They were almost immediately swarmed by people who wanted to be helped through a Trial (mostly skeletons, which had Serenity muttering again about the low quality undead … while trying to resist the absolutely wonderful smell of the cores). They’d agreed to spend the next couple of hours doing that, so Serenity didn’t really have time to think about what he’d just seen.

When the crowd finally let up, it hadn’t been quite two hours - but with the Athletic Trial, it was still significantly later than they’d been finishing. Serenity wasn’t sure if he could finish the last three Trials or not before dinner, but he decided to try anyway.

If worst came to worst, he could finish it up tomorrow. He’d really prefer to finish today, though, since it would mean there was a chance he wouldn’t have to make someone wait outside for him to finish a dungeon.

The next dungeon looked just like a cave. He got a little ways in before he suddenly had a stalactite falling at him. Serenity rolled out of the way, but it still caught him in the leg. He felt grateful he’d prepared for skeletons, because the heavy mace he was carrying seemed to work well when he bashed the disguised monster. A few hits and it was off him and dying. “Fucking Spikers.”

He could feel the core where the monster lay next to his leg, so he dug it out of the thick end of the spiker. He wouldn’t have expected one in something that looked so much like rock, but the spiker wasn’t rock, it just imitated it.

He let his leg heal while he looked at the cave. It was filled with stalactites and stalagmites. Which meant he could either bash everything … or he could figure out how to find them.

There was an easy way to do that.

“Please don’t throw a knife at me, Sillon.” Serenity looked at Sillon … and let his eyes fill with fire.

Sillon jumped a little. “That is still immensely creepy.”

“Yeah, but it should let me tell spikers apart from the cave. Creepy is better than a fake rock eating your leg … ah-hah! There you are!” Serenity attacked a fake stalagmite a little farther into the cave.

Now that he could see them - they were very clearly Solid-attuned - the spikers were easy to take care of. They were ambush predators, after all, and it wasn’t much of an ambush when they could barely move and all he had to do was whack them a few times before he could dig the cores out.

The boss was unique - because there really wasn’t a boss. Instead, there were six normal spikers set close together. Serenity ended up moving in close enough to get one to fall, taking it and its floor-bound neighbor out, dodging away from the next one as it fell, and moving out of the area they could reach. He quickly cleaned up the the fallen one and the stalagmite it landed next to - once they were on the ground, they had limited movement - and then it was a simple matter to entice the last fake stalactite to jump towards him, leaving it and the last stalagmite sitting ducks.

If the spikers had been intelligent, the fight might have been difficult - but they were almost literally as dumb as a box of rocks.

Spiker Dungeon 0.7 Complete

1 Participant

Rewards increased for reduced party size.

Monster extermination: 1,250 XP

Boss Killed: 750 XP

Total Extermination Bonus: 250 XP, 250 Ev

It had actually been a quick dungeon, so Serenity and Sillon hopped right back in the Trial portal to hit the next dungeon.

If Serenity hadn’t already done the Athletic Trial, he would have been surprised at how different the next dungeon was. It was an old-growth forest, with only a little groundcover. There were areas you couldn’t get into - but Serenity had the sinking feeling that if he wanted to full-clear it, he’d have to spend a lot of time wandering around the forest. Time he didn’t really have tonight.

They walked for a few minutes before he heard a grunting noise. Serenity stopped and looked around. The trees showed hints of Life energy, which made finding other animals difficult compared to looking for animals in a cave. After a moment, he saw what was making the grunting noise.

Unfortunately, the growl told him that the boar saw him at the same time.

And a heavy mace was very much NOT the weapon he wanted on a boar hunt.

“Shitshitshitshit-” Serenity jumped for a tree limb and pulled himself into the tree, dropping the mace. Climbing trees was not going to stop an enraged boar. His knives might work, but -

Serenity looked down at the boar as it hit the tree he was hiding in.

Nope. Not jumping down to melee a damn boar.

Which meant it was time for his old standby: Plasma affinity!

He gathered a bolt together, and released it … right as the boar hit the tree again.

It missed.

He gathered another bolt together, and held it until the boar started gathering its strength. This time, it hit exactly where he’d aimed - the boar’s head.

It took out an eye and flash-seared the side of the boar’s skull, but didn’t penetrate.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“If I can do that again …”

The boar hit the tree again, and the tree lurched. Serenity desperately hurried down one of the large limbs to where it almost met another tree and jumped. He caught the limb, and pulled himself on top of it.

Unfortunately, all he could see of the boar’s head was the side he’d already damaged, and he’d already learned that his plasma wasn’t going to penetrate the skull without a proper spell (or a lot more practice ... or mana).

It would be easy to kill the boar with Death affinity, but as he’d told Sillon … he wouldn’t learn anything by doing that. So. Options.

