“Any chance we could take them one at a time?” Tim forced himself to look around the corner again.
“Let’s find out.” Lorelei dipped past him and let an arrow fly toward the naga.
Tim watched the arrow close the distance and sink into the creature’s arm. The hallway in front of them filled with red light separating the group from the snake-beings in the room. A blocked-off hallway during a fight could only mean one thing.
Boss fight.
Oddly enough, knowing the three nagas were a boss encounter made him feel better about it. Having to wade through packs of giant monsters to get to the boss wasn’t exactly fun. Sure, trash helped offset the cost of dying to bosses in other games, but Tim had always been of the mind that the fewer trash mobs, the better.
Sometimes trash was fun when it had a cool gimmick or set the stage for the boss, but too many of them was a bad thing. Spending twenty or thirty minutes between the bosses wasn’t what he enjoyed. What he loved was the mechanics and working with a team. So in Tim’s perfect game, there would be a lot of bosses and mini-bosses but not nearly as much trash.
He sighed in relief when he noticed Lorelei still stood outside the red film that cut them off from the bosses. If she had been inside the room when she shot the arrow, all of them would have had to watch her die without being able to do a damn thing about it. This almost felt like they got away with something, but he wasn't going to complain.
The arrow sticking out of the boss's arm melted away, and the wound healed completely. As soon as the boss was back at one hundred percent health, the red light blocking them from entering the room faded from view.
“So one at a time is out of the question.” Tim tried not to look concerned about fighting three massive bosses at once.
Sometimes leadership was about projecting confidence even when you didn’t feel the flow.
He stepped away from the wall so he didn’t look like he was trying to hide. It didn’t take much effort to stand a little straighter. His group was solid, and he had the ultimate confidence in their abilities. It wasn’t like they were going to turn around now after coming all this way. What he needed to do was stop thinking and realize they didn’t know shit about what was going to happen next.
They would have to wing it and hope for the win.
There was always a way to win the fight in games. You had to figure out the trick. A good developer hid it so it wouldn’t be revealed until you were too wrapped up in the fight to notice. They would have to spot their opportunity, and if they missed it, he’d have to heal his ass off until they got it right.
“Cassie, you lead the way.” Tim turned to look at everyone else. “Try and stay on her target unless you see something we need to address. With three bosses and only one tank, we can’t afford to pull aggro.”
Everyone nodded, and Cassie motioned for them all to step into the room. Once everyone was inside, she turned to look at the group. “Ready check.”
“And willing,” JaKobi replied with a chuckle.
Lorelei made a gagging sound. “Please start the fight before I puke.”
ShadowLily disappeared.
“It’s a go,” Tim replied.
Cassie grunted. “I miss when people just said ready.” She held up a fist and waited for them to get into a rough formation. Then she held up three fingers, then two, and finally one.
“Snakes suck eggs!” Cassie screamed as she ran into the room.
The naga turned to face the charging warrior and hissed, “Human cattle.”
A crack echoed as the base of the halberd slammed onto the floor. Two screams filled the air as the other nagas slithered into view. Neither of the new monsters had weapons in their hands. While the creatures were strong enough to ruin their day without weapons, Tim had a suspicion something else was going on.
“Keep an eye on the ones in the back. They could be trouble.” He hoped ShadowLily picked up on the hint and would try and take one of them out.
Cassie’s bō staff disappeared as she pulled the hook and chain from her belt and tossed the hook at the boss in one fluid motion. The weapon wrapped around the naga’s halberd, and she used it to pull herself forward. Tim could hear the crunch from her foot connecting with the boss's chest from twenty strides away. Then he had the pleasure of watching her use the momentum from her kick to backflip off the creature’s chest and land perfectly on her feet with her staff in hand, and the chain wrapped neatly around her waist.
“That’s my girl!” JaKobi screamed as he clapped and sent a Phoenix made of pure flames sailing at the bosses.
Lorelei’s arrows fell among the creatures as Tim cast Curse of Giving. Being in the back gave him a good view of the room. The floor was kind of wet, but he didn’t see any water that looked deep enough for something to lurk in. A few fallen trees dotted the room, and one live tree in the back left corner. Hidden under the sprawling willow tree at the back seemed to be rows of cells or cages built into the walls.
No way to tell if the cells were for aesthetics or if they would come into play later. Tim didn’t put any level of craftiness past a developer. Sometimes it felt like they wanted to watch the players squirm. Part of him imagined all the game devs sitting around watching his stream and laughing about what was about to happen next.
Cassie had her hands full keeping the halberd from doing any major damage. The tiny tank dodged and twirled around like a master gymnast. He could have watched her move for hours and still never understood exactly how she did it. Tim was pretty sure Cassie bent in ways that weren’t possible for anyone but a yogi.
While Cassie wasn’t making any headway in the damage department, she also wasn’t taking much damage. A quick check of the boss’s status showed its health at one hundred percent. That couldn’t be right, could it? The group had been fighting for a little while and should have made at least a small dent in the boss’s health by now.
What in the fuck was going on?
