Lucus finally made his way back to us not long after that, he’d obviously been crying but had cleaned himself up as best he could. I headed things off by speaking first.
“I didn’t tell them, but Dawn guessed we’d broken up.” He looked at me for a moment, then just nodded and began checking his gear.
I hadn’t told any of the others I was effectively a body-snatching alien from outer space and didn’t intend to. That seemed like a level of weirdness they didn’t need to know. It wouldn’t help us survive, and the more people who did know the more likely someone would use it against me. I knew I couldn’t keep it a secret forever, but no need to rush it.
“Listen up everyone,” Arven said. “Now that we’re all on the same page, I want Lucus up front with that shield, Savas will go behind him. Dawn and Dorian, you take the middle. Tavi and I will be in the back. Lucus and I will pretend to be walls, while Savas and Tavi shoot past us at whatever’s trying to kill us. You two are the most nimble with your attacks so don’t hesitate to dart in and out. Most importantly, nothing reaches Dawn or Dorian. If they go down the odds of us making it out of here alive go down drastically.”
We all nodded our understanding, then headed out. As we jogged along the path we’d cleared out the previous day I asked Arven, “How likely is it something will come from behind? We’ve secured everything haven’t we?”
“Not likely here, but when we get past where we stopped last time there’s a place where things can get into the tunnels from the outside. You’ll see when we get there.”
When we reached the next guard post the group paused for a moment so I could gather more of our stored supplies into my soul-space. I also stored the Wild Infusion we’d gotten yesterday just in case we decided to use it after all. After that, Lucus unsealed the door leading to the next guard post and we made ready to enter unknown territory.
“This is where things get dangerous,” Arven told us. “The next guard post is part of the river gate… It’s bad there. There will be some special guards with crossbows and polearms, and a Watch Sargent. The elite is always in the same room though, so unless we screw up, we can fight them on our terms, and if we do then Lucus will distract it just like last time. We’re also coming up on a breach in the wall to our right. The floor is stable, but the hole is big enough for things to get in. Remember, whatever you do, don’t go anywhere near the river.”
The break in the wall ended up being bigger than Arven had made it out to be, or maybe it just looked bigger to me. I would have been able to walk through it without ducking. Lucus looked it over, but ultimately decided it was too big for him to close up. Instead, Dorian began his sound dampening chant and we all snuck past it, hoping not to draw any attention.
This tactic seemed to work, and we continued down the corridor until we ran into another door. Unlike the others, this one wasn’t locked, in fact it was visibly cracked open and some of the un-light from the black sun could be seen spilling into the tunnel through the crack. I activated Embrace of Shadows, and the light from Dawn’s spell dimmed a little as the area around me got darker.
Lucus advanced, shield raised. The massive thing was carved into the likeness of a giant dwarven head, complete with massive beard, and it had two slits in it right where the eyes would be. Lucus used these to see as he advanced, quietly giving us instructions to trigger his Stratagem boons. As soon as he finished, Dorian picked back up his silencing chant and we all followed after Lucus.
The door opened silently as Lucus pushed it open and stepped into the room. I remembered what had happened last time and kept my attention on the area above and behind us, just in case another Nightstalker slipped in. Ahead of me, Lucus braced as several skeletal guards took aim at him with crossbows, but he needn’t have bothered. The bolts exploded against the Bastion without so much as scratching its surface.
There was a new type of ghoul here. Unlike the Nightstalkers, these wore the remnants of heavy armor and carried long pikes. They weren’t as quick as the Nightstalker variety, but it was obvious they were just as strong. They set themselves between Lucus and the skeletal archers, giving the latter room and time to reload.
Savas had armed himself with a crossbow for this fight and stood behind Lucus, taking shots into the crowd. The ghouls didn’t seem bothered by the bolts, but the skeletons dropped easily when struck in the head, their entire skull typically shattering from a single bolt.
Lucus needed to keep the pressure on before the pikemen realized he couldn’t advance safely while under fire and the threat of their hooked pikes. He ended up releasing the shield and letting it hover in front of him like a portable wall, then with both hands he grabbed a pike and ripped it out of its wielder's grip, tossing it behind him where Dawn quickly got it out of the way. The now disarmed ghoul rushed forward, breaking formation, only to be met by one of my burning crossbow bolts directly in its rotting eye, knocking it backwards off its feet.”
I grinned and redrew the crossbow, loading another bolt. This was a lot easier with 23 strength and no cramps. I could get used to this.
I had been wanting to try something, and this seemed like a good time for it. I reached out through the shadows connected to me, finding my way to Lucus’ shadow. From his shadow, I launched two Blades of Night, simultaneously activating Burning Bolts on them. I wasn’t sure what this would do, if anything, but I was hoping to set them on fire even if the blades didn’t do much damage themselves.
What I got was interesting.
Two burning shards of night leaped out of the shadows at Lucus’ feet. They looked a little like burning coals. I’d aimed them at the two ghouls in the middle of the pack, but only one of the two actually struck its intended target. The other hit a ghoul on the far end of the line instead.
The two shards both puffed into swirls of shadow and fire on impact, and neither seemed to do much of anything at first. However, the shot that had gone wide had struck rotten flesh, and I could see that it had indeed started to catch fire. The other shard had bounced off the ghoul’s armor and didn’t appear to have done any damage at all.
Lukewarm results aside, the thing I’d be most interested in testing there was if I could use Burning Bolts on my Blades of Twilight. Blades was an interesting skill, scaling up by number of projectiles rather than raw damage, and now I knew that effects could be applied to the base skill and spread to every blade.
