“Gods, that smells like Fox’s socks,” Misa gasped.
Lines of hob warriors, all above level 20, stood along the sewer walls with a group of several Ogre bosses at the end.
“It’s right down there.” Sullivan pointed downward with one hand while pinching his nose with the other.
“Are you crazy?” one of the newer players asked. “I’m not diving into that muck.”
“As I said, bunch o’ nancies. Move your ass over.” Ragnar stepped forward, and without pausing to reconsider, jumped headfirst into the chunky, murky liquid.
Misa’s face turned a distinct shade of green. “I think I’m gonna be sick.”
“Kyth?” Malkyr said weakly.
“Don’t worry, kid, I’ve got this.” The gnomblin moved to stand before the spot the drone had jumped into and started to slowly weave his magic. A frost began spreading over the slow-flowing sludge, forming a frozen ring over the spot. He closed his eyes in concentration as he continued working his magic. Slowly, chunks of ice started lifting out of the circle, revealing a putrid, partially frozen tunnel.
Malkyr gulped and his face paled. “That doesn’t look much better.”
“Get your large butt in there before I run out of mana,” Kyth said between clenched teeth.
One by one, the groups reluctantly moved into the tunnel.
“Good luck!” Sullivan called out. He shook his head as the last person disappeared inside the tunnel. “Thank god I don’t have to go in there.” He chuckled. “It’s good to be the grand strategist.”
***
Riley stepped out from the partially frozen pool on the other side. Thankfully, the tunnel was only about ten meters long, but the slippery, frozen sewage that coated its walls made moving through it a slow process.
The other members of his party soon stepped out as well, finding themselves inside a small cave with multiple tunnels leading out of it.
“Where’s that crazy ant and which way do we go?” Misa said cheerfully.
Raystia pointed at a dead bonetis next to one of the tunnels. The creature wasn’t just dead – every one of his limbs seemed to be sheared off, leaving just a chunk of its boney torso on top of a pile of sticklike limbs. “I think he went that way. So maybe we’ll take the one next to it?”
“Fine by me,” Fox said. The bugbear brought his axe down twice on the wall beside the entrance, carving an ‘X’ on the hard stone. “Hey guys,” he called back to the next party of players who were halfway out of the frozen pool. “This one’s ours.”
***
Nero, the half-dragon, black-winged player, studied his surroundings as the Mob Squad disappeared into one of the tunnels. “Are you alright?” he asked the two inexperienced players they were escorting.
“Yeah, yeah,” Jaelon said. The level 11 player was holding a quarterstaff and wore plain leather armor. “Come on, let’s kill us some bone beasts.”
A rustling of legs sounded on the hard stone and two, level 18 bonetises burst into the cave.
“Looks like you got your wish,” Aly said. The muscled, platinum-haired woman moved forward along with Nero to intercept the monsters. “You guys stay behind us. Slip in a few hits if you can land them safely, but don’t open yourself up to attacks.”
“Wait,” Nesteph called after her. “You two don’t have any weap—”
His voice got stuck in his throat as, like a pair of whirlwinds, the two higher-level players met the bonetises’ charge. Nero’s sharp-clawed hands slashed at one of the monsters while his small wings beat, helping him maneuver and easily dodge the creature’s attacks. Aly punched, kicked, and evaded her enemy with the well-practiced moves of a martial artist.
The bonetises were soon reduced to their last few hit points, and the two mesmerized players just barely remembered to pitch in, slamming their weapons at the dying monsters, draining the last of their health.
“Two down already!” Jaelon said happily as he cut off the bonetises’ right foreclaws. “We’re bound to be the team that kills the most monsters.”
“You sure about that?” Nero jerked his head toward the other side of the cave. A young goblinette was leading another goblin and three hobs toward one of the tunnels. A bonetis came hurtling out at her only to fall apart into two perfect halves as the girl’s giant sword cleaved it apart with ease.
