Author’s Corner: Sorry for the delayed chapter, but I wanted to get this boss fight done right! Or as right as I could.
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The area I was teleported down to was roughly five miles from my lab, but even from here I could see the rapidly approaching giant wolf over the horizon. A few moments after my arrival, nine other beams of light appeared around me, the rest of the hunting group appearing together.
“Okay, guys, let’s see just how good we are. Celeste, how long is needed for the cannon to charge?” I looked to the Deus Ex, wanting to do a very brief strategy meeting. No time like right before the boss arrives, right?
“It should only take a minute to charge and lock onto a creature of that size, but the longer we give it, the more accurate the lock will be, and they can try to narrow the beam.”
I nodded my head, looking to the secondary team. “Nathan’s in charge of your group. Do your best.” I hadn’t had the chance to get to know their powers well enough to make a good plan, but since I had assigned them to get used to each other’s abilities, Nathan should be able to lead fairly easily.
As for our team… “Celeste, try to stay up as high as possible and fight with your cannon or other ranged attacks. You have the most to lose here if you get killed, so let’s try to avoid that. Sharon, same thing, don’t pull out your fully evolved creatures. Yin… give him hell.” I really did try to think of something better to tell the stormbird, but really… that was the best answer I could come up with.
Yin and Celeste both nodded their heads to me, the former shifting into her bird form before both took flight. Yo, having been the only one that didn’t receive an order, shrugged and charged towards the direction of the giant wolf. All of us summoned out our bonded items, while I also quickly activated various combat aspects.
My skin hardened and covered with green scales. Four large wings sprouted from my back. I had a breath weapon prepared for the fire attribute. And finally, the feathers on my wings began shining as I used them to pull in light mana while flying into the air.
As for Sharon, she hunched over as her armor shifted. Brown wings began sprouting from her back, while her hands and feet turned into large talons. Like with most of our group, she took to the air as well. That left only Yo and the secondary team on the ground. From what I could see, Nathan was pulling out various talismans, while Sam was charging alongside Yo, wielding a large bone shield. Clara was charging behind them on all fours, having not summoned her pets. Brian was staying at the back, and had pulled out a strange staff. As for Amy… I had already lost sight of her.
By now, the giant wolf was nearly upon us. Its frame was truly massive, being over fifty meters tall. Its speed was great as well, having traveled over from the horizon in the time it took us to prepare. In order to keep track of the battle, I quickly turned up my Cybernetic ears so that I could hear everything from the surroundings.
“Selective barrier!” Nathan shouted out as he tossed four talismans around himself and Brian, a yellow bubble rising around them.
“Fireball!” This time, it was Brian that called out, aiming his staff forward. A small fireball formed at the tip of his staff and shot towards the wolf, passing through the barrier and slowly growing in size as it traveled.
Not surprisingly, the other three of that group didn’t call out anything. Sam merely lifted a bone sword bigger than himself and threw it at the wolf that was now just ten meters away from him, while Clara lunged into the air to latch onto its body. As for Amy…. I still couldn’t find her.
Not to be outdone, our group also launched attacks, though we did not call them out like they did. From me, it was a barrage of plasma bolts aimed at the monster’s head. From Yo, she formed a thick lance with her slime and struck heavily at the falling paw of the wolf. Celeste and Yin continued flying higher, while Celeste shot out a few laser blasts from her arm cannon.
Of our flying group, Sharon was the only one that dove forward to engage the enemy directly. Her leather gloves each sprouted a meter long sword as she spun her body in midair to swipe at the wolf’s legs.
Naturally, the wolf was not idle through all of this. The first attack that landed had been Brian’s fireball, which collided against its front legs. While it did not seem to cause a lot of damage, it had stopped the wolf during its run, causing it to slide to a stop while the ground crew launched the rest of their attacks. It yipped slightly as the large sword embedded itself in the thick hide of the boss monster, but did not seem too disturbed. As for Clara, it did not seem to even notice her latching onto it.