I’d just paid the mana once to set two projectiles on fire, making it an extremely cost-effective enhancement. Even the negative synergy of Burning Bolts creating light and weakening Blades of Twilight was offset by multiplying the damage of Burning Bolts itself. There was clearly a reason that Blades was capped at 3 ranks. Thankfully, I could ignore that.
I actually opened up my character sheet on the spot and dropped another rank into the skill. Now that I knew my idea worked, this had become a cheap way to spread a burning bane while doing some damage. I was pretty sure the problem with accuracy and damage was mostly due to launching them through Hands of Night, which effectively reduced my stats by 80% at this rank. I would need to get closer.
I left Arven to hold the rear while I pushed past Dorian and Dawn to get into the room. I drew some fire as I stepped in, but I was able to dodge the crossbow bolts sent my way. Lucus was getting ready to try and disarm another guard, but I just activated Blades of Twilight and Burning Bolts twice each, sending a wall of burning black shrapnel into the room.
Without the penalty from Hands of Night, the blades were larger and more substantive, and the flames more intense. They slammed into their targets with unerring accuracy. Six shards hitting six grinning skulls. The crossbow wielding skeletons dropped instantly, their skulls shattered. The ghouls were taken aback and set aflame, but that attack alone wasn’t enough to stop them.
Lucus took advantage of the sudden loss of cohesion in the enemy ranks to grab the shield and rush forward, knocking them over like a bowling ball. The ghouls physically couldn’t push him back, and when he swept out with the shield, they all fell over in a soundless, burning heap.
His surprise at how well this worked almost cost him, as the ghoul he’d disarmed tried to claw him from the floor behind him. Fortunately, Savas was already on it, wielding his daggers again he took the ghoul apart at the joints before it could land its attack.
I was beginning to see why that shield was such a powerful item. On the face of it, it was just an incredibly strong defense, but it was both an immovable object and an unstoppable force at the same time. You couldn’t push back against it as it advanced. Any give at all and the shield would never allow you to take it back.
A shield bash with this thing was devastating, a charge unstoppable. It actually favored an aggressive approach. It would likely be more effective if Lucus had more armor to protect his flanks as he charged in, but some covering fire would have to suffice for now.
I retreated to give my mana a chance to recover a bit. As efficient as it might be, doing that several times in a row still took about half my total mana, and that was before accounting for Embrace of Shadows sustain cost.
For the remainder of the fight, I stuck to the crossbow, and only took clear shots while keeping an eye on our rear. Dorian’s silencing effect made the entire fight dream-like, but it did the job. No reinforcements came from either direction, allowing us to finish off the guards in this room easily.
Once we’d cleared the room Arven had me lock the door behind us. That let him move up to support Lucus, but I continued to hang out in the rear. He’d been right about my mobility, and I knew that if I needed to, I could teleport to the front with Shadow Step as well.
We cleared two more rooms in a similar manner with no issues. Lucus got better at using the shield offensively, and it made a huge difference in the speed at which we were able to take down these basic enemies.
Arven was a specialized off-tank, and the two worked together flawlessly. Lucus dominated the rooms with his size and implacable advance, while Arven singled out individual enemies and prevented them from getting around Lucus’ defenses. Their styles were completely different but complemented each other extremely well. Savas and I took the role of flankers picking off enemies one by one during moments of weakness.
About half-way through the second room, I got a notification.
Congratulations, you have received enough XP to become a Level 2 Shadow Thief!
I had the Founder title equipped, which gave me a 20% bonus to Shadow Thief XP. I was hoping I’d be able to get several levels out of this dungeon crawl and planned to keep that title equipped to maximize the potential benefits.
I wasn’t sure what all activities could level up Shadow Thief but fighting seemed to be one of them, and if I had the right of it my Trailblazer class got experience from improving my other classes, so I was double-dipping here even more than usual.
Between fights I went ahead and dropped points into Shadow Step, raising it to max level. While I was hoarding points in case I needed them for crafting or emergency skill expenditure, I was willing to spend the Shadow Thief points as I got them because I wanted my primary class skills to be effective, and this seemed like a class worth investing in, unlike mundane Thief.
One thing I was realizing though was that I needed more mana, and a lot of it. I had a lot of stuff that could use mana but didn’t have enough of the stuff to really use it except in small bursts. I decided to ask Dawn for advice once we cleared this place out.
Arven stopped Lucus from opening the last door on this floor. Directing him instead to the stairwell. It was going down from our perspective, but it led into what should have been the gatehouse tower.
We descended with Lucus in the lead, but we were confronted with a locked door leading to the next floor. I squeezed past everyone and Lucus lifted me up to the lock, where I used my new trick to pop the lock mechanism from the inside before retreating to my position in the back.
Dorian was starting to look a little tired, and I noticed both his mana and stamina in the group display were under half. I wanted to pat him on the shoulder to encourage him, but he was too damn tall, so I just flashed him a grin and gave him a thumbs up as I squeezed past instead. Judging by his confused look I may not have gotten my point across.
Oh well.
Lucus opened the door and stepped through. This floor mirrored the second floor of the other towers we’d been in, which meant that the next floor would have another door outside. There were some differences, however.
This version of the floor had arrow slits on the side of the room where I knew the river was located, and everyone stayed far away from that wall. I’d only seen it from a distance, but something about that river made me feel viscerally ill. I wasn’t looking forward to seeing it up close.
This floor also featured a jailor ghoul that swung a chain, but other than that it was just more guards. We dispatched them easily, and I continued to let my mana regen, getting back up to my current maximum. I’d worked out that the elite must be on the next floor of the tower, and I wanted to save my mana for him. The last one had been nasty.
