The four-fingered syncoresi didn’t have any wind up or warning for the attack, unlike the previous special moves they’d seen. It just made a huffing noise and there was suddenly a blast of searing air coming out of the beast’s body.

There was no way to avoid it, and all three of them immediately nearby were caught in it.

Balrim was lucky to be at range, as it only seemed to hit the monster’s immediate surroundings.

The attack didn’t do any damage on its own. But Kaldalis received a debuff. It was one he’d dealt with before. Burn had been inflicted upon him by the kismeleons in the first few days of quests on the island. It was a damage over time debuff that did increased damage when he moved or attacked while afflicted.

The latter trigger wasn’t going to be a problem. The syncoresi was an overworld mob, and so if he stayed his hand, he wasn’t going to lose the monster’s attention. The former trigger, though? Yeah, maybe he could stand still if the syncoresi was going to zone out and stare blankly at him for the next six seconds to let the burn run its course.

He didn’t get a number readout for the damage ticks, but the first one took an appreciable chunk out of him.

Kaldalis tried not to be afraid of what was to come next.

The boss monster reared back and ripped its claws straight down at him, forcing him to sidestep to the left, and then again to the right as its other claw came up diagonally on a collision course with his gut. He had to jump straight back to avoid getting disemboweled.

Despite avoiding a hit that would have shaved off a quarter of his hit points, he still hissed in pain. The debuff was ripping through his health bar with terrifying speed. He only hoped that avoiding the attacks was mitigating more damage than it was causing.

The monster stepped forward, pursuing Kaldalis’s retreat, and behind it he could hear Myrin cursing. She and Haldir had the luxury of standing still and declining to attack in order to minimize the damage.

Despite that advantage, he could still see their health bars draining away from the baseline damage of the debuff. In just the first three seconds, it had burned through a third of their health bars, and would likely get them below half on its own.

If they were forced to move like he was, they’d probably be dead from the debuff alone.

Kaldalis wasn’t sure how much it was doing to him - it was hard to tell exact fractions when he’d started with a pretty decent chunk taken out of himself already - but he was still a healthy distance above half.

How much tankier were tanks than everyone else?

“Just hold,” Haldir said. “A few hits aren’t worth dying for!”

Myrin just kept up her stream of curses, greatsword raised and ready, but holding it still. Unlike most DPS he’d met, she seemed to have at least enough of a sense of self-preservation to stay her blade when it would mean her death.

Kaldalis was a bit jealous. He was doing all the work now, and suffering a ton of damage for his trouble. The ticking debuff felt like a searing pain over his skin, consistent with the debuff’s name. The syncoresi didn’t seem inclined to slow down its attacks, and claws raked through the air at him. Kaldalis gave up on standing his ground to keep the monster in the reach of DPS who wouldn’t attack it anyway. He kept jumping back away from the attacks, desperate to keep ahead of the strikes.

He had to correct himself, though: he wasn’t doing all the work. Another volley of arrows came in from the sidelines, peppering the monster. It flinched from the series of attacks, and the momentary pause gave him enough breathing room to get out from directly under the charging giant. It actually let him stand still for a second and take the last few ticks of the burn debuff at normal damage instead of the increased amount.

As the burn debuff finished up, he was just below half HP.

The debuff had burned through over four hundred total hit points between the movement he’d been forced into. Checking with a thought and a quick glance, he had four-hundred and seventy-something remaining.

A healing potion hit the ground nearby and he got another two-hundred and four added to his total, bringing him back above half hit points.

Barely.

Haldir and Myrin charged back into the fray, their weapons meeting the monster’s back again at long last. Kaldalis was worried about them, as their health bars were very badly drained. Both of them had only about a third of their hit point totals remaining. Haldir was a little higher, between the two of them, and Kaldalis wondered if maybe he had some burn affinity gear on giving him some resistance to the damage.

“Hold!” a voice boomed from across the field of battle. Kaldalis looked over to see Garyung with arms outstretched, holding back a handful of adventurers. He could tell from their cloth gear that they were healers, and in particular he recognized the imperious-looking finnian from the boat. Kaldalis knew that guy had high level abilities that would let him heal all three of them at once, getting Haldir and Myrin out of the danger zone with the same move that would give Kaldalis a bit more breathing room.

Why was Garyung holding them back?

Kaldalis got his answer immediately as the syncoresi inhaled deeply.

“Fuck!” Kaldalis blurted out. “I mean blink! Flicker! Whatever! Now!”

