Cheep!?
Chapter 154
This time, the meeting didn’t take long, as it was decided up front that they couldn’t stop attacking just because of the warlord’s interference. When the rest of the teams eyed them hopefully, Niko almost felt guilty when Mithel informed them that Hyper Beam wasn’t going to be ready anytime soon. Still, that just meant that they were going to keep the Wyldwalkers rotating around the battlefield, dipping in and pulling back before the Warlord could hopefully respond. The higher tier teams would be on overwatch for the lower tier teams exclusively, paired up as evenly as they could. Hopefully, they would be able to cover every retreat that the strike teams needed.
For their part, the Dawr were responding as well as they could, attempting to move their more powerful troops to the edges in batches along their formation. There was only so much they could do, though, considering the terrain. Niko imagined that on open terrain, they would be able to spread out their bulk, forming an encirclement around the more important parts. Given that they were forced into long columns, the only way they could increase their area and split up the siege weapons would be to move them onto entirely separate pathways.
Surprisingly, that was partly what they seemed to do, spreading out larger groups with higher tier Dawr away from the main column. It would make those specific Dawr more vulnerable, but it made their intended siege equipment and any other artifacts they’d brought with them much safer.
Niko and the rest of the Wyldwalkers stalked forward, with Thorne’s team watching from afar. The attacks from the various teams were intentionally left to their own devices, though they would still be insistent. Chaotic, with every attack coming from whatever angle they could find. Given that several of the front running teams were leaving traps behind, the Dawr were slowed enough that no single team was found wanting in speed.
For their part, Mithel had a new flask in hand, one that looked like Firestorm to Niko’s eyes, yet… There was something bizarre about it. He couldn’t place what was going on with it, but they would see soon enough.
“Twenty Dawr,” Niko said with a shake of his head, “That’s much too small of a group, and it looks like they know it.”
“I count two champions, four hobs, and fourteen standard goblins,” Skye said while smirking, “I hope they don’t think that will be enough.”
Ronald grunted, “They’re probably going to retreat the moment they see us. There’s no reason for them to fight, just to keep a perimeter. Still, don’t underestimate them. The champions especially will give us a hard time.”
Niko nodded, fully agreeing with that assessment. Tier four’s could take a lot more punishment than a tier three could. While Niko could survive an alarming amount of damage, partly thanks to his species, that would pale in comparison to what the average tier four would walk away with. Still, they had a good chance of dealing a lot of damage here. Even if the Dawr sorted into slightly larger groups, all they, as the attackers, had to do was harass said group while others attacked past their inevitably overdrawn lines.
Their strategy wasn’t sustainable, but they didn’t need to maintain the march for days. Riizen wasn’t what Niko would call close, but close enough that he didn’t think the Dawr expected significant losses with their plan.
Of course, he and the others all planned on exploiting that assumption to the fullest.
At Ronald’s gesture, Niko took wing, flaring his Particle Wing pattern while Skye’s legs gripped tightly to his back. In her hands, her bow lay, arrow nocked and ready to fly, but as yet with a relaxed draw. They took high to the air, with Niko pushing his wings hard. Exhilaration flooded through him in spite of the danger he would be delivering himself into momentarily. He couldn’t help it, flight was everything he’d hoped for and more.
“Alright, take us in fast,” Skye called out, to which Niko let loose a piercing cry in affirmation.
That cry was simultaneously the signal for the rest of the Wyldwalkers to begin their attack. Mithel and Charlotte started off the attack, with the spider threading web between its front most legs and bringing them up. They’d tested with a few branches and rocks, and the sheer increase in range and velocity that said combination could give them was extreme. The two of them had to agree on a target before firing, but that was hardly an issue.
Niko couldn’t actually see them with his bare eyes, only able to see their outlines in essence due to long familiarity and his Aether Sight’s enhanced capabilities. He pulled his attention from them, and only glanced to ensure that Sasha and Thokk were moving forwards with the rest of the team before he continued his dive.
