16 – Boss fight

Julian V. Terror.
Level: 12
Class: null

VIGOR: 16 (+10)
MIND: 10
ENDURANCE: 12 (+3)
STRENGTH: 10
DEXTERITY: 11 (+3)
INTELLIGENCE: 10
FAITH: 10
ARCANE: 13

Julian felt like a new man. The almost doubling in Vigor thanks to the crystal Cultivation had him feel invincible, like an unstoppable juggernaut ready to take on anything that dared cross his path. His Endurance was up, making him tougher and his stamina pool larger, and his DEX was up too. He wasn’t sure but he could swear he felt nimbler and more graceful in his movements.

The high lasted for a few minutes, during which he planned for the upcoming fight together with Cal, who was very happy to finally have someone to talk to. He had, he said, exhausted all the entertainment options the system could give him with how little runes he had, and had even decided to go back up to explore the town some more.  Julian was a bit surprised that Cal would do something with an inherent danger to it like going back up, but he guessed that boredom had such power after a while.

“A little more than three days,” Cal said when Julian asked how long he had been under.

“Thank you for keeping the fire going.” Julian said. When he had awoken, this time, he was completely refreshed and feeling awesome, which meant that Cal had indeed stoked the fire almost non-stop for the whole three days.

Now they were ready to take on the boss in the other room. The plan was to have Julian do most of the work, in virtue of his new improved stats and the fact that he could respawn. He wasn’t counting on dying, of course, but if it came to either him or Cal then the choice was obvious. Plus, Cal made it extra clear on more than one occasion that he was only here for the ride because it was fun and he loved exploring, which meant that if Julian wanted to keep him he had to remove as much perceived danger from their adventures as possible.

The heavy door creaked on its rusted hinges, slowly revealing the dark room beyond. From what little light reached from the corridor, they could see that one side wall was completely occupied by a table full of scrolls and scribbles, while most of the rest of the space was empty. On the floor, a summoning ritual was drawn with blood and at its center was a body.

They entered. Julian carefully circled the room, keeping outside the summoning circle and avoiding its many spikes and spiraling arms, while never letting the body leave his sight. Cal went to light the torches at the corners of the room, and in the soft orange light of the fires the body revealed itself to be a shriveled and mummified corpse. Its limbs were long, too long to be normal, as if grafted upon the unwilling body of a subject. On its head rested what was left of a hat and a pair of round spectacles, broken and bent.

Julian stepped into the circle, and walked towards the body of the researcher.

“Dead. Killed by his own hubris. I wonder if this is the scientist who was responsible for what happened in the Bunker? He must be, he had the same notes on the M-field.” He said.

Cal hummed, the sound mixing with the rustling of paper. “Yeah,” he said distractedly.

A shiver shook the mummified body. The door leading into the room closed itself shut with a loud bang and a whiff of unsettled dust, sealing the two inside. A wind rose, sending all the scrolls flying to the ground and perturbing the dancing fires of the torches, and in the disturbing light the body began to move. As the mummy awakened, Cal and Julian prepared for the fight.

The mummy roared, but the guttural sound was cut short by the ear-piercing noise of 12 rapid-fire gunshots in the enclosed space. Just as many holes appeared in the shriveled body, and it staggered and recoiled as its head, chest and arms were pierced by the bullets. It didn’t stop, however. Cal began to cast. Julian reloaded the guns, making the bullets appear from his storage rings directly into the revolvers’ chambers. He fired nonstop, and kept firing until his guns were red from the heat. Then he tossed them aside, lunging at the creature just as a ball of fire flew overhead. It exploded on the mummy’s face, followed by Julian’s sword descending like judgement from above.

The thing’s head split open along the cut, but as the dead tissues began to regenerate the sword got lodged in. Julian tried to pull it out but a swipe from the creature sent him flying through the room. He slammed against a wall, two deep gashes on his chest where the armor got shredded by impossibly sharp talons. He looked at his HP and smirked.

“I can do this all day.” He said, and lunged again.

Wind Blades hit the creature, continuously making deep cuts that closed themselves moments later, Wind Shields deflected hit just as Julian attacked, Parried and absorbed attacks with his shield. It kept going for long minutes, all damage they inflicted being regenerated in an instant, while their resources dwindled.

“It would be cool if I could see the boss health bar.” Julian protested, looking at his own depleting HP bar. He had tried Appraisal on the boss multiple times but with no success.

“I’m almost out!” Cal cried from the far corner of the room.

Julian had noticed that the frequency of the artillery attacks coming from the back had diminished substantially, making the fight all the harder for him, but only grunted in response. Slowly but surely, the constant attacks were building up significant damage on the boss, and its regeneration was getting overwhelmed. It was slowing down in its attacks, showing signs of real struggle.

This was only phase one. Julian stared in horror as all damage inflicted on the mummified abomination disappeared in an instant, and as he deflected the next attack he saw something he really didn’t want to see here.

“Poison buildup!” he cried out.

“Shit!” Cal echoed. He was keeping his distance, mana depleted and unable to help further. He had fired his revolver, consuming the 20 bullets Julian had given him, but just as before it did almost no damage to the boss.

It didn’t matter to Julian. The poison meter was filling slowly thanks to the resistances he had from his increased Endurance, and he quickly fell into a rhythm. Eventually, however, he slipped up.

He rolled away in a panic, consuming all his stamina as his health bar slowly ticked down. The poison meter was full: he was poisoned. And by the looks of it, it was going to tick away at his HP for a long while.

He took a red vial from his storage ring and downed its contents, replenishing the health to full before it ticked down again. It stopped at half. He lunged at the mummy again before it could change target, and the fight was once again on.

Julian looked at the contents of his rings with his mind. “I only have one vial left, shit.” He said, and downed the last HP vial. Health full, he checked that his SP were at max as well before rejoining the battle yet again.

“This is not going well,” Julian yelled, speaking to Cal through the sounds of battle. “Contingency plan!”

“No worries!” Cal’s concentrated voice responded. “I’ve been on it ever since I ran out of MP.”

“Tell me the moment you get it to open.”

“Sure will do!”

Julian Parried yet another attack, ducking immediately after to avoid being decapitated. He looked at his HP that were below 70%, and sighed. He counted: three, two… now! Parry. The mummy was staggered, and he plunged his sword deep into its desiccated chest. Then he rolled away just as the monster recovered, dodging yet another poisonous hit.

However, despite being used to the attacks by now, Julian was still taking hits. Sometimes he predicted wrong, or misread a tell, and took a hit. His chest piece was broken beyond recovery, something he knew would happen, and had been ditched and thrown into a corner.

Slowly but inexorably the team was running out of time.

“Cal, you got it?” Julian asked.

“No!” his companion said. Panic was clearly audible in his voice as he scraped against the lock with metal tools Julian had Precision Morphed for him. “I can’t open it!” he screamed in rage and fear, and tried to shoot a Wind Blade at the lock. It bounced back, ricocheting across the room and nearly hitting Julian.

“Goddammit!”

“Sorry,” cried Cal, “I don’t know what to do!”

Julian breathed in and thought, relegating the fight to just a small afterthought consuming no more than a portion of his attention.

How do we get out from here alive?