Risen World

Chapter 414: Centipede Graveyard Dungeon Part 6

Climbing down the cliff Joshua could tell that the centipedes reigned supreme in this area just by how the side of the cliff looked while wearing his night vision goggles. When it came to the cliff that they had to climb down while facing the lizards, things seemed normal since the lizards didn't tear apart the cliff whenever they climbed up and down it. That wasn't the same case when it came to the centipedes. All around him Joshua could see spots where the centipedes had dug holes straight out of the rock before moving further down to dig another hole that went inside of the cliff.

This change in terrain made climbing down the cliff more annoying since they had to climb around the areas with the giant holes. They wouldn't be able to tell if any of the handholds around those areas were still stable enough to hang on to, especially during combat. They avoided those spots like the plague while Joshua made sure to keep up his aura sense just in case one of the centipedes tried to take them by surprise as they climbed down. Soon enough he was glad that he kept paying attention to their surroundings since he could sense a centipede hiding in one of the nearby holes below them preparing to strike anyone that got close.

Joshua led the group around that spot so that the creature couldn't take any of them by surprise. He then pointed the centipede out to the rest of the group and they decided to take it out before it could come out and become a problem while they climbed down the cliff. Julia quickly conjured a large fireball that was being compressed to increase the explosive power the moment it exploded. Robin also got to work by creating a few reflective shields in the air so that her lightning strike would be redirected towards the large hole.

Once both of the mages were ready they let their spells lose. The giant fireball dived directly into the hole, right after Robin's quick moving lightning spell flashed through the air. They all could hear the cry of the creature on the inside after it was hit by the blast of lightning. That was soon followed by a loud explosion. When the fire looked as if it was going to erupt from the hole Cinder quickly froze over the only exit the flames had keeping them trapped inside. They were cooking the poor thing alive after taking it by surprise. Joshua could even see Julia still controlling her flames to make them do as much damage as possible. After half a minute the wailing of the creature died off and they could all feel the surge of experience.

Everyone continued their descent prepared for another fight since all of the noise caused by the dying centipede had to have drawn the attention of others. It didn't take long for Joshua to sense more centipedes down below, but this time they were racing up towards them in a group so they weren't going to be able to take the creatures by surprise. Joshua warned the group as they took up position as best they could on the side of the cliff. Titus started to let out several spores that embedded themselves in the side of the cliff. The spores quickly grew vines that formed a wall in front of the group that would make it difficult for the centipedes to attack them head on.

Once the centipedes came within view everyone was preparing to take them down the moment they clashed with the vines. 'Everyone close your eyes and look away for a moment.' Marcus said through the party chat. They all listened to his warning as Marcus tossed a powerful flash grenade that sent out a blinding light that lit up the entire area. The light caused all of the centipedes to shriek and turn their heads away from the light, but their momentum carried them directly into the vines causing them to get tangled up in them.

The centipedes were clearly creatures prone to the dark by the way they acted in the dungeon. They seemed to rely more on smell and hearing to locate their targets which already signaled that they had bad eyesight. They always crawled away from the torches when moving down the hallways in the dungeons showing they liked to avoid even dim light like that of fire. The flash bang was so bright that it messed with all of their senses causing them to get caught up in their current trap.

'Well this is perfect. Their all trapped in a bunch of vines, couldn't ask for better burning material.' Julia said with a grin as she created a couple more large fireballs that she sent down towards the trapped centipedes. She wasn't alone in her attacks as Cinder also shifted to her flame form and created some fireballs of her own. Within seconds there was a massive flame right beneath the group that was burning brightly. They could hear all of the centipedes screaming from within, but the smoke coming from the flaming vines made it hard to see them completely.

Eventually Joshua could feel some experience gained from a couple of the centipedes dying from the fire, but three badly burnt centipedes came crashing out of the smoke and started charging in their direction. With the injuries that the centipedes had gained it didn't take very much for Joshua to put one of them down with a well-aimed strike to its neck area that cut off its head. Amy followed up with a punch that caused one of the others fragile exoskeleton to shatter into pieces as gore splattered down the cliff. The last centipede tried to sneak up on Joshua, but had its head blasted off by a rail shot from Aito that went straight through one of its eyes.

With the fight over the group had to wait a few minutes for the flames to die down before they could continue climbing downward. It was a much longer decent down the cliff this time around since there were constant groups of centipedes that kept coming to get in there way. At first they were able to catch most of them ahead of time with Joshua's aura pulses, but eventually they started getting ambushed by centipedes that tried to knock them off the cliff side by erupting from the wall. Joshua had no trouble catching anyone that got caught up in the tactic.

At one point the centipedes came in a large group of nearly a dozen, which prompted Joshua's group to put a bit more effort into their attacks. Joshua and Amy were both dashing around the battle field going for any opening they could that would allow them tear off the heads of one of the centipedes. Jayce and Ivan were creating shields to protect the group from whenever the centipedes tried to attack them by spitting acid at them. Adrian, Natsumi, and Victor were constantly slashing off the legs of the creatures so that they wouldn't be able to easily hold on to the side of the cliff.

The chaotic combat went on for a few minutes before Titus put an end to it as he pulled one of the centipedes out of a hole as it tried to dig away and tossed it off into the abyss. The last centipede remaining had its head pierced by Cinder's leg before being dropped off the side of the cliff. The fighting was a bit tiring while having to hold on tight whenever the wall would shake from the collisions between the giant beast or one of the mages spells, so they all caught their breath for a moment before continuing the climb down.

After a while they finally started to see a change coming from down below them. They no longer needed the night vision goggles since they could actually see with the new source of light coming from down below. Even so Henry and Monika created their orbs of light to help illuminate the area even more just in case they ended up losing the other source of light like they had last time when it turned into a giant metallic lizard.

This time around things were a bit different however since there were four sources of light. Each of them was clearly coming from a door. Joshua was getting the same bad feeling from these doors as he had gotten while going down the other cliff. He was worried that they would have to face four powerful creatures at once this time around so he warned everyone before they proceeded any further.

'If this turns out to be four metallic creatures instead of one our goal is to hold three of them off while we kill the other one. If it's something we have no clue about then be prepared to shift tactics on the fly.' Joshua said before he moved closer so that whatever trap was waiting for them would be activated. The moment he got within a certain range of the lights all four of them started to shine brighter as there gems started glowing. Then a familiar scene took place as the doors all erupted from the side of the cliff. This time around however they didn't take the forms of giant lizards but instead formed the large bodies of metallic centipedes with tons of legs that all seemed razor sharp.

The heads of the metallic life forms didn't seem to have an opening like the lizard head had, but they still had what looked like massive pincers that were able to shift and sharpen depending on the situation. What was weird about this creature was the fact that none of them had a tail end, instead they all connected together at the end forming a large door that was still welded into the wall that Joshua's group was hanging from. All of the centipedes let out shrill shrieks as they turned to face the direction of Joshua's group.

For a moment Joshua was worried that there wasn't a weak point for them to go after seeing as how they couldn't see any openings along the four centipedes. That was until the gems themselves appeared at the top of each of the centipedes' heads. There were spikes around the locations and Joshua was certain that it wouldn't be so easy to just take down the gems considering how tough the metallic lizard had been, but he got the feeling that there was something else to this fight that he wasn't seeing. He didn't have the time to figure out what that was as all four heads started charging in their direction with pincers out ready to tear them apart.