Hundreds of projectiles filled the air and the class chosen reacted immediately. Zuls called out her bonded. Prith drew his sword. Shell summoned some water while bringing her ocarina to her lips. Vorin prepared his scythes. Kumo took to the air straight towards the enemies. And Synexus started to evaluate the enemies while letting Soul deal with defending him from the small darts.

  Race: Thistledart Squirrel

  These monsters have evolved to turn the fur on their tails into deadly projectiles. One dart has enough force to blow a hole through a mature tree trunk. Additionally, the six arms of these beasts end in impossibly sharp claws. Caution: With how territorial these monsters are, beware of the treetops.

  Synexus was surprised that he had gotten so much information and would likely have to ask Gene why later, but first they had a horde of squirrels to fight. More kept revealing themselves from the surrounding trees and each one was half the height of an average-sized human. Their six arms looked powerful while their tails looked deadly.

  He yelled out to Shell to relay the information into the minds of all the others and then started his counterattack. Due to their numbers, he threw several of his razor death plant seeds up to start sowing chaos amongst their ranks. Now that he was out with a party again, he had to be careful of using them since he had designed them to just jump to the next magical entity they sensed. Even still he had thrown them high enough that it should only affect the back of their ranks. Then he ran over and used Instant Growth on the main tree they were racing down to meet the group.

  Immediately, the tree shot up, and the squirrels were barely holding on. Some fell to their deaths while others jumped to nearby trees to continue the assault. Either way the confusion had slowed them down, giving the rest of the party time to make their attacks.

  Kumo had started taking dozens out with wide cloud blades as soon as the projectiles started. Her Chain Lightning skill along with her Stormcloud skill kicked in to start taking out even more. She was a storm that the squirrels wouldn’t find shelter from. When she saw the massive tree start growing at an astonishing rate and the squirrels started falling from it, she got an idea. Focusing one massive cloud blade on the trunk, she cut it down.

  A loud creak rang out through the forest, and this titan of a tree started to tip. Synexus had grown it so much that it stood nearly 200 yards over the rest of the treetops. It was hard to miss, and they knew the impact would be dangerous, but it would be more dangerous for the squirrels that had yet to come out. As if in slow motion, class chosen and squirrels alike watched the tree fall. Silence had gone over the battlefield until a world-shattering crash rang out along with a thick plume of dust and a shockwave of force that put Kumo’s Tempest Surge to shame erupted out. More trees in the forest started to topple from the force alone and a long stream of death notifications rang through the class chosen’s heads.

  When the dust cleared, the party was blown back nearly 30 yards from where they were. Some had injuries from colliding with trees or rocks, but nothing serious. As for the squirrels, most of the original had perished, except now they had gotten the attention of more from another cluster of trees, and they were running towards them.

  Synexus reacted by using Element Modification to make a huge swath of ground soft in front of them. Shell caught on and summoned water to turn it all into thick mud. Squirrles started getting stuck in it as they charged.

  Zuls with her animals started their attack once more and were taking the monsters out almost immediately after they were stuck in the trap. Her flying and long distance bonded were perfect for this. She joined in with jets of flames and a domain of lethal snowflakes.

  Kumo continued her assault of cloud blades while renewing her Stormcloud skill. She also used her Tempest Surge when a mass of the squirrels caught up to them.

  Vorin couldn’t help with the ones stuck in the mud, but he was more than willing to inflict monster targeting plagues on those that tried to flank them. The plagues started to travel through the hordes making them slower and eventually killing them. His scythes rang against claws as he charged in.

  Prith was right there with him as his blade glided through the squirrels as if they were made of air. They couldn’t keep up with his nimble movements, and he nearly took out the whole flanking horde on his own. With Zuls’ Aura of Endurance his stamina had gotten boosted to the point where he could almost fight indefinitely.

  Shell continued to summon water and overcome the squirrels with waves of her own making. Her ocarina never stopped the sweet notes the whole time which was a further buff to the class chosen.

  Gene had flown off at the beginning and was keeping their distance. In the immediate chaos, Yu had followed the owl to make sure they got away safely, but she had just returned and was now using her wind magic to destroy the ranks of the squirrels from their flank. She was holding off on using her fire magic due to the setting of the fight. It would be a shame to destroy such a beautiful forest with a sea of flames.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  Eventually the horde started to thin out and then stopped all together. When the last one fell, the class chosen celebrated. Their celebration was cut short, however, when the ground started shaking.

  A giant Thistledart Squirrel with a few slightly smaller squirrels had jumped down from a treetop and was now screeching at the party with anger and hatred. Synexus immediately focused on them.

