The Territory Boss Pt4

"More petty tricks?" Lich Lord Trollbone's voice inquires from somewhere within my head with clacking cackling for emphasis. "Have you not figured it out, yet? You are nothing before me!"

I did not bother answering but instead used Quick Step to blur right up to him and into a 360 Geist. His sword was their as soon as the skill was cast, blocking my giant sword that pushed both his weapon and body aside a split second before an eruption of Geists suddenly flew out from his own sword and across his body.

Since he could 'fly' and was giant, the knockback from the blocked attack only pushed him a few yards away but I was one him in an instant all over again with a Slash Geist. The Slash was blocked but the single large Geist struck with full force after passing through our weapons. He was pushed back more than five yards this time but only lost as many percents from his intimidating health bar.

"Oh? You're a little faster than before," he voice almost seems to praise me in my thoughts as I close the distance once again. However, instead of following through with the slashing of my raised sword I channel Force Strike into my leg and hop up to kick almost straight up into the underside of his exposed sternum. The knockback from this attack was enough to shove him up and back another handful of yards.

Using another Quick Step to launch myself up into the air, I readily throw myself into a Flying Guillotine that only connects with Trollbone's even larger crystalline blade. However, at the exact moment of contact, I cast a Spirit Slash that passed straight through their weapon and body to force them back down toward the ground. Still, his health was constantly refilling every second so these small damage attacks were being negated one at a time in between attacks.

Spreading and flapping my recovered wings, I almost manage to Flash down across the short distance between us where we once again clash swords. "No more witty banter?" Trollbone asks before adjusting his position with a slight turn to parry our clash so that my sword slides down the angle at which he now held his blade. "You must have finally gotten serious!"

Landing in a low crouch, I narrowly avoid taking a swing from the lich lord's sword to the neck and wait for the countering attack to pass by before leaping up behind the arc of his sword. Just as I was slashing my sword up and around in a backhanded swing, though, Trollbone simply scooted back in the air to dodge just out of reach. He even clacked his teeth in laughter.

"Survive this!" His voice declares in my mind as he closed the distance once again, lashing out with his own sword in a simple chop. That simple chop carried with it the weight of a mountain, forcing me to step back and to the side away from his blade. And right into a sweeping roundhouse kick that connected with my lower ribs from under my dominant sword arm.

Renewing my defenses after being thrown through the air, I just manage to grow back all of my plates and scales when Trollbone seems to materialize from the air itself in the spot where I was landing. I had originally thought that I would have a second to recover thanks to the boss's overbearing pride, but now it seemed like he was also taking me serious. Before I even touched the ground the lich lord's sword was hacking down into my hip and back.

I could only grit my teeth against the pain and used a sideways 360 Edge to free myself, spinning off of and out from under the sword as my own blade struck across Trollbone's chest and sent them sailing backward through the air for ten yards. Even though I had gotten in a complete attack they only lost ten percent of their health that had yet to even drop by one hundred out of thousands of percent.

How can they even put a percentage like that in this video game?!

Keeping my groans and curses to myself as I land in a heap on my good side with a loss of thirty percent of my health, I simply cast First-Aid and use my sword to push myself up to my feet. Sadly, before I had even completely stood up the lich lord was there. I had no choice but to throw myself backward with a flap of my wings.

Having underestimated the strength of my newly acquired wings, I found myself flying straight back through the air with my feet dragging only a few inches above the ground. Trollbone once again appeared where I was going to land but this time I was ready. Just like while fighting the speed elites from the clan I had personally fought and wiped from the territory, I used a preemptive 360 Edge to stave off the incoming attack and by myself a split second to breathe.

Landing in a low crouch once again as the giant skeleton troll comes to a stop, I Quick Step right up to them and unleash a combination of Slash, Geist, and Spirit Slash. The initial Slash was easily blocked by their sword as if by magic but two successive waves of blurred energy passed through our weapons and struck home on his body.

Trollbone was quickly thrown back by over ten yards. I did not have long to enjoy the breathing room, though, because Trollbone had once again detached his hand holding his sword so that it stayed in the air under Hauntings. Then, freed from the limitations of having a body, the hand controlled by a long rope of darkness began whirling about to slash and stab at me from all angles.

Moving to the best of my abilities while only able to vaguely track the unpredictable movements of the hand and sword, I barely manage to parry the sword when striking from the front and dodge once with a sidestep before the black crystalline sword finally found an opening. After feinting a sweep at my head when I regained my stance from the sidestep, the hand suddenly drew back a few feet before thrusting forward.

For the second time this fight, I found myself impaled upon Trollbone's soul bone sword.

Reacting from experience, I simply opened up my body and spun away from the sword that easily passes through the opening that I created. As soon as I was free from the sword, though, Trollbone appeared right in front of my with his remaining skeletal hand slamming forward in a bony fist. That fist caught me completely by surprise, connecting with the side of my head and helm to shatter the outer layer of soul bone defenses while fracturing all of the inner layers.

