The monster rumbled across the field towards us, a whirling barge of limbs and psychological torment.

  “Pomoro, shoot the oxen things out front. Let’s see how far those maces stretch.”

  Othai was marshaling her troops into a defensive formation, trying to balance pinning the critter in place and maximizing DPS. It practically screamed OP melee with a charge attack and mental debuffs. We already had a counter for the last one. The other two we would have to deal with the hard way.

  “You know, at a certain point, the body horror just becomes… I don’t know. You get numb.”

  “Yes, Tower Master. I think most of the Awakened reached that point a long, long time ago.”

  Versai was focused on the current baddy, but I was keeping a weather eye on the roving band of frog centaurs. You just knew those motherless scum would come charging in at the last minute to wreck us. Although… no, too risky. I’d wait until they actually charged.

  “Versai, help me keep an eye on those frog centaurs, would you?”

  “Yes, Tower Master.”

  I switched my focus back to the emerging fight against the rushing boss monster. Pomoroi, with a surgeon’s deftness, smashed two of the oxen-monsters with one volley. The result was beautiful. The surviving oxen yanked the whole wagon hard to one side, making it slide and start to tip over. I thought we might see it flip, but alas, two of the monsters’ long arms smashed down onto the ground, stabilizing the cart.

  “INSECTS! YOU DARE!”

  “Do it again, Pomoroi.”

  “Pomoroi, by Imperial Decree!”

  The two oxen she killed withered, the flesh tendrils connecting them to their fellows running in reverse. It happened entirely too quickly. I could see the other oxen swelling up. They would be stronger now.

  The oxen tossed their head and made a sound, a parody of mooing and the howl of a wolf combined. A cannibal minotaur, running down dinner. The drums picked up the pace too. The gimmick was pretty obvious. And once it got too close, Pomoroi wouldn’t be able to shoot it. Just didn’t have the speed or mobility to reposition that way.

  Oh. Oooh! That could work. It would depend on how fast the oxen moved.

  The cannons roared once more, taking out another two oxen. This time the bodies were a lot more intact. One actually still had a breath of life in it. I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised when the monster swung a mace and brained it. A fast slurp, and now the wagon was racing for us with just two giant, monstrous oxen hitched, the growing out of the barge-like wagon roaring over and over “It’s not enough! Never enough!”

  “Pomoroi, Versai, up on the wagon. Othai, we will flank that thing and keep distance from it. We’ll keep up the artillery barrage as best we can.”

  “The frog centaurs-”

  “I know.” I looked over at the wagon driver and directed him to go wide around the boss monster, keeping it between us and the frog-centaurs as best we could.

  The monster charged the Genuda line. The hideous oxen put their heads down, and ran horns out right at the center of the line of pikes. Twenty foot lengths of steel topped ash notwithstanding, every single person in that line knew that impact equaled death. There was just too much mass behind those oxen, and the odds of those broad chests not being thickly ribbed was nil. They were armored beasts. They just had their armor on the inside.

  The crossbows and muskets were split out on the wings. They were trying to get as many shots off as they could, and I could see them hitting but damned if I knew how much damage they were actually doing. This seemed like a three-plus health bar kind of boss, with at least one, and likely two, phase changes. Three changes wouldn’t be out of the question either.

  It was a mortal lock there would be a phase change when we killed the last oxen. But I wanted that thing stopped now, not in a minute. I wish to hell we had stopped it before.

  The oxen crashed towards the line, which, at the very last moment, split apart. I felt my jaw drop as the ancients raised their banners and double timed their squads out of the way.

  “Units of five! That’s how Genuda thinks, units of five and ten not a hundred! No wonder they can break apart without falling apart- they are used to being hired out in odd numbers.”

  God, Othai had even told me they could stage a fighting retreat walking backwards. This was a doddle. Once the troops were out of the way, they turned and stabbed into the flanks and the wagon with their pikes. This turned out to be a middling idea.

  The Pikes scored a lot of hits on the oxen and on the boss monster itself. On the other hand, those long maces swung out and smashed apart some of those wooden spear shafts. We had wounded from the flying splinters. Hopefully no dead. The crossbow and musket units poured on the fire from the rear, this time focusing down on the boss. It didn’t appear to make a difference.

  I glared at the monster. It really didn’t seem to be making much difference. We were scoring hits- a lot of them. We stabbed the hideous thing with long spears. But the only thing that was doing real damage was the cannons. Which didn’t add up. None of the Relic Sites had easy bosses, most especially that damned Woodcutter’s wife, but they were on theme.

  Actually, I have no idea how much of a hard case the boss in Gradden March would have been if I didn’t ambush him. He seemed like a minion/control-type boss. Lots and lots of buffing, debuffing, and charm based on the scenario. Not that I let him do it. All it took was absolute desperation.

