B01DCAV4W2 (S) (32 page)

The guardian swung one massive hand into the wall, crushing some of the crystal growing there.  The ruined shards didn’t fall to the ground though.  In fact, all of the crystal near its hand lost definition.  Small rivers of crystal began to flow towards the monster.  The fluid flowed up its arm and over its body.  It settled wherever there was a crack.  In just a few seconds all of the obvious damage had disappeared and its surface was as unblemished as when the battle had started.

Richter’s lip curled and he analyzed it again.

Crystal Guardian.
 
Level 41.  Health 920.  Mana 270/470.  Stamina 300/320…

Richter cursed.  The damn thing had completely regenerated!  At least it had to use a good amount of mana to do it, but this was NOT good!  The crumbled remains of the earth elemental fell from its hand and it started pulled one leg free of the mud to start lumbering toward them. 

Richter started imbuing an arrow.  “How long is the cooldown for the spell you just cast!” he shouted.

“Thirty minutes, master!”

Dammit, he thought.  He watched the guardian lumber closer and closer.  When it had crossed half the distance, he shot at its heart again.  He had timed its shot for when one foot was in the air and free of the muck.  Its torso swayed back from the hard hit, but it didn’t fall like Richter had hoped.  It was able to swing its foot back and plant it in the mud.  He knew that he wasn’t going to be able to kill it before it got to the end of the mud if it kept healing itself. 

He had to do something!  Brute force alone wasn’t working and Richter was the only one with a ranged attack except for En’fota’s
Stone Spear
.  There had to be a way to outsmart this thing!  What he really needed was a way to delay it…  Richter looked at the three kobolds near him.

“You,” he said to the Kol caste.  “Run around the guardian and start attacking from behind.  Don’t let it catch you!”  Richter turned back to the guardian nocked a wood sprite arrow.  He activated
Drill Shot. 
Two seconds later, the arrow left the string and started spinning as it flew through the air.  It struck the guardian’s chest just to the left of the Focus Crystal.  The sprite arrow bored into the crystal for a second before stopping.  The arrow remained there, sticking straight out of its chest. 

The kobold fighter had crossed the distance to the guardian.  His smaller size and weight made him sink less into the mud than the guardian did.  Both of their movement speeds were reduced but the fighter was still a touch faster.  Richter almost wanted to cheer when the crystal monster started lumbering towards the Kol. 

He took the respite to reach into his Bag.  He pulled out two crossbows he had taken from dead kobolds and handed them to En’fota and Dur’ghen.  He doled out the bolts between them and the three of them started firing at guardian.  He also drank a restore mana potion.  Now that it was trying to kill the Richter’s charmed kobold, he didn’t have a clear shot at it chest. 
Drill Shot
wouldn’t reach its heart; the only vulnerable spot Richter could see.  He started imbuing.

The two other kobolds started firing as quickly as they could.  With the shoddily made crossbows, that wasn’t very fast at all. The weapons had some stopping power, but at best they merely chipped away at the guardian’s body.  Still, it was better than nothing. 

The Kol caste dodged and jabbed.  His attacks barely did any appreciable damage, but of course, that wasn’t the point.  Richter, En’fota and Dur’ghen were able to keep firing with impunity as their comrade conducted a deadly dance with a construct almost three times his height.  If it wasn’t for the mud, then the Kol might have had a real shot at continuing to avoid the monster’s attacks, but it was not meant to be.  The distraction he provided came to a sudden and tragic end.

The kobold jabbed at the face of the guardian and then attempted to jump back.  One foot came free of the mud, but the other stayed mired.  The monster’s fist came across the kobold’s face with crushing force.  Blood sprayed across the mud and the kobold fell limp to the ground.  The monster reached down and grabbed the body in both hands and started pulling.  The damage was enough to rouse the kobold, but all he could do was scream.

