System Change

Chapter 332: Final Moves

As Derek and Avery continued trying to wear the boss down, Vanessas shadows seemed to be trying to force themselves into the beasts mouth, eyes, and ears. But, for some reason, the shadows just couldnt find their way insidethe usual weak spots on such a beast looked to be closed tight and highly defended. Even one of Averys drill arrows did nothing more than leave a small mark on the beasts eyelidone that nearly instantly disappeared.

On top of her shadows not being able to sneak inside the boss monster, they also appeared to be weaker than they were at the beginning of the fight. Eventually, Vanessa gave up on whatever she was trying, and her shadows receded and disappeared.

Derek looked around the battlefield for her, but she had been hidden well, and he didnt know where she was acting from. However, her shadows didnt make another appearance once they recededshe was most likely running low on mana or willpower, even though they hadnt been in battle long. Using the shadows to constrain the beast at the beginning, along with them being hit by Silvis dragon fire, had to have taken a toll on the woman.

On top of that, throwing everything she had at the enemy and nothing being effective was probably a mental blow to the former Vice Leader of the Assassins Guild. But Vanessa wasnt the only one whose attack seemed to be ineffective on the beast.

Derek had barely seen Lyra doing anything during the fight. He realized why when the amphithere dove down and hovered directly in front of the meditating beast. The winged serpent stared daggers at the beast, but nothing happened. It looked as though her mind blasts and other mental attacks were having no success against the summoned beast.

Finally, Lyra turned her massive head, and Derek saw into her eyes. Averys companion looked exhausted. He wondered how much her attacks had actually done to the boss monster. It was possible that it was her mental attacks that kept the beast from unleashing its full power. Derek nodded at Lyrashe was trying her very best.

Derek and Avery continued their close-range fighting for a little longer. They were doing everything in their power to out damage the beasts healing. Lyra pitched in with her mind attacks, but at best, it was helping Derek interrupt the bosss regeneration through Meditationat worst, the beasts mind was shielded and it wasnt doing anything to harm it, and Lyra was exhausting herself for nothing.

Suddenly, Derek felt before he saw almost all the darkness above him disappear, causing him to heave a sigh of relief. If the skill was finally broken, it meant that their attacks were working. However, when he turned his head to glance up, instead of only seeing the clear blue sky that he expected, he saw a black sphere the size of a giant beach ball with bright, glittering white lights rotating inside.

At that point, he realized that the beast hadnt been losing control of its skillit was condensing it. Wide-eyed, Derek watched as the sphere began to rotate one way faster and faster, while the condensed stars inside the sphere spun the opposite.

The surrounding space close to the sphere began to warp and split and a light gravitational pull began to form on the outside of it. The faster the sphere and stars rotated, the stronger the pull, and the more distorted the surrounding space became.

At first, Derek wasnt overly worried about the sphere. It was far away, and didnt move. However, once the rotations reached a certain speed, the sphere began to move. Though slow for now, with the amount of spatial distortion caused by the sphere, if it happened to get close to anyone in the party, that person wouldnt last a second before Im not sure what would happen if someone was caught up inside a spatial distortion.

As he was staring down at the boss monster and running through the options in his head, he noticed the look in the Starfury Leonaruss eyes change. Gone was both the toying look of a predator playing with its food and the anger once it realized that its prey could fight back. Instead, if Derek had to describe what he was seeing Is is that fear? Is it scared of something? For some reason, the beast looked afraid.

But why? Weve thrown everything we have at it, and it still standing. No, its doing even better than that. The beast had basically outlasted them, and Derek was even thinking about a way to retreat.

But as he was thinking, the dread that had washed over Derek for some time now instantly vanished. Not only that, but moments later, he noticed that Absolute Nullify was even beginning to overpower the beasts sphere. Confused, he turned his attention back on his skill, but as he did, the boss monster roared louder than ever before.

Dereks eyes quickly shot back to the beast, and he looked on as it madly broke itself out of the ground and shot into the air with enough force to crumble the earth beneath. From there, it shot back to the ground and crashed into it with a heavy thud.

On the ground, in a crater of its own making, the beast rolled and thrashed about. Spatial arcs formed and shot out in all directions, destroying the surroundings even more. The power unleashed by the beast was devastating, and the entire area was beginning to resemble a wasteland.

Finally, the beast paused and fell to its back. Derek watched in awe as the beasts razor-like silver claws clutched at and dug into its own chest. Blood and goremore than Avery had been able to cause the entire time with his daggersshot out from the boss because of its own attack. Whatever it was doing wasnt enough.

The Starfury Leonarus slowly rolled over, its chest dripping blood, and limped up with its three remaining legs and paws. It tilted its head into the air and its chest began to expandgrowing bigger and bigger, like a giant balloon. Derek tensed in anticipation of the roar that he knew was coming. But when the beast opened its maw, a torrent of flame was released into the air.

Even after a minute, the flame continued to pour out of its mouth and into the sky. The beasts legs were shaky, and it looked like it was taking everything it had just to stay upright and release the flames. Finally, its three remaining legs couldnt take it anymore, and the beast fell to the ground face first. The pressure from the flame continued, but without its open mouth to release it, small amounts of smoke and fire seeped out while its body expanded again.

Attack it! Silvis weak voice chimed in Dereks head.

Without questions, Derek summoned Harbinger and shifted directly above the beast. He allowed Absolute Nullify to blink out, but the other skill had already lessened so much that he was no longer worried about it. His Multi-Strike still had a short cooldown left, but Sweeping Strike was ready to go. So, with as much void energy he could channel into his glaive, he reared back and just as he was about to launch the attack; he was met with a notification that stopped him in his tracks.

Congratulations! You have slain the Starfury Leonarus