Tim sent out a round of Healing Orb to make sure everyone was topped off and turned his attention to the three bosses working in unison. One of the females was using magic to create shields and deflect their attacks. She wasn’t able to stop everything, but she didn’t need to because the other female naga was a healer.
He wasn’t exactly sure how to work his way out of this. If they tried to take out the shieldmaiden, the healer could handle it. Focusing on the warrior was already providing them with bupkis, so they had to change things up. He’d played enough PvP to know that whoever killed the healer first usually won.
In this case, taking out the healer wouldn’t be easy. She basically had two tanks guarding her. It was one hell of a setup to mitigate damage. The nagas worked as a team to bleed away all their opponents’ power and take them out. Tim’s job was to figure out how to beat the system. If they couldn’t do it by simply fighting, there was something in the room to help them. Tim turned from the bosses and scanned the room, wondering if there was anything he might have missed.
ShadowLily bursting from stealth stole his attention from the room before he got a decent chance to search for anything new—her daggers sank into the healer, cutting the naga’s health in half. Everyone immediately switched their attacks to the wounded monster, but they weren’t quick enough.
The warrior moved to block Lorelei’s arrows. For the luxury of protecting the healer, the warrior also took a nasty blow from Cassie’s staff. The massive naga shook off the damage like it was nothing, while the magic-user with the shields held ShadowLily at bay. The brief halt in their attacks was enough time for the healer to recover half of her lost health, then the bitch started healing her wounded party members.
What’s the fucking trick?
Tim recast Curse of Giving to keep Cassie at full health and topped off ShadowLily with a Healing Orb. It felt like he could keep this up for hours, but what was the point if they never did any real damage? There had to be something else.
“Everyone get behind Cassie. Let’s try and
turn them so we can see more of the room,” Tim shouted as he started to pivot to the left.
The tank rolled out of an attack and jumped off the naga’s halberd before smashing him in the face with her bō staff. Cassie kicked off his chest to create some space and started to rotate in unison. “Good, I was starting to think you finally ran out of ideas.”
“Help!” A voice called from the back of the room where the cells were built into the wall.
The sound of someone banging something against the bars started slowly, then echoed as more people joined the man asking for help. “Get us out of here!” a chorus of voices sounded.
Tim motioned for Cassie to keep moving until they were in a good location for him to get a look at the back of the room. When the tank had them in position, Tim topped off everyone’s health and turned to examine the cells built into the cavern walls. There had to be a way to open them, or maybe that was the trick. Could they use the people in the cages as a distraction?
Would they even want to?
A player never knew what would happen when they let someone out of a cage. The people inside could turn on them as quickly as they did the naga. One thing Tim knew for sure was that being the bait or distraction never worked out well for anyone. So if setting the people free made them the distraction instead of his party, he was all for it. As a healer he might even be able to keep a few of them alive.
A very human arm extended through one of the cell doors, but he couldn’t see past the bars to confirm if the rest was a person or not. “There is a switch over there.”
Tim turned away from the cages and ran toward the button. There might not be power in The Etheric Coast, but there was magic, and sometimes the two things looked a lot alike. As he extended his hand to hit the button, he had a horrible thought. What if all the cages held smaller-sized Naga?
Fuck it.
Nothing else was working for them so it was time to take a risk. Tim smashed the button. The cell doors flew upward and crashed into the cavern wall hard enough to send down a shower of dust. People emerged through the haze in droves. The only thing missing was the sound of running feet.
Did I make a horrible mistake?
A man with a snake's lower half stopped in front of him. “Thanks for the assisssst,” he hissed before going to join the others.
Tim didn’t know what to say. He was speechless.
The guy seemed like a normal man, and yet he had the lower half of a snake and a definite hiss to his voice. Then Tim remembered what they had watched happen in the video. Most of the people here were kidnapped. They were the victims. If anyone had the right to be pissed at what was happening here, it was them. Imagine being a farmer one morning and a naga the next.
Not exactly the stuff dreams are made of.
Watching the man slither away filled him with rage. No one should have their essence changed without their consent. It was time for them to find a way to end this. Setting the smaller naga free couldn’t be the only part of the trick. It didn’t feel like their unarmed attacks would be much of a threat or a help.
There had to be something else he was missing.
There was more to this than what was happening now. There had to be. Players might stumble a few times before figuring out how to let out the prisoners, but eventually, they would figure it out. The key to the fight couldn’t be that simple. Any developer worth a damn didn’t only have one trick up their sleeve, and that meant more trouble was coming.
“Phase Two!” Tim screamed at the top of his lungs.
Shit! No one knew what in the fuck Phase Two was, including him.
All three bosses were taking heavy damage now. The healer was almost down to thirty percent, but something was starting to happen. He looked from the bosses to the floor and back at the fallen trees. The pieces began to come together.
“High ground! Get off the floor.” He looked around for the nearest log and decided it was better to lead by example than to keep shouting random instructions.
Tim sprinted forward to cover the distance between himself and the nearest log. As he jumped in the air, he placed his staff in his inventory and slammed into the trunk with a thud. He didn’t hit hard enough to knock the air out of him, but he’d have one hell of a bruise until he healed himself. Once he was secure on top of the trunk, he pulled his staff free and turned to scan the battlefield.
