The Last Experience Point

Chapter 98: Ziragoth the Awoken Part IV

On the first occasion that Zach had ever used Unleashed Phase, it had naturally been with a Phase Level of 0. At the time, he’d been rushing through B6 of Yorna to save Rian and Lienne, and along with an increase to all of his stats, a mysterious black smoke had continually risen up from his palms as well as his feet, appearing above his footwear in the case of the latter. His skin had also taken on a dull glow. Not long afterwards, when he’d been forced to call upon Phase Level 1, he’d continued to experience much the same, only in addition to the smoke, the occasional burning ember would escape a hand or foot with infrequent regularity.

Days later, finding himself caught in the middle of a war between Elvish warriors and vampire-summoned zombies, he’d been tricked into entering Phase Level 2. This time around, the smoke vanished entirely, and what replaced it was a steady stream of embers that fired repeatedly from his hands and feet. He’d also almost died just from using the ability itself, as the combination of a High and Very High exertion debt taught him that, contrary to what he’d believed up to that point, he could not simply tack on as much debt as he wanted and pay for it—or die from it—later on; if he assumed too great a debt at once, he could very well burn the life out of himself and fall dead immediately upon using the ability. Thankfully, though, the next time he’d activated Unleashed Phase with a Phase Level of 2, he’d only taken on a single Very High exertion debt; and although it’d ultimately been too great for him to pay—even having used the ability on his sword to cut the exertion cost in half—it had not been too great for him to borrow. And the same appeared to be the case here as well.

Now, with twenty of the boss’s voracious adds stampeding their way in his direction and a bloodthirsty dragon glaring down at him through golden, lizard-like eyes, Zach’s use of Unleashed Phase pushed himself further than he’d ever gone before. And with that, a rush of energy slammed into him: one so great that it straddled the line between joyously euphoric and bitterly unpleasant. Overwhelmed by a number of strange sensations that radiated through every muscle in his body, he gritted his teeth and increased the pace of his breathing as sweat began to glide down both sides of his face and his body temperature felt as though it were skyrocketing.

“I’m okay,” he said, preempting the question he could see forming on Fylwen’s lips in the corner of his eyes. “It’s just…” He paused a moment to blink away some of the sweat falling down his eyelids. “It’s just a lot.”

His hands, which were both gripping the blade she’d given him, began to jitter and shake, though not due to fear. His fingers twitched as well. For a moment, he almost thought he’d drop his sword. But then he stabilized, regaining control of his motor functions, and in that instant, bright flames erupted in each of his hands and feet, surprising him. Removing one hand from his sword, he held it up to his face and examined it. The flame being emitted danced and jumped around the glove he wore, yet it did not damage the equipment, and he had the sense that it would not be hot to the touch. Almost as if curious to learn such a thing for herself, Fylwen tapped his gloved palm with her right index finger. “It’s not even warm,” she said, coming across as fascinated rather than bitter—always a good sign.

“I guess not.”

As Zach returned his hand to his blade, he noticed something else that was new as well; now, whenever he moved one of his limbs, including his feet, a cloud-like streak was briefly left in the air in its wake, almost like the contrails left in the aftermath of a passing jet. The impossibly black smoke also returned as well, but rather than come from his hands or feet, it now appeared whenever he exhaled; each time Zach spoke or released a breath, a plume of the dark smoke escaped his lips along with it.

“I give you my word,” Fylwen said, tapping the hilt of her gladius to her chest. “Should we live through this, I will heal you.”

“I know you will,” Zach said, truly trusting her. “If you wanted me to die, you never would’ve saved my life yesterday. I trust you. I really do.”

“I don’t deserve it,” she whispered somewhat shamefully.

“And I don’t deserve this,” he said, gesturing with the sword she’d given him.

She glanced down at the weapon. “My great grandfather’s blade is the only thing I have left of him or my father. Do take good care of it, young man.”

“I will.”

She smiled at him—but only briefly. Then a more serious look came upon her face as though her thoughts had turned towards the task ahead. Even still, she displayed none of the disgust, anger, or revulsion that she’d shown the last time he’d “allied” with her in a conflict against an army of mobs. And for that, Zach was grateful. If anything, the way she regarded him came across as motherly, concerned, and loving. It was almost jarring when considering how she had until very recently wanted nothing more than for him to die.

