I woke up early, I had many things to do before going to the dungeon; There are two possibilities: I could stay here to kill kobolds or I could go back to the library dungeon to train, the first floor is only level 1 zombies and the skeleton knight but I thinks the dungeon has more to offer than that. After thinking about it and asking Audrey, we concluded that the best choice was to go back in the library, the zombies are slow so Audrey is relatively safe and I can deal a lot of damage using Life Transfer.
We departed at 9 AM, we were ambushed a few times on the way to the library but it was only goblins or wolves, I could have killed them with my aura only, but I didn't want to hurt Audrey or make her stay too far from me, she knows a few spells but they are one target only, if she was attacked but four or five monsters I don't think she could survive. I was training mage hand but I didn't level up a single time during that. It was only when I used Alter Self that I leveled up. It made me discovers something when you have no class you gain exp and level up by slaying monsters, but when you have one, you gain exp by doing something related to your class, I gained exp not from killing monsters itself but by killing them with a modified body and even with that I gained less than normal. I thought about it and concluded that I gain exp by modifying a body with Alter Self (or graft but I didn't test it yet) and killing monsters with this modified body, but only a portion, perhaps it depends on the body modification used to kill, I don't know yet.
I spend my five attribute points in Constitution, I planned to focus on it until I hit 50, to gain a skill, after that, I will spend a bit more in Strength, Dexterity, and Wisdom. After two hours of travel, we reached the library and entered it.
You are now inside the Rotting Library, a tier II dungeon
You can't leave until you defeat the first boss.
The first boss? I thought I killed it, Do they respawn like in a game?
In a dungeon, the basic monsters respawn (zombies for this dungeon) but not the boss, a new boss is created when a monster rank up, the process is similar to an Elite unit outside.
Oh so it works like that, but what is a rank up, I understand what it means but I would like to hear the details.
Monsters have no class (there are exceptions, like the lich), when they reach their maximum racial levels, they will evolve into another monster, a zombie can evolve into a skeleton knight, a ghoul or a ghost, more rank up can be unlocked through special actions but this is generally reserved for intelligent species.
So if I'm correct, the boss will not necessarily be a skeleton knight, I don't think a ghost will be a problem since I can use magic but the ghoul might be more difficult, they are supposed to be the agility type of undead, like the monsters in I am a legend, if confusion works on him it will be a piece of cake but if it doesn't work... I will have to find another strategy. Audrey and I scouted the place, it was not too difficult as the zombies are slow and not very reactive. We found the passageway to the second floor and it made me wonder, do we have to kill the boss to advance? In a typical RPG, you kill the boss who is in front of the stairs but the boss is not here.
"Audrey, do you want to kill the boss first or go to the second floor?" I asked her but she said she will do as I want, I think she needs to be less dependent, I mean, what will she do if I die? I decided to go forward as the first boss will not give us a lot of exp.
You now are on the second floor of the Rotting Library
You must kill the boss of this floor to go back on the first floor
This dungeon is weird, it's generally the opposite but, after thinking about it, it's not as weird as it seems. Undead are tireless, they can attack you forever to wear you down and you must kill the strongest to leave, it's a good strategy against first-timers such as earthlings, you go in, you die and you can't warn the others. After scouting, we saw that this floor was huge, maybe 1 mile, it's hard to judge when there is not a lot of light, it was also crowded (not as much as the community hall but almost) of various undead, there were zombies, skeletons, and some ghouls, the difficulty raised a lot, this dungeon really is guileful, the impossibility to leave coupled with the rise in difficulty is an efficient combo, there must be more than 3000 undead in here and I can't even see the boss. We established a strategy, we will hunt the stray ones to weaken the horde.
We killed a lot of undead this way, maybe 200, after that we encountered a strange one. He was not human looking, His skull was elongated, with two red lights where the eyes should be. He also had some kind of bone armor with spikes and wings, wings made of bones, I thought he was the boss so I inspected him.
Nathaniel, the traitor Lvl.11 Unholy general
He was an angel before, he was labeled as a traitor by the gods and cursed when he tried to warn humanity of the upcoming changes,
Only level 11 for an angel? Did the curse weaken him? He is the second-floor boss, after all, it couldn't be something too powerful, but a general? Does it mean he can command the undeads here? I then inspected the undeads, I did not have a reason before because I thought they were normal undeads but if they are capable of following orders they must be specials.
Undead Legion
These undeads are powered by the energy of Nathaniel, although weak when alone, they are a force to be reckoned when together.
Powered by Nathaniel, does it mean I must kill him to beat them? We killed the strays but now that I look carefully, it doesn't look like there are fewer undeads, do they respawn until Nathaniel dies? It must be that but how can we kill him when he is surrounded by zombies? My aura and the majority of my spells aren't effective against undead, I could change the negative energy in Life energy but it would cost me too much mana, the only solution would be to kill zombies and grind levels like that to gain more mana capacity but it would too much time, we don't have enough food...Ah, we have right? Just to think about it makes me want to throw up but if we starve, we could always eat me, since I can alter my body and regenerate my wounds but fuck man I don't want to eat human flesh and, more importantly, I don't want to make my sister eat my body parts. No! take yourself together man, there are others solutions before this.
