Unforeseen path, p.38
Unforeseen Path, page 38
That’s not good, I mentally grunted, realizing that the fleshy bags were probably something like poison sacs. With a name like VaporStrike, I could only imagine what those sacs might contain, especially after our experiences with the Matriarch and Toxic Stalker. Though, if we were lucky, this might actually work out for the best, I thought as my eyes swept over my friends and the pick-up groups we’d been saddled with.
Everyone looked like they’d been through the wringer. Seeing a mostly unaffected Byrnwulf and Igtra standing warily on guard, I mentally corrected my initial evaluation as I eyed Töten critically. Everyone, except the three fire-resistant assholes, looked like they’d been through the wringer.
“Hey, man,” Töten said in a concerned tone as I hit the group with a Healing Breeze, “Are you okay, man? You kind of zoned out there.”
“Better now,” I spat as the healing magic cleared my eyes and lungs of the last of their damage along with removing the toasty feel from my exposed skin. As Laura gave a wave of thanks, I spat the last of the soot from my mouth, “that I don’t feel like a crispy critter.”
“Good, because we’re down to thirty-eight minutes,” Töten impatiently said as he began eyeing the mini-boss.
“I think this guy shouldn’t be too bad,” I tiredly said, cutting the big guy off as I stood to my full height and rolled my shoulders.
“Says the heal-bot who’s not gonna be tanking him,” Töten sarcastically said, giving me a dismissive snort, before getting down to business, “So, I was thinking-”
“That it would be best if you guys only attack this asshole from a distance,” I said, cutting him off mid-sentence. Doing one last look over the courtyard area, I sent the Ghouls charging in with a thought as I began rebuffing everyone, “while we send in the Ghouls?”
“What the fuck are you doing?” Töten shouted as he whipped around to watch the Ghouls suddenly take off for the mini-boss.
“Oh my god!” Samantha hollered in alarm as she sprang to her feet along with Alan and Kevin, “you just wiped us!”
“Shit man,” Byrnwulf swore as he watched the Ghouls go, “really?”
“We didn’t even discuss a plan beforehand,” Zeven angrily growled as he shot to his clawed feet next to a worried Bright Claw and Nahimana.
“That’ll work,” Phoenix said, glancing over her shoulder as she watched her Ghouls running off with mine. Seeing the angry glares at her indifferent reaction, the Barbarian just shrugged and unslung her short bow, “I don’t know what crawled up all of your asses and died, but if you want to get in on the fighting, just use a ranged weapon.”
“We literally have twenty Orc Warrior Ghouls,” I said with an indifferent shrug as Neristhana kept quiet behind me on guard while Helgath and I buffed everyone up, “This should be a piece of cake.”
“And if it’s not?” Töten asked, somewhat calming down.
“Then we’ll send another twenty in until the job’s finished,” I answered with an indifferent shrug, “Though, it’ll probably help to make it go faster if you give some ranged support.”
“I’m a Defensive Warrior,” Samantha grunted in annoyance, “I don’t do ranged attacks.”
“Why the fuck not?” I asked, not holding back what I thought about that in the least. “You should always have a ranged option for pulling monsters or doing a little extra damage to help you hold aggro when the monster reaches you.” I let out a snort of disgust as her face turned red. “There are numerous reasons that you should have as many ways as possible to deal damage if you need to.”
“Oh, fuck you, Mr. I’m-the-best-at-everything Ironwolf,” Samantha swore as she began stomping off towards the mini-boss.
“You’re not planning on doing any range attacks on the mini-boss?” Töten asked, nervously eyeing the fighting going on between the Ghouls and the mini-boss.
“Naw, Helgath and I are going to focus on closing off the far side of the courtyard around the inn that’s not on fire,” I said, glancing over at the anxious Gnomeling standing beside me as Kevin began sending arrows at the mini-boss, “but maybe Neristhana can throw some Enhanced Shadow Bolts at the bastard while we work.”
“I can do that,” Neristhana said in a tight voice while her eyes continuously swept the line of burning buildings behind us.
