Ketovan, driven by instinct and years of brutal combat, recognized the simultaneous threats. The ground beneath his feet was surging upward from the Stone Slug's power, and three barbed vines from the monstrous Plant Slug were lashing out, aiming for his ankles.
He couldn't afford to be knocked down or bound.
With a fierce shout, Ketovan executed a blindingly fast maneuver, considering the immense size of his weapon. Instead of trying to leap or dodge the rising earth wave, he met it with a targeted, downward strike from his greatsword. The magnificent blade, etched with flowing patterns that seemed to glow faintly with an inner blue light, struck the compacted earth at the exact moment of its crest. With a thunderous CRACK, he cleaved the rising wave of stone and soil in two, disrupting its kinetic energy. The force of the strike was immense, shaking his entire frame, but it bought him the necessary microsecond.
His momentum carried him into a low, circling sweep. The greatsword, a veritable arc of blue steel and power, became a shield and a scythe. Instead of blocking the Plant Slug's vines, he spun on the ball of his foot, transforming his near-fall into a powerful, ground-level pirouette. The blade swept out in a wide, horizontal arc, not at the Stone Slug, but at the three incoming Plant tendrils.
SWISH-THWACK!
The heavy steel sliced cleanly and deeply through the thick, woody fibers of the vines with a single, powerful cut, severing them mid-air. The tips of the tendrils, coated in paralyzing sap, flopped harmlessly onto the ground, leaving the Plant Slug momentarily diminished.
His move had been one of pure crisis management, sacrificing a lethal strike on the Stone Slug to maintain mobility. He was back on his feet, but his position was precarious. He was closer to the immense Stone Slug, and its granite carapace was already hardening the fractured spot from his earlier strike.
"A slow wall is still a wall," Ketovan muttered, his breath misting near the encroaching Ice Slug.
He shifted his focus to a new point of vulnerability. The Stone Slug's head—a heavy, blind mass—had recoiled slightly. Ketovan dodged a glob of caustic sludge from the nearby Mud Slug and bolted in. He brought his greatsword up, leveraging its sheer mass, and swung it in a devastating downward arc. The blue blade impacted at the junction where the Stone Slug's massive body began to flatten into its head structure.
KRAA-CHUNK!
This time, the strike was centered and applied with all of his weight and momentum. The blade bit deep, not just cutting, but gouging a massive fissure into the creature's rocky head. A thick, dark, sap-like fluid oozed profusely from the gash, mixed with crumbling stone.
The Stone Slug shrieked—a deafening sound like two tectonic plates grating together—and tried to roll its massive body onto Ketovan.
Ketovan had to use all his strength to tear the greatsword free, the sudden suction and resistance sending him staggering back three paces, the blue light of his blade momentarily flaring with effort. He had inflicted a severe, though non-fatal, wound. The Stone Slug was now slowed, leaking fluid, and its rock-hardening power was flickering, leaving the ground around it soft and crumbly. It was disabled as the primary threat.
Now, as planned, Ketovan's eyes snapped to the next element: the six-foot, smoldering Fire Slug.
The heat radiating from the Fire Slug had become unbearable, its shimmering aura making the air look warped and hazy. It was closing the distance, leaving its trail of hissing, volatile ash. The combined effect of the heat and the smoke was making Ketovan's eyes sting and his lungs ache.
The elemental strategy of the slugs was becoming clear: use the heat to force him back and then corner him into the thick, quicksand-like trail of the Mud Slug.
Ketovan knew an elemental counter-attack was his best option. He had to hit the fire with speed and disruption before it could melt his defenses.
He spun on his heel and sprinted directly toward the core of the heat, his mighty blue greatsword held ready.
Ketovan sprinted toward the six-foot Fire Slug, the heat hitting him like a physical blow. The air shimmered, and the temperature was high enough to scorch the leather on his armor. He could not fight this creature in a straight melee; the ambient heat would incapacitate him before his massive sword could land a single effective blow.
He reached the perimeter of the heat aura, the ground beneath his feet turning brittle with the sudden drying effect. He planted his stance, the greatsword held horizontally before him like a protective shield, its blue light intensifying against the orange glow of the slug.
Then, Ketovan activated Minority World.
The air didn't cool; it simply stopped moving. For a fraction of a second, the swirling, superheated air, the rising smoke, the crackling ash trail—all of it was inverted, its properties localized and negated.
This ability, Minority World, allowed Ketovan to instantaneously create a small, localized area where the dominant physical principles were suppressed or reversed. In this case, the energy density of the surrounding air was targeted. The slug's powerful, outward radiating heat field was momentarily trapped and contained in an impossibly small, neutral bubble directly around Ketovan, allowing him to breathe freely in a pocket of normal air despite being feet away from a creature made of molten heat.
He surged through the collapsed heat barrier, traversing the three feet of intense heat in a heartbeat. He was now right on top of the Fire Slug.
The Fire Slug, sensing the sudden, unnatural cessation of its environmental attack, thrashed violently, its molten core visible beneath its obsidian shell.
Ketovan brought the blue greatsword up and over his head, leveraging the momentum of his sprint into the swing. He wasn't merely cutting; he was using the sheer mass of the blade and his speed to deliver a crushing blow.
The elemental affinity of the weapon itself seemed to activate.
The blue light from the greatsword intensified, not just to a glow, but to a sharp, icy radiance that dramatically contrasted with the slug's fiery presence. As the massive blade descended, it simultaneously initiated a secondary, localized effect of Minority World directly upon the slug.
He struck the obsidian shell. Instead of cracking, the blade's energy caused a rapid, violent implosion of the slug's outer layer. The fiery, molten substance within was suddenly exposed to the cold, neutralizing power of the blue blade.
FZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT!
The sound was a horrific sizzle, like a volcano hitting the deep ocean. The Fire Slug's body violently convulsed, the intense heat instantly extinguished and replaced by a brittle, black crust. The creature rapidly shrank and petrified, transforming from a core of liquid fire into a smoking, fragile pillar of charcoal and glass.
The six-foot Fire Slug was dead, frozen in a brittle shell of its own extinguished power.
The cost was immense. The shockwave of neutralized energy briefly overloaded Ketovan's ability; his movements were sluggish for a breath, and his vision swam. He had taken out the second target, but the others were still closing in. Ketovan turned his attention to the freezing, crystalline monster. The Ice Slug was next.