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I think I could create a Doom Bolt but with Life Energy instead, it should be possible I kind of already did it on #Harem Magician but this time it would be a ranged attack. I don't want it. It's too painful, Doom Bolt was horrible but based on the reactions of #HM (shortening it) being overcharged with Life Energy was excruciatingly painful. I will have to level up first to hit 40 Constitution. After a few hours of killing small groups who strayed from the horde, I leveled up, I also gained a level of Alter Self, I can modify my body in bigger proportions, like the totality of my arms and legs so I made some kind of defense by growing scales like the kobolds, I think it can defend me against the bites of the weaker zombies. When I got to level 15, I spent my points in Constitution, making it 45 and then another message of the System appeared
Congratulations, you have surpassed peak humanity Constitution (40), due to this augmentation, the system will upgrade your body to prevent death by explosion.
Suddenly I felt pain. A lot of pain. It wasn't like when I reached 40 Intelligence, at this time, the pain was only in my brain but now all of my body is being upgraded at once, it's not as bad as the Doom Bolt though so I can stand it, but its fucking painful, imagine hitting your toes on the corner of your table but with all your body at once. I don't think there is a pain resistance skill, otherwise, I would have learned it with all this shit coming at me. Audrey is looking at me with a worried expression, guess I should have warned her, but it's too late now, I can only greet my teeth to avoid screaming and alerting the horde. The transformation finished after only a minute but it felt like it was much longer, when the pain stopped, a message appeared:
Congratulations, as your body is now of a better quality than a normal human, it can tolerate more advanced modifications, such as new limbs. For being the first human Fleshwarper to reach peak-human Constitution, you will be awarded a free graft from the list below:
-Undeads graft:
Arm (weakening, paralyzing or incorporeal); these arms have a special effect on the livings, the weakening arm will act like the Curse spell on hit, debuffing one random physical stat of the target. The paralyzing arm will paralyze the victim ( vs Constitution) and the incorporeal arm can interact with spectral beings but not with physical entities.
Bone armor: An exoskeleton that will reinforce your defense, the hardness of these bones will increase with your Constitution stat.
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- Humans grafts:
Anything from the human body
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-3 random grafts:
Aboleth graft; Piercing tentacle
Fiendish graft: Membraneous wings
Wings like that of a bat, using them, you can fly with good maneuverability.
Dragon graft: Metabolic fire
The implantation of this graft within your chest leaves no casually visible effect. However, exposure to the energy within your body darkens your teeth and bones until they become solid black, like obsidian. A faint gleam of your main energy (negative energy in your case) might be seen around your teeth when you show them.
As much as the piercing tentacle or the extra member have their own usefulness ( for combat, what were you thinking?) I will choose the Metabolic fire, first because dragons are cool, but more importantly I think it is possible to create the Bone armor and the wings myself with Alter Self, a new organ which I don't understand how it works at all would be far more difficult to recreate. I selected Metabolic fire and another wave of pain assaulted me, I did warn Audrey before this time though. The pain was not that huge honestly, seems like even without a pain resistance skill I managed to withstand it, my insides are being torn apart to make space for a new organ after all but it seems...lacking, I'm not a masochist or anything but I thought it would be far more painful. Maybe it's because of my newly upgrade body that it's less painful.
+1 Intelligence
Uh? Ah, yes I forgot this thing existed, but more importantly, MY 50 INTELLIGENCE IS GONE, it was good and even but now it's a disgusting 51, it may seem neurotic from me, but hey, the apocalypse happened less than two weeks ago, let me cling to what I can to keep a semblance of order in my mind. Anyways, after my inner monologue, the pain stopped and a new popup is in front of my face:
You gained a new skill: Metabolic fire
This skill is named after the ancient dragons of old, who lived in seas of magma and could breathe fire, however, this skill does not breathe fire but the element of your race as a dragon-Error, race not set as dragon, this skill will use the energy you are the most attuned with.
So I suppose it's negative energy, I breathed a bit and negative got out of my mouth but since the organ responsible for this is inside my body, I think I can modify it into Life energy. For now, let's focus on My new Doom bolt, I told Audrey to step back as this will probably be dangerous, I condensed energy in my pam but this time it was Life energy instead of the negative one, a ball of greenish light appeared in my hands and t began to grow in size as *Insert explosion sound here* my fingers are gone, they exploded and it's. Fucking. Painful. The pain is even worse than before as I have to continue to channel energy in my hands, after a few seconds my mana bar is already halved, I can sense that it's almost ready, by the time I was finished, my right hand was completly gone and my hps were draining rapidly so I hurriedly threw the bolt towards Nathaniel, he tried to dodge when he saw it but he couldn't with all the undead near him, he took 300 mana and 300 hp converted in Life energy, with him being an undead, the damage were quite powerful, the bolt exploded upon conact with him, leaving a cloud of dust and undead body parts, even the ghosts were affected by my magic.
You learned a new spell:
Overkill Life bolt tier IV
You defiled what was a ranged healing spell by overcharging it with Life energy to the point of making it unstable and dangerous for the target instead of being helpful.
Every beings int the radius of explosion will get 1% of his hp in raw damage by every percent of damage above 200% of his maximals hp.
Holy shit tier IV? I suppose it's logical since it can kill very high-level beings if I have enough energy, besides, it's an AoE spell so it nor-
Defiler!
You have gained the title Defiler by using a healing spell to kill something, relationship with the goddess of Life and his followers is now: Hated
A party will receive the task to kill you.
By being a Fleshwarper and gaining the Defiler title, you unlocked the Scourge sub-class, do you want to equip it: Y/N?
Hunted? meh, if it's Peter and his harem I will manage but what is a sub-class?
Sub-classes works like a mod, it will tweak your class to gain more special bonuses than the main ones, the bonuses will be in accordance with the theme of the sub-class ( Death and decay for the Scourge class.)
In that case, it will be a yes, I already have skills like that so why not upgrade them? I selected yes and my vision went black.