ground, and Jace attacked. With each cut of his enchanted blade, the health ticker on top of the elemental’s head dropped. “Good job, Draya.”
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Psycho kept his eyes on the females engaged in combat hovering over the volcano. He wished they would fly 50 feet to the left so Esther wouldn’t have to fall directly into the lava pit if he took a shot. Every time it looked like Esther had gained the upper hand, Lamashtu dove to the ground or shot up to the sky, and the rogue clinging to her back had to adjust her grip from a Grapple to a Hold-On-For-Dear-Life.
The ranger thought in game mechanics and knew that to remove a piece of clothing from a character, you had to render them Helpless. Options existed to Pick Pocket smaller items if the target was distracted and didn’t know you were there, but the demon was fully aware of Esther’s presence. Plus, the skull bra was likely considered armor, not a minor piece of clothing.
When the first minor tremor shook the ground, Psycho braced himself and looked around. He had been so focused on what Esther was doing that he had forgotten he was in a battle. A trio of troglodytes approached him from the left, and he snapped three Rapid Fire shots at them, having switched back to his elemental bow. Acid burned a hole in each; two fell, dying, having critically failed the saving throw, while the third stood long enough to get a second arrow through the skull.
Psycho became alerted to motion from his right and spun with an arrow nocked but held his fire as Snowy barreled toward him, leaping from peak to peak on the wavy ground. She ran past him and vaulted in the air. The ranger turned in time to see the wolf tackle two other troglodytes sneaking up behind him. Psycho put an arrow through a third.
His eyes then scanned for the other group members. Rock, Leah, and Joe were sorely pressed, and he sent six arrows toward them, taking out four enemies and lightening their load. They were weak, but the priest should be able to heal them.
Finding a tall rock nearby, he jumped up and thoroughly scanned the battlefield. Most lizardmen had been dealt with, but a few still straggled about. Psycho spotted a pair that looked like they were thinking about joining their god in a fight against Jace. Two arrows later, they didn’t think anything at all.
A few others peered down into the volcano to see what Draya was doing and possibly wondered if they should climb down and interfere. Psycho helped them decide, and they each went screaming over the edge, falling more than climbing.
When the second tremor hit, Psycho lost his balance and fell from his perch. He sensed the profound nature of this magical change, and his eyes went up to Esther first. Whatever boons Lamashtu received from her union with Moloch and the volcano were gone, and Esther wrenched the female’s body about like she was a low-level peasant. Within a round, she had rendered the demon Helpless and removed the skulls from her chest.
With her task complete, Psycho could see realization hit the woman about her choices for an escape. She was over 100 feet in the air, suspended above an awakening volcano. Once again, her grip on Lamashtu shifted, and the demon gained some autonomy. Her only defense was altitude; her wings flapped hard, sending her straight up.
Psycho pulled Dragonwing again and nocked a mithril arrow. Each shaft was probably worth 40 gold; he was going through them like candy on this mission. Gromphy would be busy making more when they finished this mission, assuming Jace could find a way home. The archer got a bead on his target immediately but held his shot. To hit Lamashtu and not Esther, he would need to spend several criticals, but they were only 300 feet away. Dragonwing was accurate enough to make this shot at almost twice that distance. His problem was what to do about Esther once he killed the demon. Whether she hit lava or rock, she would probably die at their current height. It was possible she wouldn’t lose all her HP, and they could get healing to her, but it was a risk. He needed her to fall longer to enact any plan to save her, so he let the pair climb another fifty feet.
“Snowy!” Psycho called, not taking his eyes off the sky. He sensed when the wolf acknowledged his call. “Girl,” he said again when she got close, “I need you to catch Legs.” The canine whined a question. “Esther,” Psycho clarified. “I need you to catch Esther.” Now she understood. “Run toward her now.”
The ranger let the wolf close half the distance to the volcano's edge, took a deep breath, and released the arrow. The shaft split the demon’s skull, and she died. That was the easy part. Esther released the dead enemy after she had been sprayed with rotted brain matter. Psycho pretended he could hear the woman complaining about the stains as her upward momentum carried her another dozen feet before she hung in the air and fell screaming.
