Chapter 35: Chapter 35: Boss Battle

[Boss Battle Engaged!]

[Nay & The Gloom Rangers & The Bouldershield Brother]

VERSUS

[The Nether Sister]

---

“You know,” Nay said, speaking to the invisible quest giver and game master in the sky, “you need to learn about this thing called consent.”

The Nether Sister touched her crown of violet flame. A bit of the fire spread to her hand. The flame grew, lengthening into a blazing whip the color of blood.

She flicked her arm, cracking the whip at Martygan. He held up his sword in a defensive stance. The cord of flames wrapped around his sword. She yanked, tearing the sword out of his hands. It spun through the air off to the side.

The Nether Sister reared her arm back and crouched, winding up to deliver another whip crack.

As the flaming whip lashed out, Martygan dove.

In mid-air, vigor vapors swirled around him and his form shifted and he transformed.

A white wolf landed on the ground and ran for the sword, dodging the unfurling scourges of the whip.

The white wolf leaped and shifted mid-air again, returning back to the form of Martygan. The ranger landed, grabbed his sword and rolled across the ground. He leapt to his feet and charged the Nether Sister from a different angle.

She pivoted and the whip flew out again.

Lain moved in tandem with her companion, throwing up an Autumn Shield for him.

The flame whip cracked against the shield. Flames spread across the surface, weakening it.

Martygan delivered a reverse slash, cutting off the Nether Sister’s hand at the wrist. Her hand holding the whip separated from her body.

Coils of shadow spilled out of her fresh stump.

He continued his sword sequence with a lunge, pushing his sword through her armored tunic.

It went through her incorporeal torso, but the tip of the blade did not protrude from her back.

The monochrome substance underneath her armor absorbed his blade.

The sword was somewhere inside of her, inside the incorporeal void. Perhaps that part of the sword had entered the Nether Realm itself.

The coils of shadow battered against the Autumn Shield, finally cracking through it in a dissipation of vigor.

The healer cried out in surprise. “Martygan!”

The shadow coils wrapped around his other arm, winding up his torso and neck, restraining him.

One of the coils shoved its way through his lips, hammering past his clenched teeth and down into his throat. The veins in his neck and face turned blue, then black as the nether witch invaded his body.

The nether witch smiled at her captive Gloom Ranger. Martygan was in too much shock and pain to return the look with defiance.

The man was suffering.

Then the Nether Sister said something cryptic. “I do need a new familiar.”

Lain shouted and was already running towards the Nether Sister.

As a healer, she had been trained to heal her companions no matter what. One moment of distraction could get someone killed. She had never failed in her duties as a healer, so to see this now was a new experience for her. She reacted as many perfectionists might do when they realized something wrong, something that defied the plan was happening.

She reacted blindly, without thinking, in desperation and anger.

She too, leapt and shifted.

But her mobile shifting form was that of a majestic elk. She had eight Bronze-tipped points to each antler, a Monarch elk.

She lowered her head and hit the Nether Sister in the knees. She jerked her antlers up and tossed the witch into the air.

Tearing the shadow coils away from Martygan. Upon disconnection he collapsed to the ground, in the throes of a seizure.

The Monarch elk shifted back into Lain. She pulled out her hoops.

She used the last of her vigor reserves to toss one into the air and focus a damaging beam blast into the Nether Sister, shooting her into the ground.

The healer threw her other hoop like a Frisbee. It razored through the air and hit the witch in the incorporeal mid-section. The weapon disappeared into her like disappearing into a cloud.

Jolf picked up his unconscious brother’s battle-hammer. He looked at Nay, “We have to help them.”

Nay swallowed. “How?”

Lain knelt next to Martygan, comforting him as he was seizing, but out of vigor reserves and all her big spells on cool down, the most she could do was comfort him with her presence and touch. “Come back to us.”

The Nether Sister smiled at the Gloom Rangers. “It’s been too long since I’ve had capable Thralls on this material plane.”

She approached them, her back to the other two in their party.

