Witchers of Nifelheim - Finale

Thena side steps and leaps backwards away from the charing manticore. With a flash of emerald inferno a barrage of chakram attacks strike the back of the neck of the manticore as it passes by.

"There's a veritable arsenal down here!" Rogue remarks as he spies the pentagrams on the ground.

He quickly alerts the Witchers to their presence, pointing out the ones nearest them.

Circi lets out a grunt of effort and her spiderlegs noticeably bend from the force behind them as she swings herself sidways and follows the direction of Kaz's swing moving inward, The blade mere millimeters from her head. Her hair igniting against his blade. Circi's intention suddenly becomes clearer as Kaz's wrist impacts against her neck, her footing bracing against the robbed sword blow, and within her focus, barely recognizes the burning sensation against her neck from the blades handle. She grabs Kaz's arm by the upper shoulder and her hand suddenly claps over her wrist, before twisting her into the ground, swapping their positions. As soon as they are swapped her left slips from the top of Kaz's forearm and then impacts with the Parasites gut as Circi casts Consume. Circi practically sits on top of her taking ground control and her dagger already lancing towards Kaz's chest.


Rain smirks as she takes a moment to bare witness to Squiggles glory. Her armored fist Suddenly and voilently grabs a lunging horde parasite by the throat before it can reach her. Her eyes fall onto it squirming and clawing at her armored wrists and forearm, pitys it, as its jaws snap mindlessly at her... before she rears it back like an (american) football and sends it spiraling into the crystal mantacore before her wings open and she shoots up into the air for a short moment before landing on her parasite. From her position she kneels down, and leaps from her parasite to Kaz, and from the air makes an attempt to stomp her head in.

Circi executed the move flawlessly, her technique was perfect, and with a fiery spin, Kaz ended up face first in the ground, her red sword dissipating as you punched her in the ribs and saw the dark tendrils of Consume begin to rip into the Parasites flesh, taking out whole chunks of it and repurposing it, incorporating it into your body. And you felt your wounds begin to stitch up and close, all by themselves.


(Circi was healed for +20 HP, 112 HP remaining.)



Your technique was flawless, but when Kaz moved, it just became overridden. The seemingly frail body of the teal woman held the strength of ten men. She pushed off the ground and stood up, overpowering your arm lock with brute strength alone, holding her down felt like trying to hold down an excavator.

In one fluid motion and incredibly fast motion, the woman snaked her left arm around your right forearm, taking a firm grip. Then slapped the knife out of its trajectory with her right open palm, making the dagger pass within an inch of her stomach, and in the same retracting motion, she collected her right palm into a fist, and smashed it into your solar plexus, sideways.


The world froze in your eyes for a moment, and then everything exploded in pain. It was as if a steal beam on a construction crane had impacted you right in the chest at full speed. You felt your rib cage cave in, shattering or caving in almost every rib in your body, your heart compressing for not having enough room to beat anymore, and you were sent flying 15 meters into the wall in a straight line, as if launched from a canon, the impact cracking your shoulder blades, and embedding you into the stone wall, as it cratered around you, sending a spider web of cracks to run in every direction.



(Circi suffered -100 HP damage, she has been Stunned for 1 round. 12 HP remaining.)



Kaznachey barely managed to retract her bloodied fist, by the time Rain's kick landed on the back of her head. Just barely hunching her head with the impact, Kaznachey waited for you to land, before kicking you in the center of mass, with the force of a steel baseball bat. The impact was so hard, it dented your armor, sending you flying 3 meters back, as you rolled through the ground, trying to absorb the impact and retain your balance.



(Rain suffered - 20 HP damage, 180 HP remaining.)



Coming to a stop and looking over your shoulder, you noticed Kaz whip her palm at the ground a few times, getting rid of the blood left on her knuckles, making it spray to the stone, as if she was a lady at a gala, getting rid of some dirt stuck to her prized glove.

Your technique seemed flawless, the Parasite was just overpowering it with brute strength, especially when she was driven into a corner.



(Kaz suffered -35 HP damage.)




"Ow." She said, curling her lips up and looking you dead in the eyes, as the side of her stomach where Circi ripped out a piece, rapidly regenerated, until there was no sign of injury left.



A loud gallop attracted her attention and she noticed Lightning barreling down on her, atop a giant orange cat. Kaz just watched for a moment, as the two neared her, standing defiantly tall. For a moment, it seemed like Lightning aimed to ride by and take a swing with her blade, but when the girl was 15 meters away, she suddenly drew the sign for Heightened Senses in the air, her hair stood on end from the spell and she slid off her Parasite without slowing down. Sliding across the snow covered ground, carried on by momentum, Lightning planted her fist on the ground, and a few meters later, she slid across a pentagram that lit up blue, as soon as Lightning slid through it and a devastating shockwave washed over the field, as a massive lightning-strike shot out of the girls outstretched palm.


The width of the electrical beam was roughly the width of a cadillac. Kaznachey ducked low, taking a low defensive stance and whipping her hands out and a giant teal shield materialized right in front of her absorbing the lightning and shattering loudly like glass, just as the force of the lightning strike had faded.


As Lightning came to a halt a few meters away, she noticed Kaz smirking. You imagined those were about 3rd Level spells.


The Witchers Parasite cat never stopped galloping toward Kaznachey though, aiming to ram the enemy at full speed, the cat just kept charging forward in a straight line, until Kaz spinned in place and delivered a kick so devastating right into the Parasites face, that the 8 meter long massive creature was kicked off to the side like a splinter, it emitted a muffled pitiful sound and it was sent flying and sprawling across the snow covered ground.


And almost at the same second, Lightning shrieked in pain and fell down on her knee, holding the side of her face. A massive bruise was rapidly forming there, even as her body tried to regenerate it. Looking up in alarm and confusion, she noticed Kaznachey smirking. The teal woman was slowly marching toward Lightning as she spoke:


"What's wrong?... did you think there was no cost, for establishing a Parallel Synergy?" Kaznachey asked in a singsong voice as she slowly approached Lightning, who was struggling to fight back the tears from the pain.



(Lightning suffered -40 HP damage, 65 HP remaining.)



"...you seem to know a lot about something, that none of us have ever heard of." Lightning muttered, still kneeling down and holding the side of her face with one hand, while lowering the other to the snow. "Why is that?"


Kaznachey's smile faded as she slowly closed in for the execution kill:
"...your job is to die quietly." She muttered, summoning her flaming sword. "So die."

As the Parasite raised her sword for the execution, standing only a meter away, Lightning suddenly grabbed a handful of snow and threw it at the woman's eyes. Kaz bristled and blindly lunged forth with her sword, carving a long flaming line in the stone floor and you heard the sound of breaking glass and saw a flash of green light.


By the time Kaznachey felt her blade had struck nothing and whipped the snow from her eyes, she looked down to notice that her feet and legs were firmly stitched into the ground, by a series of black pulsating tendons, locking her firmly in place, leaving only her arms free.

Looking at the tendons with revoltion, the teal woman raised her scowling face and her eyes slightly widened. Where Lightning once stood, now stood two Adams. Two perfect Adams, completely similar in appearance in every way. And the two smirked in near unison.


Kaznachey scowled "...you think if I don't know which one of you's real, I won't eviscerate you both-" she cut herself off, as her alarmed gaze suddenly darted toward the center of the pit and she finally noticed the shattered Ark, lying on the floor in two dull gray pieces, amidst the twelve massive parasites that were summoned from it and cut in half.


Kaznachey's expression became extremely unsettling, as her eyes shifted back to the two Adam's. There was nothing but silent fury and a promise of unrelenting cruelty left in her gaze.


"Sorry but,"

"I'm your only ticket off this frozen rock." The two Adams spoke, one after another with a smirk.

"Guess you can't kill me and... I get to go all out."


The two rushed at Kaznachey simultaneously, as black bone-like blades protruded out of their forearms, up to a meter in length.




(Kaznachey has been afflicted with Tendons Grasp. She's unable to move from her position for 5 rounds of combat.)



"FUCK HER UUUP!!" One of the Adams shrieked across the field, in a rather familiar maniacal tone and unhinged face expression, as the two rushed toward Kaz.




"Rogue! Stun her! Use the ring!" Zoy yelled, summoning her katana and rushing toward the teal Parasite:

"Everyone, fire every Status Effect and spell you can find! Don't give her room to breathe or we're Dead!"




