Chapter 92: Dust

Rise of the Living Forge

“I changed my mind,” Reya yelled over the cacophony. “Can we leave?”

Bit too late for that, I think.

The Bonehemoth reached out toward Arwin, massive fingers casting a shadow through the room as they passed over him. He activated [Scourge] and leapt out of the way as the hand crashed down and slammed into the stone with enough force to generate a small earthquake.

Arwin landed, stumbling from the tremors, but managed to keep his footing as he brought Verdant Blaze crashing down on the side of the monster’s arm. It struck the bone with a loud crack, sending fragments flying everywhere, but it did little more damage than the bite from an aggressive rat would have done to him.

This thing has to be pumped full of magic. Does that mean I can eat it?

There was only one way to find out. He lunged forward and bit down on the skeleton’s massive arm – or at least, he did his best to. Arwin’s teeth hit the bone and he felt energy swirling within it, but it was like trying to bite through a block of steel… and not the magical kind.

He pulled his head away with a curse, grateful he hadn’t broken any teeth in the attempt. The Skeleton was either not magical enough to eat or it had too much magic for him to handle at the moment. Either way, it didn’t look like treating it like a buffet was going to be the angle.

Darkness passed over Arwin as another arm rose above him. The Bonehemoth was far from fast, but it was so big that it almost didn’t matter. He cursed and activated [Scourge] again to fling himself to safety.

Tremors raced through the stone, bouncing Arwin like a child’s toy as he hit the ground in a roll. His teeth rattled in his skull as he skidded to a stop and pushed himself to his feet.

“I don’t think I can slow it much,” Reya called back. “I think I could outrun it if I was at the far ends of its reach, though.”

The Bonehemoth reached out toward Arwin, forcing him to run to the side. He didn’t fancy his chances if the monster got him in its grip. Given how hard it had just hit the ground, he was pretty sure he was completely outclassed in strength. The only saving grace was that the monster was considerably slower than he was, even without [Scourge].

Shadows whipped out and tried to restrain the huge creature, but they snapped without so much as slowing it.

“The light is too bright to get shadows strong enough to hold it down,” Lillia said with a curse. “And even if it was dimmer, I don’t think I’m anywhere near strong enough to restrain something like this. It’s too damn big.”

“Just focus on distracting it for Arwin,” Rodrick yelled. “I’ll help.”

His sword ignited with burning light and he sprinted forward, passing Arwin and waving the blade with a yell. His efforts were immediately rewarded as the Bonehemoth brought a hand hurtling down toward him.

Rodrick’s legs pumped as he sprinted to the side as hard as he could. He threw himself forward into a dive as bone crashed down behind him. The ground bucked beneath Arwin again, nearly tossing him to the floor.

For a moment, he had no idea if Rodrick had escaped the blow. His chest clenched, but a relieved breath slipped out from his mouth as the warrior ran out from behind the monster’s hand, waving his glowing sword and screaming obscenities.

That’s one way to get its attention, I suppose. I just have to figure out what the hell I’m meant to do against something like this. If I could hit it with [Shieldbreaker] enough times in the same spot, I could probably take it out. There’s no way I can get to its head, though.

“I can make platforms out of the shadows,” Lillia called to Arwin as if she could read his thoughts. “That can get you up to its head while it’s focused on Rodrick.”

“Are you sure?” Arwin asked. “That’s quite a distance.”

“Yeah. It gets darker the farther out it is, and I’ll follow you. Trust me.”

Another rumble shook the earth. Rodrick skidded out of a cloud of dust, his sword a glowing beacon at his side. The Bonehemoth was definitely focused on him. There was only so long he’d be able to outrun the monster. He was keeping at the edges of its reach to buy himself a little more time, but his luck or stamina would eventually run out.

“Let’s do it,” Arwin said. He dismissed Verdant Blaze and sprinted toward the Bonehemoth as it extended both of its hands for Rodrick. Lillia ran beside him, the shadows at her back coiling and forming into dark wings.

“Jump!” Lillia yelled.

He leapt into the air and the shadows beneath him stretched up. They formed into a platform beneath his foot. Arwin took the next step without a second of hesitation. Strands of darkness leapt from the first platform and into a second.

The Bonehemoth’s glowing eyes snapped to Arwin as he approached. It lifted a hand and started to turn toward him. A shimmer of blue light passed over its body and vanished an instant later without so much as even making it hesitate.

Before it could reach out, a pained roar ripped out of its lips. Rodrick had driven his glowing sword into the monster’s other palm. He raised the sword and drove it home twice more before leaping to safety as the boney hand closed over the space where he’d been.

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Arwin’s mad dash toward the monster brought him up to its head. It finally reached up toward him, undistracted by Rodrick, and extended a hand to smack him out of the air. The next step Arwin took found nothing but air and he plummeted down.

His heart leapt into his chest. The hand passed above him and his foot landed on a platform. He nearly buckled from the force of the fall, but he managed to maintain his sprint back up toward the monster’s head.

Lillia leapt into the air, her dark wings flapping once and propelling her into the sky. She thrust her hands forward and shadows stretched out of the wall to wrap around its head as the Bonehemoth extended its arms toward her. The shadows were stretched thin, clearly drawing more power than Lillia had to spare.

For a second, the monster’s face was blocked off. Arwin’s makeshift stairwell brought him up to the creature’s head just as its vision was cut. He leapt forward, Verdant Blaze manifesting in his hands, and brought it down on the center Bonehemoth’s temple with all the force that [Scourge] could muster.

