Zelda and Titus’ health bars flashed rapidly as stacks of area-of-effect damage assaulted them.
I’ll help them in a minute. Gotta finish this up first. Kaiden turned his full attention back to the ramrunner. It thrashed and stomped, swinging its massive head and the horns attached to it, but Kaiden was too fast with Onslaught Mode active. He danced and ducked around the beast’s now slow-motion attacks, all the while lashing back with hammer strikes that each dished out large chunks of damage.
The ramrunner’s health dropped into the red in the face of the barrage. The big beast cried out, then spun to retreat.
Ability: Hammer Toss
Kaiden’s attack caught it in the back and drained what remained of its health.
Ramrunner assisted kill - 2,000 EXP gained!
The beast’s feet went out from under it and it slammed to the ground, shaking the earth and nearby trees.
“Nice one,” Thorne said, slapping him on the shoulder. “I hit level forty off that. Check this ability when you get a chance.” She sent a screenshot to him but Kaiden didn’t have time look at it.
“We should probably do something about that,” he said, nodding toward the still-burning toxic cloud with Titus and Zelda trapped inside it. The hominoids had dropped out of the trees and surrounded it. Wherever Zelda and Titus moved to escape the inferno the hominoids cut them off, stacking up en masse and hurling more seed pods in to stoke the flames.
One of the bolder hominoids jumped right through the flames to attack Titus. The big man rammed into it, leading with his shield. His opponent was on fire, its fur aflame, but the shield kept it from burning Titus – up until the hominoid wrapped its arms around the edges of the shield and grabbed Titus in a sort of bear hug. The flames on its fur licked at his armor and Kaiden saw the big man’s health tick down at an increased pace.
“My shield’s building charge from the fire damage in front of me, but it’s not blocking the damage coming in from the sides,” Titus said through comms, sounding lost in thought for a moment, perhaps considering if the tradeoff was worthwhile.
“Forget about charge! Worry about your health,” Zelda shouted, then blasted the hominoid off of Titus with an Improved Burst Arrow. She fired an Improved Scatter Shot next that caught several of the other hominoids, but only one died. The rest stood firm, daring her to try and push toward them.
Time wasn’t on her side, though. Her health was down to fifty-three percent and dropping by the second. Titus was beside her at fifty-eight percent himself.
“We have to get them out of there!” Kaiden shouted.
“Ooh, actually, this is perfect,” Thorne said and strode toward the chaos.
“How is this perfect?” Kaiden shook his head. “Never mind. Just focus on the hominoids. If we can make a hole in their formation Zelda and Titus will be able to get out of the fire.”
“I’ve got this,” Thorne said.
Ability: Earth Shatter
She leapt into the air…
… straight into the cloud of flame. Kaiden felt his brow furrow as he watched. She landed with an explosive boom and a shockwave that swept out and stunned several of the nearby hominoids.
“Great, now there’s three of us trapped in here,” Zelda said.
Thorne smirked.
“On the contrary…”
Ability: Improved Instigated Fury
The fervor of battle sweeps over you. For the next 8 seconds, each time you take damage, your base attack increases by 15%.
Cost: 20 charge.
Cooldown: 1 minute.
Kaiden’s visor showed him the specifics as she activated her ability.
Inside the toxic, flaming cloud, Thorne was taking constant damage. Enough to kill her if she stayed long enough, but from the looks of things, she wasn’t going to be there very long. With every second she took area-of-effect damage from the cloud, her base attack power increased by fifteen percent.
She charged the nearest hominoid. Its companions rushed to its side, but that only seemed to embolden Thorne. She brought her hammer down on it and drained a good third of its health.
The flaming cloud continued to chip away at her health bar as the hominoids attacked, howling as they flung themselves at her and struck with arms thick as Kaiden’s thighs.
Thorne’s health bar flashed constantly, but all of that damage converted right back into increased attack power. She swung her hammer relentlessly, giving as good as she got.
Hominoid assisted kill – 1,500 EXP gained!
And then giving better than she got.
Hominoid assisted kill – 1,500 EXP gained!
Hominoid assisted kill – 1,500 EXP gained!
And finally, giving so much the hominoids started to panic. Every swing of her hammer dropped her target to half health or less. And that was just with basic attacks. When Thorne used Hammer Sweep, a simple area-of-effect ability that damaged all targets in front of her within five feet, three hominoids dropped dead. Experience poured in from all of the assisted kills and Kaiden smiled as another notification joined the rush.
Level 38 achieved!
Max health and stamina increased
+3 stat points
Those that remained of the hominoids shrieked, then panicked. With arms flailing and eyes wide, they turned and ran. Thorne used Heroic Leap and landed on one of the fleeing enemies. It died instantly.
Her health was down to thirty-five percent, but it hardly mattered. The fight was over. The few surviving hominoids disappeared into the jungle and Zelda and Titus hurried from the inferno.
“Holy crap,” Kaiden said, unable to stop himself from laughing at what he’d just seen. “That’s... an inventive way to use that ability. But I can’t knock it. Talk about stacking damage!”
“That. Was. Awesome!” Titus slapped Thorne so hard on the back that she stumbled forward. When she turned, he already had both hands in the air for a double high five. “I mean, we totally had things under control, but still. That was sick!”
She smirked as she gave him a firm high five, then flicked her
