338 CHPT 338: Pack Sync, Dead Disconnect..
Ghouls were unpleasant to the eye-- no matter how grizzled of a veteran one was. Seeing death forced into life once again as something wrong and rotten never became normal
Seeing them come back to life-- sort of, from their carcass pits in all their partially consumed glory was understandably worlds worse. Claude forced down the rising sense of disgust within him as he approached and raised his spears in preparation.
"Ashe! Take yours and deal with the others! Gil you stay with Frosty and attack when fall back." He yelled, surprising even himself when he noticed his lips never moved. It was getting easier to communicate through the bond.
It seemed receiving messages was becoming easier in turn. As soon as he finished the thought, Ashe backed away from the Undead Dweller and barked a series of orders and physical ques at the other Phantom Wolves before they all moved with the twisting shadows and confronted the partially consumed undead horde slicked in a liquid sheen of turquoise with magical death-bile.
The new enemies throaty wails and screams smashed into and ricocheted off the cold cave walls like physical balls of auditory agony, smashing into Claude's ears as he closed in on his target.
The Undead Dweller snapped and roared at him, spinning around defensively while it's sowed on arms swung at the pack of Monsters that now surrounded it.
"Remember what I said?"
"Yep." Ursula huffed in a deepened tone from behind as she rolled her hulking shoulders in preparation.
"Alright.." He said before feeling the smooth tensing of his partially changed muscles as he crouched. His eyes flared once before he exploded from his position.
"Ursula!" He spoke through the bond while lunging at the Undead Dweller. She stuck to his side like an icy eyed shadow as he and the Boss collided.
Before they could smash into one another, he dropped and slid against the cold stone floor caked in dried blood and vomit, raising his spears to slice into the left arm of the Ghoul that once was swinging at him.
SHLCK!
"RAAAHH!" The Ghoul screamed more in anger than pain as the arm attached to it's back swung at his fleeting frame.
"Now."
The words hit Ursula's mind and kickstarted her insides with the sudden explosion of a firework as she lunged and bounded over him just in time to intercept the blow of the sword.
THNK!
As soon as she landed between him and the Monster, she felt the rattling blow of the Ghoul's sword run through the entirety of her body, only made survivable by the steady blue glow of her Aura.
She slide against the ground in response still holding up her Aura shrouded axe defensively as Claude rose to his feet behind her.
Gil and Frosty who once paced where the two Lupines now stood were no longer there. Instead silently stalking behind the Ghoul in it's new position. It seemed they moved right when they needed to. She was slowly beginning to understand their method to the madness.
Naturally, she moved to go in again as Claude's shield to restart the sequence.
"Wait..." His voice came again to stop her mid-stride, sending with it waves of calm and focus as the violence rose and fell around them with the Phantom Wolves tearing apart the encroaching horde, "It's not our turn..." He added.
As if responding to the thought, Gil snarled in a reptilian dogish chortle as the barbs running along it's back shook intensely before it spit a barb into the leg of the creature. Frosty disappeared in a flash, just as the Undead Dweller spun to meet it's new attacker.
"SCRAAA--" It's wails were cut short in the midst of it's hideous skittering crawl towards Gil as Frosty dashed behind it, clawing open the creatures left leg that was already punctured and scorched by Gil's flaming barb.
SHCK!
"ACK!"
It staggered, struggling to carry it's heavy weight with the tendons severed in it's left combined with the damage done to it's leg.
Gil and Frosty danced and dashed across it's vision following the attack, while trying to avoid the distant surrounding circle of recently risen Ghouls.
Ursula's eye's flared, "Now?" she asked.
a blur of black and green flew past her vision from behind her just as she heard his reply, "Now!"
She chased, somehow completely comfortable with the thought that she wouldn't know his exact move-- even though she could almost feel how it would fit with what she had planned. Something evasive, not a killing blow-- but a set up for her. She could almost see it in the way he ran-- in the way his thoughts failed to send any message of finality.
No more than two seconds passed, Claude was on the creature in a flash, deflecting the wayward sword slash from the Ghoul before kicking in it's damaged arm so hard bone tore from flesh at the elbow while it stood on all fours.
