Chapter 8: Chapter – 3.1

“Shit” said Mord as he lost all color on his face “shit, can we take it?”

“It’s wounded and some of the previous party fighting it may still be alive” Scott told us while tying a quiver to his waist and pulling out a stamina potion.

“Shit” Mord cursed again before downing his own stamina potion “We can’t let this chance pass by”

“What’s a Vouivre?”

“A draconic female monster, like a lamia from the middle floors but much bigger and stronger” Mord explained while everyone got ready “Thing is it’s really fucking rare and always has a lot of drops, if we kill it we can earn enough for half a year of work.”

“It’s also really fucking strong like the infant dragon on the upper floors” warned Scott while patting my shoulder.

Looking at the three of them I only saw small valis in place of their eyes, there was no stopping it now.

Considering my options I dropped everything I was carrying and sighed, at every encounter we had I had been training my illusions so I was almost out of mind to cast and I wouldn’t make it back without them “Any of you guys have a mind potion?”

“I have one” said Guile “It’s from that annoying mage we partied with two months ago I just never got rid of it”

“Ha! I knew the fights were a little too easy” Mord said in triumph “you got some kind of daze or confuse spell you’ve been chanting?”

“I can create crude illusions” I confessed a little of what I could do while taking the small blue vial from Guile’s hand and downing it in a single gulp “It’s much harder to use against stronger monsters and works best when there are more than one but I can probably make it miss some blows or leave itself open a couple of times”

“Will it work on this monster?”

“Fuck if I know, I could use it on the bugbears” I shrugged.

“Fine, try to create openings for us if you can but we won’t be counting on it” Mord said before taking a deep breath “alright we’re gonna try and get the jump on this thing, kid stay away from the fighting and watch out for other monsters, Scott keep your distance and harass with arrows, if Guile and I die just run and try to get the kid back to Rivira alright?”

“Sure boss” Scott lied and squeezed his bow harder making the wood creek.

We approached the Vouivre’s location as carefully as we could using one of Scott’s scent masking herbs and making sure to avoid stepping on anything to cause noise, thankfully there weren’t any dried leaves or twigs in the ground and we made good time before we crouched under a root and I got my first look of the draconic monster.

It was large, larger than a bugbear by far, Mord was right when he said the thing was like a lamia, it had a large reptilian tail but it was much thicker than those depicted in stories looking heavy and with a round ending, the woman part had bluish skin with hard brown scales covering its privates, a large pair of wings sprouted from it’s back with massive thin claws at the end of muscular arms too large for its body, it’s hair was long and it had needle like fangs all over its mouth.

It was also covered in blood and eating the flesh of a dismembered woman, I was frozen as I stared at the towering beast.

It must have ripped off the woman’s limbs where her body had fallen and then attacked the torso itself because there were trails of blood in four directions, entrails were pulled out and spread over the moss on the floor, then the beast had broken her ribs and pulled them open like a door to get access to the heart and lungs that it was currently chewing on.

Another man was pinned by the stomach to a root by what must have been his own spear his arms and legs flapping bonelessly as some of his intestines were hanging out of his belly the trails of blood telling me he had tried to struggle to pull himself free before dying, a third man had his legs cut off and was laying face down a few meters away with yet a fourth laying against another root with blood all over its clothes

I crouched there and my eyes took it all in, every speck of blood and gore, every piece of this horror hit me like a punch to the stomach and I’d never be able to forget it for the rest of my life, no wonder the Uchiha went mad.

Taking my time to register everything around the large beast I managed to keep myself from throwing up and spent almost a full minute just trying to hear and see everything about the situation, almost trembling from just the presence of the beast I knew I couldn’t afford to take it easy.

I activated the mangekyou immediately feeling a aching sensation in my eyes and, unable to catch it’s eyes, threw the best lesser ilusion I could at the beast showing it the location as it was then nodded towards Guile, the large man stood slowly making as little noise as he could and released a very slow, very deliberate sigh of relief when the Vuivre didn’t react.

We had planned it before arriving, I’d mask view and try to mask their noise, I wasn’t sure I could do scent as well so I prefer to focus on the other two and allow both melee fighters to get a devastating first blow against the dragonkin while it didn’t know they were there, thankfully the beast was already relaxed enough after the fight that the illusion took hold.

Mord and Guile made their way towards the beast, Guile in front with his shield and spear at the ready, once they had to freeze as the Vouivre smelled them on the air and lifted it’s head to look around but, not seeing anything, the creature dismissed its concerns and continued to eat.

