Dungeon of Chance: Even Odds: A Dungeon Core Novel (Serious Probabilities Book 1) Jonathan Brooks (book recommendations txt) 📖

Golem was perhaps a little shorter than Jeska’s brother, but what it lacked in height it made up with width – its “arms” were so large that it was basically as wide as it was tall.

Coming up behind them was the last of the monsters, though this one floated above the other three and was insubstantial-looking.  The Mist Demon – a demon?! – was an amorphous mass of bluish water droplets a little smaller than the Stone Golem, and it floated forward at tremendous speed, aiming for the Regional Threat without wavering.  She wasn’t sure what water droplets could do against a massive Cat, but that didn’t seem to sway it in its purpose.

The Colossal Serpent reached the ferocious feline first, and it slithered up to it with its mouth wide-open, intending to bite its face.  The Cat wasn’t having any of that, however, as it agilely leapt backwards with a near-deafening hiss – and Jeska finally got to see the sheer speed of the Threat at work.  It…it was playing with us before, like a smaller cat would if it caught a rat.  There was no hesitation, no stalking of the new monster attacking it like it had with the Heroes.  Either it was more afraid of her and her fellow Heroes, or it considered them something unworthy of a challenge.  It didn’t really matter, though, because it had abandoned any pretense and now was fighting back without reservation.

Missing its initial strike, the Serpent slithered after the Cat, but the 8-Star Threat was already pouncing.  A quick hop forward was all it needed to sail past the head of the Serpent with claws extended; it landed on the back of the giant reptile and immediately began to shred its body with its deadly paw weapons, scratching so fast that within 2 seconds the Serpent was practically cut in half.

A sudden flexing of its body was all the warning the Cat had as the Serpent’s head whipped around and struck at the Threat.  A quick turn to the side prevented the Colossal snake from striking the Champion’s face, but their nemesis wasn’t able to leap away entirely unscathed; the fangs of the Serpent struck deep into the flesh of the Cat’s shoulder, and Jeska saw the large red Health bar in her vision reduce another sliver.  Not even that is enough to really harm it. 

Unfortunately, the Serpent’s strike was costly, as it couldn’t extract its fangs fast enough; the deadly teeth of the Cat chomped down on the “neck” of the Serpent cutting through the thick muscle and bones with an ease that was truly frightening.  The next moment, the Snake was spasming in both its lower half and its head, shaking so much that its fangs slid out of the Cat’s shoulder.  The head fell to the ground, and Jeska could immediately tell that it was dead – decapitation tended to do that sort of thing.

But the assault wasn’t done yet; the Giant Bush Spider was then near enough to spring up from where it was skittering closer.  It landed on the back of the victorious Cat and immediately bit down deep into its fur. There was an immediate change in the red Health bar in Jeska’s vision, as it started to flash red and green.  A tiny sliver of the bar ticked away, and there was a small message underneath the bar that said, “Debuff: Envenomed”.

Ha!  Let’s see how this Cat likes getting Debuffs!  All of the Heroes had suffered from some sort of Debuff at one point or another, and it was quite annoying – and deadly.

Unfortunately, it didn’t seem like the Envenomed part of the Debuff was all that effective, as the Health bar ticked down another sliver and then the flashing green disappeared.  The Giant Bush Spider didn’t have a chance to attack again, either, as the Cat Champion yowled in pain and then jumped straight up into the air about 200 feet.  At the peak of the jump, the Threat somehow managed to turn itself over in a flash, leaving the Spider floating above it – and within range of the Cat’s deadly claws.  As the Cat fell, it systematically sliced apart the legs of the green-and-brown Spider, though it did manage to get bit one more time.  The envenomed status lasted just long enough for it to do another few slivers of damage to the Threat’s Health bar, but the Debuff disappeared as it turned back around before it hit the ground.

Landing smoothly on the top of the plateau, the Cat deftly hopped a short distance away, avoiding the severed legs of the Spider as they fell like confetti all over the ground.  The body of the monstrous arachnid landed soon after, hitting the ground so hard that it splattered and died upon impact.

The Mist Demon was next on the attack, and the Cat’s deft hop placed it within range of the strange-looking monster.  Jeska watched as half of it seemed to detach itself and shoot towards the feline’s face; the Cat Champion tried to rear back to avoid it, but the misty water droplets were too fast as they sped up the nose of the Threat.  Immediately, a small chunk of Health disappeared from the red bar – the largest impact she’d registered thus far – and Jeska silently cheered.  The celebration was short-lived, regretfully, because the Cat sneezed, blowing out the portion of the Mist Demon that had invaded its sinuses, and that did…something.  The portion that was blown out combined with the rest of the misty substance still floating outside, and the Mage could tell that approximately half of what went into the nose didn’t come back out.

As the Mist Demon attempted another sort of attack, it was pre-empted by the rise of another tornado-like whirlwind from around the Cat’s body.  The Mist Demon, despite somehow being powerful enough to actually do a significant amount of damage,