I’m starting to like her a lot, too, he realized. Is it because I miss my mom so much?

Taking a quick second to briefly pull up his stats, Zach couldn’t help but gasp with amazement at the sight that greeted him, which in turn caused a pitch-black plume of smoke to empty into the morning air from his sudden, heavy exhalation. He’d known exactly what to expect, and so the numbers he saw should not have startled him. Regardless, he couldn’t help but question whether what he was seeing was actually real.

Name

Zachys Calador

Level

19

EXP

47500/100000

Armor Bonus

168

Strength

207

Dexterity

192

Constitution

190

Intelligence

225

Speed

175

Luck

140

Due to the combination of his new gear, his previous level up, and the increased bonus from Phase Level 3, Zach’s stats were way, way, way higher than they were yesterday in the early afternoon when he’d gone with Olivir and the others to put the dragon to sleep. Then, he’d only had 93 points into strength: now, he had over two hundred, a number he recalled Donovan claiming that he himself never reached—not even with buffs. Actually, speaking of buffs, all the ones Vim had given him had expired, though he doubted there was any time to ask for them again as the Cursed Defenders of Ziragoth drew nearer and nearer.

Do these ones move slower than the ones from yesterday? Zach wondered. Or do they just look that way to me because my stats are so much higher?

“We must make haste,” Peter said, drawing his sword. It was a thin, but sharp-looking rapier with a golden hilt and a silver crossguard. He pointed it at the incoming mobs and shouted, “Valkyries! Destroy!”

“YES, SIR!” they replied cheerfully in unison.

As if to prove that their wings were for more than just show, all nine of the level-150, heavily armored NPCs blasted forward, hovering several feet off the ground as they soared towards the Cursed Defenders of Ziragoth as though to intercept them. And Gods, were they powerful.

The middle, center-most Valkyrie managed to stop three of the mobs in their tracks; she was wielding a large, double-bladed battleaxe with some kind of runic writing inscribed into the hilt. With a comically, cartoonishly girlish “hiiiyah!” she crashed the axe down on top of one of the wicked creatures, dealing an incredible 21,415 damage and cutting off an entire piece of its nose and lower jaw. She even struck hard enough to cause the beast to slam down onto its stomach, flattening it. Yet it popped right back up and snapped at her, attempting to bite her face off with its powerful jaw.

The Valkyrie retreated, flying backwards and dodging, only to then dash forward again through the air and rip apart the other side of the mob’s face. At the same time, the Valkyrie to the right of that one delivered a strike to the throat of a separate defender with the large broadsword she gripped in both hands; her blade caused an immediate gushing of blood to flow down from a deep gash she’d carved into its neck. And to her right, one of the Cursed Defenders of Ziragoth lost both an eye and part of its scalp as the flying, majestic, golden-armored NPC brought her mace crushing down on top of the creature’s face with enough force to also cause several of its sharpest teeth to be spat out like a bad aftertaste.

Zach watched, amazed, as all nine Valkyries brought their various weapons to bear against the boss’s adds, fighting them head-on—well, all except one. Of the nine, there was a lone, standout Valkyrie who hovered in the air at the midpoint between where Zach, Peter, Vim, and Fylwen were standing and where Peter’s Valkyries were dishing out tons of damage to the Cursed Defenders of Ziragoth. This one, whose name appeared to be “Valkyrie of the Ancient Tracker,” fought using a large, white-and-gold bow. Drawing back the bowstring, she released an arrow that looked made of pure light and magic; it streaked across the air and ended up between the eyes of Cursed Defender of Ziragoth 7T, dealing 33,215 damage and causing it to hiss as it was knocked backwards and planted onto its back. It too got back to its feet soon thereafter and charged the Valkyrie, whose bow vanished into thin air and was instead replaced with two curved daggers that she wielded as she flew forward and attacked it at close quarters.

