“Elara levelled up.” Sam commented. She was getting half of his XP, and since he had now gotten a total of 20 since they got in here, it made sense that she had hit the next level, seeming to use the same numbers as he had when he hit level 2.
He wanted to check her information and look into this but decided that it had to wait. First, he moved the flashlight into the room and looked around from afar, before he entered cautiously. Feeling good about the lacking enemies in the room he stepped in, taking a final look around before he stopped to inspect Elara’s information.
She looked ecstatic, smiling widely and wagging the tip of her tail. Like expected, she had a starting block of stats, and now that she levelled up she got one more point that could be placed. Not much more had changed. The system was set up in such a way that he decided where the point went, so he had to be sure it went somewhere good.
“Do you have any thoughts on where you want the point placed?” He asked Elara. She should have input in this as well, it was her attributes, after all.
“I am fine with whatever Master wants.” She smiled contently just being considered.
This didn’t help, she hadn’t been fighting at all so he didn’t know the value of points for her. He took some time to check the information about things, and it seemed that attacks not focused on strength like daggers, whips, and smaller things like that, used Dexterity to aid in hitting. Now, her teeth, large as they were for a snake, were small and pointy by weapon standards, so she used Dexterity to hit. Her Strength was only used to lift things or deal damage when constricting, which he didn’t intend to have her do. Another good place was to put it in Vitality, not only would this increase her Health but it would increase the efficiency of her Venom. Having her expose herself to attack didn’t feel entirely safe, but increasing her health and the potency of her Venom, which he could harvest and use, felt like a better idea.
“I’m considering putting in Vitality, that should give you more health and make it harder to resist your Venom. We can do some in Dexterity later once I don’t have to fear you dying when you attack.” He forced a sheepish smile, feeling a bit uncomfortable with the weight of that choice.
She nodded rapidly like it was the best choice ever.
Having her consent, though he had an inkling that she’d accept no matter what, he put the point in VIT. As soon as the change was accepted her health rose to 20, so a 3 HP increase per point, in addition to making her Venom harder to resist and allowing her more per day. It was a hard-hitting point, he was feeling good about placing more points in it, increasing her survivability and Venom at the same time.
Using a moment to get the goblin’s Core, he was lucky it was easy to find and since he didn’t need to be delicate about it, a few stabs, cuts and a pull later, he had the core in his hand.
Before continuing he felt the need to try out her venom, it’s a shame to not give it a test. Taking out one of the spikes from earlier. “Elara, could you put your venom on this? I want to try it on the next Goblin we find.” He moved it over to her.
“Gladly!” She sounded not just interested but happy to be asked to do something. As he held it up for her she kind of gently wrapped the end of her tail around his hand and some of the spike before she opened her mouth, long fangs flexing out. Sam was surprised, as he expected the venom to be some brown, yellow or whiteish liquid like most snakes, but it had a weird almost electric blue colour. It was more than viscous enough that it remained sticky on the spike, so there was no issue considering that it’d drip off by the time he wanted to use it.
“Thank you.” He smiled at her, who smiled even wider back as she wagged her tail in response.
Sneaking continued as they moved on, keeping his light ahead of himself seemed to be a good idea, not only would it protect him from random attacks but it could light up traps ahead of time. Keeping the light ahead like that worked wonders for the next fights as well, to the point that it almost trivialized the danger from the Goblins. Sam tried using Elara’s venom on one of them but he got a message popup stating that the Goblin had resisted [ Venom 1 ]. So they would have to use the venom on weaker enemies or level her up more. The latter should happen passively.
Further progress through the caves was solid, a few Goblins tried hiding in nooks and crannies, wanting to ambush them, but moving the flashlight around to inspect further before they went in ruined their hiding right away.
[ Dungeon clear conditions:
Kill the Goblin chiefs. 0/2
Optional: Kill all monsters
Goblins: 15/20. ]
They had found several dead ends, several rooms without anything interesting in it as well as many hallways opening up into larger areas without anyone or anything in. It seemed like the Dungeon had this large area to have options available for alternative layouts. Since Janik explained that separate runs would have things a bit different, however, it wasn’t that special this round, perhaps it was due to the surprisingly simple but effective tactics, or just that they were too easy at the moment. Not needing to even enter the room, Sam just needed to see what he was doing within range, and he could remote-stab them over and over. Janik seemed positive about it but at the same time, he had an expression hinting that he wanted a little more drama.
