Felix, meanwhile, was focused on Grimmar. The chieftain was attempting to bypass the fight completely, walking briskly toward the opened door and yawning darkness beyond. Felix cast out a Shadow Whip, intending to grab the massive Risi's leg and trip him up. Instead, something grabbed Felix's leg and hauled back. His aim was thrown, the spell falling short of the chieftain as his body was jerked backwards several steps. After those steps, Felix's new heavier Body helped him stop and brace, and he looked behind him. The prone form of Ossun had his outstretched hand clasped firmly around Felix's ankle. The older giant also had a surprised look on his face, as if he had expected that to go differently.
"Kill them all, Ossun," Grimmar said as he glanced backward without stopping. "Mother will forgive us."
He disappeared into the dark.
Shit!
"Rak len fala to'mak rati!" Ossun screamed at him, his rage reigniting from a momentary confusion. Felix felt the giant's grip strengthen on his leg, before he was sent sprawling to the side.
Felix's body impacted the ground with an almighty crash, the stone giving way beneath his strengthened Body and Ossun's enormous strength. Felix gasped in surprise, the impact driving the breath from his lungs yet again. However, Ossun had released Felix's leg as the Risi Commander regained his feet and loomed over the prone Nym.
"You...are...worthless," Ossun said in a stilted voice. Then he raised his right foot up high and drove it downward for a powerful stomp.
Rein of Vellus!
Lightning blasted all around him as Felix stopped the giant's boot with a thought and about 150 Mana. Even still, Ossun's leg began to shake and strain, moving closer with each moment. Still lying on his back, Felix cast his newest spell.
Wrack and Ruin!
A green orb condensed in his right hand, so dark it was nearly black, before launching with a powerful thunderclap at Ossun's enormous face. The blue bastard didn't even have a moment to blink before the fist-sized sphere punched directly through his forehead and shot out with a spray of blue gore.
You have defeated Ossun, Risi Commander!
You have earned XP!
Wrack and Ruin is level 26!
Felix gasped, stepping back from Ossun's death-slackened grip, surprised and a little sickened at the devastation of the giant's head. Yet he wasn't a fool, at least not always. He summoned two more dark orbs and sent them rocketing outward.
The deadly spheres were able to rip through a single enemy before they dissipated and he had to recast. As long as he hit them in an unarmored section, they died instantly, their flesh too weak to fight against the spell's powerful acid. Each casting, however, cost Felix upwards of a hundred Mana. He could manage about eight more shots before he'd be on empty, or relying on his shard's reserves.
I'll have to make em count, then.
Four more castings in rapid succession blasted out from his grasp, each one finding a giant's chest, head, or shoulder. Headshots were instantly fatal, but where the ball of highly condensed acid had to eat through armor it lost much of its penetrating power. It dissolved the crude iron armor the giant's wore, but only did moderate damage to whatever flesh was beneath. Pit, anticipating Felix's actions, used his Frost Spears and Wingblades to put the giants off balance. The tenku had embraced his Poisonfire as well, and was a green-lit torch on the dark battlefield, weaving between the relatively slow Risi like an immolating ghost.
Magda kept up her Force Walls and Stone Break projectiles as often as she could, trying to give them breathing space from the giants' massive reach advantage, but she was slower than ever. She was still strong though, and each blast of Stone Break or angled Shield Bash knocked back enemies, keeping them too occupied to properly assault Felix or Pit.
You have defeated an unknown Risi Warrior (x6)!
You have earned XP!
Less than thirty seconds into their fight, the ground started rumbling again, much louder this time. Only four Risi Warriors remained, but that was about to change; Felix could see a wave of dark shapes moving forward in the fog....from two different entrances.
"We have to run!" Felix shouted. "They're coming from all sides!"
Magda deflected a club strike, using the momentum to power her own spinning Shield Bash. The Risi facing her fell backward, it's knees smashed in at an awful angle.
"Into the doorway!" She started running in his direction immediately, and Felix made sure to whistle at Pit as well. They retreated.
"RAUKTA! Falla lokti! Falla!" a voice in the fog shouted, but Felix only ran harder. They were only twenty yards away from the door. So close. We can make it.
Then the air was filled with a whistling sort of hum, and Felix turned his head; just in time to see dozens upon dozens of crude iron clubs spin out of the fog, hurled with enough force to launch them like helicopter blades in a deadly arc. The ground ripped up, the heavy metal tearing through stone as they impacted, the clubs become tumbling dervishes of demolition. Debris exploded in every direction as blades of ice followed the clubs' paths.
Pit nimbly evaded two of them, but was only at the edge.
Felix and Magda were in the epicenter.
