by Aaron Oster
The Ocelot opened his mouth, a cry of victory tearing itself from his throat.
His head suddenly exploded in a shower of gore, painting Arthur with bits of skull and brain matter. He stared in incomprehension as the body toppled to the ground, almost in slow motion, to reveal the ant-girl, her face a rictus of fury. She was wielding a massive two-handed hammer as large as her body.
She swung it up onto her shoulder, dashing across the room and slamming into the guard that was fighting Hopps. It took her less than five seconds to reduce the remaining Ocelot to an unrecognizable pile of mush.
Arthur was so shocked that he completely missed the level-up notification, letting him know he’d hit level 10.
“Holy shit!” he finally exclaimed, staring at the still furious ant-girl as she attacked the corpse, swinging the enormous hammer around as though it weighed nothing at all.
“Holy shit is right!” Hopps exclaimed, having bounded free as soon as the girl began attacking. “She’s a monster!”
Arthur nodded dumbly as the girl spun to face them, her entire front splattered in gore and clinging bits of fur. Her bright red eyes blazed with anger, and her teeth were borne in a snarl. Arthur noted offhandedly that she looked quite pretty.
She looked more like a human than any ani-human should. Her skin was pale, with two small circles of black chiton on each of her cheeks. Her face was slim and narrow, her eyes large, and her black lips plump. Black hair spilled around her face in a tangle, giving her already terrifying appearance a wild and predatory cast.
Her body was slim and athletic, which he could make out quite well through the scraps she had on as clothes. Her skin was mostly clear of chiton, all except for her shins, forearms, and fingertips, where they ended in wicked-looking claws. She had an impressive bust, which was, thankfully for him, hidden by the rough, torn sack she was wearing, as well as wide hips and long legs. She was easily a foot taller than him, as well.
He was impressed to see such a slim girl swinging around what was easily a forty-pound hammer. The massive lump of metal was larger than his torso, with one end hooking into a wickedly curved spike and the other, flat. Both sides were painted red and had bits of the guards clinging to them.
Arthur took it all in within the span of a couple of seconds. He didn’t have much time, as the girl brandished the hammer with a scream of rage and charged them.
“Tally! It’s me, Hopps! Calm down!” Hopps yelled, interposing himself between the two of them and trying to calm the crazed girl.
She just screamed louder, and only Arthur’s quick actions saved Hopps from becoming a flat smear on the ground. He used Spring, catching his companion in a sideways tackle, throwing the both of them out of the way as the hammer slammed into the ground, blasting the stone to pieces.
“What the hell is wrong with her?!” Arthur yelled, pushing himself to his feet and watching as the girl swung the hammer up again, turning to face them.
“I don’t know!” Hopps answered, clearly distressed. “But this was kinda what you looked like back when…”
He trailed off, not wanting to mention Arthur’s rage attack on the human poachers. Arthur understood all the same. It seemed that this girl was under the same rage as he had been. The same compulsion that had driven him into a killing frenzy was affecting her now. Now all they had to do was figure out how to snap her out of it.
She screamed again, running at them and brandishing the hammer overhead.
“Quick! Help me think of a way to get her out of her rage!” Arthur pleaded, panic-stricken.
There was no way they could beat her, even if they tried.
“I don’t know. I just yelled at you until you snapped out of it,” Hopps answered, “but that didn’t really seem to do anything!”
They were forced to stop talking and dodge as the deranged girl swung down on them again. While he did manage to avoid the attack, the stone chips that were sent flying stung at him, shaving off a few hit points.
“Do something, Hopps! Anything!” Arthur yelled as the girl spun, her red eyes locking onto him and her bloodstained teeth stretching into a very frightening grin.
“Tally! Don’t you remember me?” Hopps yelled as she charged him once more.
“It’s not working!” Arthur screamed back, his voice coming out more like a high-pitched scream than a manly cry of terror.
