Lilith: Origin of Succubi

I was in my true form again, watching the boss monster from a distance. Like the others described, the beast guarding what we believed to be a teleportation circle looked like a huge undead centaur. It wore dark black armor with a few gaps that exposed its skeletal form from beneath. Flickering blue flames were lightly burning off the gel-like substance that allowed it to fit its armor. At the waist, its spine was connected to the rotting body of a warhorse that didn't seem like it would smell pleasant. Unlike the top half, the bits of exposed skeleton on this part of its body were bare, and the decomposing flesh was covered with insects. It carried what looked like a halberd, but the hooked spike behind the axe looked strange, maybe damaged.

("Is everyone ready?") I asked.

When I received a chorus of acknowledgments through the bond, I activated [Chromatic Halo] and threw a [Blinding Crescent] at the monster. The projectile hit it in the chest and popped into a small flash that sent the monster stumbling for the briefest of moments. It turned on me and charged in my direction, but I could tell that the blind was effective, since its angle wasn't quite right.

With a quick flap of my wings, I repositioned away from its charge next to Morrigan and began casting [Light Scribing] next to her. It was time to alter the battlefield as planned. The terra magic ritual resolved and I slammed my hands on the ground. A ripple traveled through the grass as the dirt and rock in front of me turned into large, rough and broken patches. Following my lead, Morrigan channeled the waste terra mana through her staff of manaflow to make the ground slant into a predictable pattern for us. The patches of rough terrain we created were large enough that we would be able to fight on them without being overly burdened, while hampering the undead centaur's movement in the area. The edge of our created arena was ringed with broken rock slats that would make walking on them with hooves difficult.

From Bella's position on the other side of the arena we created, waist-high brambles sprouted from the ground. They would be difficult to cross directly, but they would leave plenty of room for projectiles to hit the monster from above. A wave of illusion magic spread over the area, obscuring the terrain in mist that hid the ground. Invisible lines of mana shone through the mist from the bottom to our mana sight. We were hoping the monster wouldn't be able to see these delineated spaces where it was safe for us to walk. The intelligence and abilities of the undead varied wildly, so there wasn't any way to know if this would be effective ahead of time.

The monster must have regained its sight only moments before it reached the bramble on one edge, because it skidded to a stop and stumbled over one of the glowing lines in the mist. It wobbled on its hooves as it tried to adjust to its front legs being lower than its rear, which left it vulnerable.

I stood back up, no longer fueling the ritual, and threw another [Blinding Crescent] at the centaur. Simultaneously, it was hit by Morrigan's ice magic, Silva's lightning magic, Torien's shadow arrows, Lori's arrows, Nelly's holy fire magic, and Raya's foxfire. The monster was lit up from all angles, but it still managed to stumble out of the poor position it was in. Once all of the attacks had cleared, we were able to get a look at what had been most effective.

("Foxfire is healing it! Nelly's fire was the most effective!") Morrigan called through the bond.

("Raya, stick to illusions. Nelly, hit it where you can, but leave half of your mana for healing,") I commanded.

Everyone sent out another wave of projectiles except for Raya, while our frontline got into place. Kal'daeryn was the first to charge in. With a roar, the white tigerkin leapt at the undead centaur, slashing at the monster's foreleg with her longsword. The blade ran through the decayed flesh, but slid off the bone. She had been unsuccessful at completely disabling it, but we had been aware that it might not be that easy. The monster retaliated with its halberd, but Kal'daeryn caught it with her paladin shield and grunted as she was shoved back.

While that was happening, Sibyl managed to jump on the monster's back and attempt to pierce between the gaps of its armor with her thin sword. After being stalled by Kal'daeryn, the monster flailed and bucked to throw Sibyl off, but her superhuman agility kept her from being flung away. The piercing attacks individually didn't seem to have much effect, but her presence there was a constant annoyance for the monster.

Silva dashed in from the monster's left and thrust forward with a spear coated in crackling lightning. Unable to shift its halberd in the direction to catch the attack, the centaur lifted its left gauntlet to block instead. Silva's spear dug deep into the monster's arm, and the lightning forced it to seize up for a moment. Kal'daeryn took the opportunity to slash at the same foreleg as she had before, cutting away more flesh and exposing the bone to the air. While Silva's attack had been effective, the centaur didn't act like it was in any pain. It quickly turned and attempted to take Silva's weapon. She noticed immediately and barely pulled it free before she could be disarmed as the monster spun.

With the grace of an acrobat, Sibyl backflipped away just as a lance of ice slammed into the undead's side. The centaur stumbled forward with its arms locked in place as the ice tried to spread across it. A burst of blue fire flared from the monster and stopped the ice's spread, but the glowing light dimmed by a noticeable amount. Mimi took advantage of the situation to get a few heavy punches in that rocked the monster and shifted it back onto unstable footing. Mimi looked hesitant to eat this thing directly, which I didn't blame her for, it looked disgusting, and there was something off about its mana. She dodged in and out and took advantage of her super dense body to punch it with more strength than seems possible for her size.

Lori appeared next to the monster's rear mid-attack, and cut one of its hamstrings. With a flash of black shadow, she appeared on the other side of the creature and cut at its other one before teleporting away again just in time for the centaur to rear up and ineffectually kick at the empty air behind it with its newly mangled legs. Several shadow arrows peppered it in the barrel as the monster began to wildly buck like a rodeo bronco.