"Did you forget, who you're FUCKING WITH" Kaznachey shrieked in abject fury, as several people darted in her direction at the same time. A grizzled Witcher from the Fox Team got to her first, taking a giant swipe at her torso. Kaznachey deflected his sword at the last second, by summoning her red blade in one hand. And as the Witcher's momentum carried him into Kaznachey's reaching distance, the woman plunged her right palm forward at a speed faster than was perceptible to the eye and you heard the sound of crunching bone.


In one move, Kaznachey had put her fist right through the Witcher's solar plexus, impaling the man on her hand. You saw Kanzachey's bloodied fist protruding out of a gaping wound in the man's back and holding his heart. Blood gushed out of the mans throat, his eyes rolled into the back of his skull and he went limp, dying instantly, before Kaznachey ripped her hand out from his body and threw him under the feet of two Adams who froze up and almost stumbled over the corpse, as it was so carelessly cast at their feet.





Off to the side, the Amethyst covered Manticore tried to follow Thena's trajectory, moving its head in the same direction as Thena had dodged, incessantly snapping its jaws, when a random small parasite had flown right into the Manticore's face from the side, knocking its head off target and Thena felt the giant monsters poisonous jaws lock over empty air, within an inch of her face.

An inch more to the side and you imagined you would have died instantly, if the creatures jaws had locked across half of your head.

Averting certain death by so close a margin, you felt a cold sweat and a spike of fear and adrenaline wash over you, before you reflexively leaped back several times, catching a 5 meter distance from the monster, as it viciously and angrily tore apart the small parasite that had landed on its face.


Your chakram flashed through the air, striking the creature over the head, its face, its nose and neck. Each individual attack wasn't doing much notable damage, but there were so many fast strikes that the creature wailed in pain. Its giant purple eyes bulged out of its sockets and it emitted a prolonged shrieked, before its whole body contorted out of shape, froze up in a bizarre, unnatural pose and it crashed to the ground, its eyes closing.



(The Amethyst Manticores Health has been reduced to 0)



You sensed the life of its soul dissipate, but even after that moment passed, you saw its body still moving. Its belly was starting to grow and contort, quickly and rapidly expanding. The hundreds of Amethyst crystals on its back started to glow and buzz like angry wasps, the strength of the sound increasing exponentiation with each passing moment, as its belly inflated like a giant gas balloon.

"Even now this body is completely useless..." she mutters, "...Even now, she forces her way though me."

Circi snarls, as she trys to push herself off of the wall. Her head turns in alarm, her shoulder and chest, the wounds on and within them, the blood was flowing, but it would suddenly gloss over and fall to the ground in solid obsidian drops before bouncing off the ground like glass beads. She could feel something hard pushing its way though her vains, and every time she trys to move you can hear multiple small snaps, like snapping spaghetti noodles. Circi snarls, indescribable rage suddenly rockets through her body, and and in an instant, she trys to rip herself free.

Circi pushes herself forward but as soon as she frees herself from her crater the wounds in her body restrict her. Black crystals forcing their way up through her wounds, she snarls and thrashes, hyperventilating as every limb seems to lock up like stone, before she stops completely. a huge black crystal showing itself in full on her back as she drops free from the wall. Its weight Instantly brings her to her knees before shes completely envoloped in obsidian crystal that seems to be only growing by the second.

The crystal is rather opaque but through its fog you can see a silhouette. A pair of green pinpricks invade your mind with thoughts of death, a chill down your spine and needles across your skin.

Circi breaks free in a turn.

Rain slides back but manages to keep on her feet. 'Kaz must have really wanted Circi gone to move her like that' Rain thinks to Squiggles before she steps forward, 'Lets try one of Kaz's own tactics against her.' Rain surges forward, her god killer drawn. She rears it back, and from this vulnerable position suddenly casts shield, and then thrusts the flat tip of her falchion with such force that it should punch right through her unarmored target, "To have loved and then lost is better to have never loved at all Kaz! The loss of your witcher made you bitter!" She steps back out of Kaz's range as she lets go of the handle of her blade, leaving it embeded, "I think I can take a way better guess at why your ass is blue then a fucking skin condition."

Kaylee Brown wrote:"Rogue! Stun her! Use the ring!" Zoy yelled, summoning her katana and rushing toward the teal Parasite:

"Everyone, fire every Status Effect and spell you can find! Don't give her room to breathe or we're Dead!"

"On it!" Rogue responds as he fires Lightning at Kaznachey.

"Rolo, can you fire off Scan? We need to know what we're up against."

"Manticore explosion incoming!" Thena shouts out as she sprints towards Kaznachey and hopefully out of range of whatever is about to happen with the manticore.

Once she reaches Kaznachey she calls forth her chakram. Gripping it with both hands at each side she starts to bash the teal parasites skull with all of the strength she can muster. Throwing everything she can into each strike for the entire time Kaznachey is unable to move. Her goal with this attack is to chain critcal stuns so Kaznachey is unable to move for longer and thus give the rest of the group more time to attack.

"Clear away from the manticores!" Twilight ordered.

She herself casted fire at the one covered in moss, trying to burn whatever attack it would come up with. Then she ran to the main target.

"Someone with heightened senses, tell me where the nearest blindness and deafness pentagrams are! We need to coordinate this assault!"

Looking at Kaz, she almost charged up dispel, but seems to hesitate, given he was also imprisoned with sinner magic.

Disgruntled purple wrote:"Clear away from the manticores!" Twilight ordered.

She herself casted fire at the one covered in moss, trying to burn whatever attack it would come up with. Then she ran to the main target.

"Someone with heightened senses, tell me where the nearest blindness and deafness pentagrams are! We need to coordinate this assault!"

Looking at Kaz, she almost charged up dispel, but seems to hesitate, given he was also imprisoned with sinner magic.

"Over there!" Rogue points to the requested pentagrams with the hand he isn't using to fire Lightning.

"Circi!!" Johan called in alarm, racing through the deserted patch of the pit that was yet untoched by scars of mass warfare between Witchers and Parasites.

Coming to a sharp stop in front of the crysalis, he looked at it helplessly for several moments, before cupping his hands in front of his mouth and shouting:


"CIRCIIII!" When there was no response, he winced, feeling useless, then looked around in haste and drew the sign for Heightened Senses, zeroed in on something in the snow, then ran there, activated a teal pentagram and poured its energy into the crysalis.



(Circi was healed for +40 HP, 52 HP remaining)




Rain's maneuver worked, leaving herself open had prompted Kaz to lash out, her red blade crashed and was deflected loudly off of Rains transparent shield, swaying off to the side. It delayed the parasite by maybe a fraction of a second, and you used that fraction to bypass her defenses and sucker punch her right in the forehead with the hilt of your blade.

The strike was fast and deadly, the sound was akin to cracking a hole in concrete wall.

Catching some distance right afterwards proved to be the right move, as even while Kaz's head was whipped back, she was already massacring the air all around her, leaving scarlet blurs in her wake:


"Shut the FUCK UP!!!" She screamed hysterically "WHO EVER SAID I HAD A WITCHER!?!"


You saw a sudden unidentified flash of red, too fast for the eye to track and you jerked to the side by sheer reflex, subconsciously turning your torso sideways without even realizing what you're doing. A split second later you saw Kaz's red blade sail through the air like a bullet, passing within an inch of your nose and cutting the air where your head had been a split second ago.

Ursula was not as fortunate. Noticing the blade too late, she tried moving out of its trajectory, but it nicked her over the left shoulder, leaving a long and searing cut. As the girl screamed and fell down on one knee, grabbing the wound, Kaznachey dissipated her blade, manifested it again in her hand and hurled it furiously in the direction of Ursula's voice. Only then did you notice that Kaz's eyes had grown blank, as if she was staring at nothing.


Kaz had gone blind.



(Kaznachey suffered -100 HP damage and was Blinded for 1 turn)


(Ursula suffered -20 HP damage, 80 HP remaining.)

(Ursula suffered -20 Sanity damage. Her Sanity has been reduced to 0)



"...P-pretty lights-" Ursula mumbled incoherently, swaying unsteadily, her eyes growing vacant and misty "Where are they all going?"

