The [Mausoleum Giant] lumbered forwards on its ridiculously thin legs, and I still couldn’t believe how they could naturally support that massive and rotund body of its, and only the slowness of the movement belied the incredible weight of its every step: The thumping that followed was way too light to not be deliberate.
Sharpened bone after sharpened bone still shot towards those of us that were flying, unfortunately for those that were grounded they were the ones having the harder time.
“How fuckin’ many of them can it make!?” Sheeno shouted angrily while shoving back a bipedal [Skeletal Warrior] with a lizard head that wielded two sharpened bones as swords.
Although they were all a mishmash of body parts, all of the bone minions had in common the fact that they had at least a head and four limbs, which meant that, sometimes, one ended up fighting a centipedal monstrosity that had a different head pointing in every direction imaginable.
This very same creature was the one currently constricting its long body against the triplets’ [Barrier], forcing all three of them to fully concentrate on it so it wouldn’t collapse under the continuous attacks. All the other enemies just kept charging over the centipede, directly aided by the numerous limbs, that jutted out of the main serpentine body, in the climb.
For a brief moment, I considered summoning one or two [Tier 3 Aurumons] to win us the fight, but the fresh memory of the [Aurumons] getting its hand shredded by a jacked-up [Tier 1 Monster] didn’t fill me with confidence; that, coupled with the sheer amount of [Mana] the thing now possessed, made it clear enough that [Tier 3] would not be enough, and I knew for certain that summoning anything above that incurred the risk of overtaxing me to death. So, overpowering my way through the bullshit, as per my usual plans, was not an option this time.
“The real problem it’s not that it can make them-“, Twad grunted out with some effort.
“The problem is that it can properly coordinate all of them!” Twud said a little breathlessly.
“Stop talking. More casting!” Twid stopped his two siblings from being distracted any further, and they all got back on reinforcing their constantly under strain [Barrier].
What about us in the air? Well, let’s just say that the Giant didn’t forget about its enhanced magical capabilities.
*BWOOOM*
A laser of deadly mana streamed past where I was just an instant ago.
The offending culprit just closed its mouth while making another step forward, and a couple of seconds later it opened its maw to repeat the attack.
*BWOO-* “-Ack”
Me and [Kenny] waited for it to start its massive ranged attack to shoot our respective beams into what I hoped was the gaping weakness it had provided.
The giant stumbled back a step and released another massive roar, but my [Rune] on the ceiling still managed to dampen most of the sound, although I could tell that it wouldn’t be able to deal with many more of those, its lines warping under the strain.
What was left unsaid, though, was we all had the brilliant idea to head back toward the mouth of the cave, in the hope of funneling those that had a bone to pick with us in a more controlled space.
“Shit, that was a good pun and it was only in my mind.”
Lamenting a wasted pun aside, the non-plan that we all agreed on seemed to be working… until it did not.
And by that, I mean that the Undead Giant was unfairly smart and saw easily enough how things were going, and decided to collapse the entrance to its lair with another laser.
*BWOOOM*
“No!” Cherry shouted, sounding a bit more than a little panicked.
Well, that was not good, especially so since now they were boxed in against the new wall; we could have made short work of it if we were all to pitch in, but who was to say how far the cave-in went for? I was already thinking that part of the roof didn’t collapse on their head out of sheer luck, and the cracks that spread on it after the first fall made me worry that the damage from that blast wasn’t over.
As if to prove me right the [Mausoleum Giant] shot again, its attack slightly curving around Undine on its own, transforming from an unexpected hit into a surprising glancing blow. Still, a glancing blow was a blow, and my [Barrier] wasn’t enough to protect her from the entirety of the kinetic force, which ultimately sent her careening downwards.
Where a [Flying Trapper] repeated the previous tactics and saved her from the skeletal horde’s grasp at the last second.
