Adventures of Illuminatus: Highmaul

The Butcher

Written to Turn Down For What by DJ Snake and Lil John

“Bringing home the bacon takes a whole new meaning, doesn’t it?” Sabaak asked, nudging Schio with his elbow.

“Goddammit, Sab.” She put a palm over her face and shook her head, then Schio gave him a playful shove forward. The paladin laughed and joined the group trying to bring down the boars.

It didn’t take long for the two boars to die, their giant bodies swaying from side to side for about five minutes before they finally fell to the ground. Then they turned their attention to the single ogre standing in the center of a bloody arena, not paying attention to them in favor of the pale that had attacked him.

Julip wrinkled her nose. “It smells terrible.”

“Try not to think about it.” Helpfuldeath said. “We’ll kill him and be out of here soon enough.”

“Right. Well, at least the name of the butcher is accurate,” Julip said as she followed the orc death knight around to where the group was standing in loose clusters.

Xallion was trying to organize them into groups, talking with each group individually so they knew where to stand and what to do when the fight finally started. When he reached the ranged group, he looked toward the Butcher. The ogre still hadn’t noticed them, or if he did, he simply didn’t care that they were standing behind him, weapons held at the ready and spells powered up and ready to be cast.

“So ya stand here,” Xallion said, indicating the ranged group, “and ya wait til he jumps towards ya. He gonna jump back to de middle after, and ya stack back up.”

“So we basically act as a landing pad for an ogre who’s feet are twice as big as we are?” Badlanguage asked. Her brow rose and a look of skepticism appeared on her face. “And we become pancakes?”

Xallion sighed. “Well, I’d expect ya’d be smart enough ta get out of de way of him ‘fore he lands on ya.”

“Yeah, but, what if we aren’t?”

“Den I guess ya become a pancake.”

Before Badlanguage could continue making comments, Xallion turned his back on her and raised a three-fingered hand to signal Greymoon. The bear nodded and edged around the circular arena, getting in position in front of the Butcher. The other groups began to edge up toward their assigned positions, careful not to get too close because those giant cleavers looked really dangerous. Even more so because those cleavers were taller than most of the fighters slowly taking up their positions.

The moment Greymoon charged at the Butcher, there was a heartbeat of silence before the melee charged in. Over their heads flew arrows and spells, while wolves, serpents, and demons joined the fray, nipping and biting at the Butcher’s ankles.

Even as far back as they were, those in the ranged group could see the Butcher turning toward those in the two melee groups and striking at them with those huge cleavers. Thanatoss ducked under one swipe, only to be cracked across the chest with a second. His plate armor dented inward, but the soothing feel of healing magic kept his bones from breaking under the force of the blow. He dug in his heels to stop his backwards momentum, then charged in to rejoin his group. On the other side, Azmodax let out a long string of curses and hopped to the side of a strike, feeling the wind of it as it soared too close for the enhancement shaman’s liking.

Too suddenly, the Butcher turned toward the ranged group. Schio sucked in a breath and activated her Unending Resolve spell. “Here he comes!” she cried, trying to warn the others around her. Then the Butcher was leaping toward them, landing hard amid the ranged group. Schio was launched into the air, flying backwards toward the wall, along with the others in her group. Her shadowy shield saved her from more permanent damage, and she landed hard enough to drive the breath from her lungs. Gritting her teeth, she got to her feet and unleashed a trinity of chaos bolts toward the Butcher, who had returned to meet Greymoon and Xandyr in the center of the room.

Now that they knew what to look for, the ranged group was better prepared for the Butcher’s next leap. Personal shields went up as the Butcher landed again amongst them, and they were quicker to regroup after they landed. Each time the Butcher turned to them, ready to leap at them, the ranged group knew they needed to quickly fire off their arrows or spells, and prepare to be knocked backwards.

There was a desperate moment when the Butcher swung hard toward one of the melee groups, and several bodies went flying to hit the ground where they lay unmoving. Xallion grit his teeth as he looked at the bodies of his comrades, armor dented, blood pooling around them in murky puddles. Their deaths weighed heavily on his mind, and the restoration shaman started forward to try and save the survivors of the group. A hand grabbed his shoulder and he looked back into Kyel’s eyes. The warlock shook his head and pointed.

A purple glow surrounded two of the dead, and as it suffused into their bodies, they shakily got to their feet. The third casualty slowly got to her feet as well, gripping her head as though it pained her. Then they were back in the fray, and fighting as hard as they had been fighting before they had been killed. Xallion let out the breath he’d been holding and stepped back into the group, directing his healing spells toward his friends to try and keep them alive as the battle wore on.

The Butcher shifted, his swings becoming faster, more desperate. Before Xallion could activate it, Derkka snapped out a command. The time warp surrounded the fighters of Illuminatus, and they used the time given to them to put everything they had behind their blows. The Butcher didn’t seem to know where to turn to strike next, his attacks becoming wild and furious as he fought to kill the smaller creatures that were taking him down, piece by piece. When he fell to his knees, Xandyr threw his shield as hard as he could toward the Butcher’s head, watching as the steel slammed into the Butcher’s eye, snapping his head back. A cat, sleek and swift as a raging wind, leaped from the ground to the Butcher’s knee, then launched itself at the Butcher’s throat. Cosmodru sank his fangs into the soft meat of the Butcher’s throat, letting the weight of his body drag the ogre down to the ground.

As soon as Cosmodru’s paws touched the ground, he thrashed his head from side to side, his front paws clawing at the flesh his fangs were sunk into. The Butcher’s eyes rolled around in their sockets, his mouth open and his tongue lolling out, signs of his impending defeat even as he struggled to regain his feet. Cosmodru released the Butcher and leaped clear as the ogre crashed down completely to the earth. The Butcher’s breath wheezed in and out, slower and slower, until he finally sucked in a breath and seemed to completely deflate as he let it out.

Those piggish eyes finally stopped rolling, staring blankly at the fighters still standing around him as if he couldn’t quite believe he’d been taken down by creatures the size of his big toe.

“Man, Jules, if you thought that shit smelled bad, don’t get close to this guy.” Helpfuldeath said, taking a few quick steps back from the Butcher’s corpse. He waved his hand in front of his face like he was trying to get rid of a bad odor.

Julip pinched her nose shut and edged around the corpse toward the stairs. “I will be so happy when we get out of this place.”

“Then let’s keep goin’.” Xallion looked up at the sky, judging the path of the sun. “We get up d’ose stairs, we see what we up against. We go from dere.”