Arven brought us to a halt in the final room before the stairs and had Dorian cancel his silencing effect, motioning for all of us to remain quiet. After not being able to hear for so long it sounded to me like every breath we were taking was egregiously loud, but nothing came looking for us. Still, I didn’t let myself relax.
“Below us is the elite,” Arven whispered. “It’s not as tough as the rare we fought before. She’s a spear user, pretty quick on her feet, but she’s all alone in there. I’m used to fighting her, so Lucus your job is to back me up and try and land some blows with that mace of yours. She’s the strongest skeletal undead I’ve seen in here but despite that it's still easy to break her bones with blunt force. We’ll rest here a moment and then Dorian will silence us again. The absolute last thing we want is to attract the attention of the river.”
Savas shuddered. “Better to hurl yourself into the sky than that. A thousand times better.”
“How do you get the attention of a river?” Lucus asked. “And what’s so bad about it?”
“There are things living in it. It’s hard to describe. You’ll understand when you see it up close, or at least as close as we’ll be getting. For now, just try not to make any noise and stay away from the riverside walls. We don’t know what all will set it off, and we don’t want to find out.”
I was disheartened to hear that the elite was skeletal. My usual trick of setting them on fire wasn’t going to be as effective. I’d have to focus on creating openings for Lucus to wallop her. In the meantime though, I decided to go ahead and ask Dawn about increasing my mana reserves.
“Hey, any tips for getting more mana?” I asked her quietly. “This shadow skill is sustained and it’s reserving quite a bit, but it’s too good not to use.”
Dawn thought about it for a moment, then said. “Are you aware you can invest progression points directly into your various pools? It’s more effective than just raising your Intelligence or Wisdom, but still rarely done because raising those stats provides other benefits. Usually you would only wish to do so if your class had neither Intelligence or Wisdom as path attributes, as then it is much more expensive to do through attributes.”
I hadn’t known about this, but it sounded like the way to go was just to keep boosting my attributes. Since I had a 50% bonus on all attributes and Trailblazer considered all attributes to be “on-path” there might not be any reason to directly boost my mana.
I didn’t want to spend my points on raw attributes, that was kind of boring, but I might have to suck it up if I wanted to be an effective caster. While we rested, Dawn quietly explained the connection between the stats and mana to me.
Mana was affected by both Intelligence and Wisdom. All the pools worked that way, with health being derived from Fortitude and Toughness, and Stamina being from Fortitude and Willpower. That last one seemed odd to me, but Dawn explained that there is a mental component to stamina, represented by your will to keep going.
Each stat also had other properties, and for Intelligence that was your mental speed and affected things like casting time, but also dodging. Wisdom represented internalized learning and could affect things like your ability to sense danger and your accuracy with spells.
It turned out that I had inadvertently created something of a lopsided build. Strength and Willpower were my highest stats at the moment, which was giving me a bunch of Stamina and damage with all types of attacks, but for the type of fighting I was doing it wasn’t ideal. I needed to find better ways to use up my stamina pool and put less reliance on mana. The problem was, I really only had one skill that used Stamina at all, and it was Shank, and it seemed… kind of bad.
I ended up asking Savas about it, since I knew he had the skill as well. He told me that Shank wasn’t great on its own, but other skills existed that could make it better. He was too nervous to speak much about it, even in whispers, but I was able to draw some conclusions.
Thief wasn’t a combat class, so it didn’t have the best offensive skills, but classically roguish classes in games had a tendency to combo moves together and rely on burst damage. I was guessing I’d need to either evolve Shank or level up Shadow Thief more to unlock those combos. In the meantime, it was just a “this is better than nothing” type skill that provided minor benefits over a non-skill attack, but at the cost of stamina.
This was frustrating because I didn’t see anything I could do about this at the moment. For all my preparations and planning I had a glaring weakness and no way to resolve it short of pumping points into a skill I didn’t particularly like and praying I got a better skill out of evolving it.
The only other things I could spend stamina on without also spending mana were Hide & Snatch, and I hadn’t really used either yet. I guess this was a chance to try them out since my normal tactics weren’t going to work.
We finished our break, then made our way to the stairs. Stairs was a bad word for them, it was more like a ramp since the stairs were on the ceiling, but the stones that made up the staircase were rough and there was a guardrail to hold onto, or in my case, hang from.
Getting into the room fast was going to be important, as our footing in here was not good. Lucus led since his footing was the steadiest between his shield serving as a way to hold himself up and his own stone magic making it easy for him to create solid footing.
The door at the end of the ramp wasn’t locked. Lucus threw it open in perfect silence and charged into the room, Arven close behind. The elite was standing at attention in the middle of the room. It was a skeletal figure with the remnants of long hair spilling out from under a rusty helm. She wore a rotting tabard over heavy plate armor that was in surprisingly good shape. In one hand she held a short spear at mid-haft, and in the other hand she held an ovoid shield which she immediately raised to meet Lucus’ charge.
Lucus didn’t care. He ran straight into her, knocking her backwards, but she did a better job of recovering than any other enemy we’d fought so far. She managed to get her spear under Lucus’ shield, dealing him a glancing blow on one leg even as he forced her backward.
Despite her heavy armor she rolled with his blow, steadied herself, and prepared to counter Lucus’ follow through. That attack never came however, as Lucus backed off, leaving Arven to take the lead as they’d discussed.
Arven had used the opening Lucus created to get inside the reach of the spear, and now he held it in check with one sword while probing the elite’s armor with thrusts of his main weapon. He was clearly faster than her, and he used that to keep her on the defensive. Arven expertly maneuvered her to face away from Lucus, who was getting a quick healing spell from Dawn while waiting for an opportunity to bludgeon the elite from behind.
