by Aaron Oster
His brow furrowed as the drake twisted away from another attack, but was struck by a wall of fire, followed by a blast of ice. Another explosion of steam and Lumia was free, allowing a burst of Crimsonfire to wash over the hydra. Only then did she spare him another glance.
“We can’t risk completely destroying it when we need the venom!” she called.
Understanding dawned on him then, and he silently cursed himself for almost screwing up. They couldn’t risk using massive skills against the beast, as they needed the body to remain somewhat intact. Knowing that, Morgan immediately reassessed their chances of success. There were two of them, but the hydra could theoretically unleash five attacks at once. But, judging by how they were impacting Lumia, they weren’t as damaging individually.
The hydra didn’t miss the exchange, and two of its heads, the green and yellow ones, whirled to face him, eyes narrowing and forked tongues flickering in and out. It let out a hiss, the green mouth opening and unleashing a blast of wind that was visible, due to its power.
Morgan countered with his own skill, the compressed air slamming into and dissipating the blow. He quickly flew to the right as a lance of electricity crackled from the yellow head’s mouth, slamming into the wall and arcing across the metal. Morgan watched as Lumia jumped in surprise, just as a torrent of the purple venom slammed into her.
It seemed that fighting inside of what was essentially a massive conductor was going to be dangerous, especially for anyone on the ground. However, Lumia wasn’t the only one who was hurt by this. The blue head, already preparing another attack, twitched, its neck whipping to one side. This caused the blast of ice to slam into the ceiling instead of hitting its intended target.
Lumia’s roar was near-deafening, and Morgan winced as the drake shook herself free of the purple acid. He could see scorch marks on her hide, which meant that the acid was going to be the most dangerous for her to deal with. She had immunity to fire, and ice couldn’t do much to her. Neither would wind. However, electricity and acid could be quite damaging for her, and the hydra was quick on the uptake.
The yellow head swiveled away from Morgan, replaced by the red, and a couple of seconds later, the blue. It seemed less than happy at the yellow head, and purposefully bumped it on its way around. The yellow responded by snapping at it. For just a moment, Morgan wondered if the beast was going to devolve into a fight with itself. That hope was cut short a second later as Lumia flapped into the air and unleashed a powerful skill of her own.
Firestorm was one of her more potent skills, the mass of yellow-blue flames pouring down in a conical pattern and splashing against the ground like liquid. When it hit the ground, it rebounded, firing back up half the distance before dissipating. The hydra screeched in pain, whirling back on the drake and releasing an attack of its own.
Two of the mouths, both the purple and yellow, fired at once. This time, the attacks seemed to blend midair, combining to form a spiral-patterned purple beam, crackling with electricity. Lumia tried to dodge, but the beam, now given the aspects of lightning, moved much faster. The attack slammed into Lumia’s left wing, burning through the membrane and unleashing its payload of electricity.
For some reason, the combined attack seemed to be far more powerful, as though the combination hadn’t just added the two together, but had multiplied them many times over. With a roar, Lumia fell from the air as lightning coursed over her body, going through her very bones and causing her to lose all of her fine motor skills.
Morgan cursed, then tried to move in, only to have the hydra counter, sending a blast of ice, wind, and fire at him, one after the next. He rolled to one side to avoid the ice, punched to dissipate the wind, and took the fire attack head-on. It washed over him in a roaring blaze, the heat only mildly uncomfortable.
He’d learned his lesson from Lumia, and knew that if the hydra combined its attacks, they would hit much harder. The wave of flames disappeared, and Morgan found himself facing the purple and blue heads, both mouths open as they prepared another attack. He was sick and tired of only being on the defensive, so Morgan countered.
The small pieces of adamantite he’d removed from the ground before floated up to eye level, all thinning and stretching until they were some six feet long and razor thin. If there was one thing that he’d learned about fighting heavily armored beasts, it was that piercing attacks were far more effective than slashing ones.
