Worthy Core

Mistress of Festivities Pizola stands in her arena, finding that she likes nothing about her current situation.

For one thing, this is nothing like how she's used to putting on a performance. In the past she'd always perfected every last movement and word through endless practice and rehearsals, and when she did demonstrate something new in public it was usually only a small part of the whole. But, that was when she was a merely mortal circus performer. Now she's a monstrous killer, a defender of the dungeon, and in what may be the most important performance of both of her lives...she's going into things completely unrehearsed. Forget invading armies, she'd never even properly fought off a Challenger party before all of this trouble began.

Secondly...for some reason the invading army in question has refused to actually step foot into her sight. Soldiers retreating through her arena had told her the state of things, that the penultimate defense of the floor had failed, but where are their pursuers? Are they afraid that Pizola represents an even greater threat than Commander Paulados and his soldiers? She wishes she had their confidence. Truth be told, her primary contribution to things had most likely been the hour she'd spent spinning magical webs across the floor. Even now her magical reserves are still a bit drained from all of that. But if they beat Paulados, why then would they be afraid of her?

Her answer comes when a party does finally enter the final battlefield, and they look nothing at all like typical Domain soldiers. Four individuals, all draconics, all of them wearing gleaming armor designed to imitate their natural scales. She's no expert in Domain military units, but this is clearly some sort of group of elites. Not that she's about to treat them any more respectfully for it, of course.

"Well well, someone finally got bold enough to step forward. Did they have to run all the way back to Dragon's Jaw to find someone with a spine?"

The woman in the lead, a yellow-scaled warrior with a heavy shield, greets her opponent with a haughty tone of voice. Which is to say, a rather standard greeting by draconic standards. "We know that there is but one more floor remaining between you and the core of your mistress. Our sovereign has decided that it is time for us to unsheathe our own blades, and bring this farce to a close. You face the Scale Wardens, guardian."

Pizola nods back at that...and then shrugs. "...Should I know who are you? Can't say I've heard of your particular troupe."

The slight doesn't seem to land with much impact. "We're no mere Challengers, Mistress Pizola. We are the blade of the Dragonlord made flesh. Enjoy the honor of falling to our blades and claws. Begin!"

On that order the four draconics spread out, with one blue-scaled warrior taking to the air. The arena half consists of solid stone wall, up against the edge of the floor boundaries, while the other half is marked off by towering stone pillars. There's quite a bit of vertical space available, which would seem to be a strong advantage for an intruder party which includes fliers.

But that assumes that Pizola herself would be limited to fighting upon the ground.

The Scale Warden Captain dashes forward with her blade as a companion flanks from the side with a spear, each weapon gleaming with enchantments. At the same time a mage on the opposite flank casts barriers behind Pizola, preventing any escape. It would be very effective had Pizola not already left the moment they revealed themselves. The two weapons pass harmlessly through the guardian's illusion, and as a dozen new Pizolas appear around the arena they spin to face their sudden opponents.

Up above the flying draconic charges lightning in one hand and ice in the other, holding their magic for the proper moment...only to wish that perhaps they had left one hand free when a glob of arcane webbing suddenly lands in their face. A weight lands on their back a moment later, and the mage knows this is no illusion. Although somewhat muffled, they still manage a shout of alarm. "Up here! She's on me!"

The other Wardens waste no time in taking to the air themselves, for while they may have trained for ground melees, no draconic would ever call themselves anything less than exceptional at aerial combat. They can't see the invisible Pizola as she perches atop their colleague, but the sparks and scratches on his armor plating are sign enough that the woman is attempting to use her sharpened limbs to find a weakness in the man's defenses. The mage spins, hoping to dislodge her that way, but it's far harder than that to shake off a mystical spider.

"Hold, Theronis! I shall remove the pest!" When the mage brings his movement to a stop the spearwoman rushes forward, weapon extended, and she cheers out loud as she feels it puncture through something solid. That cheer turns to confusion as Theronis is suddenly yanked from his position by the attack, and the spearwoman finds herself unable to pull back her weapon.

"Webbing! It's - she's webbed my spear to his armor!"

The Warden captain doesn't hesitate to issue a command. "Her webs are vulnerable to magic! Theronis, burn it off of you!"

