[center][h1][color=00aeef]Link[/color][/h1][/center]

[center]Word Count: 979 [/center]

[center][color=00aeef][b] Level 8[/b] [/color] - (05/80) + 4[/center]

[center]Location: Carcass Island ~ Kosm's Beach[/center]
[@DracoLunaris][@Archmage MC]
[hr][hr]

The only reason that a scream of frustration didn't explode out of his mouth was that his throat was already spent from the first one. 

The second that he had seen Sakura's shoe blow through that monster's skull it was as though the weight of the world had been lifted off his shoulders. It was dead. Gone. Crumpled into ash and carried away by the surf. It, and the profound danger it presented to everyone around him, had finally come to an end. He didn't feel any exhilaration in the victory. Fear and fatigue had sapped the celebratory spirit from him, and he knew that back the way they had come was an army of monsters who had been praying to the creature they had just destroyed. It would be a hard fought battle back to their little airship. For now, at least for now though, they were safe.

It was Ms. Fortune that alerted him to how wrong he was, and he really should have noticed it sooner. According to what Linkle had told him, something was supposed to happen when The Guardian died. He had never seen what it looked like, but she had described it as a wave of darkness. He had seen its after effects though. It had to have been what had transformed the black void where they had done battle with the Dragon into the beautiful and serene Eryth Sea. Not only that, but she was right. They couldn't see the spirit of the creature anywhere.

What they could see were the changes that began to take place on this impossible beach. Gravity went haywire, bodies and liquid lifting into the air, and from the beach itself a black liquid started rising from the ground to consume the rocks and corpses not lucky enough to be lifted up. Link knelt down as he watched, gingerly lifting the nearby Junior up out of the surf as the liquid spread. Far from the clear water and floating islands, the defeat of the Guardian had made the island more treacherous instead of less. Things began to rise from the liquid, things that couldn't possibly have been just hiding under the sand. Boat's and debris he could believe, but when the roofs of buildings began rising out of the soup he was convinced that something even stranger was going on.

The cause of all this was apparent as soon as it stepped out of the thickening fog. A colossal beast stood there out in the surf, focusing on them with a single eye. There wasn't any doubt in Link's mind about what it was. Just like with Bowser, when they had knocked it down it had just risen again. Stronger. More adult than it was before. Less one head, thankfully, but not dead. He wondered whether or not the thing was an adult yet, or if it still had a ways to go?

How many times were they going to have to kill this thing? It had taken everything they had just to keep up with it until now! The feeling of that relief being ripped away was like having his legs torn off. 

Then it took one slow, ponderous step toward them and far from being intimidated he felt his spirits lift just a little bit. "At least we finally slowed it down," he breathed out, giving a quick look around at anyone who couldn't glide across the tar. The Kid was still with the Cadet, and he trusted that Ms.Fortune would be able to jump to one of those new buildings if she had too. Geralt would be impossible to carry, but he had that platform he could summon and if this tar was deep enough for buildings he didn't doubt that it was deep enough for that thing. Blazermate, though, didn't look like she was in any shape to take flight after that lightning strike. It was a miracle to him that she was even still functional, but it seemed as though she was built Guardian tough. 

“Rika?” He said, placing the Prince in the abyssals arms. “Take care. Try not to let him fall in the tar.” Making sure she could carry him, Link nodded and skated over to where Blazrmate had landed. “Come on, let’s get you someplace safer.” He said, scooping the Medabot up before turning back toward what was left of the beach and powering toward it at top speed. Spying one of the building tops just starting to push its way up out of the tar. He drifted over to it and set Blazermate down to recuperate, watching to make sure the building was still rising before setting off to deal with the less pressing concern of the giant monster.

It’s reduction in speed opened up opportunities for tactics that would have worked on the fast and chaotic juvenile forms. Not all of the rocks that had come down when it shattered the cliff had yet sunk, and Link made a beeline right for the biggest one that he could spot. Pulling out the slate he bound this one in golden chains, just like its brother before it. Putting the rock between himself and the tarred colossus advancing on the beach he began wailing on the frozen rock with the Ro Cestus. He needed to give it enough power to fly as straight as possible, hit it in just the right places so it flew at the correct angle. This was, admittedly, farther than he had ever attempted to throw a boulder like this before but with the reduced gravity he believed that it could make the journey. 

He slid back as the timer on Stasis began to tick down. If he had done this right, it would hit. If he had done this [i]perfectly[/i], it would fly right into the creature's new eye.