They entered the cavern, and Isla immediately noticed three Stone Ogres standing close together on the ground below. The floor shimmered with a faint purple light, composed of crystal fragments and dust. Dozens of large, intact crystals, primarily on the plateaus and ceiling, emitted a much brighter glow.
Isla activated the group buff that bolstered their attacks by 10%. A timer appeared, counting down from two minutes, along with a prompt asking if she wanted to choose a target for the group to focus on. She mentally selected the closest Ogre, and the creature began to glow dimly in her vision. The words ‘primary target’ appeared above its head, not literally, but on her HUD. Below the name were its three status bars, showing health, mana, and stamina.
“Ready?” Ewtain whispered. They nodded, weapons at the ready.
Ewtain stood to the side and raised a hand, signaling everyone to draw and aim their weapons at the Ogres below. Taloc’s arrow began to glow faintly as he readied his special attack. A moment later, Ewtain quickly lowered his arm, and the group opened fire.
Taloc’s glowing arrow split into three midflight, each striking the Ogre he was aiming at. Five arrows in the first volley found their marks. However, all but two shattered upon impact with the Ogre’s rocky hide. One arrow embedded itself firmly in the Ogre’s cheek, while the other lodged in its stomach, just left of a rocky outcropping near its pubis area. The Ogre cried out in pain, then charged toward the group.
The second volley lacked a bolt from Maroftis, who was still reloading, but the Ogres, now aware of the threat, covered much of their exposed softer areas when the arrows were loosed, and even the arrows that connected were not effective. Isla, Vanya, and Taloc continued to rain arrows down on the approaching creatures, but Maroftis held his fire, and Vultressant had switched to his fire spell, which appeared to be more effective than the arrows.
“Keep at it!” Isla shouted. Her voice was strained with effort as she loosed another arrow.
The Ogres advanced, but the group held their ground.
The Ogres were nearly nine feet tall, and it was clear they could easily get onto the ledge if they were left unmolested. Ewtain called for the melee fighters to help him keep them down below. Isla shouldered her bow, strapped on her shield, and drew her sword. She followed Ewtain toward the ledge.
To her surprise, Vultressant joined the fighters at the ledge. He had lost line of sight on the Ogres as they neared the wall, but Isla couldn’t understand why he didn’t just wait for them to climb up. She got her answer when the first Ogre, who had successfully made it up the slope, was thrown backward off the ledge by Vultressant’s wind wave spell.
Isla switched the primary target from the Ogre sprawled on the ground below to the next closest one. This one jumped up and landed with its upper torso completely on the ledge. Isla activated her quick slash special move, aiming at the creature’s face. Her sword cut deep, and it howled in pain but continued to pull itself up onto the ledge. She made additional attacks, but her normal strikes were less effective. The others assisted her, but the Ogre quickly stood up and drew a weapon of its own. It now brandished an enormous greatsword that, while rusty, looked like it could chop any of them in half. This Ogre was already down to 70% health, however, so the battle was off to a good start.
“Burn it down fast!” Isla commanded. She activated her shield bash special attack, leading the charge as the other close combat fighters unleashed their own devastating special attacks on the towering foe.
With the combined force of their strikes and the added 10% damage boost from Isla’s leadership buff, they brought the Ogre’s health down to just below 20% of its maximum. Isla felt a surge of hope that they might kill it before the other two Ogres could climb up onto the ledge.
Ewtain tried to move behind the Ogre, but before Isla could blink, the creature’s foot shot out with lightning speed, sending Ewtain hurtling back toward the tunnel from which they had emerged. Isla’s heart pounded as she watched Vanya sprint to aid him.
Turning her attention back to the Ogre, Isla saw it swiftly plant its foot and swing its greatsword in a wide arc. Taloc was able to dive out of harm’s way, but Isla found herself facing the full force of the Ogre’s attack. She backed up just in time to block the attack with her shield, but her arm felt numb afterwards. Maroftis took the full force of the Ogre’s blow and was knocked onto his back.
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The Ogre raised its sword high above its head, preparing to deliver a devastating blow to the defenseless Berserker below. But before the Stone Ogre could bring its weapon down and bisect Maroftis, it was engulfed in an enormous fire from Vultressant’s spell. The flames exploded with a ferocity that Isla had never seen before, momentarily stunning the Ogre and causing it to shield its face with a hand. He must have been charging the spell much longer than he usually did, because Isla had never seen one explode that spectacularly before.
Effectively blinded by the unexpected attack, the Ogre swung its greatsword wildly in an attempt to fend off any further assaults, sparing the fallen Maroftis from what could have been a fatal strike.