I activated Hide, letting the shadows wrap around me in a haze of darkness. Ghouls had an ability called Lifesense that I strongly suspected would negate any benefits of Hide without physical barriers in the way, but I didn’t know if skeletons also had that ability.
It was time to find out.
I took my time, watching the fight. Savas had switched back to his crossbow and was taking potshots as fast as he could reload, but it wasn’t doing much even when his hits penetrated the rusty armor. Lucus was preparing to charge back in, and I figured when he did the elite was going to turn to look at him in response to getting clobbered in the back of the head. I positioned myself to be in position to dart in when that happened.
Lucus made his move a moment later, and I watched as his mace came down in a devastating arc at the elite’s helmeted head. At the last moment the elite seemed to sense something was wrong, and she jerked to the side. His attack came down on her shoulder instead of her head, and the force of the blow sent her to one knee.
Fighting in near total silence like this remained unnerving, and never was it more obvious than now when I felt the force of that blow as a vibration in the solid stone floor yet heard nothing.
Several things happened at once. The elite recovered remarkably quickly. Despite having been knocked to the ground she managed to spin her spear in a slashing arc, driving Arven back and spinning on Lucus, who’d been thrown off balance by the force of his own attack.
Lucus raised the Bastion to protect and steady himself, but he was off balance, and she had a low angle on him. She drove her spear directly into his exposed stomach in an attempt to eviscerate him. Or at least she tried to.
The moment Lucus had made his attack I’d started moving. Shadows detached from the wall as I kicked off and practically flew at the elite. When she turned to face Lucus, her back was to me, and when she pushed forward with her spear, I grabbed the other end and activated Snatch.
This close to her I could see that strange distortion of color I’d seen around the other elite. She was somehow more vibrant and present than anything else here, despite being undead, and even her gear was affected.
I had a moment as my hands closed around the shaft of the spear where time seemed to slow down. It was a moment where I thought about how strong the other elite had been, and how she’d just shrugged off Lucus’ earth-shaking attack. In the next moment I felt the spear moving forward against my wishes, against even the force of my still active skill as I tried to move in the other direction. Her grip was like iron, and I was a small goblin. I might be strong, but I still didn’t weigh much.
So, I did the only thing I could think of and activated my Heroic Feat of Strength. In that final moment before Lucus was run through, my Strength skyrocketed to sixty-nine and the spear shaft audibly creaked as my grip on it became as implacable as death itself.
It was the first sound I’d heard clearly since the fight began, and for a moment I worried Dorian’s effect had failed. Then I flung a torrent of shadow at the fallen knight and pushed against her for leverage with Hands of Night.
Even at only twenty percent of my new strength this was a substantial force, especially when combined with the strength of my legs pushing me backwards and my clawed toes digging into the ground. Those cutoff sandals were suddenly showing their worth.
New Achievement! “Yoink!”
In the end it was the very force of her thrust that did her in. Her hand slipped off the shaft and drove forward, punching Lucus in the gut and sending him stumbling backward, but it was a glancing blow instead of the eviscerating attack it should have been.
Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.
I found myself stumbling backwards holding what remained of her spear. Her hand had torn the blade completely off the weapon at the cross-guard. Thankfully it had gone flying off in a random direction rather than slamming into Lucus' stomach.
I had a brief moment to realize the shaft was still radiating the same vibrancy she was before she whirled to face me, skeletal face somehow managing to convey rage. I felt my layer of concealment fail me and her empty eyes locked onto mine in the darkness.
So, I teleported away, still carrying the spear.
I re-appeared in the doorway we’d come in through. It only took me a second to realize I should have just whacked her with the stick I was now carrying. I still had a ridiculous strength score for now, and I might as well put it to good use. The spear shaft was about my size without the blade, making it the right size for a quarterstaff.
I re-entered the room in time to see the skeleton whirl around looking for me. I waved merrily, then I shifted my grip down on the shaft and held it like a baseball bat. She charged. That, as it turned out, was a mistake.
I swung the spear like I was going for a home run, and her shield exploded into splinters as she was sent skidding across the ground on her back. Everyone else seemed a bit stunned, but Arven acted like he was expecting that to happen. He almost casually started stabbing at her prone form, but even disarmed and without a shield there just wasn’t much there for slashing and piercing weapons to attack.
I moved forward, winding up another wallop. The spear was holding up remarkably well to this treatment. I’d more than half expected it to explode like the shield had on that last hit. The elite was a different story. She held up an arm to defend herself, and I virtually disintegrated it with a swipe from my new staff, armor and all. Shrapnel from the armor flew all over the room and Lucus shielded the casters by interposing himself between them and the fight.
The elite looked at the stub of her wrist and cocked her head, as if confused. As I watched small bones began to flow out of the open armor, floating into place and assembling a new, somewhat misshapen hand.
She had spare bones stored inside her armor and could use them to regenerate. That explained how she was able to shrug off Lucus' blow so easily. That wasn’t something I was willing to let continue.
I swung the spear again, this time coming from the top with the intent of caving in her breastplate. Unfortunately, I must have telegraphed my intent too much, as she was able to roll out of the way, coming to her feet as the staff slammed into the floor, cracking stone.
The elite took advantage of the bone rattling reverberations running through me to launch a new attack. She held out her new claw-like hand and it shot towards me attached to a string of bones that unraveled from her armor like an uncoiling rope.
I had not been expecting this, and if I’d been a little taller the hand would have done terrible things to my head and face. As it was, I was able to duck just enough to take only a glancing blow that still managed to rip a line of fire across my scalp. My headband started soaking up blood almost instantly, and I gritted my teeth against the pain, flattening my ears against my skull.
