The Equestrian Gourmet

by Gamel_Lightshow

Boss Fight!

Richard can only stare in awe as the giant blackened tree uproots itself in the center of the jungle like cave. The bark cracks open revealing a gaping black maw behind bark sharped and made like teeth. Eyes snap open revealing blackness illuminated by several yellow lights that lock onto the duo. Roots of various textures and sizes rip themselves from the earth as fruits fall from the giant dead tree top. The fruit all have various different effects from the explosion to summoning smaller versions of it that proceed to make their way to the duo. The blacked Trees roars making the two clutch their ears.

Other than the creatures being summoned by the fruit, there doesn't seem to be anything else here ready to attack the two. Above the trees seems to be a hole that allows for natural light to come in and blend with the glow that some of the mushrooms give off from both the ceiling and floor. Said Mushrooms are much bigger than their tunnel brethren alas there don't seem to be any giant version of the exploding mushrooms in here.

The scene would be beautiful if it wasn't for the dark creature at its center drooling green between its top row and bottom row of its "teeth".

Richard reaches into his inventory and grabs some of the smaller version of the exploding mushrooms to prepare himself for fighting. He proceeds to use his [Green Thumb] to speed up the growing process of the exploding mushrooms while looking towards Blake who seems to be looking on in disbelief. The look of disbelief is quickly replaced by a smile that only continues to grow the more he steps into the room. Blake chuckles to himself as he pulls from his own inventory a brown bowl filled with a brown and red liquid substance.

He tosses the bowl back before tossing it aside. Richard watches as the buffs from his soup begin to take effect. They're nothing too special as they have limited ingredients around, but they both hope for a quick fight. The mushrooms are great for increasing the attack stat, but not much of anything else which means they can't prolong this fight if they want to survive and defeat this thing. The once happy smile has grown into that of a maniac's smile meaning that this fight is going to be anything but short.

Thankfully they managed to heal up a good bit before coming in, thanks to equipment left by the dead, but it wasn't enough to put them back on top. The wounded stat is still there meaning they would need actual professional care. The wounded effect isn't that much of a hindrance for the two as they rely on more tactics than brute strength. They also have to take into account that their health can't reach its maximum value as they are right now. Therefore they would have to be careful and not do anything crazy.

As Blake proceeds to do something crazy.

"W-Wait Blake thi-" Richard says already knowing what the battled minded boy was thinking before he even moves.

Blake proceeds to laugh as some of the non-possessed trees proceed to uproot themselves at the command of their new master. He then proceeds to summon forth armor made of bark to surrounded his body as he walks menacingly towards the boss of the dungeon. Its name becomes clear as he approaches.

(Heart of the Forest)

Blake sends forth a volley of vines crashing into roots at the same time tying up the summoned dark treants. Blake laughs like he's on top of the world as he approaches the behemoth that shadows the two. The creature has to be at least 30 feet high and could probably kill them with a single strike. Yet here he is laughing in the face of danger.

Richard can only sigh as he too proceeds to move into the skirmish not too sure what he should quite be doing in all of this now. He never once though in his short life that he would be running into battle to what might be his death. He supposes the only thing left would be finding out what death is like. Or if they can actually die. Though he would rather avoid that altogether if possible. Leave that exploration to the more adventurous souls.

Blake grabs ahold of a root and climbs it with ease before running towards the trunk kicking, punching, and biting his way through the hoard of creatures being summoned by the Boss. Richard chuckles seeing that at least he's putting the attack boost to work as the friendly treants make short work of their corrupted brethren. And on top of everything, they are getting a steady stream of XP from every creature defeated. But the big gain is the boss.

Richard watches as hands reach out of the front of the boss to stop Blake's path. Blake reaches into his inventory and pulls out their secret weapon. A red glowing stick.

"Take this!" Blake yells slamming the stick into one of the hands causing it to burst into flames.

Richard smiles as the Tree roars in pain while the status effect burning appears next to its name. Richard hadn't known if this would work, but it seems only natural that Blake can wield nature as a weapon. In the loot they found earlier, they broke apart what looked to be a woodcutter's ax in order to classify it as a stick. Richard than enchanted the stick with fire meaning that the stick now has a fiery temper that matches its owner.