Despite the incredible power these nine Valkyries brought to the table, if Peter Brayspark’s plan was to have the summoned NPCs deal with the adds while they slipped around and made their way to the dragon, it wasn’t going to work. Although they managed to occupy the attention of twelve of the foul monsters, the other eight ran straight past the Valkyries, four to each side of them, and then took off to where Zach stood with the others. They kicked up grass and dirt as they darted at the four of them. Unfortunately, it looked like there would be no avoiding a messy confrontation that would slow their progress.

Yet even before the fast, bipedal mobs had reached them, Zach’s attention was drawn to a gigantic shadow that formed over the grasslands as Ziragoth began to slowly descend down towards the raid as though finally ready to involve himself in the battle. Seeing him approach, Zach swore loudly, not caring who heard him. How the hell were they supposed to reach him with all these Gods-be-damned adds blocking their way? He supposed he could Phase Blink over there, but then he’d be all by himself and lack the support of the others. Right now, Zach’s battlegroup—BG7—was a lot closer in terms of distance to BG4 than they were to BG1 and BG2, which was where Ziragoth seemed poised to land.

“BG7, attack the dragon!” Mr. Oren’s voice called over the Comm.

“We’re trying!” Zach shouted back. “The adds are in our way.”

“Deal with them quickly, Zach.”

“Believe me, we intend to.”

In stark contrast to the nervous quiet that had lingered for most of the time between the first and second phase of the fight, the level of noise in this part of the grasslands had grown to become incredibly loud: in some cases explosively so. Ahead of him, behind him, and even nearby him, Zach saw hundreds of people fighting with nearly two-hundred of the lizard-avian mobs. Along with this came shouts, groans, cries for help, roars of victory, and the sounds of every kind of magic imaginable. There was a steady whooshing noise as well as a constant gust of air not far from Zach as Alixa conjured forth a tornado that repeatedly struck one of the adds for between 800 and 900 damage while slightly suspending it in air, trapping it. On its own, that might not have seemed like much, but it was being hit so fast that it was likely dealing several-thousand points of damage each second.

Elsewhere, Donovan was wailing away at one of the mobs while, to the right of him, another of the creatures was being absolutely ripped to pieces by what looked like a gigantic swarm of bees. It also had some kind of purple mucus running down its nose, and every few seconds, it would flinch and take around 1,200 damage. Zach wasn’t sure what was causing that, but if he had to guess, he’d say it was some kind of poison.

On the wall, things had somewhat stabilized, and it was difficult to tell which side had the upper hand. The tanks were holding their own, and they were supported by a sufficient number of healers, but at the same time, the casters on the wall were unable to actually cast without serious risk of friendly fire, and the archers had resorted to using swords, which they were clearly less proficient at, as evident by their clumsy handling.

Returning his attention to his own issues, Zach readied himself to meet the oncoming rush of mobs that were nearly upon him. Peter lifted his rapier as though also ready to engage, and Fylwen, for her part, bent her knees and extended her gladius out in front of her. Vim, on the other hand, took several cautious steps backwards and put himself behind the three of them. Zach doubted it was due to any kind of cowardice; he knew enough now about how the adventuring world worked to understand that Vim was clearly not built to fight things at close range.

Here we go again, Zach thought as “Cursed Defender of Ziragoth 7B” made its way straight for him. Time to deal with these things again.

“Hey, guys,” he said. While keeping their heads straight, Vim, Fylwen, and Peter all turned their eyes in his direction. “Be careful about taking on more than one of these things at a time,” he warned. “They’re really, really fast, and they’re super aggressive.”

“Noted,” Peter replied, bowing his head in what Zach took to be a gesture of thanks.

With the mobs just about upon them, he braced himself for combat. He sincerely hoped that, with his gigantic boost to stats, he could at least hurt the damn things this time around. Yesterday, the only way he’d managed to do any meaningful damage to these predatory, insatiable mobs at all was by getting lucky and having his sword proc one of its abilities. Now, however, he hoped he had the strength to not only retaliate in a meaningful way with each strike of his own, but also guard with his sword, too. He hadn’t been able to do so because they’d been too strong, and even trying to block against their strikes meant losing either his arm or his blade. But now? Well, it was time to find out.