CRNCH!
Before it could fall on it's face under the lopsided weight, he brought his spears together, holding it up by the throat high enough for his knee to crush into it's face with a series of gruesome and sickening crunches.
CRACK!
A rush of power washed over her following the action-- like a physical force seeping into her muscle and bone that pushed her to move faster as the Ghoul was knocked into standing on two feet-- a perfect stunned target.
Her eyes flickered, flaring from icy blue to the pure white of rage filled madness. The change swept over her further, bronzing her skin and spreading more dark auburn fur across her flaming muscles as she raised her axe and roared, putting all the strength she had into her swing.
"AAAARRGG!"
SWOO!
CHOP!
There was nearly no pull as her axe cleaved through flesh and bone only to reemerge doused in black rotten blood.
The Undead Dweller flipped and rolled across the ground in a twisting tumble of limbs and heavily leaking blood. If it hadn't moved last second, the only thing that would've been moving at all would've been it's upper body while it's removed legs fell at her feet.
In a panic it rose back onto all fours, the arms stitched to it's back flailed and grabbed at the stray reborn Ghouls, ripping them in half carelessly before scraping ungodly portions of them into it's mouth in a last ditch effort to regain power.
Claude observed the creature from across the cave, flinching and involuntarily reaction to the ripping and tearing sounds of the Ghouls falling victim to the Wolves in the shadows around him.
"It's trying to recollect the magic it spent on the corpses by eating them....but it's too late." He thought as the Undead Dweller regarded him through a smashed face and nonexistent nose. The claws that once laced through it's lips like a cage now stabbed into it's face and gums....a couple of their ends were tipped with his own blood where his knee was stabbed.
"[Don't count on it. End this quickly-- this is no regular Bronze Boss. Don't let up, mate.]" Arne chimed in.
"Right."
Following his words, Gil sent another barb at the creature from it's left, only missing due to the discarded corpse it threw accidentally absorbing the impact and falling to the ground as glowing embers and bone.
The Undead Dweller snapped at Gil and Frosty before skittering across the cold floor like a bug-- unaware that it was being herded back over to them.
"We do it all again." Claude said as Ursula came to a stop next to him.
"Ok. Let's work."
***
And work they did.
Ursula had found her rhythm-- her place. Just as Claude explained. Their cohesion grew like a weed, more vibrant and powerful by the second....by the drop of blood-black Ghoulish essence. The failure's and mistakes grew slimmer after every sequence until they were moving and flowing through the cave as a tornado of violence that spun it's wickedness whenever the Undead Dweller showed another opening.
They wore it down, ripped and tore deep, broke and evaded. All while the Ghoul's around them shrunk and dwindled in number, slowly showing that the Deviant Boss was losing it's regenerative meals.
The fight had changed. Now more of a hunt than a battle.
"Again.....Again....Again...." Claude spoke, keeping the pack in motion, spinning, dashing and dodging as they swirled around the Boss. The head of his spear reeked of rot from all the blood his blade had tasted. The other half of his weapon lay somewhere beyond in the dark cave, leaving his clawed left hand open and unarmed after taking a heavy punch only moments before.
Other than that, not many others took much damage aside from Frosty and the Phantom Wolves.
Relatively good considering what they were facing, but they needed to wrap it up. They still had five Infested Areas to complete before sunrise.
He had just the idea on how to put an end to it all, resulting in his hand beginning to rummage through his utility belt.
Ursula nodded at him, sensing what was to come as the Undead Dweller continued to leak blood all over the cold grounds, now missing it's back arms and partially missing it's entire left foot.
When he finally moved, nobody else did, confusing the Ghoul as he dashed and lunged around the creature, letting his spear and claws open up even more lines of red along the Monster's dirtied pale white flesh.
He continued, as the sounds of violence around them faded and faded until it was just him. Ripping and tearing into the Ghoul until it seemed like there was simply no more room for any cuts.
The final blow was only moments away as he closed in at it's front.
"AAAACK!" The Ghoul roared and rose up onto it's hind legs to swing at his head.