"Ursula!!" you heard her Parasite scream in alarm, a transparent Parasite dressed as a forest ranger, or archer. He had manifested in his physical form not long ago and was now running at full speed toward Ursula, who remained unsteadily sitting on the ground on one knee and blankly staring at the ground:

"So many lights..." she whispered "...why are they-?" her voice had grown quiet, eyes suddenly opening wide in terror and she released a piercing, gut wrenching cry, grabbing her face and trying to crawl away from the spot she just sat on, seeing something in the snow that only she could see, screaming and crying in abject horror and pain, as tears began to form in her eyes:

"MOTHER!!! DON'T GO THERE!!!" She shrieked, covering her face. Her deafening voice allowed Kaznachey to zero on her precisely and when she hurled her red blade, it became apparent it was going to strike Ursula dead in the center of mass. There is maybe a second left to react.

Rogue Fire wrote:

Kaylee Brown wrote:"Rogue! Stun her! Use the ring!" Zoy yelled, summoning her katana and rushing toward the teal Parasite

"On it!" Rogue responds as he fires Lightning at Kaznachey.

"Rolo, can you fire off Scan? We need to know what we're up against."

Even through the cacophony of clashing steel and magic, it seems Kaznachey had heard you. Turning in place, she tried ducking and raising a transparent shield, but the two Adams descended on her like crows. One kicked her elbowow, whipping her shield off to the side and unleashed three vicious cuts on her arm, with his boney blade-like appendages, while the other Adam made three quick and shallow cuts across Kaz's torso with a long purple katana, before both of them leaped back and the Lightning struck Kaznachey dead in face.


The outraged shriek that followed was enough to make your blood curl. Apart from the 3rd degree burn that manifested across Kaznachey's face, making the skin melt from her cheek in a large splotch of black ash, revealing the smoldering muscle beneath, every muscle in her body had seized up, making her drop to one knee, breathing heavily as her cheek emitted black clouds of smoke. The smell of burning meat soon filled your nostrils.


(Kaznachey suffered
-240 HP slashing damage,
-120 HP Sinner Poison damage,
-450 HP Godkiller damage,
-80 Lightning damage)

(Kaznachey has been Paralyzed for 8 Rounds of Combat)



"FUCKING KILL HER!!!" Zoy shrieked with a voice so filled with venom and hatred, you barely recognized it.


Thena had joined with several of her companions, who descended on Kaznachey from all directions, cutting and slashing at her, until there was barely anything left, except a quivering mass of deformed and smoldering muscle and broken bone. You thought this could finally be it, for a moment, before your blood turned cold when you saw how fast, how unnaturally fast the create, the abomination that was Kaznachey, was regenerating.

It was like a pulsating mass of bio-matter that just wouldn't die. Just wouldn't stop pulsating with life and regenerating, pulling its pieces back together, no matter what sort of damage was inflicted on it, no matter how much it was burned, or dissolved or cut off, it always reformed.



You finally saw Kaznachey for what she really was. A monster of perpetual regeneration, a formless mass of biological cells that sought to reconstruct themselves, no matter the obstacle. And they never stopped regenerating.



(Thena, Kaylee, Sasha, Zoy and Larsen had inflicted -1400 HP damage on Kaznachey.)

(Kaznachey is still Paralyzed for 8 Rounds of Combat)





"Deploying, Activate Scan, Level 3 spell, 100 meter detection radius," Rolo reported running up to and freezing atop a glowing gold pentagrams, bringing his palms together and drawing a complex sign in the air with his index and middle fingers: "Duration 2 minutes 30 seconds, 10 rounds of combat...

ENGAGE!"


A shockwave of wind washed over him, filling the air with electrical charges, as Rolo zeroed in on everyone present, his head moving left and right slightly, eyes closing, as he tried to get a read on his targets.


"Moss-covered Manticore 250 HP remaining.


Kaznachey-" he winced "...these stats... they're different! She's stronger than the last time we fought her! All her stats have increased!!!"





Kaznachey


Health: 8,585 remains out of 11,000 Max

Mana: 9,675 remains out of 11,000 Max


Afflicted with Paralysis for 8 Rounds

Afflicted with Tendons Grasp for 4 Rounds

Afflicted with Blindness for 1 Round



Offensive Spells:

Lightning
Dragonfire - An offensive spells that inflicts Burning, Sanity and Poisonous damage.


Defensive Spells:

Spectral Armor
Eyes of the Basilisk - A Status Effect that inflicts Blindness and Sanity damage.


Utility Spells:

Water Dance
Wallrun
Heightened Senses



Weapon: The Scarlet Lotus
A blade very reminiscent of your Godkillers that may inflict Burning and Sanity damage with each strike.


Martial Arts Level: 6th Dan

Magic Category: 5


Limit Break:


The Great Masquerader"





"Oh, fuck." Kaylee jerked away from the quivering bio-mass and in several moments it began reforming in to the unsettling shape of a teal colored woman.


"...the number of creatures who discerned my true Limit Break... is zero..." Kaznachey's deep voice rang out of the regenerating mass, sounding like it was emanating from the pits of hell:


"...it is zero... because I killed them all. You've learned too many forbidden secrets today, and so..." the biomass finally reformed into something that vaguely resembled Kaz, the glow in her eye was unhinged, cold and unsettling:

"You will die."




"No, Twilight!" Alyx yelled, briefly taking hold of the alicorns shoulder, as she briefly attempted to charge up Dispel: "It will remove the debuffs from Kaz! She'll break free!"

His voice became drowned out, by the increasingly loud hissing sound coming from the Moss-covered Manticore. The creature had completely collected itself into a ball, the spores and mushrooms and moss over its back, all began glowing, as waves of green and purple light passed through them, like waves of the ocean.

The mushrooms had swelled up so large, they looked like they were about to explode, the hissing sound they emitted became unbearably loud.


And that's when Twilight's level 2 Fireball flew right at the creatures back.



The explosion came, long before the Fireball made physical contact, and you realized the Manticore had been releasing droves of invisible gas, a gas that got ignited by the Fireball and finally, exploded.



The Moss-covered Manticore was ripped apart in an explosion that split open its back, tore open its organs and exploded in a mass of green, toxic liquid that sprayed everywhere and was burned inside the ensuing fireball. All the gas and spores the mushrooms had been releasing, were ignited and burned up as well, but it only served to increase the magnitude and the shockwave of the explosion.


The resulting fireball had spread across a 30 meter radius in every direction, and even as you tried to flee, the searing shockwave struck you in the back, carrying you across the air for several meters, before hurling you helplessly across the stone floor of the pit.


The spores that had been spread across Twilight's back and clothing, from falling over the Manticore's back earlier, had all ignited with an incessant flame, burning through her clothes and searing her flesh. Within seconds, Twilight's entire backside was set aflame, burning incredibly hard and strong.

Viktoria and her wolf Parasite didn't fare much better. Although they weren't set ablaze by the explosion, they were still the closest to the Manticore, even as they tried to flee, and the resulting explosion had hit them stronger than you.


You saw them both lying unconscious in the snow, their faces riddled with bleeding lacerations and their backs signed, their clothing releasing faint columns of black smoke.



(Twilight suffered -30 HP damage and has been set aflame for 4 turns, 75 HP remaining.)


(Viktoria & Guillotine suffered -70 HP damage, 50 HP remaining.)




You imagined if you had been even a split second too late in calling the retreat, all three of you would have likely died instantly in that explosion. Looking over your shoulder, the Moss-covered Manticore was gone.



A few seconds later, the belly of the Amethyst covered Manticore, exploded, and when it did, billions upon billions of miniature tiny Amethyst shard rained across the battlefield like projectile hail, like a spray of bullets that washed over the surrounding area, covering a distance of up to 50 meters in radius, from where the Manticore had exploded, before the tiny crystals started loosing momentum and harmlessly falling down to the ground.


But the party surrounding Kaznachey wasn't far enough and they were all peppered by the purple hail. It felt as if dozens of tiny needles had shot into your body, embedding themselves in your muscle and skin. The pain began in small droves, just barely noticeable and negligible at first, but as time went on, it only became harder and stronger, and soon, it felt as if your entire back was on fire.


Each of the tiny Amethyst crystals was secreting something, some liquid that was rapidly entering your bloodstream and starting to circulate across your body. You began feeling a little dizzy, a little numb and nauseous, as if your fever was rising.

But apart from that, you couldn't tell what was wrong. You only knew that something really bad was happening to you.



