Goal #1 - I will become the best tank, crush everyone, and remain standing after every battle.

So far, completing my Goal was becoming more distant. My journey to get hard had regressed, and I was squishier than before. Instead of crushing everyone, the Living Statue had just crushed my party mates. Fortunately, I still remained standing...or running.

Running for dear life!

“It's going to take more than that to kill Herald Stone!”

I threaded through angry tendrils whipping at me, leaped over spikes that could instantly kill me if I made one wrong step. I didn't need to look over my shoulder to know that the massive boss bounded after my squishy ass. Thank you, Herald Stone, for increasing your movement speed before this fight!

I cackled maniacally as I avoided several lasers lancing through the air. The desperateness of my situation made it all the more comical.

A thick beam of light vaporized the snow to my left.

"Woah! None of that, my good sir. I’m already charcoal." With all the dangerous bullshit flying around, it was difficult to spot the golden strands that telegraphed the incoming lasers. It was better to run erratically than try to anticipate where they'd hit.

Zoar Elab scattered pieces of its body, restricting the places where I could kite it. And there was no way in hell I could kill the mini-plant monsters it spawned; I also couldn't clear the thorns strewn on the ground. Time was slowly ticking until I had nowhere to escape.

I could always just run out of the plaza and give up.

Herald Stone giving up? How preposterous!

I had to survive! Otherwise, all our progress would be for nothing. This was our chance to finally kill this boss. And my teammates were taking their sweet time coming back. Are they on vacation at Sandpiper Beach?

If only they didn’t all die at such a crucial stage of our fight.

Megantress was busy clearing the smaller plant monsters and didn't notice the lasers shooting her way. It was hard to evade them, so I didn't hold it against her. But she should've already returned here before Kezo and Nitana died.

On the other hand, Kezodilla's death could’ve been avoided. The boss expanded like a puffer fish—something we hadn’t seen before—and shot spikes in every direction. Kezo didn’t want to move away because he calculated he could finish off the boss in time.

It turned out he was terrible at math. And because he was right next to the boss, he got slapped by a wall of spikes.

Nitana and I had already fled some distance when Kezo died; the flying spikes had spread out when they reached us. Nitana shielded me with her body. Four spikes hit her—one destroyed her protective barrier, and the other three brought her life down to less than half.

If our situation wasn't dire enough, the boss evolved, changing into what was likely its final form.

All the remaining pieces of the gigantic Mardukryon statue that once covered the boss fell away, revealing the entirety of the plant monster.

Zoar Elab was a seething mass of thorny tendrils, endlessly coiling around several golden ores as large as my body. It drew power from those crystals, golden liquid flowing through the veins inside its vines, making it glow like plates in dishwashing liquid ads. Myriad vines extended from the main body and formed into different weapons. Its eyes stared at us, and its mouths gnashed its rows and rows of fangs.

[ Lvl 62|Zoar Elab, the Hermit Vinereaver ]

Nitana continued to attack the boss as it transformed. We were so close to killing it. Unfortunately, the Living Statue—no, the Vinereaver, its real body—became tankier in its final phase. For my part, I planted Totems in front and behind it, or what I assumed to be its front and back, planning to immediately trap it with my Totem Juggling once it was done with its fashion makeover.

It was all for nothing.

The final form of Zoar Elab no longer had an actual front side and backside. It was a pyramid of vines that could attack in all directions, its weapon-tipped appendages striking whichever which way, several eyes shooting light beams. It slammed its bladed tendrils at both of my Totems, taking them out in one go.

Nitana and I split up. She led the boss away from me.

I insisted on being the bait as I no longer had any use with my Totem Juggling strategy negated. But she argued that I had a better chance at surviving until Kezo or Megan returned. After all, I hadn't died a single time during our entire fight.

And the boss eventually killed her. But not before drawing the boss to the opposite end of the plaza, giving me the opening to flee to an area that was free of hazards.

Her valiant sacrifice to aid the Great Herald Stone would never be forgotten. It was forever engraved in my memory. Truly surprising how far Nitana had improved teamwork-wise from her reluctant and bored self when we first met.

Now, I was all alone.

"How the fuck does this work?" I tried to mentally open my friends' list to send messages to my party mates, but I couldn't concentrate. I decided to focus on surviving. The important thing was they were all still online.

Something must've distracted them in town. Did they all take a bathroom break?

The quakes stopped.

Zoar Elab was no longer following me.

"What is it up to this time?" I quickly spun around.

The boss was pulsating, becoming larger with each heave. Its thorns protruded further and further out of its body. Its eyes bulged and mouths frothed while it growled like the engine of a hundred cars. Dammit! It's going to explode again!

I galloped to the edge of the boss area before plopping my Totems in front of me as a flimsy barrier. Would they be enough? Even if the answer was no, there was nothing else I could do.

A powerful hiss preceded the hail of thorns, twice the number of the first barrage that killed Kezo.

"We're here, Herald!" a female voice shouted.

I couldn't spare a second to check who it was. The spikes were coming.

