The broodmother was receiving a lot of attacks, but the Rift-Sprites weren't well suited to stop her with their bodies, so, despite the injuries, she was still pretty fast.

"I think there is only one thing to do here," Reidar said. He was not focusing all his firepower on the creature, because the Dread-Spinners, although now less than 80, were still there.

"We must gamble."

Lena's eyes widened. She knew exactly where this was going.

Reidar's jaw tightened as he locked eyes with her. "Get Jake out of here."

"Are you insane?"

The queen was getting damage attack after attack, second after second, but not enough to kill her before she would eventually reach them. There was a limit to how long they could escape her.

The Broodmother was eventually going to die, but that was if Reidar stalled her enough but at the same time increasing the number of attacks landing on her.

Her health pool was simply too big for the bastard to die before it killed them. Not if the damage accrued this slowly.

"Do you have any suggestions?"

"We can run!"

"NO!" Jake couldn't even hear those words. The Broodmother was there, waiting to be killed, getting injured in ways he could have never done. That was their chance. His chance to get revenge.

"Jake, we can't kill her! Not safely!"

"I will summon more creatures! I will do anything I can!" He started sobbing. "Please! It killed my parents!"

Reidar didn't know what it felt like to have his family killed in front of him, but Jake did.

He could understand his feelings.

"Don't worry, Jake…" He gave him a determined look. "I'm going to kill that thing…"

"This is a mistake, Reidar… What if you die?"

"Just bring Jake away… Lena… I'm not going to die."

Lena grimaced.

\[Level 129 Monster Dread-Spinner Gloom-Web Arachnid defeated.\]

…

\[Level 121 Monster Dread-Spinner Gloom-Web Arachnid defeated.\]

…

\[Level 130 Monster Dread-Spinner Gloom-Web Arachnid defeated.\]

…

\[LEVEL UP! You have reached Level 118.\]

\[LEVEL UP! You have reached Level 119.\]

"Shit…" Lena turned back to see the monster chasing them. "Don't get yourself killed, Reidar… Really."

He nodded.

"Come on, Jake. We're just in the way here." She pulled him back, and after a last look at the advancing Broodmother, Jake allowed himself to be led away, his sobs swallowed by the cacophony of battle.

They vanished into the rubble-strewn streets, putting distance between themselves and the queen.

The Broodmother's glowing eyes tracked their movement, and with a guttural hiss, she lurched forward to pursue. But Reidar channeled mana through the Root Grasp skill.

Thick vines erupted from the cobblestones, wrapping around the Broodmother's injured legs and her massive cephalothorax. The monster shrieked in fury, its advance halted momentarily as it struggled against the magical bindings.

But that didn't last long.

Seizing the opportunity, Reidar's summoned creatures redoubled their assault. Fireballs from the Ember Rift-Sprites streaked through the air, exploding against her carapace in bursts of searing flame.

Each impact caused her to flinch, but the damage was still superficial, chipping away at her immense health pool far too slowly.

\[Level 127 Monster Dread-Spinner Gloom-Web Arachnid defeated.\]

The notifications scrolled, but Reidar barely noticed them. His attention was on the Broodmother, who was already tearing through the roots with her powerful mandibles.

The Dread-Spinners, though fewer, were still slaughtering his summons, diverting firepower from the larger specimen.

And she would break free soon.

"All units! Focus fire on the Broodmother! Ignore the others!"

The battlefield shifted in an instant. Every Ember Rift-Sprite, whether perched on rooftops or lurking on the ground, snapped their attention to the queen.

A storm of fireballs descended, a continuous, roaring cascade of flame that engulfed the Broodmother in an inferno.

Her shrieks turned from rage to agony as the intense heat targeted her existing wounds, cooking her from the inside.

This was a gamble, one that would leave the Dread-Spinners unchecked, but it was the only way to bring the queen down before she reached him.

The roots snapped and the broodmother freed herself. The Broodmother was enraged beyond reason and tore through the last of the vines and charged.

She must have used a skill, because a torrent of webbing shot from her spinnerets, not aimed at him, but at the ground ahead of his still-running wolf mount.

The Gloom-Web spread across the cobblestones, hardening into a sticky, grasping trap.

"Left, now!"

Reidar wrenched the wolf's mane. The creature leaped aside, claws scrambling to grab hold as the web just grazed its hind leg.

It wasn't a clean dodge, as the wolf stumbled, barely keeping its footing.

Reidar's eyes darted across the battlefield as he fought to maintain balance. The consequences of his all-or-nothing order were now horrifyingly clear.

With every Ember Rift-Sprite focused solely on the Broodmother, the remaining Dread-Spinners were doing what they wanted.

They fell upon the front fighters, tearing them apart unimpeded. The defensive line had collapsed. Notifications of his own summons' deaths now flooded his vision.

He dismissed them all.

He was winning the battle against the Broodmother. He just needed to push more.

The Broodmother screeched. She was almost upon him.

The world narrowed to a single, horrifying point: the Broodmother's rage-fueled charge.