(Thena, Kaylee, Sasha, Zoy and Larsen have suffered -15 HP damage and afflicted by an Unknown Status Effect for and Unknown duration of time.)




"InCOMIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING!" Rolo suddenly shrieked, his face turning horrified, as the ground under your feet started to shake, harder and stronger, soon turning into an earthquake so devastating, you fell off your feet.


And a split second later, two massive creatures had erupted out of the ground.


One, a massive worm, filled with disgusting slimy and orange skin, covered in rare black strands of hair. The perimeter of its mouth filled with hundreds of jagged teeth that all secreted some disgusting slime and their tips directed inward, into themselves. It lacked eyes, but its body was easily 4 meters in width and it had burst out a whole 10 meters out of the ground, with no end in sight of its body, leaving its true length underground and unknown.


The second creator looked like a deformed and bloated Spalax the size of a semi-truck, with two oversized lower teeth that snapped and bit at the air incessantly. Its fur was covered in yellow bandages and blood, its flesh rotting and showing bone in several places. Its nose didn't stop sniffing the air and its jaws never stopped snapping, not for a second, and its teeth looked like they could bite a man in half.


And almost as soon as the creatures had erupted out of the ground, you noticed the spec of magic was cooking in front of their noses.


Rogue's Heightened Senses allowed him to recognize the spells.

The Worm was cooking Confuse at Level 4, Area of Effect.

The Spalax was cooking Dispel at Level 4, Area of Effect.

The spells look like they're ready to fire. The effective blast radius will be 1 kilometer in every direction.




(Circi's Stun has faded, she can move once again.)

Kaylee Brown wrote:And almost as soon as the creatures had erupted out of the ground, you noticed the spec of magic was cooking in front of their noses.

Rogue's Heightened Senses allowed him to recognize the spells.

The Worm was cooking Confuse at Level 4, Area of Effect.

The Spalax was cooking Dispel at Level 4, Area of Effect.

The spells look like they're ready to fire. The effective blast radius will be 1 kilometer in every direction.

"They're cooking Confuse and Dispel, we have to stop them!" Rogue calls out.

"Rolo, go for the Worm, I'll deal with the Spalax" he says, firing off Lightning at the one getting ready to cast Dispel.

Just as Johan is about to leave. His eyes meet something within the crystal and it instantly made it hard to look away. Two burning green dots meet him, locking onto to batpony. Its emotions are invasive as it meets his gaze. You get a spike of overwhelming unfiltered fury and you suddenly get a phantom pain of whatever is inside might do to you. Teeth rake across your face, Claws slip between your ribs. Rending, biting, tearing, wrath, all were conveyed to you without the actual action.



(Or alternatively! (I actually couldn't decide lol))

Circi casts BERZERK

the thing inside is moving through liquid before a pitch black hand swings outward and punches a hole through to the outside. The whole crystal suddenly splinters with cracks. The pitch black hand looks as though it could hold your entire head in its palm, The thick knotted muscle of its arm suggests it could probably then crush your skull like a melon. Its fingers are long and thick, its knuckles sharp like forming stalagmites. its palm slaps the outside as the thick black arm digs its nails into the crystals walls for purchase before its second arm breaks through. It peels its cocoon back, obsidian crystals cracking and splintering, striking the ground with the sound akin to broken glass. It shoves its head out as it squirms out from its prison. Jaws splayed like a canine with rabies, it emits hurried breaths as it claws its way out. The whole top tip of the crystal breaks away with the beast as it takes a step forward, revealing a blackened obsidian warewolf. Its size quite small for a berzerker, About the size of a small box truck. Its entire body covered in thick knotted muscle and growing black spikes, a massive portion of the crystal it came from rises from its back giving it a hunched over look. Its eyes stay on Johan for a moment, its teeth coming to bare as its jowls twitch and rise. A low threatening growl escaping its throat.

As Kaz speaks its attention is suddenly ripped away from Johan in a snap and in response to her threat The warewolf HOWLS. Its voice booms across the oasis, the sound vibrating your bones, the vibration pressing in on your heart before it charges across the oasis in a shadowy flash. It slams into the spalax sheerly because it was in the way of its path. with a weight akin to a fully stocked Uhaul, its jaws splay and it slams into the side of the eyeless moles face. Its jaws close over the Spalax's muzzle like a vice. Its arm wheels to its own back and with a 'CRACK' pulls the mantacore blade free from the crystal in its back, and with one arm swings it down over the Spalax's neck.




Rains waits out Kaz's flailing, picking out a particular strike, she swipes her godkiller upward and with a shriek of alien metals sends Kaz's blade soaring through the air. Her ears fall back as she hears Circi's howl, and then the two monstrosity's rise from the earth. She curses under her breath before looking back at Kaz, "I have a lot to say to you..." she suddenly Mimics Kaz's blade throw, reeling her blade back, she whips her purple falchion back and then sends it hurling through the air towards the worm. "Squiggles!" she shouts, "Jump Kaz while I mute the worm!" she charges forward after the casting worm, readying her own dispell.

Thena continues what she is doing.

"SAY HELLO TO MY LITTLE FRIEND!" Rolo barked, getting a running start and hurling Rogue's Godkiller like a projectile at the swaying worm. The purple dual-shield sailed like a spear through the air and with the worms massive size proved to be an easy target, even with it swaying unpredictably in the breeze, it was still bound to the hole from which it emerged and the base of its body could not dodge the attack.


The shield flew right into its body, piercing it and embedding itself so deep, the weapon almost vanished from view. The worm released a hideous screech and began vibrating and uncontrollably thrashing in place. It attempted to hurl the phantom spark of magic it cooked in its mouth, but it was already too late.

The properties of Rogues Godkiller rendered all magic mute and the worms spell imploded long before it left its mouth, vanishing out of existence.



(The WORM suffered -250 HP damage, its magic has been disabled for 2 rounds.)






Another blast of lightning rocked the field, as Rogue discharged a Level 2 pentagram at the Spalax. Numerous electrical charges danced across Rogue's armor and clothes, purple sparks of energy that made his hair stand on end, before they accumulated in the palm of his hand and blasted off with a deafening explosion, that propelled a zig-zagging pulse of energy at the Spalax and struck it dead in the face.

But something in its skin, or its fur, resisted the effects of electricity. It took damage, that much was clear by its piercing shriek, but the effects of the magical ring failed to take effect this time.



(The Spalax suffered -20 HP damage.)





Johan tripped and fell back, staring in horror at the obsidian wolf that had emerged out of the chrysalis. Paralyzed by fear and unable to move, he watched wide-eyed, as the wolf zeroed in on him, and then stormed off after the Spalax.

The underground creature felt you approach and reeled back, jumping out of the ground and landing on all fours, facing you head on, but it wasn't prepared for the sheer vicious strength and momentum that carried you forth as you slammed into the Spalax, clawed at its face and in one jagged motion, swung the Manticore buster-sword at its neck.


A spray of blood shot into your eyes, covering your face and muzzle, dripping down in droves as the Spalax shrieked and thrashed uncontrollably under the blade, ripping the wound up even more as it tried to escape.

Its carotid artery must has been severed, and with the Manticore's blade preventing regeneration, the bleeding sprayed out like a fountain, shooting out blood up to 5 meters into the distance and didn't stop.

Within 5 seconds, the rotting Spalax had shrieked, thrashed and vibrated violently in place, before it collapsed to the ground and stopped moving. And as its last breath escaped through its massive front teeth, the Dispel activated.



(Spalax Health has been reduced to 0)





The battle around Kaznachey could not be described as anything but a massacre, more and more people and Parasites were joining the fray, clawing, slashing and trying to dismember what once looked like a person. The amount of blue colored blood that sprayed in your face began to blind you, just by the sheer quantity of it.

And through all this massacre, you heard Kaznachey's voice clearly, inside your head. She was speaking to you telepathically, just like she did so many times before, and in your mind, her voice sounded, calm, amused. Like a teacher observing a doodle of a first grade child and patting him on the head for the effort.


"Even now I hear the unconscious whispers of Kepler. The collective cry of hundreds of human souls as they are snuffed out by the Horde, as my Parasites rampage across your homeworld."

The woman's voice grew venomous and smug, the image of her beautiful form in a spotless blue dress, manifested itself in your mind. She was smiling, raising her palm to her head and cupping it next to her ear, as if to hear clearer:

"Oh, is that the sweat sound of lamentations I hear?...

