God of Zero Cost

The narrow copper head of the duckbill axe hissed through the darkness, slicing a silver crescent toward the Scarab’s exposed rear seams. Ethan didn't yell. He didn't command the trapped golem to pull against the vacuum of the floor slough. He simply leaped across the narrow stone lane, his hide boots biting hard into the oil-slicked limestone as he swung his heavy, fire-hardened wooden mace—capped with razor-sharp, volcanic obsidian glass teeth—upward in a brutal, two-handed arc.

Crack.

The dense, glossy black obsidian teeth of the mace collided with the side of the socketed battleaxe just inches from the golem’s clay skin, sending a shower of dark glass flakes spraying against the stone. The raw, structural shockwave vibrated straight up Ethan's forearms, the immense kinetic force tearing the skin of his calloused palms and sending a stinging numbness down his shoulders.

The fallen king stumbled backward, his boots slid smoothly along the edge of the bubbling tar trench as he effortlessly reset his twisting, deceptive posture. Shinab’s face-plate twisted into a cold, hollow grimace. Tzelem Shinab didn't care about a counter-attack; he fluidly spun on his heel, turning his back to Ethan entirely as he swung the narrow axe backward in a blinding, low-slung reverse cut meant to take Ethan out at the shins.

He’s using the same back-turning pivot again. Instead of retreating, Ethan stepped directly into the path of the swing.

He dropped his weight, driving the thick, heavy wooden shaft of his obsidian mace straight down into the narrow gap between Shinab's ankle and the slippery limestone ledge. He didn't swing it for damage. He used it as a literal crowbar, wedging the glass-toothed tip deep under the fallen king’s heel.

"Up," Ethan growled, throwing his entire physical strength into the lever.

The sudden, rigid leverage completely jammed the sub-boss’s volatile, drifting momentum. Shinab’s back-turning spin violently stalled halfway through its arc, his stance breaking as his center of gravity overbalanced backward toward the open pool of bubbling tar. The king let out a harsh, panicked roar, his fingers clawing at the air as he tried to drag his weight forward, but the high-friction sludge bubbling beneath the rock ledge caught his heel first.

The natural tar sump violently suctioned around the king’s tattered leather boots, the heavy black oil grabbing his legs with the exact same trap he had used against the clay beetle.

Shinab was completely stuck, his torso violently jerking forward as he tried to wrench his heavy duckbill axe free to clear a path.

But a cornered boss was a desperate machine. Even pinned in the swampy tar, the phantom king violently twisted his upper body, lashing out with a blind, sweeping backhand strike that caught Ethan dead in the ribs. The impact threw Ethan three feet backward across the slick rock floor. His breath evaporated. His health bar took a jagged, sudden chunk out of the green, and his vision blurred into an erratic warning flicker.

Ethan scrambled onto his knees, his hands frantically searching the loose gravel as Shinab managed to wrench the axe free from the muck, raising it again with a slow, heavy, un-stabilised fury. The king's frantic struggle was tearing the tar open, but the violent momentum of his own thrashing carried his torso too far forward. The frantic lunge threw his heavy conical helm back just an inch, exposing the thin, flickering chasm of light right at the base of his linen neck wraps.

I only get one shot before he clears the pit, Ethan thought, his shaking hand already snapping his leather sling into a ferocious wheel over his shoulder as he fought through the stun penalty.

He forced his trembling fingers to lock the leather pouch, tracking the shifting light of the sub-boss's throat through the red haze of his blurred vision.

Don't miss.

At a distance of barely three feet, Ethan released the strap.

The iron-reinforced stone left the sling with a low, deafening hum, striking dead center into the exposed throat gap of the trapped king. The heavy metal slag ball pulverized the rotten windpipe, completely stopping the sub-boss in a single, catastrophic crunch.

Ethan dropped onto his back against the cool cave wall, his chest heaving as he stared down at the bold durability counter of his trapped Scarab: 215/530.

The golem’s leg was still wedged deep in the floor slough, but the boss was defeated. He rolled onto his knees, salvaging the heavy metal plates.

Ethan lifted the heavy scale armor, his thumb tracing the crude, shaved edges of the bronze disks caked into the leather.

Five rebel kings... Ethan muttered, his mind pondering at what else lay further in the dungeon.

He stuffed the heavy breastplate deep into his pack, his eyes tracking the dark, deeper limestone fissures running toward the lower vaults. His golem’s durability was dangerously low, but there was tar and dirt all around this cave.