With a sharp whistle and crack, the Firestorm flask ripped into the middle of the Dawr. It hit them behind wooden barricades that doubled as shields, sailing over top and cracking against the head of one of the hobs. They’d likely aimed for the champion behind it, but that was good enough.
Instead of the flood of fire, light, and smoke, Niko was treated to a twisting whirlwind of ice, snow, and ravaging sheets of hail and sleet. He almost pulled away in shock, but rapidly adjusted his Particle Wing instead. How Mithel had converted a Firestorm flask into an Icestorm flask, Niko had no idea, but it arguably gave them an even better way to engage. He pushed with his pattern, taking their path around the edge of the blizzard.
“Keep us about this far, I’ll hit them when visible.” Skye spoke, with Niko leaning on their connection to ensure he heard her right. Closely, he skirted the edge of the raging blizzard, and idly wondered which was the worse fate, fire or ice?
When the storm broke, Thokk and Sasha were very nearly upon the Dawr, and the wreckage was revealed to them all. Niko took in a deep breath in preparation even as he took stock of their damages. All of the goblins were down, either deceased or thoroughly frozen in place with ice and snow packing them down. The hobs were actually worse off, looking like they’d taken considerable damage from chunks of ice hitting them amidst the sudden storm. Ironically, the fact that they hadn’t been thrown to the ground and covered in ice meant that they’d taken the brunt of the razor sharp shards of ice that made up the storm. The champions weren’t nearly as damaged, looking like they’d taken a beating, but the biggest problem for them was the sheer quantity of ice that had frozen to their forms stiffly.
As far as damage went, Firestorm was greater, but Niko couldn’t deny that Icestorm was far better at setting up for following damage.
Skye mumbled something on Niko’s back before firing, hitting one of the barely moving champions in its right eye. Said Dawr snarled, a muffled sound with the ice that rapidly cracked as it surged with essence. It shattered, just as Skye mumbled something else, and then its other eye was hit by an arrow.
“Still got it,” she grinned, before pouring on more essence. Niko shook his head in amusement at his companion, even as bark covered her form. Now she fired rapidly. Every wing beat punctuated by another twang of her bow. The champion looked up at them, before Niko senses essence roil in its body. He tracked the energies movement even as Niko’s lungs expanded, prepared to intervene.
Somehow, it tracked towards them, the great-axe in its hands suddenly glowing with a sticky, yellow glow. It drew back, essence trailing into patterns in its arms, ready to release the blow in an instant.
‘Gotcha,’ Niko didn’t know what the patterns specific purpose was, but knowing it’s layout and path was enough. The champion’s control of its own essence was a far cry from someone like Ronald, leaving Niko virtually able to trace the entire network from the essence that billowed from its flesh.
He screeched, Carrion Call buffeting the champion. It grimaced, but adamantly continued to swing…
…And nearly lost its balance on the ice when the energy from his weapon launched prematurely, sending it directly to the sky mid-swing.
“Where are you aiming!?” Skye mocked as Niko took in another lungful of air – for himself, not his pattern – and repositioned around the group. She hit it several more times, arrow after arrow crashing into both armor and flesh. Several of the shots stuck into the metal, while the rare few only grazed or bounced. The metal plates may have been clumsy work, but they were effective enough. The arrows that went deeper still weren’t enough to bring it down, though.
Another flask blasted the second champion as they continued to harry the first. The explosion was much smaller, but concentrated, and seemed to rip the cold from the area. Niko actually had to compensate to the sudden change in air pressure, Particle Wing maintaining his track in the air after he suddenly lost altitude.
The champion, on the other hand, now was utterly encased in ice, like a tomb. Given that he didn’t feel a rush of essence, Niko didn’t think that it was dead. Which, frankly, was ridiculous, given how much pressure the ice should have been under at that point.
