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Chimera
Chapter 18 - Dungeons: The Kickstarter Way!

Chapter 18 - Dungeons: The Kickstarter Way!

Name: (Words) = Thinking (usually reserved for third person perspectives).

Words~ = Sing-song voice.

Words/ = Monotone voice.

*Words* = Sound effects/actions.

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Peckerwood - Next Morning

Oh, the great abandoner has come back, to revel in my despair!  You left me to my fate of the accidental flag!  She wouldn’t take no for an answer!  I kept hitting her, but she kept panting more and more!  I think that redneck asshole infected her with something else…  I did figure out how to stop her though, but it came with a cost…  I used wind manipulation to create an electrical current to target the pain center of her brain.  Without thinking, I kind of struck a pose and said “Forbidden Art: Pleasure Devouring Lightning”...  Not my proudest moment.  The System decided to be a smartass about the whole thing…  I HATE YOU SYSTEM!

[Chuunibyou] has updated!Title: Chuunibyou

Look down on others?  Believe you have special powers?  Think you know better than everyone else?

Don't deny it,  that's why you have this title!Effects:

* +30% effectiveness when you state the technique name.

* Posing in a cool manner may make you more intimidating.

* Able to modify attacks for special purposes.

(Please note that you still need the required attributes for these bonuses.)

I didn’t even shout the technique name before hand!  It was after the attack!  There was no shouting!  Of course I look down on others, I’m awesome!  I do have special powers, this is a freaking world full of goddamned magic!  I do know better than everyone else, I have internet access!  You can’t win against the system when it’s rigged to always win…  Back to the aftermath:  I tied her up, and used her funbags as a pillow.  Best night of sleep.  Ever.  Anyway, she’s tied up, and strapped on top of the buggy while we head to the dungeon.  Which totally isn’t a mile away,  maybe a mile away as the crow flies, but not by goddamned road...

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Dungeon Entrance

You have discovered [Adulterated Sepulcher]![Adulterated Sepulcher] wasn't always filled with the undead.

After the Bandit takeover of Peckerwood, those bandits disposed of the bodies inside this cave.

Between being improperly buried and a having a death filled with resentment, those bodies awakened as undead.As the first group to discover this dungeon, your group will gain the following benefits for the next week:

* +100% Drop rate bonus for regular dungeon denizens.

* Bosses always drop all of their loot table.

* +100% Experience bonus.As the first group to discover this dungeon, your group will gain the following benefits for the life of this dungeon:

* +20% Drop rate bonus for regular dungeon denizens.

* Bosses always drop items your group can use.

* 20% Experience bonus.

Did I read that right?  Ugh…  Can’t they use stereotypical names for this crap?  Noooo, always having to use the hipster version of things to seem different..

Tyche:  “Group Invite Sarah…”

Sarah may not be invited to the group, as she is a [Citizen] and not an [Adventurer].

THE FUCK! Hold on a second, we have to go register the Maid…  PORTAL TIME!

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Adulterated Sepulcher - Entrance - Afternoon

Okay, now that that is out of the way…  Let’s try this again…

Tyche:  “Group Invite Sarah…”

Unable to invite Sarah to group, as a group was not created.

Must. Not. Murder. Everything.

Tyche:  “Create Group?”

The Group System is under maintenance, please try again later.

Tyche:  “I QUIT!  Midas, you take over, I’m gonna cry off screen…”

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Midas PoV

Hello there, that was weird wasn’t it?  Tyche is off in the woods crying while hugging a doll that has blue hair…  Still don’t know why she asked me to make it, but make it I did.  What else is there to do?  You guys are pretty much current on what we have done or want to do…  Oh well, let’s go play some games…  Crap!  Some of my crops in farmville withered…  OH!  The ranch!  Well, farm is the more politically correct term for it, as we are also growing those plastic dandelions, and a few other things…  We received the first shipment of the rainbow squids yesterday, so the breeding program is getting added to the farm too.

The Group system is now back online from maintenance.

Tyche:  “FINALLY!  Gimme back the reigns!”

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Tyche PoV

Tyche:  “Create Group!”

A blue window pops up in front of me, asking all sorts of questions.  I filled them in and submitted it.  Show them the Group Selene!

Group InformationName:P.A.N.T.S.U.Affiliation:Adventurer's GuildSpecialisation:NoneRank:XMembersLeader:TycheClass:CosplayerCo-Leader:MidasClass:CosplayerMember:SarahClass:Marksman

Oh~Hohohohohohohohoho~!  I’m evil!  Can you imagine that:  “Oh Shit, it’s PANTSU, RUN!”  or  “We are gathered here to thank the people who rescued our Kingdom from invasion, please bow down and thank PANTSU!”  What does it mean you ask?

