"RAAAA!" Yang shouted as she slammed her War Pick into the Iron Ant Guardian's leg. After the damage she had already done to the complex, and relatively delicate, point in the armor, crushing it completely was as simple as activating a few Skills.

'I would have gotten it sooner, but those damn Warriors kept getting in the way,' she thought as she watched the mighty Guardian stumble from having one less leg to support its massive bulk. 'It's a good thing Loran showed up when he did.'

The last time they fought a Guardian there had been far fewer Iron Ant Warriors present. Sure they had been standing behind enemy lines, surrounded by thousands of Drones, but Zed was good at keeping them away, and even when a few got through they could afford to ignore them for a few seconds at least. A Drone's jaws did damage over time, but a Warrior's blades were deadly in an instant. Even their new armor could only take a few hits before its structural integrity was at risk, and Yang had nearly destroyed her armor pulling people out from under the Moutain Goats. She didn't know how much longer it would last.

'I'll need to apologize to Rika when we get back.'

Yang ducked to the side as the Guardian swiped at her with its stump leg. A piece of jagged iron left a cut along her cheek, but the most upsetting part of the attack was splattering her with blood, making it hard to see.

"Gah! Oh fuck it's in my mouth! How did this happen again?!?"

Momentarily blinded and distracted, Yang couldn't respond to the Guardian bringing its huge head around, hoping to crush her with its massive jaws. Before it could though, Alexx let loose with a devastating drop kick, connecting with enough force that, had it not been for the many iron cables in the Guardian's neck, would have ripped the ant's head clean off. With its head twisted in the wrong direction, the Guardian lost its opportunity as Yang quickly wiped the blood and viscera from her eyes, charging forward toward the giant's other front leg.

As injured as the Guardian was, it was still surprisingly capable of protecting the new weak point on its head. They needed to immobilize it first.

As Yang charged the other leg, the Guardian lashed out at her, swinging the spiked appendage directly at her. She ducked under it, feeling the wind blow past her as she changed target to one of the middle legs. The leg continued past her, aiming for Alexx before he could land another attack on the insect's head.

'Let's see you dodge this one asshole!'

With its only remaining front leg still in the air, the Guardian was too slow to move the targeted leg, and Yang's War Pick smashed into it. Unfortunately, the middle leg was far more sturdy than the front legs, and showed significantly less damage.

Yang was about to take another swing at the leg when it suddenly lashed out and slammed against her chest. Having seen what Yang had done to its other leg, the Guardian decided to prioritize her. The blow knocked Yang underneath the giant ant into a pile of Drone bodies.

Then it felt like the sky fell on her.

The Iron Ant Guardian let its weight drop onto Yang, crushing her underneath several tons of flesh, chitin, and iron. It then quickly raised its body up again, actually gaining a few inches of air time, before crashing back down even harder than before.

Between the crushing force of the Guardian and the Drone bodies feeling like a gruesome ball pit, Yang was unable to move as she was pounded into the ground. It only became worse when the Drones, which she thought would all be dead by this point, started biting her arms and legs, making it even harder to move and damaging her armor further.

'Gotta get out, NOW!'

Planting one foot on something solid and waiting for the Guardian to move again, Yang used [LEAP] right as she unequipped her weapon and armor. The armor disapeared, creating a little more than an inch of space between her limbs and the Drones' jaws just as her body took off like a bullet. She suffered some bumps and cuts as her body plowed through a few dozen Drones and slammed into the canyon wall, but it seemed better than the alternative.

Rubbing the back of her head, Yang looked up to see the Guardian still bouncing up and down, still determined to kill her. The giant ant was rather close to the canyon wall, so Yang's escape had been disguised under the bodies tossed around by the Guardian's jumping and flailing.

'What about the others?'

Alexx was trying to get closer, likely thinking that she was still under the giant ant, but the insect's movements were too erratic and he couldn't approach without being hit by a flailing limb or thrown body. He managed to get pretty close at one point only for the Guardian's mandible to swipe at him like a spear strike. Alexx dodged it, but threw himself back so hard he flipped over to avoid landing flat on the ground.

Yang could also see Loran holding back the Warriors and Drones; he was doing...astonishingly well. He was using small bursts of mana to get the attention of anything outside his melee range to draw them closer, and if they tried to ignore him he launched a more powerful attack to either kill them or force their acknowledgment. Despite being surrounded by nearly a dozen Warriors and too many Drones to count, Loran was practically dancing through their attacks, dodging and blocking each one with ease as he slowly cut down one ant after another.

