The Field Boss had evolved, entering a clear and distinct second phase. The boss had withstood the defenders' onslaught for most of the previous day and the entire night, but it had finally had enough. Gaol was abandoning its static, defensive posture in order to retaliate with an obviously more mobile form. Coop reinspected the boss, worried about what was coming next.
[Field Boss: Primal Serpent (Level 45)]
[Gaol the Unveiled Blade (Agility)]
[Manifestation of the Primal Constructs]
Coop was relieved that the level hadn’t increased, it wasn’t that the difficulty of the encounter was increasing, but rather the dynamic was shifting. They would have to adapt along with it and he believed they had already proven their flexibility.
The class, or the boss equivalent of a class, had changed from Veiled Blade to Unveiled Blade and the monster’s primary stat had switched from Body to Agility. The physical alterations corresponded to both of the changes, with a sleeker look and longer exposed blades that reflected threateningly in the red tinged light of the rising sun. It seemed as though the boss agreed that it was time to finish the match, one way or another.
Gaol dove into the sand with a speed that matched its transformation, arcing its body and revealing that more than half of it had been underground the entire time. Coop wasn’t sure exactly how long its torso had been, just that it was clearly the largest boss he had seen, and by a large enough margin to raise concerns.
The Crazed Serpents chased after the boss in the water like a school of fish, but the boss remained beneath the sand with only a series of its massive blades breaching the surface. It pushed through the ground, leaving a wake of churned water, turbid from the disturbed sand. The tunnel it created left the sandy bottom bulging as if a subway tunnel was hastily constructed underneath the shallows before collapsing from a lack of support.
The Field Boss went straight for Sea Burial, intent on removing its most consistently dangerous foe. The ship had no chance of outmaneuvering the tunneling monster and was cleanly split in half with loud snaps as the ghostly deck planks were broken by the first blade, then into quarters before being smashed to bits by the following blades. The boss continued tunneling, unimpeded by the ship’s destruction. The shining blades that extended from Gaol’s body cut through the bulk of the hull as easily as the shallow water.
It was an odd scene, to see a ship sink in no more than three or four feet of water, but it didn’t last long. The ship flotsam dissipated back into mist, like an ethereal weapon, and the surviving crew were left standing in the shallows like everyone else, except they were facing down thousands of Crazed Serpents that remained in the boss’s wake.
Most of the crew teleported around the surge of monsters, but Charon stood his ground with a hundred of his orbs rushing forward and engaging targets. After accumulating them for so long, he had built up an entire swarm of the orbiting spheres, and he clearly intended to use them. He cleaved the school of Serpents down the center, in revenge for Sea Burial, but he was forced to use his own movement skills when Gaol took another pass. Frustratingly, the giant metal worm had yet to expose itself from underground.
Gaol destroyed the formations of the defenders and caused most of the survivors to flee back around the fort, away from the fight. They completely lost control of the perimeter, but Gaol wasn’t interested in forming more living armor after it had molted into its new form. Coop remained on the battlefield, but could only chip away at the constant surge of Crazed Serpents that continued to join in on the chaos. He needed a way to engage with the boss.
Coop swapped his ethereal weapons around so that he wielded his reliable spear alongside his solid round shield. He traced Gaol’s path as the boss circled the shallow water battlefield, seeking an opportunity. For the most part, the defenders had successfully evacuated back to the fort, but the boss wasn’t satisfied and continued to patrol the edge of the northern reef as if it would find Sea Burial once again.
Coop mistjumped into the center of the previous battlefield, to get in range of the boss monster while keeping enough distance to avoid grabbing attention from the swarm of Serpents that trailed behind. It would be tricky to get close enough to land any solid melee strikes even if the boss exposed itself, due to all of the blades flaring out in each direction, but that wouldn’t prevent Coop from throwing his spear.
The angle was such that Coop wouldn’t be able to target the boss directly if he pitched his spear, even with all of his Strength. The shallow water and submerged boss would impede a straightforward strike. His typical damaging throws needed to be adjusted. Instead, Coop aimed his left arm up into the sky and threw his spear with an extremely steep angle, as if he was trying to break the mana dome’s ceiling or take down the sun itself.
Gaol kept moving, but Coop had given the boss several seconds of lead time before it would arrive at where he had aimed. The spear didn’t come back down for a full 10 seconds, but when it did, a plume of water and sand exploded into the air. A dozen Crazed Serpents were defeated simultaneously, but the attack had landed well behind the boss. Coop hadn’t expected his weapon to take that long to come back down, and when it did, it shot into the ground like an arrow.