I wasn’t sure if this would work, but I had plenty of stamina so as I moved away from the reaching claw, I reactivated Hide. My shadows swirled around me, masking my position and movements, and I felt it as the elite lost track of my exact position. She obviously still had an idea of where I was but had lost track of me in the darkness.
Here, finally, was a good use for my stamina pool. I could use this to launch multiple attacks from hiding and keep my foe wondering where I’d strike from. This was going to be a big deal.
I didn’t have any formal fighting training and neither had Tavi. I was probably very easy to read for anyone that knew what they were doing, but that didn’t matter if they couldn’t see me. I swapped the spear to one hand, sacrificing some power for speed and reach, then went to work.
First, I crashed the staff against her skeletal legs, taking them out from under her and again sending pieces of armor flying. Then without pausing I reactivated Hide and circled as her snakelike arm struck out at where I’d been. She tried to rise, and I saw more bones flowing into place to shore up her broken legs. I didn’t plan to allow that.
Now that she was more on my level, I thwacked her across the head. My blow tore the helm from her skull, allowing her stringy white hair to fall free, and knocking half her jaw clean off. This time I didn’t relent, and with my backswing I intercepted the bone claw arm as it darted out for me, smashing it to powder and sending bones flying to all corners of the room.
Arven took advantage of the situation once again. This time he moved in low with swords crossed in front of him, activating a skill I’d not seen him use before. His twin swords glowed with a soft blue light and he pulled them apart with a single smooth motion that was so fast I couldn’t follow their movements.
In the afterglow left by the swords I saw that they had both passed cleanly through the elite’s unprotected neck. It happened so fast that her head took a moment to realize it was no longer attached, then it fell, bounced once, and rolled over where Savas was standing. He calmly shot it at near point-blank range, splintering the skull and sending more pieces flying.
To my surprise the body didn’t stop moving. It writhed on the ground as bones poured out from the armor and tried to assemble themselves into limbs. Arven and the other veterans of the group didn’t seem concerned though, and as I watched it became clear that these were death throes, and the growths were mostly random and short lived.
The bones and remaining armor began to fall away, and the vibrancy began to fade from them as I watched. That made me worry about my new stick, so I quickly identified it and shoved it into my last open soul-space slot.
The moment I’d done so a wave of lethargy hit me as my heroic strength skill wore off and was replaced by the Exhaustion bane. I sat down on the door frame between the stairs and this room and closed my eyes for a moment. I could feel the start of a headache coming on, but I took a moment to look over the spear stats while we waited for the elite to finally die.
> Elite Boss Spear
>
> Short Spear (Tier 3, Elite, Headless, Thrown, One-Handed, Hardened Mooq, Unique)
>
> Damage: 12 (30 Base, -50% Elite, -20% Headless, Bludgeoning)
>
> Quality: Ancient
>
> A simple spear made of Hardened Mooq, a strange material not found in nature. It is suitable for throwing and stabbing. Much like its former wielder, it has lost its head. While holding this weapon energy based effects used on or by you are 10% less effective.
>
> Note: This is an Elite weapon and so may only be wielded effectively by an elite.
What the hell was Hardened Mooq? Was... was that just Wood written upside-down? Of course it was, it was probably from some kind of crazy upside-down undead tree. I was honestly surprised at how low the damage was, though it was still slightly better than my other weapons. I guess my raw strength was enough to compensate for the huge penalty.
Congratulations, you have received enough XP to become a Level 3 Shadow Thief!
Dorian maintained his silencing effect right up until what remained of the elite started glowing a pleasant blue color. As soon as the silence dropped, Arven preempted any conversation with a whispered order to remain quiet. “We’re not out of danger yet. The river could still hear us if we’re not careful. Less likely down here but no need to take risks.”
“Let's see what we got.” Dawn said quietly, placing a hand on a glowing leg bone. There was a flash, and the room was suddenly much cleaner. Dawn was now holding a short, black-hafted spear. I checked to make sure the other one was still in my soul-space, and it was, but I noticed that none of the elite’s other gear had survived the looting process. Even the head of the spear, which hadn’t been in my soul-space was now gone.
“She dropped her spear this time? I wonder if we’ll eventually get her entire set of equipment if we keep doing this,” Dorian said, then seeing my confusion he clarified. “Last time we were here, we got her shield as a drop.”
“I’ve still got the spear I stole from her sitting in my soul-space. Where’d that one come from?” I asked.
“Magic?” Dorian shrugged. “I’m not sure anyone knows how it works, but sometimes you loot things the monsters were using, sometimes you get things that seem completely random. Sometimes you get nothing. Elites nearly always drop something at least.”
Arven cut in. “I don’t know exactly how it works, but it’s not a complete mystery. The spear you stole isn’t real, no more than the rest of her gear. It’ll likely dissolve the moment you take it out of your storage. Items used by dungeon monsters rely on the monster itself for their strength, especially ones wielded by elites. If you examine that spear Dawn’s holding, you’ll find that it’s an entirely different item. The theory is that the System creates loot from the monsters we kill, and that flash converts them from what they were into a permanent item.”
“Is that always how it works? Like, if someone kills me do they get to take my stuff, or do I just turn into some random loot?” I asked.
Arven made a noncommittal gesture. “Looting is the only option for things that the System considers dungeon monsters because nothing here is part of our reality. The looting system helps keep the dungeons isolated from the outside world. Leaking dungeons are dangerous, which is why the city built a prison around this one, but the loot we get from them is valuable.
“For stuff outside the dungeon the System will usually give you the option of looting or scavenging a corpse, and if you choose to scavenge you can take whatever you find and nothing else.”
