Dungeon Prowler : One Man Army

Chapter 12: action

Once the party of six made it to the outer periphery of the nest "plan?" asked the leading lykan "hasty annihilation" answered Leader, thus Lucian took out his daggers and flashed into the back, Bai took out his swords and stood beside Dustan and Balin while Fae fiddled with the gem on her staff, and Leader took out her crossbow. Dustan and Balin looked at each other, nodded, then looked at Leader for the starting signal, she nodded at them. two looked towards the heart of the nest and simultaneously issued an earth shaking roar, both roars seemed as if strengthening each other, it is a dungeon exclusive pair skill "greater taunt" it would cause every enemy selected by both users to target either of them, (for example all monsters in the nearest nest) all enemies within one kilometer are affected and all enemies with in three klometers would come closer to around 1 kilometer away but not attack until provoked.

Dustan with his blunted axes and Balin with a shield on his back and two hammers in hand -he basically just kept the same posture he slept with, they walked further in, Bai was beside them looking around and the rest of the party followed soon a horde came barreling on them, with Dustan and Balin as the targets the party only needed to be careful for some variants that were unaffected by the taunt or other enemies.

The trio in the front carved a bloody path into the horde while chatting "hey Balin, i still have priority for the repairs right?" Dustan asked, the sound his blunt axes made while brutally splitting anything that came in reach made his heart ache, " I want to make my babies broader at the edges, they are blunting too fast recently".

"Bah" retorted Balin while crushing a head and caving in a torso, "my hammers first you brutish nincompoop, how many times do i need to bash your head in to get you to remember that?" those hammers were made especially to cause havoc when they connect, not every monster hit by the hammers dies immediately, most lay there with broken spines or destroyed inner organs, immobile and dying sooner than later.

"Think about his poor brain master Balin, all the bashing surely caused some damage" Bai jabbed at the two while slashing a monster into bits, the ocasional bolt and fireball would fly here and there, from behind the trio, Leader was sending bolt after bolt at the incoming enemies while Fae was lobbing fireballs at the back of the monster horde, Lucian on the other hand would just dispatch the ocasional monsters that came by trying to surround the group. soon a volley of arrows fell around Bai, Balin and Dustan, the three dodged seamlessly as if the arrows were avoiding them, all the while talking and joking at each other, Fae, Leader and Lucian mostly stayed out of the conversation, no one would like to be the butt of the jokes these three had in their sleeves.

"Fae lass" called Balin " my shield is itching, how about a few popsicles for me?" although Fae was clever enough not to join the joking spree she was too irritated to just let it slide, so she blasted the area around them with a storm of ice spears then sent the last one between the legs of the dwarf "call them popsicles again and i'll get rid of yours" this prompted a roarous laughter from the dwarf "thanks lass but i have to decline, i only have the one, passed through generation, and forged in the hottest ovens, i can not let you throw away such treasure" he laughed and laughed while his hammers kept bashing and breaking whatever came into contact with them.

Leader started to cast her heals, and scolded Dustan saying "oy, bloody orc, when are you planning to dodge? i have limited mana and i don't plan on wasting it healing scratches" the orc felt wronged and pointed at a claw made gash that went from his elbow to hand along his arm "are these still counted as scratches? if so i might as well get master Balin to change my skin into steel or something".

Leader just glared at him and said " if i say it's a bloody scratch, then its a bloody scratch, dodge more or put on armor, you buffoon" with that she let a bolt whizz past his ear into the eye of a monster lunging at Dustan. Balin got a bit closer to Dustan and thoroughly checked his body as if appraising an ore "useless fellow, your body needs more than iron for skin, i assume i need to add in new bones and refit your rusted joints, too much of a hassle if you ask me" he then backed away as an axe flashed by his nose. Bai on the other hand was raiding a rather tall monster and guiding it to stomp on its fellows, "i doubt you can refit any of him master Balin" said Bai while the monster was trying to toss him off its back "but i think the odds are worse that there is an armor that can actually stay on his skin, an if there is it just pointless work to repair them" another axe flashed by, and the poor beast Bai was raiding was split in half.

As the the party dodged the incoming friendly fire while hacking, slashing and bashing their way to the heart of the nest, soon the horde succumbed to the brutal onslaught brought in by magic and sword and arrow, and the few stragglers left either ran away or lay injured beyond help on the ground. half an hour had passed, so the party went further into the nest and the cycle started again, the taunt, the jokes and the scolding, until they reach the heart of the nest were the strongest monster would be. this nest was filled with quad-pedal monsters that resemble a blend of wolves, tigers and bears, all fangs and claws, and thick fur.

the boss was a 5 meter long, 3 meter high chimera with black fur, long fangs and long bear claws and stumpy tail, when it made its appearance the party changed their demeanor, Bai retreated behind Balin who raised his shield and covered for the orc hacking at the remaining beasts like a madman, while Leader started casting her buffs and Fae was chanting stronger spells, meanwhile Lucian made his way behind the boss and started hacking at its posterior and hind legs.

The usual plan was for the dwarf to take the beatings, Bai to draw the aggro of the boss and hide behind Balin whenever the boss was striking, Fae would chant some type of continuous spell that keeps bombarding the boss till it fell, todays spell of choice was meteor shower: it brought flaming stones from the sky hurtling towards the boss, Leader was to heal and buff, Dustan would keep the monsters away from the party while Lucian would deal the critical damage to lower the mobility and hinder the boss at all times, quite an effective and well rehearsed strategy, by the end of the hour the boss finally fell and the group started to make its way to the next nest. this was what might be called a reckless efficiency.