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The elf pulled three mundane arrows, activated his Pinning Shot and Rapid Shot, and let fly as quickly as possible. Luckily, the pair hadn’t been directly over the center of the volcano, or there would have been nothing Psycho could have done. They were closer to the back edge, but it was still too far for Snowy to jump. At the center, the open crater was over 200 feet across. Where she fell, Esther was about fifty feet from the far side.
Pinning Shot was designed to secure someone against a tree or wooden wall. With the right arrow, it could attach them to stone. It worked best when the target stood directly against the anchor point, but the shot could carry them back a certain number of feet equal to the level of the archer. They would get significant bonuses to save against the attack, but Psycho didn’t care; as a party member, Esther was guaranteed to fail.
The first arrow hit her two seconds into her fall, carried her backward 20 feet, and then continued past her when it didn’t find a tree or wall to pin her to. The following arrow did the same thing, and after the third, she was no longer in danger of falling inside the volcano’s mouth. She would still hit the stone ground at incredible speed in about two seconds, but Psycho saw Snowy leap toward the descending woman with perfect timing.
Esther hit the massive wolf thirty feet above the ground, slowing her considerably, and the two disappeared on the far side of the peak, out of Psycho’s view. He winced, anticipating the impact, knowing Snowy would take most of it. The wolf had nearly twice the Hit Points of the woman, and the ranger trusted the loyal familiar would be more than willing to sacrifice her body. Psycho waited a few anxious moments for a notification that Esther had died, and when he didn’t get one, he let go of the breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding.
The ranger stored his long-range bow, pulled his other one, and ran toward his leader to help.
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Rock was not doing well.
The enemies’ tridents no longer Stunned him, which he guessed was a good thing, but at only level 11, he couldn’t save against the damage either. He frequently failed critically against the electrical attacks and took double damage. As a dwarf with high constitution, he usually cut the damage by 50 or more, and his Hit Points were almost as high as Psycho or Esther, but he spent most of the fight below 150 and was often a roll of 1 or 2 from dying. Once Joe arrived to help, he had a safety net, but while the priest’s healing spells kept him alive, the human was not an endless supply of mana, and he wouldn’t last much longer.
Rock’s only saving grace was Leah. The witch seemed to have an endless supply of curses and hexes to throw at her enemies and needed to supply very little of her own mana to operate her wands. By the time Rock approached to bash them with his hammer, they were usually Blinded, Diseased, Dazed, and Frightened. She strategically chose banes that didn’t overlap, so they stacked against each other. The dwarf wasn’t an expert with his hammer, as many of his feats gave bonuses to chiseling stone instead of bashing heads, but the weakened troglodytes fell before him.
When a new wave came that Leah had not yet impaired, their initial shocking attacks rattled the dwarf’s teeth and dropped his health, but after a few rounds, he was pounding their bodies with his hammer, deflecting their lack-luster thrusts with his shield, and receiving healing spells from Joe.
Occasionally, arrows flew in out of nowhere, dropping enemies faster than Rock could follow. It amazed him that the distant archer could dispatch these troglodytes so efficiently while he labored to kill even one, often needing two to three rounds to drop each enemy.
Few of Leah’s spells did actual damage, but when the dwarf was in extreme distress, poison or acid would shoot from a wand and consume one of his adversaries. Joe would only engage an enemy if they were fully incapacitated by Leah first, and even then, he could only take one at a time. Since he didn’t carry a shield, he lost considerable health from each encounter and spent just as much time healing himself as Rock.
When the number of enemies finally dwindled, and it looked like even Leah was running low on mana, the troglodytes got desperate. After casting their initial lightning attacks, they threw their tridents and pulled knives. Jace had told Rock he needed to guard Leah to repair their relationship, but the vindictive woman had protected him so far. As three tridents sailed in at them, and Leah had no defense against the ranged attack, the dwarf saw his opportunity and stepped in the way, raising his shield against the spears.
Two projectiles bounced harmlessly off the guard, but the third hit him in the shoulder and took him from his feet. He winced as he slammed against the hard stone, and the tip of the sharp trident Pinned him to the ground. He tried to wrestle free but failed critically and was rendered Helpless for a few rounds.