“Uh …” Jaelon's eyes widened. “We might want to hurry.”
***
“Aright newbs, to the back,” Malkyr said brightly as they stepped out of the pool. “We’re the last team in because someone had to keep a spell going, so we have a lot of catching up to do.”
Kyth chuckled. “I’ll let you go through the tunnel first on the way back without my annoying spell to slow you down.”
“That’s alright, old-timer.” The large man patted the smaller gnomblin’s back. “I know you old folks like to take things slow.”
“I’m not even 60 yet!” Kyth protested. “I’ll show you old. I’ll bring down twice as many bonetises than you.”
“You’re on!” Malkyr grinned. “And here’s our first challenge.”
A group of three boney creatures charged out of one of the tunnels at them. Malkyr intercepted all three, swinging his giant, two-handed axe in wide arcs to keep them at bay while his sister, using him as cover, darted in and stabbed the creatures’ softer parts.
Kyth smirked and raised a hand. Two bolts of ice hit the ground below the creatures, and two of them went flailing down the slippery surface. “That’s two for me!”
“What?” Malkyr protested as he delivered a final, overhead chop to the closest bonetis. “You didn’t even scratch them.”
“I brought them down, kid,” the gnomblin pointed out smugly. “That was our deal.”
Hoshisu snickered. “He got you there.”
“Fine,” Malkyr grumbled then chopped at one of the fallen creatures, hacking it apart. “Now we’re even.”
The other two players joined in as they circled the last remaining bonetis and killed it without any difficulty. Then they stopped in their tracks, their eyes glazing over. “We’ve leveled up!” one of them said ecstatically.”
“Good job, kid.” Kyth patted him on the back. “Now come on; plenty more where those came from.”
***
Ragnar looked down at the two dead bonetises before him, then at his own bloodied body. That fight had been too close for his taste. The lone bonetis he’d killed earlier had pushed him to level 15, which instantly healed up the wounds he had sustained. The fight had been easy, causing him to misjudge their true prowess. The level 17 and 19 creatures he’d just killed fought like a synchronized unit, making them much more dangerous foes than each one separately.
Ragnar grimaced as he pulled a serrated boney limb from his side, and more blood gushed out of his wound. He kicked one of the corpses. “Damn, yor some nasty beasties.”
He was at a severe disadvantage in terms of level and raw power, but his new drone body was surprisingly resilient. His vicelike claws were able to easily cut through the creatures’ limbs, and his powerful mandibles crushed anything they bit. His chitin also proved much harder than a bonetis exoskeleton, allowing him to outlast them, if just barely.
He was severely hampered, but not out of the fight yet. He brought a severed, boney leg dripping with gore and marrow up to his face and shrugged. “Dig in.”
His powerful mandibles crunched the bone as he slurped in the juices.
Slowly, his health bar started trickling up.
Yep, there were advantages to being a monster.
“Now let’s go find the’ rest o’ yor family and do the same to them.”
***
The Mob Squad had just finished up another trio of bonetises when an especially large one came running at them from a nearby tunnel.
“Watch out!” Raystia shouted. “That’s a level 30 warrior.”
The bonetis, wider even than the bugbear and almost as tall, charged them with flailing sharp limbs.
Fox cursed as he brought up his shield, blocking the brunt of the attack, but two slashing legs still hit his, neatly parting leather armor and flesh. “That one’s a strong bastard.”
Raystia dove into a roll, slashing her daggers along the bonetis’s underbelly, somehow evading its flailing legs, but the attack barely shaved ten percent off its health.
Riley muttered a prayer and a bolt of darkness shot out, impacting the creature and sending it back a few steps. With their foe momentarily unbalanced and out in the open, it was Misa’s turn. Her chain flew out from her magic ring, wrapping the bonetis around its torso, binding two legs, and severely hampering its movements.
Using the reprieve, the dark priest put a hand on their tank and muttered a quick prayer, healing up the damage.