Jolf gestured at the witch and Nay nodded, they each held tight to their weapons and held their breath, creeping up behind the Nether Sister.

Nay held her breath as she stalked. At any moment, the powerful witch could turn around and that would be the end of her.

She imagined herself making no noise, footsteps silent and non-existent. Just like when she was a child and she would play hide and seek with the neighborhood children.

But instead of hiding she was back-stabbing.

Shadow coils extended out of the Nether Sister’s wrist stump, wriggling in the air towards Lain. Her purple eyes flashed in anticipation.

Nay peeked the incorporeal torso underneath the witch's armored tunic.

She had seen what had happened to the Gloom Ranger weapons. They had disappeared within the spirit matter of the Nether Sister. Is that where the weapons had gone? Some kind of spirit realm where she had originated from?

Regardless, she chose a more tangible target.

So she drove Thorn into the side of the witch’s neck.

That was corporeal enough.

The blade plunged into the flesh and bone with a crunch. The Nether Sister spun, her hand flying to her neck, only to see Jolf swinging the battle-hammer into Thorn’s handle. It tapped the skullcrusher with a sharp clang and buried the entire weapon through the creature’s neck and spinal column.

The witch clamped down her teeth. Blood from her throat bubbled up, coating them. She stared down her surprise attackers, red-tinged slobber dripping down her chin.

She staggered and collapsed to the ground, blood squirting out of her wound. She started hacking, as breath hitched in her ruined throat. But she managed to dig Thorn’s handle out of her neck. She grimaced, pulling out the combat dagger.

Blood sprayed out of the wound. She put her hand up to her violet flame crown, grabbing a handful of fire. She shoved it onto her neck, cauterizing the entry and exit wound.

She started to push herself up.

Lain saw that the Nether Sister wasn’t dead. It was regrouping.

The healer addressed them. “We have to get out back to the Fort and tell the rest of the Rangers that there’s a Nether Being here.”

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“You’ll just leave the town?” Jolf said. “Leave us to fend for ourselves against this thing?”

“No one stands a chance if Scarwatch isn’t alerted,” Lain said. “I’m sorry.”

She stood, lifting up Martygan in her arms. “I’ll get us to safety, but then I must leave and get us to Fort Nixxiom. Two Rangers, one unconscious, most of our spells on cool down or not strong enough – it’s not enough to defeat her! Come with me!”

Vigor fog surrounded her and she shifted into her elk form, Martygan atop her back.

“By Voreheim’s arse,” Jolf said. “I will stay in town with my brother. I have to organize the watchmen and convince the townsfolk to stay hidden.”

He put a hand on Nay’s shoulder. “You should get to Quincy back at the Lodge. You’ll be better off with him.”

Nay gently picked up Bryja’s brother. He was still asleep, still under Lain’s calming sleep spell.

Lain knelt onto her foreleg so Nay could mount her. Martygan was draped over the elk in front of her.

The elk sprinted off, away from the rising Nether Sister.

The witch saw the elk darting off with Nay and the fallen ranger.

A black cloud swirled into existence in front of the Nether Sister. She walked into it, disappearing.

Nay looked back, seeing no trace of the witch.

But then a black cloud formed in front of them.

The Nether Sister stepped out of it, blocking their way. She extended her wrist stump and the scourge of shadow coils undulated out, oscillating and extending.

Before Lain could change directions, the shadow coils wrapped around her antlers. They yanked the elk to the side, and its forward momentum whipped them around, spinning Lain’s mobile form in a skidding one-eighty, her elk head caught on the tendrils of shadow.

Nay and Martygan flew off the elk.

Mid-air, the cook held Bryja’s sleeping brother tight, wrapping herself around him as she landed on her back. The crash knocked the wind out of her.

The tendrils held the elk’s mouth open, and they flickered, poising to travel into Lain’s throat.

Something buzz-sawed out of the sky, slicing through the Nether Sister’s foot and impaling it to the earth.

Vapors of vigor rose off the spirit weapon in the form of a massive and cruel-looking battle-axe bisecting the witch’s foot.

