Monarch of Yngrave (2)

"This damn thing is tenacious..! It just isn't giving up or letting up at all!"

Alessia's growl fought with the rustling and shouting as the clearing we stood in continued to get assaulted by the vines and roots, the monster still refusing to show itself all while it maintained its attack from afar, keeping the pressure up and trying its damndest to pick us off one by one before attacking us in earnest.

And on a few occasions, it almost succeeded in that goal, its many limbs becoming stronger and faster as more time passed us by, its understanding of our individual strengths and more importantly, of our individual weaknesses allowing it to target those certain individuals with extreme prejudice.

Sadly enough for me, with my strength falling down towards the bottom of the group and my prior actions having already earned me its ire, the monster was targeting me decisively, doing its best to work against my defenses and try to grab me.

A few of us had our wooden armors damaged already - torn away, splintered, or punctured - and since I wasn't able to step back again to recast [Wooden Armor] over everyone, our armor remained at its current state of disrepair, thankfully having served its purpose already.

My wooden blade danced around in front of me as I sliced through the roots as quickly as I could, keeping it in a constant state of movement as I chopped, slashed and sliced with precise movements and constant power, doing my best to maintain my current state for as long as I could without tiring out and making myself an easier target.

All of this was happening whilst the older mage in the middle continued to prepare his spell, the other elites gathering around him and protecting him from the dozens of vines that began to descend onto us from above, adding yet another angle of attack that constantly harassed us.

Each second we fought felt like it dragged on for eternity, which made it all the more harrowing as the first of us let out a surprised shout before being pulled into the air, two separate vines wrapping around the soldier's arms and pulling in two separate directions, tearing the woman apart above us and showering us in blood and gore, before each half was flung into the forest, discarded like a piece of trash.

That first casualty during this intense defensive struggle made each second stretch on forever, the realization of our mortality becoming even heavier in our minds as we wondered if this was where we would die, if this was the end of our story; torn apart by a monster that we couldn't even see yet, in a forest that had no qualms using our bodies as sustenance for its many monsters.

As the vines attacking from above began to match the roots attacking us from below, we were constantly pushed back and made to go all out here and now, hoping that we could sustain our current expenditure of mana and energy for long enough so that we might just escape with our lives.

Another soldier was plucked from the clearing, thrown screaming into the forest and swiftly silenced as the roots did their work out of sight, before a third was impaled and dragged away just as rapidly as the other two, creating holes in our formation as the ocean of vines and roots began to crash against us at increased rates.

The thumping of my heart inside my chest as adrenaline and blood was pumped throughout my body created a solid tempo for me to follow as I just kept cutting, the rush of hormones inside me sharpening my vision and hastening my reaction speed as I did everything possible to stay alive, each second accompanied by the drumbeat of my heart and the sharp inhale as I dragged in oxygen.

The heightened clarity of being so near death made what happened next all the more beautiful; the area around us, previously illuminated in a bright, pale light, was suddenly bathed in a harsh, blinding orange and yellow, and a wave of heat far hotter than anything I had felt before washed over me, stealing the breath from my lungs and burning my eyes.

And yet, even as my vision watered - just to have the liquid dry up a fraction of a second later - I watched as a sea of flames crashed down right in front of me, a giant ring of fire appearing around us and leaping into the forest, disintegrating the roots and vines and making the monster screech in agony as it's forest burned.

The flames leaped into the forest and began to burn everything in its path, whilst some remained behind to encapsulate us in a dome, blocking any of the vines or roots that managed to survive the initial burning and turning them into smoldering ash that drifted harmlessly to the ground around us.

I staggered back a step as I watched everything around us burn; the leaves crumpled and burned away in mere moments, whilst the towering trees were charred black and began to wither, the water inside their trunks vaporizing and allowing them to shrink before crumbling beneath their own weight.

The dirt darkened and hardened from the heat, any and all foliage or organic life resting on its surface burning away as well, joining everything else as a ring around us was sapped of moisture and burnt into nothing, the crackling and roaring of the flames joined by the agonized screech of the monster, which remained unseen.

Alessia twisted her blade again and rested her brow against the light sheathed blade, her lips moving swiftly as she muttered another prayer, which spread that golden light from just her claymore into the air as well, which drifted down to us like glitter as our wounds and aches began regenerate slowly, restoring some of our energy.

More and more spells were cast in hopes of rejuvenating our energy enough for whatever was to come next, and we stood there warily, in the middle of a charred, blackened forest waiting for the appearance of the monster we had just sufficiently angered.