The hobs, those left, tried to rally as Thokk and Sasha smashed into them, the attacks of Ronald, Stella, and Dachna following up rapidly, reaping them down. Niko refocused on their quarry, just in time to notice a new pattern manifest in the champion.
With a howl and a surge of bloody energy, the champions wounds healed before Niko’s eyes. The arrows were forced out of his eyes in a gory shower, replaced by perfectly healed orbs that glared balefully at Niko and Skye. Several other snapping sounds resounded as arrows were snapped at their shifts, the heads of the arrows unable to be forced back up and out of armor. Still, it seemed that the champion was as good as new.
‘That’s what I’d think if I didn’t see how far its reservoir just dipped, at least.’ Niko watched as half of it’s available reserves vanished in a flash. He shared that with Skye, who immediately shot another arrow at the Dawr’s neck. When it moved to block, she followed up with a second shot, far quicker than the previous had been. It failed to react in time, and now had one of its eyes pierced once more.
It screamed curses that Niko could unfortunately understand, some of which made Niko cringe. “Yikes, he’s… really angry.”
“I couldn’t tell,” Skye called dryly, before groaning at the arrow being pushed out of its eye once more. “How much essence is that taking him?”
Niko tried to estimate from what he’d said, but shook his head, “Not nearly as much as I’d thought it should. Maybe it takes more to heal multiple wounds at once? Heads up!”
He called out the shift in essence as yet another, new pattern activated. With all the grace of a runaway train, the champion catapulted itself through the air, nearly all the way to where Niko was. Startled, Niko banked hard, narrowly dodging a yellow blast of energy.
Before he could reposition, the champion’s essence charged again, and this time Niko cut loose, surging an immense amount of heat beneath his wings to soar upwards. He narrowly dodged the champions axe, leaving the Dawr screaming at him midair.
Skye shot at near point blank range, the arrows punching into his screaming mouth. The head of one blasted out the back, with another angling upwards into what Niko hoped was its brain.
“Peck me! It can charge midair?” Niko cawed, before warning, “No essence! Still alive!”
Skye cursed even as the body fell, smacking down hard a branch below. Niko watched as the motionless body twitched and spasmed, the arrows being pushed out of its flesh as its regeneration pattern aggressively performed its task.
“Whoa… that is… an impressive pattern.” Niko blinked in dismay.
“That’s a champion for you, alright.” Skye said, unable to help the hint of respect from her voice. “We need to take this into melee, I can’t do enough with arrows anymore.”
The Az-Phorus dove, “Hop off!”
Skye did so immediately, flaring her pattern and reaching for plant limbs that likewise stretched out to her. Niko confirmed only that she was able to use them and rapidly descend before dedicating his focus to his dive-bomb.
Air whistled past his ears, and as he approached he ramped his Carrion Call to the maximum, intent on dealing damage and debilitating with it. That turned out to be prescient, as the champion regained mental faculties just before the attack began. Instead of being able to martial itself, the champion, fresh from brain trauma, floundered the defense.
Niko flared his Wyldstrider and Sharp Strike patterns together, focusing on his front talons for power and piercing. With a crushing blow, he pierced through the champions chest plating, bending the metal with a gruesome mixture of rending metal and snapping bones. Blood splattered from the champions mouth even as it immediately tried to push Niko away. Anchored as he was in the champions chest, he couldn’t leave even if he wanted too just then. So, he doubled down.
He empowered his beak with a sharp strike, wrapping his body simultaneously with the bloody haze of energy that empowered his flesh. With savage intent, he pecked down, driving his ridged, sharp-edged beak into the champion’s head. He cracked the bone on the first blow, rattling himself with the hit, but Niko felt that he’d had a bad angle. Rearing back, he tried to go for another blow, only for the Champion to surge its arm pattern, coating its fist in yellowish energy. Niko grit his beak, ready to take a hit and return it twice over.
