Ch. 34 Fear the Rainbow

The Scholar entered the boss's room, surprised at the creature inside, "a King Lily? If this is the boss, then how was the dungeon able to move the Ivy maze as it pleased? Confusion quickly passes as he remembers that this was a newborn dungeon and can not spawn a roaming boss, even if that Spector dog was very close to being one.

The mass of vines covered most of the back walls and extended halfway to the sides. Though the flower was hiding inside its own vines for some reason, it was plain to see that this boss was leagues stronger than a King Lily could realistically be at this floor. The Scholar concluded that it was a variant of some kind, and the dungeon was trying to hide it.

Although the Scholar wanted to finish this boss quickly to obtain the core, he was not willing to take any risk with a prismatic core. The many changes and unknown elements at its disposal made the Scholar wary. Searching thru his ropes for his teacher's gift, the Scholar finds and opens the book covered in purple eyes.

The Scholars chanting echoed, as the pages of the book quickly turned endlessly. After a few seconds, the book bursts into purple flames as the scholar's eyes changed color. The boss also glowed in the spells purple light, triggering the boss into attacking with sharp snake-like vines aiming towards the flanks of the group, forcing the warriors to leave only a few earth soldiers guarding the middle.

The mage group was split into two squads on each side of the scholar, protecting him as the spell finishes. They watched as the earth soldiers held back the vines while the wind soldiers slashed the smaller nimbler vines that managed to escape, as they prepared spells for any accidents.

Suddenly their Mana Field noticed vines moving underground towards the mage's flanks, turning to the sides they found the vines that laid clinging against both sides of the walls had discreetly dug their way towards them, getting as close as they could.

Seemingly aware that they were found out they quickly spring out of the earth aiming for the Scholar, the mages alerted the others and formed a circle around him, they cast fire and wind spells toward the vines.

At that moment the Scholar Finished getting the feedback of the (Analyze) spell, in the blink of an eye the Scholar's face turned pale screaming in fear. "SCATTER NOW!!!!" The mages and soldiers were stunned for a second at the Scholar's fearful scream, sadly that one second spelled their death.

Just as the Scholar came to his senses, the large vine cocoon unraveled itself displaying the sight of a beautiful rainbow lily, with a similarly gorgeous mass of energy in its center, sadly for them, this was the last thing they saw. The silent beam of Mana first disintegrated the three earth soldiers left in the middle as it continued on increasing in size reaching the mages a millisecond after.

The Scholar had no time to prepare and could only use ten times the Elemental Mana to cast (Breezy Shield) instantly with no casting. As the Scholar pulled around half the mages with him to the side while using the increased speed of the spell to get away from the blast zone, the beam reached the mages turning them into ash, the Scholars' shield was pierced easily at the side, bursting like a balloon.

The explosion of the breezy shield sent wind blades in all directions both damaging, but more importantly, pushing more mages to the sides preventing their death. The Scholar was suffering a headache from the improper use of his spell as well as its violent scattering.

Shaking out of his muddle mind the sound of screaming could be heard. The soldiers were running to the mages while slicing the vines apart trying to save the scattered mages from getting skewer, the boss ignoring them and aiming solely for the mages.

The Scholar was enraged seeing his mages getting killed and started to cast a large area of effect spell, the third circle (Lesser Tornado), around the surviving troops with the intent to use it as a make-shift barrier, giving a chance to reform the formation in the storm's eye. He however felt the mana gathering around the boss again, he quickly canceled the spell and instantly cast the first circle (Wind Steps) increasing his speed.

A much smaller beam of multicolor mana hit the spot his head used to be half a second after. While he was dodging the attack even more mages were getting killed, realizing that the boss would target him the moment he started to cast large spells the Scholar proceeded to instant cast first and second circle spells.

With the support of the Scholar, the soldiers got to the mages slashing the larger cluster of vines while protecting the injured mages. The scholar saw that they were starting to get control of the situation once again, he redirected his spells to the boss's main body while yelling at the mages.

"Fire mages burn the vines, the boss can still use them to attack. Do not gather in large groups, and keep an eye on the variant Lily don't let it fool us again!" The group panic a bit at the mention of 'variant' becoming even more careful, while the Wind Element soldiers used the last of their Elemental Mana creating a small gust of wind pushing the large chunks of vines away from the group.

At that moment the severed vines came to life, slithering like snakes towards both the unconscious mages as well as those with missing legs and arms trying to crawl to the group. A small group of the mages finally recomposed themselves burning the vines to ashes as they remained five feet apart from each other while protecting any of the disabled mages that were still alive.

After the Scholar got the situation back to normal he attempted to kill the boss with a large bombardment of instant spells, only to notice that the boss would dodge as much as it could while attacking the scattered mages. On top of all of this, the spells that missed or those that were used to burn the leaf storms and snake-like vines would have their Elemental mana absorb by the flower's corona.

The small lingering awareness he had for his own mana told him that it was being redirected to the damaged vines quickly repairing them. This went on even when the scholar used his Mana on Ice, earth, and fire spells horrifying him. He finally sends out a new order, "retrieve back outside the boss doors your all useless here!"

Without the mages around the boss, it would not be able to stop him from casting third circle spells with no more dead weight to distract him. After a few more deaths from the mages not spreading out properly they all left, the Scholars enraged eyes narrowing towards the boss.

"You can absorb even Ice mana, I am truly shocked yet overjoyed. If even a lowly creature like you can so easily learn to absorb different mana this can only show the great value of the core." The scholar smiled evilly, gathering a large amount of mana into his fingertips, "you like beams right? See if you can stomach this one, I do not believe a small and weak Rank one creature can absorb a third circle spells mana without heavy damage."

"Third Circle (Rime Beam)!!"