Another good thing was that Elara had levelled up again, they agreed that they’d keep putting the points in Vitality for a while longer. Since it brought the most value to the table until he was starting to feel it was safe for her to attack on her own.
Having continued through the Dungeon Sam was going to head into another connecting hallway, as he had been doing all this time, but Janik stopped him.
Looking at Janik with a questioning expression, Sam wondered what was going on.
“I was wondering if I should just let you go in there, but... It’s the final room, the exit and bosses are in there.” He seemed a bit hesitant.
“Yes? Isn’t that good? We made it this far with... frankly no problems?” Sam tried to quell his pride and arrogance, he didn’t want to become one of those guys but... It had been surprisingly easy so far.
“Yes, kind of, but there is another problem. There are 5 Goblins and 2 Chiefs we haven’t found so far, we have checked everywhere so they should be in there. That’s seven targets, two of which stronger than the others.”
This gave Sam a moment of thinking. Based on the fight so far, the Goblins had between 5 and 10 Health, or at least could take that much damage to go down, he didn’t know about the Chiefs but there were two of them.
“In your honest opinion, do you think I can do this alone?” Sam didn’t think this was going to go as easily as the other things he had done, not considering the Fleshy Dungeon. But he wanted to know.
“Hmm.... What’s the Defensive rating of your armour?”
“Five.” Sam responded, considering that this was a dangerous question to give to just anyone, but Janik could have taken him out at any time during this process without problem, there also was no hint of any double-crossing planned. He had decided to trust him.
“Then I don’t think that’s a good idea. They hit harder than you think, even the normal Goblins can bite through that and do a little damage, there are five of them. And the chiefs will bite surprisingly hard... Not sure it’s a good idea to let you handle this one alone.” Still seeming a little lost in thought, Janik was not hiding the uncertainty on his face.
Sam did the math. He had four daggers in the air, assuming perfection the five Goblins would need two hits each, not counting the Vampiric dagger. If he was smart with the wounds, going for legs, necks and so on, then he might get lucky and get all Goblins at the same time, but the Chiefs, compared to the other times he met them, there was a significant difference between them.
“On the other hand-” Janik continued through his thoughts. “It might be a good way to see how you do. I can see your health so I can step in when it’s needed.” Using a few seconds in thought he continued. “No... that’s too risky, I could join the fight and thin the herd.”
Sam was wondering if Janik had a good idea with the testing of the situation. It would be dangerous and Janik seemed like the extra safe type, which might be why he was taking such great care in the training and safety. Something he did appreciate but at the same time, Sam was feeling slightly paranoid given the forceful entry to a Solo Dungeon... if that were to happen again he needed the experience and power.
“That’s good.” Sam commented. “We’ll do that.”
Janik was forcefully pulled out of this train of thought, looking back at Sam with a confused expression. “Wait, what? Which plan?” His confused expression turned almost panicked as he saw Sam turning off his flashlight and stepping into the hallway, heading for the final room.
He moved his daggers closer to Elara, who sat perched around his neck on his shoulder. “Elara, can you put your venom on my daggers? If we’re lucky at least one of them might do something.”
According to the Companion info window, she had four of five charges left of her Venom ability, since she levelled up and the point was put into Vitality, it increased the daily uses.
She smiled widely and without responding started putting her venom on the blades, the thick high-viscosity, almost honey-like, substance irregularly covered the tip and edges of the blade.
“No, wait.” Janik broke in with a harsh whisper, trying to get his attention before the point of no return around a few corners. “This is dumb, don’t just step in like this.”
“Oh, I won’t do that in a more dangerous situation, just now. You said you could handle it alone, so I feel relatively safe.” Sam smiled back. He felt quite safe with Janik’s comments. He also had his potions and enough funding to reimburse Janik if he had to use any of his own on Sam.
Knowing that his actions might seem arrogant or rash, the only reason he dared do this was because of Janik. The fact that he considered it a proper test meant that he felt confident in his ability to handle this if it turned south. It was also a lot for his own sake, his love/hate relationship with the Tower and its minions had him want to kill them, it wasn’t that he thirsted for blood. Or rather, it kind of was as if it was an extension of vengeance towards the shit the Tower and System was doing. Using the System’s power to do so felt like a solid plus.
Janik used a few seconds of silence before he caved in. His tone of voice was filled with annoyance and disagreement, it was very clear he didn’t like this. “Fine, we’ll do it like that this one. Just don’t fucking do this kind of shit again.”
Sounding borderline angry while at the same time agreeing, at least somewhat.