A bubble of yellow energy appeared around Magda and was instantly bombarded, flaring a dangerous orange-red. Another flickered around Felix as well, much smaller and tighter than Magda's usual, but then he was engulfed. Dozens of metallic clubs lashed into him and sent him flying, ricocheting within the storm of metal and rock and icy magic. Felix felt his Health drain precipitously, his skin tearing and muscles ripping, and a bone snapped in his right arm. Felix's HUD indicator had dropped to a bare 5% above empty.
Above death.
Armored Skin is level 32!
Armored Skin is level 33!
Cold Resistance is level 18!
Pain Resistance is level 36!
Felix groaned as he came to a stop, half buried under rock and maybe forty different hunks of iron. He felt like a building had fallen on him. Dust and blood was in his eyes, but Felix could hear the thunder of approaching footsteps. Panicked, he shoved his way free, shifting enough of the clubs to squeeze out of his cage.
The area was devastated. Five foot spikes of dark metal stuck up everywhere, piled together or lying at angles where they impacted the stone enough to stand erect. Ice swarmed over it all, frost clinging to the metal and snaking trails of ice led back into the distance to either side of them. The fog swirled, thicker than ever with a haze of dust and the greasy smoke of dissolving monsters. Felix sent a quick pulse through his pact, and Pit emerged nearby, seemingly unharmed.
Thank god, Felix thought with relief. But where's...?
Then he spotted her. An armored hand sticking out from beneath a metric shit-ton of iron and ice. With a grunt, Felix leaped in her direction, his powerful legs easily carrying him the ten foot distance. With his left hand, Felix started yanking the metal away, careful not to cause any of it to collapse. The clang and clatter was deafening, but he didn't care. They had to move. Now.
Felix revealed enough of Magda that he was able to pull her out of the cocoon of crude iron, though it was a struggle with only a single arm. She was in rough shape, her armor further dented and torn, the leather portions almost completely chewed up. Her legs looked particularly bad, the metal having sheared in several places.
"Wake up, Magda!" Felix shook her gently before slapping her face with more urgency. The thundering was closer than ever.
Magda's eyes fluttered open, her blunt features creasing into a faint frown. "Don't need to yell."
Felix's breathing was harsh and loud, the pain of his arm and the thousands of lacerations on his body all screaming for attention. ""The giants are coming. Stand up! We have to go!"
"I can't."
Magda pushed and pulled herself into a sitting position, but she didn't use her legs at all. Felix looked, really looked at the damage, and noticed a heavy smear of blood stretched between Magda and the iron pile he'd pulled her from.
"You can't walk?" He asked.
Magda shook her head. "Something...tore into my legs. Broke one, and my muscles gone all loose in the other," she didn't make eye contact with Felix, instead staring out into the fog as the tromp of booted feet grew louder. "I'm not going any farther."
"What?" Felix asked, flustered. "But it's right there! The doorway is so close, I can drag you."
And he started to do just that, despite Magda's half-hearted arguments. They had only gotten a few feet when a new sound joined the cacophony: the grinding and squealing of stone and metal.
The door was closing.
"Aaaargh!" Felix shouted, wordlessly hurling his rage. "C'mon!"
He reached down and lifted Magda, throwing her into a fireman's carry. He staggered under her weight, her six and a half foot frame far heavier than he had anticipated.
I've got 131 in Strength. I can do this.
Step by plodding step, Felix drew closer to the doorway. The ground was littered with debris, iron, chunks of stone, and slick patches of ice. Each step was more hazardous than the last, and when Felix stumbled for the third time, Magda pushed him away. He looked at the door, more than halfway closed.
"Stop this! We won't make it!"
"No, we can do it. I'm not leaving you behind."
Pit crooned sympathetically, echoing Felix's tone. Felix turned to the tenku. "Pit, run ahead! I'll be right there, ok?"
The chimera hesitated a moment before dipping his beak and darting off. Felix turned back to the shield warrior, who was tightening the straps on her last remaining shield.
"Go, Felix. Get out of here. I've got this."
"Why?" Felix asked, his eyes flicking between the closing doorway and the approaching Risi, who even now he could see through the mist. Magda swallowed twice before answering.
"Someone's gotta survive to deactivate the artifact," she ripped her pendant off and handed it to Felix, closing his fist over it. "Give that back to Callie when..."
"No. You-"
Abruptly, an invisible forced smashed into him, throwing Felix backward nearly thirty feet. He landed hard, rolling on the ground before fetching up against a hard object. Dizzy and a little nauseous from the pain in his broken arm, Felix turned back to see Magda staring back at him, her shield arm extended as if pushing something. Then the round vault door slowly closed between them.
No!
Shadow Whip!
Felix saw Magda smile gently at him an instant before the vault door closed, and his Shadow Whip flailed against impervious stone.