And (N)one Shall Remain

“Fuck! It’s been buffing itself all this while!” Ethan yelled after he took a look at the flying beast. Alissa’s own [Analysis] had leveled enough that it returned more information than usual to her, and what it returned would have probably caused her to panic, were it not for her [Weather the Storm] skill. They were still halfway towards the lair’s entrance, and they knew that no help was forthcoming, except maybe for the Fifth Princess.

 

[Winged Scavenger Alpha Matriarch Lvl45 (Enraged) (Invigorated) (Greater Regeneration) (Haste) (Berserk)] was what Alissa’s [Analysis Lvl5] returned to her. Just from the status it displayed alone, she knew that the party was in real trouble, this time. There was no time for hesitation, and so she immediately activated her buff skill as well. “[Divine Blessing]!”

 

“[Raging Bellow]! [Taunting Cry]! [None Shall Pass]!” yelled Ethan as he caught on to her cue and made use of his own skills. The multiple skills stacked together, and combined with a few lesser skills from the guards around them to elevate the party’s prowess to its maximum, if only for a brief period of time. They all knew what it meant. 

 

Either they killed the beast or escaped its clutches before their buffs ran out, or most of them would likely meet their end right then and there.

 

Alissa had saved her other two active skills for the right moment. She knew that she would only have one chance to use them in the battle – their cooldown periods dictated that – and given their brief effects, she had to make that single use count. That one strike would probably be the party’s best chance to incapacitate or kill the creature, bar none.

 

While the royal guards and temple guards had their own set of skills, theirs were worse in quality compared to what the summoned [Heroes] got, with the best one of the group being the Fifth Princess. Unfortunately, even her best group buff skill gave barely half what Alissa’s own [Divine Blessing] offered, so the three [Heroes] were still the linchpin of the group.

 

The royal guards had not bothered to switch back to their ranged weapons, as they all saw how useless those had been against the matriarch. Instead, they took up positions behind the line of temple guards, long polearms pointed towards the flying beast above them. Ethan and Alissa joined the line of the temple guards, while Joshua remained at the back, looking for good opportunities.

 

While the remaining [Winged Scavenger Reapers] engaged the line – a futile gesture, as they were all blocked by Ethan’s [None Shall Pass] – the matriarch swooped in from above, in a swooping dive towards the wall of temple guards. Ethan immediately took a step forward and pushed the monsters blocked by his skill a step back as he braced himself to take on the attack.

 

What happened next was out of their expectations. 

 

Instead of the [Winged Scavenger Alpha Matriarch] being stopped by the skill, or the skill failing entirely to stop it, when the creature struck the invisible wall created by the skill, it visibly slowed a bit, while at the same time, Ethan was thrown on his back against the ground. The beast then continued its flight, though the delay allowed the guards it targeted to avoid or block the strike and saved their lives.

 

Several of the other guards’ long spears struck against the tough skin of the Matriarch, only to leave tiny wounds at best. The polearms and greatswords wielded by the royal guards met with similarly pitiful results. One of the long spears that struck true even snapped in twain as its wielder braced it against the cavern’s stony floor, leaving the metal spearhead embedded halfway in the beast.

 

It was a minor injury to the creature, at best.

 

Even when Joshua unleashed another bolt of lightning from his hands that struck the matriarch directly on its chest, it did little more than to leave a scorch mark where it struck, while barely causing a hitch at the creature’s flight. It did cause the beast to view him as a bigger annoyance, however, and one of its legs lashed out at him as it passed by.

 

Had Moira not reacted swiftly and tackled Joshua to the ground, the claws that crowned the creature’s toes would have torn him into two pieces right then and there.

 

She paid for that timely selfless act quite dearly, however, as the tips of those claws raked across her back, easily shearing through both the chainmail and the gambeson worn by the young girl and cutting deep, bloody grooves into her flesh. The injury was not one that endangered her life in the short term, but it was plenty to take her out of the fight nonetheless.

 

“Take down these reapers first! We can’t afford to be distracted against that thing!” yelled Alissa, giving a command for the whole group. She had to yell at the top of her voice, because their ears were still ringing from the Matriarch’s earlier piercing screeches, though Ethan’s skill at least meant they could ignore the pain from the damaged eardrums and the headache those screeches caused.

 

As if to put action to the word, she blocked one reaper’s claw with her kite shield, deflected its other claw with the shaft of her spear, and in the same smooth motion pierced right through its eye and into its brain with the spearhead, withdrawing her spear even before the dead creature could start to fall. The dead beast fell on its face right next to her feet, but Alissa ignored it as she headed to help Ethan. Two of the reapers were whaling on him while he struggled to stand back up.

 

Alissa took the opening that the reapers’ preoccupation with Ethan left to strike one from the side, her spear piercing deeply into its skill through its left ear. That gave Ethan a chance he took to rise from where he fell as he deflected a claw swipe to the side with his pollaxe’s butt end and then hooked the axe blade behind the reaper’s neck, pulling down hard with all his weight.

