Chapter 31 #2
My fist is begging me to punch her in the face. But my strength score is pitiful, and it’s the eidola, not Sylvia trying to stab me in the back right now.
Instead, I say, “Or she just wants me to stay alive.”
Miko scrolls at the menu only visible to her. “God, I can’t wait to get some druid gear so I don’t have to use my menu for spells,” she says and then taps in the space a few inches from her face.
A fire elemental shows up. Much like the air elemental, it looks like the vague outline of a person, with an undefined head and arms and a body but no legs or feet.
“Double up,” she commands it.
It splits into two copies of itself. At Miko’s behest, the two fire elementals wander around our area, melting the ice in their path.
All the while, the chaos dragon is getting closer. “Sorry, but how are we supposed to fight that?” I ask, pointing at it. “It’s so high up. Either Cait needs to learn how to fly so she can clobber it, or we need to figure out how to kill a fucking water cyclone.”
We all share a moment of grim silence. Even Sylvia seems genuinely concerned, though it’s probably just the eidola wondering if she’d survive something like this.
“I have a spell that might help,” Guy says, “but it’s going to use up all my concentration and energy.”
“What is it?” I ask.
“Magnet,” he answers. “It magnifies gravity on the target of my choice so that it can’t fly and can only move with great effort. But it only lasts for maybe fifteen minutes, and the last time I used it I wound up passed out for several hours.”
Joshua nods. “Yeah, I remember. You used that on the harpies in the Strophades, and we had to take a long rest so you’d have time to recover.”
“That’s a huge gamble,” Cait interjects. “If we’re not able to kill the chaos dragon in time, you’ll be defenseless.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Miko says. “Lauren’s right. You and Joshua pack the biggest punch, but you won’t be able to do that unless the chaos dragon is within reach.”
I wish my Near Future Vision worked on battles instead of just life stuff. That would be pretty handy in this decision process.
“I’ll stay by Guy,” I say. “I know I’m weak, but I should still be able to alert someone in case he’s in danger while passed out.”
Cait’s mouth twists in hesitation. There’s no perfect solution to this problem, and she hates the idea of her friend being helpless in a situation like this.
But after a moment of consideration, she nods at Guy.
“If you think it’s a risk worth taking, I will do whatever I can to make sure your plan succeeds. ”
“Here’s hoping,” he responds with a nervous laugh.
I squeeze his fingers and whisper to him, “I’m here for you.”
The words were only meant for him, but Cait adds, “I’m here for both of you.” The look she gives Guy and me is so sure, so warm, that I wonder if it comes with the promise of us—not just her and me, but the three of us together.
God, I hope we don’t die.
We don’t rush formulating a plan. As fast as the chaos dragon is traveling, it will still be several minutes before he reaches us. Better to spend all the time we have making sure we can do our best than to panic and fuck everything up.
Just like on the ship, Joshua and Cait will be far ahead of the rest of us but even more so than before.
There will be a full football field length between them and us.
This is so that there will be room for the chaos dragon’s body and cyclone to land, but our heavy hitter will also be able to melee immediately while Joshua keeps up a sleep song on his fiddle.
Alexander, Miko, and Sylvia will provide ranged attacks from the left.
They’ll be closer to the monster than Guy and me, but far enough away that they shouldn’t have to resort to melee.
Sylvia will use her poisoned arrows in her rapid-fire assault.
Miko will see if she can wrest the cyclone away using water and wind elementals to reverse its churning so that it spins back to the ocean.
Alexander will keep up firing his endless supply of bullets.
Meanwhile, Guy will cast this huge, terrifying spell, and I’ll make sure nothing attacks him while he’s out.
Of course, I’ll also be casting healing spells if needed.
I remind myself that I can only use the Kiss of Life three times before it’s gone.
Hopefully, using all my energy on healing spells will prevent me from needing to use anything like that.
Once we’re all in place, I ask Guy, “Are you scared?”
He lets out a nervous chuckle. “Terrified.” He keeps his gaze on the approaching dragon but laces his fingers with mine. “But I know you’ll keep me safe.”
“I’ll try,” I say. “But I’m only level four.”
“You do more at level four than most people do at level forty. You’re the gamebreaker.
” Guy turns his attention from the dragon so that I can see how serious he is with his next statement.
“You’re the most likely to figure out your offering out of all of us, and I’m not letting anything keep that from happening. ”
A sound like the overlapping of a roar, a thunderstorm, and a shrieking eagle sends waves of energy rippling through us. The chaos dragon is so close now that the black smoke leaving its nostrils drifts to the ground at Joshua’s feet.
Guy lifts his staff high and shouts, “Magnet!” Then, he drops to the ground.
The chaos dragon falls with a thud that topples me over despite it being more than a football field away.
That’s no surprise given that this creature is easily fifty feet long, and its scales look as hard as rock.
Even Cait and Joshua get knocked down, but they jump to their feet as fast as rabbits and pounce on the monster at once.
Having three heads means it will be hard to kill it, but Joshua fiddles his sleep song, and the third head passes out.
Then, our melee duo gives it all they’ve got on the two other heads.
Joshua strikes at one of the dragon’s throats, and blood flows like a river from the wound.
Cait cleaves the skull of another head with her great axe.
But the two heads remain conscious. Game logic, I suppose.
At least its health meter went down by a fifth with those two attacks.
Though Alexander is at a distance, the sudden bang of his shotgun startles me. He just keeps going, concentrating on the head not targeted by Cait and Joshua. The monster’s health bar creeps lower and lower…but not by much. I guess three heads means it’s three times as hard to kill it.
Despite secretly working against us, Sylvia keeps the arrows coming, and most of them strike true.
That doesn’t mean I’m not scared to death that one of those will “accidentally” wind up lodged in Joshua or Cait.
Maybe she understands that by killing them, she lowers her own chances of surviving this encounter.
Miko puts her water and air elementals to work. It looks like they’re playing ring around the rosy with the water cyclone—so effortless, so playful. Their minimal effort seems to be making more progress than anything the rest of the party is doing.
I’m crouched beside Guy with my hand over his chest so that I can feel the steady rise and fall of his breathing. All the while, I keep a careful watch over our surroundings. The dragon and its cyclone seem to be the only threats to us now, but I’d rather be overly cautious.
The whole situation is terrifying enough with how little our attacks are chipping away at the chaos dragon’s health bar.
I check the time on my menu. Five minutes have passed.
The monster is down to three-fifths of its health bar.
That seems like it would be a big deal, but there’s only ten more minutes until the magnet spell ends.
Then, we’ll have to fight a pissed off, high-powered dragon who can fly, and Guy will be helpless the whole time.