“I’m gonna join Samantha and get some whacks in on the mini-boss so this goes a bit faster,” Töten grunted as he began jogging towards the fighting.
“It’s your hide,” I said, watching the big guy go. As he shot me a bird over his shoulder, I hollered back, “and try not to pull too much aggro from the Ghouls.”
“We’re with Töten!” Byrnwulf laughingly said as he jogged past me with Igtra following behind him.
“I guess we’re going in too,” Zeven said as he began jogging after the two Red Draconian-Humans, “Come on, Bright Claw.”
“Don’t you think we should stay back and guard Nahimana?” I heard Bright Claw ask as he reluctantly followed after the Badger kin.
“Sorry, Star,” Phoenix called out as she shouldered her bow and began jogging after the rest of the melee team, “but I may as well join them.”
“Seriously, you’re gonna do that with a mini-boss named VaporStrike?” I demanded as she turned around while running backward to point at the large amulet around her neck.
“I do have this nifty new Poison Resistance amulet,” Phoenix tauntingly replied, flashing me a broad smile.
“It’s for one type of poison only,” I called back as she gave me an innocent shrug, before turning back around to catch up with the others.
I really didn’t know what to say to those idiots. While I understood they wanted to get in on the action and mostly didn’t have any ranged attacks, there was no doubt in my mind this was gonna go south really quickly. Whatever, I thought, giving Helgath a nod as I called out to the rest of the group that had stayed behind.
“Try to keep up with us as we’re throwing up Zombie Walls,” I said as we strode off along the outer edge of the courtyard so we could get into the twenty-five-yard range needed for casting the spell.
“As long as you stay in the range of the melee players, that shouldn’t be an issue,” Laura said as she anxiously followed after us. Glancing back at the Badger kin female sticking to her side, it looked like Nahimana had taken it upon herself to keep an eye on the Priestess’s back.
“You want me to work on burning down more of the town or start hammering the mini-boss?” Alan asked as he nervously followed, while Kevin gave an indifferent grunt as he silently kept pace with us firing his bow.
“It would be cool if you could get the area that we’ll be working on starting to burn ahead of time, that might help us not get swarmed if any of the monsters figure out where we are,” I said, pointing towards the area we were gonna start on first, “Otherwise, I’d make sure to throw some love towards the mini-boss.”
“I can do that,” Alan agreed as he studied the arc of houses we were headed towards. Though, he stopped for a moment to throw a few Scorching Shots at the mini-boss, before hurrying to catch back up to us.
“Do what you can to watch our backs,” I said to the Gnomeling at my side, “but if you need us to step in to give you a hand.”
“I’ll let you know,” Neristhana said in a no-nonsense tone.
“Good, now let’s get to work,” I said, increasing my pace to a jog.
It took only about thirty seconds to get to the end of the line of burning houses. Signaling for Helgath to put a wall up here, I kept going with the rest of the group. As the Half-Orc got to work, I stopped at the other end of the house and got to work on the next gap. Seeing what we were doing, Alan began setting fire to the house we were in the process of blocking off along with the next few houses further down the line.
As the Scorching Shot set the front doors aflame, I heard chittering shrieks come from within the houses. Neristhana, Laura, and Nahimana nervously braced for an attack as the rest of us worked, but none came before we were done with our work. I completed my cast just as Helgath ran up. With a wordless nod, we hurriedly moved over to the next house to repeat the process.
These small Zombie Walls were a lot easier to put up. The gaps between the homes weren’t more than four yards wide, so it only took a maximum of two soul stones per cast. That saved on the mana expenditure big time.
“Gah, Töten keeps pulling the aggro from the Ghouls,” Laura complained behind us as we ran to the next set of homes.
“Yeah, but that’s because of the massive damage that he’s pushing out,” Alan grunted as he gulped down another Mana potion.
“He’s having to keep aggro off of Byrnwulf and that Igtra chick, because those flaming enchantments on their weapons are pissing VaporStrike off big time” Kevin explained as he trailed behind us while sending arrows slamming into the mini-boss from range, “I still can’t believe we’ve already got the bastard down to thirty percent health in only five minutes.”