Surprisingly, my plasma shots did not seem to do anything to the wolf, aside from singing its fur, while Sharon’s attacks actually produced a little blood. When it was shot on the nose by Celeste’s arm cannon, it roared out in anger, finally deciding that we were not just a bunch of passing insects. Yo’s lance attack slid its foot back a few meters, but it almost immediately regained its stance, white breath condensing in its mouth.
“It’s launching a breath attack, everyone be careful!” Nathan shouted to the others, holding another talisman in his hand. “Brian, be ready for a quick heal.”
The orc nodded his head, readying himself as the white mist began spreading out from the wolf’s mouth, before it was blasted down at the ground. As soon as it came into contact with the grass, a layer of ice appeared. The same thing happened to Sam, whose skeleton body was immediately coated in ice. Thankfully, due to his body makeup, that did not impede him heavily, as his body did not consist of any flexible or moving parts. He was merely made of bones that moved as he commanded. However, he did slip and fall due to the ground and his feet both being covered in ice.
“Thaw…” Brian said with a sigh, a red ray of light shooting out at Sam, before steam rose around him, the ice slowly vanishing from his bones.
“Thanks…”
By now, Yin was just arriving in the clouds, and gave a loud shriek as her magic spread out. While she was calling the clouds to herself, she sent down a bolt of lightning at the giant wolf, not needing to fear missing such a large target. The wolf recoiled at the attack, but then glared up at her just in time to receive the second barrage of attacks from our groups.
“Novaball!” “Fire Chains!” The two casters within the protective bubble called out in unison, and two spells launched from their hands. From Brian, a thin chain of fire soared through the air, while Nathan produced a large fireball by sacrificing three of his talismans. The two spells impacted simultaneously, with the chains attempting to wrap around the wolf’s mouth, and the fireball striking its neck.
From below, Yo continued striking with her lance, while Sam jumped up onto the wolf, grabbing onto his large sword. With a sideways thrust, the sword cut through the flesh it had embedded in, and he landed back on the ground. Meanwhile, Clara continued to climb up its leg like a cat climbing a tree.
From above, I decided to change my means of attack. This creature seemed to have some resistance to plasma, but was at least annoyed by fire. So fire it is! In front of me, I began gathering as much fire as I could while my wings continued absorbing light mana, wanting to launch my biggest attack yet.
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For a moment, I thought such an attack might be unnecessary, though. A thick beam of light appeared from Celeste’s arm cannon, likely one of its biggest attacks, and struck directly at the head of the wolf. This caused it to howl out in pain while taking a step back, a large portion of the skin on its face melted. This how also made it break through the fire chains as if they were nothing, though really chains of that size didn’t pose a danger in the first place.
However, the six tails of the wolf began glowing, one of the tails dissolving into particles of light. All of the injuries it had received, from the melting of its face, the burns on its neck, or the minor cuts on its body, rapidly healed until it was returned to its peak condition. “Oh, that is just not fair.”
We had to heavily injure this thing at least five more times before it died? Or did we just have to kill it before it had the chance to heal itself? Either way, it was mad now, and looked down to the people below it. Raising up one paw, it slammed it down heavily on top of Yo, causing cracks to spread out in the ground from the impact, and slime to spray everywhere. Even with her near immunity to physical attacks, that only applied as long as her core wasn’t damaged. With this… Yo had been taken out of the game.
Another angry shriek came from the skies above, and five condensed lightning bolts shot down from the clouds at the wolf, a light rain beginning to fall. Naturally… this rain was not too kind to the growing fireball in front of me, but it was unable to do too much to slow its growth as well. Sharon, seeming to understand that she can’t do as much as she wanted like this, dropped to the ground and changed forms.
Her wings receded into her body, her hands and feet returning to normal, before she was covered in a white fur, and took on her bunny girl appearance. As soon as her transformation was completed, she disappeared in a burst of speed. From several parts along the boss’s body, there was a flash of light, followed by a small spurt of blood.
Sam seemed to find that he couldn’t do much either, except for once again throwing his sword out to embed it in the wolf’s flank. Brian didn’t do anything for now, while Nathan grabbed a new item from his inventory, a throwing knife carved with runes. “Lightning Throw!” When he threw the knife out of the barrier, it began glowing with crackling energy, before changing into a lightning bolt that shot at the boss monster. At the same time, I decided to release my fireball, throwing it for the wolf’s head. At the very least, it would be an annoyance.