At this very moment, Kepler burns."





(Squiggles, Thena, Rose, Kaylee, Sasha, Zoy and Larsen have inflicted -2000 HP damage on Kaznachey, 6585 HP remaining.)



Something very wrong was happening to Thena, you could tell right away just by looking at her. And not just her. Kaylee, Sasha, Zoy and Larsen were all beginning to manifest the same symptoms.

The dozens of tiny wounds where the Amethyst shards had struck them, all began oozing a strange dark-purple liquid. This dark liquid soon began solidifying and turning to crystal, and within seconds, each move you made, was accompanied by a soft crunching sound, as if you were walking through fresh snow.


Kaylee jumped back, looking at her arms and screamed out in horror. Amethyst crystal formations were starting to grow over her body, like an infection, oozing out of her wounds and growing over her skin, and in places, under it.

The pain was increasing, so was your fever, the exact same thing was happening to Thena, Sasha, Zoy and Larsen, everyone hit by the Amethyst barrage earlier, and the process didn't show any sign of slowing down. The Amethyst formation was growing, and slowly consuming your body.



(20% of Thena's body has turned into crystal. The same effect is observed in Kaylee, Sasha, Zoy and Larsen.)



"What the fuck?!" Zoy reeled back, watching in horror as a ridge of crystals ran down her elbow and up to her shoulder. She tried to crush it and swipe it away, but more and more crystal formations kept forming in their place, and she only managed to cut her own fingers, where new crystals started to form in the wounds.

She locked eyes with Kaylee, who looked just as freaked out and horrified.


And then, the Dispel hit.





(Activate Scan has been Dispelled)

(All Heightened Senses have been Dispelled)

(Wallrun has been Dispelled)

(All Status Effects on Kaznachey and the Worm have been dispelled)




One second, that was all it took for Kaznachey to manifest in her real form and kick Squiggles so hard across his torso, the Spider was sent flying like a bullet into the crowd of 48 Witchers who were trying to hold back the invading Horde in the distance. The massive collapse of their ranks prompted the Parasites to descend upon them and soon, the air was filled with the dying shrieks of men, as they were ripped apart by hundreds of rabid parasites.

You lost count of the dead after the first 10 Witchers died.


(Rain suffered -80 HP damage, 100 HP remaining.)



Rain's falcion had just pierced the Worm, embedding itself almost up to the hand guard in the creatures flesh, when a sudden and crippling pain gripped her stomach, forcing her to collapse to one knee. Looking around, you noticed that Squiggles had just been violently kicked across the pit.



(The Worm suffered -260 HP damage, it has been Blinded for 2 rounds.)



Without missing a beat, Kaznachey sprang out of her encirclement and locking her eyes on Thena, slapped both of her hands aside, exposing her stomach and violently shoved her knee right into your solar plexus

The strike was akin to being hit with a sledgehammer. You were thrown a good five meters back, and even as you rolled over your head, trying to absorb and roll with the fall, you saw Kaznachey's eyes right next to yours, just a few inches away, as the woman leaped after you, summoning her Red Blade and taking a diagonal swing toward your torso.


Time seemed to slow down to a crawl, as you watched her blade sail toward you in slow motion, cutting through each individual snowflake that flew in its path. You saw the frozen Kusarigama vanish out of Rose's hands, some 5 meters away and felt her frantic scream in your head, as she tried communicating with you telepathically:


"THENA! USE THE GODKILLER!"


You have a fraction of a second left to react.



(Thena suffered -20 HP damage, 55 HP remaining.)

(Amethyst formations cover 20% of her body.)

Kaylee Brown wrote:Without missing a beat, Kaznachey sprang out of her encirclement and locking her eyes on Thena, slapped both of her hands aside, exposing her stomach and violently shoved her knee right into your solar plexus

The strike was akin to being hit with a sledgehammer. You were thrown a good five meters back, and even as you rolled over your head, trying to absorb and roll with the fall, you saw Kaznachey's eyes right next to yours, just a few inches away, as the woman leaped after you, summoning her Red Blade and taking a diagonal swing toward your torso.

Time seemed to slow down to a crawl, as you watched her blade sail toward you in slow motion, cutting through each individual snowflake that flew in its path. You saw the frozen Kusarigama vanish out of Rose's hands, some 5 meters away and felt her frantic scream in your head, as she tried communicating with you telepathically:

"THENA! USE THE GODKILLER!"

Rogue fires off another Lightning at Kaznachey, hoping to take advantage of her being distracted by Thena.

The God Killer appears in what looks like a tangle of chain around the both of them. As Thena full on blocks the attack with the blades from her weapon the chain has already looped itself around Kaznachey's neck and pulls tight. The next attempt from Kaznachey to send her flying is going move the chain like a saw accross the throat of the teal parasite. The chain is also now pressed in regardless and still dealing damage and with this Thena pulls the chain as tight as she can.

With the flames washing over her, Twilight howled in pain. As her clothes ahad caught fire, she rolled across the ground to douse them.

Stop, drop and roll, everyone.

She wanted to quickly take off after dousing the flames, but the fire on her back must have hit her wings as well, as the felt numb and several feathers were burned or damaged. She forced herself on her feet, and ran to her child to check on them.

After checking on them, she looked around, trying to find the best way to apply herself to the battle.

White film flicks over the crystal warewolfs eyes as it drags its teeth through the parasites face. Like a starving animal it tugs and rips at its head as it simultaneously hacks at its neck. Its grip tightens as the parasite emits its death rattle and shutters as its hit with dispel. Its jaws snap close as the parasite turns to dust.

The wolf tightens its grip on its blade as it swallows ash. Its jowls rise again and it lets out a vicious snarl. Your not sure how something like that could get MORE angry but it certainly looked like the despell pissed it off even more. Its eyes lock onto Kaz, the only thing between it and him. a giant worm. Its paws slide across the oasis rock, digging deep clawmarks into the cobblestone and potentially ruining a pentagram. It charges the hole where the worm came out of and FLAILS its mantacore blade into the worm, hacking at its body like a tree trunk with the full width of her blade, lacking the little finesse in violence Circi had.


Rain gasps as she grips her ribs, "S-Squiggles!" Rain shouts, "Damn you Kaz!" Rain roars, "I'm going to turn every bone in your body to DUST!"

Rain casts BERZERK

"You'll regret taking that ten thousand health! I'm going to make you feel EVERY POINT!" Rain roars out in defiance, "Squiggles! CRUSH THEIR BONES! Kaz can exist as a living pile of meat!? Let it be US that puts her into that state!"

The lightning strike flashed off from Rogue's fingers, zig-zagging toward Kaznachey and striking a weak teal shield that had manifested over the Parasites shoulder at the last possible second, deflecting the spell and shattering in the process.

"Rogue we have exhausted our Mana reserves!" You heard Rolo's voice in your head, as the Parasite changed directions and hurled himself to the side, a moment before the giant worm struck the ground in an effort to devour Rolo in a single gulp. The worm missed by just several inches.


"We may have to resort to consuming a Mana potion, but that will drain our Sanity that is currently at set at 1... you saw what happened to Ursula when her Sanity hit zero... I don't she saw in her mind, but I don't want you to experience that, so we may need a Sanity restoration potion before anything else..." he clicked his tongue "What a mess... Rogue, we need to end this battle quickly. The longer it protracts, the more casualties we'll suffer."


Rolo's voice rang with steel, telepathically in your mind, as the Parasite rose to full height, sizing up the worm that wiggled and writhed in its hole in the ground.

"...Kaznachey is the priority..." his voice came off rattled and for a split second you felt the paralyzing fear in his heart, fear of death, fear of watching friends getting devoured and ripped apart, fear of this fight being for nothing, fear of Migrating to Kepler and finding nothing but smoldering ruin, another planet, void of life. And you felt how he struggled to push past that fear with every fiber of his being. How the only thing holding him together was the desire to save the comrades around him, even at the cost of his own life.

You noticed his hands slightly shaking:


"Kaznachey has to die, or none of us are going home... focus on her... the Parasites will buy you time." Rolo scowled at the worm, and rushed right at it. And when the Parasites of Ursula, Kaylee, Zoy, and Johan, all rushed toward it in unison, while others rushed toward the Horde that poured into the cave, you realized Rolo wasn't just speaking telepathically to you, he was speaking to everyone present.

Everyone could hear his voice in their head.



