Yemi cast his curses. Pulling down stone columns, the Devourer of Flesh spat out a long stream of sticky protoplasm that covered me like spit on a bug and began to slowly pull me back toward the monstrous snail’s open maw\ The jellylike substance was far more acidic even than the rain. My bones blackened, thinned; I could survive it, but I had no idea how to escape. The boss seemed to just absorb damage from Reflection. The pulling jelly had no health bar.
I took a risk and fired off Plague Fury, and the plague energy just passed through the substance as if through air. The group survived thanks to Francesca’s buff and started to desperately gulp down health potions.
Sleeping Vindication stirred the protoplasm, blowing it up from inside like bubble gum. That was my chance. I jumped to the stretched-out edge and tore through it with Hammerfist, but before I could climb out, the energy of Sleeping Vindication vented as if from a burst balloon and flew into the sky in an invisible stream, breaking through the clouds for an instant. The toxic and spring} mass enveloped me once more.
Trying not to panic, I used all the offensive abilities I had: Ghastly
Howl made no sound, Lethargy and Liberation did nothing… The monster was crawling away, and soon the others might be out of combat, which meant they’d lose the experience and achievement.
I watched through the semitransparent mass as Yemi threw a bunch of strange threads into the creature’s back, sticking to its shell, but the Devourer of Flesh just sped up and tore them without even noticing.
The mages fired a series of spells at the protoplasm. Its surface rippled, but that was all. The monster was protected from all magic, even divine magic.
This could happen only in Dis—even enveloped in goo and unable to lift a finger, Harnmerfist, driven by the game mechanics, struck and broke a hole in the jelly. The snail creature got worried, started pulling faster. I worked both arms with Hammerfists and ordinary hits, tearing flesh, but the holes quickly healed up.
The boys released the needlers, who ran out into the rain and had time to fire one larva each into the boss before they fell to the acid droplets. A second later, the Pai’asites Inside debuff dropped off—the larvae didn’t survive.
Yemi threw a magically compressed ball of stone at the boss, but it just smashed uselessly against the shell like a clod of earth. Crawler fired a powerful burning beam, trying to cut the slime connecting me to the boss, succeeding only to burn a breach that closed just as fast as it opened. Francesca ran to the very edge of the safe zone and caught the snail creature in a box of multilayer forcefields, but the monster broke through the barrier as if it was paper. One of Yemi’s dolls latched onto one of the boss’s antennae and immediately dissolved like a chunk of plastic on red-hot iron.
In the meantime, I kept wriggling, trying to pierce through the protoplasmic tendril, nearly at the snails mouth. The boss stopped and opened its shell again, firing off a dozen stalks with eyes, each of which stared at one of my allies. I had no fear for my friends—they could leave through Depths Teleportation if things went south.
The pool of bubbling liquid within the boss showed through its skin up close. I saw orange veins in the stomach walls, streams of steam from mysterious openings, undigested pieces of barakata shells. Even after two Ravagers and the Nucleus, I didn’t like the look of this. My Balancer was still on cooldown and the Thunderbearer trident with its ten million damage would be like a toothpick against an elephant.
The protoplasm pulled me up, the pot-like stomach opened up and I was thrown inside. In the same instant, I saw the beast’s health bar of three hundred million, and fired off everything I could: Destroying Plague Immortality, Sleeping Vindication and Combo. My bones, reinforced with the power of the Nucleus, thinned before my eyes. My Hanunerfists began to look less and less like a combination of closed fingers.
My plague reservoir and vindication bars filled up instantly, so from outside it must have looked like I was flashing with constant explosions. I watched with frenzied hope as the snail’s health fell, slowly but surely. When it reached the red zone, three explosions were enough for the boss to die. It exploded, spraying out concentrated acid and scraps of crystallized flesh. I fell to the smoking ground.
My sense of time had disappeared in the creature’s stomach, but the timer showed that I’d killed the dalezma in less than half a minute. Unable even to stand up, I just lay there and stared into the sky with my empty eye sockets. Triumphant cries rang out from afar, but with my arms and legs dissolved, all I could do was lie and await my recovery.
Devourer of Flesh, Giant Dalezma, dead.
Experience: +116.3 bil
Experience at current level (579): 281.69 bil I 733.46 bil
You got Dalezma Egg.
Dalezma Egg.
Legendary fi’ee pet.
The dalezma are a species of solitoids that are immune to magic. Even the most dangerous monsters of Terrastera fear their extreme toxicity and acid flesh.
Attention! This type of pet belongs to the fi’ee category: it must be bound to a specific area.
To hatching: 0/1,000,000 experience.
Next I looked at the achievement reward and felt a little disappointed. We’d gotten Depths Teleportation for killing Murkiss in the sandbox (not without the Sleepers’ help, I think), but here…
Unlocked achievement First Kill: Devourer of Flesh, Giant Dalezma!
You are the first in the world to kill the local boss Devourer of Flesh, Giant Dalezma! The Devourer of Flesh is an ancient dalezma of the solitoid genus. For centuries, it