Skye was there before it could even finish cocking its arm back, slashing bark-encased claws slicing the joint between the armor at the elbow. Niko could feel that Skye was nearly maxed on her Wyldform patterns maximum energy use, and even if he couldn’t see the essence in her body, the fact that she was nearly completely covered in pale white wood was indication enough. Given the freedom to strike at will, Niko hit it again, and again, before the champion surged with essence again. It launched straight upwards, whatever bizarre charge pattern it had smashing Niko into its chest where he finally dislodged his talons.
To his surprise, Skye was latched onto its back, and before the champion could follow up on its freedom and rapid healing, she slashed through the back of its neck.
And still it was not dead.
“Clucking ridiculous!” Niko felt his blood pressure spike, before realizing that the champion was nearly bottomed out of essence now. “No, wait, almost got him!”
He flared his wings, heavily strained, but managed to guide the champion downwards. Skye, seeming to know why he was delaying, crawled around its back and atop Niko in a way that he would have found creepy at any other time. Still, with the strike zone clear, Niko happily readied their package.
“Special delivery!” Niko cawed aloud sharply as he used Particle Wing to send them downwards with deadly acceleration. The other champion had, somehow, broken through the ice and was demonstrating similarly ridiculous durability, though not through regeneration.
Niko dove and shunted his barely living payload straight at its companion.
The champion looked up, though Niko didn’t know what tipped it off, it didn’t seem to matter. They went down in a tangle of limbs, only one was very much more contorted than the other. Niko and Skye’s initial champion broke loudly against the still standing one, like it was made of stone, rather than meat. Still, it knocked it over, and Niko felt a significant rush of essence, and immediately pulled the available bloody essence from the kill.
Now reduced to one combatant – the rest of the hobs were dead or near so – the final champion could only look down at its previous companion. It looked dismayed, even afraid, before it made the executive decision to turn and flee.
“Hit it hard!” Ronald called, lashing out with a longer ranged strike with a kinetic lance of force. He hit the champion in the back of the leg, though aside from a brief faltering in its footsteps, the Dawr kept moving. Essence rotated powerfully in a body-wide pattern that Niko thought was similar in many ways to what Skye had. The others piled on additional attacks, running after it to try to stop it.
They slowed it, but it continued to build speed and momentum. Even a blast from one of Mithel’s Glue Bombs didn’t do much. Before they could begin to pursue, Ronald shouted, “Fallback! That’s good enough.”
They immediately did so, finding Thorne and his group coming up on them quickly. The tier fours looked upon them, impressed, with Thorne immediately saying, “Good work! We’re pulling off, one of the scouts saw a troop of champions running this way.”
The Wyldwalkers definitely didn’t want to contend with several champions at once. They retreated rapidly, moving with Thorne as they tried to regenerate their essence in the lull.
“Can you guys hit another group?” The tier four leader asked.
Briefly conferring, Niko and Skye had spent the most essence, but still had a little more than half of their reserves left.
“We can fight again so long as Niko and I don’t try to kill our champion.” Skye answered Thorne after speaking with the others.
Dietre snorted, “The fact that you both are only half empty after that is absurd. What do they feed you people in the lowlands?”
Skye went bright red at that, with Niko cawing merrily, “We’re not the norm. Maybe my siblings can pull something like that off, but definitely not your average adventuring group.”
Thorne, laughing along, added, “Well, I’m certainly not complaining. We’ll keep overwatch again and pull you all out if there’s reinforcements coming. There’s a lot of day left before we have to withdraw from Riizen, though, so don’t burn yourselves out too fast.”
Niko and the others nodded at that, understanding that they had to balance their expenditure. Idly, Niko wondered at what his siblings were doing now.
Hopefully, he’d meet them sooner rather than later; he’d love to rub the fact that he could fly now in Gabby’s face. ‘Bad at birding. I’ll show you what for.’ He grumped, but felt warmth in thinking on them. ‘I hope they’re doing well…’
Cheep!?