Panties Appropriateness (of) Nobles Technical Survey Unit

If you were wondering, it’s exactly the same Acronym on my Royal Underwear Inspector badge!  I will have to remake the badge though, remove the “Royal Underwear Inspector” from it…  We can use that acronym for all kinds of things!  Okay, enough fun…  Let’s get to work.

Tyche:  “Okay, Sarah?  …  Where’s Sarah?”

Midas:  “...”

Tyche:  “So she left us…  Oh well, I’ll just wait in the buggy…”

As I arrive at the buggy, I find a tied up Sarah on the roof…  Oh yeah, I vaguely remember tying her up.  So that’s where I left her?  *cough*  Let’s get her down, and untie her…  HEY! Don’t look disappointed!  Ah, what a blast from the past, that’s the look Midas used to give me back when he was Fortuna…

Tyche:  “See!?  That’s the look you used to always give me…”

Midas:  “Did I always look that creepy when I did it?”

Tyche:  “...”

Midas:  “Seriously?”

Tyche:  “Yeah.  Anywho~, Sarah, if you do what I think you’re going to do, I will tie you to Midas, and take pictures.  Now bring out your weapons, I have to show you how to use them.  She then proceeds to dump them out of her Interspatial Ring onto the ground…  Ugh!  Now we have to go through this…  I take off her apron, and attach the rifle holster to the back of it, put the apron back on her, and insert the rifle into the holster.  Next, I roll up her sleeves, strap the sleeve gun sliders to each arm, and then loop the release/retract bracelet on each wrist.  I motion to her to roll down her sleeves, and I begin the explanation.

Tyche:  “Take out the rifle…  The one under your apron...  Hold it like the crossbow you used to have.  Good, that’s it!  As long as you have ki left, it shoots every time you pull the trigger.”

She then proceeds to systematically murder a tree, starting with the outer branches, to the inner branches.  As she begins the process of shooting it in half, I take it away from her.  Now for the pistols…

Tyche:  “Now for the pistols, focus your ki into your wrist, and rotate them.  The pistols will pop out.”

Sarah:  “Like this?”

Tyche:  “NO!  NOT IN FRONT OF YOUR FA-”

Sarah “ACK! My nose!”

Tyche:  “Not in front of your face…”

She looked directly at her wrist as she did it, and the barrel slammed into her nose…  Kind of can’t blame her for that, she doesn’t know any better…  I heal her nose, and get her to do it again, sans looking into the barrel.  She draws and withdraws them a few times to get used to it.  And then she goes back to systematically murdering that tree…  That tree has done nothing wrong, you hear me!  It’s not like it killed your parents or something…  Bandits did that!  That’s a redwood tree, not a redneck tree!  Let’s stop her now, we wasted enough time…  Let’s drag her into the dungeon, the reason why we are here!

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Three hours later…

Tyche:  “WHERE THE HELL IS ALL THE ZHAMBIES!”

Midas:  “Shhhh!  You’ll attract them to us!”

Tyche:  “SHHH YOUR ASS!  THAT’S THE POINT!”

Sarah:  “Why am I in the front?  Aren’t you guys stronger than me?”

Tyche:  “Zombie bai…  Combat training?”

Midas:  “Pre-warning Alar... Perception training?”

Sarah:  “Be serious please…”

Tyche:  “Deadly serious here, we are here to train you, so go along with it.  Remind me of something: didn’t you want to join us?  So suck it up!”

Defeated, Sarah turns around and advances at a snail’s pace.  Ugh, this is going to take forever!  I kick her in the ass to make her go faster.  Ah, terror must trump masochism, because I received the reaction I wanted.

Sarah:  “KYAA~!” *crack crack crack crack crack*

She drew out her pistols and fired randomly in fright, destroying the thin wall of the cave.    Revealing a… surprised zombie... Seriously?  This freaking sucks…

Tyche:  “We were in the wrong goddamn cave!  We should have taken the other entrance…”

Seriously, useless freaking maid!  Points us to the wrong stupid cave entrance.  This is the part when the poor stupid zombie gets blasted to pieces like the wall that used to be in front of it!  Wait, seriously?  Don’t freeze up now!  Well, it worked last time right?  I kickstart the potential big breasted death machine.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

Sarah:  “KYAA~!”  *sploosh sploosh sploosh sploosh*  “STOP THAT!”

Tyche:  “Why?  It worked didn’t it?  We would have helped if you found yourself in trouble.  I think?  Hold on, [Inspect].”

Zombie Corpse Puddle (5 liters)What remains of a level 12 zombie, who was once the Tanner of Peckerwood.

He was slaughtered in an unfortunate accident.The soul of this corpse was freed from his torment, and may re-enter reincarnation again.

Sarah:  “It had four levels on me!”

