Dragon Roost Fried Ritos [Lavaclaw, BP / UD]

The enormous ape screeched when Naomi started shooting at it with her crossbow, landing back in the lava with two large splashes where its feet hit the thick, hot liquid. The rockslide stopped, and the beast swung its massive arms overhead, its hands balled into enormous fists. However, it did not continue its attack, instead turning around and rushing away at an inconceivable speed for its bulk. It slammed its knuckles and feet down into the lava without concern for the substance, rushing off towards an enormous hole in the wall it had likely made itself to get here in the first place.

When it disappeared, the area calmed down. Elliot groaned quietly, but audibly. With one hand, he tried to push himself up from the ground, but he pressed the other one hard against his waist. Next to him lay a rock about the size of his head, one side lightly smeared with blood from where it had hit him. Momentarily forgetting he was in the presence of another Rito and disregarding his social status, he swore in pain and anger. "I swear if that dragon-fucked ape shattered my crystals..." Undoing the threads holding his pouch together, he looked inside. Fortunately the crystals containing his mana were untouched, scratched perhaps, but not destroyed.

Standing straight, but still pressing his hand to his side, he looked at Naomi. "Tell me you're alright or I'm going to lose my mind."

"Huh?" She poked her head out from around a few rocks and saw Elliot. "Yeah, I'm--" she stopped inspecting the bruises she'd accrued and immediately turned her attention to his wound. "Hey, wait. That's my line, prince!" There was a terrible red spot spreading on his robe. It somehow was made all the more sickening by the pure white that the rest of the cloth was.

Naomi gulped and ripped off the hem of her own robe. "Let me see that." She was no healer, but she knew that they'd need to apply pressure to the wound and stop the bleeding...

"It's nothing," Elliot protested, "It grazed me. I'm lucky it wasn't bigger." He looked up, letting Naomi take over. She was evidently not going to let this rest and he didn't want to make her angry again. "Did you see where that primate went? We have to go after it." He didn't doubt for a second that killing the giant ape would settle Lord Valoo eventually- it radiated evil like nothing he'd ever seen.

He looked over. The hole in the wall was gaping, but they couldn't reach it from here. There was an enormous pool of lava between them and the wall, with very few safe, rocky platforms scattered throughout it. Once more, Fire Keese hung from the ceiling and Elliot suspected there were Fire Bubbles laying in ambush under the lava. Flying was, yet again, not an option. "Maybe we can get over there," he said, reaching into his pouch of crystals while Naomi tended to him. "Maybe the Ice ChuChu can cool a path for us."

He pulled out a crystal and held it in one hand, focusing on the creature that they had walked alongside before. He heard a slight cracking noise as a chip appeared in the crystal, and from the bottom, thick blue jelly oozed out of it. It pooled on the ground, slowly but surely assuming the form of a blue ChuChu that produced little puffs of cold air whenever it exhaled. Elliot pointed it towards the lava, and it waddled over, looking over the ledge. It didn't seem afraid, at least, and appeared to be waiting for Elliot and Naomi to catch up before it would go down into it.

"Oh, boo," Naomi said flatly, wrapping the cloth around his waist. "Even small wounds can be bad if you leave them alone," She finished as she tightened the makeshift bandage and tied it. "Sorry," she said quietly as she did so.

Still, she was unsure of whether the little ChuChu would be sufficient to clear a path alone. It was certainly willing, if nothing else, as it stood at the very edge of the platform unafraid, bobbing once in a while as the only indication that it still awaiting them.

"Are you really up to it, little guy?" She asked, getting closer to the living blob.

The ChuChu didn't look at them, instead hopping down into the lava when Elliot came closer to it. Truthfully, he was happy that Naomi had bandaged his wound as best she could. He did know how dangerous it was to leave anything untreated, especially with his small frame. Still, he would never admit this to her, his pride probably more wounded than his side. If he got his talons on that stupid ape... if only he had been stronger like his brothers or more magically talented like that sorceress.

