Magic Murder Cube Marine

It turned out the bounty on a Chthonic Titan of Devastation was two thousand gold. As Francis looked at the skyscraper sized bipedal monster, he couldn't help but think the AG was holding out on him. That was one big fucking lizard.

Willow told him it was one of Hades' champions. Evidently the god had decided to skip several steps in the villain’s handbook and go right to the big guns. Francis could respect cutting to the point, instead of fucking around. After all, hadn't the Buddha said to “always initiate contact with your heaviest weapon”? (No.)

Francis was many things. But he wasn't actually stupid, even if he pretended to be when there were officers around. He turned to his team. “So what's the SOP for killing Barney Verde over there? I don't think he wants to be friends.”

“It's got thick natural armor so its Deflect will be at least twenty.” Willow said, doing her best to explain how large monster combat worked. “Eyes and other weak spots will be half as protected. Insides are always zero. If your attack rating is five or more below its deflect you'll automatically miss. Five or above auto crits and multiplies damage by your Tier.”

He took this information in. “So, go for the weak spots. Can I hamstring the fucker?”

“Crippling a limb requires a quarter of its HP worth of damage. Sometimes, if a creature sustains an injury incompatible with life, System will let you kill it that way.” She scratched her horns and did some math. “The guild usually pays around a gold per every ten HP. So that tells me this thing probably has about twenty thousand health, give or take.”

“Gotcha.” Francis bent down and gave her a peck on the forehead. “I'll be right back. Imma one shot this son of a bitch.”

The Marine began walking away from the castle towards the beast. Francis could also do math, even if he pretended otherwise. A magic blast from inside the Titan would be an automatic critical hit. He was Tier 7, so if he could do 3000 magical damage it would be increased to 21000 from the crit. Now all he needed was to get inside the thing without dying.

He twirled his staff and used one of the new spells Relativity had taught him. He was instantly teleported one meter down the road for a cost of 10 MP.

The spell was a little expensive for his tastes. At that rate it would cost him around 1000 MP to get on top of the monster. He needed to start from higher up in case his first shot missed or something. He also needed to find a place that was outside the city to limit collateral damage.

Francis decided to head towards the old wizarding tower in the Dark Forest. If he was lucky the trees might even slow down the creature and give him some cover.

“Need a ride?” Called Chuck as he trotted over to join Francis. For some reason a sparkling white horn had sprouted from top of his head. “I just finished my evolution when I got an alert that you wanted to go back to the old wizarding tower.”

“Yeah, think you can outrun our friend?” Francis decided to ignore the horn for now (even though he was really excited at the idea of finally having his own Pokemon) and pointed at the Titan off in the distance. It would need to turn away from the city to follow him. And Francis had the sneaking suspicion he was its real target anyway.

“Oh, Francis.” Chuck laughed. “I'm a level ten Magical Charger now. I can outrun anything.”

***

There were fast horses. There were really fast horses. Then there was Chuck. He flew along the ground like a missile.

Yesterday, after downing his bucket of beer, Chuck had gotten a bright idea. He asked around the stable about any horse thieves in the area. Then he went hunting. Eventually he leveled up to ten and reached Tier 3.

Each new Tier came with an adaptation. He already had improved durability and the ability to do magic from his previous Tiers. This time Chuck decided to lean heavily into speed.

It took a few minutes before Francis realized Chuck’s hooves weren't touching the ground anymore. Instead the Magical Charger was levitating above it and leaving clouds of sparkling rainbow colored exhaust in his wake. (It smelled like fresh hay and sugar cookies.)

Unfortunately the Titan was still gaining on them. “You got anything extra in the tank?” Francis shouted.

“Oh, I'm sure I have something.” Chuck went silent as if he was reading over his new skills. “I wonder what this one does?”

Chuck's Afterburner ability activated. At first there was the sound of carousel music being played faster and faster until it became a chaotic roar. Then a three meter long blast of Technicolor magic shot out of Chuck's ass and he rapidly began to accelerate.

Francis was almost thrown from the saddle but he managed to hold on. The ground blurred beneath him. Eventually Chuck hit one hundred kilometers per hour and leveled out. His horn sparkled, forming some kind of prismatic shield that kept the wind from tearing Francis off his back.

“Holy fuckballs.” Francis looked back and saw the world's happiest chemtrail. “You weren't joking.”

***

The old stone tower was exactly one hundred meters tall and fifteen meters in diameter, the bare minimum for a single mage structure. The wizard who built it hadn't believed in putting forth unnecessary effort, and it showed.

With the Chthonic Titan hot on his tail, Francis teleported off Chuck and learned an important lesson. Teleportation didn't conserve momentum. He landed on the ground at a dead stop and sprinted into the tower.

The Titan maxed out at three hundred kilometers per hour on open ground. The trees had slowed it down, but only just enough. Contrary to Chuck's boast, he wasn't actually faster.

Francis took the stone steps three at a time. He could feel the ground shaking beneath him. He caught sight of the reptile through the window. It was almost to the tower.

He continued to haul ass up the stairs. As he reached the top there was an ear shattering roar and everything went dark. A moment later the emergency lighting kicked on. Small glowing crystals outlined each step, making Francis feel like he was standing on a staircase made of stars. Why was it dark?

He tried to look out a window. There was nothing to see but blackness. However, an ominous glow was coming from the door at the top of the staircase. The creature was trying to burn through the roof. Only the tower's aging wards were stopping it from cooking him where he stood.

Francis teleported fifty meters straight upward. The magical backlash of trying to teleport out of a warded structure hit him for 500 magical damage and the spell failed.

“Fuck!” He couldn't run, he couldn't teleport away, and the glow from above was getting more intense as the wards failed. But why was it dark?

Francis thrust Relativity through the window and felt it hit soft flesh. He hoped the wizard who built the tower had been forward thinking enough to make the defensive wards one way.

“Tag, motherfucker.” Francis said as he pumped three thousand MP into his attack. “You're dead.”