Richter sent Alma in.  The cooldown on
Psi Blast
had elapsed and she swept towards the monster, unleashing her power.  The guardian released the kobold who fell to the mud.  Crossbow bolts continued to plink off of its body, while it staggered.  Richter continued to imbue his arrow.  The dragonling flew clear.

After two seconds, it recovered from Alma’s attack and reached down again.  The Kol caste kobold hadn’t been able to escape.  Blood seeped through the kobold’s skin in places mixing with the mud.  Even worse than the superficial injuries, the guardian had crushed one of the fighter’s legs before it released its hold.  It grabbed him again.  Holding the kobold above its head, it began to pull for a second time.  The Kol screamed and screamed and blood began to speckle the guardian’s head and chest.  With a horrible wet sound, the kobold was wrenched apart.  The crystal monster dropped both halves and turned towards Richter and the other kobolds again. 

Richter’s arrow had shifted from a pure gold to scant black lines to the black streaks now appearing solid in a barbershop pattern.  As soon as he saw it face him head on again, he released.  The arrow struck it square in the chest and the shockwave flattened the mud and the boom even hurt Richter’s ears.  It also finally knocked the monster down. 

Richter looked at the bloody severed halves of the kobold laying in the mud.  He felt like a monster himself, but he looked at Dur’ghen and said, “Go attack it.”  The thick scaled kobold didn’t hesitate.  It started to stride towards the fallen monster, mace in hand. 

Richter downed another mana potion.  When the guardian got up, he could clearly see cracks in its chest again.  Still none of them reached to the Focus Crystal though.  Richter cursed.  Just what did he have to do to kill this thing?!  Once again, the Focus Crystal flared and the guardian slapped its hand against a wall.  The crystal flowed away from the wall and up its arm.  Just like last time, the clear liquid stone flowed over the guardian’s body and healed all of the damage it had taken.  Richter noted that a portion of the now bare cave wall glowed blue.  He shut that from his mind though, and got back into the fight.

Richter checked its status again.  

Crystal Guardian.
 
Level 41.  Health 920.  Mana 91/470.  Stamina 283/320…

With gritted teeth Richter drew a sprite arrow.  At least the bastard wouldn’t be healing again!  He triggered
Drill Shot
again.  He just had to wear it down!  All he had to do was kill it before it reached him.  Of course that was when things got screwy again!

The monster took one step towards Dur’ghen who set himself to meet it at the edge of the mud.  The guardian didn’t try to close anymore of the distance, though.  Instead, it pointed a crystal arm at the kobold and the Focus Crystal flashed.  In a heartbeat, the arm halved in diameter but doubled in length.  Before Dur’ghen could move, the spear like appendage shot through his chest.  The kobold screamed in pain and swung its mace weakly at the crystal arm.  He swung twice more, each attempt weaker than the last, and then his head slumped forward in death.

The crystal guardian’s arm resumed its normal size.  It took a step towards Richter and En’fota, finally free of the mud.  Richter shouted at the mage to run, and the two remaining party members both dashed away to make space between themselves and the blood spattered monster. 

“Can you summon another elemental?” Richter shouted.

“I don’t have enough mana, master!”

Cursing, he gave her his last restore mana potion and tossed it to her on the run.  En’fota drank it.  After another few seconds, he asked if she had enough now.

“Yes, master!”

“Then fucking summon it!”

They both turned left around a corner and then turned back to face their enemy.  En’fota started chanting.  Richter drew a heavy arrow and extended his aura around it.  He then began pouring in his mana as quickly as possible.  The steps of the guardian grew louder and it came around the corner.  Richter released!

He hadn’t had enough time to invest much in the imbuement, but the ‘heavy’ quality of the arrow coupled with the extra power were enough to make it fall to one knee.  En’fota finished her summoning just in time!  The elemental rose from the tunnel floor and jumped on the guardian.

The small elemental and the guardian looked like mini me fighting Austin Powers, but Enfota’s pet still had powerful hands.  As proof, crystal fell to the ground as it attacked.  The kobold had just enough mana to cast
Stone Spear
again.  The stone projectile hit the monster in its chest.  Richter shot it in the same place, but did not have much mana left.  The blow only created a few cracks in the crystal.

