Tier Five? And a Boss at that?
What could we, at just tier two, do to a tier five? How tough was it? My wizardly one in my physical stats mapped to 10 HP, and my two in mana and memory to my 21 in MP. What would that mean for the beast? Did pools double every level? Jump up by ten? Either way, it was well above us.
The beast roared, charged, and took a chunk out of a tree as Eimear dodged. A whole chunk. Nearly the entirety of what my whole stamina pool took to do with an axe, it did with a glancing blow.
We couldn't fight this! How was this supposed to be a tutorial? Or was this the part where we died and we got a lesson on resurrection? Drop a backpack, run back to it, pick up stuff, and have a good laugh? Would God reincarnate us again? Or would this be it?
Sé tried to flank the Boar-hemoth, but it was surprisingly agile. The moment Sé found an approach, the boss dashed across the field to rundown Eimear. She juked around a tree as she launched another orb spell attack that fizzled against its thick, crusty hide. Meanwhile, the beast took out another chunk of the forest with its tusks.
I needed to help. But how? My spells all had a range of close -- except my divination ones which were medium. Not to mention, I didn't have any spell that could deal damage.
But I could add an element to someone's attack.
"Curses," Sé said as he realized he missed a window, and ran after the thing. I ran alongside him.
"[Add Element Wind]." I touched his shoulder as mana flowed into my best friend.
I hoped that would make him faster, but we were both just as slow as we were the moment before. He threw a knife, wind twirled around the blade as it flew through the air connecting with the haunch of the boss. The blade bounced off the hide, and clattered uselessly to the forest floor.
We followed the forest boss into the clearing where all three of our crafters had scattered. Gormán was mid-stride, running to hide behind our pile of logs while both Blánaid and Torcán dashed off to the side.
The beast locked onto Gormán the moment it charged into the clearing, and crashed right through the logs. Gormán barely managed to dodge roll out of the way. The collision slowed the beast down as it knocked logs every which way, then stamped over them. It's steel like hooves cut through the logs turning them into nothing more than oversized firewood. Hours of work vanished in a moment.
"Gods damn bastard," Torcán shouted. "That's our hard work!" He'd had enough, and he picked up a makeshift axe. He swung, but the blade bounced off the side of the beast's thick fur. "What the..." He swung again. "Die already!"
"It's tier five!" I shouted. "Can we fight it?"
"Tier five?" Torcán's eyes went wide.
"Yeah. And a boss at that."
"What? No way. No how. Each tier is --" He was interrupted as the beast tried to bite at him. He stumbled backwards.
"It doesn't matter!" Eimear shouted as she caught up and cast a spell along her blade. The rusty short sword glowed in blazing red as she thrust it towards the beast. She connected with its haunch, the blade barely pushing past its fur and the boss roared. "We don't have a choice. We have to fight. We have to win! Risk it for the biscuit!"
Waves of magical fear emanated from the beast, once more freezing me in place. I knew without a shadow of a doubt that this would be where I died.
[ Fear Roar. You are paralyzed until broken out of it. ]
The popup flared up in front of me.
The giant glowered over its shoulder at the offending Mage-Knight, and kicked its back leg at Eimear's head. She got her shield up in the nick of time before she was knocked bum over tea kettle backwards. Seeing how badly she got rolled, Sé paused, before thinking better of jumping on the thing's back. He only had daggers -- no sword, no magic, and no shield to hide behind.
"We can't fight. We need to run," Torcán said as he crawled backwards.
I picked up and threw a rock to try to distract it, but it bounced off. An annoyance of a headache rocked through my brain, then the fear came back twice as strong.
[ Warning. You are a Non-Combatant. While you may defend yourself, actively attacking another will have consequences. You have been warned. ]
Adrenaline rushed through me, and I collapsed to my knees. I held onto my chest, and hugged myself. I was going to die here. There was nothing I could do. The thoughts came unbidden, one after the other, as a cavalcade of despair.
I needed to do something. Anything. I reached around, my hands shaking, to grab another rock. The beast roared, and I was once again crouched down, covering my head with my arms.
I took a deep breath. I knew these kinds of thoughts. I'd lived with them. I could manage them. I could live with knowing that I was going to die, but I couldn't live with doing nothing. I had to do something. I had to push through to get stuff done my whole life. I had never felt comfortable. This was nothing. Just a little distraction.
I looked around to try to find some way I could contribute. There had to be some utility I could put to use. I needed to think about this differently.
"[Extrude Wood]."
The boss had damaged the logs, it took chunks out of trees, but the thing was still massive. It couldn't just go wherever it wanted. I could build tunnel ways between the trees, giving Eimear and Sé options to retreat. We could trap it, and bleed it.
Deep breath. Accept the fear. Do the work anyways.
This was still winnable.
I grabbed one of the logs that had rolled to the edge of the clearing, pointed my staff at it, and cast Extrude Wood to lift it and force it against two trees.
I ignored the clashes behind me as I got the log in place. I moved to my left and started on the next one, as I wrapped that one up, I looked over my shoulder. "I'm building barricades, hide behind them as you need them."
The beast lunged at Torcán. It knocked his axe away, and slammed its shoulder into the tall elf. He was knocked to the ground. He tried to roll away, but the beast took a step forward. It walked over the man. One hoof in the gut, another in the head, and it was over. He was gone. Dead.
Something inside me broke. Torcán's leg twitched as the beast shook the corpse off of its leg. Blood dripped from its underbelly, and it let out a terrible roar.
Isn't it supposed to take longer for a person to die? Shouldn't there be critical health warnings? Injuries that weaken, but can be healed. People aren't supposed to just die. People don't just die.
Torcán just died.
Another flood of fear washed through my brain. Another reminder of the situation we were in.
"Torcán!" Eimear shouted in agony, as she pushed herself up.
"RUN!" Sé shouted, as he grabbed Blánaid's hand and dashed through the trees on the opposite side of the clearing from me.
That did it. I fled. There was nothing to be done here. This wasn't a fight that we could win. This was the world deciding that we were nothing.
I didn't care where I went. But I couldn't be here. I didn't know what was in these woods, but it had to be better than getting trampled by a monstrous boar. My legs burned as my stamina plummeted. I barely paid attention to my surroundings as I only thought about getting as far away as possible.
There was the occasional roar, and the sounds of fighting in the distance behind me. How could they still try to fight? They should run too. There was nothing for us.
I tripped over a root at one point and ate dirt. I pushed myself up, and I swore I saw the trees behind me cracking, so I got up and ran. To my right I heard some shrieking, and I didn't think it was human... or elf. I turned away from it, and kept running.
I slowed for a moment when I'd realized I hadn't grabbed my staff when I fell. I should go back for it. Then I heard some far off howl, and I kept running.
One foot in front of the other. Until my stamina bar emptied, and I couldn't keep going.
I looked around. I had no idea where I was. Somewhere deep in these woods. I leaned against a tree. Either I escaped, and I was going to have to contend with some new horror, or the beast followed me, and I was about to die alone.
I caught my breath, as the pounding in my ears slowly subsided. Birdsong echoed through the canopy, and leaves rustled. But there were no other sounds.
I might've been safe, but I realized -- I was alone, and I couldn't fight.