Echoterra: Rise of the Verdant King

The basin woke like a struck hive, and then… all hell broke loose!

WHOOSH!

Veyra's arrow cut the Thorn Crown Behemorph's cheek, and that was the one signal that set in motion the stampede.

The Thorn Crown Behemorph hissed, its Verdant Warden powers flaring in rage as it whipped its head in their direction.

It slammed a forelimb into the ground, and bones jumped even as dust flew.

BOOM!

The sound rolled across the bowl like a drumbeat.

Torren touched his hidden seam, and the rib wall buckled and fell behind him in a roar as a rain of plates and old bark smashed down between the Verdant Warden Rank Behemorph and its meat.

It shrieked and charged through the mess, furious and blind with pride.

The rival Verdant Warden Behemorph didn't understand the Thorn Crown's reasons though. It took offense, and Clayton's plan clicked into place.

As soon as the Thorn Crown charged, it took it as a provocation and reacted, surging in from the left, its thorns bristling and crown flaring in challenge.

It arrived before the Thorn Crown could react, slamming shoulder to shoulder against its side as its razor-sharp claws raked through the side of the Thorn Crown, cracking vines as sap sprayed like emerald rain.

Taking advantage of the chaos as his signal, Kaelin rattled the scavenger packs as this happened, and then… they burst from their holes in a tide of chitter and teeth, racing for the fight.

Click! Click! Click!

One of them was not intimidating, but the sight of all of them charging out could make the most valiant of Behemorphs stop in their tracks.

It was while they fought and the second Behemorph gradually got the advantage over the Thorn Crown when Harrick threw a hook and caught its leg, yanking it with all his power.

The Verdant Warden Behemorph stumbled and crashed into its rival, the Thorn Crown, biting at the wrong throat.

And instantly, its advantage was gone, bringing the epic clash back level.

Clayton felt the rhythm change, and he raised his hand.

"Now!" He roared.

They finally broke cover and moved along the basin's rim, silent and quick with no wasted steps as they went on the run.

As they ran, Veyra loosed a second arrow high and wide.

It whistled like a bullet and pricked the flank of the Thorn Crown Behemorph. The already raging Verdant Warden disaster snapped at the air in deafening thunderclaps as it spun and struck its rival in the jaw.

From there, the fight went hot and ugly.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

While the fight raged, in the distance, the Prime's footfalls rolled in from the far ridge, at first in a slow and heavy, but then faster, and faster still.

The ground learned a new beat as it move.

The scavenger tide felt the aura of the new intruder first as horrified, they fled. But by the time the two battling Verdant Warden Behemorphs realized, it was already too late as they froze, then they faced the sound, stunned.

The Prime hit the basin like a landslide.

KABOOM!

It was a tower of fused plates and living root. Its head wore a crown of broken blades, and its chest glowed dull like banked coals.

It did not howl, neither did it not posture. Instead, it walked forward and decided what lived.

It chose violence.

One strike… BAM!

The Thorn Crown Warden flew and broke a staircase of ribs. The other tried to flank, but the Prime swatted it like a fly.

Within just a few seconds, the basin became filled with the sound of torn wood and crushed iron as the Prime bent and fed.

"Eyes front!" Clayton snarled at his comrades, his heart pounding heavily in his chest as he ran. "We leave the gods to their feast".

He seemed calm but inside, his heart was racing.

Badump! Badump!

His anxiety was acting up as different thoughts filled his mind.

'What if the Prime suddenly turns around and notice us? What if it doesn't like its current food and decides to hunt us?'

'If it decides to pursue, can we outrun it?'

'And if we can't, can we fight it?'

His head was overheating from all the thoughts in it.

But before he knew it, they slid behind a fold in the ground and climbed the outer slope. From here, the temple looked bigger now.

It stared over the battlefield like a wounded eye. The shimmer inside its ring pulsed in a slow, steady, and sure rhythm.

"Tier three," Soren said under his breath. "The basin is cleared."