“Thanks,” Fox said. “Come on, let’s take it down. Watch out for those serrated legs. They’re sharp.”
The group surrounded the partially immobile bonetis and, working together, steadily bled its health until it collapsed into a broken heap.
“That one was not level 20,” Riley said.
Raystia shook her head. “I’m thinking the ones that came into the town were their food gatherers – the workers. There were bound to be stronger types down here. We should move in carefully.”
“I’m all about caution and care,” Misa said. “And on the bright side, it looks like we all made it to level 16!”
“Hell, yeah,” Fox said. “Come on, let’s make it an even 20.”
***
Jaelon and Nesteph walked through the tunnels, their jaws nearly dragging on the floor as they followed the players ahead.
Nero and Aly proved to be a nearly unstoppable duo. The two slashed and killed every bonetis they encountered with ease while avoiding retaliation strikes or letting them bounce off harmlessly from Nero’s powerful glassteel armor. Jaelon and Nesteph had to push themselves to their limits to be useful; though even then, they’d barely landed more than a couple of glancing hits.
When an especially large specimen charged them, the two veteran players easily parted to let it through, then closed in and attacked it from behind.
The two awestruck players stared at each other as the giant bonetis fell and their level ticked upward.
That was some mad power leveling.
***
The gnomblin chuckled as he sent another charging bonetis skidding across a frozen patch of ground. “So that’s 14 for me.”
“So. Not. Fair,” Malkyr grunted with each chop as his axe carved deep gouges on the creatures’ boney exterior. “I killed eight. You only killed one.”
“Without him, the bonetises would have ganged up on you and tore you apart,” Hoshisu pointed out. “You do the tanking, he’s working control. Every creature we kill is also credited to him.”
“Yeah, yeah, hurray teamwork and all that kumbaya crap,” Malkyr said sourly. “I just wish he had fire spells instead of ice; my axe would charge up and then I could really bring on the pain to those things.”
One of the players they were escorting spoke up. “If that were the case, then every kill you’d make would be essentially his.”
Malkyr shot him a dirty look. “You too, eh?”
The player smirked. “Just wanting to be part of the team spirit.”
“Good, we’re going to need all the spirit we can get,” Hoshisu said. “Looks like the tunnel opens up to something big. My money’s on the queen.”
***
Lirian carved up a charging bonetis, then spun on her heels to intercept one that came at her back, narrowly avoiding his open mandibles.
The goblinette was unharmed, but her group had been forced into a tall and narrow chamber that several tunnels opened into, including some above their heads. More bonetises crawled out of those openings, charging at her group, disregarding the danger.
“Move, protect the princess,” Savol said sharply. His cloak flurried behind him as he dashed ahead, somehow cutting off a pursuing bonetis’s limb. He stood beside the goblinette, drawing two short swords from the folds of his cloak, and whirled them around, holding back another bonetis with flailing blades and flowing cloth.
The other hobs’ strikes were much less precise. The three, now level 6 warriors, were woefully underpowered. It only took a few glancing slashes to put them a hair’s breadth from death’s door.
Lirian fought like a raging storm, her sword a blur as she hacked apart boney limbs and split whole monsters in half. She inhaled, not stopping the barrage for a moment, and her jeweled choker glittered as she breathed out a cone of flames, completely incinerating two more creatures.
The young hobs couldn’t hope to match her prowess. They stumbled as their health fell alarmingly low, making their own attacks slow and weak.
“Hold the Line!” Savol roared, triggering one of his Boss abilities.
The three hobs straightened, and their movements became faster and more powerful, giving the princess and her dreaded sword the time she needed to cut down the monsters in front of her.
But their inspiration was short-lived. As more bonetises fell to the ground dead, the others chipped away at the weaker links of the group. The first hob fell as a serrated foreleg punctured his chest, then the second and the third one followed, their bodies torn apart.
Savol whirled, covering Lirian’s back, his tier 3 boss’s health proving much more resilient than his soldiers’.