However, Coop had already learned at least one lesson when it came to Field Bosses. They were durable. Andamarius the Blight Howler had shown that a simple spear throw wouldn’t cause enough damage, and even though his improved Strength would turn his spear throws into truly harmful bombardments, he wasn’t satisfied with his standard spear slicing into the ground after free falling. So, Coop dismissed his spear and resummoned it with one major adjustment. He turned it into an extraordinarily heavy bar of solidified ethereal mist, with absurd density that pushed the limits of his Retribution skill.
Coop took another running start, feeling his muscles burn from the extra heft, and threw the heavy spear like an immense javelin. This time, the spear took on a more typical arc, giving Coop a significantly more accurate throw with less hang time, but when it slammed into the ground it was like a kinetic bombardment from beyond the atmosphere. The plume of sand that erupted from the collision was incomparable to the previous, and the attack was right on target.
Gaol remained underground, but Coop’s spear had disappeared through the surface and presumably straight through the boss. Coop resummoned his spear to take another shot, satisfied with the dramatic result. Increasing the density of his spear to such an extreme degree wouldn’t be useful in just about any of the other situations he had found himself needing a ranged option, but against an underground enemy it turned his spear into a bunker buster. The boss turned to move away, not appreciating a heavy rod burying itself straight through its metallic body, but also unaware of the perpetrator.
Coop launched another heavy spear throw, pushing himself to put all of his Strength into getting the projectile enough distance to reach the retreating boss. Gaol was already beyond its original position, approaching the coral reef and abandoning the patch reefs and sandy shallows that had been their arena. The spear followed a shallow parabola before crashing through the sand near the tail end of the boss. The resulting eruption of water and sand caused the Crazed Serpents to scatter as they lost track of the boss’s trail in all of the debris.
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The boss rounded on itself, now positioned exactly north of the settlement, and charged forward. Coop’s attacks hadn’t slowed it down, and if anything, the boss had become more agitated. The boss maintained full control of the fight.
As Coop tried to decide what to do about the Field Boss, he watched as it rushed beyond his position, toward the fort, and finally exited from underground, fully revealing its form for the first time. It leapt into the air, with exactly the same motion as the Primal Serpents when they committed to their leaping attacks, only Gaol was targeting the fort itself.
The full length of the boss was finally displayed. Nearly 100 feet of metallic scales covered in countless blades fully cleared the moat and smashed into the battlements of the northern wall. The impact shook the fort and collapsed a portion of the top floors, like a hammer smashing into a sand castle. Defenders fell off of both sides of the ramparts as they scrambled out of the way. Coop hoped no one was crushed by the monster’s tackle.
There were two gaping holes in the segments of the boss, which confirmed that the heavy spear was dealing real damage. The problem with these Field Bosses was their incredible health pools combined with even more impressive durability. They maintained functionality throughout the fights so that it was problematic to judge if they were weakening at all. Coop took special note of the distinction and filed it away for when he had a chance to address his own shortcomings.
The monster splashed back into the moat before tunneling through the sand to resume its underground rampage on the empty battlefield. When it found nothing of interest, the boss retreated all the way to the reef a second time before rounding on itself once again and prepared for another charge. It had left a massive crater in the fort’s wall, with the center of the fourth floor entirely turned into rubble all the way down to the second floor. Coop didn’t think the wall would hold after a few more of Gaol’s charges. The courtyard would be breached if Gaol was allowed to continue its strategy.
Coop resolved himself to do something more to protect the fort. He began mistjumping toward the weakened portion of the wall to prevent it from being destroyed by another attack. He intended to pull a desperate move to redirect the Field Boss from hitting the same spot. Maybe his Strength would be enough to at least shift the gargantuan monster’s path.
As he rushed across the shallows, racing Gaol toward the fort, he noted the collapsed rubble was stirring. Someone had apparently survived the monster’s tackle and was struggling to escape after miraculously avoiding being crushed by the bulk of the Field Boss. All the more reason for Coop to find a way to prevent the monster from repeating its attack.
The pile of rubble swelled until it finally detonated, sending stone and brick flying. Monstrous leather wings unfurled and flapped hard, carrying the survivor above the wall.
[Common Fruit Bat (Level 56)]
[Oblivion Caller (Intelligence)]
[Chosen of the Red Coven]
Coop hesitated for a moment. That wasn’t the survivor he had expected, but to be fair, he had avoided exploring the bat roost when he stumbled upon it previously. Still, this was another extremely high level resident that had managed to go completely unnoticed.
