Revisiting the Swamp

Sven took a bite out of his gamey meat skewer, Ignis had prepared a camp fire with her magic and the two were resting after a long fought battle. The scaled creature that had attacked Elise didn't taste half that bad, at least that's what Sven told himself as he chewed. 'Could use some seasoning' was his only complaint. Ignis looked tired out, Sven felt bad for relying on her so much but until he got himself a primary class, he was mainly just bait for her AOE spells.

Ignis meanwhile propped herself up against a tree, stealing sly glances at Sven when he wasn't looking, she was amazed at his nimbleness and knowledge of monsters. No one else she'd ever known could weave in and out of combat so effectively, all the while putting your own life on the line. He did it so effortlessly sometimes that she forgot how incredible he was for doing it. It was like he knew everything, when where and how the monster would attack, where it would re-position itself, when he was free to attack back and so on. She thought he was incredible, so incredible that she had long since vowed to try her best to keep up with him.

"We've been out here for two days, there's no sign of that creature the quest giver gave a description of." Sven grumbled slightly as he finished his skewer, moving onto inspecting his new weapon. Using his transmutation hero skill he had combined his berserker blade with alligator hide and toad innards to create a +90 Slivian Blade. It had increased reach that he could make use of to actually fight the toads now, but what was more important was the unique passive: once an hour, the user can gain weak invisibility for 20 seconds.

The quest giver had come from the tree village, the problem was many merchants and travelers had been attacked while traveling the swamps main road. The discovery of this road probably would have earned him a glare from Elise if she were here, after having to wade through that filth she would have been pissed to find out there was a perfectly good road to travel to and from the swamps grounds - another difference from the game version of AxioM.

The corpses Elise had discovered weren't made by those alligators, rather the gators were using the scent of rotting meat to attract live pray that they would feast upon instead. The bite marks were too big for a gator, the **** of the bite alone had crushed bones clean in two, whatever had been feasting on those travelers was serious business and Sven had a good idea as to what it was.

"It's gotta be those gators we killed master, I don't know why we're still searching." Ignis finished by yawning, they had killed pack after pack of gators just to be sure but Sven still wasn't convinced. In truth, Sven had discovered the way (finally) to open his quest journal, and the quest he had received was stuck at 0% progression. Killing those gators wasn't the purpose of this quest, but was good experience in the meanwhile at the very least - that and the monsters hides sold for a good price in the tree village.

"Those bite marks weren't left by gators, whatever half-ate those people - I'm certain it's still out there." Sven picked himself up off the rotted log and doused the fire, Ignis protested with a groan at the fading warmth of the flames dissipating into the cold mid day air but picked herself up never the less.

"That man we saw when we first came here, do you remember him?" Sven asked as they walked down a worn travelers path, the dirt beneath them hardened by the countless feet that had traveled the same course as them right now, an oddity in such a damp and wet zone.

"The guy with the missing arm? Yeah he was running away from something." Ignis remembered the zoned look he had on his face even now, the tunnel vision he had as he fled clutching his recently departed arm.

"The bite mark on his arm were consistent to those we've found on other bodies, whatever attacked him is what we're looking for." Sven noticed a group of gators hiding away in some bushed up ahead, to the untrained eye all they would see is shrubbery and green leaves, but to the trained observer scales began to show through the leaves. Telling one type of green from another was just one way of telling. Deciding not to agro that group Sven took a detour off the main road a little to avoid conflict, Ignis was still tired and there was a lot of daylight hours still ahead of them.

"What if we found the guy and asked him to lead us to the monster?" Ignis inquired as she jumped on Sven's back, refusing to wade through the foulness of the swamp. Sven had gotten used to the added weight, it had almost become second nature to him now.

"If only we could, he ran towards Botany Fields and when we were at the Inn, I couldn't spot him among the regulars. Seems he's long gone, we're just gonna have to keep looking until we-" Sven stopped mid sentence as he felt a vibration run up his legs faintly at first, but soon enough the tremor in the ground could be felt even by Ignis, the ground shook beneath them followed by a tell tale sign or enemy contact - a shark like bulge in the watery ground formed suddenly and was heading right for them!

Quickly, Sven jumped back and diverted to the main path, making sure to clear away from the gators he had seen earlier. It would be better to fight on the road due to the movement speed penalty they faced in the swamps murkiness. Ignis hopped off his back and readied her staff, the bulge in the water was soon approaching, with its approach the creature had surfaced out of the water, causing heaps of mud and water to be catapulted into the air upon its arrival.