FWOO!
He dodged the injured creature with ease, all while continuing his press onwards to drive his fist through it's stomach.
SHHLCK!
"AUCK!"
The seven foot tall Ghoul leaned forward in response, barely enough life left to react.
Claude ripped his fist out in an instant, continuing forwards before back kicking it towards the onlookers yelling for Ursula to move.
She was moving before he even finished-- unaware that Gil ran beside her, loading up her Aura shrouded fist while activating her Skill (Mad Charge).
"RAAA!!"
CRACK!
Her fist connected with it's jaw so hard half of it completely disconnected from it's face followed by dozens of rotten black teeth falling all over the hard floor like discarded dice.
It stumbled backward a few steps in response to the torrent of green flames that erupted from Gil's maw after Ursula's punch before ultimately falling into Claude's outstretched glowing green hands.
FWWWSHHH!!
"AAAACK!"
In a flash, the seeds he embedded into the Ghoul's stomach and dozens of other superfical wounds burst to life, completely uncaring of the creature they ripped their way out of, ripping apart limbs, breaking and splitting ribs and bursting from it's mouth covered in blood and magic.
As if that wasn't enough, he grabbed hold of it's left arm, unaware that Frosty already had it's right. In perfect sync they pulled, ripping the creature in half with the help of the now dead plants and branches.
The ripped and torn mess of the Boss hit the floor with a wet plopping sound. Almost anticlimactic compared to how it presented itself in the beginning. So grand and horrifying, now laying in it's home torn by Nature and natural claws.
They all slowly collected around the creature in silence with Blackbeak arriving first to peck at the corpse much to Claude's dismay.
Ursula arrived last, looking down at the mess. She couldn't even accurately describe what she was looking at. It was like a Nature bomb just erupted from inside the undead amalgamation. Vines even spilled from it's eyes and snaked into it's opened jawless mouth.
"That was..."
"Yea." Claude said with a sigh, "Good jo--"
[+400 EXP]
DING
[You have Leveled Up!]
[You are now Level 25!]
[+2 Stat Points]
[10 Stat Points Available!]
DING!
[Congratulations! You have slain The Undead Dweller! Collect your Loot and Exit the Tangent!]
[+150 EXP]
Following the message, wisping spirals of magic rose from the undead corses, as if the loot rising from their flesh needed it's emergence heralded with some sort of somber light-show.
Weapons and gear suited to the users who'd completed the Tangent rose from everywhere, lighting up the dark cave with their faint glow.
"We really did it.....we completed the Tangent as a duo.." Ursula said.
Ashe and the rest of the Phantom Wolves looked at her with all the offense they could muster on their wolven faces.
"Erhm..my bad." She said before they all split up and began sifting through the Loot they'd earned.
Minutes passed in a flash as they worked diligently in grabbing what they needed.
"Oh HELL yes!" Ursula said, rising from the corpse of a reborn Ghoul at the far end of the cave while she held the twin axes in her hands.
"I thought you liked the big axe?" Claude said from across the room without looking at her while he slid his hands into the dark metal and leather arm bracers. They were simple in design and covered all of his forearms while giving him all the mobility he needed from his wrists.
When he was done putting them on, he sheathed his weapons and picked up his newest spear. One on the shorter side-- yet longer than the short spears he owned, and it's silver shining blade was quite a bit longer than the norm, rimmed by a glowing white stone-like texture.
If he had to guess, he'd say the blade was rimmed by a material similar to his sword back home. Bane of the Undead. Only less effective.
Before he could study the weapon any more, Arne spoke. His voice was laced with a heightened level of anxiety that Claude resonated with. He still felt uneasy despite their achievement.
"[Alright, I think it's time we wrap this up.]"
"Yea...let's get the hell out of here and hope we don't hit any bumps on the road. These Infested Areas won't wait up for us." He said before hurriedly grabbing his loot.
Along the way he couldn't help but slightly relax at their accomplishment. She was tough, they could grow at this rate and soothe his anxieties for what lied within the desert. They just had to keep going.
"Keep fighting."