He was woken from his ponderings when he saw what the ChuChu was up to. "Whoa whoa! Hold on, buddy! Where are you going?!" The blob of jelly had hopped into the lava and didn't seem to move of its own accord, but it slowly drifted downstream, spinning in place slowly and not trailing the path that Elliot had expected it would. "There's a current!" he realized, "Naomi! Give me a hand here!" He ran over to the jar of water and tried to lift it, despite knowing he needed the other Rito's help. "We need to follow that ChuChu!"

"R-right!"

Naomi hurried over, trying to find a way to grasp the pot. Her hands found the bottom and she lifted with all her might, and with Elliot on the other side the two managed to lift it. They hefted the thing and staggered with it towards the lava, though Naomi grew dizzy at the heat and hesitated as they drew closer to the edge.

"O-okay! On three! One, two..." As she counted, she swung the pot forward and back, building momentum.

"...three!" Elliot finished Naomi's line of thinking, slinging the jar forward with all his might. Upon contact with the lava, it broke open and its cold contents were spilled into the hot substance, instantly hardening it. "Hurry!" he exclaimed, "Before the current takes it out of reach!" Unceremoniously grabbing Naomi's wrist, he leapt onto the rock platform, which started to drift in the same direction as the ChuChu had gotten off to. He looked at the ground beneath him for a few seconds, fearing it would disappear, but it appeared solid enough. For now, at least.

As they drifted, Elliot spotted the ChuChu clinging to a rock formation not far from them. It was a strange sight- the blob had its lower half coiled around an outcropping and looked into the lava as if it was scared to go back down into it. "C'mere boy!" Elliot called, prompting it to look up and hop down, waddling through the lava to get to them and join them on the rock as it flowed slowly towards the opening in the wall that the enormous ape had left through.

They came to a halt against a black, ashen kind of ground, and Elliot sent the ChuChu onto it before he ventured on it, himself. "It's solid," he said to Naomi, holding out a hand to help her step on it as well. "It doesn't look it, but-" he made himself smaller when the ground shook and the entire room started rumbling. When he turned, he heard the screech of a monkey, and...

In the middle of the room stood the monster from before, but now that he was closer, he saw it in its full glory. At least fifteen feet tall, and up close he could see that its skin had a texture akin to that of the ground they stood on. Its eyes glowed like hot coals.... MALICIOUS hot coals. The ChuChu shivered, and Elliot became painfully aware of his lack of weapons and spells. Still, he took a wide stance, knowing that he had found the source. "Infernal beast!" he cried, "I am Elliot of Dragon Roost, and will stop you here!"

Smoldering Primate
Magmape​

"Uh, prince?" Naomi asked, drawing a bead on the monstrous ape. "I don't really disagree, but can we save our lectures for after we've already won this one?"

Magmape, apparently, shared her sentiments. It glared at them, unimpressed, then gave an awful roar that, despite the distance between them, vented a good amount of heat at her. Her eyes narrowed, not only because of the ever-increasing amount of enmity she held for this overgrown chimp, but because the lousy thing's heat burned at her eyes.

"Urgh. Take a breath mint," she grumbled, notching a Chill Seed in her slingshot. She fired straight and in the impact, the organic ammunition promptly burst into a cold blast of air. The roar that escaped the beast's molten lips this time was not a threat; this was a sound of pain. She was glad that she'd filled her pockets with the things...

And then her feelings of appreciation for the little frozen seed were cut off by the loud, angry, burning primate that jumped towards her with speed that caught her off-guard. Before she could react properly, the massive thing was already towering over her.

"I don't think so, ape!" Elliot snapped his fingers and leapt forward, towards the ashen giant, with the Ice ChuChu hopping along next to him as quickly as it could. The ChuChu couldn't reach it quickly enough, so the Rito took a risk and flew up, aiming for Magmape's eyes.