“Isn’t that a problem for things like murder? If I kill someone, couldn’t I just loot the body to destroy the evidence?” I asked.
Arven chuckled quietly. “A lot of murderers try exactly that. It doesn’t work well. If you examine your logs, you’ll see the message generated when Dawn looted that elite. That message is public, and the Watchman class gets both increased range and automatically visible alerts of all non-monster looting that takes place. Various divination spells can also detect looted corpses and even reconstruct the scene. Looting a murder victim is a great way to confess if you ask me.”
Dawn walked over and handed me the new spear for storage. “That was actually how I was caught performing my ritual. I didn’t loot the poor fellow, but I forgot that higher perception grants increased range on viewing logs, so I thought that just because I couldn’t see any other logs from the warehouse I’d chosen meant that nobody else could see the ones I was generating. It was very annoying to find out otherwise, but at least I succeeded in my task before I was arrested.”
I identified the new spear. Arven had been right; it was a totally different item.
> Gray Watch Spear
>
> Short Spear (Tier 2, Thrown, One-Handed, Returning, Soul-Bond)
>
> Damage: 20 (Piercing) or 16 (Bludgeoning)
>
> Quality: Good
>
> A simple spear made from hardened wood and featuring a steel tip, suitable for throwing and stabbing. Ten seconds after being released this spear will transform into silvery mist and reappear in its bonded owner’s hand, or an empty holder on their person if they have no hands free. If no holder is available, it will appear at the owner’s feet.
I started to shove it into my soul-space alongside the other one, then changed my mind and bonded it first. It wasn’t a bad weapon for me with my current strength score, and it’d be a much more effective weapon against skeletons than my crossbow. I noted with some interest that it did not pop into my soul-space like the shield had. It seemed that was a property of that specific item.
“What ritual were you performing that got you into so much trouble anyway?” I asked Dawn, curiously.
“Oh, I used a human sacrifice to summon one of The Lord Adversary’s devils into the world,” she said, casually.
“So, you murdered someone?”
“Not exactly, he was a willing participant. Another of The Lord Adversary’s followers. His death wouldn’t even have been necessary if not for the Mad King’s Decree. People frown on summoning agents of The Lord Adversary however, which is perfectly understandable since they are usually here to cause disasters.”
Savas shuddered, “I didn’t realize you’d succeeded, I thought they caught you in the act. You mean to say there’s a devil wandering around somewhere out there right now? My family could be in danger!”
Dorian hushed him as he became a little too animated. Lucus was looking at the place on the floor where I’d cracked the stone earlier. He had one hand against the floor and was slowly sealing up the cracks, but he looked up at Savas’ pronouncement, a concerned look in his eyes. “Is that true Dawn? How likely is it that this devil has plans for Altria?”
“I don’t know, she didn’t tell me what she was here for, nor did she have time. That said, such plots rarely unfold quickly, not the serious ones at least. I suspect the authorities have had plenty of time to deal with it, given that they discovered the summoning as it was happening.”
I distributed a round of snacks and drinks from our supplies while we talked. I needed an hour to recover from my Exhaustion bane, and nobody else minded the rest. We continued chatting quietly amongst ourselves as we rested and ate. I happily tore into a big chunk of jerky and asked a few more questions between mouthfuls.
“So who’s this mad king, and what did he decree?” I asked Dawn.
“The Mad King is another of the god Reign’s many titles,” Dorian broke in. “Usually applied by those who do not worship him. His followers prefer to call him The Last King instead.”
“Our version is more apt, I think,” Dawn said tersely, and Dorian gave a mollifying nod. “I don’t disagree.”
Dawn turned back to look at me. “The Mad King’s Decree is one of the great compromises made between the gods when the world began. Reign said he would withhold his support unless the other gods agreed that no unique soul not of this world could enter it without a unique soul of this world being consumed in the process.
“His decree has made summoning spells quite expensive here, and virtually deprived us of travelers from other worlds. It is widely seen as a direct attack on The Lord Adversary’s power here since his devils are not native to this world.”
My eyes widened and I glanced at Lucus, who was very carefully erasing cracks in the floor by tracing his finger along them. He didn’t look up at me. This “decree” very nearly matched what Valera had told me, though she’d said the sacrifices needed to be random.
Perhaps that was something special the mad god had tacked on for this specific situation. I rather thought that while Reign may not have minded inconveniencing The Adversary, his true target with this decree had been Valera. That was interesting.
“Who even worships this Reign guy anyway? He seems like a jerk,” I grumbled.
Arven let out a surprised guffaw, then covered his mouth to cut it off. After a moment of silence where nobody moved and we all strained to detect any response from above our heads, Arven quietly apologized and then explained his outburst.
“Tavi, I doubt you’ll find any disagreement here, but you should understand that Reign is, by far, the most popular god in this country. Possibly the entire world. Don’t speak of him like that outside of company you trust, or you’ll quickly find yourself unwelcome.”
My ears bobbed in acknowledgement, but my curiosity wasn’t sated. “Why’s he so popular? I’ve heard nothing but bad things about him, and when I met him, he seemed like a total creep.”
Dorian threw his hands up in exasperation. “Of course you’ve met him… Is there any god you haven’t met? No, don't answer that… I’ve realized suddenly that I very much don’t want to know.”
Arven gave a more measured reply. “It’s pretty simple really. He’s the god of blood and gold, worshiped by soldiers, merchants, and lords alike. He has two great boons, a skill that lets his followers exchange gold for healing anywhere and anytime, and one that gives them a boost to their stats based on their personal net worth.