Two reached him at the exact same time: 7B and 6Z. It was 7B that struck first. Releasing a vengeful-sounding chirp, it lunged at Zach, snapping aggressively at his face. Zach kicked off his front foot and dashed backwards, but the mob, just as relentless as any of those he’d fought yesterday, pursued. The mob pressed him, its sickle-shaped body shifting side to side as it raised its right claws and viciously swiped at Zach, who decided to risk guarding with his blade.

With his hands shooting flames and his eyes fixed on his target, Zach swung his sword with all his strength, hoping to parry and knock away the creature’s claw, which would open it up to attack. Part of what had made these so difficult to deal with was the inability to do anything other than dodge. At the very least, if he could use his sword to its full capability, it would make taking on multiple of these things so much easier. And so, hoping his blade wouldn’t go flying out of his hands, his sword met claw—and then there was a chirping-hiss as Zach not only succeeded at parrying the strike, but cleanly sliced the thing’s entire arm off, claw and all. It flipped several times in the air before landing soundlessly on the grass; blood spurted out of the now-empty socket.

48,301

“Wow,” Vim said, sounding genuinely impressed. “Nice one.”

Given the speaker, it was impossible to be sure if the words were truly meant as praise or if there was some biting follow-up remark about to be made. Either way, Zach didn’t care. He was beyond pleased with the result. In fact, for the first time since having the misfortune of discovering these so-called “boss adds,” it was him who felt like the predator. He even licked his lips. “Oh, you’re in trouble now,” he said with a laugh.

In a way that he almost found stunning, the mob displayed a behavior Zach had not yet seen: it backed away. And now, it was Zach who pressed the attack. With a loud grunt of exertion, he crashed his Sword of Light Amidst Darkness down upon the top of the creature’s head, splitting it apart and knocking its left eyeball out of the socket, dealing 63,500 damage in the process. Even as he saw both the number and the result of his strike with his own two eyes, he still couldn’t believe how hard he was hitting. And the mob, it seemed, couldn’t believe how hard it had been hit, because with half its head missing, it still did not die.

HP

188,199/300,000

Name

Cursed Defender of Ziragoth 7B

Level

90

Overflowing with a sense of confidence and capability, Zach continued to press the attack; this, even as two more of the mobs aggroed him, one to his left and one to his right. Raising his sword twice in fast succession, he deflected a claw from each, then half-ducked beneath a bite from the one on his left. And following that, he resumed punishing 7B. Pulling back his lips to bare his teeth, he angrily struck out with his blade. First, he held it slightly above his head and slashed downwards, reducing the creature’s head to nothing more than a triangular-shaped clump of meat and hitting it for 51,310 in the process. Then, spinning around, he sliced off the opposing arm for another 62,801. And now, lacking most of its head and all of its claws, the creature had been well and truly neutralized.

But Zach didn’t care. He wanted it dead.

He raised his sword to go in for a finishing series of strikes, but paused as the mobs to his left and right each lunged towards him, launching another round of attacks. The one on the left snapped at the same time that the one on the right scratched. To avoid both, Zach had to leap into the air above both their heads and front flip over the two of them. The moment he landed down onto his feet, he quickly spun himself around on his heels then hacked off whatever little stump of a head remained on the shoulders of 7B before finally plunging his sword deep into its gut. Yet, incredibly it still somehow remained alive—as unrecognizable and useless as it was.

HP

3/300,000

Name

Cursed Defender of Ziragoth B

Level

90

Zach rolled his eyes. Three HP? Seriously? He decided he’d just kick the thing in its leg or something. Lifting his foot, he prepared to end the creature and earn his xp. And that was exactly what he did: he kicked out with his leading foot, barely putting any effort into it—and then stared blankly in confusion as, for some reason, a random bolt of lightning appeared from out of the cloudless sky and struck the mob for 910 damage, killing it and depriving him of all the experience points he was about to earn from his efforts.

“Hurray!” Fluffles shouted over the Comm. “I kill-steal.”

“F-Fluffles!” Zach snapped. “Why would you do that to me?”

“Fluffles earn so many xp! I level-up!” He meowed happily over the Comm line.