Tyche:  “Levels aren’t anything in this world…  The supreme gods of this place are severely incompetent…  Anyway, your ki guns are slightly-”

Midas:  “Not slightly, those things are freaking overpowered!”

Tyche:  “Shhh!  They nerf when you brag!  Anyway, aim for their heads and joints.”

Sarah:  “What are joi-”

Tyche:  “Joints are elbows, wrists, shoulders, knees, hips, ankles.”

Sarah:  “How do yo-”

Midas:  “She’s 1/64th cherokee, while I’m 1/28th Navajo.  We can listen to the heart of nature.”

Tyche:  “Haaa~  We haven’t  did that in a while!  Anyway, keep going!  You should have leveled up, or are really close to it!”

Sarah:  “If we survive, can we-”

Tyche:  “NOPE!  And don’t raise flags you idiot!”

Sarah:  “Why not?”

Tyche:  “Midas and I are a package deal, both or nothing.  So the faster you get over your man fear, the faster it can happen…”

Sarah:  (mumbling) “...It’s not like that…”

Tyche:  “Less mumbley, more zhambie!”

Ass sufficiently prodded with my boot, Sarah advances.  She’s getting pretty good at this!  She’s double tapping the zombies as they get near us, and they fall down dead… Wait, they’re zombies right?  Re-dead?  Let’s go with that…  Midas and I are taking turns dropping the zombies and whatever they dropped into our inventory.  This is getting pretty boring, so I take out my harp.

Midas:  “Death metal?  Pretty good, didn’t know you were into that?”

Tyche:  “I listen to everything, it’s all about the mood.  And that’s not me…  Since when can I play guitar, bass, and drums at the same time?  I’m sure as hell not singing with a male voice either…”

Midas:  “...”

Just as I was lifting my boot to kickstart the guide, Sarah advances.  Pretty soon, I’m strumming my harp along to the music while humming along.  My right drill starts shaking, so I look over to find a surprising scene:  Selene headbanging… Let’s hold a mana crystal, and save this moment for later…  Okay, moving on!

The music getting progressively louder, we reach a large rusted iron door.  Sarah tries to open it, but doesn’t have the strength to do it…  She has like what, five strength?  Oh, the tank or something is supposed to do that…  Midas walks forward to help her, tripping in the process and knocking the door off the hinges as he falls into the room…  As Midas is getting up from the floor, I notice a large zombie in a purple robe holding a giant scythe..  Is he a boss?

Boss:  “Ah, welco- ACK!”

An irritated Sarah doesn’t let the Boss finish, and starts riddling him with ki shots.  He keeps trying to say something, but every time he tries, he stumbles again.  The singing stopped, I guess it was him doing it?  It was only vocal notes, so l start singing to replace it, since the skeletons in the background are still playing their instruments.  My right drill starts shaking again.  The boss, giving up on saying his greeting, assumes a pose and starts charging his energy.

Boss:  “Come o- ACK!  Seriously, stop that!”

Midas:  “We don’t negotiate with terrorists!  Especially since I think your door gave me tetanus…”

Tyche:  *stops singing*  “Sorry, I can only heal damage, not afflictions… We can visit an alchemist later?  Sarah, what are you doing?  Shoot him some more!” *resumes singing*

Boss:  “Screw this!”

He angrily summons skeletons to attack us.  Wait…  Did he just break character?  No!  Don’t question it!  I conjure a ball of light attribute, and throw it at the skeletons.  Which still damages them, but doesn’t do the whole turning to dust thing you would normally associate with undead and light based attacks.  This must mean there’s some “Divine Attribute” or something similar, since Light Attribute looks to only be attacks made of light…  Maybe it will still work on vampires?  Hopefully there are real vampires in this game, and not those fake glitter in the sunlight assholes.  I hate those guys!  If those are in the game, I will commit genocide on those sparklefart assholes…  Oh! Rambling again, I should probably take care of those skeletons right?  Oh, Midas took care of them with some slashes infused with fire attribute ki…  My bad?  I turn to look at the boss, and find him still doing that hilarious jerky dance when people get riddled with bullets in movies.  Sarah has a sadistic look on her face while she mutters something sounding like “he will notice me?”  I must have misunderstood…  Yeah, that’s it!

The boss finally crumbles into dust, with an annoyed screech. I don’t blame you Mr. Boss, Sarah totally cheesed your encounter mechanics…  A chest falls from the ceiling over Sarah’s head.  Midas tackles her out of the way, and lands on top of her with his hands on her chest, with her legs spread open…  That is kind of cliche, but funny. It should happen any second now:  3, 2, 1… 0!  Go!  Now!

Sarah:  (mumbling)  “...please be gentle…”

Midas:  (freaking out)  “I’M SO SORRY!”

