Batrire and Owen healed up the warrior whom Max had saved as Huethea used an archer ability that sent an arrow through the last ogre’s skull.

The two groups who had fled returned, grateful for the help and grimacing at the three bodies of their fallen teammates.

“I’m sorry for your loss, but you all need to fall back and consider returning to town,” Huethea told them as Max and Asher picked up the fallen adventurers, carrying them to where the others were. “We can’t escort you, but we need you to go quickly.”

Fowl grunted, and Max gave him a perplexed look.

“She’s right,” Fowl whispered. “They need to go. Look at their eyes. Their spirit is broken. Staying out here will only cause them or others to die.”

Bobbing his head, Max could see the blank stares on the faces of the party members they had saved.

“We need to move!” Huethea shouted. “Next wave is incoming!”

Everyone turned and saw a line of ogres stretched as far as the eye could see.

“What in the gods' name is that?” Owen asked, watching the line of ogres advance.

Max looked at his teammates and saw Tanila and Batrire frowning.

“We can’t take those, can we?” Asher asked. “There are too many.”

Huethea and Fowl looked at each other, both nodding without saying a word.

“We need to run north and find another group,” Fowl stated. “We might need to even collect two more after that. This thing is going to descend upon the city, and all we can do is limit how many get there.”

“Human balls,” Osonia cursed.

Max and Fowl whipped their heads toward the female elf, who saw their gaze. She turned a little red, and both men started laughing.

“I’m going to remember that one,” Tanila stated before jogging after the rest of the team, who had already started running.

In the midst of corpses and death, a small thread of laughter came from four people, easing the mood just slightly.

Ten minutes later, six groups gathered together, preparing to face a horde of ogres, now only about two hundred yards away.

“Stay tight! Protect the support classes!” Brunhilde shouted.

Max grunted at Fowl as he listened to the female dwarf leading the warriors. Brunhilde was a level forty-five warrior and was the highest-ranking adventurer.

No one argued. Being in charge carried the burden of responsibility, and with the task before them, it was a burden that none wanted.

“We need to create a wedge and break that line! Once we do, support the main tanks on the edges, and you damage dealers, carve us a path from the back!”

She turned and looked at her counterpart, Diagon, a male human mage in charge of the support and ranged adventurers. “You call your targets, and we’ll adjust.”

The mage nodded and began barking orders to his people.

“This is going to get ugly,” Fowl said. “I’m just glad we aren’t on the outside edge.”

“That’s because we are only level thirty-eight. She put the higher level tanks outside.”

“Only… we have gained levels so fast, and that last boss…” Fowl stopped talking when Max coughed and motioned behind him.

“It was Fowl, right?” Brunhilde asked, her eyes peering out of a plate helm sporting massive horns on top.

“Yes, ma’am!”

A chuckle could be heard as the dwarven woman shook her head. “Be ready with that taunt. If I call for it, use it. Don’t do so otherwise. If you attract too many with it, I’m not sure we can save you.”

Fowl nodded as she turned and moved back to her spot.

“That’s a heck of a battle speech. You might die if you screw up,” teased Max.

“It’s why I have you. How do we want to play this?”

Max had already discussed it with Asher and Nuala, who were on the north side of this group. Off-tanking would be challenging, but it could be required at any moment. Their goal was to break the line, hold the outside, and then kill them from behind.

“I’ll support you by going for maiming blows. If we can leave them unable to move or walk, it’s a win in my book.”

Fowl grunted and began to rotate his shoulders.

A sharp whistle came, and everyone turned, looking across the grassy field toward where the treeline had been cut back to, half a mile away. They could easily see over a hundred ogres between them and the trees.

“Warriors ready! Fifty yards!”

Cursing under his breath, Max wished he hadn’t already used his Power Strike. Not having it would make things harder, and he could see now that out of every four or five ogres, there was one that carried the shield and sword combo, only this time, they wore plate armor instead of chainmail.This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Tell me we can win,” Fowl muttered, banging his shield with his hammer.

“You’re family. I won’t let you die.”

The moment Max spoke those words, the sound of laughter echoed inside his head.

“Help!” Fowl called out.

Max rushed forward, slashing at the ogre that was overwhelming Fowl. Two of the ones with a sword and shield had converged on him when Brunhilde called out for a taunt. They immediately abandoned the warriors on the right and left, freeing them up to assist with the wall of ogres trying to surround them.

Spells flew all around, ensnaring and rooting ogres, earth prisons holding a few back, and the occasional ice prison encasing one.

Two warriors were already down, requiring everyone to collapse closer and leaving them weakened against the forces in front of them.

The formation was falling apart, and Max slammed his hammer into the back of the knee of the ogre on the right of Fowl. A crunching sound resulted from Max’s attack, and the ogre stumbled, falling to the left side, and ended up on the ground.

Max spun, building up momentum and force as his sonar skill told him exactly where everyone nearby was, and then planted his feet, led with his hips, driving the halberd into the ogre's other leg, which was already in a bad position.

