The rope supporting the lion up there snapped audibly, tawny lines painted on its flat mane and everything, and it fell down into the crib. With clearly artificial motions that somehow retained a bit of feline grace, it bounded towards the hole already made by the horse, clearly intent on leaping down to join me.

Above it, stiff eagle calls from the hippogriff and the griffon screeched out encouragement. Right...

The Lion roared, something like the rattles of logs tumbling down, and leapt out of the crib.

I heaved up the six-inch thick broken crib pillar to meet it, spinning sideways.

It slammed down right on top of me, its AI not caring about the threat, crashing down on the pillar, and severely compounding the damage from the jump as its clockwork innards tore out.

The shock stopped it for a moment, and I heaved myself out from under it, Soak bleeding away instead of suffering any bruising and claw damage from the golden claws affixed in its wooden legs. It snapped at my legs viciously, and the dark pants I was now wearing were ripped through.

It leapt after me, its rear legs not working very well, lifting itself and the impaling timber off the ground, overtaking my backwards scramble quickly.

I snapped the club up and jammed it into its gaping jaws, the insides carved into jagged saws instead of teeth, save for the four ornamental and gleaming golden fangs at the front.

I wedged the horse-leg between those fangs, and was promptly smashed backwards by its weight. It clawed at me, but didn’t have a lot of flexibility in its legs, and I rolled over its shoulder, ending up sitting on its back, with the impaling column right in front of me.

I lifted my legs up to avoid the rear claws promptly raking for me, tucking them over its swinging rear legs and the wooden tail that could only impotently swing to and fro. The lion started to circle and try to reach me, even as it tried to shake out the club now wedged in its jaws.

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That was the seam I wanted. I grabbed the stump of the pillar, and began to pound down on the joinery work next to it, exploiting the weakness.

Chokchokchokchokchok, I pounded open the new gap. The lion’s back legs stopped working, and I almost fell off when they went powerless, but kept at it until the joinery was completely fractured. The lion froze, and then fell apart, leaving me sitting there holding onto the four-foot stump of the pillar that had won me the fight amid a tumbled ruin of oaken kitty-clock parts.

Well, would you look at that. I glanced up as an eagle called out in brass and copper tones, scrambling to my feet.

Yeah, I was probably going to die this time. The crude wooden wings of the hippogriff flapped on their hinges, and I sneered despite myself. Damn, my Null wasn’t high enough to invoke Stillflight. Those golden claws and beak were more than big enough to do the job.

I chopped at the edge of the pillar to give it a wedge point once again. It was too short, but it gave me an idea of what to do next time.

I Inspired for The Archer Stand Thrust, One Strike, and Hold the Line. I set my Stance, locking my crude wooden stake out in front of me, centering it on the gaping razor-sharp beak of the diving hippogriff.

Damn, but being fearless was so useful when several hundred pounds of animated oak was diving at you fast...

The stake was considered braced with The Archer’s Stand Thrust, which also made any piercing weapon do double damage when set against a charge. Spears had the braced property, however crude, and that meant triple damage against a charge.

One Strike meant giving up movement to make a single strike with a bonus to hit, damage, AC, or saves. I picked damage, as it would be multiplied by the hit, and I felt the damn thing wouldn’t be hard to hit while charging in a dive. +2 on the stack.

Hold the Line meant I got an AoO when it entered my threat range. That basically meant two attacks to it before it hit me. In real terms, I was going to get one REALLY good impale on it.

Its beak opened in front of me, its AI naturally fearless as well, and it drove itself and the big seam inside its mouth straight onto the point of the stake raised motionless to receive it.

There was a huge crack, and then it slammed into me. My Soak kinda went puff, and huge claws drove into my chest and ripped through bone and muscle. The stake hit the ground, and the hippogriff’s head exploded, but that was small comfort to me.

I blew a Vigor use to stop the bleeding and force its claws out of me even as it fell apart, but it didn’t matter. It fell apart on top of me, and my sight was dimming as I heard the rope snap and the very sharp cry of the toy griffon screech out roughly. I had nothing to fight with as it came down, and I just stared at the massive claws as they came down to rip off my head.