Mantle of the Gods

Charging phase meant one of two things.

When I was a Porter, I’d hear someone yell ‘Charging!’ and it either meant burn it down or run away. I should run away, I wasn’t going to beat it before it was fully charged. But I trusted my Buffer and Healer would keep me going.

“DASH!”

I charged, closing the distance and then hacking away at it the best I could. I aimed for the ribs because the spine was too thick and I wasn’t going to chop through that before it finished charging. If I had gone behind it, then I could have, but that would have taken longer and I just needed to disable it.

I saw its head bob like it was about to spit and that was my cue to start moving.

“DASH!”

I shot to the side and threw the ax in the other direction before I got hit. The last thing I wanted was to either be knocked into it or have it blasted into me.

I rolled up again as the stream of sand hit me. There weren’t a lot of places I could go that weren’t in either the direction of the snake or the direction of the supports.

I wasn’t close to a wall this time, so I got knocked a good distance from where I had first been hit. It felt like this one hurt less, but that may have been because the boss was weaker, or maybe because I was being pushed away instead of being pushed into something.

Either way, it wasn’t as bad, which meant I was ready for another round.

“DASH!” I shot towards where the ax had ended up.

The snake must have been smart enough to realize what I was after because it began slithering that way too.

“DASH!” I had to have a second boost to get me there. I slid again to make sure I grabbed it. This time I felt the burn on the side of my leg as I scraped it against the rock.

It was a small price to pay to reach the weapon first. The snake turned as I slid by it, but I was already moving again. I raised the ax to chop into it and caught the tail in my chest.

What was tail now anyway. I dropped the ax as I was knocked up into the air. This time my skin hadn’t been hardened and the blow knocked the wind out of me. I gasped for breath as I tried to get to my feet. The snake was turning around, but it wasn’t aiming for me. Instead, it began to slither towards the ax.

“DA-!” I couldn’t formulate the word. I scrambled as fast as I could, but that was barely moving while I couldn’t breathe.

Soft blue light began to cover me and I felt better. The open wounds started to close as air began to fill my lungs.

“D-...”

There wasn’t a point in finishing the skill as I watched the snake scoop up the ax and snap off the head in its mouth. The best weapon we had against it clanged as the pieces of it hit the stone floor.

I looked over at Aelin. The blonde buffer still had the dagger, but it wasn’t going to do hardly anything to this monster.

I started looking around for something else, but there was nothing but an almost smooth rock cave and the dust lining the floor.

The snake began to coil as it turned its focus back on me.

“Pebble shot!” I stared it down as I waited for it to strike. "Pebble shot! Pebble shot!”

The projectiles were doing almost nothing, but they were knocking off small pieces of it. A death by a thousand cuts. It wasn’t going to be quick, or easy, but as long as all three of our mana held out, we’d be fine. I just hoped Ether could stay alive long enough for us to break her out.

I turned my focus back to the present as the snake struck.