“Talia! Don’t forget who you are!” Hopps yelled as she closed with him. “Remember your parents, your brother Pace, and sister Grace!”
Talia froze an inch away from him, her face clouding up in confusion. Then Arthur saw the rage leak from her features as though it were never there. She stared at him for a few long moments, confusion clearly written on her face. The hammer clanged to the floor behind her, and she pitched forward in a dead faint.
14
Arthur just managed to catch her as she fell, though with his meager Strength attribute, she just ended up bearing him to the ground and landing on top of him. He tried to push her off but found himself unable to, as the girl’s body was unusually dense, making her much heavier than she appeared.
“Hopps,” he gasped, “I need you to get her off me! She’s crushing me!”
Hopps bounded over to him, and together, they managed to get the unconscious girl off him, rolling her onto her back on the stone floor.
“Thanks,” Arthur wheezed, sitting up and rubbing at his ribs. “She was really heavy!”
“Ani-humans who have insect traits normally are, mate. Just don’t let her hear you saying that,” Hopps said, looking her over with a critical eye.
Arthur nodded, remembering well the one time he’d made an off-handed comment about his mother’s weight when he’d been younger. He hadn’t been able to sit right for a week after the spanking she’d doled out. The memory alone was enough to make him shudder.
He squatted over the girl, feeling at her neck for a pulse. He leaned down and placed an ear to her chest. It was then, of course, that she came to. She lifted her head, making eye contact with him, his ear pressed into her chest.
“Um…Hi?” Arthur said as the girl’s face turned a deep scarlet.
“Creep!” she screamed, slapping him across the face so hard that he saw stars and his already low HP dipped a few more points.
This is some anime-level bullshit! Arthur thought, rubbing his sore cheek as Talia attempted to cover herself up.
“Talia! You’re okay!”
The ant-girl turned, just in time for Hopps to land on her. Instead of knocking her flat, as he would have done to Arthur, she didn’t even budge, staring down at the large frog in confusion.
“Hopps? Is that really you?” she asked, her brows furrowing. “What are you doing here? Also, when did you get so big?”
“Well, interesting story, actually. You see…”
Arthur loudly cleared his throat, interrupting what would likely be a very long story, earning him a glare from the ant-girl
“We have a quest to complete, Hopps, and seeing as it didn’t complete when we freed her, there must still be another scout still alive.”
Talia’s glare shifted to concern and then to fear. Her eyes flicked to the corpse of the pulped scout. At least, he assumed it had been a scout.
“Yes. I don’t know where they took him, but they took my cousin Space to someone named Claudia. We have to save him!”
Arthur resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the name.
She has a brother named Pace, a sister Grace, and now a cousin named Space. Why the hell doesn’t her name rhyme with theirs?
Arthur shook himself, taking a quick glance at the timer on his quest. Just 27 minutes left.
“We know where Claudia is, but I don’t think we can beat her on our own. Can you help us?” he asked.
He’d seen what she’d done to the two guards. With her on their side, they could crush anyone in their way.
“Yeah, I can help. All I need is my hammer. I think I saw them put it against…” She trailed off as
she spotted the hammer lying less than a foot away from her, covered in gore.
Her eyes then flicked from the twisted bars of the cage she’d been in, to the two pulpy corpses of the guards, and a look of confusion returned to her face.
“What happened? Did one of you use my hammer to kill the guards?” Her gaze moved between the two of them.
Hopps was obviously unable to swing the weapon with no hands, so that made Arthur the only likely candidate. He shook his head in the negative.
“It was you. Don’t you remember?”
“Are you sure?” she asked, raising one eyebrow. “I feel like I’d remember pulping two ani-humans to paste.”
“Yup. It was you, alright!” Hopps said as she got to her feet. “Slaughtered the buggers and damn near killed us, too!”
“Really?” she asked, her eyes going wide.
It was only then that she really looked herself over and found she was drenched in blood.
“Well, shit. One of you will have to explain this, but later.”