The monster reacted a whole lot more quickly than he had expected, and he had to wheel out of the way before he would be plucked clear out of the air. He avoided the hand, but not the immense gust that was created by the air it displaced, and it took him a few seconds to regain his balance. Magmape reached for him again in his disoriented state, but at exactly the right moment the ChuChu hopped up onto the back of its foot, finally stopping to brace itself for a stronger jump.

Even before it could jump, though, Magmape cried in pain once more and started to shake its foot, apparently strongly disliking the cold that the creature radiated onto its body. The ChuChu interrupted its attempts to headbutt the beast's shin, but somehow managed to stay attached to it. "Amazing," Elliot muttered as he hung still in the air for a few seconds, "Its underside must be stickier than we thought... Naomi!" he called down, "Pop him one while he's distracted!"

"Yeah!" Naomi didn't bother loading her slingshot with the frosty little bullets this time, she just lobbed them at the fiery ape. One from each hand, and both cracked on contact with the lava-skinned monster, the bursts of cold wind meeting hot air with a great whooshing noise, a mighty and pained roar escaping from its mouth amid the din and ripping through the air. There was some amount of mist from the seed's explosion, but after the sounds died down a fist emerged from the smokescreen. It hammered into the ground with a terrifying force, and the room shuddered with the impact.

Naomi, not expecting the force of the shockwave that came her way, was bowled over by it quite readily with a cry. Between the aftershock and the nausea it caused, she needed several seconds to regain her footing, and even then the needles she summoned and slung were badly off-kilter. Her sense of balance hadn't come back yet...

Magmape, meanwhile, paid little if any attention to the pesky weapons. It had, in the confusion, managed to shake off Elliot's Chuchu, and now it glowered at the little white blob with ever-greater vigilance.

The ChuChu flopped about on the ground in front of Magmape, and Elliot looped around to distract him. Summoning a new ChuChu would take too much time, and the little creature was evidently the key to their success here; the ChuChu and Naomi's Chill Seeds. Swooping down, Elliot planned to follow a parabolic path and fly back up, but he realised too late that Magmape was faster than him. The ape's enormous hand came closer to him very quickly and closed around him, lifting him up to the beast's eyes.

For a moment, birdman and gargantuan ape stared each other down, until fear gripped Elliot and he started to struggle. Magmape roared, and Elliot saw that he was raising his arm- Oh god. "Valoo's hooked tail," he muttered, "Don't throw me don't throw me don't throw me-" He threw him. The prince soared through the room for a few seconds, before hitting a stalactite that hung from the ceiling. The impact knocked it loose, and while Elliot managed to put his wings out and break his fall before it was too late, the stalactite hit Magmape right in the neck as it turned around to find the annoying Ice Chu again.

Magmape howled in pain as the mass of rock crashed into it. The roar was deafening, extending for several seconds. Naomi clutched her head and covered her ears in pain, head still spinning from her earlier tumble. Though the noise echoed and reverberated in a terrible crescendo, she welcomed the reprieve. She still needed to recover from the last shockwave.

When the anguished sound finally stopped, she looked again at the great fiery ape. There was pure hatred in its eyes. It roared again, this time the sound leaving no doubt: the beast was angry. With a frightening crack, molten veins appeared on its skin. As it screeched, flames sprouted from its neck, its ankles, its wrists. It swung at nothing, pounded the floor like drums.

Terrifyingly, the stone began to give way. Under the stress several seams opened, and magma glowed hot and vengeful below them.

Naomi nervously readied another seed.

And Magmape thrust its hands into a pool that it had created.

For a tense moment there was silence as the two took aim.

Then lava and frost alike flew. Naomi channeled all her energy into her legs, and beat her wings to give her force. A curtain of lava and embers showered the space she once occupied. Magmape, too, leapt from its lava pond, but to its surprise none of the painful cold came.

Naomi had tricked it.

Instead, the seed flew in an arc, and landed in the Chu's waiting mouth.

