Chapter Thirty One - 031"Help them, mage," Harn pointed at the flippy girl and the mage, who was just getting to his feet. The shield warrior was helping to steady him, and Felix noticed an empty glass vial in her hand.
Healing potions? Maybe I can get some refills.
"What about you?"
The man cracked his neck, small overlapping plates allowing his weird helmet to flex. "I'll be keeping this one busy."
Felix nodded, checking his Mana.
He was still over 80%. More than enough, probably.
Felix started running toward the giant, moving as fast as he could. The lightly armored young woman was fighting alone at this point, the mage still orienting himself as he passed by at speed. The shield warrior and mage gave him a strange look, but Felix didn't bother with them yet.
"Magda! Let's do this!" Harn called, apparently to the shield warrior.
The giant was fighting in a section of the ruined city that had several remnant walls and columns. The agile fighter was weaving in and out of them, trying to stay one step ahead of the powerful creature.
Analyze
Health: 344/890
Stamina: 210/488
Mana: 15/75
Felix reached out a hand and formed shadow Mana, Fire Within on blast as he shaped the Mana internally. The twists of Shadow Whip were strange to him, not as complex as Stone Shaping perhaps, but weirder somehow. The Mana pattern felt sticky and pervasive, yet tightly compacted in a way that made him briefly dizzy. Shaking his head, he dropped his attempt and kept it simple. Once he was within range he activated the Skill as normal.
Shadow Whip!
A tendril of darkness latched outward, tangling up the giant's legs. It was like a spider web, tacky to the touch and shining dully in the moonlight.
The giant, who was running toward the young woman, stumbled and fell to its knees.
Shadow Whip is level 12!
At the same time, the young woman with black hair flung her chain around a column, tightening it and somehow slingshotting herself around it, throwing her up in to the air above the giant. The chain unraveled, pulling back into her grip as she fell like a rock onto the giant's back. The chain, which he now noticed was definitely bladed, looped around their head with a quick flick of her arm, and Felix saw her grin.
It was a manic, irrepressibly gleeful sort of grin.
Then he was at the giant himself, who reared back, suddenly leashed by the small woman on his back and shoulders. Taking the opening, Felix wound up a Corrosive Strike, blasting the Risi Warrior right in the gut. The armor dented and the giant doubled over even as the woman on its back started choking it.
The giant slammed it's hands around, smashing into the ground and throwing Felix off into a wall. The wall cracked and the ice on it sheared off in large sections.
Armored Skin is level 15!
+1 VIT
"Uugh." His Health and Stamina were both down below 60%.
Wobbling, he got back up.
The chain fighter was hanging off the giant's back, who was now on its feet and smashing blindly into ruined pillars.
Felix ran back in, this time directing dual Acid Streams at the blue skinned warrior. His acid ate into its exposed flesh, burning it with an audible sizzling.
"UGH! That smells terrible!" The warrior gagged and did a running leap over a ruined wall, yanked her chains backwards with her. Using the wall as a fulcrum, the giant was leveraged back as it flailed his arms at the chain tightening around its neck.
Felix dropped his Acid Stream and darted forward, throwing Corrosive Strikes as fast as he could into the giant's center mass. After the fifth shot, its breastplate fell apart. It swung at him, but it was simple enough to dodge back, then close again. Three more strikes and he could feel its rips crack After the twelfth shot the giant's eyes rolled back into its head and it collapsed.
Corrosive Strike is level 16!
Corrosive Strike is level 17!
Corrosive Strike is level 18!
Physical Conditioning is level 19!
The chains suddenly tightened and cut into the Risi Warrior's neck, half decapitating the monstrous giant.
A Risi Warrior is dead!
XP Earned!
"Not a fan of that," Felix blanched as he saw clearly into the creature's ruined neck meat. A leather clad blur flipped up and over the wall, landing in a perfect gymnastic dismount next to him. She turned to him, pulling her hair out of her face.
"Hi! I'm Evie!" She beamed, her rounded face appearing younger than he suspected. The girl flicked her forearm and her spiked chain unraveled from the corpse, a second flick wrapped it back around her own arm. She had pale skin, green eyes, and straight black hair that hung from a convoluted braid around the crown of her head. "Who are you?"
"Evie! Your help, if you please!" Vessilia's proper voice shouted out from nearby.
Felix looked at Evie and shrugged. "Time to go, I guess."
He headed toward the voice. Evie followed after.
"It's just so weird to see someone out here! How long have you been fighting these things?"
"Uh," Felix ducked under a low column. "Like a half hour?"
"Ahh!"
Vessilia landed before them, holding the mage in her arms, who was covered in a layer of frost. The slender mage pushed Vessilia away from him.
"Enough! I'm not a child!"
"You need to stay back here," Vessilia said, looking back toward the cloud of smoke and debris she had just escaped. She had found a spear somewhere, eight foot long and entirely made of metal. "That leader is extremely powerful. Not even you could take it alone, Ser Nevarre."
Felix felt their eyes orient on him, but he was too busy trying to pierce through the smoke cloud. Silvery sparks and flashes of purple white Mana flared and faded, and he could clearly hear the sounds of at least...three people moving and grunting in combat.
"Damn this fog! I can barely see my feet, let alone the giants. How many are there?" Atar's hand lit on fire as he raised it up, as if it was a torch. "It sounds like an army!" Felix looked at him, askance.