One spike destroyed my [Superior Replicant Totem]. The weaker version behind it fell to another spike. I hurriedly recast the Totems, but a spike passed over them as they rose out of the ground. I was about to get hit!

A crystalline orange barrier enveloped me before the spike slammed against me. The barrier broke apart, but I was still alive. My Totems solidified and caught the two other spikes that followed.

Divine bovine! I looked over my shoulder. "Thanks for the save, Nitana!"

The rest of my party arrived in the nick of time. This could've been in a movie with how nail-bitingly close I was to dying and our entire boss hunt ending in failure. But of course, Herald Stone, the star of the show, was never in any actual danger. I knew all along that my teammates would be there for me—let's go with this story.

"I got you," Nitana said. "And I can't believe you managed to survive solo."

"Sorry for being late!" said Megan. "Really, really sorry."

"Awesome job holding down the fort," Kezo said as he burned the clumps of vines and thorns around us with waves of black flames. "Time to finish this fight."

"Why does the boss look like that now?" Megan asked, gingerly pointing at Zoar Elab with her wand. New thorns emerged through the holes scattered all over its body. "Looks way uglier now. And disgusting too with those things growing out of it."

"It transformed after you and Kezo died," said Nitana.

"We have a problem," I said. "With this form, the boss can attack in all directions and hit multiple targets simultaneously. Kezo and my Totems will all immediately die. Our strategy no longer works. Without a tank—and I don't think Kezo with his tank build can stand up to the boss in this state—there's no stopping it from chasing us."

"Oh my gosh!" Megan gasped.

"That's a problem alright," Nitana dryly said.

"So, you got any plans?" Kezo turned to me with a smile on his face. "From your tone, it sounds like you don't have any worries at all. I bet you've already thought of what we'll do?"

The boss roared, its vines ferociously waved in the air like dozens of inflatable tube men were gathered from car dealerships, glued together, and possessed by a demon.

"I do," I said. "It's going to chase us. We have no way of stopping it. So...we run."

"What?!" Megan exclaimed.

"We run," I said with a laugh. "We kite it, hit-and-run tactics with ranged attacks. That includes Kezo. While the boss could attack several people within its reach, it can only chase one person. It can't split itself."

Zoar Elab ambled toward us. The vines slithered across the plaza, uprooting stone blocks as it pulled its massive body forward with surprising speed, given its size.

“Whoever it chases,” I continued, “focus on surviving. Everyone else, continue attacking from a safe distance. I'll debuff it and try to distract it with my Totems. Even if it became tankier, it only has a tiny bit of health left.”

“Let's do this!” Kezo roared as he charged forward.

“Megan, drop your Totem here!” I said. “Split up, everyone!” And we did. The boss followed Nitana. I called out to her, “Nitana! Try to circle Megan's Totem! Kezo and Megan, attack it now!”

I inflicted the boss with [Withering Brand]; the slow helped Nitana run away from it. I didn't bother with [Gnawing Rot] because the boss was continuously moving. Running parallel to Nitana, I dropped Totem after Totem behind her.

Nitana fireballs gathered around her staff. "Should I att—?"

"No, focus on running," I told her. "Come this way! Make sure the boss is within range of Megan's Totem."

The remaining five percent of Zoar Elab's health took ages to chip down. Kezo, only able to use ranged attacks, immensely lowered our party's DPS. But five percent became four, and then became three. Nitana was still alive. Megan and Kezo continued hitting it. No word was uttered while we perfectly executed our roles, dancing among the vines, the thorns, and the beams of light.

I wouldn't be surprised if our real bodies were holding our breaths as the three percent health bar of the boss shortened into two.

Then the boss stopped in the middle of the arena. It was puffing up to shoot spikes again. This was the window of opportunity to finish the job.

"Attack!" I ordered. “Kezo, you—" Before I finished my sentence, he had already launched himself at the boss, a flaming black meteor.

I also charged towards it to spread [Gnawing Rot]. Nitana turned around and caught up to me, blasting away with her fireballs. Megan and her trusty Totem sprayed the boss with flames. Kezo hacked away at the vines, using the most powerful buffs he had saved.

Two percent became one percent. I headed to Megan and placed my Totems in front of her. "Nitana, let's protect Megan," I said. "She should be the last one standing."

One percent continued to decrease. I couldn't see the remaining health of the boss anymore.

But it had reached its critical size.

It exploded!

Spikes shot forth. Kezo died and turned into a burst of light. The spikes headed our way decimated mine and Megan's Totems. I braced myself to get hit. Nitana jumped in front of me to block the rest. Her health zoomed to zero as multiple spikes slammed against her. She managed to give me a triumphant grin before disappearing.

"Nitana, no!" Megan shouted.

"Ow, you didn't have to scream right in my ear," I said. "You're overreacting like she's actually dead..." I stopped as I noticed that the boss deflated, its health bar gone.

[ Congratulations! Kezodilla's party killed: Zoar Elab, the Hermit Vinereaper ]

[ Loot: 1169 Artas, 2 Golden Eyes, 1 Vine of Possession, 1 Statue Fragment, 1 (Unidentified) Ocadule Shard ]