Zach shook his head furiously. “No dinner tonight, Fluffles. That’s it!”

“No! Zach still give Fluffles dinner!” The cat hissed, and it too was audible over the Comm. Fluffles must have been genuinely angry, because not only did Zach have to dodge a downward slash from the Cursed Defender of Ziragoth to his right as well as a bite from the one to his left, but he also had to leap away from a bolt of lightning that was clearly targeting him on purpose. Having hopped backwards and out of the bolt’s path, he glared angrily at Fluffles, who glared right back at him from where he was still standing on the wall next to the Elvish archers, who were currently engaged in melee combat against the mobs that had been dropped all along the curved pathway.

“You’ll be eating air after pulling that! Did you seriously just—”

“Quiet on Comms!” Donovan roared. “If you have the energy to argue with Fluffles, put it towards aggroing the Gods-damned dragon, kiddo.”

Zach shut his mouth immediately. Only now did he recall that everything he was saying was being picked up and listened to by over five-hundred people, including the leaders of humanity, the Elvish queen, his girlfriend, the leader of every adventuring guild, and maybe even the media for all he knew.

“Fluffles, knock it off,” Maric said, the sound of strain and exhaustion evident in his voice.

Any disappointment Zach might’ve felt about losing his kill vanished from his mind as one of the Valkyries—this one wielding a glowing spear—was first to finish off one of her own targets. The moment the mob died, Zach was greeted with a very pleasing sight. It seemed that, since there were only four people in the battlegroup including himself, and since that “XP-share” thing was set to “Battle-Group only”, Zach only ended up losing half the xp that each of these were worth as opposed to three-fourths.

+19000xp

To Next Level

66,500/100,000

Hell yeah! Now that’s what I’m talking about.

It only really occurred to Zach right now just how much xp he actually stood to gain from these adds alone. Given his current level of power and how easily he could now handle these mobs, he could end up making some serious progress during this raid. Finally, he would be able to spring ahead and maybe close some of the chasm that existed between himself and Kalana.

No, no, what are you saying? he scolded himself. You’re not here to farm xp. You’re here to take on the dragon!

As though to remind him of this very fact, Ziragoth at last descended low enough so that he hovered only a dozen feet off the ground, and by the Gods, he was massive. The dragon was huge to begin with, and now he was at least twice the size he’d been when he was a T7. He also seemed to have double the number of spikes running down his barbed tail, and his teeth somehow managed to appear even sharper than they did before.

What’s he doing?

The dragon was behaving strangely. It was craning its head as though searching for someone—but not for Zach. Its eyes scanning the surrounding terrain, it paused at the sight of the mages on the left side of the wall. Then it looked to the archers on the right. Finally, on the heels of loud, terrifying roar that caused the ground to shake, it opened its mouth widely enough so that Zach could see the inside of its throat. Then there was a bright light, one that would’ve partially blinded him if he’d stared directly at it. There was also a massive bout of heat that he could feel even from over here. And with that, the dragon released a tremendous ball of fire that burned across the grasslands at the speed of a bullet and caused an enormous explosion that almost knocked him off his feet.

Instantly, a vast portion of the wall was vaporized. Thousands of pieces of destroyed stone and brick were flung every which way, many slamming into Zach or otherwise raining down on top of him. Despite not being flammable material, an entire section of the wall had become an inferno, with a heat so intense that it made Zach worry the hairs on his neck were being singed. And then there was screaming: so much screaming.

Casters, archers, and even a few tanks were crying out in agony as they were burned alive, suffering one of the most painful deaths imaginable. It horrified Zach. It reminded him of the scene he’d witnessed in the Den of Ziragoth. It broke through the confidence that Unleashed Phase had injected into him and left him momentarily paralyzed. If not for Fylwen shoving him out of the way, he would’ve had his face bitten off by one of the mobs.

“BG8!” Donovan shouted, his voice steady and commanding. “We have casualties!”

“On it!” Grundor replied.