Reidar's wolf mount scrambled backward as another wave of Gloom-Web splattered where they had just been. The thousands of fireballs still hammered the queen, but she was ignoring the searing pain to reach the source of her torment.

A Dread-Spinner broke through the chaos, its mandibles snapping at the wolf's side. Reidar yanked the beast sideways, but the movement threw him off balance.

The Broodmother's leg crashed down, missing Reidar by a hair. The jagged tip hooked his Summoner's Cloak.

"Shit!"

He was cornered. The Dread-Spinners were closing in, and the queen was too enraged, too massive, and too close. His mana was trickling back thanks to the Mana Siphon perk, but it wasn't enough for another large-scale summoning. Desperation clawed at his mind. He needed something now. A shield, a distraction, anything.

Instinct took over. He reached for his most basic, most reliable tools. The foundations of his army.

"Summon Bone Militia! Summon Primal Pack! Summon Guardian Shade!"

As the spells left him, something different happened. A rush of understanding, came to him. The intricate structures of the spells, their formulas and limitations, unraveled and then rewrote themselves into something grander, more efficient, more powerful.

\[Summon Bone Militia has reached 100% proficiency.\]

\[Skill has been upgraded to Tier 4: Summon Skeletal Warriors.\]

\[Summon Primal Pack has reached 100% proficiency.\]

\[Skill has been upgraded to Tier 3: Summon Feral Pack.\]

\[Summon Guardian Shade has reached 100% proficiency.\]

\[Skill has been upgraded to Tier 5: Summon Shadow Guardians.\]

The knowledge settled into his mind.

The Summon Bone Militia skill was no more. In its place, was Summon Skeletal Warriors.

Based on the description, they allowed to summon stronger creatures. They held not crude bone swords, but good to use blades. They also had partial armor, a breastplate, a shield and some boots.

They were only two levels below him, and based on the skill's description, they came in a group of 30, along with an ingrained intermediate combat proficiency.

But he didn't have time to marvel. The Broodmother's mandibles, snapped shut where his head had been a second before. That thing was too fast, and there were far less Rift-Sprites around to slow her now.

Reidar used Root Grasp again. The Summon Skeletal Warriors wasn't the only new skill he got. Summon Primal Pack evolved to Summon Feral Pack which gave him new choices.

He could summon a wolf, a panther, a bear, a horse… and a crow. The image of the massive, rhino-sized crow flashed in his mind. That was exactly what he needed to get out of that mess.

The wolf he previously summoned disappeared once Reidar got the skill at 100% proficiency, which meant Lena and Jake were on foot too. Although they were faster than him, so it was hardly going to be a problem.

He channeled mana into the skill.

Five massive crows materialized right above him in midair. One dove straight down, swooping under Reidar's boots. He didn't hesitate and jumped on it.

For a moment, he was suspended in the air; the ground falling away. Then the crow surged upward, and Reidar flew.

The feeling was unreal. Flying on a plane was too different from this. Reidar felt free. The noise of battle decreased, replaced by the wind roaring past his ears.

Below, Loden looked like a shattered toy town. Lena and Jake were tiny specks, still running, this time, from where they came, because they assumed, when Reidar's summons disappeared, that he had died. Of course, that wasn't the case.

As for his Rift-Sprites, they swarmed like angry fireflies around the Broodmother, who thrashed and burned as she got rid of the root grasp.

The Dread-Spinners were still destroying everything. For the first time, Reidar saw the whole battlefield laid out, and it felt like the world had slowed down just for him.

A fierce, wild grin spread across his face.

"I'm going to kill that fucker!"

He willed two other crows to break formation. They dove toward Lena and Jake. He saw Lena look up; her face a mask of shock, then understanding, as one of the giant birds descended beside her, offering its back.

Reidar turned his gaze to the battlefield below. From this vantage point, he was untouchable.

The Broodmother reared up, trying to get him with her Gloom-Web, but he was too far and her movements were slow, hampered by her injuries. Her Gloom-Web shots kept falling short.

Things were going to be different now.

There still was one skill he could use.

Summon Shadow Guardians. They were larger than the old shade, their bodies more defined beneath their tattered, hooded mantles. They had no faces, only pools of deeper darkness, and were far better at siphoning mana than the Guardian Shade.

He summoned them below.

He felt the ambient mana in the air twist and flow toward them, then towards him. Mana came like a torrent compared to the trickle he was used to.

Based on the skill description. The creatures had their own skills. They could create a lance of pure shadow, a grasping field of darkness to entrap foes, and the ability to raise walls of solid shadows.

The Broodmother shrieked again. She was badly wounded, her leg shattered, her carapace a mess of cracks and burns. She was bleeding out, being cooked alive, and now her prey flew mockingly out of reach.

Now the Shadow Guardians were going to keep her as trapped as possible. The only problem was, that they were still several levels below it, so that was not going to last long.

Reidar leaned forward on the crow's back, his grin hardening. The gamble had somehow paid off.

"Don't let her move!" He ordered to the Shadow Guardians.

Then, walls of shadows appeared.

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