'When the fuck did he get that good?' Yang couldn't help but wonder. 'I know Alexx can move like that, and Loran is faster, but...' Yang shook her head, deciding she would just need to ask about it later.

"GAH!"

At that moment, Yang heard a pained shout over the sounds of battle. Alexx was still trying to 'rescue' her from the Guardian but was still being held back. Even so, he tried to force his way through with a desperate look on his face and was struck across the chest for his efforts. His armor and flesh were almost instantly shredded by the spikes on the front leg before he was flung back. Alexx managed to roll to his feet, but Yang could see the blood quickly covering his arm. The injury was severe.

"ALEXX!?" Teeth bared in rage, Yang planted her feet and quickly activated [LEAP] again, launching her unarmored body high into the air above the Guardian. Just as she reached the peak of her jump, she re-equipped her weapon and armor. "HOW DO YOU LIKE GETTIN' CRUSHED ASSHOLE!?"

Yang dropped out of the sky like a meteor, landing on the Guardian's back and striking the remaining front leg with her War Pick.

*CRACK!*

A spiderweb of white lines spread from the impact point. Yang pulled her weapon away and watched the lines continue to spread as the Guardian tried to support its weight with the weakened leg. The sound of tearing metal could be heard and a moment later the leg bent, sending the Guardian's head crashing to the ground.

With the massive insect immobilized, Alexx leapt onto its head and began pummeling the weakened point in its armor with his fists while ignoring his injuries. After ten uninterrupted seconds, the ant's HP dropped to 0%.

'Okay, now it's got to be dead...'

Unfortunately, she didn't have [ANALYSE] to confirm the death, but she was pretty sure it didn't just happen to become unconscious again when Alexx punched it with only 2% HP remaining. Yang sighed with relief but winced as a sharp pain ran across her back, hurting even though the game's pain reduction setting. Glancing at her HUD, she realized that her HP was below 40%.

'I took more damage in that fight than I would like to admit. Time to fall back.'

She had managed to get some decent EXP from fighting the Guardian, even if it was less than she had hoped for when she checked the menu. Both of them needed to recover.

'Besides, Soze probably still wants us to stick to the plan, so we probably don't have long before Zed needs a break.'

Dropping off of the Guardian's back, Yang shouted at Alexx and Loran to fall back and the three made their way up to the ledge.

Once they were out of the battle, Loran went over to Alexx to treat his wounds. "I'M LOW, CAN SOMEONE HELP!?" Another caster immediately pushed past Yang to assist as she got her first good look at Alexx's injury.

It didn't seem fatal, but it certainly didn't look good. The jagged iron spikes along the Guardian's leg had easily pierced and tore away his armor, along with several layers of skin. A lot of it was just scratched like shallow cuts, but there were three that were deep enough to expose his ribs beneath the muscle. A wide wound sat in the center of his chest where a big piece of flesh had been ripped away and was causing most of the bleeding.

After a moment, Loran got up and moved away, likely not having much mana left after fighting earlier.

"HOW BAD IS IT!?" Yang asked desperately, already recalling the player she failed to save earlier.

He sat against the wall with his eyes closed, saying nothing but giving her a thumbs-up.

Yang breathed a sigh of relief and turned to sit next to him, resting for a while as the battle raged below.

*BOOM!*

After a few minutes passed, a sound like an explosion suddenly rocked the canyon, almost forcing every living thing to turn toward the source. Even Loran nearly threw himself off the ledge when he bolted to his feet!

Right on top of a now very dead Guardian, was The Guardian Elder. She had finally managed to take out all the remaining Soldiers in the air and reentered the battle by using [SKULL BASH] from nearly 300 feet in the air!

Yang recalled how hard and resilient the armor of an Iron Ant Guardian was, how even a direct hit from a Mountain Goat's [SKULL BASH] was only enough to knock out one of those giant ants.

She shuddered as she saw the massacred body that The Guardian Elder had landed on. The ant's torso, which was constructed of iron, was flattened and torn in half from the impact. Its legs were bent backward as they stuck out of the 15-foot-wide crater in the canyon floor. A spiderweb of cracks covered the ant's head, dangling from The Guardian Elder's horns before she shook it off.

When the expedition had first arrived at Ziege Basin, there had been a few players who thought about trying to hunt The Guardian Elder.

No one thought this way any longer.