A second ticked by, at your spectral companions clashed with the Horde, fighting side by side with Witchers to try and hold back the rising tide of death, claws and teeth that continued to pour into the pit from above in rising numbers.







As Thena summoned her blades and attempted to block the ancients attack, Kaznachey's blade came crashing down on her sideways, like an arm of a construction crane. The sheer force of the impact dug your feet into the ground and with the sound of an explosion, your heels cratered the stone floor, sending a spider-web of cracks to run into every direction and small bits of stone to fly upward, peppering against your armor and face, as Kaznachey's furious face appeared inches away from yours and she continued to press your feet into the stone, attempting to push through your defense by brute force alone.

And it was working. She was just too strong, your muscles felt like they were of fire, as you attempted to push against her red blade, while the parasite aimed to simply keep pushing forward, inching the edge of her searing blade closer and closer to your face.

You felt your hair starting to singe, as loose strands fell on the red blade and their tips burned to a crisp in an instant.


The next second, the teal chain of your kusarigama tightened and started to wrap up around Kaznachey's neck. She loosened her grip on the red blade, holding it with one hand now, while rising the other and pressing it vertically against her head in a blocking gesture.

And once the teal noose began to close around her, it didn't wrap up fully against her neck, but rather, pressed hard against the left side of her neck, while on the right side, it wrapped up around her raised arm, pressing against her skin, singing it and causing visible frostbite, but it prevented the chain from choking her outright.



(Thena suffered -5 HP damage from the blocked impact, 100 HP remaining.)


(Kaznachey suffered -150 HP damage, 6435 HP remaining)

(Kaznachey has been afflicted with Frostbite for 1 turn, her reaction time has slowed down.)



With a sudden motion Kaznachey slid her sword across your blades, knocking them momentarily sideways, before she turned her sword sideways and slammed its pommel into the side of your head, right in the temple.


(Thena suffered -40 HP damage, 60 HP remaining.)


The impact was so devastating your vision went dark and suddenly the ground raced at your face. You must have blacked out for a fraction of a second and by the time you blinked and reflexively jerked sideways, rolling away from the Parasite, you saw her throwing your chain off of her, making the teal metal scrape against her skin and leaving even more frost burns, before the woman rushed at you again and you realized you wouldn't be able to raise your blades up in time.

You were still too disoriented from the strike, it took too much health from you, made you too sluggish. There wasn't enough time to dodge or move out of the way. She was going to cut you in half from head to toe in one brutal motion.

You saw the red blade rise and realized, this was the end.




"KETZ!" You heard Adam's bark and heard the thunderous clap as he brought his palms together and your vision was suddenly clouded by an explosion of purple mist and the sound of breaking glass flooded your hearing, as billions of tiny glass shards grinded together, forming shapes inside the mist.

You felt yourself carried off your feet and moved a meter off to the side.


It only took one second. And when the purple mist vanished as quickly as it appeared, 15 identical Thenas stood around Kaznachey, surrounding her in a circle, with only one of them being real. The teal woman belowed in outrage and cleaved in half the Thena that stood in front of her a second ago, and that Thena exploded in a blast of glass shards and purple mist, revealing herself a decoy. An illusion.


The Army of One limit break had activated around Thena. 13 Decoys remaining.








(Circi has activated Berserker Limit Break. Her Max Health received a bonus of +44 HP and she was healed for +44 HP)

(96 HP remaining out of 176 New Maximum.)



Off to the side, the Berserking Sinner Wolf had descended upon the worm like a storm of claws and steel, the blade attack was so sudden, vision and devastating, you managed to hack into the worm right up to half of its width, leaving behind a mess of orange viscera and blood that sprayed out like a fountain up to 5 meters into the distance, from the dozens of giant, messy cuts that would not heal.

Ravaged skin, fat tissue and rotting muscle became exposed in the hacked wounds as the worm released a horrid, deafening screech. Its upper body suddenly flexed, unexpectedly fast and its mouth suddenly and violently came crashing down, snapped shut around the Wolf's torso. It looked like parasite worm had attempted to swallow the wolf in one gulp, but it failed or thought better of it at the last moment.

Instead, hundreds upon hundreds of tiny teeth had locked around the Wolf's torso, piercing its stomach and back, with the Wolf's entire upper half being inside the worms mouth, before the worm clenched its teeth tight, lifted the Wolf off the ground, spinning it violently in the air and hurled it at the nearest wall.


The impact was so explosive and devastating the wall cratered deep into the stone, sending massive cracks in every direction and embedding the Wolf deep in the crater amidst the broken stone shards.


(The Worm suffered -450 HP damage and afflicted with Blindness for 2 turns)


(Circi suffered -60 HP damage, 36 HP remaining.)




The Worm emitted a low piercing shriek and crashed hard into the stone ground. Its massive wound continued to leak and spray liters of orange blood and viscera, until a disgusting cracking sound was heard. You saw its body suddenly begin to segment, just above the wound and split open.

With a loud, disgusting pop, the upper half of the Worm had detached itself, leaving the ravaged wound and the rest of its body behind. The upper part of the worm, now only some 5 meters in length, writhed and crawled away, alarmingly quickly, leaving behind a trail of foul smelling guts, as its segmented part closed off and healed, leaving behind an ugly scar.

The ravaged lower part of its body slowly fell back into the hole it crawled out of and vanished from sight, leaving behind only echoes of its descent, as it fell into the black void below.







"THE QUICKENIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING!!!" Squiggles shrieked with glee on the other side of the cave as his body suddenly dissipated and vanished in thin air, only for Rain to explode in a massive blast of orange smoke and searing flame, sending a burning shockwave in every direction and knocking the tiny Parasite of the Horde off their feet.

They scrambled to flip from their backs and onto their tiny paws and legs and all looked up in unison at the creature emerging out of the orange flame, and their pupils dilated.



A massive 5 meter tall spectral spider was rising out of the searing fire and smoke, with Rain suspended in a dream-like state at the center of its body. The spiders mandibles were covered in a jagged layer of biological plates that served both as armored plates and spiked blades, its front teeth were longer and sharper somehow, its eyes massive and burning with enviable glee and fury, as it opened its eyelids and slowly surveyed the battlefield.


"BOW, MORTALS, FOR I AM YOUR NEW MASTER!!!" Squiggles's deep, bass voice boomed across the pit, as the spider abomination broke into maniacal laughter.



(Rain activated Berserker mode. Her Max Health received a bonus of +67 HP and she was healed for +67 HP)

(167 HP remaining out of 267 New Maximum.)



The spider immediately zeroed in on Kaznachey and stampeded toward her, his numerous tall legs stepping loud and eerily close to his comrades, stabbing the stone floor and leaving small craters in its wake.








"Mother," Viktoria winced, rising up on one knee and looking at Twilight, as black smoke continued to rise in droves from their singed hair and clothing.

She looked back at the slithering worm, then at Kaznachey surrounded by decoys of Thena and the massive Spider rushing toward them.

Then her eyes shifted toward Zoy, Kaylee and Sasha. The Amethyst crystal formations were still growing on all of their bodies, catching more and more room, turning more and more flesh into crystalized purple formations and the Amethyst invasively grew over and under their skin, repurposing muscle into more crystal formations. They started screaming in pain, Sasha collapsed to her knees, no longer able to bear it.


(Thena, Zoy, Kaylee, Sasha and Larsen have 30% of their body covered by Amethyst crystal.)



"...my god, what is happening to them?" Viktoria asked in a hoarse voice, her face draining of color "Mom, have you ever seen anything like this?... its like... they're infected with something... like something is spreading in their blood... if we don't stop it, they'll turn into crystal!!!"

Viktoria's horrified purple eyes darted to you, there was little left there but fear and barely contained panic:

"What do we do? How do we help them? Please, there must be someth-"



Her voice became drowned out by a deep rumble and the ground itself began to shake. The echo was coming from the holes in the ground the Spalax and the Worm had dug up, and the sound was reverberating and growing stronger by the second.

Something was coming. Something massive, and with each passive second the ground shook harder until it turned into an earth-quake so strong, you could no longer remain on your feet.

Almost everyone fell, even Squiggles and Kaznachey ended up on one knee, digging her red sword into the ground for support.