“Thirty percent!” I exclaimed, eyeing how much further we needed to go to seal off the courtyard with Zombie Walls.
‘It’s gonna be close,’ Helgath agreed as she ran ahead to the next gap.
“Whatever it is, all that I can say is that keeping him healed up is a bitch,” Laura groused as she stopped behind us to cast another heal on him, before running to catch up with us.
“Pretty cool, right,” Kevin excitedly said as he let several special glowing shots off in a row, “Seriously, I swear this guy is even easier than the first mini-boss.”
“You weren’t even a part of that fight,” Neristhana irritably grumbled as she ran over to a burning adolescent hatchling that stomped out of the flames in front of us and buried her hand axe between its eyes.
The monster was one of the handfuls of horse-sized adolescent hatchlings that had been making their way out into the courtyard from the areas we hadn’t closed off yet. I figured they were probably fleeing from one of the bigger suckers that had to have been winning further inside the burning hamlet. If Alan hadn’t managed to set the rest of the houses around the courtyard on fire, I’m sure Neristhana and Nahimana would’ve been hard-pressed to keep up with the adds otherwise. Though, with the adolescent hatchlings being disoriented from the smoke and down to half-health from the fire, the pair were kicking its chitin-reinforced ass.
Not that I was paying too much attention as my Zombie Wall grew out of the ground to seal the hole the adolescent hatchling had just come through. Helgath was already racing past me for the next gap when the monster let out an enraged chittering shriek and chased after the Gnomeling. I had to give it to Neristhana and Nahimana, they were taking their guard duties like a champ.
My big concern was what was going to happen when VaporStrike the Ravenous hit twenty-five percent of its total health. If the mini-boss was anything like Toxic Stalker the Noxious, he’d put out a call for help that would leave us buried by the swarm. Looking ahead, I hurriedly counted how many more holes we still had to block off. Just eight more left and we’d be golden, I anxiously thought, as the Badger kin female jumped into the scrum.
Lunging from the side, Nahimana smashed the adolescent hatchling’s bulbous head with a Toxic Chitin-Spiked Knuckled fist. The punch sent the monster lurching to the side as the Gnomeling began blasting away at its nearly point-blank range with Enhanced Shadow Bolts. Even as the monstrous insect tried to reorient on its new attacker as the necrotic magic rotted its face, the Badger kin female stepped in close as her other fist came in with a powerful uppercut that sent the monster reeling back on its spiky legs.
As I ran to catch up to Helgath, Neristhana was using her hand axe to peel away the monster’s mouth tentacles and hacking away its pincher claws as Nahimana continued pounding it in the side of the head. Once she had both severed, the Gnomeling hammered her hand axe down on the same gash from before. I didn’t need to run an Identify to know that the fight was nearly over. Looking back over my shoulder at the crunching sound of the shattering chitin, I saw Neristhana shove her fist into the gaping wound and began blasting the monster’s innards with Enhanced Shadow Bolts at point blank range while Nahimana pummeled its head until the adolescent hatchling crumpled to the ground.
That works, I thought, sliding to a stop as I hurriedly started my next cast of Zombie Wall. I was nearly finished with the spell when a terrible chittering wailing suddenly rang out behind us.
“To me little brothers, to me!” VaporStrike the Ravenous cried out to the swarm across the hamlet.
As I looked back toward the mini-boss in horror, I saw the fleshy flaps that had been laying across its back suddenly raise up and begin expelling gouts of noxious green-looking cloud as an answering chittering chorus rang out from the hamlet. This was very bad, I anxiously thought, when group chat was suddenly filled with the agonized wordless screams from the melee team. As one, I saw my friends and teammates flop to the ground to claw at their faces and throats.
“They’re all dying!” Laura’s alarmed shout snapped me into action.
Before VaporStrike went back on the offensive, I cast a Healing Breeze while ordering four of my Orc Warrior Ghouls to break away from the combat and drag the melee team out of the poisonous cloud. It was the best I could do as the Priestess struggled to keep the melee team alive. That might sound cold, but I didn’t dare take any more time away from securing our position. If Helgath and I didn’t get these Zombie Walls up, this was going to be a wipe.