The bat swooped toward the tunneling Field Boss before Gaol had a chance to leap at the wall a second time. The bat hovered for a moment before emitting a chirp that Coop felt in his bones. A high frequency vibration ripped through the air directly into Gaol’s path with a burst of energy.
The shallow water parted where Gaol was tunneling and the drenched sand almost seemed to liquify, turning into a patch of quicksand that forced the boss to leap prematurely. Gaol dove through the blast, breaching the surface before reaching the moat, and froze as if it had been momentarily stiffened. The bat had retaliated for its disturbance, but flapped its leathery wings and abandoned the battlefield rather than follow up with any other abilities.
Gaol was committed to its attack, and even if it was stunned, its body had enough velocity to collide with the damaged wall. Coop prepared to heave his heavy spear from the side, but Charlie acted first.
An incredible blast of wind stalled the boss’s forward momentum so that its trajectory stayed much lower than it had originally intended. Coop seized the opportunity, with the boss effectively turned into a low flying spear, and adjusted his aim to try and take advantage.
Coop threw his heavy spear into the side of the boss’s exposed head. The spear smashed into the vulnerable boss with a terrible metallic tearing sound, and Coop immediately mistjumped into melee range. He slammed his shield against the crown, beneath the extended blade, with every ounce of strength he could muster. He tumbled back into the shallow water with his shield arm numb from the collision and watched as the boss sailed across the moat. The combination of the bat’s interrupt, Charlie’s push, and Coop’s attack shifted the boss ever so slightly off of its previous track.
The Field Boss plowed into the wall at the wrong angle, making no effort to adjust, smashing its head into the second floor instead of the battlements. It was off center and away from the already crushed outer section. The boss remained frozen for a few more seconds before it started thrashing its body. Gaol was struggling to dislodge itself after piercing the fort like an errant arrow.
Coop had already returned to his feet in a rush to make sure he was out of the way, but seeing another opportunity, he threw his shield across the moat and into one of the adjacent cannon portals to go on the attack while the monster was vulnerable. Inside, he swapped his heavy spear for his sword and rushed for the boss.
He wasn’t the only one to see the chance to deal damage. Other defenders on the remaining ramparts started blasting Gaol with whatever spells they could muster. Coop rushed through the corridor and found the massive blades of the Field Boss, still seeking purchase to extricate the damaged head from the interior of the walls. The stone walls were quickly being pulverized by the extended blades along its body, and it was only a matter of time before even more of the wall was dangerously weakened.
Avoiding the thrashing, Coop threw his shield and mistjumped into melee range. Using his sword, he started hacking the red lights of the crown, shattering the weak points like stained glass bubbles and causing Gaol to redouble its efforts to escape. The boss’s escalating struggle only motivated the defenders to go all out.
The boss abruptly shifted as something in the fort gave, causing part of the second floor ceiling to collapse in a heap, and Gaol started to free itself, sliding backwards until another series of columns caught its forward blades and it was trapped again. It hadn’t escaped the defenders yet, though its tail had reached the deep water of the moat. Coop was dragged along with one of the horizontal blades near its face, but regained his balance when the boss was wedged again. He resumed his onslaught.
The monster shuddered as a massive collision between its flank and The Fearless occurred. The 70 foot corvette jammed the boss in place with battering rams while its ornate flamethrowers blazed with gouts of fire. The boss was pinned for as long as the ship held, completely surrounded by the desperate residents.
Coop found himself side by side with The Cleary brothers as they bombarded the boss with their metallic fists, sending visible shockwaves through the body, and dozens of phantoms teleported onto the boss’s back to hack away at the shiny armored scales. The collapsed ceiling provided an opportunity for casters to sling more spells at the exposed body of the boss, and the tail that extended to the exterior was riddled with arrows and magical projectiles.
Coop couldn’t reach the opposite side of the monster to attack the rest of the critical areas, so he just started gouging chunks into the metal scales, carving his way through articulating metals and doing as much damage as he could. They only needed to avoid the still extended blades as the agitated boss tried to escape. With enough time, he could decapitate the monster, but he wasn’t sure how long it would stay vulnerable.
It was a true group effort, with others joining Coop in attacking from the sides while attacks rained down from the top and still more attacked from outside.
They all flashed in the light of new levels as The Unveiled Blade finally ran out of health after nearly 25 hours of conflict.