There was a bellowing battle shout and everyone looked up to see Quincy descending out of the sky like a comet. Nom was draped across his shoulders, making what sounded like a trilling scream. The tentacle didn’t have a weapon, but he was flailing and amped up to join the fight regardless.

Ostentatious text overtook Nay’s vision, flashing in synthetic, 80s style Battle-Royale font.

---

[New Contenders Have Entered the Boss Battle!]

[Quincy The Doomhearted and Nzxthommocus the III, Third Whip of the Pain Lord]

VERSUS

[Nether Sister]

---

Gertrude, the battle-axe, was spinning in Quincy’s hand and more spirit axes were flying from it. They whip-sawed straight for the Nether Sister.

The spinning spirit axes sliced through the shadow coils, freeing the elk from the witch.

The Nether Sister managed to lean and dodge the other spirit axes.

Quincy landed, swinging the axe down like a guillotine at the witch. Gertrude dug into her shoulder, going a foot into her chest. Smoking green vigor began bubbling off the edge of the blade embedded inside the witch.

Her shoulder started to swell, veins turning black from an infection. Boils began to form and burst from the plague-ridden flesh.

Quincy ripped Gertrude out in a spattering of blood and sickness. He watched the witch stumble.

Nom flew at her, straight as a javelin and disappeared into the incorporeal gray matter of her torso.

/////////

Nom floated through the Nether Space.

He seemed to still be in Lucerna’s End, except it was the town floating through a monochromatic wasteland. Color and sound save for a distant wind were void from the place.

The cobblestone streets and buildings were drifting through space, everything in black and white. Between the objects, Nom glanced a gray void whirling in the negative spaces.

And there was a creeping darkness always on the edge of his peripheral vision. He got the sense it was a different realm underneath the reality he was used to occupying.

In front of him, he saw a sword and a golden hoop floating in the air. He wiggled his body towards them, swimming like a sea snake.

/////////

The Nether Sister, severely injured, conjured another black cloud and escaped into it right as Quincy swung at her with another guillotine combo. Gertrude swung through empty air.

Him and Nay looked at each other, then looked around, searching for the witch.

That’s when Nay got an idea.

She accessed her inventory and mentally clicked on Mirkwood’s Eye. The object automatically appeared in her hand. She held a handle connected to a chain, and the eye itself, in its triangular metal frame, dangled on the end of the chain.

She clicked the button on the handle, activating the eye. A cone of light shined from it, highlighting the realm underneath the material plane they were in.

Within the cone, her and Quincy could glimpse the Nether Realm.

The monochrome gray realm underneath their material plane. It was like peering into a shadow realm.

They spotted the Nether Sister crouching in the Nether Realm, observing them from this different plane. She snarled as the cone of the Mirkwood Eye exposed her.

Quincy swiped Gertrude through the air as if it were a hook, creating a rush of wind that pulled the witch towards him.

With his other hand, he pulled the massive crossbow from his back, Samuel. There was a glowing bolt already loaded.

Nay caught a flowing script carved in a corkscrew pattern around the bolt.

The Nether Sister was pulled back into the material plane by Quincy’s distance-closing ability. Then he used his crossbow for some intimate, up close wet work. He pulled Samuel’s trigger, releasing the bolt into the witch’s face.

It was like a pumpkin exploding. A flaming pumpkin.

The Nether Sister’s head separated into its component atoms as the glowing bolt pierced her forehead. Its special energy causing a chain reaction with the Nether Being’s matter.

The flaming violet crown extinguished. The disintegrating head and its body fell back into the Nether Realm, disappearing as the duration of the Mirkwood Eye ended.

Nay, Quincy and Lain, back in her human form, stood there in stunned silence.

“Has anyone seen Nom?” Nay said.

And as if on cue, Nom flew out of the dark dissipating cloud where the witch just was, his protuberances wielding Martygan’s small sword and Lain’s missing gold hoop. He crashed onto the street, sliding, the weapons clanging across the stone. He stopped.

“What did I miss?”

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