Another crunching sound came as both knees gave out, and the ogre fell the rest of the way to the dirt.

Fowl used the reprieve and backed up, reducing the number of ogres on him.

Every time he blocked an attack from the elite ogre, it smashed him back or to the side a few feet. Its size and momentum allowed it to control the momentum of their fight.

Max couldn’t help until he was certain the other ogre was out of commission. He ran up the grounded ogre’s back and drove the tip of his weapon into the gap between the ogre’s helmet and backplate. It shuddered and then went still as he sliced the spinal cord.

Max began running to help with the second one when another shape entered his Sonar skills range from behind.

It was coming fast, and he just had a moment to act.

Max ran at the ogre on Fowl and drove his spear into its lower back, severing its spine.

As the ogre pitched forward and Fowl moved to get out of the way, Max spun around, dropping low and to the side as a sword slashed through the space he had just been occupying.

Max already knew his attacker was different than every ogre he had faced so far as his sonar revealed more information than he expected.

Rolling and standing up, Max held his halberd out, parrying the second attack from an ogre wearing chain armor and dual-wielding long swords.

Its skin was different from the rest, a black color that reminded Max of the dungeon they had barely beaten, where he had almost burned to death.

The monstrous brute stood fourteen feet tall, and its seven-foot-long swords whistled through the air as it swung them at Max.

Dancing backward, dodging and weaving, Max sometimes parried and blocked with only fractions of an inch between the blades and his body.

“Someone taunt that!” Brunhilde called out.

“NO!” Max shouted, not letting himself get distracted. “Finish, then help!”

Curses came, and Max blocked out whatever Brunhilde and Diagon were shouting. He was in the hardest fight of his life as far as he could remember. No other boss had felt this close to killing him, and it was taking every bit of concentration while trusting his sonar and evasion skills to avoid getting cleaved into pieces by this ogre.

Sweat ran down his bald head, trying to get into his eyes. The parries and deflections with his weapon told Max that this thing was stronger than he was, a scary thought after previously having been the one who overpowered everything he fought.

The black eyes of the ogre were focused on him, its blades moving so fast they were a blur.

He had to make sure each place he stepped when he dodged wasn’t somewhere with a rock or hole lest he stumble and find himself dead a moment later.

A flash of something silver and bronze moved in the corner of his vision, and then Max felt two people entering his sonar range. A few seconds later, a third person approached him, and Max finally allowed himself to believe this would turn out all right.

“Taunting!”

The warrior that taunted was behind the creature and as the ogre spun, both swords coming around at its new target, Max saw that it was the warrior who had been next to Brunhilde.

“No!”

His words were too late as both swords connected only a second apart. The first sword hit the shield and forced the warrior’s arm and shield away from her body, leaving her open for the second sword, which cut clean through her plate armor, slicing her in half.

This is like watching me… we are outclassed…

The ogre roared, briefly studying its kill before turning on Brunhilde, who was shouting as she covered the last few steps between them.

The sound of metal on metal rang out as both the ogre’s swords slammed into her shield. Another strike came, and Brunhilde parried it with her sword, losing a step or two each time she stopped one of the attacks.

“We need to freeze it!” Max shouted, glancing toward the mages, who were still supporting any warriors still standing.

“Help me,” Brunhilde grunted between blows while being driven back toward the line of ogres the rest of the groups were fighting.

Max noticed Asher about to engage.

“Stop! Don’t attack it!”

Asher froze two yards from the boss.

“It will kill you! We need an ice prison!”

The warrior glanced back and forth between Max and Brunhilde, who was struggling to stay standing. She had the ogre’s attention, and Max could see small dents starting to form in her shield.

“TANILA! FREEZE!”

The next three seconds were the longest ones Max could remember in a while as the ogre assaulted the dwarf, who had not realized just how much she had bitten off.

Slowly, ice began to creep up the ogre’s feet and legs. It howled and roared, trying to break free of the prison that was encasing it.

With only a moment to spare, Max took in the carnage before him. The back of their group was about to get overrun, the ogres having pressed around them. They could no longer stay where they were. Everyone would have to relocate and form up to the rear of the ogres.

“Seth!”

Tanila’s voice sounded scared as he sensed something changing around him.

His sonar skill told him that the ogre was about to break free from the ice that was holding it fast.

A familiar aura of red that Max recognized covered the ogre. He had only seen it once before, and Brutus had almost died the last time he had.

“Berserker!”

Max wasn’t sure who shouted it but the moment they did his heart sank.

People are going to die…

The ice shattered, and a heartbeat later, The ogre let out a roar that had Max wincing from the volume of it.

One moment Brunhilde was standing there, her eyes wide through her helmet’s slits. The next moment, her body was cleaved into four pieces.

“BLIND!”

Max shouted, knowing of only one person who had that spell, and now it was a race against time.

The boss took two steps toward Fowl, crushing the warrior it had just slain under its feet.

Max cursed when he saw Fowl stumbling backward as he saw the ogre was coming at him.

“BLIND DAMNIT! BLIND!”