A loud crack split the air and chunks of bone rained down. The shadows caught Arwin before he could fall, but before he could swing again, a massive roar ripped through the cavern. Lines of electricity ripped through Arwin’s body as his limbs stiffened against his will. A loud hum rose up in his ears, but he couldn’t so much as wonder what it was.

The shadows that had been holding him aloft vanished. He plummeted downward, unable to so much as twitch a muscle. Lillia fell to his side. Her wings evaporated as they tumbled toward the unforgiving ground below.

Fragments of blue light fell away from Lillia with the sound like shattering glass. She spun, tucking her arms in close to her chest as the darkness swirled back to her, reforming her wings.

They snapped open and she pulled up, shooting over to Arwin and grabbing him out of the air. The shadows coming off her body wound around him like ropes, holding him against her body as she pulled up and flew higher into the air.

What felt like a river of freezing water poured over Arwin. He drew in a sharp breath as blue light broke and swirled around him. Control returned to his body.

“I’m good!” Arwin yelled.

The shadows holding him to Lillia snapped and reformed beneath his feet. Arwin hit them in a run, sprinting back toward the behemoth. It reached out to him again and he dove forward, dropping through the air and letting the huge hands pass overhead.

He hit a carpet of darkness in a roll as it formed beneath him, then ascended the stairwell that gathered at his feet. The Bonehemoth’s hands slammed into the ground behind him with a massive crash.

It let out another furious cry and a flash of light flickered through the room as Rodrick’s sword carved into it again. Whatever the energy in his attack was, it was doing a lot of damage to the huge monster.

Arwin didn’t have time to wonder why. Lillia had brought him back to the Bonehemoth’s head, and the only thing on his mind was playing the world’s largest game of whack-a-mole. He leapt off the shadows and shoved his foot into a crack in the monster’s skull.

He pulled out every stop, letting his [Soul Flame] course through the weapon and into its head. He didn’t know how much damage flame was going to do bone, but it certainly couldn’t hurt.

[Scourge] ripped through his veins and Verdant Blaze crashed down. Bone shattered like a bomb had gone off and the hammer ripped into the monster’s skull. Arwin stiffened, bracing himself for what he suspected was to come, but there was no preparing for it.

A scream tore through the air and his body locked up like a wooden board as rivers of electricity tore through him. Arwin started to pitch back, but the foot he’d stuck into the monster’s skull had just enough leverage to keep him teetering in place. The benefit of being functionally frozen solid was that none of his body would move. The loud hum that had been building in his ears reached a creshendo.

All he could do was wait for –

Shimmering motes of blue fell away from Arwin with a tinkling crash. Control returned to his muscles once more. Brilliant blue and grey light burned at the center of Arwin’s chest, emanating from the gem in his armor.

The roars were magical. That must have counted for the magic stored in the crystal.

He called out to it and the power responded. The [Soul Flame] burning around Verdant Blaze’s head turned a blueish gray and he brought the hammer down once more. It struck the same spot he’d hit twice before with a loud crash.

Bone shattered. Power ripped out from Verdant Blaze, coursing out in tongues of flaming gray that wormed into the Bonehemoth’s skull. For an instant, the enormous monster locked in place as its own magic was turned against it. Faint particles of frost gathered at the site that Arwin had struck, remnants of the Ice Mage’s power finally released from their prison.

Arwin didn’t sit around to see the results of his strike. He raised his arms and brought them down once more. [Scourge] coursed through his veins as he drove his hammer into the large dent he’d formed.

A brilliant crack split the air. Fragments flew up all around Arwin and the spell that had been pinning the Bonehemoth in place shattered. It thrashed, launching him from its head. He tucked his arms and legs in and shadows swirled around him, forming into a ramp.

He hit it in a roll that took him all the way back down to the ground. A rush of air roared overhead as an unseen hand hurtled through the air where he’d been moments before. Arwin felt himself hit the rough stone and pushed himself up to his feet.

Another roar ripped through the room and his body ground to a halt, breath catching in his chest. The effects of the magic weren’t anywhere near as bad down on the ground as they had been next to the Bonehemoth’s head, but Lillia had still been in the air.

Reya, who had positioned herself near the exit to reduce as much of the magic’s power as possible, recovered from the yell and thrust her hands toward Lillia. Even as the magic freed her, the sky above Arwin darkened.

One of the Bonehemoth’s hands hurtled down toward Arwin. He tried to pull himself free, but the effects of the roar still had him in their grip. Reya spun toward him, the firelight illuminating the panic in her eyes.

Judging from the last times she’d freed Arwin, it took her a second or two to recover between casts.

She wasn’t going to be fast enough.

A flash of burning yellow light ignited to Arwin’s side. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Rodrick sprinting toward him, his entire body clad in burning yellow and white flame. He’d broken through the Bonehemoth’s roar with some sort of self-buff. Despite his situation, Arwin couldn’t keep an idle thought from flashing through his head.

That doesn’t look like a normal Warrior skill.

Wind from the descending hand pressed down upon him. Autonomy started to return to his body, but not nearly fast enough.

Rodrick dove forward in a tackle. He shoved Arwin back and away from the hand’s path – and traded his own momentum away in the process. The enormous hand slammed to the ground with a resounding cash. Arwin rolled across the ground right at its edge, missed by just feet. His body finally threw off the effects of the magic and he scrambled to his feet.

“Rodrick!” Arwin yelled, his words swallowed by the cloud of dust rising up all around him. “Rodrick! Are you there?”

There was no response.