Kieran

  Once Marissa consented to the fight, [áine] did a quick swirl in midair. “Great! Let’s get more toward the center of the room before we start.”

  As the [Queen of the Fae] moved toward the center area of the room, the party followed.

  “What do we think we should expect?” Firo asked.

  “My assumption is the beginning will be classic stuff, right?” Ash offered, “Big AoE, some fairly normal hits, and maybe a simple intro mechanic or two?”

  “It does feel like áine is set up to test us a bit at first, so I don’t think she’ll come out of the gate swinging.” Evie said.

  “I don’t trust it.” Evan said. “I’ll keep my guard up as much as I can. Don’t wanna die too fast.”

  “Says the crazy man who will undoubtedly start fishing for Perfect Blocks thirty seconds in.” Kieran chuckled.

  “Bold of you to assume we’ll make it thirty seconds.” Marissa said.

  “Come on. Unless we wipe to a full party AoE, two rezzes should get us through thirty seconds.” Ash said.

  “And I think you’re being optimistic. You saw what she did to that tree.” Firo said.

  Kieran just laughed at that, as did a few of the others.

  “I’m gonna Perfect Block that beam, just you wait.”

  “I want to see that shit just punch straight through you, Fiona, not gonna lie.” Nyx said. “I think it’d be hilarious.”

  “Then I’ll make sure when I see her prepping it to be in front of you, Nyx. We’ll have to see how many bodies it takes to stop it.”

  Nyx snorted, but bit back her retort when [áine] turned around to face the party.

  “Right then.” The Queen said, holding her hand out in front of her. Silvery light flashed around her palm, sparks flying every which way. Then, suddenly, she was holding a brilliant, marble-white staff. The top bloomed into a bright red flower, despite the staff itself clearly not being made of living material. It was still a very awe-inspiring weapon, though.

  [áine] grinned widely again, showing off her predatory smile from earlier that would no doubt turn stomachs if it were real. “We can begin when you’re ready.”

  [áine, Queen of the Seelie Court] appeared over her head, along with her HP bar, denoting her status as an actionable boss.

  “Here we go.”

  “Pulling,” Evan said, and the fight began.

  No one pulled any punches right from the start. Caoimhe used [Driver] to close the distance to [áine] immediately, and begin rotating through the [Tyrant] opener, utilizing [Knock Down] and [Wild Swing] to get the improved [Punishments] out as quickly as possible under the buffs that Mellody offered at the beginning of fights.

  As Kieran had more or less expected, the [Knockdown] effect was lessened on [áine]. She gained the status [Off-Balance] momentarily, which still allowed Caoimhe to get the bonus damage from [Punishment], but [áine] was quick to right herself in the air.

  And she was moving about untethered from the start. As soon as Fiona had made her opening move, [áine] had opened up her own offensive. The marble staff had crashed against Fiona’s shield twice, leaving behind a mark but not enough damage to be significant.

  [áine] didn’t seem bothered though. She abandoned her physical attacks pretty quickly, opting to throw magic at Fiona instead.

  [Nature Magic] was given the nature name, but the magic it consisted of was far closer to elementalism than just nature. While it did also encompass plenty of nature-y spells that made use of plants, vines, and the like, that was just one niche among the other elements. Fire, water, ice, lightning, earth, air and other elemental effects were all included under the [Nature] heading. And while [Arcane] magic seemed to be canonically the most outright destructive, [Nature] was no slouch in that regard.

  [áine’s] opening magical volley started with what Kieran considered small. Vines appeared, and struck at the party. Several small ones were concentrated on Fiona, which Kieran was sure was meant to be the stand in for [áine’s] basic attacks. But much larger vines also appeared, targeting the rest of the party with both line and cone AoEs as well.

  They were clearly marked with warnings on the ground, and the party adjusted accordingly. Thankfully, in the fairly large grassy room, they had plenty of room to maneuver. The vines slammed down on the ground or swept across it, depending on which AoE they performed, and then withered away back into the ground.

  “Not bad, not bad!” [áine] called, sounding like she was excited, but still yet to be fully engaged in the fight yet. It was a clear sign that she was far from actually getting going, in Kieran’s mind.

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  “That was easier than expected.” Firo said.

  “Firo! Bro, you have to stop jinxing us, dude.” Evan said, making sure that Fiona continued to block any and all incoming attacks. Nothing stood out as particularly dangerous yet, however. “Besides, we did expect her to kinda warm up as the fight went on, didn’t we?”

  “True.” Firo said. Before he could continue though, [áine] was already preparing for her next big attack. She was clearly casting a spell, but Mag Mell didn’t show cast bars or spell names for spells that enemies were casting beforehand. Different spells did often have different effects while being cast, so they were meant to act as tells for what was coming.

  Of course, that wasn’t always fool proof, as many fire spells were only subtly different from each other. For example, the basic [Fireball] spell had flames and embers flying from the caster’s body, while the [Flame Lance] spell looked nearly identical, except the ember effects flew off at a different angle.

  Thankfully, most spells that bosses utilized were designed to look different from one another, as the spell casting animations were used very distinctly as the tell, no different from a warrior winding up to swing with a weapon.