Chapter 154
This time, the meeting didn’t take long, as it was decided up front that they couldn’t stop attacking just because of the warlord’s interference. When the rest of the teams eyed them hopefully, Niko almost felt guilty when Mithel informed them that Hyper Beam wasn’t going to be ready anytime soon. Still, that just meant that they were going to keep the Wyldwalkers rotating around the battlefield, dipping in and pulling back before the Warlord could hopefully respond. The higher tier teams would be on overwatch for the lower tier teams exclusively, paired up as evenly as they could. Hopefully, they would be able to cover every retreat that the strike teams needed.
For their part, the Dawr were responding as well as they could, attempting to move their more powerful troops to the edges in batches along their formation. There was only so much they could do, though, considering the terrain. Niko imagined that on open terrain, they would be able to spread out their bulk, forming an encirclement around the more important parts. Given that they were forced into long columns, the only way they could increase their area and split up the siege weapons would be to move them onto entirely separate pathways.
Surprisingly, that was partly what they seemed to do, spreading out larger groups with higher tier Dawr away from the main column. It would make those specific Dawr more vulnerable, but it made their intended siege equipment and any other artifacts they’d brought with them much safer.
Niko and the rest of the Wyldwalkers stalked forward, with Thorne’s team watching from afar. The attacks from the various teams were intentionally left to their own devices, though they would still be insistent. Chaotic, with every attack coming from whatever angle they could find. Given that several of the front running teams were leaving traps behind, the Dawr were slowed enough that no single team was found wanting in speed.
For their part, Mithel had a new flask in hand, one that looked like Firestorm to Niko’s eyes, yet… There was something bizarre about it. He couldn’t place what was going on with it, but they would see soon enough.
“Twenty Dawr,” Niko said with a shake of his head, “That’s much too small of a group, and it looks like they know it.”
“I count two champions, four hobs, and fourteen standard goblins,” Skye said while smirking, “I hope they don’t think that will be enough.”
Ronald grunted, “They’re probably going to retreat the moment they see us. There’s no reason for them to fight, just to keep a perimeter. Still, don’t underestimate them. The champions especially will give us a hard time.”
Niko nodded, fully agreeing with that assessment. Tier four’s could take a lot more punishment than a tier three could. While Niko could survive an alarming amount of damage, partly thanks to his species, that would pale in comparison to what the average tier four would walk away with. Still, they had a good chance of dealing a lot of damage here. Even if the Dawr sorted into slightly larger groups, all they, as the attackers, had to do was harass said group while others attacked past their inevitably overdrawn lines.
Their strategy wasn’t sustainable, but they didn’t need to maintain the march for days. Riizen wasn’t what Niko would call close, but close enough that he didn’t think the Dawr expected significant losses with their plan.
Of course, he and the others all planned on exploiting that assumption to the fullest.
At Ronald’s gesture, Niko took wing, flaring his Particle Wing pattern while Skye’s legs gripped tightly to his back. In her hands, her bow lay, arrow nocked and ready to fly, but as yet with a relaxed draw. They took high to the air, with Niko pushing his wings hard. Exhilaration flooded through him in spite of the danger he would be delivering himself into momentarily. He couldn’t help it, flight was everything he’d hoped for and more.
“Alright, take us in fast,” Skye called out, to which Niko let loose a piercing cry in affirmation.
That cry was simultaneously the signal for the rest of the Wyldwalkers to begin their attack. Mithel and Charlotte started off the attack, with the spider threading web between its front most legs and bringing them up. They’d tested with a few branches and rocks, and the sheer increase in range and velocity that said combination could give them was extreme. The two of them had to agree on a target before firing, but that was hardly an issue.
Niko couldn’t actually see them with his bare eyes, only able to see their outlines in essence due to long familiarity and his Aether Sight’s enhanced capabilities. He pulled his attention from them, and only glanced to ensure that Sasha and Thokk were moving forwards with the rest of the team before he continued his dive.
