"ON THE COUNT OF THREE! ONE! TWO! THREE!!!" At the count, Sera shot out her hand, unleashing a wave of frost that formed a layer of ice over the Boss and the quicksand. The Boss's eyes snapped open as soon as the frost hit them. Uncurling its body, the gigantic snake broke the ice covering it. Letting out a loud screech, the Boss charged forward toward the source of the cold. Completely missing Alex, who ran over the newly frozen sand to get closer to the distracted monster.
With potion and magically enhanced strength, Alex leaped forward, landing on top of the charging monster's long body. 'Silk, freeze me to the Boss, then focus on maintaining the boosted Restoration spell.' Alex mentally commanded as he went down on his knees, wincing when ice burst from his legs, freezing him to the Boss. Tapping on his chest, he pulled out the weave for the magically created ice that was anchoring him to the Boss and wrapped it around his arms before taking out three potions from his pouch. Taking a deep breath, Alex downed one of the potions before smashing the other two against the Boss's hard scales, causing an explosion of electricity and ice.
The Soul Glare King Cobra let out a pained screech, distracting the monster long enough not to notice the wall of thick ice in front of them before they crashed into it. Before the Boss could have any time to recover, they were bombarded by over a dozen Ice and Acid potions, followed by half a dozen Lightning potions aimed at patches of softened or frozen scales. Enraged, the Boss opened their mouth and sprayed a shower of acidic venom towards the cluster of five students.
"FREEZE!" Shouted Crystal as she flung a hand upwards, creating a wall of ice between the venom and her group. A burst of green gas erupted from where the venom and ice touch, forcing Crystal to extend the wall, creating a dome of ice around the group. While the Boss focused on showering the dome of ice with venom, the other group charged forward towards the large monster. Once they were close enough, the three students started viciously attacking weakened patches of scales while occasionally throwing a potion to slow down the Boss's regeneration.
Meanwhile, Alex finally healed enough of his body to continue with the plan. Quickly weaving a Create Water spell, he solidified it before grabbing it with his mouth and activating it. Focusing on the weave, Alex manipulated it to have the water flow down the solid Mana threads and fall onto the Boss's cracked scales under him. Once enough water seeped between the scales, Alex took out four potions, holding two in each hand.
-Screech!-
'Really? Huh, Sera's potions pack a bigger punch than I thought they would,' Alex mused. 'Don't worry, Silk; this won't completely drain me. Though, sorry, you might have to go a bit hungry for a little while.' He mentally apologized before smashing the four potions together against the soaked scales. The subsequent explosion triggered a chain reaction, trapping electrified water between the monster's scales beneath a layer of petrified liquid. As the potion-generated electricity flowed through the water, it alternated between boiling it into steam and freezing it into ice.
Unable to ignore the damage it was receiving any longer, the Boss started coiling its body, forcing the melee team to back away. The Boss let out a loud screech towards the three retreating students before closing its hood over its face. "BRACE YOURSELF!" B(?) shouted as the skull-like pattern emitted a blinding white light. Meanwhile, without the Boss bombarding the larger group from afar, the venom that was eating away at the icy shelter finally ran out.
"Are you two ready?" Crystal asked Jack and Mari who was on an ice platform in the shape of a surfboard with a pointed front.
"Yup/ HELL YEAH!"
"Then brace yourself, I'm launching you two on the count of five." Crystal slowly released her hold on the dome of ice. "One." Crytsal quickly chugged down a Mana potion Sera handed her. "Two." Crystal fully shifted all her focus onto the ice around the surfboard. "Three." The paralytic gas should have fully dispersed by now. "Four." She took in a deep breath. "FIVE!" She shouted while shooting both her arms forward as a wave of ice and frigid air shot forward. Picking up the surfboard, the wave of ice carried the duo past where the barrier used to be and towards the still Boss. Sensing the sudden drop in temperature, the Boss unfurled its hood, just in time to see the wave of ice before it crashed into them.
