With a greeting like that, the st of Natalie’s doubts were dispelled. Sofia’s exasperated suggestion that her css might make the bosses perverted was clearly not true—or at least not for this enter. The dryad seemed far more ied in turning them into forest fertilizer than anything.
Natalie didn’t waste a moment, seeing the dryad raise her staff. She charged forward. The four patches of dirt in each cardinal direeant something, but she kept that in the back of her mind—she couldn’t kly what until it revealed itself.
Quickly c distaoward the dryad, her oppo raised her staff into the air in reply, pointing the shaft of wood skyward. Her previously blue eyes turned white, vibrating with energy, and pathered at the tip, humming to Natalie’s magical senses—and then a half-sed ter, to her physical eyesight too, as crag white sparks maed on the gip of the staff.
The hair on the back of her neck raised, and instinct aloold her what to do. She flung herself sideways, her pn for charging head-first into the dryad relegated to sed priority.
A sed ter, searing white lightied into the grouly where Natalie had been headed. A thunderous cp echoed through the air, enough to leave her ears ringing, and Natalie briefly wondered how well she would have held up against a lighting strike.
Bosses weren’t called bosses without a reason—they were by the far the most on way for experienced delvers to find their careers abruptly cut off. Being roasted in a single shot wasn’t fully off the table. Though, a durable css like Natalie probably wouldn’t die in a si. Liz or Jordan, though? More likely, at least for a strong charge-up attack like that.
Which was why it was so important Natalie kept the dryad’s attention. She’d flung herself recklessly sideways, knowing she absolutely had to avoid whatever ining attack had been gathering at the dryad’s staff tip, but she still recovered smoothly, turniumble sideways into a roll and finally staggering to her feet. The powerful spell hadn’t beehe dryad’s eyes were still fading from their blinding white and back to their natural color, rec from the expenditure of mana.
Natalie cobbled together her own key spell. Illusions shimmered around her body, growing limbs and ons where they did. They were less refihan in her fight against Elida, because she didn’t use [Empower]. Burning progression points whenever she fought a boss simply wasn’t wise—that powerful ability o be saved for moments that truly mattered. If things turned sour, then obviously she would tap into that expensive resource, but if at all possible, she wao hahis with her base css.
Natalie arrived to the tall green woman right as she finished rec from her lightning spell. L her staff and gripping it two-handed, she swung in a wide arc before Natalie could get her own attack out.
Though seeming like a mage css, the dryad’s physical abilities weren’t g. Natalie barely mao duck the hurtling piece of wood, and it soared above her head with a whistle of wind that doubly firmed any attacks from this creature wouldn’t be a third as easy t off as anything else she’d fought thus far, barring maybe the mini-boss they’d gone up against.
Prior to this point, the humanoid monsters she’d been fighting had all beeher shorter or equal height to her. Dealing with the eight-foot dryad, not to mention her gigantic reach with her wooden staff, wasn’t an easy feat. Power and swiftness mattered, but so did the sheer reality of physical advantages—being able to swing and smash a gigantic rod of wood from seve away was rather hard to deal with as a shield-and-hammer wielder.
Still, practiced footwork and keeping a careful eye on the dryad meant she could sneak her own attacks in. The dryad blocked or dodged them, but every moment that Natalie kept the creature’s attentio safety—and opportunity—for her teammates. They had hardly been sitting around; Sofia and Jordan had edged in from either of the woman’s fnks, and the dryad grunted as bdes scraped her green flesh. The injuries oozed a dark green ichor, and it had a potent, disgusting smell, like rottih.
Irritated at having been surrouhe dryad smmed her staff into the floor, and a shockwave bsted all three of the melee fighters backward. Natalie grunted as she hit the ground hard, but quickly recovered. Sofia and Jordan weren’t as lucky, not half as durable, and not bearing Liz’s emp buff. A long shaft of wood hurtled toward Sofia, following up on the disabling spell, and Natalie only barely mao barrel forward, shield-first, into the dryad’s arm. The motion deflected the strike, her oppo’s staff hitting dirt rather than Sofia’s skull, but Natalie had put herself off ban the mad rush. A kick to the chest sent her crashing into the dirt far harder than the first time, and even with her HP, a rib might have cracked.
“I,” the dryad said. “You should be hoo return to nature.”
Bck sshes of energy ripped across the dryad’s body, one of Ana’s stronger, slower-eling spells maing. The creature grunted in pain as a half-dozen wounds opened up across her body, tearing into her leaf-woven clothing and the smell of rotting wood filling the air to an even more pu degree.
Abruptly, the sshing tendrils of power stopped having an effect, a white sheen of protective energy c the dryad’s body. The boss monster pulled her staff close to her chest and closed her eyes.
Natalie staggered back to her feet. It was effectively the tank’s job to be tossed around and bullied, soaking up punishment, but she still couldn’t say she liked being manhandled like that. It was impossible to match a boss monster’s might, but the disparity in strength still annoyed her.
She focused on the fight, those thoughts only flickering through her head. The dryad was clearly entering a special phase or attack—the white light proteg her, fending off their follow-up attacks with total ease, suggested that pretty clearly. Though special phase how?
“Safe zones,” Liz cried out. “Maybe?”
It was a reasonable assumption, and a fairly ei a boss arena, so Natalie sprinted for one of the dirt patches. Sofia, just a bit slower than her, havirying to break the protective white spell, threw herself the st several feet, the energy in the air building and the dryad’s special attack clearly starting to ma. Natalie grunted as she caught the white-haired girl and stopped her from tumbling past the edge of the small patch of dirt.
A sed ter, lightning crashed down in a torrent. Dozens or hundreds of the booming streaks of light scalded the grass of the arena, so numerous and frequent the noise overpped into one world-ending cacophony. A primal instinct had her g her wrists onto her ears—her hands were full—in an attempt to block the sound out. Even with her eyes closed, too, the flood of light turned her eyelids red.
Finally, several seds ter, the barrage ended, and the dryad sagged, nearly falling to her khe spell had drained her.
Which, of course, meant an opportunity for retaliation.
Natalie didn’t waste a sed—she charged forward. The powerful lightning barrage had expehe dryad far more than her previous spells, and Natalie was rewarded with a satisfying thunk as she crashed her hammer straight into the creature’s skull. Still, it was a boss monster, and insanely durable—it only sent the dryad stumbling sideways and climbing to her feet to recover.
The fight progressed that way for some time. Several times more, the dryad called that same ultimate attack down, and the team o go rushing to the small patches of dirt. There were a few close calls, with the timing window shrinking with each follow up. Bosses teo get stronger as they got weaker, the opposite of how fights ought to work.
Still, they were well-prepared for this fight, even having some of their gear stolen. The whittled the boss down, bit by bit. Ana’s spells of bergy tore into green flesh, Sofia danced betweealiatory strikes and poked and sshed, and Jordan delivered occasional devastating sneak attacks.
Ana was the one who cimed the finishing blow. A cascade of thick bergy spikes burst from the ground, impaling the dryad in dozens of pamely, oraight through her chest.
“I,” the dryad repeated balefully, gring at Ana for a long, suspended moment—then her face went sck, and the creature finally disied into motes of energy.