JaKobi and Lorelei continued to do damage as they moved toward downed trees. Tim quickly topped off their health before turning his attention to the tank and assassin. ShadowLily’s face was a mask of pure joy as she slashed at the bosses with unbridled fury. The three naga’s health was dropping at a steady clip, and Tim knew his girl was in the DPS zone.
“ShadowLily! Time to bail.” Tim watched her take one last swipe before turning away.
The last hit put the healer’s health at under twenty-five percent and triggered the next mechanic. Shields came down around the bosses, knocking their attackers away from them and to the floor. Tim watched as Cassie and ShadowLily struggled to climb back to their feet. The pair eventually succeeded but didn’t seem to be able to move any further. They were stuck.
One look at the sly smiles on the boss’s faces, and Tim instantly knew whatever was coming next wouldn’t be good.
They’d never make it out of this fight without a tank, so Tim cast Cleanse on Cassie, leaving his girlfriend to struggle on her own for a little longer. His spell got the tank moving at half-speed, which he hoped would be enough for her to make it to safety before the boss’s next attack hit. With Cassie on the move, he felt confident turning his attention to ShadowLily.
It wasn’t often he got to play the hero in their relationship.
The assassin was in a ton of trouble. While Cassie had been knocked toward safety by the bosses, ShadowLily was behind them and had been pushed farther away. All Tim could do was focus on what he could accomplish now, and not what they might have done differently. He cast Cleanse on ShadowLily, and her legs started pumping furiously a moment later.
Without thinking about it, he cast Cleanse again and decided she might need some more protection and made sure she was covered by Who Needs a Shield. He wanted her to make it to safety, but it always paid to prepare for the worst while planning for the best. Tim watched her sprint across the room, willing her to go a little faster.
He knew she wasn’t going to be fast enough.
It wasn’t enjoyable watching someone you loved fight for their life and seeing the grim determination on their face as they struggled against a losing battle. ShadowLily might not think she would make it, but Tim would be damned if he was going to let her die.
That wasn’t going to fucking happen!
The third of his Cleanse spells got her sprinting at full speed, but it wouldn’t be enough. He couldn’t watch anymore. Tim turned away from ShadowLily to see what the bosses were up to. As she fled for her life, the healer naga lifted her hands high in the air. Arcs of brilliant blue electrical energy flowed up and down the monster’s arms.
A smile spread across the healer’s lips, and she hissed, “Vitaria awaitssss you in the underworld.”
The naga slowly reached out, and the electricity jumped from her hands to the shields surrounding the three boss monsters. Whips of electric energy slashed outward from the shields as the energy continued to build.
It wouldn’t be too long now. They had to hurry.
Cassie made it to her tree trunk, but ShadowLily was still running. Tim switched all of his protective spells to the assassin and silently prayed for her feet to move just a little bit faster. He felt the release of power and turned to watch as the waves of electrical energy arced across the wet floor like a tidal wave of death.
Right before the deadly wave should have consumed her, ShadowLily jumped in the air like Carl Lewis. Tim watched as she glided through the air, hoping she would make it but knowing she would fall short. She hit the trunk on the side, her hands scrabbling against the surface but never finding any purch
ase.
Her descent was slow at first, but the harder ShadowLily fought against the inevitable, the faster she slid. If she hit the water, the assassin was dead. He couldn’t watch, but he also couldn’t look away. All the naga he'd released from the cells had already turned to ash. Tim knew this was only a game, but it didn’t stop it from feeling real.
ShadowLily’s feet were only a foot from the floor when she started screaming.
Her feet weren’t moving toward insta-death anymore, but the assassin had three arrows sticking out of her, and her health was dropping fast. Tim guessed this probably wasn’t an approved method of dodging the mechanic, but he wasn’t going to say anything about it. A Healing Orb flew from his hands, and he cast Cleanse on her again in case Lorelei didn’t have time to switch from poison arrows before saving the assassin’s life.
It wasn’t often a guy found himself thanking a person for shooting his girlfriend full of arrows, but today was that magical day. Tim turned to the ranger. “I hope I don’t need you to do that to me sometime, but I’m happy knowing you would.”
“You say that like this doesn’t hurt like a motherfucker.” ShadowLily grimaced as she tried to keep from moving.
Lorelei pointed at the floor. “Look what happened to the other guys.” The ranger grinned and tried not to snicker. “And for the record, the next time I kabob you, there better be some better swearing. Motherfucker is downright pedestrian.”
“I swear to Christ if you ever kabob me again, we're going to play a little game called ‘it puts the apple on its head,’” ShadowLily shouted through gritted teeth.
Tim shrugged apologetically at the ranger. “Some of us are more grateful than others.”
The electrical current running through the floor stopped, and it was time to get back to work. He didn’t know if this phase repeated or if using the prisoners to trigger the electric event was a one-time opportunity they couldn’t waste.
Tim was good and pissed now. ShadowLily had almost died, and the bosses smiled like they enjoyed what was about to happen. He didn’t give two shits anymore. This was going to end now. Tim cast Behold My Power on the shield-bearer before calling to the rest of the group, “Get the healer.”
Deserts Of Naroosh Page 16