William and Robyn flew away from the altar, taking in the sight of the being as its body wound up into the sky from its portal.
The sides of its long body were ringed with shining cyan blades and small orange spikes. Its head had two sets of jaws, with a set of blue eyes just behind it.
William took a look at its life count, hoping it wouldn't be too high.
384,000.
Over double the Plaguebringer Goliath's.
They at least had some stronger weapons than before, but this boss was clearly at a higher level than that infected Queen Bee.
Keep calm, he thought to himself. Keep it together.
He watched as everyone around him started to attack. Meg was the first, launching exploding fireballs from her Forbidden Sun. Sid sent forth his swarm of butterflies to rake along Astrum Deus's body. Robyn began to open fire with her bow, shooting columns of plague bees at the boss.
William himself swung his True Forbidden Oathblade, launching waves of spinning purple spheres. He flew in up close, switching to his higher-damaging Ark of the Ancients. He stuck the blade out in a parry against Astrum Deus's body, charging it up, and dropped downwards, raking the sword down the worm's body.
On landing on the altar he watched as its tail finally came out of the wormhole, its full length now revealed. The worm arced through the air and came down among Sid and Meg, who were quick to run to the side, but that was when lasers began firing from the worm. Starting from its head, then coming rapid-fire from each segment running all the way down its body. All of the lasers aimed at Sid and Meg, but it didn't look like they had too hard of a time dodging it.
Astrum Deus then burrowed down into the ground below them, then emerged next to Robyn. She jumped backwards, flying directly upwards, more arrows firing, but didn't seem to be in any danger.
The worm flew through the air, past some of the citizens who chose to fire at it. The Steampunker fired her assault rifle and the Archmage fired clouds of ice magic. James the Clothier was in his Skeletron form, but he had decided he would just keep an eye on the whole battle and carry any citizens that got injured to safety.
"Let's see that thing get a load of my Fabstaff!" Cirrus shouted, holding out a wand made from gold and pink gold. It fired colourful pink and blue beams that streaked towards Astrum Deus in a rush of light, impacting against it. William was shocked to see it seemed to actually do quite a bit of damage.
"Dang, I'm out of mana already!" Cirrus grumbled.
"I can give you some mana potions if you want," Meg said as she flew past her.
"Mana potions never work on me! I need booze!"
She pulled out a bottle, took a swig, and held out her Fabstaff again.
But then she keeled backward right off the platform. She would have fallen maybe fifty metres had Skeletron not outstretched a hand to catch her.
William turned away from the scene and focussed on Astrum Deus. It had already lost almost 100,000 of its life – they were doing this! Impossibly, they were doing this!
It began to fly horizontally along one of the platforms, chasing Sid as he placed Daedalus Golems in its path to try to slow it down. Sid took to the skies as it began to shoot lasers out of its mouth. But that was when Astrum Deus seemed to emanate some sort of sonic blast along its length.
The first thing that happened was that Sid's wings suddenly seemed to stop working. He fell, landing just behind Astrum Deus's head and bouncing down along its segments before falling off to the side.
When the blast passed through William he conversely felt like he was floating – higher and higher, arcing over the battlefield. He swung his True Forbidden Oathblade at the boss, but even at this range the projectiles couldn't hit it reliably.
"This thing's messing with gravity!" Meg shouted as she sailed past upside-down.
William realised he was floating towards the rope Sid had placed when trying to get into the cloud layer, so he grabbed out. He cried out as his hands closed around it.
But then he saw Astrum Deus was flying up straight towards him. The blades on its side were cutting the rope to pieces, and its mouth opened wide, a black hole preparing to swallow him.
William jumped from the rope, again lashing out with his Ark of the Ancients. He carved the blade down Astrum Deus's side – dealing even more damage as it charged up, crystalline blades and energy lashing into it.
Landing on the ground again, he looked up at the boss, arcing back down towards them.
It began to spin as it charged down to the ground, faster and faster like a neutron star.
Before it split in two.
One worm was completely orange, the other completely blue. The blue worm peeled off to the side, while the orange kept charging towards William. He dodged to the side as it burrowed deep into the ground, but then began to feel the ground rumbling.
Far more intensely than what this worm should have created.
He spun around just in time to see something emerging from the Astral Dirt, spraying up clods of earth and debris. Something large. A large silver leg stuck itself up onto the surface, then another, and another. Four in total – which then raised their joints, holding up a central body studded with orange and blue lights. On its top flickered a large orange flame, and its legs had teal crystals sticking out of their tops.
It was another boss. Astrum Aureus. 171,000 life. William glanced at the two Astrum Deus worms as they went after his friends. 192,000 each.
Astrum Aureus began to scamper towards him, its metal legs moving quickly. Lasers began to fire from the flame on its top, striking the ground as William began to run away from it. He swung his True Forbidden Oathblade at it, dealing some damage with its projectiles. The boss made loud metallic grunting noises as it took damage, and it made a massive leap towards William. He jumped, flapping his wings to get above it. It landed with a loud clunk, another spread of lasers firing from it at the same time. It made another leap, but William had soared too high.
His wings' flight time ran out so he was forced to glide down and land, and Astrum Aureus chased after him again, peppering the ground behind him with more lasers. When it jumped for him again William flew upwards again, but the boss must've learnt from last time as it jumped higher and further, its entire hulk slamming into him for a high amount of damage.
He crashed into one of the platforms from the blow, quickly scrambling to his feet. He watched as Astrum Aureus jumped up onto the platform with him. He kept running, still swinging his sword behind him and dodging Astrum Aureus's lasers. When it jumped again he decided to trick it by rushing backward underneath so it would pass over him, but it saw through that tactic and just slammed straight down on him.
He was slammed through the platform, his body impacting on the Astral grass below.
Oh no... He'd been brought to dangerously low health.
He scrambled to his feet and went to yell for help, but it looked like his friends were dealing with the duo of Astrum Deus worms. They'd both started flying faster, one firing waves of lasers while the other left a trail of glowing spheres that must've been some sort of space-mine, as when Sid landed near one it exploded and blasted him into the air.
And the worst part – they too seemed to be losing. The bosses were overwhelming them.
They were too much for them.
Soon the Astrum bosses were going to start managing to kill them.
They would lose.
William grit his teeth. It couldn't end like this! Not when they were so close to their goal!
That was when he heard a voice, loud and booming, echoing across the Astral plains.
"GOD OF THE STARS!"
It was Permafrost the Archmage.
His hands were splayed out, ice swirling around him.
He palmed them down into the ground, and he began to rise.
On a massive pillar of ice.
1 vote = 1 cubic metre of ice for the Archmage.