  I let my fingers drape over Sebastian’s old army knife. I hadn’t had to use it in a while. Good. Theoretically I could one-shot this boss. Practically, I would be the one getting one shotted. I’d need uppies just to stab the huge thing.

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  “Pomoroi, can you shoot that thing yet?”

  “I cannot obey the order.” It sounded like she was physically pained to admit it.

  “Damn. Driver, get us more distance. Over, yeah, a bit left, good. Keep going.”

  “Tower Master, the Frog Centaurs have started chasing us.”

  I pressed my fist to my head. It was expected. Not nice, but expected. “Move towards that ridge a mile from Wastet. Where we had the battle earlier,” I ordered the wagon driver. “Are they catching up?”

  “Slowly, but yes.”

  Damn. Again, expected, but unwanted. “Can we make the ridge?”

  “Should be able to. They are a few hundred yards away.”

  “Alright. Alright.” I shifted around, craning my neck to see where they were. “Versai, we have one shot at this. The frogs are going to be focused on me and Pomoroi. So what I need you to do is jump out there and cripple them. Just go up and down their lines as fast as you can, and cripple them. Don’t worry about killing them for now, just slow them down. Immobilize them if you can. But Slow. Them. Down.”

  She gave me a hard look. “Yes, Tower Master. You do remember that if you die, everyone dies?”

  “I do. So don’t let me die.” I watched the monsters charge in towards us, grouping up as they saw us moving up the ridge. “Go. NOW!”

  My nonexistent heart was thundering in my ears. I felt like I couldn’t breathe, even though it had been two weeks since I did last breathe. All those old physiological fear responses were right here with me, my brain filling in the blanks my body provided.

  The frog centaurs were huge. As big as an Icelandic powerlifter on a clydesdale. Covered in heavy armor, and wielding a long glave. I would be dead in one blow. If I was lucky, anyway. The monsters liked to play. They had been playing with us, keeping us distracted. Keeping us scared. But now they had a perfect target. Two unsupported artillery pieces, a sword and board infantry woman, and me. The useless king on the chessboard. The only piece that was a pure liability.

  It was the perfect setup for them. No chance of us escaping. Certainly no chance of us winning. Unless we somehow cheated.

  Versai came out swinging. That long sword of hers flashed in the cold sunlight, a flickering torch of defiance. She looked so small. So brave.

  Then she hit them moving like a bullet made of pure homicidal malice and the fragile warrior princess thing just collapsed in a heap. She hamstrung one, and before the tendon finished snapping, she was underneath a different one of them, catching it mid leap and opening it like she was behind the curve in highschool bio and needed the grades.

  In fairness, it was definitely moving a lot slower now. There were fifteen of the frog centaurs. She was moving impossibly fast between them, but they were still coming on. We weren’t waiting around, of course. I kept the wagon going as fast as it could. Watching them get closer, as my bodyguard, my very first summons, was left behind to fight the monsters. It was the smart move tactically. It felt bad on every level.

  Must have felt bad for the frog centaurs too. I could see the lock in. They couldn’t turn and deal with Versai. They physically could not. Their programming had kicked in, and I was triggering a whole stack of target prioritization rules. None of the monsters seemed to have any rules about prioritizing their self preservation without orders. And right now, the Dyn Hunlief was playing bull to Othai’s picador. No time to give orders.

  There was an odd similarity between the monsters and me. We were both being pursued. Once we were caught, we were doomed. Not dead straight away, but we’d wish we had died. I doubted there was enough in them to let them understand the horror of their scenario. A nightmare chase, where they were always running forward, even as something impossible crippled them from behind.

  Ten left. Seven Left. They were catching up. I could make out their enormous eyes through the gap in their face visor. I could see them fixating on me. One went down with a scream of outrage and a tangle of limbs. Six left. Barely four spear lengths behind the wagon. My knuckles turned white on Sebastian’s old army knife. I didn’t know if I would go down fighting or just kill myself if they reached the wagon.

  Five left. Coming on fast. They moved more smoothly than something that big should have. Their leaping pace was graceful, steady. They must have been strong as hell, keeping their oversized bodies upright. All that jumping around, and their glaives were still aimed directly at me. Four left.

  Versai was going for the hamstrings- their tendons were thick, but her sword was the sharpest thing I had ever seen. This close, I could hear them snap when she cut them. Could see their flesh knot up as the ends of the tendons suddenly yanked apart. The sounds they made were agonizing. I speak as an expert in monster extermination- they suffered. Sometimes, she would hack open an artery as she went past. They were big enough and tough enough that it wouldn’t kill them right away. They got to linger a while.

  Three left. And now the math changed, didn’t it? They were barely two spear lengths away now. Could I dodge three of them until Versai crippled them? It would only be a few seconds, but could I really manage it? But there were only three of them. It would be a shame to kill myself when there were only- only two of them now.