With a sharp whistle and crack, the Firestorm flask ripped into the middle of the Dawr. It hit them behind wooden barricades that doubled as shields, sailing over top and cracking against the head of one of the hobs. They’d likely aimed for the champion behind it, but that was good enough.
Instead of the flood of fire, light, and smoke, Niko was treated to a twisting whirlwind of ice, snow, and ravaging sheets of hail and sleet. He almost pulled away in shock, but rapidly adjusted his Particle Wing instead. How Mithel had converted a Firestorm flask into an Icestorm flask, Niko had no idea, but it arguably gave them an even better way to engage. He pushed with his pattern, taking their path around the edge of the blizzard.
“Keep us about this far, I’ll hit them when visible.” Skye spoke, with Niko leaning on their connection to ensure he heard her right. Closely, he skirted the edge of the raging blizzard, and idly wondered which was the worse fate, fire or ice?
When the storm broke, Thokk and Sasha were very nearly upon the Dawr, and the wreckage was revealed to them all. Niko took in a deep breath in preparation even as he took stock of their damages. All of the goblins were down, either deceased or thoroughly frozen in place with ice and snow packing them down. The hobs were actually worse off, looking like they’d taken considerable damage from chunks of ice hitting them amidst the sudden storm. Ironically, the fact that they hadn’t been thrown to the ground and covered in ice meant that they’d taken the brunt of the razor sharp shards of ice that made up the storm. The champions weren’t nearly as damaged, looking like they’d taken a beating, but the biggest problem for them was the sheer quantity of ice that had frozen to their forms stiffly.
As far as damage went, Firestorm was greater, but Niko couldn’t deny that Icestorm was far better at setting up for following damage.
Skye mumbled something on Niko’s back before firing, hitting one of the barely moving champions in its right eye. Said Dawr snarled, a muffled sound with the ice that rapidly cracked as it surged with essence. It shattered, just as Skye mumbled something else, and then its other eye was hit by an arrow.
“Still got it,” she grinned, before pouring on more essence. Niko shook his head in amusement at his companion, even as bark covered her form. Now she fired rapidly. Every wing beat punctuated by another twang of her bow. The champion looked up at them, before Niko senses essence roil in its body. He tracked the energies movement even as Niko’s lungs expanded, prepared to intervene.
Somehow, it tracked towards them, the great-axe in its hands suddenly glowing with a sticky, yellow glow. It drew back, essence trailing into patterns in its arms, ready to release the blow in an instant.
‘Gotcha,’ Niko didn’t know what the patterns specific purpose was, but knowing it’s layout and path was enough. The champion’s control of its own essence was a far cry from someone like Ronald, leaving Niko virtually able to trace the entire network from the essence that billowed from its flesh.
He screeched, Carrion Call buffeting the champion. It grimaced, but adamantly continued to swing…
…And nearly lost its balance on the ice when the energy from his weapon launched prematurely, sending it directly to the sky mid-swing.
“Where are you aiming!?” Skye mocked as Niko took in another lungful of air – for himself, not his pattern – and repositioned around the group. She hit it several more times, arrow after arrow crashing into both armor and flesh. Several of the shots stuck into the metal, while the rare few only grazed or bounced. The metal plates may have been clumsy work, but they were effective enough. The arrows that went deeper still weren’t enough to bring it down, though.
Another flask blasted the second champion as they continued to harry the first. The explosion was much smaller, but concentrated, and seemed to rip the cold from the area. Niko actually had to compensate to the sudden change in air pressure, Particle Wing maintaining his track in the air after he suddenly lost altitude.
The champion, on the other hand, now was utterly encased in ice, like a tomb. Given that he didn’t feel a rush of essence, Niko didn’t think that it was dead. Which, frankly, was ridiculous, given how much pressure the ice should have been under at that point.