Sam couldn’t see much more than where he was walking, but he could hear Janik pull his swords and fumble in a pocket, it sounded like he was getting ready for everything.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Peering around the final corner Sam was positively surprised that there was a little light in the final room. It was much larger than the others, being large, comparable to a one-floor house just in a single room. The light seemed to come passively from the room somehow, there were no visible light sources at all, it seemed the Towers were throwing the Players a bone in that one.
Their eyes having adapted to the dark after they turned the lights off a short while ago, let them see the Goblins, most importantly he could count them all. So none were hiding and they were all clustered. He had four envenomed daggers and seven targets. The logical thing would be to poison the Chiefs, but most realistically he’d just go for whomever he could hit, the venom only lasted for one attack, after all.
Due to the size and lacking clutter of the room, there was nowhere to hide, given the Goblins’ better vision in the dark, the chance of sneaking over there was... zero. They weren’t moving around and were currently out of reach of his Area. He would need to expose himself, one way could be to run in there until he got in range and fuck with the flashlight. He wanted grenades, gas smoke bombs or something that could affect areas right about now.
Like the first mission to Aetheria, this was a perfect time to do some testing due to backup.
Mentally preparing himself he started running into the room, going as fast but as silent as he could. He felt relatively confident in his stealth but that was against normal people in a city. It didn’t take too many steps into the room before they noticed him and shrieked something while pointing to get everyone to see him.
Already having the flashlight lifted in the air he started blinking it on max power, moving it far to his right. This tactic seemed to still work as spears, rocks and bones were thrown at the glowing and disorienting source of light, everything missing Sam by a lot.
Finally getting within range of the group he launched his attack as planned. Wanting to thin the herd before they got a chance to do much, he assumed that the Chiefs had a higher constitution than the others, so the Venom wouldn’t be as good on them.
Sending his four daggers out, targeting one Goblin each.
The Vampiric dagger missed its mark entirely, but the three normal ones hit their target with the first landing hit scoring a critical hit!
[ Critical hit, double damage! ]
[ The target failed to resist against [ Venom 1 ]! ]
[ The target failed to resist against [ Venom 1 ]! ]
[ The target successfully resisted against [ Venom 1 ] ]
He was happy that two of his attacks had the Venom go through, one luxury problem was that one of the failed saves was on the Goblin who got a critical hit on him, which took him out entirely. His body fell to the ground with a slight twitch as the two other targets were frantically attacking around them in the hopes of hitting something. The Chiefs seemed to be quite a bit smarter than the others, they both threw makeshift spears in the direction of where Sam was, seeming to hone in on the sound. The Goblins just frantically attacked around them or threw things towards the flashlight.
Taking advantage of the moment he split up his attacks, ignoring the successfully poisoned one for now, aiming his Vampiric Dagger at the original target, and moving his remaining to one of the others. It could be smarter to start attacking the Chiefs but he wanted to get rid of the small targets first.
Continuing to move, he stepped to the side while moving the flashlight around, flashing it on and off as it moved around to fuck with their target acquisition. He knew that the Vampiric blade would one-shot a normal goblin if it hit, so having Venom on that was a bit wasted as he focused them, but it was something to think about for another day.
All four attacks landed true, the Vampiric dagger landing solidly it took out the target as expected, but didn’t trigger the skill. The two already wounded targets fell to their wounds followed by the fourth target taking damage but still standing.
Sam’s luck ran out as the barrage of thrown debris towards the flashlight managed to hit it, breaking the LED within, and cutting the light. Their highly attuned eyes used a brief few seconds to attune back to the dark, but that was the same for Sam, they charged the sounds of where he was running and he tried attacking them in return, nothing landing on either side.
The Goblins’ eyes adapted faster than Sam’s did, this was backed up by the feeling of claws raking across his body as well as a powerful bite in his lower arm.
[ Armour, Defence 5 has negated the damage! ]
[ Armour, Defence 5 has negated the damage! ]
[ Armour, Defence 5 has lowered the damage. ]
[ HP: 34 / 35 ███████ ]
It seemed the bite was powerful enough to make it through his armour, but just barely, the claws didn’t do much at the moment which had him feel good about his situation. Bringing all four daggers in towards the target attacking him in a slight panicky reaction, had three of the four attacks land, but it was more than enough. The goblin fell without problems, however the Chiefs were now coming for him.