“Perhaps even more importantly, his temples offer a service where his followers can convert gold into progression points. Almost every lord and lady of any note is one of his followers, as they can convert their wealth directly into personal power. Oftentimes without having to work a day in their lives...” He trailed off with a faraway expression on his face.
Holy fuck. He was the god of pay to win. Wasn’t Astraea, a goddess of Justice, supposed to be at the head of the pantheon? How was this fair or just? This couldn’t possibly be the full story.
There was no way the other gods would allow that sort of thing without having excised major concessions from Reign in turn. The Adversary had the Exchange, which was similar if much more merit based. What did the others have? What did my patron goddess Valera have? I remembered how angry Reign had seemed when I’d chosen Valera for my patron. Why was that?
While I pondered all this I went ahead and purchased another rank in Expanded Soulspace. With all the supplies and loot I was carrying I’d run out of room again. I wanted to keep at least one slot open to catch enemy spirits, and I was sure I’d need more room soon. I also reviewed my unlocked skills, trying to make sure I wasn’t missing anything.
Spiderclimb remained super tempting, but I’d been holding off on it since I could still activate that skill from eating Nightstalker spirits. It seemed amazing in this dungeon, but I wasn’t sure if it was worth an Innovator rank.
I had previously noticed that I actually qualified for the “Smite!” skill that Dawn had taught me after the last elite fight. Or rather, I was exactly one point of wisdom away from meeting the prerequisites. Since I needed more mana anyway, I decided to bump that up with two Trailblazer points and picked up the smite spell, assigning it to Trailblazer as well.
After considerably more indecision, I also decided to go ahead and buy Limitless’ other special skill, Unrestrained. Not only was this skill a stamina sink, but if I over-ranked it enough times, its duration could be as long as its cooldown.
Being nearly immune from crowd control was ridiculously good, and just having the skill available had the potential to be the difference between life and death. The painful part was just how many progression points it cost, since it was a tier 10 skill and needed a rank in Innovator just to qualify for it.
Thirty points later, I’d committed heresy for a second time. Fortunately, this time it didn’t get me cursed. I felt a lot better knowing I had that option now. If I’d died due to crowd control without buying that I’d have deserved my fate.
I also eyeballed my weirdest penalty as well, the insane Tier 50 Valerian penalty was going to cost me 100 progression points to get rid of, and I could still just barely afford it. If I did that though, any crafting was definitely off the table, so I decided to put it off a bit longer.
The main thing keeping me from just biting the bullet on this one was that I was pretty sure it was just going to lead to whatever skill I needed to swap bodies. I no longer hated being in this body - it was sort of mine in a weird way - but I still wanted that ability. The problem was that I couldn’t think of any viable use for such a thing in this dungeon.
About that time my Exhaustion bane expired, and so we started getting ready to move again. I could tell all the veteran members of our party were reluctant to do this next part. Still, Arven gathered us up and explained the next steps.
“From here on out, we’re entering unfamiliar territory. The last time we tried this, it went very poorly, but the plan is solid. We’re about to try and cross the river. There’s a bridge that goes across this floor, but of course it’s upside down. However, the river gate is wide open, and because it's affected by gravity it’s just hanging out there, within arm’s reach. We’re going to climb across it to the other side.” He explained.
Lucus nodded. “That makes sense. What went wrong last time?”
“We didn’t realize it could reach us if it noticed us,” Arven said. “We sent our bruiser across first, figuring there were probably more skeletons on the other side. He was a bit like you are, he could take a real beating, so we were confident he could hold them off until we crossed.”
Arven sighed. “He’s probably the only reason any of us lived. He made it across fine, but a skeleton met him at the door, so he just ripped it out of the door and dropped it into the sky. I had a foot on the gate when it came for him. The things in the river came down the side of the tower and grabbed him, then yanked him up and out of sight.”
“I’ve never heard screams like that before and pray never to again.” Dorian said, his eyes focused far away. “We had to run, it was coming for us, feeling for us, but we could hear his screams minutes later. I think he was dead but still screaming. I pray he was dead. If the worst happens, do yourself a favor and kill yourself before it can consume you.”
I shuddered at that. “What is it? Why’s it so terrible?” When I’d seen it in the distance it had made me want to throw up, the wrongness was palpable even from there, but I hadn’t been able to make out details.
“Come take a look.” Arven told us, walking over to one of the arrow slits on the river side of the tower.
I did as asked. I looked up into the improbable river flowing above our heads, then I turned away and focused on keeping my lunch down. It was ok, I didn’t need to see it any longer, the sight was burned into my mind to be reviewed at my leisure, and in every nightmare I would ever have for the rest of my life.
What was hanging above our heads right now was not a river, calling it a river was only possible due to a lack of any other term to describe it. There was no water to be seen. The appearance of liquid was there, but if it was anything it was crude oil or tar. Black as night and almost gelatinous.
It was hard to tell how much of that there was though, because the vast mass of it consisted of writhing creatures that reminded me of strands of old ground beef, but several centimeters thick. The tubes of meat undulated like worms, propelling themselves forward in a slow crawl that caused the surface of the river to flow in strange patterns. It reminded me of maggots swarming over rotten flesh.
That was hardly the end of it. Some of the tubes of meat were attached to human faces, like kites on strings. They stared blankly and unblinkingly towards the empty sky below them. Occasionally you could see huge black grubs crawling amongst them. I witnessed one of these force its way out from between the teeth of one of the faces, and then another, and another, and then I realized the faces were somehow giving birth to these things.
Ghouls moved through the river like lazy swimmers. Only a few passed by as I watched, but I saw at least one dip under the slime and remain there, so who knows how many swam beneath the surface. I watched one meat tendril without a face wrap itself lazily around a ghoul as it pushed by, but it simply brushed the tendril off.
