Lilia was complaining about not wanting to continue, the main reason being she was out of mana potions. After some negotiation, it was decided that they would continue down into the second level. At least until they died. Hamish seemed to think that clearing up the mobs until they reached the second boss would not be a problem. But, he expressed doubts about whether they could take on the Wurm. The Wurm was the next boss at the end of the catacombs.

They made real progress, mostly because of the teamwork between Beth and Lilia. Beth would run along the corridors and into the small spaces where oozes were hiding. When they were all attacking her, Lilia would shower them in what appeared to be bolts of ice. The oozes took a lot of damage from this, and the new duo hardly needed any support from Felix, Hamish or Anika. Anika was pleased that her shots were doing some damage, she felt less like a spare wheel, although the damage she was doing was nothing compared to Lilia's magic.

Everything was running smoothly, there were no surprises. Hamish only had to focus on keeping Beth at full health because nobody else was taking much as they made their way through the winding corridors of the catacombs.

The only thing that appeared to slow them down was the fact that Felix was always stopping to collect something from the oozes. When Anika asked him what he was doing, he explained that he could distil some of the goo they released. He could make it into a potent poison.

"It's an alchemy poison, and it works well against non-magical creatures."

It must have been valuable because he didn't leave a single ooze untouched and was almost feverish in his attempts to harvest the goo he was talking about.

"If you want, I'll try to make you some for your arrows. I think it'll work, you just need a different quiver. Something that can hold the poison without leaking onto your back."

That sounded interesting. She hadn't thought of her arrows being dipped in poison until now. She told him she would be grateful if he could try. She would speak to a leatherworker about what kind of quiver would be needed.

Despite Felix slowing them down due to his frantic goo harvesting, Anika figured that it had taken them less than half an hour before they had cleared their way into a massive cellar. They were now standing at the top of a large hole in the floor, which was paved with rough stones. A staircase went down into what looked like a wet and damp space. A few torches lit the way, but it was hard to see how large the space below them was.

Hamish took it upon himself to remind them what they were about to see. He explained that the Wurm was somewhere down below. It was a massive, blue snake-like monster. It would attack like any other boss, but at regular intervals, it would disappear into the ground and reappear at a random spot. Once it reappeared, the aggro levels would reset, so everyone had to be careful about attacking it straight away. This was where it got tricky. Beth had done a fantastic job so far in making sure that the skeleton Queen and the mobs they had encountered, were attacking her, instead of everyone else. But this time they couldn't rely on her to keep the boss focused on her exclusively. When the aggro levels were reset, not only did everyone have to be careful about who the Wurm was attacking, anyone standing close enough to it would also get a nasty bite.

It seemed that all three of her group members were worried that she would die from just one of these bites, so they told her to stand as far back as possible and to make sure she ran away when the Wurm reappeared. The main worry was that if Anika took so much damage she died, Beth would die as well, and they would be left with nobody strong enough to soak up the rest of the damage. Hamish suggested that he would assume the Wurm would appear close to her every time and make sure she was topped up and at full health at all times and making sure she had one of the heal over time spells on her to mitigate the damage.

Anika was ready to try anything and listened intently to the instructions. She could tell that it was almost guaranteed she would reach level 6 after clearing this boss, she was only about 10% of her way there. The other three did not look confident at their prospects.

With Beth leading the way, they all descended the wooden staircase. It felt as if the stairs would crumble underneath their feet because everything was so wet and it was evident the wood they were stepping on was rotten. Everyone was nervous, they knew that there was a good chance Anika wouldn't survive, and it sounded like that would be the end of their expedition. Lilia had already clarified that she wouldn't be making the trip back to the dungeon anytime soon without a proper group. Her resurrection point was over half a day travel away.

When they got into the room, Anika noticed that the entire floor was covered in puddles.

"Don't step in the puddles, they can be deeper than you might think." Felix was showing them how to sidestep and hop from one dry area to the next. Beth had also learned that she should stay away from the puddles, one of them almost swallowed her whole when she stepped into it.

There was still no sign of the Wurm. Anika had an eerie feeling of anticipation and dread, by the looks on her companions' faces it was a feeling shared among all of them. Even Beth wasn't looking her usual self, not cowering, but not confident in her stride. When the ground trembled, Anika knew the action was about to begin. She had positioned herself along the wall in the corner of the dark and damp room, and she could hardly see a hand in front of her because it was so dark.

When the Wurm showed itself, Anika felt as if they may have bitten off more than they could chew. It was absolutely massive and covered in blue scales which made her think it would be impossible to kill. Its head comprised an enormous mouth, with a long row of sharp teeth. She couldn't see its eyes anywhere, they must have been hidden somewhere behind the scales covering the rest of its body. Frankly, it was hideous.