The guardian had been twisting at the waist as it tried to grab the slightly faster earth elemental.  It finally caught the summoned creature though.  The garden’s protector threw the small rock man at En’fota and she went down with a large thud.  With no other distractions, the monster turned its full attention to Richter.  It extended one hand and the Focus Crystal began to pulse again.  Knowing what was coming he mentally called out.

*
Alma.  Blast it!*

The dragonling swooped from above and hit it with another blast.  The guardian’s arm dropped as it struggled to overcome the two second stun.  Richter reached into his Bag and pulled out a specific arrow.  The entire fight he had been hoping he could knock the Focus Crystal free of the guardian’s chest.  He had reasoned that without its heart, the crystal monster would simply fall apart.  Now though, Richter just wanted to survive.

He placed the Arrow of Piercing on his bow string and triggered
Drill Shot. 
The guardian recovered a half second before Richter finished the two second activation of his subskill, but the distance was so small it had no hope of evasion.  The arrow left his bow spinning and struck the guardian dead center.  The arrow as a whole stopped spinning after a second just as his previous drill shots had.  The special property of the Arrow of Piercing was to ignore 66% of its target’s armor though.  The arrowhead continued to spin and it drove deep into the monster’s chest.  For the first time in the fight, the Focus Crystal itself was damaged.  The guardian fell to its back. 

The Focus Crystal pulsed wildly.  It was a form of life that was barely self-aware, but it still struggled to survive.  It needed to heal itself, but it lacked the mana to use the crystal in the garden.  So the Focus Crystal used the only thing available to it, the body of the guardian.

Before Richter’s eyes, the monster began to shrink in size.  As it did, Richter noticed that the cracks his arrow had made in the Focus Crystal began to disappear.  He knew that he didn’t have much time.  Dropping his bow, he drew his shadow dagger and ran over to the guardian’s prone body.  Raising his dagger high, he drove it down into the hole that the piercing arrow had made.   Now, both his dagger and arrow pierced the central crystal. 

The guardian swung one arm up to strike Richter, but the loss of its mass showed in its decreased strength and speed.  Richter released his dagger and jumped back out of the way.

*
Alma!  Drain it!*

His familiar flew in and wrapped herself around the monster’s head.  The guardian was only five feet in height now and its limbs moved randomly as if it had lost the ability for concerted action.  It shrunk faster now that Richter’s dagger was sunk into its heart.  The Focus Crystal drew upon the guardian more and more, but it couldn’t heal with weapons still penetrating it.  Richter drew his high steel longsword.  He placed both hands on the hilt and raised it up prepared to drive the blade down into its body, when he realized he was wasting an opportunity. 

He freed one hand from the hilt and twisted his fingers into an odd configuration.  A word of power left his mouth like a caress and he cast
Soul Trap. 
Then he raised his sword again and drove the blade down into the guardian’s neck.  The high steel sword shot straight through the crystal and only stopped when it hit the tunnel floor.  With a twist and a wrench, the head came loose and the guardian’s health dropped to zero.  A ribbon of light twisted through the air and disappeared into Richter’s Bag. 

The monster was finally dead.

CHAPTER 18

Alma crowed in triumph and jumped into the air.  Richter looked down at the once large body.   Despite not moving, the body continued to shrink as the Focus Crystal tried to heal.  It still couldn’t though and the body was only three feet tall now.  Not wanting his prize to be lost, he quickly removed the dagger and arrow and watched as the wounds in the crystal closed before his eyes.  Once it was completely restored, the body stopped shrinking.  A prompt appeared.

You have found: Focus Crystal.  This can be used to grow a Crystal Garden.  It can be planted anywhere, but thrives underground.  This is a living entity and it feeds on the ambient magic in an area.  It must be planted within one week or die.  Weight 13.6 kg.