Elliot, the Chu, maybe even Magmape itself; it was as though everyone held his breath, waiting to see what would happen when the Chu opened its mouth again. The blob of jelly mostly looked confused, but then its eyes started to roll in its head and it leaned forward, opening its mouth and exhaling in Magmape's direction. Now, Elliot had noted before that when the Chu exhaled, it produced little puffs of air. Apparently, the Chill Seed had done something funny with its insides, though, as what came out now wasn't a little puff, but an outright cloud of frigid air, hurling towards Magmape and grabbing hold of its legs.

The ape screeched loudly, its voice booming through the room and shaking the walls as well as Elliot's eardrums, as it stomped on the ground to rid itself of the pain. Elliot remained airborne and watched as the Chu toppled over, turning into a puddle of goo and stopping moving. "Thank you," he muttered. He had no more ice to hurl at the giant primate, but he had now seen that the stalagmites hanging from the ceiling hurt it as well. That gave him an idea. "Naomi!" he called, "Keep that glove ready! I have an idea!" With that, he looped around, hoping to build momentum as he flew towards the nearest stalagmite. He flew into it as hard as he could, and while he groaned at the impact to his shoulder, this time the rock came loose, too, falling. "Knock it into him!" he shouted, "Quickly!"

Looking up, Naomi was at first deeply confused and then felt a sense of dread. She was still a bit stunned from the Chu's reaction. She had expected something, yes, but nothing so... explosive.

After shaking off her momentary daze, she jumped in the air and then grasped a falling stone with the help of the gauntlet. She levitated with it for a moment, getting her bearings and making some quick and dirty decisions on how best to use this thing. It might make for a nice ride, come to think of it, if it weren't for the certain death currently looming over them.

Magmape was mad. It had no love of these wretched winged things who had burst into its home and assaulted it, and it made its displeasure known loudly.

"Come and get me!" shouted the Rito, a note of challenge in her voice. With that, it began charging, and she swiped downwards.

She rose quickly into the air and the rocky projectile descended just as quickly. It collided with the molten menace's head, making a fierce cracking noise. Naomi watched carefully, trying to know what sort of damage that had done...

Magmape roared, jumping up and down and punching the ground repeatedly, finally creating larger holes in the stone ground and sending lava splashing out of them as he kept punching. The tantrum could only mean that he was in great pain, and Elliot nodded in satisfaction. "Naomi!" he called, "I think this is our best bet for now! What we have to do is keep using stalactites and other large objects, along with that gauntlet of yours, until he stops moving!" He was just about to ask if she was prepared to try and ram one through its eyes into its brain, or into its heart, when he felt a fist connecting with him and sending him reeling once more.

This time, he landed against the nearby wall, knocking the wind out of him. He tried to break the impact with his arm, but all he achieved was that that arm produced a sickening cracking noise, and he fell to the floor, groaning. With only one arm, he could no longer fly and knock down heavy projectiles for Naomi to use. To make matters worse, when his sight cleared up and he looked at Magmape, he saw the beast had gathered up another scoop of lava, and had brought his hand up to throw it at him. "I'll distract him," he said, forcing himself to stand up, "Use everything you can get your hands on..."

Getting up, he threw himself to a side to dodge the lava tossed at him, hoping and praying they were about to reach the final stretch of the battle. It was when he fell to his knees, his head spinning, that he realised something was wrong. Was it just him... or was the temperature in this room rising rapidly?

Naomi fired chill seeds at the stalactites directly above the ape. Heat plus cold made things brittle... right? The pointed bits of rock shuddered and cracked.

Naomi chose now to fire another volley of them, some at a different trajectory altogether. As the stalactites rumbled ponderously and finally fell, Magmape looked up in time to catch a face full of rocks. Or rather, it would have had its instincts not inspired it to step back as it did so; the stalactites left large cuts and scrapes trailing up and down its head, but it was not the killing blow Naomi had hoped for. Magmape turned and roared, ready to charge.