The horrible reverberating sound reached its apex, and a flood of teal water came rushing out of the holes in the ground, flooding the pit in seconds. The water was strange, too teal and murky, sparking somehow, revealing nothing under its surface. In a few seconds it rose up to your knees, then up to your chest, before the speed of its rising began to slow down.

Just barely able to move and horribly restricted by the mass of water around you, you could just barely move or your arm. In the confusion that followed, you saw Kaznachey react first, as if she was waiting for this from the start. Flopping onto the surface of the water, as if it was a solid flood, she bounced off her hands and landed on her feet, standing a meter above everyone else.


You saw her feet glowing and realized she must have activated the Water Dance spell. You don't quite recall seeing it in action before, but this is what it must look like. Kaznachey was standing right atop the very surface of the water, the souls of her feet just barely sinking through and slightly bouncing back, as if she was standing atop a bouncy surface.


Without missing a beat, she turned and sprinted across the surface of the water, kicking up sprays of teal, as she ran towards Squiggles, who was up to his neck in the liquid, his movements sluggish and restricted. The spider hissed, rising his head up and preparing to bite into her.



"Where's the Worm?!" you heard Lightnings yell from afar but you saw nothing. The slithering Worm had completely vanished under the surface of the water, together with a large portion of the horde of tiny parasites that flopped helplessly, trying to stay afloat.


"EVERYONE ON KAZNACHEY!" Zoy barked over the racked, trying to ignore the crystals that were consuming her arms "DON'T LET HER BREATHE!"

The worms teeth grind against Circi's werewolf. It was like trying to bite into a boulder, jagged crystals across its skin hooking on its teeth and breaking away to dissolve in its mouth. It was like trying to drink a bittering agent, its taste horrifyingly acidic and a bitterness thats vomit educing. It didn't matter how hungry, every single sense shreiks this thing should not be anywhere near its mouth. Teeth dig in and even with their size, even as they broke skin, the wolfs muscle mass is extensive and with a flex, its muscles tighten over the teeth in its body and in a sudden, small yet violent movement, rips out whatever teeth it can. The crystal on its back shrieking like a fork against glass as its teeth carve scratches onto it. Through the worms hesitation though it nearly forces itself down the worms gullet, the only thing that stopped it was its sudden clamp down on its body. As the worm rears back Circi is trying to force its mouth open before shes thrown across their area again.

There was no waiting this time. The beast rips itself from its crater without any hesitation. Its about to charge Kaz, the moment its been waiting for, ready to bare down on the woman when the dam breaks beneath the oasis. The werewolf is flooded by water, and it releases an outraged roar before its put over its head becoming a dark spot beneath the water.

Bubbles rise up from where the werewolf once was, a shadow beneath the waves. It moves, slowly at first, but as Kaz casts her spell the shadow approaches at an alarming pace, its movement trailed by ripples over the waters surface. The spot beneath the water approaches with the speed of a shark, and just as Kaz lifts herself to her feet the water bursts open in a thunderous wave beside her, and shes suddenly very nearly, face to face with Circi's predator. Its jaws close over her legs with bone shattering force and it slams its muzzle back beneath the water, dragging her under. It rips its head back and forth giving no quarter to its victim, no clear shot to make it stop, before breaching the surface again to expose her, even for a moment, to oncoming spells.


Rain hisses, "Damn her. Damn her!" Rain roars to squiggles, "Right as we go berserk!" Rain paces "We have wall run but we cant cast spells can we?! Urggghhh..." her eyes practically roll into the back of her head before Circi makes her move in a splash of violent action, "What is that thing..." Rain whispers, before Circi breaks the surface with kaz between her teeth, "Squiggles! Quick! Stab for Kaz's head!"

With no time to lose, Rogue quickly looks around for a Witcher carrying sanity and mana potions, and makes a beeline for them once he's found them.

Thena drops into shadow form and darts accross the liquid toward Kaznachey. Using the momentum of the rush she regains her corporeal form and catapults herself in the air towards Kaznachey. The angry wooshing of frost enchanted chains from Thena's godkiller are accented with the sound of a blade stabbing into the back of Kaznachey's leg in order to cause her to stumble. Though assuming that Kaznachey will dodge or turn to counter attack an ice spike has already formed and is darting through air towards the teal parasite.

"The Calibration Sto-blaaaarh!" You heard Adam's yell turn to gargling as the boy went underwater. Moments later he had already bounced up, above the surface with the souls of his shoes glowing. Adam's expression was distorted with a kind of pained, awkward expression as the boy clumsily tried to maintain balance, as wave after wave passed by.


You noticed the water level steadily rising and not showing any sings of stopping. The shine of the Calibration Stone quickly vanished below, under the murky teal surface of the water. It remained stuck on the stone floor, hidden inside a saddlebag, still fastened to a beheaded griffon.


Johan burst out of the water a moment later, deeply inhaling and dragging Ursula along with him. The girl was barely conscious, still stuck in a nightmare inside her own head. Spitting and coughing up water, Johan struggled to maintain himself and Ursula's head above the surface, before he strained, tracing a hieroglyph underwater with one hand, then screamed under pressure, as he momentarily laid on his back, then rolled into a crouching position and let his shoes hover over the water, struggling to lift Ursula onto his hands.


Ursula's eyes opened suddenly and with a start. The girl screamed, grabbing her face, still disoriented and a blinding burst of golden energy exploded out of her, turning into a golden sphere that washed over the pit, enveloping everyone in it.


(Everyone was healed for +107 HP, including Kaznachey.)



As the Sinner Wolf burst out of the water in a massive blur of claws and teeth, Kaznachey just barely managed to turn around and raise her sword. She thought you were about to attack her head or her torso and she miscalculated. Her sword passing several inches over your head in slow motion, as you bit into her feet and dragged her under.

Disappearing under the waves, you saw her red sword sizzle and smoke, as its searing flame continued to burn underwater. Both the wolf and the parasite turned into a blur, as the struggled to fight underwater and you felt your teeth digging deep into Kaznachey's legs, tearing apart her muscle and leaving wounds that would have dismembered a lesser creature or disfigured it permanently, but Kaznachey held.



(Kaznachey suffered -350 HP damage, 6,192 HP remaining.)



Breaking out of the surface of the water again and no longer constricted by the viscous liquid, Kaznachey's blade flashed faster than the eye could see, leaving only an after-image burned into your retina, as the blade slashed right over Circi's muzzle, her face and her forehead, diagonally leaving behind a horrifyingly messy and deep wound and immediately filled up with dark blood that sprayed in every direction, falling onto Kaznachey's own face and her clothes.


(Circi suffered -70 HP damage, 73 HP remaining.)

(Circi has been Poisoned for 2 rounds.)



The strike was strong enough to loosen the grip of your teeth on the teal woman and she broke free from your grasp. Landing firmly on her feet and immediately gliding back to a distance for 5 meters back, her eyes darted toward the 14 Thenas that were all charging at her in unison.


"KETZ!" Kaznachey barked, momentarily dissipating her sword and bringing her palms together in a deafening clap. And as she broke her hands apart, a Fireball the size of a semi-trailer materialized in front of her body, dwarfing her in comparison and burning as bright as the sun, a ball of earth and magma and flowed out in droves, falling onto the water and sizzling as it cooled down in seconds, turning into blobs of black viscous liquid.



Thrusting her hand forward, Kaznachey sent the giant magma filled fireball right into the crowd of Thenas, where their numbers where most concentrated. Time seemed to slow down for a moment, as the real Thena felt the searing heat of the meteor, as it shot passed her with the speed of that approaching Mach 1, missing her by less than a meter, and completely obliterating everything in its path, turning 5 of your decoys into splashes of purple mist and glass, as they were wiped out and grinded to dust instantly, before the Fireball continued to sail forward and impacted the far wall, causing an explosion so devastating, it sent a giant crack to run up the side of the pit for hundreds of meters, until it reached all the way up to the top.

You got a guttural feeling that if that spell had collided with you, you could have died instantly.



(Thena has 8 Decoys remaining.)



As 9 differed Kusarigama blades flashed toward Kaznachey she conjured a teal shield over her left shoulder, causing several decoys to strike it, their teal blades bouncing off, before the shield was shattered by Thena's ice spike, in a spray of glass and ice.

There was simply too many targets attacking the parasite at once, too many venues of attack. And as she struggled to block most of them, Thena's real blade found its way to Kaznachey's leg, cleaving a giant slice out of it and making her stumble, falling face first in the water.



