NOVEL NEXT Chapter 59 - The conclusion
After the laser is deflected, everything is suddenly quiet for a few moments that seem to stretch on forever. Then Siegfried collapses, the Skill having taken a toll upon his reserves to activate.
He will be fine with sufficient rest, but he is out of the fight for the moment, and it is not over yet.
But seeing that display has invigorated our allies as they suddenly fight like men, women and monsters possessed, while it evidently shattered our opponents morale. And so it is swiftly that the injured skeleton is brought low and the last remaining one is overwhelmed with numbers and destroyed as well.
Though the rest of the invaders fight well and none of our allies get off without a little mark to remember them by, no one dies as the cultists are dispatched one by one.
When it comes around to only the two necromancers being alive, rather than fight the two nod at each other and their bodies fall to the floor limply like dolls with their strings cut. Meanwhile, I can feel a rush of power through my halls, towards the sole remaining invader… their leader. He is tired, exhausted even, but as the energy reaches him, it somehow makes him look… worse.
His face which is smeared with blood from his nose downwards sags, the eyesockets going hollow as his eyes are consumed in a flash of green flame.
He opens his mouth to speak, and the voice that emerges sounds… dry and empty, but with an ominous echo.
“So they have all been done in… very well. Before rushing to our masters' side to be granted bodies anew, let me show you the courtesy of going all out, child of the parasite, if even for a little bit.”
Then he, too, falls over, his form consumed in a ball of greenish fire.
There is a rush of power and a feeling of dread begins to mount as the flame slowly drifts towards the fearsome golem. I do not want to see what that does, that thing is terrifying enough as is, thank you very much.
Larissa seems to think the same as she suddenly abandons caution and goes for the creature in a mad dash. Its mostly featureless head follows her movement, the entire creature going still, poised to strike at any second.
Larissa reaches it before the ball of flame, by a few seconds. The creature strikes as soon as she is within reach, its powerful arm swinging wide in a sweeping arc, intending on crushing the rogue’s arm and potentially torso.
She seems to slip on something, however, going into a tumble on the floor and narrowly avoiding the blow that carves a small crater into my flooring. Only belatedly do I realize this was not by chance but intentional, as she springs up and jumps at the creature's chest where the glowing x-mark she left upon it at the beginning of the fight still flickers with golden light.
Bringing only one of her daggers to bear, the other discarded to the floor, and gripping it firmly with both hands, she thrusts upwards with all of her strength, impaling the blade squarely in the center of the x.
For a moment, nothing happens, the creature barely reacting to the foreign piece of metal embedded in its chest, but then, just as the flames would reach it, the mark pulses with power and a spray of blood and viscera emerges from the creatures back as the creatures torso is pierced by energy in the shape of an x that emerges out of its backside.
More importantly, there is a cracking noise from within its torso, and the energy animating its body begins seeping out into its surroundings. The flame reaches the motionless beast, absorbed into it, but I can see it immediately joining the rest of the energy inside the creature in dissipating into the surroundings.
The heaps of flesh making up the creature begin to lose cohesion, and it falls to the floor around where Larissa stands, her hands still hefting up the dagger that the flesh is sloughing off of. Impaled upon it, it becomes clear, is a beautiful round orb of obsidian, cracked and splintered. With the creature’s body no longer holding it in shape, the orb shatters around the dagger, breaking into two equal parts and falling to the floor with a clutter, but not breaking apart any further.
“I hate fighting Golems.” the woman that is drenched in blood and rapidly dissipating fleshy bits declares solemnly.