Kaldalis didn’t wait to see and jumped across into the Paths Between Paths. He was happy to see everyone else there, including Balrim. It was then he realized why Garyung was withholding the aid that the rest of the camp could offer them. After the howl attack, there would be a safe window while the boss’s attack was on cooldown to run in, get their healing (and maybe damage) in, and then get back out before things got too dangerous.

Garyung also showed good judgement by holding back the whole crowd. The alpha player finnian was probably strong enough to tank the howl damage safely, but letting him pass would undermine any further attempt to keep the others at bay. After seeing one person run into the fight, someone else would think there were no rules anymore and rush in with them.

It was just a short trip from there to everyone getting one-shot by the howl attack. Since the howl attack had been timed to take advantage of that healer instinct, his judgement had saved lives. Especially since they didn’t know who was and wasn’t an NPC.

After a few moments, they popped back out into the real world to find that the syncoresi was ready and waiting for them. It had a handful of arrows sticking out of its left arm and shoulder that Kaldalis didn’t remember being there before.

A slightly larger change was that all the grass and loose branches that had littered the ground had been blasted away, obviously by the force of the howl attack. He was glad they’d managed to avoid it, but he had to wonder how a regular group without access to Kaia’s Flicker was supposed to deal with the move.

Kaldalis ducked under the first swipe of the claws, barely avoiding getting caught flat-footed coming back out of the empty void. He was actually starting to get the hang of this. Kaldalis had been getting caught unprepared out of the Flicker, but now he knew to expect enemies to have an attack ready and queued up for him.

Thankfully, now that the howl was out, the group of anxious healers was allowed to rush in. As soon as they were within range Kaldalis and friends were pelted with potions. The healers were able to get Haldir and Myrin back up to full in a flash, with Kaldalis’s larger health bar taking only a second more. At the same time, the group of archers staying outside of howl range moved in, and instead of a smattering of arrows, a stream of them arced in at the monster.

Emboldened by the support, Myrin started to cackle wildly as she resumed her assault. Haldir redoubled his own efforts as well.

The syncoresi major made another sweeping attack with its claws and Kaldalis ducked forward, moving inside the arc of the attack. As soon as he was sure the monster wasn’t going to kick him in the face for stepping in, he drove the head of his glaive into the fuzzy giant’s right kneecap, aiming to strike it side-on. He got his five damage in, but he got his third stack of Gust, triggering the energy blast.

It only did three damage - the lowest he’d ever gotten from a Gust proc - but the strike landing on the knee was devastating to the four-fingered monster. Its legs flew out from under it and it landed on its side. The creature’s arms flailed on the way down, and Kaldalis just barely dove clear of blindly swinging claws.

His allies jumped on the opening afforded by the momentarily downed beast. Myrin started hacking away at its shoulders - presumably for the novelty of being able to reach, and Haldir jabbed his shorter blade into the small of its back.

Another volley of arrows rained down on the monster, and the raw weight of the attacks made the beast snarl, the sound deep and threatening. Kaldalis found himself flinching away despite the compromised position the monster was in. The syncoresi scrambled to its feet before he could capitalize on the opening himself. He just tried to satisfy himself with the knowledge that he’d gotten everyone else an opening.

As soon as its claws lashed out at him again, he was ready. A horizontal slash came across and he ducked low under it. Another slash was coming back across the other way with impossible alacrity. Kaldalis stepped inside the arc of the attack, positioning himself right under the giant’s furry legs. He drove his glaive straight up, stabbing it in the gut as high up as he could reach. He got his five damage in even as the beast raised its enormous claws over its head, ready to bring them down on him.

The blow never came down as that five damage pushed it over the threshold of its courage.

There was just a single moment where its beady eyes widened before Kaldalis realized what was happening. The arrow-studded creature broke and ran, vanishing into the forest within seconds of his attack landing.

Kaldalis started to give chase, breaking into a jog, but he had barely made it a dozen feet before a huge hand closed over his shoulder, stopping him. He looked back to see Garyung holding him back.

“Now is not the time,” the bhogad said. “We got out of this alive. That’s more than I honestly expected when that thing showed up. I won’t let you gamble on that twice in one day.”

Kaldalis grimaced, but couldn’t disagree. Despite his anxiety about when the infernal horde would return, led by the upgraded syncoresi major, Garyung was right. That burn attack had almost been the end of his DPS, and there was a chance that it might pull it again before Balrim could have supplied the healing to Haldir and Myrin, finishing them both off. When they faced it again, it would need to be in force, and in the wake of what they’d all just faced, now wasn’t the time for it.

He turned back and followed Garyung back to the encampment, trying to ignore the quest still hanging out on the right side of his vision, taunting him with its directive to finish the job he was walking away from.