Chrysalis

At this point, I’m not sure how I manage to still be shocked at the effect of the empowered Void Chomp. The fact that it all happens right in front of my face is a little unnerving, and I’m not ashamed to say I’m still not used to it.

Nevertheless, the screaming void appears, my jaws close with a shattering, calamitous sound. Black jaws of pure energy form, crashing down a dozen metres from the front of my face. The orb… seems unimpressed.

The entire cloud evaporates, the lightning cloud too, only to reform twenty metres away, still crackling with dark purple light.

Well, that was a little disappointing. I’m not convinced that my opponent took no damage, surely it hurt them, even if only a little bit, but it certainly didn’t have the effect I’d been hoping for. Broken chunks of rock fall from the roof as the tunnel groans under the effect of the void chomp.

After reforming, the enemy bathes me once again in its lightning. I don’t enjoy it.

The magic attack comes so fast, even my absurdly enhanced reflexes can’t do much to get me out of the way, and once I get hit, the energy ripples through my body, sizzling me, inside and out. With the healing fluid still bubbling through my system, my health starts to recover quickly after the lightning has burnt through my system. Thanks to the bountiful number of ants nearby, my regeneration gland is already almost full, so I trigger it again immediately.

Man, this fight is really exposing just how weak my defences against magic-based attacks are. I’ve been fighting them so far by using my mind to break down the mana, but this monster just has such a weird mana signature.

Nevertheless, I commit my minds and reach out, trying to take hold of my opponent and break down their energy. It’s immensely difficult. I feel like I’m trying to take hold of a fish coated in butter inside an ocean of maple syrup. When I do manage to get a ‘finger’ on the lousy thing, trying to draw out any of the power is like ripping a mountain up by the roots.

[Surrender to me. Your efforts are in vain.]

the attitude on

How long can you afford to sit around here failing

be able to heal yourself

It seems to believe it's done this dance before and will triumph eventually. I’ve got bad news for this monster, I can

time, I inject gravity

and reforms, but this time, it looks a little unbalanced, a little more… chaotic. The lightning contained within the azure clouds sparks and spins with increased agitation, leading me to believe

bathing me in the crackling energy for a good five seconds. When it fades, I’m steaming, quite literally, but the damage is already healing. I didn’t even bother trying to dodge this time, instead I preemptively

just… weird. This monster is dumping so much energy, so fast, it’s almost as if it isn’t playing by the rules. How in the heck can it do it? There must be some sort of Skill or organ involved. To unleash the amount of mana this thing is cooking me with, I would need a significant amount of time, and the build up of energy isn’t exactly difficult to detect. My opponent is just throwing a bucket full of water in my face, but I

they can’t seem to do is move all that fast. Or perhaps it just doesn’t feel the need to? Regardless, an empowered dash puts me right in front of

pollute me!] the agitated ball of lightning roars.

First of all, gravity mana is amazing. Second of all, keep my

reply, but roils even more violently, blasting me once again with lightning, which I endure. I’m starting to suspect this monster isn’t as evolved as I first thought, or is running underpowered for some reason. Perhaps it didn’t move through the fifth completely unscathed and has lost a great deal of its power? Considering I’m not even deflecting these lighting blasts, simply healing through them, I really shouldn’t be sitting pretty as I

hurts like heck, but I’m in no danger of dying any

like gravitational mana after

spell, I unleash a gravity well, empowered with the full force of the Altar behind it, directly on top of the

that it would be smashed to smithereens on the floor of the tunnel, crushed under the weight of the well. What actually happens is that it sinks down, fairly rapidly, and is then pressed into the ground,