The large cobra let out a pained screech as it crashed into the ground with a loud thud. Not even a second later, the Boss was bombarded by waves of potions thrown at its face and discoloured, weakened scales. The Boss tried to lunge forward at the melee team only to be interrupted by an explosion of fire, ice and acid erupting from its back, knocking them out of their attack.
"Shit! I'm out of potions!" B(?) yelled out loud.
"Same!/ Me too!" The other two in her group yelled back at her.
"Shit, I can't believe we're already out." She groaned to herself. "We can't give this bastard time to heal! Attack!" Rushing closer, B(?) tore at the patch of weakened scales with her clawed gauntlets, ripping them out to reveal grey flesh underneath. As the five students hack away at the Boss, Alex, who just endured another explosion to the face, was gasping for air.
"FUCK! Why were my lungs among the last things to regenerate?!" he shouted before hacking up a mixture of blood, flesh, and sand. Groaning, Alex downed another Mana potion and quickly repaired the ice anchoring him. He examined the damaged scales he was kneeling on before weaving an Icicle Spear. He placed the tip on a weak spot and then struck the flat end, shattering the scales and piercing the flesh easily. After embedding the spear fully in the monster, Alex formed another Icicle Spear and used it to drive the first one deeper into the boss.
Feeling the growing pain in their back, the Soul Glare King Cobra started tilting their body, planning to roll over and crush anyone near it. Sensing the monster's movement, Alex dismissed the fourth Icicle Spear and took out two potions. Placing his hand on the base of the top Icicle Spear, Alex quickly hollowed them out, making a long tunnel running through all three spears. Alex quickly poured a Fire potion down the hollowed-out spears and then smashed an Ice potion over the hole to seal it. With no time to spare, Alex used the empty bottles to break the ice covering his legs. He then used all the power he could muster to fling himself as far away from the Boss as he could. Belly flopping on the sand, Alex winced when his legs were crushed under the Cobra's large body. Before the rest of his body could be squashed under the Boss's hefty weight, Alex felt someone grab onto his torso and pull him away, tearing what remained of his legs off in the process.
"Sorry, Captain." Mari awardly chuckled while she glanced down at the stumps that were Alex's legs, while carrying him in a bridal carry.
"It's nothing I can't eventually heal from." He replied while watching the other students continue their assault on the giant cobra. Squinting his eyes, Alex noted the Boss's healing had started to accelerate. "Did the melee team run out of potions?"
"I think I recall B shouting something like that."
"B?" He muttered before deciding to focus on more important things. "Looks like we need a change of plans."
"What do you have in mind, Captain?"
"Toss me in the Boss's mouth." Mari barked out a laugh when she processed what he said.
"Sure thing, Captain!" Mari said with a wide grin. Turning around in a wide arc, Mari dashed towards the Cobra's head. While she ran, Alex downed a Health, Mana and Iron Skin potion before taking out five differently coloured potions. "GET IT'S MOUTH OPEN!" Mari shouted as she closed the distance between her and the other students. Figuring she must have a plan, the other students immediately burst into action, intensifying their attacks on the Boss. Enraged at the damage it was receiving, the Boss started coiling up its body. Seeing this, the students backed away instead of continuing their attack. The melee team rushed towards the large group of students while Crystal prepared her spells.
Coiled up, the Boss faced towards the group of students huddled together and opened its mouth wide. Seeing her chance, Mari jumped up and, to almost everyone's surprise, tossed Alex into the Boss's gaping maw. Sensing the presence entering its mouth with its tongue, the Boss instinctively snapped their mouth shut. A flash of multi-coloured light blinded the students as a deafening thunderous boom reverberated across the arena. Followed by a loud thud when the Boss's head crashed into soft sand. The students stood in shocked silence, staring at the giant fallen Cobra. Only to be brought back to reality by Mari's mad laughter.
"HAHAHAHHAHAHA! Hey! Watcha doing just standing there! We can't have Captain have all the fun!" She shouted as she dashed towards the slowly rising monster. The Boss tried to tilt its head upwards in an attempt to swallow Alex, but was interrupted by another smaller explosion within its mouth. Dazed, the Boss's head crashed onto the sand once more, allowing Mari to wail at its face with heavy punches unimpeded. Following Mari's lead, the melee students, with the help of Crytsal freezing the Boss to slow down its regeneration, attacked the weak points in the scales they made earlier.