The hobs, those left, tried to rally as Thokk and Sasha smashed into them, the attacks of Ronald, Stella, and Dachna following up rapidly, reaping them down. Niko refocused on their quarry, just in time to notice a new pattern manifest in the champion.
With a howl and a surge of bloody energy, the champions wounds healed before Niko’s eyes. The arrows were forced out of his eyes in a gory shower, replaced by perfectly healed orbs that glared balefully at Niko and Skye. Several other snapping sounds resounded as arrows were snapped at their shifts, the heads of the arrows unable to be forced back up and out of armor. Still, it seemed that the champion was as good as new.
‘That’s what I’d think if I didn’t see how far its reservoir just dipped, at least.’ Niko watched as half of it’s available reserves vanished in a flash. He shared that with Skye, who immediately shot another arrow at the Dawr’s neck. When it moved to block, she followed up with a second shot, far quicker than the previous had been. It failed to react in time, and now had one of its eyes pierced once more.
It screamed curses that Niko could unfortunately understand, some of which made Niko cringe. “Yikes, he’s… really angry.”
“I couldn’t tell,” Skye called dryly, before groaning at the arrow being pushed out of its eye once more. “How much essence is that taking him?”
Niko tried to estimate from what he’d said, but shook his head, “Not nearly as much as I’d thought it should. Maybe it takes more to heal multiple wounds at once? Heads up!”
He called out the shift in essence as yet another, new pattern activated. With all the grace of a runaway train, the champion catapulted itself through the air, nearly all the way to where Niko was. Startled, Niko banked hard, narrowly dodging a yellow blast of energy.
Before he could reposition, the champion’s essence charged again, and this time Niko cut loose, surging an immense amount of heat beneath his wings to soar upwards. He narrowly dodged the champions axe, leaving the Dawr screaming at him midair.
Skye shot at near point blank range, the arrows punching into his screaming mouth. The head of one blasted out the back, with another angling upwards into what Niko hoped was its brain.
“Peck me! It can charge midair?” Niko cawed, before warning, “No essence! Still alive!”
Skye cursed even as the body fell, smacking down hard a branch below. Niko watched as the motionless body twitched and spasmed, the arrows being pushed out of its flesh as its regeneration pattern aggressively performed its task.
“Whoa… that is… an impressive pattern.” Niko blinked in dismay.
“That’s a champion for you, alright.” Skye said, unable to help the hint of respect from her voice. “We need to take this into melee, I can’t do enough with arrows anymore.”
The Az-Phorus dove, “Hop off!”
Skye did so immediately, flaring her pattern and reaching for plant limbs that likewise stretched out to her. Niko confirmed only that she was able to use them and rapidly descend before dedicating his focus to his dive-bomb.
Air whistled past his ears, and as he approached he ramped his Carrion Call to the maximum, intent on dealing damage and debilitating with it. That turned out to be prescient, as the champion regained mental faculties just before the attack began. Instead of being able to martial itself, the champion, fresh from brain trauma, floundered the defense.
Niko flared his Wyldstrider and Sharp Strike patterns together, focusing on his front talons for power and piercing. With a crushing blow, he pierced through the champions chest plating, bending the metal with a gruesome mixture of rending metal and snapping bones. Blood splattered from the champions mouth even as it immediately tried to push Niko away. Anchored as he was in the champions chest, he couldn’t leave even if he wanted too just then. So, he doubled down.
He empowered his beak with a sharp strike, wrapping his body simultaneously with the bloody haze of energy that empowered his flesh. With savage intent, he pecked down, driving his ridged, sharp-edged beak into the champion’s head. He cracked the bone on the first blow, rattling himself with the hit, but Niko felt that he’d had a bad angle. Rearing back, he tried to go for another blow, only for the Champion to surge its arm pattern, coating its fist in yellowish energy. Niko grit his beak, ready to take a hit and return it twice over.
