Dungeon Noble - Squire

They dealt with two more Tendae as they approached the tree, taking them one at a time.

The first was no issue, but the second got a lucky root strike on Aspen, and Gargan responded with a blast of fire to its chest.

Unfortunately, right as Gargan acted one of the Lesser Rhythaes emerged out of a stand of crooked saplings. The sight of the flames enraged the monster and it charged at Gargan with a creaking roar.

Aspen and Jake intercepted the Rhythae while the other three dealt with the Tendrae, but the damage had been done.

A few more Lesser Rhythae and another ten Tendrae were heading their way from where they’d been hidden. It was all or nothing now.

“At the tree, there it is!” Alan shouted out, drawing their attention to three monsters that were emerging from a depression within the tree’s roots.

The first two were Tendrae, but Jake’s eyes immediately locked onto the third, larger creature.

Tendrae were five feet tall as a rough average, but the imposing monster Jake saw now was easily nine or maybe even ten feet tall.

While bigger than the Tendrae, the other creature kept the same rough profile, rather than the bulkier and more tree-like appearance of the Rhythae.

Rows of vertically aligned leaves still formed its body, but they were bigger and thicker than those of the Tendrae, with an almost glossy look to them.

“That’s a Woadite!” Aspen shouted eagerly, wrenching his spear from the dead Rhythae. “Watch out for its roots.”

Jake nodded and hurried forward to join Nepthys, who was moving to engage the closest of the Tendrae before the Woadite arrived.

Blasts of flame filled the air as Gargan started using his wand and Skill at the same time, targeting the Rhythae.

The tree-like monsters let out their unsettling roars and outpaced the Tendrae as they tried to close the distance to Gargan.

Judging the distance, Jake was confident that Gargan could deal with it, so he carried on to help Nepthys.

They needed to deal with as many of the solo Tendrae as they could, but the Woadite wasn’t waiting for them.

“I’ll hold it off!” Aspen called out as he rushed to engage the Woadite and the two Tendrae escorting it.

Jake wanted to watch, but a close call with the Tendrae he was fighting almost grabbing hold of him with a tendril had him give it his full focus.

Moby came swooping in with an aggressive quack, smacking into the side of the Tendrae and distracting it for a few brief moments as they struggled.

Deciding that the time had come to start using everything he had, Jake holstered his wand and conjured the Hidden Fang dagger.

Lunging forward, Jake struck out with the dagger and ripped up and through the leaves of the Tendrae’s chest.

The poisoned dagger cut through easily, killing the surrounding leaves and making them curl inwards, exposing the core.

A moment later, the Tendrae was wilting on the floor, its core punctured, and Jake was rushing on to the next fight.

Jake’s heart was pounding as he went from fight to fight, finding himself being pushed slowly but surely back toward Gargan and Alan.

There were only so many Tendrae, though, so they just had to outlast them.

Stabbing the Hidden Fang into the head of the next Tendrae, Jake left it in the creature as he went for the next one.

It would use up more of the Manifestation, but it was almost done, anyway. Leaving it in the Tendrae would kill it and save him time.

Jake looked around for the next target for a few moments before realising that all that was left was the Woadite and its two companions.

His arms were covered in cuts, and he had a deeper wound in one shoulder, but he’d kept the steady stream of enemies off of the others, despite it all.

What surprised him, though, was that the two Tendrae with the Woadite were still alive.

Aspen and Nepthys were both fighting the three monsters, while Alan and Gargan were supporting from a distance, but somehow they were still alive.

The reason became clear as Jake hurried over to join them.

The Tendrae were normally direct attackers, with little concern for anything else, but these two were using the trees as cover against Gargan and Alan.

All three monsters were in the midst of a sapling grove, one that ran alongside one of the streams that he’d seen earlier.

Monsters using trees as protection from their attackers was enough to give Jake pause, and he hoped fervently that it was just the influence of the Woadite.

If Tendrae began to act this way normally, that could be bad.

Then again, if an Awakened could have this level of impact, that was quite scary as well.

From what Jake could see of the fight, Nepthys was creating shields to block the attacks of the enemy, while Aspen was trying to get close enough to deliver a solid hit to any of the three of them.

The Woadite had more reach than the Tendrae, though, and was using it to great effect to keep Aspen at bay.

“I’m here. What’s the plan?” Jake called out as he joined the other two, who quickly pulled back from the fight.

“We need to get them out of these trees if we can,” Aspen said, wiping some sweat from his brow. It was one of the few times that Jake had seen the other man looked physically tired, and he wondered just how hard the Woadite was pushing them.