  [áine’s] first big casting animation consisted of winds whipping about her, sending her dress rippling while leaves gathered in the winds as well. The effect was commonly used for wind related spells that were either a point-blank AoE or a donut Aoe, with the safezone in the middle, depending on how large the tornado that was about to occur would be.

  As was fairly standard procedure for such mechanics, the party moved to a middle ground, just outside of average melee range. The point-blank AoEs and donut AoEs were fairly standardly sized across most fights in the game. Point blanks would usually reach to the edge of what most melee classes could reach, just barely stopping their uptime, unless it was a [Dedication] like [Tyrant] or [Glaive], which had longer weapons, and therefore reach.

  In reverse, most donut AoEs were the inverse, requiring most ranged classes to come into melee range to be safe. This dichotomy made the most common tactic for party members to stand around that dividing line to react quickly depending on the AoE markers that usually announced which AoE was coming.

  And, as expected, when the larger donut AoE flashed, the whole party stepped inward, mostly on instinct. Then the red coloring on the floor that marked the danger zone flashed again, which was unusual. Kieran eyed it warily, and considered the strange behavior for just a moment, before opting to step back out of what was clearly marked as the safe zone.

  Kieran wasn’t the only one that second guessed the AoE either. He saw Nyx, Evie, Firo and Mellody all step back into what was marked clearly as the danger zone.

  Until it wasn’t.

  Right before the AoE actually went off, the safe zone and danger zone swapped, and a tornado whipped up right around the boss, catching Fiona, Aleister, and Bisky in the damage. Thankfully, they all survived, but they also all received a debuff. Kieran sent Caoimhe back into melee range to re-engage with [áine] as the Queen laughed.

  “Tricked you, did I?” She said, her voice light with amusement. “There’s more where that came from! I hope you’re prepared!”

  “Befuddled,” Evie read, as she examined the debuff that those hit by the tornado had received. “Having been tricked once already, you are at risk of being tricked again. [áine’s] tricks are harder for you to see though.”

  “Oh. That’s just great.” Marissa said flatly.

  “Okay, so everyone else saw the weird flicking effect on the AoE marker last time?” Kieran asked. “I wasn’t sure about it, but I guess that’s probably the tell for the fake AoE?”

  “I noticed the marker flicker, yeah.” Nyx said. “And I just generally don’t trust a Fae boss, so…”

  “Same,” Ash said. “I guess that’s something we need to watch for.”

  The real question will be how that interacts with the safe spots. Will they always be an inverse?” Marissa asked. “And for that matter, what does the debuff do?”

  “I bet you won’t get the tell on the AoE anymore.” Firo said. “We’re going to have to warn you verbally.”

  “That tracks.”

  “And it looks like the debuff stacks.” Evie said, and sure enough, there was a little “1” attached to the debuff symbol, which usually meant exactly that. “Be careful, because I can only assume that more stacks will eventually make the fight impossible.”

  “We’re going to need to be sure that we manage them, then, yeah.” Evan said. “They have a duration, so we’ll need to fight to make sure we don’t refresh the timer with more.”

  “Great.” Marissa said.

  As the party repositioned themselves in their normal spots - how they typically felt the most safe - [áine] was moving into her next spell. This time, rather than the wind or flames, there was a cold looking wind coming off of her, as well as a bit of ice beginning to coat the ground under where she was hovering.

  “Ice spell. Still no AoE marker.” Evan declared.

  “Yup. Be ready.” Ash said, as if that was somehow helpful.

  Kieran kept moving through Caoimhe’s rotation until there were signs of danger. Cast times for bosses typically varied a lot, but the longer cast times on mechanics usually meant they were more dangerous ones. And when Caoimhe was able to make it through three more skills before any AoEs appeared, Kieran was on high alert.

  Then the entire room - including the walls - flashed red with danger.

  “Uh.”

  “Any plans?” Kieran asked.

  “Nope. Shields.” Evie said, as she was clearly focused on applying some hefty shields to the party, hoping to mitigate whatever was coming.

  Mellody, too, was trying to apply what little she had in the way of party shielding, while Aleister and Fiona both threw up the party mitigation skills they had.

  When the attack went out, the damage was fairly minimal, leaving everyone hovering around 8,000 HP after all the shields and mit. As it was, the attack was probably pretty dangerous if they took it unprepared, but with the skills used, it really only tickled.

  The bigger issue, however, was that the entire courtyard was now covered in ice. Icy floors were a common enough thing in Mag Mell that everyone was prepared for it, and stood still while continuing their rotations for the moment. Traditionally, if they moved, the character would slide for a ways before being able to stop or correct their direction. It made for very awkward movement while the floor was icy.

  Nyx suddenly vanished from her spot and reappeared behind Caoimhe in an instant, while continuing her attacks. “It’s lesser ice,” she said, sounding relieved. And while no one said anything, Kieran was sure the party was all inwardly sighing the same way he was.