“This won’t work for much longer…”
My pessimistic thought process was based upon the constantly rising [Mana density] inside the Giant, and the fact that that last glancing blow was enough to create some hair-line fractures along the segments of the [Barrier] that absorbed the attack. If my calculation were correct, my terrible mathematical skills notwithstanding, when we found the [Bone Giant] it was still in the process of fully [Evolving] into a [Mausoleum Giant], and during this entire fight it has been powering up to full capacity. Meaning that we were having problems with an [Aberrant Monster] that wasn’t at its 100% yet, and that last fact was not going to remain true for long.
“I’m starting to understand Cherry’s hatred for [Aberrants].”
A weird ping sounded at the edge of my attention, but before I could make sense of it two more followed, then another, and another, only after that last one I realized where it was coming from: The mangled forms of barely alive [Aurumons] had been automatically recalled into my [World Within] after some hidden criteria deemed it opportune. Something had just managed to kill off multiple of my [Tier 1 Aurumons], whose outer shell was made of divinium, and I had no idea who-
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
That distraction cost me, and a deadly beam hit my lower section, with catastrophic results: My two [Trappers] under my feet were blasted apart, so I began falling, my [Barrier] barely staved off the initial hit, but the laser was a stream of energy, so after that, it cracked, and then immediately broke, almost all at once.
Then there was pain.
I had thrown out the term ‘blinding pain’ so much that I thought I had pegged out what I meant by it, but right now I refused to look at my legs even after casting [Repair] on myself, the unexpected drain that it caused on my [MPs] further assured me that I shouldn’t look.
My back slammed on something and my consciousness was back in full; the pain was so all-consuming that I practically blacked out for a moment, ending with me falling on top of a distracted [Skeletal Warriot], which tried to rake me with its bony claws but I wasn’t so out of it that I couldn’t conjure another [Shamanic Totem] next to me just in time to protect me.
With blood pounding inside my ears, the cacophony of bones trying to get to me assumed a background role, second to the sound of ragged breath and thumping heart.
“I could die here.”
I felt like I was having a panic attack.
“DARWIN! Darwin answer me!”
My wide eyes caught a glimpse of midnight purple hair among the ivory crowd, and suddenly nothing besides getting back to her mattered. I slammed the head of my scepter into the ground next to me, just after drawing a [Rune of Repulsion] on it with my [Mana], through [Manakenisis].
“I’m fine!” I shouted inside the newfound breathing room, the [Rune] having temporarily blasted away everything besides me and Sheeno in a circular radius.
For a moment I saw her shoulders sag in relief, but then she caught a look at my lower half and her eyes widened in shock.
“You’re not fine!” She shouted in abject horror.
“I just need more time to repair that. Regrowing stuff is apparently a little beyond me right now, and I’ll need Undine for it”, I explained, not fully understanding how I kept on talking without shouting in pain.
She looked like she wanted to argue more about it, but the skeletons climbing over the mound of their fallen brethren made her think otherwise.
“We need to get out of here. UNDINE! We need a lift!” My mate shouted to the ceiling, and soon after a delicate stream of water brought us out of the minion’s reach.
*BWOOOM*
I instinctively flinched in fear, and the quick jerk brought back to mind the bundles of pain that were my legs, causing me to grit my teeth through a scream.
Thankfully that laser was not for us, but the sight of pieces of cloud being flung around filled me with a different type of dread.
“We really n-need to get our of-f here”, I said through clenched teeth.
“That’s what I’m here for-“, Undine started saying, coincidentally getting close enough to us at that moment.
“No! I meant l-like out of this fucking c-cave!” I interrupted her, finding it harder and harder to talk through the pain.
“That asshole collapsed the only entrance, remember?” Sheeno reminded me with a light tremor in her voice.
I took stock of where my resources stood and I saw that I was below [50% MP] and above [70% SP], and among my summoned [constructs] only my [Totems] were fairing decently, meanwhile, the [Turrets] on the ground had been destroyed and the [Trappers] simply weren’t strong enough to be effective against such a powerful enemy.
Looking closer, one of the places where there previously was a [Discus Launchers] on the wall was now just a crater… That last laser was the [Mausoleum Giant] attack a [turret] using [Divine Mana]! It probably realized that it was among the few things that could arm it, for however how briefly before it regenerated from it, and it took action against it.
