“This has got to be one of my least favorite plans I’ve ever been a part of,” Vin complained as they carefully loaded the last of his cargo onto his back. “I mean really, don’t we still need some of this stuff?”

  “We need to not be crushed to death by a giant worm of flesh even more,” Golrim said, motioning for the Earthers to take a few steps back now that Vin was ready. “How do you feel?”

  “Like I have a hundred pounds of volatile explosives strapped to every portion of my body,” Vin said bluntly, struggling to turn and look down at himself. He had satchels of explosive powder hanging from his arms and legs, a backpack of detached ballista bolt heads in a pack on his back, and a few dozen of the magical grenades tied around his chest and hips.

  “One hundred and fourteen pounds by my count,” Golrim smiled. “Enough to most likely destroy this entire section of the outer wall if they were to detonate right now.”

  “Do you think it’s enough?” Spur asked, having quietly bounced back and forth between watching their preparations and the slow-moving monster as it got ever closer to crushing them all. The Slayers and combat classes were doing an excellent job tying up the fleshy protrusions, but it would only be a few more minutes before they reached the outer wall. “If this doesn’t work, we’re going to be hampering our own combat effectiveness for weeks to come for nothing by wasting all these explosives.”

  “If you have a better idea, I’m all for it,” Golrim said as he tugged a few of the satchels tighter around Vin’s arms. He was going to have to be able to move, and the last thing they wanted was anything falling off. “I already ran it past Mei, she thinks it’s a good idea. Especially when combined with Vin’s Epic Monster Slayer title.”

  “In that case, hurry up already!” Spur snapped, turning to focus his attention entirely on the monster. “We’re running out of time!”

  “I’m sorry, allow me to wait faster as I have even more high-powered explosives tightly secured to my body,” Vin drawled as Golrim continued tightening things. He understood why it had to be him doing this, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.

  “Actually, I think you’re ready,” Golrim said, giving one of the satchels one final tug. “Lumel, you remember the plan?”

  “Yes. I’ve already cast the spell,” she nodded, looking surprisingly okay with what was going on. Vin would have expected her to be just a tad more worried about what he was about to do, but she knew better than anyone how his divine boon worked. In theory, he’d be totally fine.

  Yet he’d never tested his boon quite to this degree before.

  “In that case, get down there and start running,” Golrim ordered, giving him one last smile as he pointed at the ever-encroaching ring of flesh. “I estimate we have about seven minutes before we’re all crushed to death, so no time like the present!”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Vin grumbled, turning to give Lumel one last kiss before deciding against it at the last second.

  There was something about having one hundred and fourteen pounds of incredibly volatile explosives strapped to one’s body that made them want to avoid physical contact with other people.

  Instead, he gave her a warm smile before turning and running down the side of the wall with his magical boots. He had more than enough strength to simply jump off and land, but he’d been ordered to avoid any sudden movements as much as possible.

  If he detonated now, he’d destroy a decent chunk of the wall and kill who knew how many dozens of people.

  Reaching the ground, Vin’s gravity oriented back to normal and he began jogging out toward the giant ring of flesh. It was close enough now that the ground was really starting to shake, to the point where he was pretty certain if he hadn’t improved his dexterity he wouldn’t have been able to walk in a straight line. As he ran, he heard Mei call out from up high with her magically enhanced voice.

  “Alka, help Vin carve a path into the monster!”

  Seeing Alka turn and begin sprinting back in his direction, Vin turned his focus toward the ring of flesh he was quickly approaching. It was even more intimidating up close. A sheer wall of living flesh the height of a two-story house and stretching as far as the eye could see in both directions as it slowly closed in on them while continuing to coil up on itself. Naturally, they’d chosen to send him in at a spot where the Slayers had already hit and Tiffany had sealed off the fleshy protrusions, which meant Vin didn’t have to deal with so much as a single one of the flesh-imitations of elite monsters that the rest of the combat classes were taking on. Now that he was closer, he could see the merider silk patches straining to contain the flesh tendrils as they continued trying to regenerate, but merider silk was something else. Those mana-infused threads wouldn’t snap so easily.

  “I see it falls to you and me to save all of Terra once again!” Alka called out, laughing as she finally saw what he looked like. “Is that seriously the plan? You’re going to blow yourself sky-high?”

  “The monster regenerates too fast to try cutting something of this size in half with a regular blade, so this is the next best option,” Vin argued, feeling strangely self-conscious of all things as Alka continued laughing. “Look, it wasn’t my plan, alright?”

  Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  “I figured. I’m just cracking up that even with all the incredible magical tools at your disposal, the first plan anyone came up with was ‘blow Vin the hell up.’”

  “Yeah, go figure,” Vin said, finally cracking a smile himself as he realized how ridiculous the situation was. “Anyway, can you help me get inside? Golrim said that would be the best case scenario.”

  “I think I can. I tried cutting into the side of this thing earlier, but it regenerates ridiculously fast,” Alka said, picking out a spot away from the sealed flesh tendrils. “Fair warning, I saw some of the monster’s blood land on my Slayers during all the fighting, and it’s definitely acidic. This is going to hurt.”