She stooped and lifted her hammer once again, swinging it easily onto one shoulder, then turned to look down at Arthur.
“So, perv, you say you know where this Claudia is?”
“It’s Arthur,” he said, feeling his hands tighten into fists at his sides. “And I’d appreciate a little gratitude. We did save your life.”
Her eyes flicked above his head, then to the dead guards. Her black lips quirked in a half-smile.
“If that’s what you say, little frog.”
Arthur could hear the smug sarcasm in her voice.
Oh, okay. Let’s see what makes you so great, he thought angrily, concentrating on reading her information.
Name: Talia
Race: Cutter Ant (Humanoid)
Level: 14
HP: 100/100
“Level 14? How the hell did you get captured?” Arthur exclaimed, unable to help himself.
“They took my cousin first,” she responded with a snort. “It’s called blackmail. Heard of it?”
Arthur suppressed the urge to snap back. This girl was already severely testing his patience. They had no time for this now. They’d already wasted enough time.
“Let’s go,” he said, turning his back on her and heading for the exit. “We’ve got a Boss to kill.”
Talia spared one last sorrow-filled look at the bloody corpse of her comrade, before hurrying after him, with Hopps bringing up the rear.
“I can’t believe we actually found you. When you disappeared a couple of weeks back, we were sure you were goners.”
“Yeah, so did I. Guess I owe you a thanks for coming after me.”
He bristled at that.
The girl thanked Hopps, but all he got was scorn?
He restrained himself from turning around, instead simply increasing his pace and forcing the others to speed up to keep up with him. He dug into his bag, drinking down two Health and Stamina potions. They both regenerated at 10 points per minute outside of battle, but he didn’t have the time to let them regen on their own.
His MP could restore itself to full on its own, and his Stamina should be back to full by the time they made it to the Boss room.
“I’m just sad we couldn’t save Mace. He was a good guy.”
“Yeah,” Talia replied to Hopps’ statement. “Too headstrong for his own good, though. They were gonna start torturing me first, but he taunted them, and they ended up killing him first. It wasn’t pretty.”
They went silent then, leaving Arthur to try and figure out how they could take down the Boss in the next 25 minutes without dying. He had no doubt that she would be much stronger than the last one. They had Talia now, though, which was a major benefit that they didn’t have on the previous floor. Maybe it would be easy to defeat Claudia.
Arthur’s wishful thinking dissipated the second they walked into the Boss room.
The room was long, with a red carpet stretching across its length to a marble throne set on a dais on the other end. The walls held torches flickering with green fire, casting the room in a strange and eerie light.
A large ani-human cat sat in the throne, her entire body shrouded in gleaming armor. A massive polearm stood in a bracket next to her on either side. She turned gleaming green eyes up as they entered, her pupils dilating to slits as she glared at them. Her face was a dark tan and covered in fur.
Her face wasn’t as animalistic as the guards he’d been fighting, but it also wasn’t as human as his or Talia’s. She had a short muzzle and a pair of elongated canines that showed as she rose from her throne with a languid grace.
“So, you’re the ones who have been causing all this uproar in my Dungeon. I should have figured it would be filthy prey animals.”
Her voice came out in something between a purr and a hiss, sending chills down Arthur’s spine.
“Where’s my cousin?” Talia demanded, stepping out in front of Arthur and brandishing her hammer angrily.
“Oh, look. One of the little bugs has escaped its cage,” Claudia said, examining one of her claws as though she was entirely bored.
It was then that Arthur noticed the timer counting down. It was already at fifteen seconds. He quickly realized that she was trying to distract them and catch them by surprise when the timer ran out. Wasting no more time, he examined her to see what they were up against.
Name: Claudia
Race: Clouded Leopard (Humanoid)
Level: 15
HP: 450/450
A yellow crown flashed above her head as he finished examining her, meaning she would have two AOE attacks. The fact that her HP was lower than Mitten, the first floor Boss, made him even warier. She was five levels higher than he’d been, meaning her attacks would pack a serious punch.