At once, Grundor, Chumpkenwiffles, and a now-transformed Fluffles converged upon the flaming sight of destruction, seemingly impervious to the fire. Acting with apparent haste, Grundor began grabbing the burned, charred bodies and flinging them back over the wall, presumably in the direction of Olivir, whereas Chumpkenwiffles and Fluffles used their mouths to drag corpses through the now massive hole in the wall. Gods, Zach sure hoped they could all be revived. With that one attack alone, Ziragoth had just killed nearly twenty of them.

And he appeared to be ready to kill another twenty more.

No! Oh, Gods, no! We’re going to wipe!

A second blast of fire followed the first, and following another deafening bang, another massive section of the wall was blown to bits. The dragon even killed several of its own adds in the process. Once more, screaming voices of agony cried out for help. The sound of suffering and pain in their voice cut through Zach like a sharp knife. Those not killed instantly by the blast would be traumatized for the rest of their lives. There was no doubt about it.

“Kill them!” Zach ordered—even though it was totally not his place to do so. He couldn’t stop himself. He couldn’t listen to their screams any longer. With a sense of urgency, he shouted, “Stop hesitating and kill them!”

“Kill who?” one of the Elvish archers asked in reply. “Do you mean our own…?”

“Think about it,” Zach said, becoming frustrated. “Why let them suffer when they’re going to be revived anyway? They’re going to die either way, and they’re going to be healed and revived.”

“That’s true, but still, asking us to—”

“No, he’s right,” Donovan said. “Kill them. Do it now!”

As though immediately seeing the logic—and compassion—in Zach’s suggestion, the archers temporarily dropped their longswords and once more took up their bows. Then, with merciful quickness, they unleashed a volley of arrows into their own allies, ending their lives and their suffering immediately. Shortly afterwards, Grundor, Fluffles, and Chumpkenwiffles took their burned, dead corpses away and brought them to the vampires for resurrection.

“We have to do something,” Zach said, speaking to his three compatriots off-comm.

Peter nodded. “Believe me, I understand the need to move swiftly. It is our responsibility to deal with that infernal beast, and yet here we linger while the treacherous heathen brings death uninhibited!”

As though in confirmation to Peter’s fears, someone from BG6 began calling out in warning. “It’s going to fire again!” exclaimed one of the mages atop the wall. “BG6 will wipe if we take another hit from that thing!”

“Do not let it fire on us again!” Donovan shouted, now sounding rattled. “BG1, tank it as originally planned until BG7 can fight their way over to you!”

Despite none of this being his fault, Zach actually felt shame at the fact that their inability to get to Ziragoth had caused so much pain and death, even if temporary. He also felt terrified: not necessarily of the dragon itself—though there was also plenty of that—but at the idea that the raid might wipe right here and right now. It sure seemed to be heading that way. The dragon opened its mouth a third time, clearly intent on releasing yet another blast.

“Someone stop it!” Mr. Oren said, panic in his voice. “BG1, do not allow it to—”

“Worry not! I shall taunt it!” cried Londril defiantly.

As though it were solely to make his queen proud, Londril, the massive Elvish warrior who was already tanking seven of the Cursed Defenders all on his own, bashed one of the beasts in the head with his huge shield and then shoved another out of the way. Then, dashing a few steps closer to the dragon, he made a waving motion with his axe. Immediately, the dragon’s mouth snapped shut, pausing just before delivering another fiery, explosive blast at the wall. And with that, it turned its head and looked directly at Londril.

“It hast been taunted,” Londril said. “Hither it cometh!”

“Great work,” Donovan said approvingly.

Zach sighed with relief. That big guy could definitely handle things at least for a little while. After all, he’d taken hit after hit from the dragon during the first phase, and while Ziragoth was certainly more powerful this time around, Zach was sure the guy could at least hang on for a few moments while BG7 worked their way over there.

But Gods, he was so wrong.

Things were not like before. That much, Ziragoth seemed to delight in making abundantly clear. Raising his shield in anticipation of one of the dragon’s attacks, the two of them engaged in something of a repeat of earlier—only with a very different, far more unsettling outcome. The dragon spun around and lifted its now tree-trunk-sized tail, swinging it fast enough to make an otherworldly screeching sound in the air. Like before, Londril stood his ground and absorbed the entirety of it on his shield. But unlike before, he did not walk away from the attack unscathed.