Reeling from the sudden concussion I had received, I could only stagger back a couple of steps as twenty percent of my health disappeared once again. Fighting through the disorientation of the concussion, I raise my sword straight up in front of me with the flats facing forward to block yet another punch. Despite this block, though, I was thrown back several yards and right into their swinging sword.

Having already been dropped down below fifty percent, being chopped across the backs of my shoulders shaved me down to thirty percent as well as threw me right back to the lich lord. Taking full advantage of this, Trollbone once again throws another punch aimed at my chest like the second. However, I simply opened up my body so that his fist passed through my newly gaping chest.

Losing his balance after meeting zero resistance with his attack, Lich Lord Trollbone received a harsh headbutt from my densely defended head that takes away four percent of their health and almost makes them land back on the ground.

"Survive this!" I cry out, now, whipping around into a 360 Geist that not only connects perfectly with their exposed neck bones but unleashed almost a dozen Geist blades that sends them crashing down to the ground where they slide for several yards along the ground. After having managed to land a critical hit as well as a combination of True Damage strikes, thirty percent of health was drained away from their health bar.

"First-Aid!" I cast aloud, bringing my health back up to just below fifty percent and recovering from the dazing of my concussion. "Look at you, Lich LORD, getting thrown around by a little ant," I sneer while sidestepping the still disconnected hand and sword that thrusts at me from behind.

Whipping my sword up across my body to fend off the following slash, I just barely manage to push Trollbone's sword away before Trollbone himself reentered the fire with a savage left hook. Ducking under the punch that anybody could see coming from a mile away, I step forward away from the next attack of his sword before spinning past them with 360 Edge.

My sword passed through nothing but air as Trollbone disappeared for a split second, reappearing just outside of my attack range and reconnected with his once free floating hand. "I'll admit it," Trollbone remarks casually in my mind. "This current trick is not bad. You have gotten much stronger and faster thanks to Lady Fate's power."

"Mana Slash," is the only thing I say in response, whipping around with a wide swing of my sword that unleashes a thousand mana points worth of Mana Slash. The myriad energies passed cleanly through the lich lord, shaving away a whopping fifty percent of his health while throwing them almost twenty yards away. I had finally managed to do a hundred percent's worth of damage but had taken more than twice that in the process.

Channeling the one hundred and twenty extra mana granted to me by Melpomene's mask into my own body, I start wildly crackling and arcing with dark electricity all over my body. Then, using another thousand MP in a single attack, I channel all of it into my hands in the form of my darkened lightning that I bring together with open palms facing forward. From my hands poured forth a beam of lightning that was even larger than the electric attack I had used on the Troll Commander.

Catching his balance in time to catch my attack, Trollbone takes the concentrated lightning beam straight to his giant sternum for a loss of another thirty percent of his health before being sent flying up into the air. I simply cast First-Aid all over again and leaped into the air. A single flap of my giant golden wings was all it took to close the fifty yards of distance between us.

Meeting the lich lord in the air with a slash of my sword before he even had time to recover from the attack, I use a combination of Force Strike and Slash Geist in the attack to send them plummeting back down to the ground with a small explosion of kinetic and spiritual energy.

Diving down to the ground on top of them, I find myself once again impaled upon their outstretched sword even as I continue to chop my sword down right on their skull. The attack landed despite a loss of thirty percent of my health, reaping another twenty percent of theirs.

"Take it back!" I snarl angrily, feeling a raging inferno of anger override the pain in my gut blossoming around the sword in my body, raising my sword and chopping it down all over again. "Take it back! Spirit Eruption!" A new explosion of energy occurred through the third swing of my sword, throwing me flying backward up into the air while cratering the ground around Trollbone with several yards deep and three times as far around them.

Climbing up to their feet in the crater with relative ease, the flames in the lich lord's eye sockets suddenly flare up to twice their size before his voice screams in my mind, "Good! This was worth climbing down from the high horse to deal with personally. Come! Show me more of this power!"

Then, just as I was casting First-Aid again, Trollbone appears in the air right in front of me and snaps his legs out to kick my in the chest. Flapping a single wing, I spin out of the way of his attack and lower myself ten feet in the air before using a slight flap of both wings to steady myself out. However, Trollbone was right there all over again, once against slamming the heel of his foot straight out but this time managing to connect.

All of the air left my body along with fifty percent of my health, dropping me into critical levels before I even started falling to the ground like a star from the sky. Using several Air Cannons to stop my descent, I feint a flap of my wings my raising them only for Trollbone to appear in the air above me where I would have been. Instead, I used one giant Air Cannon to rise ten feet up in the air and whip my sword up across their body after they struck out at empty air.

"Take it back!" I demand furiously after shoving them several yards back through the air, finally flapping me wings to blur across the short distance and bodily slam into them so that we both rose higher into the sky.

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