“It hits hard,” Nepthys said, giving Jake a warning look. “The roots that come from its hands are studded with spikes as well. Be careful.”

“We’ll stay back to give you room, but if you can get it out of the trees we’ll hit it with everything we have,” Gargan called out from behind them.

He and Alan had come closer, and were still taking the odd shot at the monsters, but there was just too much cover.

To make matters worse, the three monsters seemed content to wait where they were rather than chase after them.

Jake considered the situation before nodding to himself. “Alright, if we do the same as before again, but this time I’ll flank them and try to take out one of the Tendrae. We can whittle them down that way.”

“As good a plan as any,” Aspen said, lifting his spear as it burst into flames. “Let’s put some pressure on them, see if we can’t land some hits.”

Nepthys’s swords gained a Wyrd-infused edge as she followed Aspen back into the copse of trees, many of which were blackened and damaged.

Jake shifted to the right as they did, noting that one of the Tendrae shifted slightly with him, while staying next to the Woadite.

An arrow flashed past Jake to strike the Tendrae, piercing its leaves, but the monster then dodged the following fire blast from Gargan.

Fire flashed to the left as Aspen engaged the Woadite, but this time Jake was close enough to see the Awakened in action.

As Aspen closed in with it, the Woadite lifted its hands and a cluster of spike roots burst out, stabbing out like spears to try and impale Aspen.

The classer twisted and dodged, using the trees as cover while cutting at the roots.

Unlike those of a Tendrae, however, the Woadite’s roots were as thick as Jake’s arm and could take a glancing hit without issue.

Nepthys waded into the chaotic battle next, using her shields to block the Woadite while she tried to close with the Tendrae on its flank.

Even with both of them fighting hard, they were barely making progress. The Woadite was simply too big, too strong and had too many spearing roots for them to take any risks.

As Jake decided to press his own assault, he noticed that Gargan had landed two hits on the Woadite during that brief exchange, but neither had done much to the creature.

The glossy look to the Woadite’s leaves had faded somewhat where the flames had hit it, though, so perhaps it had a limited protection against fire?

Putting that aside, Jake rushed in at the Tendrae that had followed his movements, keeping a part of his attention on the Woadite as he did.

The Tendrae moved slightly forward to meet Jake’s approach, its roots shooting out to try and ensnare him.

Prepared for the attack, Jake swayed aside and hacked into the first root, cleaving off a large section. Following up on the attack as the Tendrae screeched in pain, Jake dropped his shoulder and rammed right into it.

The hollow Tendrae flew backwards, slamming into a tree and dropping down to the ground.

Jake was on it in a flash, driving his sword down through its chest. The weight of the downward stab let him pierce right through the leaves, and a lot of practice let him strike its core.

It wasn’t a clean hit; the Tendrae was alive, even though it was somewhat wilted.

Grunting with effort, Jake pulled his sword free and was about to plunge it back down when he was hit from the left by something heavy that tore right through his armour.

Jake was sent tumbling from the force of the impact, his side a bloody mess, and his eyes went wide as a second root cut through the space where he’d been standing a moment earlier.

Tracing the roots back, Jake saw that the Woadite had turned in his direction, the empty eyes of its humanoid face fixed on him as the two roots snapped back into an outstretched hand, which then began to swing toward Jake.

Jake fought through the pain and scrambled away, but the first root shot out again before he could do more than roll aside. The root itself missed him, instead digging into the ground, but the spikes along it caught the edge of his thigh.

Jake cried out in pain, but he managed to get his feet under him and lurched to one side as the second root struck a tree next to him, smashing deep into the bark before retracting back to the Woadite.

Off balance, Jake could almost feel the next attack coming his way, he wouldn’t be able to dodge this one.

A deep, aggressive quack cut through the sounds of fighting as Moby dove right down into the Woadite’s face, buffeting it with his wings and ramming his bill into its eye.

The attack did nothing to the powerful Awakened, the Woadite simply shifting its hand to send a root spearing up through Moby’s body.

Blood and feathers burst free as the Woadite killed Moby, but the valiant duck had given Jake enough time to drink a potion and get clear.

Casting the empty vial aside, Jake felt for the Mighty Drake Boon, relaxing as he felt that it was possible that he could summon Moby again.

He’d assumed that would be the case, but seeing Moby killed like that had been a punch to the gut.

The Woadite was quick to recover from the surprise attack, but Gargan had used its distraction to immolate the other Tendrae.

The one that Jake had mostly killed was using one arm to drag itself to the stream, and Jake was just about to go take out his anger on it when Nepthys screamed in pain.