The Soul Glare King Cobra wasn't going to take this beating lying down. Learning from its earlier mistake, it tried to fill its mouth with venom, resulting in another explosion. Taking the blast without even flinching, the Boss decided that Alex wasn't worth the effort and spat him away. "Captain!" Mari shouted as she chased after his flying body. The Boss opened its ruined mouth, covered in several dozen different kinds of wounds and let out a shriek at the students surrounding it. The students tried to ignore the shriek and continue their assault, only to be forced to retreat when the Boss started rolling around, trying to crush them.
"FREEZE!" Crystal shouted, encasing segments of the Boss's body in thick ice, preventing it from rolling around. Taking advantage of this opportunity, the melee team continued their attack, focusing on any weak patch they could find. Struggling to free itself, the Boss opened its mouth and started recklessly spraying venom everywhere, not even caring when some landed on its body, melting their scales. Retreating from Crytsal, the students hid under a dome of ice to escape from the rain of acidic venom and paralytic gas. Due to Crystal being forced to focus on maintaining the dome of ice, the Boss was finally able to break the icy restraints covering its body. With glowing red eyes, the Boss screeched at the icy dome before charging forward, planning to ram into it. Only to be interrupted when something smashed into its face before exploding in a ball of fire.
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"HAHAHAHAHA! Take that!" Mari laughed with potions in hand and Alex's glowing limp body draped over her shoulders like a blood-covered fleshy cape. "Hey, Captain, is this what you always feel when you fight? Because I feel like I could fight non-stop for days!"
"That would be the Boost and Energize spell I applied to your body. The feeling will quickly disappear once I stop maintaining the spells." Alex replied in a hoarse voice. "Did you never use a buff before today?"
"Yeah, and I thought the one the short kid put on me felt great. But it can't even compare to what you did!" Alex coughed up a wad of blood.
"Hmm, is that so. Well, just so you know, when all the buffs on you wear off, your body will most likely experience a crash."
"That would be future me's problem." She chuckled with a grin. "Until then, I'm just going to enjoy myself!" She laughed while rapidly throwing her potions at the Boss. Mari continued to bombard the Boss with a seemingly endless supply of potions, as Alex would hand Mari more every time she ran out. Even more enraged than before, the Boss made a hard turn and charged at the duo. The Boss kept rushing forward, ignoring when fire potions blinded its vision, Ice potions froze its body, Lightning potions scorched its flesh, and the Petrifying potions slowed its movement down. "Hahaha! Looks like someone's mad!" She barked out while Alex downed a Mana potion.
"Here, drink this." He said while handing Mari a red potion, which she drank without any hesitation.
"Bleh, bitter. What did I drink?"
"A Health potion."
"Why would you tell me to drink a Health potion?"
"You're bleeding from every orifice on your face."
"Huh." Wiping her face with her hand, she was shocked to see it covered in blood. "I don't remember getting hit. Did I inhale some poison or something?"
"No, your body is just slowly breaking down due to the strain of all the enhancements placed on your body. Blood Boil is a very physically demanding buff for most people. Though it shouldn't have been a problem for you if it wasn't for the fact that your current internal body temperature is at an all-time high due to the Energizer potion you got from Sera. Those two factors meant that when I applied Boost and Energize on you, it pushed your body way past its natural limit."
"Huh," was all she could say. She was snapped back to reality by the sounds of gulping and the feeling of Alex tapping her cheek with his fingers. "Hmm?" Catching her attention, he pointed at something in front of her. Mari's eyes widened when she finally noticed that the charging giant cobra was only a few mere meters away from them. Jumping to the side, she was barely able to dodge out of the way before the Boss could run them over. "Hey, Captain."
"Yeah?"
"Was the crash thing you were talking about earlier, had anything to do with my body?"