Instead, his shield was shattered into several pieces, and he was swatted away like a Gods-be-damned insect. Zach watched on in awe and horror as the man was flung at an absurd speed in the direction of the wall. Yet somehow, as if to prove his warrior spirit, he managed to not only ignore the unbearable pain he must’ve been feeling, but the white-cloaked Elvish tank actually managed to straighten himself mid-flight, kick off the wall while somehow managing not to damage it, and then launch himself right back at Ziragoth at an even faster speed than he’d been hurtled. With a loud battle-cry, he raised his axe as he flew closer and closer to Ziragoth.

And then Ziragoth opened his mouth and bit him in two halves, causing a shower of blood to rain down on top of a now badly demoralized BG1, who reacted with such fear and disgust that they began losing the battle they’d been winning against the adds. There were screams of terror, and despite the angry shouts that came from Donovan and even Mr. Oren, their morale collapsed, their courage fled them, and they began to retreat in the direction of the wall.

“Don’t you dare run away, you cowardly bastards!” Donovan yelled. Spitting out a wad of saliva, he whacked the Cursed Defender of Ziragoth he was fighting in the face with his battle-axe then shoved his way past it, heading for the dragon.

“Get it away!” a member of the Royal Roses cried. The dragon had somehow aggroed onto him and was advancing towards his position. “Boss, please! Help!”

The reaction from Vim stunned Zach almost as much as everything else taking place. “I’m coming!” Vim shouted urgently into the Comm. This time, it was Zach who had to grab him and stop him from running off, and his level of surprise increased tenfold by how forcefully Vim struggled to break free. Did this mean he actually cared about his guild-members? Were the political guilds even capable of such a thing?

“Boss!”

There was a loud crunch, and then another crunch, and the man was swallowed whole—all but his head and a tiny portion of his neck, which the dragon spat out and which was technically all that Olivir claimed he needed to bring someone back. Though, looking at what remained of the man, it was hard to imagine him growing…well, an entirely new body.

If he says he can do it, he can, Zach reminded himself. Olivir is the most reliable person I’ve ever met.

Having become totally broken and panic-stricken, all of BG1—aside from Maric and Spider—continued to ignore Donovan and Mr. Oren’s orders as well as everything else going on around them as they fled haphazardly towards the wall. Even with the dragon upon them, it was, by far, the worst thing they could have done. Because now, in addition to the futility of trying to outrun Ziragoth, they were also set upon from behind by the dozens of Cursed Defenders of Ziragoth that they’d only just been winning handily against; now, the creatures chased after them: ripping, biting, and successfully killing more than a dozen of them while Ziragoth stomped down and actually crushed even more of BG1 under its massive feet. Once more, Zach couldn’t help but question the limits of Olivir’s ability to bring back—and heal—those whose head remained attached to their neck, as before his very eyes, Zach witnessed humans—and a few Elves—become literally squished to the point that their eyes popped out of their sockets and their teeth spilled out onto the grass.

“Stop running!” Mr. Oren pleaded with them. “You’re better off fighting and dying!”

Resurrection or otherwise, Zach knew that he did not have the right to criticize their cowardice, because he understood their fear very, very well. He empathized with it. It resonated with him. He knew how terrified they were of the dragon, because he was just as scared. And now, as BG2 rushed in to take their place, dragging their own adds behind with them, Zach looked over to Kalana and began to wonder if it was time to grab her and go. This was going to be a wipe, wasn’t it? It was sure looking that way. And the one thing that Zach could not—would not—do was witness Kalana’s death or serious injury. He would lose it. He would lose every trace of sanity if that happened. He couldn’t allow it!

Maybe I should get her out of here and take her to Archian Prime.

“Fylwen,” he began, “we should think about—”

“No,” she said as though reading his mind. With a deft, agile stroke of her shortsword, she finished off the mob in front of her and earned the four of them another +19000xp. “Hold strong. We have what we need to triumph.”

“W-we don’t,” Zach said, once more having to be shoved out of the way, as he felt his own fighting spirit becoming undone. “This was a mistake. We can’t win.”