(Kaznachey suffered -200 HP damage and suffered Frostbite.)

(Her reaction time has been slowed down for 2 turns, 5992 HP remaining.)



The next second, Squiggles had erupted from under the water, right under the teal woman and impaled her on 4 of his mandibles, and on the purple fiery falcion the spider held in his jaws, bursting out of the water up to two meters into the air and carrying up the parasite with him.


(Kaznachey suffered -250 HP damage, and suffered Blindness for 1 turn, 5742 HP remaining.)




By the time the two crashed back into the water and Squiggles immediately went under to avoid Kaznachey's wrath, the womans red blade stabbed the parasite in the head, just as he tried to dive, prompting him to released a gargling, piercing shriek underwater.


(Squiggles and Rain suffered -60 HP damage, 207 HP remaining, they have been afflicted with Poison for 1 turn.)





Looking around, Rogue soon located the surviving Witchers. There were only 23 left. Hovering a milimeter above the surface of the water, they all ran toward the approaching Parasite horde, as the small parasites continued to spill into the pit. The Horde was adjusting now, instead of jumping down, the parasites were now crawling over the surface of the pit, like hundreds of thousands of roaches, and moving like a single wave and finally dropping down onto the waters surface.

Their legs glided over the water as if they were skating, their legs, limbs, mandibles and paws keeping them afloat and the battle resumed. The Witchers were running around them, kicking up water and trying to slash through the parasites at the edges of the horde to thin out their numbers, while the parasites sought to launch themselves at the soldiers, trying to bite into them arms and feet, often missing and going under, not to be seen again.


Rogue noticed several of the Witchers having large pouches fastened to their lower backs, filled to the point of bursting with potions of every sort you could find. But they were too preoccupied to reach back and use one. The continuous onslaught of the parasite horde was so tenacious, they had to go all out, concentrating on the combat just to survive.




Kaylee had burst out of the surface of the water, spitting out the teal liquid and climbing out onto its surface, the souls of her shoes glowing and her wings soaked wet. Breathing heavily, her green katana materialized in her Amethyst covered hands. Wiping the water off her eyes, her eyepatch came loose and fell off, sinking and disappearing under the waves, revealing a horrible, ugly scar over her eye that covered the entire sclera and iris.



Zeroing in on Kaznachey, the girl gritted her teeth, her face distorted by pain as more and more Amethyst crystals crawled under her skin, shining under her cheek and splitting her skin, bursting out in new formations.

"You fucking whore." Kaylee muttered, her eyes distorted by a horrible scowl as tears filled her eyes "...whatever you did to my daughter... you'll share her fate." she whispered, before exploding in a burst of speed, sprinting toward the parasite and kicking up water up to a meter in height.


"I would worry about your family on Kepler." Kaznachey's voice echoed in your head, in a deep rumbling bass and the parasite cackled "Your unborn child, Kaylee. I wonder if it, and your fiance are being burned alive at this very moment."


Kaylee shrieked, in a voice so filled with indescribably outrage and pain, your blood momentarily turned cold in your veins. The girl ran straight at Kaznachey at full speed, brandishing her katana and kicking up water up to a meter in height in her wake.

Kaznachey's smirk was growing wider, the Parasite spread her arms wide, holding her sword in one, clearly opening herself to attack. She was baiting Kaylee to charge in, it became so painfully obvious, you wanted to scream. You weren't sure how, but you knew for a fact, Kaznachey was setting a feint, and when her ruse works, she'll murder Kaylee in a single blow.

Kaylee screamed louder, bringing her sword back or a strike, there was only 5 meters left between them and Kaznachey's grin grew wider, the look in her eye more unhinged. Whatever was going to happen, was going to happen in the next split second. The Parasites eyes were on Kaylee, and only on Kaylee, her tear filled eyes filled out outrage and pain, one yellow, one scarred.


A heart beat passed. And in that moment, Viktoria and Zoy struck from behind. Bursting out of the water in an explosion of speed, Viktoria's scythe danced in the air cleaving through Kaznachey's back, her neck and the back of her head so fast, you only saw a blur of shining green in its wake. Viki collided with Kaznachey's back and used it to launch herself away, planting both feet in her back and jumping off, kicking Kaznachey further toward Kaylee.

As Kaznachey turned and thrust her sword forward, it was deflected, the scarlet flame passing next to Zoy's cheek and leaving a long shallow cut there, and Kaznachey's eyes went wide.


Zoy's expression didn't show any emotion. Not fear, nor anger or hatred or pain. It was just an emotionless mask of concentration, completely devoted and focused on her task - the Level 5 Dragonfire that danced in the palm of her hand like an untamed flame, forever burning. And Zoy's Amethyst ridden hand extended, planting her palm right into Kaznachey's face, shoving the spell point plank into her forehead and eyes, and detonating it, point blank.



The resulting explosion was so devastating, it sent Zoy hurling for 10 meters backwards, as Kaznachey's head took the brunt of the attack. Her eyes became covered by scar tissue, black and charred, the skin and muscle on her face practically melted, as her head was whipped back, and the full burst of the explosion ignited her head and vented upwards, creating a column of fire that shot up to 300 meters into the air, burning so bright, it dimmed everything in the pit for several seconds, until all you could see was the column of flame and you heard Kaznachey's horrid shriek echoing and overlapping over itself, as the woman lost balance and started to fall back in slow motion.




(Kaznachey suffered -1500 HP damage, 4242 HP remaining.)

(Kaznachey has been afflicted with Poison for 20 turns.)




And as Kaznachey slowly fell back, she fell right into Kaylee's hands. The purple pegasus' sword was gone, dissipated from her hands, as the girl broke off a particularly large piece of the Amethyst crystal from her own cheek and mercilessly stabbed it into Kaznachey's open wound on her face, driving it so deep it went into the jaw bone.


"If my little girl with turn into crystal... then so will you." Kaylee mercilessly whispered into the parasites ear, holding her in a death grip and pushing the crystal as deep into Kaznachey's face as she could.



A scream so horrid pierced your ears, it made every muscle in your body seize up, as your hair stood on end. Kaznachey screamed, frantically and hysterically. And there wasn't just pain ringing in it, it was desperation and fear. Uncontrollable, un-tameable, fear.



Wigging out of Kaylee's grasp, the parasite kicked her in the chest so hard, you heard Kaylee's ribcage snap, as the girl was sent flying 15 meters over the surface of the water, before she collided with the far wall and sank into the water, disappearing under the waves, as the Parasite writhed.

Even as Kaznachey's burns healed, even as her eyes regained their blue color and regenerated, the purple Amethyst remained stuck in her cheek, pulsating with a dim light and sending little tendrils of purple to spread across the parasites cheek, running down her bloodstream, down her neck, spreading further and faster, and soon, new Amethyst crystals began bursting out of her skin, all along her neckline.


"YOU.... FFFFFUCKING BBIIIIIIIIIIIIIITCH!!!!" Kaznachey shrieked, in uncontrollable fear and outrage, trying to rip out the Amethyst from her cheek, breaking only half of it off and cutting her hands in the process that soon filled with new crystals growing in the cuts on her skin.


"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGHHHHHHH!! Kaznachey's wild eyes darted across the surface of the water, frantically scanning everyone present, until her eyes zeroed in on Adam and she broke into a sprint toward him, so fast and frantic you couldn't even track her movement anymore, she moved faster than the eye could track or follow, kicking up sprays of water in her wake that rose up to 5 meters in height.



(Kaylee suffered -70 HP damage, 10 HP remaining.)

(Kaznachey suffered -50 HP damage, 4192 HP remaining.)

(20% of Kaznachey's body is covered in Amethyst.)

(40% of Thena's, Kaylee's, Zoy's, Sasha's, and Larsen's bodies are covered in Amethyst.)

Not wishing to distract any of the surviving Witchers and risk them losing their concentration, Rogue looks around for any dead Witchers who may have also been carrying potions.

Twilight tried flying up, to avoid the water. She had held herself back to think of a soultion to the crystals spreading around on the bodies of her friends.

Her upper body was above the water, helped by the wings that slowly regenerated. But she knew she had to act fast.

"Let's try this first." She said as she charged up a dispel to cast on one of them. In her mind, it was either that or the stuff they used against manticore venom, and she didn't carry that with her.

With Kaylee kicked away, she first tried it on her, Flying over to catch her and casting the spell.