"No. If you do experience a crash, it would be due to your body suddenly being cut off from a seemingly endless source of strength and energy." Mari jumped over another attack before retreating a safe distance away from the Boss. "Kinda like a sugar crash, if you ever had one of those before. It's a pretty common thing to experience after receiving your first buff. I had something similar when I first started using the Energize spell while training. Your body gets used to it pretty quickly, so it's not something you need to worry about." The other students were finally able to leave the dome and rejoined the fight. "As for your body breaking down. Well, there isn't much you can do about that besides getting stronger or avoiding using too many enhancements at once." Mari heard Alex explain, followed by loud gulping sounds.
"Wait, don't you usually fight with multiple buffs? I refuse to believe you're stronger than me." She huffed, crossing her arms over her chest.
"Of course, you're physically stronger than me." Despite not being able to see him, Mari was sure Alex was rolling his eyes. "But training your body isn't the only way to get strong. For example, the reason why my body can handle multiple buffs at the same time is due to my Regeneration Trait, which allows me to heal faster than the rate at which my body breaks down. You can achieve a similar result by learning some healing spells."
"Hmmm, I'll think about it." She replied while thinking of the fire spell she wanted Alex to teach her. "So, Captain, how are you feeling? Ready to rejoin the fight?"
"Yeah," Mari heard him say, followed by more gulping. With an excited laugh, Mari rushed forward towards the Boss.
"WHY WONT THIS FUCKING SNAKE DIE ALREADY!" Shouted a student wielding a sword and shield while slashing at the exposed flesh.
"It's slowing down! Just keep attacking!" B(?) shouted back, gouging chunks of meat from the Boss before jumping over the monster's attempt at rolling her over.
"Hey, Sera! Do you still have any potions left?! The effects of the ones I used earlier are starting to wear off!" Jack asked, struggling to pull out the sword that he had thrown at the Boss a few seconds earlier. After a few more attempts, he finally managed to retrieve his sword just in time to dodge out of the way of a volley of venom shots.
"Sorry, I don't! I gave the last of them to Mari earlier!" Sera answered back. "Are you ok?" She asked Crystal, who was hunched with her hands on her knees. Sera winced when she started vomiting before rubbing Crytsal's back.
"Yeah," Crystal groaned. "Just a bit of Mana Sickness. I think I drank too much Mana potion too fast." She shakily raised a hand towards the Boss. "Freeeeze." She managed to wheeze out, sending forth a way of ice, before hunching over and starting to vomit again. The wave of ice crashed over the Boss, covering them in a thin layer of ice that barely managed to slow them down before exploding into a shower of snow that blanketed the area. "Hey, you ok?" She asked the tired-looking short student, who was hunched over, hugging his staff, which was slightly taller than he was, with his whole body. "Are you experiencing Mana Sickness as well?"
"No, I don't think so." He groaned. "It's just that maintaining eight separate buff spells is very mentally straining, and ha-" He covered his mouth and took several deep breaths through his nose before gulping down the bile building up in his throat. "And having to drink a very bitter Mana potion isn't helping." He shakily poured himself another shot glass and tried to drink, but only managed a few tiny sips before vomiting. "I can't drink any more." He groaned between heavy breaths. "I can still maintain the buffs for roughly another ten minutes." He managed to say before collapsing to his side.
Sera looked between the two students at her side and the Boss, who was recklessly thrashing at anyone in sight. Gulping down the lump in her throat, Sera quickly took out three bottles: a Health potion, an Energizer, and one filled with swirling red and green liquid. She hesitantly brought one to her mouth before pausing to look at the struggling students next to her and then at the enraged Boss not far off from them. Taking a deep breath, Sera steeled her resolve and downed each potion one by one before throwing the two downed students over her shoulder. Sera groaned under the strain of her newly gained strength as she slowly carried the two students away from the fighting.
Meanwhile, the melee students were slowly pushed back by the Boss's relentless attacks. The Boss momentarily stopped attacking to hiss at the students before smashing their tail against the ground, blanketing the area in a cloud of sand. Unable to properly see, the Sythe-wielding student was caught off guard when the Boss's tail collided with his body, sending him tumbling away.
"Shawn!" B(?) shouted as she backed away from the fight.
