Jake's shoulder was burning from the strain of holding on to the beetle as it raced along while keeping Ella from flying off. The plan they eventually came up with was to wait for Ella's Vine Grasp skill to come off cooldown. It normally had a thirty second duration and a five minute cooldown. She had a secondary skill that let her refresh it. But that one was an hour long cooldown. Right now they had a good four minutes of clinging on for dear life to maintain before they could really do anything. That was even if the skill would still work on the now bright red beetle.
"It must be some kind of skill. Maybe an enrage timer or something? If we are lucky it will wear off before my cooldown finishes." Ella shouted over the sound of the wind. The beetle was that fast and now that he couldn't find them was just charging forward in a straight line, picking up even more speed.
"Great. Then what? It will just do it again?" Jake shouted back then gritted his teeth. 'Why does this hurt so much? My arms are burning. Who makes a game feel this real? Stupid.'
"You don't play many games, do you? Lots of bosses enrage. Once it runs out there is probably a debuff timer before it can do it again. You just have to go all hulk smash on it again." There was a pause. "That was actually pretty impressive. I thought you pulled the short straw with a Melee class. The other two I met have been ranged too. But man that was something. I'm kinda envious of the tech type's armor too. If that thing hit me I'd be smushed. Instead, you just bounced off."
Jake looked back at Ella. "What do you mean tech types armor? Don't you have like a magic shield or something?"
"Yeah. But magic types armor protects against elemental damage not physical. Tech types block physical but not elemental attacks. It's the trade off." She shrugged awkwardly still mostly dangling from his grasp.
Jake parsed that information for a moment before groaning out. "I don't think I can hold on for your skill thing to come back up. My arms are killing me! Who puts pain in a game?"
Ella waved her arms some in the air like she was doing a cheer. "You can do it, I have faith in you!" She let out a squeak of fright as the extra moving around caused him to almost let her go.
"Er… You can do it. I have faith in you!" She said in a much more subdued fashion and without the extra cheering moves.
Jake chuckled some and did his best to hold out.
He didn't actually have to wait out the full duration of the cooldown. The beetle started slowing down not long after. The bright crimson color fading from the beetle at the same time. Soon enough it not only slowed back down to the previous speed but kept slowing down further. It finally came to a crawl and then stopped. Jake and Ella shared a look then slid off the back of the beetle. It started sluggishly turning towards them. Making weak chittering sounds.
"I think it ran out of gas." Jake said.
"Maybe. Better do this quick then." She pushed his shoulder some as if to shove him towards the beetle. He glared at her, his arms still hurt.
"Don't give me that look. I lost my bow. It's going to be a pain to find it. Get to smashing." She flexed while scrunching up her face as if angry. "Hulk smash."
Jake shook his head ignoring her as he turned towards the beetle. It was turning around so slow he could easily walk around to the side and stay ahead of its movements. Doubling up his fist he wound up and slammed into the side of it with all his strength.
When the beetle had turned red his hits seemed to bounce off it with no effect. When it turned back to the dark shinty black it seemed to have lost the extra defense. His blow smashed into it with the same effect as before. Cracks spread over it and his fist smashed into it making a basketball sized hole.
The giant beetle made a strange chittering sound that reminded Jake almost of a whimper. 'It's just a big bug in a stupid game.' He grabbed the edge of the hole into the shell a second time and started yanking back. It took a few tries since when he tried to brace his foot on the now smooth chitin it slid off. But eventually, he pulled another hole into the beetle. White goo again gushed out of it.
It wasn't long before the beetle that had started to try and crawl away shuddered hard before going still. "Alright! We killed it." Ella came bouncing up with her hand held up as if waiting for a high five.
When he didn't slap her hand she stuck her tongue out at him. "Way to be a sour puss. You killed a boss monster on your second day playing! I've been playing a week already and this is the first one I've killed." She paused. "It is also the only one I've seen but still." She looked over at the dead bug and then back at him. "Alright. Loot time. Go get the Mana Stone!"
"Mana stone? You mean Power Core?" Jake asked.
"Whatever you want to call it. Come on. Go get it! See if WE got a Monster Essence too!" Ella tried to push him towards the bug again.
"Wait. Why do I have to go get it?" He eyed the hole in the side of the bug, the hole filled with bug goo.
"Duh. You are the boy. I'm not doing something gross like crawling in a bug." She gave him an overly dazzling smile. "I'm a delicate lady."
"Yeah well, I killed it. So you should go get it." Jake dug in his heels with a frown. Ella gave him one of her pursed lipped looks of displeasure.
"Quit being like that!" Her tone was bossy and again he was reminded of Cassandra.
"No!" Jake didn't know why but he dug his heels in deeper and was determined not to do as told.
For a moment Ella gave him a fierce glare then seemed to wilt when he didn't give in. "Fine. How about we rock paper scissors?" Jake thought for a moment then relented.
Ella lost.
When the archer emerged from the bug covered in goo and looking miserable Jake actually felt bad. Not bad enough he would have gone in instead but still. She hopped down and splashed in the growing puddle of bug goo. Shook off as much as she could, realized some of it was in her hair, made a horrible face then sighed.
Stepping over towards him she no longer seemed upset. Holding a marble sized crystal in one hand and a pulsing silver mess of flesh in the other. "C grade Mana Stone. I've never seen anything above a D rank one." She held up the small crystal some. "Then even better a Skill-type Monster Essence! I've never seen one before." She held up the pulsing ball of flesh.
"Mutagen." He corrected her as she made it to him. He expected her to give him another of those sour looks but was still grinning.
"Whatever you want to call it. I'm just SOOO excited I feel like… Hugging you!" She lunged forward and wrapped her slimy goopy arms around him and rubbed herself against him. Smearing him with almost as much bug goo as she had been covered in.
"AHH. No Gross. EWW." Jake managed to pry her off him even as she giggled.
"That is what you get for making a girl climb in a gross bug corpse." She laughed then sighed as if the act of covering him in goo had released some pent up stress.
Jake was looking down at himself making a face. "Catch" He looked up and managed to catch the pulsing silvery ball of flesh. "I can't use the skill, can you?"
Jake glared at her again then looked at the item in his hands.