Chapter 90: And Then Spikes – Chapter 90

Akhier

Jeremy and Kelly stand right below the edge of the next room with the others lined up behind them. Jeremy raises his hand with all the fingers out. One by one he lowers his fingers and on zero everyone covers their eyes as Kelly releases a spell up into the air.

The monsters can hear a slight whistle as a dull grey ball rises over the edge and into view. All the kobolds and goats look over at the strange sight, just in time for the spell to go off. There is a bright double flash of light that leaks through into the eyes of even the group who had been prepared for it. Up above them the kobolds and goats never stood a chance to avoid the near blinding light.

Without a second’s notice, Jeremy leads the others up into the room. Being the first up, he charges at the enemy mage with both daggers out. Kelly enters next and sidesteps out of the way as Susan comes charging in. After that, the rest of the group climbs the staircase at a more leisurely pace. Though this doesn’t stop them from firing off spells and arrows.

Two goats fall in the first moment before the monsters can recover from the flash, but that is it. The kobold mage panic casts a spell that raises up a stone wall in front of the four kobolds. This stops Jeremy from a quick behead operation. The wall doesn’t look too sturdy, but he doesn’t know what the kobolds are preparing behind it, so he diverts to attack the goats.

Unlike on the previous floors though, his drive by throat slitting doesn’t provide the same outcome. While it hurt the two goats, they don’t drop right away and instead can counter attack. Jeremy crosses his daggers to block, but more than just the goat’s toughness has gone up. The two of them bash him back with just enough extra force from the second floor to throw him off and knock him over.

Then the wall falls. With only one mage who had been in charge of the wall, the kobolds didn’t get to prepare anything too crazy. Still, this changed the fight from an ambush to a straight up fight, and the group was discovering they weren’t quite ready for that. The two kobolds wielding pick-like weapons put pressure on Jeremy as they try to spike his knees. More troubling for the group though is the goatherd now being free to take command of the fight.

The five uninjured goats ignore Jeremy and all gang up on Susan, who was in the middle of trying to flank the mage. She jumps over the first, dives through the next two and just rolls away from the last two. Supporting her Bell goes into rapid fire mod, shooting off arrow after arrow to suppress the goats. This doesn’t do as much as she would like. The goats, clearly much tougher than the ones on the previous floor, can shrug off the arrows with them stuck harmlessly in their sides.

Worse yet, Zach notices something worrying as he prepares a spell. “Heyo, just in case you didn’t notice, the goats seem to have a wee bit of regen going on!”

And he isn’t wrong about that. The two goats with slit throats aren’t bleeding anymore and as he watches, the arrows stuck in the other goats are being squeezed out. It isn’t a quick heal, but enough to stabilize them if they aren’t finished off.

Still rolling around on the ground, Jeremy curses. “How much con do they have? Even our more body focused people haven’t hit regen yet!”

Kelly laughs as she releases a devastating fire spell. “They’re goats, what do you expect? Of all the farm animals, they’re seen as some of the tougher ones. I bet that nonsense kicks in below twenty for them. Plus, the dungeon buffs them. While I still haven’t quite detected exact levels from range. It is easy enough to tell that there are a range of levels among the goats on the first floor.”

While she is talking Kelly’s fire spell lands. From what looked like a small red crystal, a shower of fire shards cascaded outward, flying just over Jeremy on the ground and delivering severe burns to the goats and kobolds attacking him. The goatherd frowns at this and with a bark the four goats change their targets and charges at the group’s back line. Two of them however don’t make it as the fire shards are just too much, having already had their throats slit.

The two that lived long enough to reach the back line do little better as Zach releases his spell. From a seed he had gotten from a pouch on his belt, a green vine shots out. Within moments this vine has grown around the two charging goats, tripping them up. Of course such rapid growth isn’t sustainable, and the vine turns brown and crumbles away in the same amount of time.

Still, it didn’t need to last long and had done its job. Along with stopping the charge, those vines had grown wicked sharp thorns of amazing length. Unable to break free from the vines, those two goats were pin cushioned, which along with the damage from the fire shards was enough to down them.

Not enough to kill the goats as their regen kicks in to stop the bleeding and continue working on the burns. But the party isn’t going to give them a chance. Bell steps up next to them and with two well-placed shots kills them.