  Thistledart Squirrel King

  This monster rules over the territory of the thistledart squirrels and is the most powerful amongst their ranks. They are often protected by a retinue of future kings. Do not underestimate this foe.

  “Heads up everyone! This is the king.” He yelled out and the others got into position.

  Unbelievably big thistles started to get launched out of the king in rapid succession. Each one was able to cut through several trees before losing speed. One mistake and any one of them could be killed by the attack.

  The class chosen scattered and continued to dodge the attacks from the king and it’s retinue. With how fast the darts were being shot out, they barely had time to make attacks of their own, but the ones they were able to make were connecting. Two of the future kings had already fallen from targeted attacks by Kumo and Prith.

  Zuls went invisible along with her bat and they were coordinating to deal some damage to the king himself. When they got close, she unleashed a torrent of flame that started burning wildly on the fur of the king. He immediately turned to target her while screeching in pain. At that moment, Whimper revealed himself and let out an even louder sonic attack straight into the king’s ears. It stunned him long enough for Zuls to summon ice claws and strike at the neck of the king. Unfortunately, he was too quick and she got stricken by his tail.

  Zuls flew through the forest with a bad gash along her right arm. Snowfall acted quickly and caught her before she smacked into a tree. Whimper disengaged before being taken down, but the king was clearly hurt. His retinue fell back to surround him and took several cloud blades to protect their king.

  Another shriek rang out from the king and then mana started spinning in the air. Synexus saw the attack coming and tried to warn the others, but it was too late. Magical thistles came into existence out of nowhere and each of the class chosen and Zuls’ bonded were pierced dozens of times. Luckily, they were much less powerful than the regular ones. Even still they each needed to back up and remove the darts before continuing.

  Synexus had evaded the attack due to his Mana Perception and pushed the king to give his allies a moment to recuperate. Using Body Transmutation he made most of his body lighter to increase his speed in order to close the distance. When he was only a few feet away, he used Progress Garden and Instant Growth to grow binding vines beneath each of the enemies. While they were distracted with the vines, he logged them into this collection skills and then used that to empower Progress. Ignoring their defenses he was able to take out the retinue singlehandedly before the king broke free of the vines.

  Now that the king was all alone, he dashed forward and jumped onto his back. He went to go strike the brain with Progress, but the king smacked him with his tail. Synexus hit the ground hard. He was barely able to get back up. His friends needed more time though and he was determined to give it to them. He rolled to dodge one of the claws of king before standing uneasily along the flank of the monster. Stumbling forward he used Enemy Transmutation and turned the thistles back into fur. Confusion and panic flooded the king’s face when he tried to hit Synexus and instead of a hard hit, he was met with fluff. Synexus took this moment of confusion as an opening and stabbed Progress into the beast. It wasn’t nearly enough to kill him, but it drew his attention once more which was just enough time for the tempest-powered cloud blade to cut straight through his neck.

  You have slain a Thistledart Squirrel King!

  The notification rang out in everyone’s head and there was a sigh of relief. They all stumbled back together and with Vorin’s healing buff from his achievement and Shell’s healing song, they were able to get back to top shape in about half an hour.

  Hours followed of them looting the battlefield. Most of the squirrels didn’t drop anything, but some had remnant magical thistles, claws, or hides laying around. It would be a good haul to sell in Goldhill or to put towards Synexus’ amulet. At the end of looting they met up at the sight of the king’s death to see what he dropped.

  King’s Acorn: This magical item sells for quite a bit and can be used in several alchemical mixtures. Carrying it will also keep thistledart squirrels away.

  With a vote, the class chosen decided to sell it in Goldhill. One person would also carry it at all times while walking through the forest to prevent another fight. After that was decided they took off at double the pace to create distance from the warzone they had created. There was a good chance it had alerted other predators to their position, and they didn’t want to be around when those predators showed up.

  As they darted off, Vorin turned to Kumo.

  “Did you have to cut down the giant tree?”

  Everyone laughed before she answered.

  “At the time it seemed like a good plan to take out a good portion of their numbers. I didn’t realize it would make that sort of impact.”

  “Well next time take a little more time to think about the consequences please. We are lucky it didn’t land on any of us.”

  “I’ll be more cautious going forward. Sorry, everyone…but hey it did work!”

  Everyone laughed again and Zuls added.

  “It was pretty awesome! You truly are a chaotic storm and a force to be reckoned with.”

  The conversation ended and they all picked up the pace towards their destination.