"Don't jinx it," Kaelin murmured, anxious.

From there, they cut across a narrow saddle between two dead trunks.

The line gave them height and a view of the ringed fourth tier. The air there felt thinner and the ground rose in waves. Shapes moved at the edge of sight as predators watched predators and decided if it was worth the effort to fight.

Here was even more dangerous than where they just passed. They knew it from Clayton's plan, but seeing it with their own eyes was a different thing altogether as their heartbeat accelerated even more with adrenaline.

Clayton reached for the next Seedpike, then the ground boomed.

"Down!" Torren barked.

They dropped behind a low slab just in time as a shadow crossed the saddle and kept going. It was not the Prime from the basin. This was bigger; its stride was smooth, and the sheer weight of it made the slab hum.

Veyra's face tightened. "Another Prime".

"This wasn't in your loop," Kaelin said. There was no blame in his tone, just a fact that Clayton needed to adjust his plan around.

They kept still and waited in absolute silence.

The shadow slowed, then it turned.

BA-DUMP!

Clayton felt the stare like a hand on his neck. It had not seen them, not yet, but it was close. Besides, this big guy did not trust the empty saddle. It wanted to test the quiet to make sure it was truly empty.

"It will sweep this ridge," Harrick said, his voice rushed and anxious.

Soren pushed up on his knuckles. "Then we run."

"Not all of us," Kaelin said. "If it sees the group, it will commit."

"We're splitting?" Mira's voice stayed steady, but her fingers dug into her satchel in anxiety.

"Just a short split," Clayton said fast. "Kaelin, Harrick, peel to the right. Make it bored and cut its eyes away from us while we keep moving".

"Meet us at the temple stairs."

They didn't question his decision.

"Copy," Kaelin said.

Harrick cracked his broken spear in two again, the loop ready. "Copy."

"Do not fight it," Clayton said. "You'll die a meaningless death if you do. Instead, show it the shadows, show it noise, then vanish".

"You can do that right?" Clayton looked at them.

Kaelin grinned like a man who loved bad plans. "I'm good at vanishing."

And then, they broke.

The group slid right, using the slab line to cover the move even as Kaelin and Harrick slipped left and vanished into ribs and cables.

Immediately after they moved, the shadow reacted as it shifted. It tracked left without hesitation; it had chosen its test.

"Go!" Clayton said.

The rest of the cohort ran doubled over along the ridge, then dropped into a low gulley and crept.

The sound of the second Prime rolled behind them as it moved after Kaelin and Harrick, letting out the sound of metal groans, ground-bass thumps, and a low steam hiss like an animal's breath.

Twice a flash of white heat lit the ribs, and twice Kaelin's soft laugh came back like a ghost as he proved his balls of steel once again, taunting a Prime Synchron Rank Behemorph.

Very few Awakened or humans in existence could boast of ever doing a crazy feat like that.

The Prime barely focused on him when a thrown haft clacked off a plate and led the giant the wrong way… Harric.

On the other side…

"Don't look back," Torren muttered as he ran.

They didn't and soon, the last rise fell away.

The temple steps were cut into a ring of black stone, half buried on the soil and half broken. Each tread was wide, and each riser was tall.

Vines had grown, petrified into stone, and cracked at some point. The arch was a perfect circle, cracked at the crown and held by nothing more than stubborn memory. Inside the arch, green light turned like slow water.

As soon as they arrived, Clayton's chest eased in relief as for the first time, he tasted home in the air.

"Almost there," Mira muttered while breathing raggedly.

But then, the steps shuddered and something hauled itself up from the right, out of sight, then over the edge.

It hit stone hard and stood.

It was another Behemorph… a Verdant Warden!

It was crowned and absolutely gigantic, as tall as a house. It wore plates, but not built ones. They had grown from its bark like scarred scabs; gray mycelium crawled under the plates and puffed fine dust with each breath.

Veyra's mouth thinned. "Hybrid".

"Thorn and Spore," Torren said as he got ready for battle. "Ugly pair".