Then a flash of darkness drew his eyes upward.
A bonetis twice as large as the normal ones was soaring down at them.
***
Ragnar tilted his head as the tunnel he was following opened into a vertical shaft. The sounds of battle greeted him as he approached the opening.
Looking down the shaft, he noticed more tunnels opening into it, spewing out bonetises that jumped down to engage several figures.
“Well, lick me down and call me Mary,” the drone said to himself. “That’s fugly’s whelp.” He watched with interest as the girl expertly evaded blow after blow, and her retaliation strikes always brought death, carving the boney creatures apart as if they were made of extra-crispy butter. The thought made him sigh. “I’d kill for ‘nother taste of them deep-fried butter sticks.”
Below him, the fight wasn’t going well. The five combatants huddled together as more bonetises charged at them from all sides. Then, one by one, the hobs started to fall, leaving just the two goblins to fight.
Ragnar shrugged. “Those two are goners. Oh well, two less greenies out there. Nothin’ I can do about it.” He was still injured from his last fight and needed a little more time to get back to full health. He was just about to leave when another movement caught his eye.
An especially large bonetis hurled itself out of one of the openings, falling straight down on the unsuspecting goblins.
Ragnar’s multifaceted eyes widened as he remembered something. “Crap, fugly said she shouldn’t get hurt!”
Not bothering to reconsider, he launched himself out of the opening and down into the shaft.
***
“Remember I said there must be a queen down here?” Misa whispered nervously as the Mob Squad carefully inched back toward the tunnel they’d come through. “I hate to be right.”
“You had to jinx it, didn’t you?” Riley whispered back furiously.
The four adventurers had entered a large cave with glowing green crystals embedded in the walls, shedding a toxic green light.
Several huge bonetises, much larger than the big one that attacked them earlier, loomed around the cave. Each creature was busily grooming a clutch of gray eggs glued together with an oozing substance.
“I just remembered something,” Raystia said quietly. “Mantises don’t have queens. All their females can lay eggs.”
“You don’t say,” Fox muttered. “I almost didn’t figure it out by their description; bonetis broodmother, level 40.”
“There’s no chance we can take down so many,” Riley said quietly. “Maybe one, b
ut something tells me they won’t line up for us.”
“We need to wait for the others,” Raystia said. “We can coordinate our forces to bring them all down. Killing the broodmothers and smashing the eggs should solve the town’s problem.”
“Think the others will make it this far?” Riley asked. “It wasn’t easy.”
“They’ll make it,” Fox said. “I saw their faces. Those guys are no quitters.”
“Even the drone?”
“Especially the drone.”
***
Nero and Ally smashed up the last group of charging bonetises and continued following the tunnel. They stopped abruptly as they turned a bend and came face-to-face with another group.
“Malkyr.” Nero bowed his head in greeting.
“Hey, man,” the large man said easily. He looked Aly and Nero’s ichor-drenched bodies up and down. “I see you two haven’t decided on using weapons yet. It helps make things a little cleaner, you know?”
“There’s honor in fighting with one’s natural weapons,” the half-dragon said.
Malkyr chuckled. “You get no argument from me. How many did you kill?”
Nero and Aly looked at each other and shrugged.
“They brought down 18!” Nesteph said excitedly, stepping forward. “It was amazing! Jaelon and I are both level 12 now.”
“Us too!” the two players accompanying the other group said with large smiles. “And they killed 17,” one added.
Kyth moved ahead. “Looks like the tunnels we were following merge into one. Join forces?”
Aly shrugged. “Sure. Have you seen any of the others?”
“No,” Hoshisu said. “But I can hear one hell of a clash going on not far from here.”
The others looked around as they strained their ears, but they couldn’t match the assassin’s sharp senses.
Malkyr shrugged. “Oh well, we better get going if we want to catch up to those guys’ body count.”
Life Reset: Salvation (Life Reset - Neo Book 6) Page 6