 

The [Winged Scavenger Reaper] stumbled and fell forward even as Ethan grunted and raised himself to a seated position, timing it so that his forehead struck the falling reaper’s snout directly. His forehead won that contest, and the reaper was sent falling on its rear end, dazed by the headbutt that broke its snout, while Ethan used the time he won to stand up, back to his feet.

 

Then he ended the reaper with a hammerblow that crushed the reaper’s forehead.

 

During their little tussle, the fifth princess had put down one of the other reapers, while several of the royal guards tangled with the last one. Fortunately, the Matriarch seemed to be fixated on Joshua, and kept swooping in towards him with its strikes. The temple guards had formed a defensive formation around him, knowing all too well that as long as he remained the beast’s target, they would have an easier time dealing with it.

 

It was a role that cost them, however.

 

Three of the temple guards already lay dead on the cavern’s floor, while more than half of the rest had lost their shields, as the beast broke them apart with its strikes. One of the dead guards was missing her head, another had been torn in half at the waist, the two halves of his body only connected by a long string of intestines, thrown a good distance away from each other. The third seemed to have tried to block a blow from the beast’s claw only for his shield and helmet to fail him, as his skull was halfway split vertically by the blow instead.

 

“Keep the bloody thing off me for a bit! I can’t focus for a stronger spell with it coming at me like this!” yelled Joshua from behind the guards. Mere moments after he said that, he had to duck own to avoid a claw swipe that aimed for his head, while the upper portion of another guard’s shield was reduced to splinters as he blocked the blow and diverted the strike somewhat. 

 

Fortunately that guard had the presence of mind to duck low even while he blocked and thus avoided his compatriots’ grisly fates.

 

“You got something up your sleeves, Smith?” asked Ethan as he and Alissa rushed back towards Joshua, their eyes trained at the flying Matriarch as they cautiously followed its every move. Just after Ethan asked, the beast’s next strike came and clashed against the barrier from his [None Shall Pass] skill, sending him down on his back once more while also slowing the Matriarch’s attack.

 

That allowed a few more strikes to land on the Matriarch as it flew past, though like before, none of the strikes landed any serious blow to the beast. The remaining royal guards flocked to the defensive formation after they finished off the last of the reapers, adding their weapons to the fray, and doubling the formation around Joshua.

 

“I’ll start working on it. Just keep that animal off me while I get the spell going. I’ll need fifteen seconds,” said Joshua, somewhat emboldened by the circle of defenders around him. Both Ethan and Alissa nodded at his request as they joined the defense. Ethan remained at the outermost circle, with the only two temple guards that had intact shields as well as Alissa all supporting him from behind.

 

A few tense seconds passed as the [Winged Scavenger Alpha Matriarch] flew in a circle above them, outside the reach of their weapons. After a moment, the beast finally banked into another swooping dive, while Ethan along with his supporters scrambled to intercept the beast. Like before, the [Winged Scavenger Alpha Matriarch] slammed against the invisible barrier from Ethan’s skill.

 

Unlike before, Ethan had not only braced himself for the impact, but also had three others supporting his back, their shields laid flat against him as they helped him endure the impact. Another half-dozen guards pressed themselves against the backs of those three in turn, and further solidified their formation, sharing the burden between ten of them.

 

As a result, the [Winged Scavenger Alpha Matriarch] was actually halted in mid-air for a brief moment, the momentum from its dive spent. The beast crashed to the cavern’s stony floor, but quickly regained its bearings and raised itself on its legs, its full height towering over the remaining members of the party. It gave another deafening screech at them even as it rose high above their heads, about to beat its wings and take to the air once more.

 

This time, however, its screech met with an answer.

 

“[Spell Merge]! [Mana Overload]! Take this, you overgrown flying rat!” yelled Joshua from the back of the formation as he raised and pointed both of his hands towards the [Winged Scavenger Alpha Matriarch]. 

 

The next moment, everyone was blinded for a brief moment as a too-bright flash of light filled their visions.

 

A scintillating bolt of lightning, one far greater in size and power than anything Joshua had ever created throughout the entirety of their dungeon dive so far, connected the young [Mage] to the [Winged Scavenger Alpha Matriarch] for a brief instant before it dissipated. The lightning strike was followed by the deafening roar of thunder that caused the cavern to shake slightly, dislodging many small stones from the ceiling.

 

It also made the [Winged Scavenger Alpha Matriarch] screech in true pain for the first time, a branching electrical scorch mark spread over its torso. The blinding and deafening blast also disoriented the beast, its eyes completely unused to such a bright flash, while the deafening thunderclap burst its sensitive eardrums, blood visibly flowing from its ears.

 

The moment the party regained their bearings and saw the still-disoriented beast before them, they struck with all they had.