The explanation took quite some time, mainly due to the System censoring him. He had to swap words, using gaming, let’s plays and reality shows as analogies... it was somewhat spot on but he had to abstract down things a ton even using other words or dumb metaphorical comparisons to get through it. The System even censored writing, if he typed the words on his phone, he could see them fine but Janik saw them as random symbols not mean anything. Even trying to spell them out, slowly and adding a ‘code’ in the sense of skipping ‘this letter’ or numbers didn’t work as the System seemed to know what he was doing. But for some reason, it allowed the abstracting or bullshit explanation, at least some of it. A few things never allowed themselves to be translated.
But after an hour of attempted explaining and being violently shaken by Dia every time he made weird sounds, he felt like he had completed the explanation.
“That... that’s the weirdest explanation I have heard... but... I suppose it makes kind of sense.” Janik explained as he mused on the explanation. “It also explains the things you’ve been through, but I don’t get why you were sent to these places. And how these administrators control the System to-”
As Janik got to that point in his summary, Dia looked at him with a similar worry. “Jan-ik!” She briefly let go of Sam’s arm to shake Janik instead, repeating “Ila!”, her language for Stop.
“Ok... I guess it means that I’m also censored...” Janik chuckled through the shaking.
“I could hear you fine...” Sam commented a bit uncertainly. He wasn’t worried; he understood that this was probably something like a chat filter. This topic was heavily moderated, and the only reason he wasn’t flagged or attacked might be the Ascendant thing keeping him relatively safe.
”Though you might want to keep that to yourself, it mentioned that I’m safe due to my haxx, but I don’t know if you are...” The word haxx is a horrible way to explain it, but though he had used the word Ascendant before, it was censored in this context, so it was one of the workaround words he used.
“Yeah... yeah...” Janik commented. “I’ll keep it to myself, not interested in getting accidented, so...”
Janik let out a deep sigh and changed the subject ever so slightly. “So, what do you intend to do with all of this?”
“Those fuckers sent that monster... thing... to my neighbourhood, fucked up my family, friends, my life. Threatening to fuck with Dia. What do you think?” Sam’s tone soured dramatically as he was forced to remember all of that.
“You’re going to fight it?” Janik asked rhetorically.
“What do you think?! Off course I’m going to fucking fight it, I’m going to abuse everything I can get my hands on, work my way to the top and turn those fuckers inside out.” Sam knew this was a colourful use of words that would probably be a somewhat empty threat, but it still illustrated his goal. Initially, he was in this for luxury, to live and thrive, now this turned to revenge, not just for things done in the past, but for the passive and indirect threat to those he cares for. It ignited something deep in him.
He used to have a happy life, he was close with his family and friends, school life and worrying about what kind of job he wanted in the future for the sake of education. But still being young enough to not properly worry about everything, in hindsight it was great having those worries. Back then everyone thought that the monster had just somehow broken containment or something, gotten out of the Tower in some weird way. But knowing what he did now... This felt more like the Entities in control doing an experiment, or just creating drama for their entertainment or just to keep ‘the humans on edge’.
The more he thought about it, the more he grew to hate them. Even more than the forced events or taking over his body, this was just...
“I thought as much.” Janik chuckled.
Sam wanted to react to the chuckle, it metaphorically slapped his anger in the face, but he decided to hold back. It was perhaps a realistic way to respond, but he was annoyed, so everything had a sour taste. From going through all this... kind of twice as he tried to explain everything to Janik, he was forced to remember the events of his past, the image of the six-eyed massive lizard-like creature tearing through the walls.
“Right now I just want to fight something...” Sam felt a powerful aggression he hadn’t felt in quite some time... or perhaps this was the feeling of vengeance? In either case, he felt like punching something just to vent his energy somewhere, but he didn’t exactly want to take it out on anyone around him just now.
Janik let out a strangely nervous laugh, but with an honest tone mixed in, to Dia’s confusement as they continued down the path, leading away from the little village. Sam vaguely remembered that they could ask there for directions if needed, but since Janik was leading them, he probably knew where to go.
Mellowing out ever so slightly as he got time to process and calm down, Sam started thinking about other things than direct anger. The Entity confirmed and shared a lot of disturbing things, but Sam also realised that he couldn’t just take it all at face value. Like anyone, it could be lying for its gain, a healthy dose of paranoia was probably not a bad idea, but a lot of things started making surprising sense if one assumed that everything it said was true. The Ascendant thing was getting more interesting, if that was true he needed to find a way to harness that elevated power somehow...
“We’re here.” Janik’s voice broke Sam out of his train of thought.
Looking up from his stare into the ground in front of them, he could see that they had walked into a small valley which terminated at a cave entrance. The cave didn’t look too deep but there was a familiar shimmering field in front of the opening.
Janik was staring at his phone, scrolling up and down before looking satisfied and putting it in his pocket.
“This whole thing is going to be inside a cave, but it’ll be high enough in rooms for the bats to fly, we can probably bottleneck them if needed.” He looked surprisingly excited.
