The party got into the best defensive position they could while waiting for Lili’s prison to fade. They were arranged in a sort of diamond shape, with Rose in the front, although still some distance from the aberration. Drex and Tesilim were on the side corners and behind Rose. Alyx was at the very back point and opposite Rose, while Jasmine stood in the center, in the middle of everyone.
Lili's prison was slowly fading away, but none of them went to attack since it could possibly increase the speed of its dissolution. And every second that passed was a tiny bit of mana regenerated that could be the difference between life and death.
As the void bubble dissipated, more pink energy bled through. Finally, after a tense minute of waiting, the bubble of darkness reached a breaking point and began to dissolve at a more visible pace. They hadn't been able to recover much mana, but it was time to get the fight started. It only took the seconds of them activating their Body Enhancements before all the darkness had disappeared, and the body of the aberration revealed itself.
The tall humanoid creature with long limbs and fingers looked much worse for wear than when they had come into the cave. It was shrouded in a soft pink glow, but the damage done was evident, with chunks missing from its body. Not big chunks, not chunks that would completely kill it, but both small, irregular, and also perfect spots where its flesh was simply gone and dark blood poured out.
A moment of silence stretched between the party and the aberration. The darkness had fully cleared from around its body, yet it stood there. Its featureless face looked in their direction as if it were watching them with its nonexistent eyes. Then, in that tense moment where both parties stared at each other, the laughter started. It was manic and unnatural, as if it were mimicking a person's laughter, yet it didn't fully understand what that entailed. Finally, when the laughter calmed, the aberration spoke, its voice calm but filled with barely suppressed anger and insanity.
“You know, I was going to turn you all into majestic things, after all, you are such great specimens, yet now… NOW! YOU WILL BE ATTACHED TO INSECTS OF THE LOWEST QUALITY! You!” It pointed at Rose, “Will be a dung beetle! And you!” Its long finger switched to Jasmine, “Will be a-”
The thinman was interrupted when Rose ran out of patience and sent a blade of golden energy at it. The slash of power didn't do anything to the monster, a shield of pink energy popping up to block it entirely. Clearly, the aberration hadn't expected Rose to do that, and it especially was not expecting the redhead to charge straight at it because Rose cleared the distance to the monster without issue.
Of course, the redhead hadn't informed the party that she was going to do anything, and they were caught by surprise. Still, they had been ready for combat, so they managed to react in a second or so. Drex immediately began sprinting towards the aberration, Alyx started a chant, and Jasmine sent a boost of power to her friend, adding a silver color to her golden glow. Tesilim, on the other hand, was waiting but ready. He was the one with essentially the fastest way to intercede between the aberration and Rose. So, it was best that he wait for whatever would happen before he did anything. The only thing that he really did was bring out all of his Chaos Mana into his body just in case he needed extra juice for a quick technique.
By the time Rose felt the extra energy infuse her body, she was already mid-swing. Sadly, her golden sword did not strike the aberration directly but instead struck a shield. One thing the attack managed to do was awaken the aberration from whatever stupor it had been in. In a burst of power, the aberrations shield disappeared, and its arm blurred before Rose was flying through the air, pain wrecking her chest.
Drex was already opening his mouth when Rose was sent flying. He was only about ten feet from the aberration when a torrent of lightning spewed forth from his maw. The lightning enveloped the aberration, singeing its pink and bloody body. Sadly, that didn't stop it from retaliating, and in another blur, it closed the last few feet between it and him.
A golden spot flew towards and between Jasmine and Tesilim; the attack had been so fast that even with their maxed-out enhancements, they had not been able to fully see it. Tracking the redhead, their eyes met right as the blur passed by them, and the room was lit with a blue light as the sound of lightning reverberated. In that fleeting moment, they both knew what they needed to do.
Jasmine turned and threw a beam of energy at her friend. The beam struck her friend moments before the redhead hit the back cave wall, enveloping her in healing magic. At the same time, Alyx finished his spell, and a blur began to settle over the aberration. Tesilim had some guesses about what the spell did, based on understanding a few of its words, so he didn’t hesitate to teleport behind the aberration, his katana already in motion.
The monsters hit hadn't managed to knock out Rose, and she saw a beam of white light following her before everything went black. Thankfully, she woke up a moment later, finding herself on the ground. Her body hurt all over, but her chest and back were the worst offenders. Fighting through the pain, she looked over at the rest of her party and found Jasmine staring at her, their eyes meeting for a second before her friend turned around.
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The moment the aberration had appeared in front of Drex, he had already begun to tense his body, ready to jump back. Sadly, that hadn't been fast enough, and when his dad appeared behind the aberration, Drex was struck by the creature's long glowing fingers and found himself flying as well, but in two pieces.
