Eliona's War 1: Hesitant Healer

Chapter 20

The corridor had two more packs of marble dragons.

It went better than the first time. Severance figured out that if he placed Radiant Dome first, then its constant uptick helped buy him more time for Mend. He also started casting Mend as soon as anyone lost the slightest bit of health, because he was afraid of letting it drop too low. Especially when the marble dragons sometimes gave out that nasty red icon that made his healing lose half of its effectiveness.

When the last dragon of the corridor fell, Severance walked up to the group.

"Great work," Rasin gave him a warm smile. It made Severance stare awkwardly at his feet. He'd done okay, he thought, but he still felt incomparably weak compared to these people.

"Are we ready to move on?" Maun asked.

"Yeah, I'm good," Dhin flexed. The fact he was practically covered in his own blood from head to toe didn't seem to bother him. Rasin nodded his assent. All three of them looked over to Severance. He wordlessly gave a nod.

The rocky corridor swung sharply to the left before opening up into a wide room. This room was perfectly square and lined with pale gray marble walls.

Light beams shone down from the ceiling, brilliantly illuminating a single creature in the center of the room. This was the brightest room Severance had seen yet in this dungeon, and he had to squint to make out the monster. It wasn't a marble dragon.

It was much larger and skeletal, appearing to be all bone, skin, teeth and claws. If there was an award for the 'Most Hideous' of dungeon creatures, Severance was sure this would be a strong contender.

"It's a bone dragon," Rasin said, answering Severance's unsaid question. "You can see why we call it that."

Why yes, that was rather obvious. Severance nodded mutely, his eyes following its frame up and up until they settled on its powerful jaws. They had to be big enough to swallow a car. He swallowed, feeling very tiny and insignificant, and shuffled a little closer to Rasin.

The bony dragon shifted, its elongated head swiveling in their direction.

"Be careful here," Maun warned. "This one has some friends, so Dhin, Rasin - take care of them and keep them away from Sev."

"Got it," Dhin said. He gave Severance a wink before twirling his daggers deftly. It looked ridiculously cool, and for a second, Severance thought about trying to spin his staff in a similar manner. Then he decided against it.

No way I'd look remotely cool. I'd just look stupid.

Maun ran at the bone dragon, his daggers flashing in the light cast from the room's high ceiling. His charge was eerily silent, and only the faintest of footsteps came from Dhin and Rasin as they followed close behind.

They immediately took up positions near the dragon's rear, attacking furiously while Maun managed to keep its attention focused on himself. A safe distance away, Severance watched closely, his uninspiring tree branch out and ready.

Things went smoothly. Maun took little to no damage, and managed to put out enough damage that the bone dragon's focus never wavered from him. It was nothing short of incredible to Severance, whose jaw dropped at the insane display of skill.

The dragon's health dropped to half.

It lifted its bony maw toward the heavens and gave an ear piercing roar. Severance winced as the sound nearly burst his eardrums. He saw Maun shout something but was unable to hear any of it.

There was no time to worry over it though, because things started dropping from the ceiling. Dark skeletal lizards the size of cats fell like a mutant rain of death. Instead of going splat when they hit the marble floor, as one would expect from falling from that distance, these things landed on all fours with a bone jarring impact.