"Very well!" The elementalist does just that, engulfing his own body in flames, and sure enough it seems to destroy the trap at a rapid pace. It barely even singes the man, dragon-descended as he is. It does distract him somewhat, however. "It's free! Now, where did she - hrng!"

His good mood comes to a quick halt as a pointy spider-leg pokes out his right eye, and it appears that while the invisible Pizola may have briefly departed while the flames were in use, she immediately returned to her target the moment they were doused. This time though the spearwoman is fast enough in swinging her weapon to land an impact on the real Pizola, and her illusion begins to fade as she goes flying into one of the towering pillars of the arena.

"Ahh! I think you broke one of my legs, you meat-headed heckler! Good thing I have five more!"

Indeed, Pizola doesn't delay in skittering around the pillar, then hopping from one to the next as she gains some cover. It's a bit of an adjustment for the former drider, using legs attached to her back rather than to a massive spider-like abdomen, but her monstrous instincts work well to fill in the gaps. With a bit of help from her mystical webbing Pizola soon gains a fair bit of distance, while leaving a few sticky tripwires in her wake.

Unfortunately, her enemies aren't just limited to melee attacks. The mage who cast the barriers earlier now switches to spells of pure force, firing off blasts of energy with the strength of a siege weapon. They're too slow to hit the swift guardian directly, but every time they impact a pillar the stone cracks and shatters. A few such hits are enough to bring a pillar down, and Pizola soon realizes that this delaying action of hiding behind pillars is not going to work out to her advantage.

Instead, the next time she leaps out and casts her webbing it's in the direction of the hovering Scale Warden captain and the spearwoman. Lines of webs latch on to a leg from each of the pair, yanking them downwards as Pizola swings from them, yet like an acrobat Pizola flips gracefully and then turns back in the opposite direction. The draconics are easily able to support her weight thanks to the inherent magic keeping them aloft in the first place, but her speed is faster than they can quickly adjust to. Worse, each time she picks a target - a leg, a wing, an arm - another limb gets caught up in arcane webbing. The enchanted weapons the Scale Wardens use is better at cutting the lines than a mundane weapon, but they still can't keep up with the performer's pace.

Finally, the captain growls out in frustration. "If she keeps this up, she'll have us in damn cocoons! Prepare to fire on me!"

It's a bit of a confusing order, but her meaning becomes clear when she spreads her wings wide and dives for Pizola the next time the woman is swinging off of her leg. It leaves the draconic unable to dodge, receiving a few more webbings and a handful of scratches for her trouble, but this time Pizola herself is also unable to move out of the way in time. The end result is both women smashing hard into the rocky floor of the arena, but it affects the spidery guardian far worse than the draconic warrior. Pizola's build is that of a mage, not a fighter, and even her acrobatics were due more to her personal skill than to her dungeon-inherited traits. Thus it is that she has little resistance to being crushed into the stone by the speed and mass of the woman on top of her.

Still, she could have perhaps webbed the captain to the floor and slipped away...had the mages not followed the woman's command. One of the mages being down an eye doesn't seem to harm his aim too much, and bolts of lightning and blasts of force pound into the pair. The Scale Warden's enchanted armor and natural scales help spare her from the worst of the damage, but Pizola lacks any such protection. Heavy armor would have made her acrobatics impossible, after all.

Which means that soon enough, a battered Warden rolls off of the gruesome remains of what used to be a famous performer. She's hardly unscathed from the spells - a wing is clearly broken, and a possible head injury seems to have left her dazed. Yet she is alive and her foe is not, and that is what pleases her sovereign.

A fact which is confirmed but a moment later when the Dragonlord themselves steps into the arena, wearing their draconic form. "Very well done, Yelene, and the rest of you as well. Mistress Pizola was an untested opponent, and clearly quite a clever one. It truly is remarkable what a dungeon guardian is capable of with a lifetime of experience to draw from, is it not?"

Yelene swallows down a healing potion before responding, perhaps uncertain if she would be able to answer without slurring her words otherwise. "Nn. I mean, indeed, my lord. I don't believe I've ever faced a combatant such as her. Had she more experience as a fighter and not just as a performer, we may well have taken losses."

"But you live!" The tyrant grins, and gestures to a stone door that's just appeared in the opposite wall. "And the final floor awaits. You have done well getting us this far, Yelene. But now gather the others, and follow."

The dragon narrows their eyes. "It is time for me to play my part."

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