Altogether, six lightning bolts struck the boss monster almost at the same time, causing it to let out another pained roar. By the time the other attacks had all landed, and the smoke cleared, another of its tails had vanished, as had its injuries. This time, it looked even more mad than before, turning its head towards the sky. The white mist that had been leaking out was pulled back into its mouth, before it condensed into a beam of blue light that shot into the clouds Yin was controlling.
Almost immediately, the rain stopped. And then the sky began falling. The cloud that had been struck had been condensed almost entirely into ice, breaking apart and falling in massive chunks. I had to duck, weave, and use my Water Manipulation while flying in order to make sure that none of the pieces hit me. However, soon I saw Yin’s body inside one of the frozen chunks as well, unable to move.
When that chunk smashed into the ground, it shattered. And with it, Yin’s body shattered as well. Even though I knew it was a clone, I felt anger rising in my chest at seeing her body broken apart. Flying to the ground, I landed and fully extended my wings, turning my mana absorption to the limit while glaring at the wolf.
“This looks important~.” I heard a small voice coming from the wolf’s back, before it let out a yelp of intense pain. One of the tails had been cut off, blood spraying out over a small figure standing on its back holding a pair of twin knives. So that’s where she ran off to… With this, it only had three tails left.
Before we could gather for another round of attacks, the wolf dropped to the ground, rolling over twice. This… well, it wasn’t a good move for us. Sam, having been standing directly below the wolf, was crushed under its weight. Amy, being on its back, was flattened when it rolled over, unable to jump far enough away in time. And Clara, having just finished climbing up its side, was likewise smashed under its weight.
“Ouch…” I heard Nathan say with a small voice, before he pulled out a series of talismans and began laying them out on the ground outside the barrier. “Five elements barrage!” He finished the attack by throwing another dagger at the wolf, while the five talismans he placed on the ground lit up. Fire, water, and lightning all shot towards that dagger, followed by shards of metal and stone. Though, against a boss so many levels higher, the smaller attacks did not do more than annoy it.
They did, however, distract it from the second thick laser that shot down from above, which took off its face… again. Immediately after the laser ended, there were dozens more flashes of light all along its body, and it cried out miserably. Several places had been cut open, including its four eyes.
“Sharon, clear!” I called out, feeling that this was my best shot. Activating the Aspect of the Attuned, I made light my primary element, and poured my entire mana capacity into filling my wings with light mana, making the grow brighter and brighter.
“Element… Burst!” I condensed the light in my wings as far as possible, before directing it towards the wolf. At the same time, one of its last remaining tails began dissolving. This was the biggest blast I had ever launched, even bigger than the one I had used back in NeoLife. Since I had been able to gather mana faster, and my light affinity was higher, the results were clear.
A ten meter wide blast of prismatic light shot up at the wolf, just as its healing was starting to kick in. But how could light be the slower of the two forces? Without the protection of its thick fur and hide, the rainbow blast was able to tear through its skull, attacking the brain directly.
When my light had faded, I dropped to the ground from exhausting so much mana in one attack, panting wildly. The next moment, there was a crash that felt like a small earthquake, as the wolf’s body also fell. The last two tails began to glow with a blue light, making me fear that this was still not over, and then shattered into nothingness.
You have killed the Frozen Scourge Wolf
You have leveled up x20
Luck has increased by 5
Malthan gives you a thumbs-up.
Sweet… it died. And it’s even staying dead… even better. Opening up my friends list, I sent a call to Yin and Yo, making sure they were okay. Thankfully, they were. Everyone that died had safely gone back to their original bodies, though that meant they were left out of the experience from the kill.
Next, I used my comms to send a message to the ship. “Battle is over, power down the cannon.” All in all, only losing half of our attack group and managing to kill a world boss isn’t that bad, right? But now… there is a really big boss monster body in front of me… and it has lots of cool things for me to study!