"I'm fine, Wendy!" Shawn shouted back inside a clear bubble covered in circuit-like lines while clutching the side of his body. "But I don't think I'll be able to continue in the fight!" He managed to shout before being retrieved by the adult helper, who had been watching the fight from afar. Watching him get carried away, Wendy shook her head and turned to face the now visible Boss. Letting out an angry growl, Wendy charged forward and sent a powerful punch at a patch of exposed flesh before ripping chunks of it out. Hissing in pain, the Boss tried to retaliate but was interrupted when Jack finally managed to slice through its thick hide, cutting open its side, causing blood and guts to spill out of its body.
"Whoa!" Jack yelled, jumping over the Boss's attempt at rolling him over. The only thing the Boss managed to do was crush their exposed organs. Undeterred by the damage they are inflicting on themselves, the Boss continued to roll around in an attempt to crush anyone they could. "Wow. To think I'll see a living being who cares less about their body than Alex or Pa does." Jack marvelled at the sheer amount of self-harm the Boss was willing to inflict on themselves. When the Boss finally slowed down and stopped rolling, their stretched-out organs were wrapped around their body like a bloody gauze bandage. Staring Jack down, the Boss opened their mouth and was about to spray venom at him, only for Mari to come out of nowhere and deliver a powerful punch to one of their fangs. The Boss let out a pained hiss as venom leaked out of their cracked fang and into their mouth.
"HAHAHAHAHA! Take that!" She laughed out loud before landing on the sand with a soft thud, Alex still draped over her shoulders, downing another Mana potion. "Another one? Didn't you drink an entire bottle, not even a minute ago?" She asked her teammate.
"Ugh, I'm not used to having to maintain a buff on someone other than myself, resulting in a lot of wasted Mana."
"Is that how that works?"
"Apparently."
"Well, in that case, we'd better finish this before you run out!" She shouted with a wide grin as she rocketed towards the Boss. Reaching the Boss, Mari latched onto them using her left hand before rearing back her other arm. Then, with a powerful punch that easily shattered the Boss's weakened scales, Mari buried her right arm deep within the monster. "HAHAHA! Do it, Captain!"
"I hope you don't regret this!" He shouted while activating the spell he had finished weaving onto what little of Mari's arm that wasn't buried in flesh. Mari's grin grew when she felt the biting cold of ice quickly spreading down her arm and into the monster. Then, with a strong tug, she ripped her arm along with chunks of frozen flesh out of the Boss's body. Violently shaking the ice off her arm, Mari shot another punch into the hole she made, burying her fist deeper into the Boss before Alex activated another finished Freeze spell. They repeated this process until Mari felt shards dig into her when she punched through solid bone.
"HAHAHA! Looks like we hit the jackpot!" She cackled. "Captain! Pour everything you've got into this one!"
"You'd better pray you don't lose that arm after this!" Quickly chugging down a Mana potion, Alex then activated the spell, instantly encasing Mari's arm along with a large area around it in ice. Tensing her body, Mari pushed against the Boss's body, shattering the ice along with ripping free her arm. Falling backwards, Mari quickly rotated her body, making sure she landed face down into the sand. Pushing up with her good arm, Mari slowly stood up.
"Dang, it's still not dead? It's almost as tough as you, Captain." She weakly chuckled while clutching her blood-covered, limp right arm.
"Here."
"Heh, th-groan-, thanks." Drinking the Health potion Alex handed her, Mari looked over the still-breathing Boss. The scales that weren't covered in blood or organs were noticeably duller than they were at the start of the fight. The Boss's insides, along with litres of blood, spilled out from the three large cuts along its body. Several craters of dug-out flesh, the biggest of which was the one Mari just created, littered all over the Boss's body. Their partially melted mouth hung loosely open, venom still dripping from their cracked fang. Moving her sights away from the Boss, Mari looked around for her classmates. She couldn't find the scythe-wielding guy, nor the one with the sword and shield. But she did manage to find B downing a potion a few meters away, along with Jack, clutching the hilt of a snapped-in-half sword not far off from her. Then, after a full minute of tense silence, the Boss finally collapsed, life quickly draining from their eyes.