  Icy floors in Mag Mell functioned in one of two ways, which the player base had decided to refer to as lesser or greater ice. Lesser ice allowed for precise movement skills to be used without carrying the character forward with momentum, allowing for repositioning through skills like [Shadow Slip]. Greater ice would’ve sent Nyx continuing to slide well past Caoimhe’s back, as if she had moved to that spot normally.

  Lesser icy floors were far easier to deal with, especially when Kieran had no doubts that more interesting mechanics were about to be coming their way.

  And moments later, [áine] lifted her staff in the air without a cast time, and vines appeared around the area again, as she performed the same attack pattern that she had opened with. Just with the added complexity of the ice floors.

  “Y’all know the drill here. Be careful of sliding.” Ash called out, while Kieran was mentally trying to decide where he should go for safety as soon as the danger markers popped up from the vines.

  As he was about to pick his direction and slide toward what he hoped would be safety, he saw the danger zones fuzz in the same way the tornado AoE had done.

  “Fuck, they’re fake.” Evan said, before Kieran actually got a word out.

  Unfortunately, many of their party members had already committed to their safe zones and were slipping across the ice. Kieran, potentially saved by his slightly longer decision making, recalculated the danger zones by swapping the cones for lines and the lines for cones in his head. Thankfully, the directions of the vine’s attacks seemed to match with the way their bodies were tilted, so he didn’t think the directionals were fake.

  With a deep breath, he committed and flung Caoimhe to where he hoped would be safe. He let out a heavy breath when the AoEs all swapped and the two lines that had been crossed over where Caoimhe stood suddenly became safe as the cones stopped before reaching where she stood.

  When the attacks went out, he glanced up at the party list to see who all got hit. It seemed that almost everyone either committed early enough that they had time to course correct after their first sliding stopped, or they had waited before moving like he had.

  Aleister, Bisky, and Firo were the ones that had gotten hit.

  “Oh, what the fuck is this?” Jazz said. Marisa was just laughing.

  “What is - oh.” Ash began, but interrupted himself with laughter. “That’s fucking hilarious.”

  “What is it?” Evie asked.

  “I see eight áines on Aleister’s screen.” Ash said. Kieran could hear Jazz flipping out through Ash’s mic, but she must have muted her own mic because nothing was coming through on her end as she was cursing up a storm.

  Marissa, for her part, was just laughing, while continuing to attack the boss. “Oh, my, god. If she does something where she flips positions with a party member and makes us target her, this would be hilarious.” She said, struggling to keep herself under control.

  “I guess that’s the two stack effect of Befuddled?” Evie said, trying to get everyone back up to full HP after the vines.

  “Guess so.” Ash said through some chuckling. “Oh man, this is going to be a fun one, I can feel it.”

  “And that’s just two stacks?” Firo asked, as [áine] ignored the incoming attacks from the party in favor of casting a new spell. The spell effects looked similar to something being cast from the [Shadow Magic] type, with wispy, smokey effects, except they weren’t the dark purples and blacks associated with that branch of magic - instead, they were a soft white-silver.

  “Focus up, focus up.” Ash called, but Marissa was struggling to get her giggles under control. Jazz was still muttering in the background of Ash’s mic, but seemed to be mostly prepared to face whatever was next, as Aleister was tracking [áine’s] movements perfectly well, and attacking like normal.

  When [áine] finished her spell, she vanished. It was functionally only a short range teleport, which got her out of range of the melee DPS, but the secondary effect was the real issue; there were suddenly four of the Queen in various places around the battlefield, and that was before accounting for the party members who saw everyone else as [áine] as well.

  Marissa burst into a fresh bout of giggles, and Kieran wasn’t sure if she genuinely found this hilarious, or was just unable to get herself under control.

  [áine] and her three illusory copies all began casting a lightning spell, as evidenced by the electricity arcing off their bodies. From where Kieran stood, he couldn’t tell a difference between the original and the three copies.

  “I bet we need to stop this cast.” Nyx said quickly, [Sprinting] toward the nearest [áine]. “We need to find the original quickly.”

  “On it,” Kieran said, sprinting in a different direction. The party shifted focus to trying to deal with the copies, with the group separating to try and find the original.

  Nyx reached her target first, and swung at it a few times, declaring, “This isn’t the original! The HP is going down too quickly,” and quickly moved toward another target.

  Caoimhe closed the distance to her chosen [áine] with [Driver] and swung a few skills into her as well. The damage was adding up, with [Driver], [Knock Down], and [Punishment] quickly knocking off around 15% of the copy’s HP.

  “Not this one either.” Kieran said, moving toward another.

  “South!” Evan shouted, and the whole party moved to converge on the southern [áine], who was not taking nearly as much damage from the attacks.

  “Gotcha.” [áine’s] line displayed in a special text box usually reserved for special messages during big fights, and was accompanied by an overly saccharine performance of the voice line, as she and all her copies let the spell fly.

  “Oh no.”

  The lightning blast each targeted the nearest player before chaining to the next. And with more than one chain blasting around the party, they were decimated in seconds.

  “Gotta love chain lightning.” Evan sighed as the party laid on the ground around the arena, dead.

  “Do I though?” Nyx asked, her voice dripping with sarcasm, “Do I really?”