I let out a dismissive snort as the Ghouls began grabbing my friends by a foot to drag them out of the poisonous cloud. Then again, if the mini-boss continued aggro’ing after Töten and came any closer to us while we were working, it would also be a wipe. All that I could do was hope that VaporStrike wouldn’t leave his guard position before the inn’s double doors to chase after us.
“Why aren’t you doing more to help them?” Nahimana screamed at me as I raced after Helgath to the next house, “Their skin is melting off their bodies!”
“I’m already doing what I can,” I shouted back to the Badger kin female as I slid to a stop and cast another Healing Breeze, before sealing up the gap with another Zombie Wall, “If we can’t close off the courtyard to the swarm, then we’re all dead.”
“Holy shit!” Kevin exclaimed as he turned around to stare at us in horror. Obviously, he hadn’t understood why we’d been running around like maniacs to seal off the hamlet from the courtyard until just that moment, “That’s what you’ve been doing this whole time!”
“Oh my god … oh my god,” Alan began to anxiously chant as the chittering chorus around us took on a new meaning to him. I saw his eyes swivel to the gaps we still had left to close up, “There’s no way you’re going to make it in time!”
“Probably not,” I agreed, taking off running for the next house with Helgath as pounding started coming from the closest Zombie Walls behind us, “but if we can get enough walls up, maybe we can hold the gap if we can get the melee team back up long enough to seal off the courtyard.”
“Uh, how can I help?” Alan nervously asked, looking back and forth between the burning holes and the mini-boss.
“You and Kevin just keep hammering the mini-boss with the Ghouls,” I said without stopping my cast, “the quicker we take that asshole down, the better chance we have of taking out the boss before our time is up.”
“By the dark!” Nahimana cursed under her breath as the reality of our situation dawned on her.
“Don’t try to weigh the odds, just do the best you can,” I hollered as Helgath and I began casting Zombie Wall again.
“What about Zeven and Bright Claw?” Nahimana worriedly asked, seeing the Ghouls trudging towards us with the dying melee players being dragged behind them like sacks of potatoes.
“The Priestess is working to keep them alive,” Neristhana assured the Badger kin female as she stepped up beside her, “Our job is to keep Lord Stinky and Helgath alive so they can do their part. Okay?”
That seemed to get the Badger kin female back into gear. Without another word, the two females jogged over to catch up to us. It was perfect timing since another burning juvenile hatchling was just stumbling out of the flaming hole in front of us a second before I managed to get my Zombie Wall up.
Luckily, before the juvenile hatchling could attack me, the Zombies in the wall behind it grabbed ahold of the monstrous insect with their clawed hands. Its chittering call for its brethren was cut off as Neristhana and Nahimana began hacking and punching it for all they were worth. As I hurried to the next gap with Helgath, the Priestess called out in group chat.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with them,” Laura anxiously said as continuously tried casting heals on the group.
Glancing over my shoulder, I saw that the Ghouls had managed to escape the poison cloud with our teammates. One look at the bubbling mass of skin sliding down their undead faces let me know this was some kind of consuming poison that acted like an acid. It would have to be neutralized before our heals would work like with Toxic Stalker. The only problem is that none of these guys had been part of that fight and didn’t fully understand why it had been so difficult to keep everyone on their feet.
“Hit them first with a Minor Cure Disease,” I hurriedly explained to the stressed-out Priestess, “and then start healing them.”
“Okay … okay, that makes sense,” Laura nervously chanted as she simply did what I said while talking to herself out loud, “The heals aren’t going to do much of anything if the poison is still eating them alive.”
“What’s the mini-boss’s health?” I called out as I started the next cast of Zombie Wall, “And are those Ghouls doing enough damage to finish the job?”
“Um … twelve percent,” Kevin said after a moment, “I think so. It’s slower, but not that much.”
“That’s working!” Laura exclaimed triumphantly behind us.
“Good,” I said, breathing a sigh of relief as I took off again for the next house while calling the four Ghouls over for backup.