Skye was there before it could even finish cocking its arm back, slashing bark-encased claws slicing the joint between the armor at the elbow. Niko could feel that Skye was nearly maxed on her Wyldform patterns maximum energy use, and even if he couldn’t see the essence in her body, the fact that she was nearly completely covered in pale white wood was indication enough. Given the freedom to strike at will, Niko hit it again, and again, before the champion surged with essence again. It launched straight upwards, whatever bizarre charge pattern it had smashing Niko into its chest where he finally dislodged his talons.
To his surprise, Skye was latched onto its back, and before the champion could follow up on its freedom and rapid healing, she slashed through the back of its neck.
And still it was not dead.
“Clucking ridiculous!” Niko felt his blood pressure spike, before realizing that the champion was nearly bottomed out of essence now. “No, wait, almost got him!”
He flared his wings, heavily strained, but managed to guide the champion downwards. Skye, seeming to know why he was delaying, crawled around its back and atop Niko in a way that he would have found creepy at any other time. Still, with the strike zone clear, Niko happily readied their package.
“Special delivery!” Niko cawed aloud sharply as he used Particle Wing to send them downwards with deadly acceleration. The other champion had, somehow, broken through the ice and was demonstrating similarly ridiculous durability, though not through regeneration.
Niko dove and shunted his barely living payload straight at its companion.
The champion looked up, though Niko didn’t know what tipped it off, it didn’t seem to matter. They went down in a tangle of limbs, only one was very much more contorted than the other. Niko and Skye’s initial champion broke loudly against the still standing one, like it was made of stone, rather than meat. Still, it knocked it over, and Niko felt a significant rush of essence, and immediately pulled the available bloody essence from the kill.
Now reduced to one combatant – the rest of the hobs were dead or near so – the final champion could only look down at its previous companion. It looked dismayed, even afraid, before it made the executive decision to turn and flee.
“Hit it hard!” Ronald called, lashing out with a longer ranged strike with a kinetic lance of force. He hit the champion in the back of the leg, though aside from a brief faltering in its footsteps, the Dawr kept moving. Essence rotated powerfully in a body-wide pattern that Niko thought was similar in many ways to what Skye had. The others piled on additional attacks, running after it to try to stop it.
They slowed it, but it continued to build speed and momentum. Even a blast from one of Mithel’s Glue Bombs didn’t do much. Before they could begin to pursue, Ronald shouted, “Fallback! That’s good enough.”
They immediately did so, finding Thorne and his group coming up on them quickly. The tier fours looked upon them, impressed, with Thorne immediately saying, “Good work! We’re pulling off, one of the scouts saw a troop of champions running this way.”
The Wyldwalkers definitely didn’t want to contend with several champions at once. They retreated rapidly, moving with Thorne as they tried to regenerate their essence in the lull.
“Can you guys hit another group?” The tier four leader asked.
Briefly conferring, Niko and Skye had spent the most essence, but still had a little more than half of their reserves left.
“We can fight again so long as Niko and I don’t try to kill our champion.” Skye answered Thorne after speaking with the others.
Dietre snorted, “The fact that you both are only half empty after that is absurd. What do they feed you people in the lowlands?”
Skye went bright red at that, with Niko cawing merrily, “We’re not the norm. Maybe my siblings can pull something like that off, but definitely not your average adventuring group.”
Thorne, laughing along, added, “Well, I’m certainly not complaining. We’ll keep overwatch again and pull you all out if there’s reinforcements coming. There’s a lot of day left before we have to withdraw from Riizen, though, so don’t burn yourselves out too fast.”
Niko and the others nodded at that, understanding that they had to balance their expenditure. Idly, Niko wondered at what his siblings were doing now.
Hopefully, he’d meet them sooner rather than later; he’d love to rub the fact that he could fly now in Gabby’s face. ‘Bad at birding. I’ll show you what for.’ He grumped, but felt warmth in thinking on them. ‘I hope they’re doing well…’