As it did so, a dozen tiny, puckered mouths suddenly opened along the length of the tube and bit fruitlessly as it squirmed. The ghoul seemed unaffected and uncaring. The tendril didn’t seem to know what it was looking for and ended up curling up and mostly biting itself.
Lucus watched longer than I did, but when he turned away his skin was nearly as green as mine. “I can see what you mean about killing yourself. I can only imagine…”
“If they come for us, I want you to activate that shield’s forcefield ability,” Arven said. “We’ll pray they get bored and go away. I don’t think they are intelligent. That said, if they don’t, we’ll kill each other before the thing comes down.”
Lucus only nodded solemnly.
“This time, we’re all going at once. We’re going to stay under cover of the walkway above us, and Dorian is going to keep things quiet for us. Dawn’s light will be off, but Tavi if you can keep us shadowed that may help. Stay in the middle this time, Lucus and I will take the lead and push into the next tower as fast as possible. Dorian, you’re in the back, stay out of the fight, if we lose you, we’re all dead,” Arven instructed.
We all buffed up as much as we could, Lucus took a few moments to essentially repeat Arven’s instructions just to get his Stratagem boons going. Then he stepped out onto the river gate and began climbing across it. The gate was crosshatched, so it was very easy to climb, but it was also partially rotten. We had to be careful not to put weight anywhere that couldn’t support us.
We knew the door ahead of us wasn’t locked from the last time they had done this, so when Lucus got there he checked behind him to make sure we were all in position, then opened the door and ducked through it, shield first.
As predicted, there was a skeleton right inside the door, but Lucus bashed him with the shield and pushed him further in. Arven was inside a moment later, then Savas. I held back waiting for Dawn and Dorian to keep them shadowed. I had a much easier time climbing this than either of them did. Between my weight, strength, and the ranks in the Windows skill Tavi had picked up, climbing was easy.
Beneath us was nothing but the empty sky and unmoving black sun. This gate was very near the center of the city, bridging the river to the large island the keep sat on. What felt like years ago I’d seen this very place from the air as my soul gem fell from the sky over Altria. What irony it would be if left this city the same way I’d entered its mirror twin.
Dawn was struggling. I could tell she must have a fear of heights that she’d done very well to mask until now. I trusted the others to be able to handle the next room without me, but I leaned back a bit to look in the door anyway just to check, then swore silently.
Inside, Lucus and the others were fighting another elite. I made frantic hand motions to Dawn to hurry up, but she was too focused on climbing. I activated Hide and concentrated on expanding my shadows as much as possible to cover us. The last thing we needed right now was the elite deciding to attack us out here.
After what felt like minutes but was probably only a few seconds, Dawn finally made it over to me. I climbed into the room, then helped her climb in after me. She was visibly shaken, but when she looked around and saw what was happening, I watched her silently swear as well.
Arven was going all out against another female skeleton elite that seemed to use the same dual-wielding fighting style as himself. Their blades were filling the room with sparks as they clashed, and both were moving at such speeds that Lucus was primarily just trying to disrupt the elite’s footwork with his shield rather than risking an attack.
Savas was sitting against one wall, breathing hard and holding a hand over his stomach. He was literally holding his own guts in. He had a bleed bane and three quarters of his health was gone. Dawn rushed over to him even as I prowled closer under cover of stealth, trying to figure out the best way to help without getting cut to ribbons.
I waited for my moment, getting close enough that my shadows linked up to the ones under the elite. Then, when Arven was pressing her back and Lucus seemed ready to make a move, I simply pulled the Gray Watch Spear out of my inventory right beneath the elite’s feet, using the shadows there as the point of origin for the skill and activating my Soul Vault’s instant withdraw ability.
The spear went flying, but so did the elite as it tripped over the spear that had suddenly ruined its footing. Lucus was already moving, and even though the elite rolled, he slammed the shield down onto her, and then just left it there, pinning her quite effectively to the ground. Then he and Arven started simultaneously disassembling her with their weapons as she lay there helpless.
This one didn’t have a healing mechanic. Her gimmick had been speed, and when we robbed her of that she fell easily. The spear appeared in my hand a moment later, apparently having decided that it had been thrown. I shrugged and started using it to help stab the helpless elite to death. Lucus got the final blow, staving in her skull with his mace. I was a little sad to lose out on that soul, but it was too important we handle this quickly to try and snipe the kill.
Savas had recovered most of his health and the only sign of his previous injury was the cut in his leather armor. Healing him had cost Dawn over half her mana, and I could see why she typically didn’t participate actively in combat. If she got caught without enough mana one of us could easily die.
Suddenly my Danger Sense skill, which had been letting me know of various levels of elevated threat for some time now, screamed at me. I spun around, searching, and trying to call out a warning, but Dorian’s silencing effect was still in place. As necessary as that skill was, it was a real double-edged sword.
My eyes fell on Dorian, he’d just stepped fully into the room. He saw my panicked look and froze. The door to the outside was still open behind him. Our eyes met, and I watched in horror as a rope of dead gray flesh swung into the room and wrapped around his neck like a noose. Circular mouths full of jagged teeth bit at anything they touched.
Without a sound, it yanked him back out the door in a single fluid motion. I saw the terror in his eyes as he realized what was happening, and then he was gone.
I didn’t have time to think.
I was already moving when the sound returned, and the screams began. I yelled over my shoulder as I ran for the door.
“Keep going! I’ll distract it–get to the next watch post! I’ll meet you there!”
Then I activated Devour Essence and swung out the door, spider climbing up the tower and towards the black river.