Isla spotted one of the remaining Stone Ogres halfway onto the ledge, with the other beginning its climb. With only seconds before the onslaught of two more Ogres, she charged at the blinded Ogre, aiming her stab away from any heavily stoned areas. Taloc followed suit, and together they swiftly dispatched the wounded Ogre.
Isla saw that the Ogre on her left, closer to Ewtain, hadn’t taken any arrow damage but had taken some damage from Vultressant’s earlier attack and was now at 80% of its health. Vanya was healing Ewtain—or possibly giving him a potion—and Maroftis was getting up slowly to rejoin the fight. Isla made the decision to switch out her offensive buff for a defensive one. With only one melee fighter per Ogre, defense seemed like the better option.
Isla checked her abilities and noted that the cooldown of her defensive skill was ten minutes, while the offensive one showed just over eight minutes remaining. She realized she wouldn’t be able to use either buff again in this fight unless the fight dragged on.
Taloc ran towards one Ogre, so she headed towards the other one. “Don’t try to move around them once you’re engaged!” she heard Maroftis call out. “That triggers the kick ability.”
“Thanks for telling me now,” Ewtain called back.
“I used my assess other ability again, and it gave me new information,” Maroftis called back as he moved to help Isla. With two melee fighters on each of the Ogres, they were able to keep them away from the casters. Isla and Maroftis just tried to defend against their Ogre, who had yet to take any damage. Vultressant and Vanya sent spells and arrows, respectively, at the other one; it was down to 60% health and falling quickly. Ewtain was wary of another kick and was only dodging back when a strike came his way.
The larger group swiftly killed their mob and converged on the remaining foe. Despite Maroftis landing a few strikes, the Ogre remained nearly at full health. They managed to bring it down to just under half, when Vanya’s warning cry pierced the air.
“Incoming!” she shouted.
Isla scanned the surroundings and spotted two more Stone Ogres charging toward them from the end of the ledge. What Isla had initially mistaken for a drop, like the side of the ledge, turned out to be a gradual slope leading down to the cavern floor. As the Ogres approached, only their upper bodies were visible, but with each step, more of their massive forms became visible.
Isla didn’t panic. The encounter had gone smoothly except for Ewtain’s boot to the stomach, and a quick glance at the party’s status bars revealed that no one was critically injured. However, she saw Vultressant’s mana level had dropped below 20%, so he was nearly out. She did know that Vultressant had a way to get his mana back, but she was unsure as to whether he had played that card yet.
As the Ogres drew closer, she could tell that they would reach the group before the other Ogre was killed. Not wanting to get flanked by the fresh Ogres, Isla decided to intercept them.
“Maroftis!” she called out. “You take the one on the left.”
He nodded and disengaged from their current foe before moving to intercept the charging Ogres. Isla followed and moved toward the Ogre on the right. She didn’t want to face one alone, but she knew that it was the most logical choice.
Ewtain was a dodge expert, but he couldn’t dodge from the Ogres’ kick ability. He had to rely on the rest of the group for this encounter.
Maroftis decided to charge his Ogre, while Isla chose caution. She was trying to buy time and minimize damage. Maroftis said he could handle a single Ogre alone, but Isla knew that she couldn’t. Not only was he a great fighter, Maroftis was almost the size of the Ogres. Her skills were very different.
Isla could recognize the Ogre’s sweeping special attacks, so she easily avoided them. While she did take some damage from regular attacks, her shield stopped most of the strikes. Fatigue began to set in, however, and Isla felt herself becoming exhausted as the fight wore on.
Just as she started to flag, Ewtain arrived to lend his support, relieving some of the pressure. Glancing at her status bar, Isla noticed her energy had dipped below 15%. She needed to get in shape. The strain of solo combat had taken its toll on her reserves. Unlike in other games where special abilities often drained energy, here the simple act of fighting depleted her energy.
Ewtain had arrived just in time, and Isla inwardly cheered. She checked the energy levels of the party and saw that Vultressant’s energy was just under 50%, but the rest of the group still had plenty of energy left.
Her energy bar, however had just dipped below 5%. Warning prompts flickered urgently on her HUD, but Isla ignored them, knowing all too well that they related to her depleted energy. She made the decision to disengage from the battle, retreating to where the casters were positioned.
With her gone, Ewtain held the defense alone, though not without taking a strong blow before the rest of the group managed to kill their Ogre and come to his aid.
The rest of the party had matters well in hand and didn’t rush to kill the final Ogre. They had it surrounded and by this time knew how it fought, so there was no need to risk an injury. Once they finally killed it, Isla felt relieved that they had beaten the mobs and suffered relatively minimal damage.