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From his place up on a branch Scott pulled out an arrow and started testing if he could get a good enough footing to draw it, the branch was wide enough he soon found a comfortable position and waited while both warriors flanked the beast and prepared their blows.

Unsheathing my sword and crouching between some roots where I could still keep an eye on the beast I watched as Mord and Guile took their positions one in the front and another at the creature’s back then stabbed with their spears aiming for the monster’s crystal to end the fight early.

Mord’s spear pierced all the way through the vouivre’s torso but somehow missed her crystal, the beast reacted with serpentine reflex twisting away, Guile’s spear leaving a deep gash on its chest but failing to pierce it.

With a loud roar of pain it whipped its tail around and hit Guile’s shield, sending the man stumbling back while striking blindly behind itself forcing Mord to retreat then it lifted its head and opened its wings wide, releasing another roar of rage so loud I had to cover my ears.

I felt my ilusion break as the beast’s magic was roused and tried to send another one, something hastily put together that would only leave static copies of adventurers I had seen laying around the beast, hopefully confusing it a little but it didn’t take hold, the Vouivre in too much pain and rage to be fooled by a lesser ilusion.

Guile threw his spear like a javelin but the beast batted it aside with an arm and took the time to break the shaft of the one piercing its body, pull it out and throw it away.

Then it reeled away with a screech of pain as an arrow sprouted from its left eye, Mord and Guile didn’t waste the chance.

They struck as one Mord jumping up to try and get to the beast head while guile delivered a powerful blow to it’s chest caving in some of the creature’s scales, the beast twisted around with a wide sweep of its arm and Mord was forced to block with his sword or be disemboweled by its claws.

A second arrow nicked its neck and it roared again, its wings retracting to protect its head before its eyes focused on Guile and it was all the warrior could do to survive the fury of blows it released.

Claw swipes dug deep gashed in Guile’s shield forcing the man to retreat while the beast keep Mord away with tail strikes which hit the ground with so much strength it sent wood flying like shrapnel, another two arrows hit it in the chest and tail but the Vuivre just ignored them and continued it’s assault.

I kept trying to catch it in another Illusion but it was too strong for me and I was left feeling useless as the group fought for its life.

Mord finally managed to dodge the creature’s tail and, blocking the shrapnel from reaching his face with an arm delivered a deep cut to the vuivre’s waist, the beast twisted around once again delivering a devastating tail strike against Guile’s shield and sending him flying through the air.

Ducking under another arrow the female dragonkin focused on Mord and delivered strike after strike even as blood flew everywhere from the deep gash on her waist.

Mord was overwhelmed, with only his sword he wasn’t able to fully block its claws and was scratched again and again making his armor look more like rags and leaving his arms trembling from the strain, in desperation he took a claw swipe to the chest armor in order to focus fully on a new strike.

With a scream he delivered a full powered chop towards the beast’s limbs somehow managing to sever both of them just below the elbow, the creature was beyond caring thought and just struck like a snake biting down on his neck and riding him to the ground.

Scott frantically shot arrow after arrow but the beast curled her tail around Mord like a snake and let the arrows pierce her strong muscular coils while she savaged Mord’s neck.

Looking around I noticed Guile finally getting up but his shield arm was hanging limply by his side and he had clearly hurt his leg since he was limping as fast as he could towards the two fighters.

“Crap he won’t make it” I didn’t even notice I had spoken out loud, I was afraid, no, terrified, our party was losing and, although the vouivre was deeply hurt it still seemed strong enough to finish off Guile and face Scott alone.

I knew what I should do now, there was no shame in retreating from an enemy vastly more powerful than myself, we had even discussed it, Guile was too hurt to escape so he would draw the monster’s attention and Scott and I would escape to live another day.

Fuck, I knew Scott wasn’t gonna abandon them of his own accord but if I ran first he may follow, I could be saving his life even.

Even if he didn’t follow me, I could be careful and use my illusions well enough to have a chance of making it up to the 18th floor, certainly more of a chance than if I faced the powerful monster as a level 1 with all my attributes below three digits.

The hell, for all I knew those guys could have been planning to kill me after dealing with the Vouivre to avoid paying my 10%, we only had a professional relationship where they were paying for me to act as a supporter it’s not like we were a permanent party and the money from such big haul could be enough for them to turn against me, I even vaguely remember Mord acting like an asshole towards Bell on the Danmachi anime.

Shit, what do I do?