That was weird I guess?  I think there’s some misunderstanding here but I couldn’t care less right now, so I activate [Denial], and walk over to the chest to search the loot.  I find all kinds of generic dungeon loot:  Potions, gems, gold, silver, copper, and… cards?  Not even caring, I go to the pile of dust that was once the boss, and use my boot to push around him to find our real loot.  I find a golden lute!  [Inspect]

Melody's Golden Lute:  Golden Lute that was once owned by a famous Minstrel.

Type:  Instrument --- Rarity:  Rare

Class: Minstrel/BardEffects:

*+5 Perception

* +10 Dexterity

* Everyone who doesn’t move with the beat of your music will have their hearts explode!

The hell kind of garbage is this?  Wouldn’t that kill my friends too?  Let’s put this in the lead sealed vault we have in the inventory for items that are dangerous…  Where was that badass scythe?  I can’t find it, but I do find two cards.  What is with this dungeon and cards?  I pick one up and use [Inspect].

Loot CardHeavy Metal Scythe:  Scythe once owned by a musical skeleton raising necromancer.

Type:  Weapon - Scythe --- Rarity:  RareEffects:

*+10 Strength

* +8 Agility

* Your attacks can cause tetanus.Uses:

* You can convert this card to its original form.

* Use it to augment one of your own.

(Please note that the receiving item has to be of the same type.

Weapons > Weapons, Armor > Armor, Jewelry > Jewelry)

* Equip this card in an equipment slot.

(Requires an item to be worn in the corresponding cosmetic slot.)

Oh!  That’s how cosmetic slots work!  Midas and I have been wearing our Cosplay stuff in the cosmetic slots.  My corset is in the underwear armor slot, as that does have some defensive capabilities…  Midas’ leather armor is in armor slots too.  Let’s see if I can augment my scepter with it…  At most, it will say it’s not possible, right?  Here we go!  The scepter absorbs the card, and turns into the scythe.  The Fairies fall onto my shoulders…  That’s weird, shouldn’t they be in my drills?  I lift my hand up to find that they aren’t there.  What?  Did I gain another mode?  This is going to suck, isn’t it?  GODDAMNIT SYSTEM!

Goth Mode:  Your personality is as uninviting as your long silver hair.

Type:  Passive/Cosmetic[Goth Mode] has been absorbed by [The 'Dere is in the Hair].

SERIOUSLY!  The system has been shitting all over my cheerios today!  I will get revenge for this, I swear!  Furious, I open up the GM interface, and begin to hack… fix my stupid hair passive.  Stupid fucking developers, never fixing the broken stuff…  If things aren’t done right, do it yourself!

Male Voice:  “So you managed to defeat my second in command!  I commend your bra-”

Tyche:  “SHUT THE FUCK UP!  I’M HAVING AN EXISTENTIAL CRISIS HERE!  WE’LL KILL YOU WHEN WE ARE GOOD AND READY, NOT WHEN YOU ASK US TO!”

Male Voice:  “... That’s fine too…”

Sarah:  “I’m never pissing her off again.’

Selene:  “You should follow that advice, I’ve only annoyed her, and my neck always hurts for days afterward…  Last night wasn’t her being mad, that was mild irritation.”

Sarah:  *shivering*  “...”

I stopped listening to the conversation here, as I’m trying to rescript my passive in the GM interface.  Really, it should be called the Developer Interface with what I’m allowed to do...  Whoever designed this game deserves to be shot!  Who uses some bastardized mashup of C++, LUA, and Java for a game?  Ughghghgh, you have to persevere Tyche!  This is to end one of the major annoyances in your life!  Come back tomorrow guys, I have to recode this, and we’re turning in for the night soon.

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Author’s Notes:  3k wordcount chapter!  It went a little longer, as it was a perfect spot to do one of the plot points I had on the to do li… storyboard…  Yes, it was the hair passive, she’s going to “recode” it.  I’m going to keep Tsundere, Dandere, and Yandere, as they are pretty good for comedy.  However, I will get rid of goth mode, and change neutral mode.  I’m thinking three modes: Agility, Strength, and Intellect.  Scepter will be Intellect, Scythe will be Strength, and Agility won’t have anything yet.

Next chapter is the second half of the dungeon!  They won’t be cheesing it this time, they will do it somewhat legitimately.  Well, as legitimate as you can get when you have overpowered ki talisman weapons…  I think I’ll try for a Sarah PoV?  Not promising anything...

And on the Sarah front:  I reread the chapter after finishing it, and noticed that she is more masochistic with Tyche, but “notice me senpai” with Midas…  I think I’ll keep her like that to be honest.

Oh!  If anyone can guess what game I referenced the shit out of, you must understand my pain...