  “Why have Total Resistance if I’m not going to use it, right?” Vin offered weakly, looking forward to this plan even less now that he knew he’d be forcing his way not just deep into the center of the monster, but being eaten alive while he did so.

  “That’s the spirit!” Alka shouted, stepping forward and cutting deep into the monster’s side with her blade. It spoke as to just how insanely massive the monster truly was when it didn’t so much as shudder or do anything when she cut a deep, human-sized gash straight into its side. The flesh wasn’t all that tough or resilient, but already they could see how it was trying to knit itself closed right before their very eyes.

  “Okay, this is going to get messy,” Alka said, her eyes narrowing into small pinpricks. “Stay close, and follow me!”

  With that, Alka transformed into a living blender, pushing her golem body to the absolute limit as she carved a tunnel straight into the side of the monster. Her arms wouldn’t grow strained and she didn’t feel exhaustion, so she continued stepping further and further into the monster without worry.

  “Oh, I can’t believe we’re doing this,” Vin muttered, taking a deep breath before stepping into the monster right behind her. Sure enough, just as Alka had warned him, he immediately began feeling minor burns spreading all across his exposed skin from the acidic blood. The fact that he was still burning so quickly even with his Total Resistance skill and the defenses of both his Survivor and Epic Monster Slayer titles meant that this creature's blood truly was something else. It was hard to judge, but if Vin had to guess, he’d imagine a regular person without either of those abilities would be dissolved within seconds.

  Of course, acid meant nothing to Alka.

  “Come on!” she shouted as she began to pull farther away from him, the acidic blood fully coating her darthsteel form. Vin hurried to catch up as he squeezed forward, hissing as more and more of the blood washed over him. It reminded him of his desperate dash through the acid-spitting butterflies of the infernals’ old dungeon, albeit far more painful.

  I have got to learn some sort of Protection from Acid spell, assuming we all survive this thing.

  The trickiest thing about what they were attempting was that ideally, they would only carve their way directly into the center of the monster. If Alka just kept going in a straight line, eventually, she’d cut out the other side. If they wanted to blow this thing in half and stop it from coiling around itself, triggering the explosives in the middle was their best bet. So it was that after a solid minute of hacking though flesh, Vin finally stopped her.

  “I think we’re in the middle!” he shouted, struggling to move forward with twin walls of acidic flesh pressing in on him from both sides. Their tunnel Alka had been carving was barely large enough for one person already, and that was before it regenerated right behind them. “You need to get out of here! Even if the explosion isn’t enough to hurt you, the force might be enough to send you flying into the next fragment over!”

  “What about you?! Do you have a plan for that?”

  “Yes, trust me!” he said, desperately squeezing by her and putting her on the side facing Terra once more. “I’ll try and give you sixty seconds, but then I’m triggering the bomb!”

  “I know this sounds crazy, but be safe!” Alka said, nodding at him before beginning to hack her way back out of the monster. Their thin tunnel had already completely healed over, which meant her exit would be slow going. She quickly vanished within the burning flesh as the tunnel sealed shut between them, and Vin couldn’t help but cry out when the already squished area he was within began pressing in on him even harder as the monster tried to heal around him. It felt as if he were stuck within a hydraulic press coated in acid, the sizzling walls literally melting through his flesh as they pressed in on either side of him hard enough to make his bones creak. He was already past the point where he couldn’t breath, but he knew from all his swimming with Lumel that he could go entire minutes without air if needed.

  He did his best to hold on and count to sixty to give Alka time to escape, but as the pressure and pain from the flesh grew worse and worse, he had a sudden chilling realization.

  If my boon activates early from me being crushed to death… It won’t be able to protect myself from the force of the explosion.

  I’ll be blown to bits!

  Startled, Vin moved to grab his fire-knife secured to his belt and ignite the explosives, only to realize he couldn’t move his arms. The small pocket of space he was in had been all but erased from the monster’s regeneration, and he was completely trapped within the flesh. He had no idea how much time had passed since Alka left, but he couldn’t wait any longer.

  If he didn’t trigger the explosive now, he would die.

  Luckily, he didn’t need the use of his hands to start an explosion.

  As his flesh melted away and he silently screamed without air from the pressure crushing him from all sides, Vin focused on his core and threw together the runic formation he’d accidentally become more than familiar with during his many days of trying and failing to create his first new spell. After all, he knew better than anyone exactly what happened when one tried to cast Fireball with the incorrect runic formation.

  They blew up.

  The world erupted in heat, pressure, and light as his mana transformed into fire and erupted all around him, immediately touching upon the hundred-plus pounds of explosives he was carrying and triggering those as well. A bright, golden light washed over him as his divine boon saved him from being blown to bits and utterly incinerated, and Vin struggled to maintain consciousness as he suddenly found himself out in the open sun once more.

  His smoking, burned body hurtling away from Terra due to the force of the devastating explosion.

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