Sam didn’t comment, he was more focused on the upcoming fights. Though he might have special perks as far as the Player System went, he could still die like anyone else, something he wasn’t entirely keen on.
“We good to enter?” Janik turned around and looked at the others.
Sam nodded, Dia seemed to somewhat know what was going on and looked ready as well.
Janik smiled and walked backwards a few steps before disappearing in a white light.
Sam stepped into the area as well and accepted the familiar popup, the white light moved him like normal and he was somewhat happy to see that when he landed the group was there as well. Parts of him were halfway expecting to be pulled somewhere weird.
A quick look around confirmed that, as expected, they were in a cave. It was poorly lit up with only one exit. The stone itself looked unworked and looked like a natural formation rather than one dug out by someone. They were in a rough dome-shaped room with one exit leading into a dark hallway. The air was surprisingly clean even though it had a dampness to it.
Everyone ended up looking at each other after having a look around the room they landed in. Janik shrugged and was the first to say something.
“I suppose we move on?” As he commented he took a small flashlight out of his pocket, and a strap out of another pocket, fastening them together he placed it on his forehead for a simple headlight.
Sam realised he didn’t get a new flashlight after losing the older one he borrowed from Janik, on the Island. But it would have to do for now, he could feel around to a certain degree as long as he didn’t need the hands for something else.
As they walked towards the hallway, a familiar window popped up.
[ Dungeon clear conditions:
Kill the Large Golem: 0/1
Optional: Kill all monsters
Monsters: 0/20
Rewards:
500 000 xp
1x Random mid-level crafting material
Chance (2%): High D-tier weapon or armour.
Bonus rewards for optional step:
500 000 xp
Random Box - X. ]
It was simple, same format as the others and had a low percentage of getting some decent gear. However, the massive difference was the XP rewards.
“Dude...” Sam let out as he saw the massive bump in numbers. “If we clear this properly, a million XP... Four or five runs of this will level me again...”
He wasn’t complaining, he was just surprised. But based on what was said or read earlier, it did seem that the system was giving you a boost at the start of a new Floor, almost like it wanted you to get excited again after perhaps struggling on the last Floor. Knowing what he now knew about the System as a whole, it made a lot of sense that it was set up like this, the metaphorical carrot and such.
“Yeah, think how I feel!” Janik replied with a huge grin, barely lit up by the flashlight sending its rays forward.
Sam understood his feeling, he was a bit lower level than Sam and given how much time it took to level normally, not counting PvP, and considering that Janik was a bit more safety-focused in how he had been doing this so far... His excitement made a lot of sense.
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“Well, I suppose we’ll see how this goes, then. Perhaps you can even get yourself a new weapon~” Sam ended his statement in a playful tone as he casually, but very obviously, wielded the Moonblade.
Janik’s mild annoyance amused Sam.
“Aaaanyway, let’s go on. Though the Guide says this should be relatively straightforward, it is the starter Dungeon on this Floor, after all, I still don’t want to get fucked up on my first day here.” He looked ahead with both his swords in hand, having the only active light source he directed it properly.
Sam nodded in agreement, though he didn’t consider that Janik didn’t see him at first, but after a few seconds of nothing happening, he repeated his agreement vocally. “Yeah, let’s go.”
Walking down the hallways felt surprisingly familiar, much like the starter Dungeons in the city, it was simple to navigate, and it didn’t take long before they came to a large open cave. Before they came to the mouth of it there were sounds of rock dragging against rock, as well as a few high-frequency chirps.
Janik turned off his flashlight before they turned the last corner and well before they entered the mouth of the cave, but even before they got there they could hear aggressive flapping and chirping. It wasn’t hard to guess that they already knew the group had arrived.
Turning the flashlight back on, Janik took a stance in front of the other two, looking ready to do whatever he needed to. As the powerful LED cast rays into the large room, there was a collection of pained shrieks.
The room was pretty large, like a basketball field, just roughly dome-shaped. The golems looked to be a little bit larger than strong men but otherwise looked like rocks stacked on top of each other. The Batfolk looked much smaller than he expected, standing upright next to him they’d probably reach his stomach, rather lanky bodies with a wing membrane reaching from their weird little bat-hands down the arm, along their side down to their feet. The odd humanoid shape was the main thing that made them look weirdly different from normal bats. A good thing to keep them away was that they hated the bright light of the flashlight, seemingly shrieking angrily at it from afar.
The golems didn’t care, Sam couldn’t see a face or eyes on their head so that made a lot of sense.
Since the bats kept their distance from the light, Janik could easily keep them at bay that way, at least for now. Sam took this chance to test out an attack on the closest Golem. He wanted to feel the difference with, and without, the Clustered Strike, so the first attack was just all his weapons individually as normal.
[ Critical hit, double damage. ]
[ Bleed 5 triggered. Target immune. ]
One of the cheap daggers landed a critical hit, which was good but... it didn’t change anything dramatic. Sam was also glad to see the bleed effect triggering but... as the golems didn’t seem to have any vital fluids it made sense that it wouldn’t do much.
The total damage done also looked... lacklustre, it made some surprisingly deep gashes but nothing looked too debilitating.