The beast’s heads and necks were heavily scaled, but with these needle-like javelins, Morgan was sure he’d succeed. The metallic projectiles whipped forward, streaking through the air and slamming into the hydra’s open mouths. There was a loud crunch, a hiss of pain, and then the purple and blue heads went limp, dropping like puppets whose strings had been cut.
Morgan grinned, glad that his plan had worked so well. The attacks had gone clear through their open mouths, penetrating their brains and emerging from the other side of their heads, killing them instantly. The other three heads let out a loud hissing cry, all of them turning from the downed drake to attack Morgan. As soon as their eyes were off of her, Lumia was on her feet.
It seemed that she’d noticed the hydra’s glaring weakness as well. Since their fight had begun, it hadn’t moved so much as an inch, doing all it could to keep them at a distance. This told them that the beast wouldn’t be good in close quarters combat. The bulky and misshapen body gave that away as well, meaning that the beast wouldn’t be able to move well in a fight.
Lumia pounced, her massive jaws opening wide, even as her front legs whipped out. With a savage, ripping-tearing sound, the remaining hydra heads were torn from the creature’s body, falling to the ground with hisses of acidic blood. Lumia then tore the other heads off for good measure, turning to Morgan with a pleased look and licking at her damaged mouth.
The hydra’s blood seemed to be just as dangerous as its purple acid, and Morgan had a feeling that he’d be smearing the same paste onto the drakes tongue to heal the damage once they left, though he had no idea if it would even work.
“Good work,” Morgan said, drifting down to the ground. “That fight was a lot less bloody than I-”
A flare of blue light in Morgan’s Aura sense caused him to hesitate, turning back to the seemingly dead beast in surprise. His brows furrowed, noting that the hydra, that was clearly dead, still had a very active core.
“What the hell?”
That was all that Morgan had the time to say before the beast practically exploded with power, its decapitated body rising from the ground.
Lumia, in a panic, unleashed a torrent of flames upon the headless hydra. Much to both of their shocks, two blue heads sprouted from the stump where its head had once been and intercepted the attack. Not only that, but the attack, now coming from two heads, blew Lumia back against the far wall, crackling ice flowing over her form and trapping her there.
“What the hell kind of monster is this?!” Morgan exclaimed, teleporting over to help free Lumia as a torrent of purple venom splashed over the ground where he’d been standing before.
“No idea,” Lumia replied as the ice around her shattered.
She dropped to the ground, her still-injured wing not allowing her to remain airborne. Morgan remained where he was, hovering some ten feet off the ground as the two of them watched the remaining hydra heads regrow, splitting down the center and rapidly growing a set of scales to cover up any weak points.
Morgan cursed silently as the now ten-headed hydra let out another roaring hiss, spittle flying from its serpentine mouths as it prepared to attack again. He had no idea how a beast that they’d killed had come back to life, and with twice the power, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to let it catch its stride.
“Come on!” he yelled, darting in and unleashing a blast of wind.
The hydra’s heads reared back, tossed in all directions as Morgan summoned several spears using his Stormforge. They flew from his outstretched hands, slamming into the beast’s heads and necks, then unleashed the
ir payloads of electricity.
Lightning coursed over the hydra’s body, tearing its flesh and scales. Almost all of the heads were incapacitated, caught in the barrage of attacks. Almost, but not all. The yellow heads, both seemingly immune to lightning-based attacks, both turned on him, unleashing simultaneous bolts of electricity.
Morgan was about to dodge when he noticed Lumia behind him. If the lighting was to hit the wall, she’d be caught in the blast, due to the room’s metallic structure. Cursing, Morgan threw up a Stormforged shield, catching the blast on its surface and being thrown back to slam against the wall. The attack was powerful enough to crack the shield and hit his armor. Thankfully, it held, fending off the weakened attack and leaving him unharmed. Well, unharmed but for the massive loss of RP that this stunt had cost him. It had been five thousand for the spears alone, another five hundred for the shield, and the sustained 500 RP per second cost of keeping the lightning streaming through all ten spears.