But Naomi had been one step ahead. She launched the Fist of Pacci and caught the second salvo of chill seeds mid-air, propelling them straight into the side of the beast's head. Simultaneously, she flew towards her comrade at great speed.

As she hit the ground with a thud, she faintly recognized the sound of Magmape's displeasure. "Still alive, prince?" She asked distractedly. Truthfully, she wasn't in great condition herself; she was used to flying or climbing, but not being flung; she had been exposed to so many screams her ears were ringing; and the heat was making her disoriented at best. She wasn't sure how long she could keep up the assault. Still, she offered a hand to her fellow Rito while never taking her eyes off the rampaging creature before her.

"I'll live," Elliot said, not willing to tell her in detail that his arm was broken in at least one, maybe two places, and he gritted his teeth as the pain made him want to gasp every other breath, making it hard to talk. He looked at Magmape, his sight a bit blurry; but was it because of the pain or because of the sweltering heat? Still, he could see that the massive primate had one eye firmly shut, either in pain or frozen shut. "...Naomi..." Elliot said as he got back to his feet, "Do you think you could do that again, this time with the other eye?"

They would have a distinct advantage if they could blind it fully. Yes, the beast was enormous and powerful, but if it swung its arms and threw its lava blindly, they could dodge more easily and catch it by surprise with their own attacks. The temperature kept rising, however, and Elliot now became really worried. "Make it quick... I think we have a problem."

He didn't say it, but it was obvious enough he was struggling. She took a few seeds from her pouch and pressed them into his hand. "In case something happens," she said simply. It wouldn't be enough to beat Magmape, but if things got ugly, maybe it would let him get away.

As for whether she could do it again... she didn't know. This thing would definitely be on guard. Even if it weren't a sensible assumption it was plainly visible that it was learning from its mistakes. It had shifted its head slightly to account for the loss of its eye, and it circled them watching for them to drop their guards. As it did so it started opening up more lava pools, specifically to have them around.

Yes, it was definitely showing more intelligence than she either gave credit for or wanted it to have. She took a deep breath and took her slingshot in hand. She leapt into the air, firing a first, probing shot from above. He answered in kind with a fistful of magma, whizzing past her with a seething air temperature following. It looked like Magmape hadn't yet adjusted its depth perception... it was good that she was able to press her advantage now, then. She summoned and threw needles quickly, forcing it to defend itself. It wasn't intended to do damage, only to create an opening. One chill seed caught the beast in its chest. The massive primate roared once more and rushed. She hurled herself to the side...

Only to be blocked by solid rock. She turned to find a mass of rocks had fallen from the ceiling, weakened by the lava spray and shaken loose by the reverberations of the chamber.

Had that overgrown monkey... planned this?! She stumbled over herself trying to get to safe ground, and found the fiery monster towering over her. Its arms slowly came up and clasped together, preparing to strike downwards. In that moment, she could have sworn time slowed down. She could feel her heart's beating vibrating throughout her whole chest. She could hear the sound of her own labored breathing and her rushing blood as if they were the only sounds in the world. She brought up her own slingshot, the movement lasting an agonizing eternity before she was pointing where she wanted to. If she missed, it was over. All those thoughts and sensations happened before she was fully conscious of it, and so too did she fire before her mind could process it completely.

Distantly she registered a vast rumbling, a mighty vibration that left her ears ringing and her head spinning, her senses momentarily failing her and resigning to an unmitigated numbness. Was this what it was like to die?

But after a few moments she realized foggily that she was still breathing. It took her even longer to connect this to the idea that she was still alive.

That was an epic shot.

And it had been dead on.

Magmape roared in pain, grabbed its head and began to stampede around. With every step he took, more of its ashen skin seemed to fall off, landing in the lava with small splashes. It stopped, turning around to seemingly listen for the two Ritos, and turned its face upwards when a terrifying sound cut through the area. Lord Valoo. The Dragon, above them, gave a mighty roar and shook the caverns once more, causing the floor to finally give way and fall apart. Elliot gathered his strength and ran towards Naomi, the ground disappearing behind him, and as he reached her, he shoved her onto a part of the floor that had a slightly different colour and was unharmed.