As they stomped closer and the light-warding still worked on the bats, Sam targeted another Golem, this time with the Clustered attack, wanting to visually see the difference. Mentally triggering the Clustered Strike ability, he sent the blades forth.
[ Clustered Strike active. ]
Like in the training, he felt a bit weird about it as the timing of the attacks delayed some of them and let others speed up, forcing them all to hit at the same time. It felt extra weird in a live test like this, it wasn’t negative, just weird.
[ Critical hit, double damage. ]
Another cheap dagger landed a critical hit, so it was a good comparative attack. This time the damage dealt to the Golem was considerable. It was still standing and walking, but the gashes and visual damage dramatically increased from the first one.
Sam was happy to confirm that it was indeed working!
“They’re getting a bit close now, don’t you think?” Janik warned with a heavy sense of uncertainty in his voice.
Sam couldn’t fault him. Having taken advantage of their slower speed he had somewhat forgotten that he wasn’t alone here at the moment.
“Right.” he confirmed as he changed tactics, it was time to kill them!
Keeping the Clustered attack active, he focused on the first golem, as it was the one closest to them. As the collection of blades landed and penetrated the rough same area of the Golem’s chest, it stopped moving and fell into a pile of rubble, whatever force keeping the different rocks together vanishing.
This attack was repeated on the other one, resulting in the same level of damage, taking it out easily.
The bats had retreated to the ceiling and were covering themselves with their arms, using their clawed feet to hold onto the rocks up there, as long as Janik moved the lights up to them now and then, they seemed to remain there without problems. This made the Golems much easier to handle. Their slow stomping speed, and lacking dodging, made it extremely easy to land critical hits, and the Clustered attack did as it should do and handled their defence easily, resulting in him needing only two hits per target to take them down.
The room only had three golems, so it wasn’t an issue at all, Dia and Janik didn’t even need to do anything.
“I know this might sound weird but... isn’t this a bit easy?” Sam commented. He didn’t want to become arrogant but it was feeling a bit...
“Well... What’s your damage potential?” Janik challenged.
“Hmm... if everything hits, not counting triggering anything fancy or critical hits... 202.” Sam used a brief few seconds to do the math. Though he didn’t have any damage scaling, he did have 25 weapons in the air. Though 20 of these were cheap daggers, it all adds up.
“Yeah.... with my two swords, my damage potential, with my stats, is about 80.” His tone was a bit sour, not like he blamed Sam or complained, just a bit envious or perhaps annoyed at his progress.
Sam pondered that for a moment. He couldn’t remember the exact numbers but Janik did explain that if he used the Moonblade, he’d do around 150 damage with that one hit, or something.
“I think we need to get you some better weapons.” Sam joked.
“Ya fucking think?!” Janik’s head snapped to look at, and blind, Sam. It was clear this hit some nerve, which made a lot of sense.
Sam knew that Janik had... bills to pay, based on what he explained earlier he had a lot of responsibilities with his gaggle of kids. He had also explained that the two swords he used are both the cheapest, 10-damage, weapons you could find. He needed two swords for his class but he couldn’t afford better, nor have he been lucky with getting any. Sam briefly wondered if he should donate, or at least loan the Moonblade to him but... that would affect his damage output considerably as it did the same damage as 12 cheap daggers, and more than all his named daggers together.
Janik let out a surprised expression as Sam squinted and lifted his hand to block the light. It didn’t sound like he intended to do that but more that it was a side-effect of hitting a nerve.
[ Dungeon clear conditions:
Kill the Large Golem: 0/1
Optional: Kill all monsters
Monsters: 3/20 ]
[ Experience gained: +20 000. ]
[ Experience gained: +20 000. ]
[ Experience gained: +20 000. ]
[ Companion Elara, level up +1! ]
[ Elara XP to lv.16: 9 402 / 81 920 ██░░░ ]
Sam’s eyes widened, this was surprising to see, and it also raised a solid point regarding why PvP was a thing... But perhaps it was more than just the XP and more about the killing or general griefing mentality...
He was happy to see Elara’s level-up prompt, not even considering it he put her point into Vitality, which had him think of something.
“Hold on, keep the bats away, I just want to check something.” Sam commented to Janik as he took out the toothpick contained with venom toothpicks.
Inspecting the numbers on them, he was extremely happy to see that even if her Venom was already applied, when her Vitality increased it retroactively increased the values, meaning if he had hundreds already applied, they wouldn’t lose any power if she levels more later!
This was huge!
“Elara levelled up.” Sam started explaining to Janik. “I put her point in Vitality. It seems that the Envenomed Toothpics retroactively got their numbers boosted.”
“Oh, I didn’t know that was how it worked, but that’s great.” Janik didn’t turn his head and kept the light on the annoyed bats hanging in the ceiling.
Sam took out one of the envenomed toothpicks, he intended to clear this dungeon properly so there was no need to not test things at the same time. Especially since they seemed like they didn’t want to fight anyway.
“I’m going to test a toothpick on them.” He explained to Janik.