The gray veil slid over his senses again. The moss light dulled. The stink of rot flattened. The world beca distant, like he was watching through thick water, and his body felt less present, less anchored. The internal energy bar dipped slightly, the familiar tax.
With the new threats arriving, the Boss suddenly went into a rage as it tried to swat anything that got too close.
The basilisk’s focus shifted, not fully, but enough. The sudden influx of bodies made it lash out with more urgency.
Its tail slamd into a cluster of Snakes and sent them stumbling. Its jaw snapped at a spear, catching wood and tal, crushing the shaft like it was a twig.
The sound of splintering echoed, then the sound of n grunting as they scrambled away from the teeth.
It was going into a frenzy.
Its roar filled the cave, vibrating in Kael’s ribcage. Dust rained from the ceiling. The tail slamd down, cracking stone. Claws gouged trenches into the floor as it twisted between targets, jaws snapping shut inches from a Snake’s shoulder.
Boots shifted against loose gravel. They climbed just high enough to see everything without being in range of the sweeping tail. The slope gave them elevation and an escape route if things turned.
Kael remained near them, listening to their breathing and the way their weapons shifted in nervous hands. Nobody spoke loudly now. Even the loudmouth from earlier was quiet because seeing a different group get shredded up close did sothing to people. It reminded them they were at too.
"Tend to your wounds, and get ready for combat." The boss said.
His tone was practical, almost calm. He wasn’t comforting them.
He was organizing them. Kael watched the boss’s posture, the way he stayed slightly behind the line, the way his eyes flicked constantly between the basilisk and Petrov’s group. The boss was already planning the next rotation.
Planning what he would sacrifice and what he would keep.
Every mber of the Sun clan agreed that they exhausted too much of their stamina in that skirmish; it was only five minutes, but it felt like five hours for them.
So sat on rocks or crouched behind protruding stone, hands shaking slightly as they checked their weapons.
Others pressed cloth to the cuts. Soone wrapped a torn strip around a wrist. It was a pathetic display of preparation, but it was real.
Even if the Tower didn’t let their lungs burn the way a living body would, the mind still got tired. Fear did that. Fear drained people faster than any stamina stat.
The boss was too tanky, too bulky, and far too deadly to risk anything this early on.
Kael knew they ant the basilisk, but the sentence applied to the room, too. The basilisk was not the only "boss" here. Petrov was a boss. The Sun Clan leader was a boss. Every leader in this place was deadly in their own way, and none of them were worth trusting.
The sun clan boss turned his head and finally located Kael, who had undone [Presence]
Kael let Presence fade when he felt the boss’s gaze searching for him, not wanting to look suspicious by staying absent too long.
The gray dulled world snapped back into sharper color and sll with that familiar whiplash, like soone had poured cold water over his senses.
"That bitch seems to have sothing against you," he said.
"Yeah, feels like I killed her children or sothing," Kael replied.
Kael kept his face neutral as he spoke, but his mind was already asuring consequences. That line was a joke on the surface, but it was also a hook. If anyone got curious enough to check under his tracksuit later, curiosity would beco greed fast. The basilisk leather underneath was not sothing a first-floor climber was supposed to have.
"Report?" The boss asked.
"One dead. Two were heavily injured. But we’re still strong." Peter replied
Peter’s voice carried that forced steadiness of soone pretending he wasn’t imagining his own death. Kael glanced at him briefly. Peter’s eyes were fixed on the fight, but his hands were gripping his weapon too tightly, knuckles pale.
"Weapons?"
"So far, everything is still operable, a few spears bent and broke, but we have spares."
"Good, keep an eye on how the snakes fight, see if we can find anything," the boss said.
The boss wasn’t just watching the basilisk. He was studying Petrov’s people. The way they moved. The way they rotated. The way they used their archers. He wanted to steal their efficiency the way n stole coin.
Looking at the fight, it was quite similar to how the Sun Clan fought.
Bait and switch, only this was less efficient.
They didn’t have a tank that could simply disappear and reappear like Kael.
The Snakes had to force aggro through noise and pain.
Their lee fighters would stab, retreat, then another would replace them, trying to keep the basilisk’s attention split.
But the basilisk’s attention was not split cleanly. It was angry, and anger made it unpredictable. Kael’s vanishing act had been the only clean "reset" to its focus. Without that, Petrov’s group had to work harder for every breath.
The Snakes, however, adopted a different strategy.
Archers.
They had three. And each of them shot at different intervals. They were spread all over the cave in a triangle.
Kael’s eyes tracked them imdiately. One on the left near a jagged rock shelf, one on the right closer to the slope, and one farther back near the basilisk’s nest. A triangle that forced the basilisk’s head to turn repeatedly. Smart. Annoying. Effective. And expensive.
Once the basilisk aid at one of the archers, the other two would amp up their fire rate to pull the aggro toward them. Then the basilisk would give up on the archer that was not attacking and try to attack one of the other two. Once that happens, the Archer that stopped would resu shooting.
Bait and switch to the maximum.
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