He’d never really used Void affinity offensively. Maybe it was time. He could remember using the Vaccuum affinity he’d evolved into Void offensively, but it had been very specific. Void ought to be usable as direct … hm. Maybe if he split the giant pig?

Serenity concentrated. He was only going to get one or two shots at this, his mana was down by about a third and Void was energy-hungry, never mind the amount of time it took to use an Affinity instead of a proper attack. He concentrated on making a plane of Void right through the solid matter where the boar’s head was.

It cost more than he’d expected, but the boar’s head split into two pieces.

When Serenity checked, he found that he’d managed to split the boar’s core, as well. He picked up the pieces, but they were already dissolving. He could feel the strong pleasant buzz before they disappeared.

Serenity looked at Sillon as he came out from behind a tree. “I can see why people die on this one.”

“Yeah, it’s a bad one. What are you going to do now?”

Serenity found his mace, tucked it into the loop on his belt, and pulled himself into the trees. “Take the high road, find the boss, get out of here. May have to take some time to rest, that was … something else.”

Serenity saw several boars as he traveled further in, but none paid attention to him up in the trees. Eventually, he found a boar that was twice the size of the previous ones. He’d actually made it to the boss before his mana was full, so he took a few minutes to watch it while he waited.

The giant boar seemed to just be wandering between trees, but it was always near a particular pair. Serenity took a good look, and between the two was an oval opening he knew had to be the dungeon exit.

I hope this works.

Serenity climbed as close to the giant boar as he could get and waited for it to be in position before he generated the Void slice. This time he aimed for the boar’s neck.

It took minutes to form the spell, and when it finally did form, it took more than half his mana, but it cut most of the way through the boar’s neck. He really wanted an actual Void spell. That was amazingly powerful but completely sucked to use -

[Void Concept unlocked]

Oh shit.

Serenity grabbed onto the branch he was on for safety. He felt small Void explosions - implosions? Implosions - trigger around himself.

They seemed to last forever.

Then the branch he was holding onto tilted.

Serenity frantically jumped to another branch, then hurried to the ground. This display might draw other boars, but being in a tree seemed even less safe.

It wasn’t stopping.

I haven’t initiated a Concept at this high an Affinity without a containment circle since I got my Death Concept the first time. That was bad … most initiate smoothly, especially at low Tier, there just isn’t enough power available to make things go really wrong … but … not at high Affinity … standard is that if it’s over 20% you contain it just in case … I’m at 60 …

Serenity looked at the forest floor. There was a big enough more-or-less bare area. He pulled out a knife and started cutting a circle in the dirt. He followed it with the fastest Concept Containment circle he could manage.

It still took several minutes to draw it correctly, because he had to draw it big enough to stand in - and a knife in the forest floor wasn’t exactly the best tool for precision work anyway.

Once it was completed, he could feel the energy being pulled into the runes.

A few minutes later, it was safe. He broke the rune circle to find Sillon standing next to the exit.

“What was that?” Sillon looked nervous.

“That … was why you try to initiate a Concept before you have a really high Affinity. I should have known better than to use it twice in such a big way.” Serenity looked down.

Sillon looked more confident. “Ah, right, I’ve seen Concepts initiate before. That was … spectacular.”

“60% Affinity. Way too high. At least I don’t have any others over 50.”

Sillon stared at Serenity. After a moment, he stated “I don’t even want to ask. Did you want to get the last Dungeon Trial tonight?”

“No. Not after that. I need to rest. Might need to heal, I’m not sure. Void affinity is sneaky.”

“Not asking …” Sillon shook his head as he led the way out of the Trial.

Boar Dungeon 0.8 Complete

1 Participant

Rewards increased for reduced party size.

Monster extermination: 250 XP

Boss Killed: 500 XP

Dungeon Cleared: 250 XP, 250 Ev

Name: Serenity

Species: Human (Altered Template)

Path: Paths Available

Level: 77 (10/780)

Tier: 0, 0/77 Spent

Path History: None

Condition: Healthy

Healing Available: Full

Mana: 280/280

Stamina: 340/340

Might: 22

Agility: 25

Phys: 24

Understanding: 15

Will: 23

Mind: 18

Perception: 25

Luck: 16 - 121%

Ev: 7692

Resistances

Pain: 1032 (32 active)

Sleep: 1

Pleasure: 2

Unknown

Affinities

Death: 100.01%

Life: 9%

Mind: 30%

Arcane: 50%

Plasma: 40%

Liquid: 5%

Vapor: 10%

Solid: 15%

Energy: 40%

Void: 60%

Time: 15%

Space: 5%

Concepts

Death

Mind: 15%

Void: 25%

Time: 5%

Unknown

Aspects: Unknown

Titles

Previous Supreme Existence

Altered Template

Named

Ghost in the System