Those stray observations ran through my mind as I summoned Josiah’s Storm while simultaneously switching back to my underwater breathing ability. Changing aspects only took a mere second and nothing more. I could freely switch between the extra strength and the water breathing at will.
But would my bow work underwater? I could not afford to leap out of the water and snap off a shot, for the darkness would consume me instantly. I guess I would have to try. I placed my arrow in the bow and aimed at the L’Gara across from me, its yellow eyes glowing defiantly as it recoiled in pain. It seemed to know better than to try and grab me now. Behind me, I could hear as the other beast was munching and crunching on my leg. Somehow…that sound didn’t make me sick at all. If anything, I looked at the noise as a positive sign. Maybe my leg’s toughness made it harder for the beast to chew, giving me more precious time.
I fired the first arrow, hoping against hope that it would work. Sure enough, the arrow struck true, flying at full speed.
Your Unmoving Arrows ability works against water as well as wind, Josiah’s Storm remarked. It seemed just as surprised as I was. The arrow nailed the L’Gara right in the eye, causing the beast to shriek out in pain once more, blood streaming from its big eye. Tentacles came whipping at me, blindly attempting to grab ahold, but I fired shot after shot, forcing the attacks to retreat.
I chuckled as I fired another shot into the creature’s other eye, blinding it for good. The wound to its larger tentacle, mixed with the wounds to its eyes were clearly lethal. And this beast lacked the regeneration abilities of its predecessor. My snickering was cut short, however, as suddenly the world began to spin around me. I coughed and tried to catch myself, forgetting that I was underwater. My health dropped another 10 points. Glancing down at my leg, I could see that it was bleeding profusely. My regeneration had not kicked in yet. Normally, it would start sealing up the wound almost immediately. Had…had I somehow lost the ability to regenerate?
There wasn’t a lot of time for me to answer that question. The blinded beast was down, but certainly not out. It had taken to lunging forward, propelling itself with its large limbs scraping across the bottom of the lake. Its mouth was wide open, hoping to seize hold of me. I swam down as hard as I could, narrowly avoiding the attack as the enormous body sailed over me. Kicking with my legs was more or less useless, but I was able to make up the difference with my arms alone.
As the great beast crashed over me, unable to grab me with its enormous mouth, I fired shot after shot at its crescent-shaped bottom. These shots went in quite easily, revealing another weakness of the creature. Its undercarriage was quite soft compared to the rest of its skin. My arrows punctured its flesh easily enough, killing it within a matter of seconds.
I floated beneath the massive creature, watching as it ceased moving and simply began to drift upwards, towards the top of the water. Immediately, another set of tentacles lunged forward and snatched the deceased L’Gara, pulling it towards its open mouth. Apparently these L’Gara had no bones about cannibalism.
I could have used this distraction as a means of escape, I suppose. But I had just lost a leg (hopefully not permanently) in pursuit of these precious aspect points. I wasn’t about to just give up now.
Sinking down to the bottom of the water, I pulled my scarf off my neck and quickly made a tourniquet, stopping the bleeding on my stump. Thankfully, I had quite a history of handling sudden amputations and was able to get the blood flow under control.
Once my health was sitting at a stable-ish 35%, I grabbed hold of the rocks at the bottom. It would be easier to climb across the lake than to try and swim without exerting my legs. I was afraid that more movement would cause the wound to begin bleeding even harder. And while hitting 25% of my health would trigger the Blood Rage ability, it still meant I’d be pretty banged up. The last thing I needed was an extended recovery time when this was all over.
The remaining L’Gara crunched away happily on the body of its former ally, almost completely forgetting about me. All it could do was compulsively chew, almost as if it had no other choice than to eat. In a way, I pitied such a stupid creature for making such a poor decision. But then again, I had happily walked into an ambush in the hopes of gaining some easy aspect points.
I took aim at the creature, but Josiah’s Storm was quick to warn me. That beast seems bigger. Are you healthy enough for this? It asked. I held my fire for a moment and looked at this L’Gara. Indeed, it was a shade darker than the other one I had just killed, bigger and nastier-looking too. Was it a good idea to pick a fight with such low health? Or should I just harvest and run? Doing so would give up a lot of useful crafting material for our fight against the Shadow Titan later…but getting myself killed would certainly doom the village back home. Trig was a fine fighter, but he didn’t have my level of Bloodpoints. He couldn’t take down the Shadow Titan alone.
Cursing the wisdom of my bow, I decided to make the sensible decision, in spite of my desire to get as many aspect points as I could. I carefully swam up to one of the long, pale appendages of the deceased L’Gara and cut into the bone, carefully performing