Was that why it was concentrating on me and Undine? Not because it could get us with its minions, but because it could its anathema radiating off us through our [Spells] and [Skills]?
“I could use that.”
“New plan: I act as bait-“
“No!” The [Water Nymph] readily rejected my unspoken idea.
“A-at least let me fin-“, I wanted to explain that it wasn’t as dangerous as it was starting to sound, but I was interrupted once more by a strong negative.
“NO!” My girlfriend shouted even louder, grabbing my cheeks with one hand and forcing me to look into her unnervingly serious eyes.
“Ok, ok… New ‘new’ plan: I create bait for a ‘fuck off beam’ in front of the rubble, so the Giant will clear it for us, while we all huddle up together behind layers and layers of defensive mea-Woah!” I wasn’t even done explaining when Sheeno shared a look with Undine just before suddenly taking me in a fireman carry and jumping off the flow that was keeping us aloft.
Good news: Sheeno could summon those icy-rock pillars from the air, helping her create elevated platforms for our safe passage.
Bad News: She had to jump between structures, and every leap sent a stab of pain from my legs to my spine, and that then exploded in my brain like tiny demented fireworks.
I cast another [Repair] on myself, but I only felt marginally better, just about around where I was after the first massive one.
We finally dropped inside the triplets’ [Cloud Dome], the structure opening a hole in front of us to let us through as if expecting us, and Undine floated in right behind us.
“What ha- OH [GROWTH]!” Cherry had come to inquire about our situation but was too shocked to find me in my current state to continue.
Although, She probably shouldn’t have been worried about someone else in her condition.
“What the hell happened to your arm!?” I promptly asked, my pain-addled mind not caring about the touchy subject.
“My arm? What happened to your legs!?” She just as easily ignored decorum, and a mental slip made me look from her left stump, just below the shoulder, to my legs.
“Aw fuck, that’s worse than I thought…”
If there is something that my pulping at the hand of Grog taught me, is that there’s no harm without a cure here: Even a severed head could be fixed if done right on the spot and rapidly enough.
So, that’s why I wasn’t screaming in horror; but I was instead very close to screaming in pain. Seeing the wound only made it all the more real.
My own black-scarred stumps were truly revolting to look at.
“N-nevermind that. Look, I have a plan to get us out of here, but it requires everybody’s collaboration”, I shook my head in a vane attempt to get the image of my missing feet out of my head, while getting everybody on board with the idea of safely getting out of here.
As if to mock my plan, the [Mausoleum Giant] roared, this time its power overwhelming the [Rune] on the ceiling, breaking, and hitting us with the last bit of its sonic attack, leaving us all with our ears ringing painfully.
“This plan better be quick!” Sheeno exclaimed while joining back into the melee, at the edge of the [Cloud Dome], to keep the skeletons at bay. Meanwhile, [Kenny] was making sure that the Giant was shooting at it, and not us, by keeping its attention with a constant barrage of [Holy Light].
*BWOOOM*
Finally, the [Monster] grew angry enough to start shooting at the tiny thing that kept flying around it, while repeatedly stinging it with its annoying light.
A memory from when [Kenny] melted the face of a [Ratton] in the same [Tier] right off flashed through my mind, further bringing home the point that this enemy was unfairly sturdy.
“I was thinking that it might have been [Tier 4], but maybe it has been altered all the way to [Tier 5]… And to think that the [Quest] was for a [Tier 3 Monster].”
“So?” Cherry called out urgently.
“I’m doing it. It’s just… It just includes doing something that I promised myself that I’d never do…” I hesitantly said, knowing that to show such reluctance in acting upon my own plan wasn’t good, but unable to easily digest what I was about to do.
“Which is!?” This time it was my mate that loudly called out, between a swing of a massive [Ice Mallet] and another.
“…Deliberately sacrificing one of my [Summons]”, I finally responded, after an awkward pause, which I used to instruct [Kenny] to lead the Giant towards the collapsed entrance.
And it obeyed without complaining, like the little filial minion that it was.