I kept throwing [Blinding Crescents] every time I saw an opening, but I don't think it was helping much. I decided that I would probably be more helpful in melee range, so I cast [Arms of Light] to give myself a light-construct claymore suited to my larger body's size. I attacked it head-on after watching it slash through a misty clone of Kal'daeryn, and thrust it deep through the chest while it was overextended. The attack would have been deadly to anything else, but it didn't even flinch. The only reason I knew the attack had hurt it at all was because its blue fire continued to dim with every slash.

When the monster tried to counterattack with its halberd, I caught the weapon with my blade and locked it in place. While it was tied up with me, it left an opening for the other melee fighters to continue getting hits in. Unfortunately, Lori's disabling attack didn't do much to slow it down since it's just puppeteering the corpse with undead magic. It managed to rear up in time to send Kal'daeryn flying back with a brutal kick, despite its gruesome tattered legs.

("I've got her,") Bella said only moments after the tigerkin hit the ground.

Since her small piercing attacks hadn't seemed to be doing much, Sibyl started to focus on quick slashes across the back of the monster's spine whenever there was an opening. Even if the undead monster could control a body that shouldn't be able to move, removing its entire bottom half at the base surely would make the fight easier. Sibyl was quick and agile, but even she had to retreat now and then when the monster's furious bucking became too much.

I dueled with the monster even as everything else was happening. Even while throwing kicks at the others with its wild horse half, it managed to maintain pretty stable footing on its front hooves. At our relative sizes, the halberd was manageable for me with my long claymore. I was able to stay close enough to it to deny the monster its reach advantage with its weapon without putting myself into too much danger. The only reason I hadn't already disarmed it was because whatever the weapon's shaft was made of, it was durable enough to withstand the repeated strikes it was taking. It was a bit hard for me to gloat, since most of my swordsmanship skill was stolen, but I was much more skilled than this monster with my chosen weapon.

We were going to win this fight eventually. The constant pressure we maintained kept the monster in a constant state of defense, but every moment was perilous for those of us up close. Still, the advantage of our healers made up for the wounds we took. No one had taken any severe blows since Kal'daeryn had been kicked, and we were slowly wearing the monster down. Its glowing light dimmed more and more until its spine finally snapped under Sibyl's relentless attacks. The undead centaur fell in two pieces, and the instability was more than enough for me to pull its weapon away. Silva was the one to finish it with a lightning-empowered strike to the bare skull it had been hiding under its helm.

[Your party has defeated an Undead Chimera Enmity]

[Apprentice Magic Swordsman has increased from level 6 to level 8]

[Swordsmanship has increased from level 42 to level 44]

[Swordsmanship Skill Ability Slicing Flash has been unlocked]

I breathed out in relief and plopped onto my ass after the long fight. Once I had entered melee range, I had been in constant combat with the centaur monster. My muscles burned and my hands ached from gripping my sword, but I felt relieved that we defeated the monster as easily as we had.

"Is everyone okay?" I asked aloud.

"The only one that got hurt was Kal'daeryn, and I've already healed her," Bella said.

Morrigan stood over the corpse. "We should drag the body away from here and burn it. Some undead monsters can regenerate, and I'd rather we not have to fight that again."

I nodded in agreement. While we were able to handle it without too much trouble, it was only because all of us maintained focus throughout the entire fight without making many mistakes that we came out of it all right. If someone had taken a bad hit, any one of us could have died. It was only because so many of our recent fights had been so much closer that this one felt like it had been a bit easy by comparison. Eleven on one, on terrain that we altered as the fight started, was quite the advantage, though. I felt good about that fight. For the first time since I had taken this swordsmanship skill, I felt like I actually earned that melee victory, rather than just relying on stolen instincts. I had finally reached the point where I could guide my instincts to get the results I wanted, rather than just relying on them to get me through the fight. There was even a reward, seemingly to prove my feelings true.

I pulled up the description of the new ability.

[Slicing Flash - Uncommon Swordsmanship Skill Ability]

Empower your next sword attack to cut so quickly it appears as a flash of light. The next attack after this ability is activated will have significantly increased speed. This attack's ability to penetrate defenses is increased.

Hmm, interesting. If I was right, then this attack would look like one of those movies where the swordsman cuts through something in an instant. It was curious to me that I had been gaining more skill abilities now that I was getting higher levels of swordsman. I wonder if I had stunted my ability to learn new skill abilities from stealing this skill originally. My swordsmanship was almost twice the level of my next highest ability, yet I was only now starting to see skill abilities pop up for the skill. Since my class is a hybrid one, I was tending to gain more spells from it than swordsmanship things. That kind of made sense, considering how often I used magic, rather than fought things close up, lately. Not that there's been much of a chance with how many banshees we've been killing.

I stood up and helped Morrigan and Silva drag off the disgusting undead monster and burn it to cinders. Now that it wasn't fighting back and wasn't absorbing the fire to heal, it wasn't tough to burn the body and get rid of it. The armor it had been wearing was disgusting, not at all worth salvaging, but the halberd seemed pretty good.

"Hey, Silva, do you want this?" I asked, handing the polearm to her.

She hefted it and swung it a few times. "It seems like an alright backup weapon, but the spear I got from the previous dungeon is too strong for me to give up. Will you hold onto it for me, Mimi?" Silva asked.

Mimi nodded and took the weapon before turning it into magic sparks that she absorbed.

"Now, let's go check out that teleportation circle," I said with a grin.