Lumia, temporarily unencumbered, took the opportunity to strike before he stopped channeling electricity to the Stormforged spears. Her jaws opened wide, and this time, she wasn’t pulling any punches. A mass of blue fire built up in her throat in under a second, then blasted forward, expanding to nearly ten feet before it impacted the hydra’s body.
The explosion rocked the entire chamber, and Morgan released his hold on the sustained lightning cost, pulling back as many of the spears as he could before they were incinerated in her Azure Inferno skill. Lumia’s attacks came in so many different shapes and flavors that Morgan had to wonder if there were some he still hadn’t seen.
As far as he knew, she had some twenty regular attacks and seven big ones. Azure Inferno was in the top three of her most powerful regular attacks, and Morgan had felt it enough times to know that it was a painful one to be caught in. The blue fire burned so hot that the metal beneath the hydra turned to molten slag, and the expansion of the explosion was so violent that it sent the molten metal showering across the room.
Morgan saw a couple of the hydra heads, now burned beyond recognition, exit the explosion as well, but he didn’t really think much of it. His working theory right now was that they just had to kill it enough times for its lifeforce to run out, and then it would die. It was a shaky theory, at best, based on speculation, but it was all he really had to go on right now.
The inferno continued billowing around the hydra, burning away at some of its flesh before it began to die down. Morgan wasn’t nervous that Lumia would destroy the beast with that attack. The hydra was at rank 71, so a regular attack might be damaging, but not life-threatening. He was hoping, though, that it would be damaging enough to severely deplete its life force.
The flames cleared, revealing a scorched and burned beast, now missing several of its heads. The stumps were already writhing, and the remaining heads were preparing for an attack. Though he hadn’t recovered much of his RP in the few seconds he’d had, it was enough for him to keep going. It looked like this was going to be a very long fight.
48
Grace followed Ivaldi, making sure that the dwarf was past the next bend in the tunnel before scurrying after. The banging on the door was growing louder as she drew closer to the house, and she had to wonder if they were going to knock the door down before the dwarf could answer.
Another loud boom echoed through the building as Grace pulled around the last bend, watching as Ivaldi stomped over to the door in clear aggravation.
“What?!” demanded the dwarf as he ripped the door open, revealing the same group that had been displayed on his spying device.
“You are Ivaldi, the master smith,” the lead elf said, his voice sounding oddly smooth and his accent lilting and foreign.
“Obviously,” Ivaldi answered.
“Good,” the elf replied. “My name is Bartholomew, second-in-command of the Stranglers. We have come on behalf of our leader, to request an item be built in the name of our mighty God.”
“No,” Ivaldi said, slamming the door in his face.
Grace pulled back a bit, expecting the dwarf to come stomping back. However, it seemed that Bartholomew wasn’t about to be so easily dissuaded. The door shook as he pounded it once again, and though Grace could see that Ivaldi wanted to do nothing less, he turned to open it once more. This time, he did so with the tip of his strange weapon leading the way.
“What part of ‘no’ don’t you understand?” the dwarf asked, his eyes hard and unwavering.
He was clearly outnumbered, as the Stranglers – as they called themselves – had five others there aside from him. But he wasn’t afraid at all, though he hadn’t displayed even a shred of power. He was very old, so Grace had to assume he was strong. Just how strong, she didn’t know, but eight-thousand years was a long time to be training.
“You don’t seem to understand what we have to offer,” Bartholomew said, clearly not intimidated.
“Not interested,” Ivaldi said, moving back to try and slam the door once again.
This time, Bartholomew placed his foot inside the doorjamb. It was not deep enough to actually step into the house, but just enough to stop the door from being closed.
“Listen, smith,” the elf said, leaning in just a bit. “We’ve been cordial up until now, but you don’t seem to realize with whom you are dealing. We are the Stranglers, and you don’t want to be our enemy. We have no interest in quarreling with you, and having allies in our ranks can be extremely beneficial to one such as yourself. We can make you rich beyond belief. All we ask is that you forge us the Sword of Destiny, so that we may…ack!”