Arthur hadn’t taken much time to examine his status since he’d reached level 10, but at that moment, he pulled it up, sinking another 3 points into Agility and two into Endurance. He would need every edge he could get in this fight.
“Get ready!” Arthur said, breaking into their conversation.
“It’s rude to…” Talia began, rounding on him.
“He’s right,” Hopps cut in, having noted the timer counting down from 5. “Plan?”
“Slow her down. I’ll move in first. Talia, you follow!”
The timer hit zero then, and Claudia roared, ripping her polearm from the throne and charging them, covering half the room before Hopps’s Mud Bath slowed her down. Unlike with previous fights, the skill didn’t completely immobilize her.
Arthur dashed forward, using Spring to cover the last few feet and slammed into her, slapping her face and using his Poison Touch. He was forced to jump back as she swiped at him with her claws, glad for his increased Agility when using Acrobatics.
Talia came in right on his heels, swinging her massive hammer down on the Boss with a scream. Arthur was sure the Boss was done for, but she somehow managed to bring her own weapon to bear, deflecting the blow to the side and slamming the butt into Talia’s stomach, sending her staggering back with a gasp.
Hopps’s Water Bomb exploded in her face as she tried to follow up, and a second later, Talia glowed as he hit her with his buff, restoring her HP to full and boosting her attributes. Arthur dashed in once again as the water cleared and slashed at her exposed back – the armor was leather instead of metal there – and sliced through, scoring a minor hit.
Claudia screamed in rage and twisted in place, her polearm whipping through the air at a devastating speed. Arthur dropped to his back, hearing the hum of the weapon as it passed overhead, then sprang back to his feet, landing a double kick on the humanoid and sending her stumbling forward. Talia slammed her hammer into her chest as she stumbled into her, sending the Boss flying across the room, shaving off a full 15% of her HP.
“Nice shot!” he called out.
“Not too bad yourself, frog-boy,” she called back.
Arthur felt a vein in his neck twitch at the nickname and turned instead to face Claudia, who
’d landed on her feet despite the devastating blow. The front of her armor was dented where the hammer had struck, and blood trickled from the corner of her mouth.
“You’ll pay for that!” she hissed, her voice somehow carrying across the room.
She took a leap forward, only to be engulfed in a cloud of Hopps’ Swamp Gas. She crashed to the ground, hacking and coughing. Arthur used Spring and jumped on her in an instant, hitting her with Poison Touch once more and slashing at her neck with his dagger in the same motion.
He shaved off an impressive amount of her HP before he was forced to vault clear as Talia came charging in to attack. Her hammer whooshed through the air, slamming into the cat-girl once more and shaving off a full 20% of her health this time.
Claudia screamed as the stone under her splintered, driving her half an inch into the solid ground.
Talia pulled her hammer back to attack again, but despite her obvious pain, Claudia managed to avoid it, using some type of ability or skill. Her body glowed yellow, and she seemed to flow around the attack, her body contorting to avoid the hammer-strike.
Her claws flashed as she went for Talia’s neck, but Arthur barreled into her from behind, using his Tae-Frog-Do.
Claudia was once again sent sprawling, and a Water Bomb detonated right on top her, bring her HP down to half.
“This is way easier than I thought it would be!” Talia said with a grin.
“Damn it!” Arthur yelled, turning and running away from the ant-girl.
“What did I say?” Talia asked, half turning from the downed Boss.
“Never say it’s too easy! That’s when bad shit happens!” Arthur tossed over his shoulder.
And, as it seemed, he was right.
Claudia screamed, the entire room shaking with her rage as she rose from the ground, her entire body glowing yellow.
“Oh no,” Talia said, turning to run as Claudia sprang into the air, pulling her polearm back for one of her massive AOE attacks.
She came down with a yell, slamming the weapon into the ground and sending an explosion of force rippling out. The ground tore itself up, bricks and chunks of stone exploding out from the point of impact.