Back with Jeremy, he still can’t manage to get himself off the ground, which at least Susan hasn’t had to deal with. Whenever he attempts to get up the pick wielding kobolds will go for sweeping attacks to keep him down. This doesn’t mean he is defenseless, though. With wild spinning kicks, he is close to knocking the kobolds over. Then the spikes happen.

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At the back of the room, everyone had ignored the earth mage. Not on purpose. There was just enough elsewhere for the group to deal with. This wasn’t a good thing though as he had been channeling a spell and that spell has gone off. From the floor jagged spikes burst upward everywhere at odd angles. One of the goats near Susan even gets caught up in the mess.

It knocks everyone in the back line except for Bell over with serious wounds to their feet and legs. Bell avoids the spell with a quick hop and getting lucky with the spike placement. Still, she isn’t completely able to avoid damage because she does have to land somewhere and everything is covered in spikes.

Susan does better by making use of the goat that got hit as a platform, but her left leg is still ripped up something fierce. On the other hand, Jeremy gets out better than anyone else in the group. Having been laid out on the ground and with the spikes all bursting out at the same time, it raises his body up instead of piercing him. While a little pointy, he is able to spread his weight out enough to not be pierced. The closest to being hurt is when one spike grows up at an angle and almost pincers him.

This however does not help him get up. If anything this new terrain feature makes it even harder for Jeremy as it prevents him rolling around to dodge the pick wielding kobolds. In the end, those same kobolds are his breakthrough point. The kobold mage was careful to not hit them and so there is a decent sized ring around the two free of spikes.

Once Jeremy notices this he is quick to take advantage of it. While the rolling around on the spikes isn’t very kind to his skin, he soldiers through it and ends up in one of the spike free circles. This crowds out the kobold that was previously there, knocking it over. As the kobold falls Jeremy pops up and lands a palm strike on its chest, slamming it down on the spikes. While not dead the kobold isn’t going anywhere and will bleed out if not helped.

This distresses the other pick wielding kobold, who tries to sweep Jeremy onto the spikes. Jeremy isn’t taking this though and redirects the pick down into the surrounding spikes. The stone shatters against the mining tool, but it delays the attack long enough. He hops up over the intervening spikes and slams into the other kobold. It flails its arms, letting go of the pick but managing to stay standing.

This doesn’t save the kobold, though. Now on his feet, Jeremy draws out another set of daggers after losing his first set while rolling around. A quick one two attack pattern and the kobold is bleeding out from the throat and its dominant arm has been disabled. Then a gentle push topples the kobold back, impaling it on the spikes as well.

As this is happening Susan is in a standoff with the goats. She has ended up in a large area clear of spikes but much of it taken up by the four goats still standing. Though the fifth goat that had accidentally been hit by the spike spell is constantly trying to get free, so could join in at any moment.

Having seen that a simple throat opening might not do it, Susan goes in for the double tap. In one hand she has a slashing dagger which she uses to open the closest goat’s throat, but she doesn’t leave it at that. In her other hand is a stiletto style dagger and after getting in under the goat she thrusts it into the goat’s heart, leaving the dagger in place.

If she took it out, the goat might end up bleeding more, but just as likely it would have healed up enough to not bleed out. This way even if a slower bleed the damage stays and can’t heal back to full without the weapon being removed first. Unlikely to happen though as the goatherd kobold is stuck back guarding the mage.

Then she does it again with another stiletto and again and again and once more to finish all the surrounding goats. Not even sparing the goat impaled on the spikes takes a little bit of time during which Bell is holding down the mage. That kobold mage keeps trying to take control of the spikes to cause some more serious damage, but that would require concentration. Something in short supply when you have arrows falling all around you and you only have a friend with a shillelagh to defend you.

All the while Doctor is in the back trying to get Kelly, Zach, and himself on their feet again. Though as all three of them now realize, it is a bit hard to cast a spell when you have literal spikes of stone shoved into your feet. None of them say it, but with a shared look they know that once out of the dungeon some other things will be put on the back burner. They have to find a skill that will let them cast through things like pain or surprise. If anything, just looking at the kobold earth mage being denied spells without even being hit is enough to highlight the problem.

Though even without the three of them helping the other three are doing alright. Bell has even landed some hits on the kobold mage while the Barrais are working their way through the spikes to join in on the fun. Their help doesn’t take long to get there and with that the last two threats are taken out and all that is left is the cleanup. This will not be easy, of course. Especially since the spikes don’t go away with the mage dead.

Akhier

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