The form of the Twisted one could hardly be seen through the crowd of defiled swarming toward them. The only trace of it that Leor could observe was the drifting cloud of black corruption swirling above the heads of the incoming wave, but he could feel the sickening Will of the creature pressing down on his soul.
It wasn't until the front line of defiled crashed into the sturdy fortress of angry muscle that was the Highblood Beast Bone that the Twisted finally showed itself. At first, it was hard to differentiate the Twisted from a normal mutated elf, other than the fact that it was shorter than usual and its shoulders and neck seemed to blend together, giving its body a shape reminiscent of a frog.
Before Leor could use Alina's prophetic ability to try and learn something about their new foe, the Twisted crouched low in a squatting position and launched itself into the air. As it did, the entire front of its face and chest opened up like a vertical mouth, exposing a long black tongue dripping with ichor.
The frog-like Twisted hit the ceiling from the power of its jump, its spring-like legs activating once again as it rocketed off from the ceiling directly toward Leor. The devious Twisted one had completely bypassed the front line defenders in order to try and destroy the Willpower torch that was weakening it and all the other mutant defiled.
Leor's heart dropped into his stomach as he realized what was happening, clenching his polearm tightly out of instinct as the feeling of dread inside him exploded. The Twisted fiend flew through the air toward Leor like a rocket, the spear-like black tongue jetting forth from its abominable mouth like a poisonous serpent striking at its prey.
This was a deadly situation for the young man to be in. Bone and Old Grey were completely occupied at the front of the formation; there was no way they would be able to disengage to save him. Because of that, if this incredibly agile Twisted one had launched the attack a few minutes earlier during the first wave, Leor would surely have died.
However, the amazing boon of Willpower he had received since the battle began had already changed him. His chest was full to bursting with power, and that power was slowly changing both his body and mind. He might not be strong enough to stand against such a powerful enemy, but he now had what it took to dodge that unexpectedly lethal attack.
Leor flung his body aside with more speed than he had ever mustered before, sending himself crashing into the inky black floor of the cave as he underestimated his own power. No sooner had his body slid out of the target area of the Twisted one's strike than a slimy black tongue crashed into the rock with tremendous force.
The power of the strike alone was enough to seriously injure Leor, but that was not the most dangerous aspect of the attack. The shadowy black cave floor began to bubble and hiss the moment the dark ichor poured onto it from the tongue. It wasn't just a small amount of acidic ichor either—it was as though a bucketful of the nasty stuff had been ejected from the tongue the moment it made contact with the floor.
Leor pushed himself up onto his knees, gritting his teeth in pain. Since the battle had resumed, his body was once again burning up inside from the explosion of growing Willpower, but now he also needed to struggle for his life against a deadly Twisted! Thankfully for Leor, before he could even rise to his feet Alina had reached his former position.
His young human companion must have set off toward him before anyone else had even realized he was in danger. Leor looked up just in time to see Alina dashing across his line of sight, the golden glow still filling her skin as she held her gleaming silver rapier out before her.
Just as the Twisted one came following behind its disgusting tongue, its body crashing down into Leor's previous position, Alina's rapier was also reaching out to strike it. It was a perfect display of her prophetic battle ability in action. The frog-like Twisted was one of the fastest defiled Leor had ever seen, making Alina the only ones left with any hope of standing up against such a creature right now.
An angry bubbling hiss sounded from the Twisted's strange mouth as Alina's empowered rapier stabbed into its deformed face. She wasn't able to follow through on her attack, however, because the Twisted's incredible agility allowed it to speed away from the blade as soon as it felt the pain of it. The result was little more than a shallow wound.
The Twisted landed on the wall a few meters away from Alina, staring down at the young girl with burning hatred plain to see across its abominable features.
"Leave this one to me! Its attack is too dangerous! No one can afford to get hit!" she shouted as she moved forward to confront it with agile steps.
The powerful Twisted was a double threat. Not only was it incredibly fast and strong, with an ability that could one-shot many of Leor's companions, but the shadowy black corruption spreading from its body was empowering all the weaker defiled. It was of the utmost importance that they defeat such a creature as soon as possible.
Thankfully, Leor's Willpower torch was still burning as bright as the morning sun. The weakening effect from his talent was probably the only reason Alina was able to face such a powerful being on her own. As Leor finally crawled back to his feet, he paid the Twisted one back for its malevolent sneak attack by adding another burst of Will to the torch in his hand. The great ball of flame flickered and sparked as it grew just a bit larger.
Glancing around the battlefield, Leor realized that things were not looking good. The power of the dozens of defiled was growing every second that the Twisted one remained alive, and Bone was already at his limit with how many of them he could handle at once. There was a constant pressure on the mighty ape as dozens of defiled attacked him in a never-ending stream. Even a Beast as powerful as Bone would begin to exhaust himself if he had to continue delivering powerful attacks one after another without rest.
The dark corruption made everything worse, allowing the defiled to move more swiftly and letting more of them escape from each of Bone's attacks. It greatly reduced the speed at which the ape could dispatch them and allowed the mutants' numbers to continue to grow.
It was bad, everything about it was bad. That blunt thought was all Leor could manage to summon about the current situation. The Twisted needed to die if they were to have a chance to live. Period.
Turning his head back to Alina's position, Leor got the feeling she already understood the dire nature of her current fight. The young girl's face was thick with a sheen of sweat, and the look of concentration in her eyes was deeper than he had ever seen before. This was a life-or-death struggle, and Alina was putting everything on the line in order to help them survive another few minutes.
The Twisted didn't intend to make her job easy, however. The vile mutant was still intent on destroying the source of the enraging light that was sapping the power from its body. Alina was forced to continuously predict its moves in order to prevent it from moving past her to kill Leor.
Leor heard the voice in his mind as he was considering trying to help Alina despite her insistence to the contrary, but he instinctively obeyed the order when it came, dropping back down to the ground he had just climbed up from.
Glancing up from the hard rock, Leor saw the spear-like black tongue of the Twisted one rocket past the area where his head had been only an instant earlier. The disgusting tongue crashed hard into the far wall, causing the cave itself to tremble and leaving a blast of ichor the size of a barrel lid melting a hole in the solid rock.
Leor tightened his jaw in anger, and before the Twisted could retract its tongue, he stabbed forward with his polearm. He knew he wasn't strong enough to truly harm the creature, but he didn't need to. He only needed to break its skin. Leor disregarded his own prior plan at that moment and filled the tip of his weapon with power, while at the same time rapidly condensing a bead of Will.
The tongue already began retracting just as Leor's weapon was rising into the air, but the young man's newly acquired power allowed him the speed to reach the disgusting appendage before it slithered back into the Twisted one's mouth.
As the tip of Leor's weapon made contact with the ichor-covered flesh, the razor sharp head of his polearm cut a shallow slice into the slimy tongue. The small bead of Willpower he created shot up his arm and down the shaft of his weapon, injecting itself into the escaping appendage of the Twisted before it could flee!