Of all things, Sir Peter Brayspark laughed at his concerns. “And if so?” he asked. “Are you fighting for your own life, or do you fight for your love of another?”

Zach regarded him a moment—then ducked to avoid having his head taken off. “I’m fighting for Kal,” he said.

“The Elvish girl, yes?”

Fylwen nodded in Zach’s place. “Correct. My daughter. Your God-niece.”

With seven fast, elegant strokes of his rapier, Peter eliminated the Cursed Defender of Ziragoth 7S that stood before him. “Then focus only on that,” he said to Zach as the mob fell over and died. “If you flee, it shall be but a matter of time before the dragon finds you. Would you face the girl again knowing you cowered in shame and abdicated your duty to protect this world? I dare say I do not think she plans to quit the fight. For the sake of the Gods, Zach, you are a human being, and you are brave! Show that to the world, lest you degrade yourself in the eyes of our Gods.”

+19,000xp

LEVEL UP!

20 (19)

Luck

+1 (141)

XP Required for Level 21

130,000

(LEGENDARY UNIQUE) Gacha Get’cha Acquired!

(STANDARD L20 PASSIVE) Enhanced Item Information I Acquired

Zach was so conflicted about how to proceed that he didn’t even care what his new ability did. After what happened last time, it wasn’t like he was going to make the mistake again of trying something new in the heat of battle. Thus, whatever “Gacha Get’cha” did, he’d learn about it later. And as for the other thing, he already knew what that was: it would allow him to see the level of his equipment from now on whenever he looked at it in his inventory. He knew this because he’d already been told in advance that he’d acquire it. Yesterday, when Fluffles had delivered to him his new sword, it’d been explained to him that, at level 20, everyone of every race gained the ability to view the specific level of any given piece of equipment, such as his sword, which he’d been told was level 65.

And so, putting his level up out of mind, he took a moment to consider Peter’s words. Fundamentally, he knew that the man was right. Regardless of his impulse to keep Kalana safe, he knew that Kalana wasn’t going to flee the battle this time around. This confrontation…this was pretty much all there was. It was their final stand. Losing here meant the death of everyone on Galterra. Even if he managed to escape with her to another planet, it would be a lonely world without other people in it. Sure, there might be some adventurers here or there who’d escaped to Angelica’s, and there would still be those on Archian Prime, but all the rest of society would be gone. All of his dreams would be gone. He and Kalana would exist in a world devoid of modern civilization. She would hate that, and so would he.

“Can we really win this?” Zach asked hesitantly as he sliced one of the boss adds across the face and proc’d his beautiful green aura that increased the duration remaining on Unleashed Phase all the way up to 17:22.

Even as they fought back against their attackers, all three of them nodded in the affirmative. This only caused Zach to shake his head in confusion. How could they be so certain? “Look,” he said, “if you guys think I can kill that thing just because my stats are this high, you really need to—”

“That’s not what we think,” Vim said. He jammed his staff into the ground, and then out of thin air, ten gigantic boulders popped into existence and crashed down on one of the Cursed Defenders of Ziragoth that was applying a great deal of pressure to Fylwen’s right flank. Each boulder struck for over 15,000 damage, and by the time the last had fallen, the mob was nearly dead. Despite having pulled aggro right off of Fylwen, Vim Alazar motioned with a flick of his wrist, and then from beneath the soil, several stones burst through the ground and formed something of a cage around the mob, rooting it in place.

“You don’t?”

“No, Zach. We know that even with your current stats, you’re no match for what is essentially a level-570 mob.”

“Then how the hell do you expect us to win?”

Vim grinned cheekily, then shrugged. “Oh, that’s easy. I’m going to cast my Zone of Enfeeblement on you, Zach.”

“And that is, what, exactly?”

“It’s a curse and a debuff that inflicts you with T2 poison, T3 confusion, strips you of any stat-enhancing buffs you might have, cuts your own stats directly in half, and prevents anyone from healing you while making any wounds you currently have even worse.”

As Vim started to laugh, Zach nearly lost his head and had to raise his guard at the last second to defend himself. “Okay, so yeah, basically we have no plan and we’re dead. Just great.”