It entered the room from one of the puddles in the middle of the floor and had a look at its surroundings. Beth didn't waste any time, she roared and charged straight into battle. Felix followed suit, got behind it, and started slicing and dicing at the thick armour on its back. Before locking onto the creature and letting her arrows fly, she noticed that each attack from the Wurm was taking at least 10% of Beth's health away. From the get go, Hamish was busy healing to make sure that Beth could stay alive.

The first time the Wurm descended into the floor through one of the puddles, they were all able to take a breather and rearrange themselves around the dry parts of the floor. It was important that they spread themselves out according to Hamish. With everyone at full health again, it was just a matter of waiting to see when and where it would reappear. Before it did, the floors rumbled, and tiny waves splashed across the puddles all around them.

The Wurm reappeared right in between Felix and Beth, and as soon as it had looked around, it chose Felix as its target for the bite Hamish had told them all about. It moved across the floor at quite a fast pace, there was nothing Felix could have done to move out of the way. In one giant chopping motion, its head launched itself at Felix, and he took a massive amount of damage. Anika figured that he only had about 10% left. Luckily, Hamish was ready with his spells and Beth moved in with a charge to draw the attention away from Felix. They had survived the first sequence from the boss, but it felt to Anika like it was a close call. Felix might have been lucky to survive, but he was level 10 and appeared to have a much larger health pool than Anika did. She was getting anxious that it would all be over if she were unlucky enough to be the closest target the next time the Wurm went through its sequence.

Instead of continuing to cause the creature damage, she looked around and to see if there was some way she could escape or move to quickly if she was unlucky enough to be the Wurm's next target. To her dismay, there was nowhere to run. Her back would be against the cold stone wall and judging by the speed of the Wurm, she could not make it very far when it resurfaced. For reasons she couldn't explain when she thought about it later, she pulled out a flint and tinder and made small flashes to light her surroundings up. She could see that the stone wall behind her was not very even, it was as if part of it had caved in and there were rocks and rubble on the floor next to her. With a combination of lighting her way and feeling the edge of the wall with her fingers, she got the sense that there was a possibility she could move into the part of the wall that had caved in. It was as if there was a small ledge, and she wondered if this would be enough to put the necessary distance between her and the Wurm in case it attacked her the next time.

She didn't have any time to consider alternatives. When she looked back at the fighting, she saw the Wurm disappear into one of the puddles and watched as her companions took a breather and nodded at each other in preparation for the next attack. She decided not to wait around and climbed up to the ledge and squeezed herself inside it. She was now in a position where her elbows had enough room to still shoot her arrows, and she felt safer than before.

When the worm reappeared, it was clear that she had made a brilliant decision. It came out of a puddle close to where she had been standing, she would have been an obvious target for it if she had stayed where she was. It looked around at everyone, and Anika could see it was trying to decide between going for her or Lilia. That she was out of the way on a ledge didn't seem to put the creature off. It had made its decision and was heading straight for her, mouth wide open with sharp slimy teeth, ready to attack.

Her first instinct was to draw her bow and let the arrows loose, but she remembered what Hamish had said about the aggro levels resetting. If she caused damage to it before anyone else, she would commit suicide right there and then. She felt utterly hopeless, she couldn't attack, there was no way for her to defend herself, and she knew she was only seconds away from taking enough damage to kill her outright.

Before she closed her eyes in anticipation of the attack, she saw that Beth was right behind the beast doing her best to distract it. Then she heard a thundering crunch. The Wurm's bite had caught part of the ledge and a massive amount of the stones below her. She opened her eyes just in time to see that its mouth was full of stones which it spat out and was about to get ready for a second bite. At this time the damage from Beth and Felix behind the creature must have been enough to distract it. It turned around and attacked Beth in the same way it had done so before.

Anika counted herself very lucky, placing herself on that ledge had saved them this time. She then wondered if the AI behind this creature was bright enough to remember where she was and if it would come back for her. She couldn't think of a better plan, so she stayed put and continued to attack the beast from her vantage point.

The time between the Wurm's special attacks had decreased. It was at around 50% health now, but the pressure was building because they didn't have the time to recover their health and adjust their positions in between each attack. Hamish did a phenomenal job of keeping everyone alive, it was clear that he was working harder than anyone else in the room. His first priority was always to make sure that Beth was fully healed, but it didn't take long before even that became a challenge. The Wurm would strike again before they had a chance to breathe.

Anika had been lucky that the recent attacks had not been directed at her, but when the worm had what looked like 15% of its health left, she found herself confronted by it again. This time it didn't strike her immediately. It made its way over to her and cocked its head sideways, studying the space she was in and working out the correct angle for it to bite from.

It craned its neck and tilted its head further, then it went in for the attack. In that split second, Anika knew she would be done for, so she tucked her arms and legs close to her body and rolled off the ledge, dropping onto the ground like a sack of potatoes. The fall was painful as she landed on her back on a large boulder and smashed her head on the floor.