Richard moves out of the way as a darker treant roar before swiping at him. Richard focuses back on to his task in all of this making sure to avoid larger groups of the creatures all while dropping shrooms wherever he goes but making sure he has enough for the finisher. The tree isn't too far away from the entrance, but Richard has only half of Blake speed. Fatigue would eventually catch Richard before Blake.

Nevertheless, the plan must go off without a hitch to really chunk it. Or at least that's what the idea was.

Richard stops as he watches Blake lift the stick high above his head and shoves it into the Root of the tree below it. Fire proceeds to spread throughout it causing it to roar and send several vines after Blake. They find their mark and yank the boy from the stick before flinging him across the room in Richard's direction. Blake skips across the ground into a tree which makes Richard change course while glancing back at the beast. It desperately tries to pull out the stick but finds it embedded too deep like a splinter.

The irony isn't lost on Richard one bit as he helps Blake back up to his wobbly feet.

"You good?"

"Y-Yeah! I've got my blood pumping real good! I wanna know what its insides look like!" Blake says he eyes have a faint tint of red to them.

"Y-Yeah? W-Well we should stay focus for a second. Richard says doing his best to turn the boy's eyes away from the beast, "We're going to need to change our plan. There's no way I'll be able to get close enough to throw the shrooms in. So we're going to chip away at it as you did before. But we're going to need a lot of sticks for you to wield."

"Done!" Blake states finding his second wind quite easily.

Blake attempts to take off but Richard cuts him off quickly, "Nope nope listen. Look at me not them. When I say sticks, I mean small ones like the one before. And I need LOTS of them. I know you want to make this a huge fight, but for both of us please please try to keep in mind that I value my peaceful life more than this fight. Okay?"

Blake focuses on the conversation eagerly and nods his head growing a more serious look on his face, "Yeah. I got it. I won't take long to do what I can."

"Good. Go get em, tiger."

"I'm a buck." Blake says taking off.

Richard rubs the bridge of his nose and exhales before turning back to the tree that seems to have given up on the task of removing its ailment and proceeds to focus on attacking them in the form of more creatures and vines. Richard pulls out some shrooms and tosses them forward causing a chain reaction of explosions around the front end of the tree and in areas that the enemy crosses. Richard moves away as the vines search out for him.

As he moves about he lets Blake know where he is every so often to allow him to bring him sticks to enchant.

"This plan seemed a lot better in my head..." Richard says panting watching as a Blake treant tackles a darker treant.

"That's why we shouldn't think but just act!" Blake states stuffing another fire enchanted stick under his arm.

They quickly move out of the way of more vines that separate the two. Blake quickly tears his vines apparent while Richard drops to the ground to move out of the way of their grasp.

"Gods above why me..." Richard breathes out getting back up and moving away with Blake, "Blake just go for it! That should be enough."

Blake acknowledges the command by running past the vines towards the tree. He moves effortlessly around the darker treants while keeping his eyes on his main target. He jumps into the air as roots attempt to entangle him to the spot as he gets closer to its trunk and main roots. Hand of wood and leaves once again attempt to stop him to only find sticks slammed into them igniting them with fire causing the beast to attempt to move away from Blake and its imminent destruction.

Blake slams the sticks as hard as he can into the base of the tree causing a fire to come out of the beast's mouth. He writhes and attempts to put out the fire inside of it unsuccessfully. Soon everything goes quiet as the shadow creature bursts and forms a spiraling circle of blackness. The darker treants wilt and proceed to die off as their master is now dead.

Richard limps over to Blake as he looks into the spiraling void of darkness before them.

"What now?" Blake asks dropping the last few sticks they didn't need to kill the beast.

"I'm... not sure actually. We sho-"

Blake reaches out and touches the circle causing Richard's eyes to go wide. Instead of something horrible having, the darkness turns white and blinks out of existence before a message appears.

[Dungeon Cleared]

They both blink and find themselves back outside the cave with a timer telling them that the dungeon will safely reset after a week. The two look at one another and can only drop to their knees exhausted and ready to return home victorious.

Author's Note:

Richard: level 21 1: Create Cooking Fire, 5: Green Thumb, 10: Enchant With Fire, 15: Summon cookery, 20: Locate,

Blake: level 18 1: Vines 5: Bark Armor 10: Summon Treant, 15: Grow