Alyx had used a slow spell on the aberration to try to give the party a chance to survive its attacks. It wasn't a good spell since he couldn't use his concentration in the current fight in order to make sure that his shield stayed up, but it was better than nothing, and he began another spell as soon as the first spell settled over the monster.
Tesilim’s sword connected with the aberrations back, and a gash appeared. However, to his horror, he hadn't been fast enough, and his drake was sent flying with his body cut in half, blood spewing forth. Seeing his friend like that shocked him into inaction for just a moment, which was enough for the aberration to focus on him. Thankfully, thanks to Alyx’s spell and Jasmine, who was able to buy him back that second with a silver shield, he was able to teleport out of the way and thank his lucky stars as a wave of energy was unleashed, tearing a gash in the stone and barely missing the elf on the stone table.
After ensuring that Rose was okay, Jasmine turned around to barely help Tesilim dodge a lethal attack. And once she saw that he had teleported further back into the cave, she turned to help Drex. The drake's body had practically landed right next to her, which was a stroke of good luck. Running over to him, she quickly brought the two pieces together and flooded him with healing energy, the burning sensation in her body increasing even further.
Alyx finished his chant right as Tesilim teleported out of the way of the attack. A wave of flames shot down from right above the aberration. The fire quickly consumed the monster, but before the spell could take effect, the creature was already out of it and running towards him. Things got even worse when the monster changed its trajectory, heading to Jasmine instead, who was busy healing Drex.
Thankfully, before it could get close enough to strike Jasmine, Tesilim appeared in front of it. His sword was already mid-swing as a multitude of water slashes appeared out of nowhere. The monster was clearly not thinking straight, and one hand wrapped around Tesilim’s blade, causing the elf to stop mid-swing. Tesilim tried to tear the sword away as the water slashes cut into the aberration’s body, but he found that the monster was much stronger. Then, before he had the mind to let go of the blade, the aberration's other hand was already closing in, its fingers pierced through his armor and into his body. Finally, when the palm reached his chest, he was sent flying back with a wave of force.
Rose's whole body was burning. She had thrown all she had into it to make sure she was ready for combat once again. Getting up, ready to join the fight once again, Rose saw Tesilim get pierced. The monster's long fingers went right through his chest before he, too, was sent flying. Then, only moments after the monster threw Tesilim away, stone hands erupted from beneath the creature.
One thing Jasmine needed to improve at was not losing herself when healing someone. She had lost track of the battle as she poured energy into Drex. There was something that happened when she healed via physical contact, and one of the many things she had to improve on. As such, it was thoroughly surprising when she came to and a multitude of hands erupted from practically right next to her. Looking over, she found the aberration much closer than she liked. And if it hadn't been for the stone hands preoccupying the creature, she probably would be dead. At the very least, Drex was ready to go, the drake already getting up.
Just as Jasmine was about to begin her own assault on the aberration, she heard a groan of pain from behind her. Turning to look, she found Tesilim falling to the cave floor, one of his arms bending the wrong way. She didn’t hesitate and immediately rushed the elf.
Alyx had needed to keep the monster distracted with something, and the best way to do that was with a spell he could constantly keep active. The gnome was prepared to keep the spell going for however long to let the others get back in the fight, especially after Tesilim had been sent packing. Luckily, he hadn’t had to spend too much mana. Once Drex was back in the fight, still, for those few moments he had spent quite a good amount of pure mana and godly mana, his whole body burning like never before. Either way, the drake unleashed a torrent of acid at the aberration. The acid would eat through the hands, barely keeping the aberration in place, but it would also deal a lot of damage, especially since the drake wasn’t stopping. In fact, the flow was increasing, even as the drake started becoming translucent.
Rose had told her body to run, but it hadn’t listened. Instead, she had taken step after step until she began walking properly, right as Drex unleashed a torrent of acid. Pushing herself harder and harder in response to the drake's doubled effort, it didn’t take long before Rose was running at the aberration, the drake’s body already becoming translucent.
Tesilim had lost consciousness when he had struck the wall, and he came to, falling to the ground, his body wrecked with pain. Of course, out of everything, his chest and left arm hurt the most. It took his muddled mind a second to register that, and he forced his left arm to move, but only felt a spike of pain. With a force of will, he shifted his body, pressing his back against the cave wall. Looking over, he found his arm pointed the wrong way, which made him wince. Finally, seeing as he was still alive, though bleeding badly, he looked back at the continuing fight and found Jasmine almost right on top of him.