Trying to gain some distance proved fruitless, they were much faster than him and had closed the distance at record speed now that their eyes were properly ready for the dark. Sending his daggers out for the leftmost Chief before they caught up to him, the situation had only two attacks land, however to his surprise, the Lifesteal effect triggered.
[ Life Steal 1 triggered, draining 1. ]
Though the healing was weak, it was enough to negate the damage he had taken before, bringing him back to perfect health. He also felt extra surprised as the Chief fell there and then. Though only two attacks landed, one was the Vampiric Dagger which did considerably more damage than the others, his attack did 25 damage, not considering any defence the goblin might have had.
Feeling the full weight of a grown man land on his chest, he realised the remaining Chief had pounced on him, not taking any damage from the ordeal itself, it was different as the angry Chief raked across his chest and bit into his shoulder, barely missing Elara, the bite hurting considerably more than he expected.
[ Armour, Defence 5 has lowered the damage. ]
[ Armour, Defence 5 has lowered the damage. ]
[ Armour, Defence 5 has lowered the damage. Critical hit! ]
[ HP: 12 / 35 ██░░░░░ ]
This chewed through two-thirds of his health, it hurt enough to make him cry out in pain. He could barely hear Janik’s steps into the room as he pulled in all four daggers in anger, sending them at the monster standing on his chest.
The only saving grace of the situation was that the Goblin Chief was standing on Sam and holding onto him, which meant that he wasn’t dodging the incoming daggers. All four blades pierced into his back, his body going limp immediately, falling to the side allowing Sam to panic-move and get himself back on his feet in a sudden motion.
“Ok, Ok! I get it. That was stupid!” Sam broke out before Janik managed to say anything. Looking at his ally he saw the man holding a potion bottle in one hand with his thumb over the uncorked mouth of the vial, his arm cocked ready to throw.
“Jesus fucking christ... That was too close... Fuck...!” Janik took a few moments to breathe and re-cork the vial before, putting it back in his pocket. “We’re not doing that again!” Sheathing his sword he pointed at Sam like a berating parent.
“I... agree...” Sam commented. “Tough I did get them all if it hadn’t been for that cri-” Sam wanted to turn it positive, but Janik broke in, just as angry as before.
“Yes, it’s good that you managed! But if you hadn’t killed him when you did, he would have killed you! You had just a few seconds... You chose to attack, which luckily worked, but you didn’t have a backup, you didn’t use a potion. You need to focus on your own life more than just attacking.” Having walked up to Sam, Janik placed a hand on his shoulder, his happy or giddy nature completely gone, though his anger had softened just in those few steps it was clear he was forcefully calming himself.
“I... Don’t like yelling like that but... Don’t risk your life, even with backup...” His expression was almost sad like Sam had already died instead of barely coming out on top. There was clearly something personal brought up in his mind.
“I... Understand.” Sam couldn’t manage to bring himself to defend himself. He wanted to say several things, how he did well, how this would have been different in a real scenario where both attacked but... Truth be told; Janik was right. Sam had taken a chance just because of having backup, the lack of arrogance in his mind was just a different kind of recklessness.
Janik pulled his arm back with a nod and half smile before he stepped away.
Sam wanted to comment but not only didn’t he have anything to say, but the Dungeon Clear conditions popped up.
[ Dungeon clear conditions:
Kill the Goblin chiefs. 2/2
Optional: Kill all monsters
Goblins: 20/20
Rewards:
100 xp
1x Aether Crystal - E
Bonus rewards for optional step:
50 xp
Random Box - X. ]
In addition to this, the XP log listed his combined share of XP totalled up to 40xp which gave Elara a total of 20, not enough for her to level up but a decent way there, in Sam’s case he was still only a quarter there. Though he didn’t get the weapon or armour reward.
As the Dungeon was complete, the rewards manifested shortly after displaying, dumping the Aether Crystal and Random box in his hands, the XP reward put another 150 into his Pool, which gave Elara enough to push her into Level 4 and close to Level 5 landing on 62/80. The Attribute point was again put into Vitality, bumping her health and Venom a little.
“So, what’s the plan now?” Sam commented as he opened the Random Box. Since there was no reason to wait with opening it he might as well get that done.
It opened to a bright light and when it faded, a red potion and two Aether crystals remained.
“I think we’ll go to Aetheria, get you used to roaming about there. It’s very different from Dungeons, though you’ll see plenty of combat if you want to.” Janik smiled, seeming honestly happy again as he opened his own Random Box, getting similar stuff from it.
They both headed for the exit portal.