There was a loud zapping sound, and the elf was thrown clear out of the doorway, landing flat on his back some five feet away. His hair stood out on end and his body twitched uncontrollably. The elves cried out in alarm and anger, two of them moving to help their leader, while the others advanced on the dwarf threateningly.
“Take another step, and I’ll give ye the same as your buddy over there,” Ivaldi threatened. “And this time, the voltage will be twice as much.”
The group hesitated, watching the strange pronged rod with a mixture of apprehension and fear. Clearly, they’d heard of the dwarf’s reputation. Why would they come here otherwise? And, if a single attack had been enough to lay their leader out flat, it would most definitely be enough for them, especially if it were twice as strong. They hesitated for a few long seconds, but when Ivaldi took a threatening step forward, they quickly backed off, scurrying away to scoop up their leader and leave. Of course, they obviously couldn’t help throwing dire threats in the smith’s way.
“We’ll be back, smith, and next time, we won’t be so nice!” yelled one of them.
“You’re dead!” another cried intelligently.
“Your days are numbered!”
“Make peace with your false gods, because…” Ivaldi slammed the door, cutting the last one off.
“You can come out, girl,” he said, leaning the rod against the wall.
“How did you know I was here?” Grace asked sheepishly as she came out of the tunnel.
“You’re about as sneaky as a wolf in a flock of sheep,” Ivaldi grumbled, moving to his kitchen and grabbing a pair of mugs.
“Are you worried they’ll come back?” she asked as the dwarf moved over to a large, dusty barrel sitting on a wooden bench.
“Of course they’ll be back,” he muttered, turning the spigot and unleashing a torrent of frothy dark liquid.
“What are you going to do?” she asked worriedly.
“They won’t get within ten miles of the place next time,” Ivaldi assured her. “All of my traps will be back up and they’ll turn back after the first explosion takes a few toes.”
He filled both mugs, already drinking from the first and holding the second out to her.
“What is this?” Grace asked, looking at the mug, but not taking it.
“Beer,” Ivaldi said. “Best brew of the dwarven kingdom, straight from the small brewing town of Beer, in f
act.”
“Wait, you’re drinking beer from a town named Beer?” Grace asked, finding the dwarven naming scheme somewhat ridiculous.
Ivaldi shrugged.
“We like to drink. Now, do you want some, or not?”
Grace just shook her head.
“I’m too young to drink.”
Ivaldi gave her a once-over, then let out a snort.
“Come on, you have to be over eighteen, so you’re definitely not too young.”
“I’m fourteen,” Grace replied, not sure if she should take it as a compliment or an insult.
“Are you? Look like a full-grown elf, don’t you,” he muttered.
“Maybe,” Grace replied. “But I’m human. I’ve still got plenty of growing to do.”
Ivaldi stroked his beard, but shrugged and emptied his mug, before helping himself to the second as well.
“Guess I haven’t been around any in a while. I must have forgotten.”
“When was the last time you saw humans?” Grace asked as the dwarf began stomping towards his smithy once more.
“Oh, it must’ve been some five thousand years back,” he muttered, taking another sip.
“You mean the Five Kingdoms and Faeland were able to communicate with one another so recently? I thought they were cut off long before that.”
“So recently?” the dwarf said with a snort. “Clearly, you don’t have a great concept of time. The world was a very different place five thousand years ago. And yes, that was around the time when the humans were driven back, and their race was locked away.”
“Was it really that bad?” Grace asked. “I know that a war is coming, but none of us really want to fight. We’d rather just stay where we are and mind our own business.”
“It was bad, girl. Worse than you can imagine,” Ivaldi replied, setting his mug down on the metal table and pulling up a chair.
Grace, seeing that he was ready to actually talk, grabbed another one. For once, she was grateful for her relatively small stature, as the dwarf-sized furniture was perfectly comfortable.