  I could dodge two. I’m sure I could dodge two. Their glaives had almost reached the wagon. I could see the gleam on the edges of the blades. I could smell the stink of them. They were huge. They were so damn big, that they were still taller than me when I was sitting in the back of a wagon. One went down in a pile of limbs, their glave flying off as they collapsed. One left. Just one left. I could definitely dodge one.

  Our eyes met. It would only have one shot. I think it knew. It pulled its arm back. I bent my knees under me. Leant forward. Ready to jump to either side the second that arm twitched. My muscles coiled. Some instinct screamed- I rolled to my left. The glave lodged into the floor of the wagon. The monster was down. Versai had made it.

  I looked at the glave jammed into the floorboards. It wouldn’t have missed me.

  “Get us clear, driver. At least fifty yards. Up on the ridge here. Versai, can you finish them off safely, or would it be safer if Pomoroi did it?” I was proud of how even my voice sounded. “Actually, never mind. Othai has it under control for a couple more minutes. Pomoroi, kill the wounded frog centaurs.”

  “Pomoroi, by Imperial Decree.” She acknowledged the order with a grim firmness. It took less time than I would have guessed. We moved the wagon around so she could bag two or three in a single shot, and the two of them alternated firing. We cut the time down to a minimum, picking up Versai along the way.

  “You know why I wanted us up on this ridge, Pomoroi? Because it gives us an extra twenty feet of elevation, while keeping the boss monster in range. In other words, there will be no such thing as our troops blocking your line of sight. Your job- kill that thing for me. Let's end this battle with the roar of cannons!”

  “Pomoroi, by Imperial Decree!”

  The long guns roared. I think I would have found it ridiculous, once. Long legs in black leather boots, pedaling around a portable cannon with all the furious intensity of a career artillery officer. Reddit would have a field day with the doujinshis. I sure would have. Standing next to her, I dare them, I goddamn triple-dog-dare them to laugh at her. This is who she was and what she did. Pomoroi existed in the roar of the cannons on a desperate battlefield. The fierce pride of an empire with a worthy emperor.

  She sewed her lanyard to her hand, so even when the monsters tore her apart, she would keep firing. So long as any part of Pomoroi remained in the world, her guns would kill her Emperor’s enemies. She would hold, so others could escape to fight another day.

  On the flat ground below her was Othai- all period piece finery, waving her halberd and moving her troops around in a deadly bullfight with a damn Persona Boss. She was doing it too. The experience of a lifetime, leading these troops against this enemy. Seeing the worst the enemy had to offer, and the worst her countrymen did too.

  The boss knew what they were up to. It wasn’t stupid. It just couldn’t corner worth a damn. The body of the wagon was too long, the oxen were now just too big, and everything was too top heavy. I’d bet it wanted to move forward at a walk. It would have slaughtered them if it could just walk up to them. But the monster was bound by the same laws as the rest of us. It was a monster that charged, a creature of speed and power.

  So it moved as fast as it could, and Othai swung her formations around, letting it slip past and stabbing it in the flanks as it went. The muskets and the crossbows never stopped firing either. The damage was starting to tell. The two surviving oxen were visibly smaller.

  The cannon balls went flying out. We were a long way out, and the monster saw them coming. He snarled, and the wagon jerked sharply right. This made the whole thing tip over. Othai capitalized, rushing her pikes forward and stabbing furiously. It righted itself with a roar, long arms swinging maces around furiously, but that’s the nice thing about pikes- you are twenty feet away from your problems.

  Othai poured on the damage. The monster had no choice but to charge away, then come around for another ramming charge. This time with much smaller oxen.

  Two more rounds. It knew the fire was coming, and clearly had kept an eye out. The oxen might have shrunk, but the wagon hadn’t. Physics wouldn’t be denied. It tipped over once more, and Othai got back to the stabbing.

  The cycle repeated three times, before the monster let out an unwilling roar and absorbed the final two oxen. It wrapped its arms around itself, turning into a sort of murderous meatball.

  “OTHAI! It’s a phase change! Get everyone back until you figure out what it is! Pomoroi, don’t stop shooting. Burn that thing down.”

  The meatball expanded again, the arms moving seemingly bonelessly, a swirling cage of maces flowing around it. Pomoroi shot it again, but the rounds were casually deflected. One very nearly plowed through a formation of crossbows.

  “Cease fire.”

  “NOT ENOUGH! None of you are enough. Your little nations, your absurd hopes, none of them are enough. You can’t even slow us down. You can’t even touch me. You are too weak.”

  “Good to have confirmation that what we are doing is working. Let’s see it parry small arms fire.”

  “Tower Master?”

  “The monsters always lie, Versai. You know that better than I do. The monster says that we aren’t enough.” I smiled over at her. “We are enough. And the monsters know it.”