Now that they were both safe and wouldn't drown in lava, he looked around. Other than a few patches like the one they were sitting on, the floor was gone, replaced by a pool of lava that Magmape waded around in. The primate's form was even more terrifying than it had been prior to this. Instead of its ashen, rock-like skin from before, it had revealed its true form to be that of a being made entirely out of lava. Small wonder he could move around in it freely, Elliot thought. The cavern shook again, and he groaned in frustration. This was it, he knew- the final stretch. Valoo was either enraged or rooting for them; whichever it was, it made the arena even more dangerous than it would have been normally, and to make matters worse, Magmape would do anything in its power to destroy the two Ritos.

But with its lava skin exposed, Elliot realised, he was also a lot more vulnerable. "Naomi," he said, shaking the female, "Naomi, get up. I have a plan, but we have to execute it swiftly and flawlessly." With that, he bent down, quickly whispering his plan into her ear as the heat sweltered. By now, he was certain of what was causing it.

It wasn't that the temperature kept rising. The caverns had always been this hot. But their protection was running out. Veran's enchantment on them was fading.

Naomi needed a few moments to get over the shell-shock. Her head was still spinning and every part of her body shook and trembled against her will. She could almost hear Elliot's voice, but that couldn't have been it, not with the things he was saying. She looked over to see Elliot actually there, and she could only stare blankly at him for a second. Maybe she wasn't okay. Maybe she had actually been hit and was hearing things. She pinched herself to confirm that this was not some manner of dying dream, then, finally, answered. "You want me to what?"

This plan would have been intriguing if it hadn't been so horrifying. She tried to protest to it but before she could get far in her attempts the words died her throat. His eyes let her know he wasn't going to be dissuaded from this. She shook her head in resignation. "Please try to come up with something else," she asked him. She could tell from the arena and the seething air that they were running out of time, but... she'd have to buy as much as she could. Magmape wasn't attacking them, which amazed her... until she realized what it was doing. It no longer had its eyesight, so it was listening intently among the chaos. Clever creature...

She held a finger to her lip as she crept around, trying to put some distance between her and the lava beast. Then, she played the Elegy of Emptiness as quietly as she could. She moved away and threw a slicker at it, covering the resulting statue in oil. Magmape began skulking nearer, having heard something. Naomi tried her hardest to muffle her movements, sneaking past Magmape. She stopped moving when he got close. For a terrifying moment, he sniffed the air in her direction... then kept moving towards the statue. Naomi waited a bit, then put more distance between her and the monster before playing the song again.

This time, Magmape did not wait. He charged. It was certain now that there was something sneaking around. Its charge was in the general direction of the interloper, using the echoes to pinpoint it. And then something hard connected with its back. Magmape was dreadfully confused about this, since it was neither as hard as the rocks in its home nor as cold as the other projectiles it had been attacked with.

In truth, just as Magmape's charge was a feint, this was a part of the plan. Naomi wanted a distraction, and had used the Fist of Pacci to rotate the first statue into it. It shortly burst into flames, the sensation further confusing the ape, but doing no real damage. It roared and leapt from the rock into the lava... causing a small wave of the stuff to arise. She got ready to fly... and then stopped. Elliot was still wounded! She rushed over to him, and tossed up a chill seed as high as she could. "Hang on, prince!" She grabbed him around the waist with one arm and caught the Chill seed with the Fist. Then she swung them above the wave, but the seed was lost shortly after. They dropped back down with a thud. Meanwhile, Magmape had clambered back onto the platform and beat its chest victoriously; it had heard the sounds of something being hit by the wave and its summary destruction. Not... quite how she had wanted to use the statue, but it would have to do.

"I hope you've got something, Prince..." she said, pointing out the massive foe's distraction.