From his back, Rock saw Leah step over him, a wand in each hand. He heard the cries of the troglodytes and the strange language the witch used to cast her spells, all while staring up at a clear sky, the sun beating down on his bearded face. He heard Joe cry out in pain, the crackle of lightning, and then silence.
The player lay there feeling useless for a few seconds before Leah returned and crouched beside him. Her face was unreadable. “Thank you for trying to save me,” Leah said. She paused. “But I still hate you.” She pulled a yellow wand with dark red strips, stuck it deep into his slack-jawed mouth, and released a swarm of wasps down his throat.
With his settings turned low, the pain wasn’t bad, but the feeling of having a swarm of stinging insects fly down your esophagus and rip apart your lungs was as real as the game could make it. Leah bent down to kiss him on the forehead and then walked away.
In his last few seconds, Rock heard Joe panting and asking if he could save the dwarf, but Leah said he was too far gone and that the priest shouldn’t . . . And that was all Rock knew as his character died and his vision went black.
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Jace received a notification that his trade with Rock was terminated.
The orc was too focused on cutting apart the stone elemental to pay it much mind, and Gracie had to tell him the sad news. In between sword strikes, the enemy took acid hits from Psycho. The arrows didn’t do much physical damage at first, but the acid melted the “skin,” creating softened targets for future arrows that penetrated deeper.
A few moments after the elf joined the fight, Draya emerged from the volcano and drenched the back of the elemental in dragon fire. This new incarnation didn’t have nearly the same protections as Moloch had, and molten rock dripped off him that didn’t grow back. Eventually, even Leah joined the fun, Blinding and Enfeebling the creature. The elemental fell two rounds later.
Jace was clean out of mana, having gone through four separate Damage Sink Totems. His health was also pretty low. Psycho appeared okay, and Draya was at full health. Jace wanted to ask what had happened in the volcano but was distracted when he didn’t see Esther.
“I think she is fine,” Psycho said, reading his leader’s expression as the orc took a head count. The ranger led the group around the back of the mountain and found Esther unconscious on the ground. Snowy was severely hurt, too, but conscious. Jace learned that Snowy had needed to use most of her innate healing spells on the woman to stabilize her. Even with all Psycho’s precautions, the fall had nearly ended the rogue.
By now, Joe had met up with the heroes and offered what little healing he had left, but Jace turned him down. Now that they were out of combat, they could waste several rounds to drink the healing potions Gromphy had crafted. Within a minute, everyone, including Esther, was at full health. Mana restoration potions were much more challenging to make, and the game restricted each character from carrying only one at a time, but everyone in Jace’s party had one. Within another round, they were ready to take on anything.
“What happened to Rock?” Jace asked, turning to Leah.
“He didn’t make it,” the woman replied simply. It was clear she didn’t want to elaborate.
Draya stepped toward Leah. “Do you recognize this?” She pulled the emerald from her inventory.
The witch paused at the sight of the gem. It looked like she was trying to remember something. “The magic seems familiar,” she said slowly. Draya offered her the stone, and she took it. “Yes. This is the same magical signature I felt around the Life Spring when it was full and nurturing my kingdom. This is what was stolen from my land.”
“Then you can use it to cure the plague?” Esther asked.
The other woman shook her head. “I don’t know how. My magic is . . . well, it isn’t the life-giving kind.”
“I think that is where I come in,” Joe offered, stepping up and taking the gem from his aunt. His eyes rolled back in his head once he fell into the stone's magic. “Yes,” he said finally. “I can use this to end the plague and restore your land. Though,” he paused and looked at Jace, “you will have to get me there first.”
“Then what are we standing around here for?” Jace asked. “Let’s get moving.” The group was eager to escape the volcano's heat and headed toward the shade of the main island. Jace noticed that Draya lingered, staring back at the top of the mountain. “What happened in there?” Jace asked, moving alongside her. “What did you do?”
Draya paused in thought for a while and then shook her head. “You don’t want to know. Let’s just say the volcano is under new management. And we should go.” Jace wanted to ask her what she meant, but she skipped ahead to find Leah and Esther reliving the fight. Jace sighed and followed after.