It was huge, a bulbous yellow worm with circular gnashing teeth rotating as it opened and closed - the thing was easily the size of a school bus back in Sven's world and was a ferocious sight to behold, its body expanded and retracted rapidly as he jutted itself towards the two hungrily.

"Devouring Lumbricus! It can taste your location so don't try to hide, try to aim fire balls at its mouth or tail, its midsection is highly resilient to all forms of damage!" Sven tutored on the go, dragging the creatures attention as he lead it down the road. The worm turned to follow him like he expected, exposing a reddened bulb on its tail to Ignis. Realizing this was her target, she shot a fireball that collided with the worms tail causing it to scream out a a fetid mist of its poisonous breath.

"Enchant my sword now!" Sven demanded quickly, Ignis wasted no time in casting her flame enchant onto his sword, donning his blade in a fierce surge of dancing warmth. The worm was about to turn to attack her when a fiery blade sliced off a portion of its jaw, screaming again Sven had to jump back to avoid the caustic fumes that would no doubt render him fleshless in his current state.

With its attention fully drawn back onto Sven, the creature extended its body forward in a suprisingly fast motion, reaching for its jaws to tear at Svens body. A bite like this would no doubt catch most people off guard, as it had done that armless man, but Sven knew the deal - barrel rolling to the side to avoid its lunge Sven found himself in the swamps waters, the creature bounded forward into the dirt path scraping against its surface from the **** of its forward momentum.

During this time a second fireball collided with the bulb, the creature had been in a foul mood before but now it was positively pissed.

"Hey you maggot minded piece of shit! Over here!" Sven taunted, while not being able to hear per se, it could still detect the vibrations of his voice, and so it mindlessly attacked whatever was closest to it that the creature perceived to be a threat. Barreling over to Sven once again the creature let out a carnivorous screech, sending clouds of gasses out either end of its saw like mouth.

The worm stopped in place suddenly and used its weight to reel its tail around for a vicious swipe, Sven timed his jump and escaped the blow by an arms length before counter attacking the bulb as it narrowly missed. The bulb popped open like an infected boil, spurting its foul essence across the swamp and covering Sven from head to toe. The puss burned his skin in ways he'd never experienced, but it wasn't something he was unprepared for, quickly he dove into the water to rid himself of the puss. Meanwhile, the creature had collapsed backwards in agony as it writhed, only antagonized more so by the additional fireball that exploded inside of its mouth, sending rotted razor-like teeth soaring through the air - along with chunks of yellow, stinking worm flesh.

The creature bellowed, a **** cry if ever Ignis had heard one, it began to wriggle its way towards her but was much slower, its tail being punctured had really affected the creatures ability to give chase. Sven picked himself out of the water and downed a health draft, the burning puss now rid from his body and the burn marks slowly healing away. The creature was on its **** bed, and it seemed to understand this as it screeched helplessly. Sven walked up to the creatures deflated bulb and readied his now extinguished blade.

"Fire!" Sven commanded, Ignis cast her fireball and the two attacks landed at the same time from both ends. As the worm died the gasses from inside of its body were expelled from both ends until finally it dissipated. When the gasses stopped, the creature suddenly began to fade out of existence, leaving behind a wooden chest in its place. This didn't shock Sven at all as this was just how it worked in AxioM, but Ignis was looked like she had just seen a ghost.

"M-m-master it-it's gone!" She couldn't believe it, usually such a corpse could be harvested for ingredients or materials but she'd never heard of a vanishing corpse! Opening the chest, Sven revealed a small array of items, first of all was scaled hide shield, seemed to have been made out of basilisk scales, a +40 defense shield from a level 20 area? That would definitely come in handy Sven thought as he strapped it to his left arm. Picking out the next item, it was a green ring that gave +5 to strength but came with the ability to push a target backwards in a gust of wind with a 20 second cooldown. Lastly, the remaining item was just a tooth, a tooth that belonged to the monster itself - no doubt a quest item to be used to confirm to the quest giver that they had indeed complete the quest.

Equipping his newly acquired gear Sven lead Ignis back to the tree village, explaining along the way what happens to a boss class monster when killed by a heroes party. Well, he made up a bunch of stuff or suited it to the best of his understanding at any rate. If boss monsters don't dissapear for regular people then are they NPC's still? 'They can't be NPC's, NPC's can't think on their own like Ignis can. It must just be because I'm a 'hero' or whatever these people call me.' Sven thought as the neared the tree village.