I walked over to Gary who I saw standing by himself toying with his spear while the rest of the team continued talking close by.
“Did you choose?” I asked curiously. Gary turned to face me and stabbed his spear into the ground.
“No,” he shook his head, “I just needed to move around, I’m not sure which one I should take.”
“What are your choices?” I asked.
“Spear, Stance, Preservation, Agility, and Lightning. I want to take Spear, but I’m also considering lightning and stance,” he responded. I was quiet while I thought over the options his class gave him and he began slowly practicing his spear form. “Which choices did you get? All of us were wondering when you walked off.”
“Sorry, I was pretty focused on what choice to make and I didn’t want any distractions. My specializations were Bond, Restoration, Air, Earth, and Nature,” I grinned, “I chose Earth.”
“Interesting, I would have chosen restoration if it were me, I understand that this has to be a choice you decide for yourself, though.” Gary shrugged, “I’m sure earth will give you some powerful skills, did it offer you a skill?”
“I had a choice between Tremor and Earthen Might, and I chose Earthen Might. It’s a spell I can cast on someone that increases their strength and vitality by four.” I explained, “It lasts about half an hour, although it takes about a third of my Essence to cast.” Gary looked interested and stopped his slow spear strikes and blocks.
“That’s amazing, if you can cast that on Zack and me before we enter every dungeon it will make a huge difference. How long would it take you to fully recover after casting it twice?” he asked.
“Slightly under fifteen minutes, I think. I think I’ll cast it on myself first, then on you and Zack. I should be able to have the effect during the whole fight, although it might run out at the end,” I explained eagerly. I was looking forward to fighting under the effects of my new skill. “When I decided to choose Earth over Restoration it was because I didn’t want to base my entire future on healing, even with how powerful it is. I want to be in the fight and be able to hold my own, finally.” I winced slightly at how I sounded, but it was true. Although I improved significantly from when I started fighting with a spear I was still far less capable than Zack and Gary in a dungeon.
“That makes sense,” he nodded, “maybe that’s a good way to look at it,” he said musingly. “I want to be a spear master, how could I choose anything other than Spear.” I headed over to the rest of the team since Gary looked like he was thinking deeply about the skills he was offered.
“Why didn’t you ask it what else we could do in the Warband, then?” Gabrielle asked Zack with a scowl on her face while I took a seat beside them.
“He’s a Duergar, not an ‘it’,” I defended Aidor. If I got past the shock of speaking with someone who wasn’t human, he seemed like he was a good person. “We came back to tell you all of you everything he said. Besides, we can always ask him later.”
“I guess,” Gabrielle responded. “Did you choose a specialization, Eli?” I nodded and quickly explained my specializations, the skills I was offered, and what Earthen Might did.
“Well, I chose Protection, but I can’t decide between the two skills, Intercede and Shield Bash,” Zack said.
“Interesting, shield bash sounds like it could be good for this dungeon,” I replied thoughtfully.
“That’s what we all told him,” Aaron rolled his eyes, “I went with Execution, it was a pretty easy choice and I decide on Imbued Arrow over Seeking Arrow for my skill.”
“That sounds strong,” I said. “What about you Gabrielle?”
“I chose Barrage for my specialization, and my spells are Flame Pillar and Fire Wave,” she smiled. “I think I’m going to choose Pillar, but I haven’t decided yet.”
“Fire Wave sounds like it could be difficult to cast if you're behind us,” Zack commented.
“Yeah, you might be right,” she nodded decisively. “I’ll go with Flame Pillar for now, and I’ll probably end up using my next skill point to upgrade Fireball,” she sighed. “Two more levels for Fire Wave.” I waited quietly while Zack and Gabrielle looked at their Status pages, and we chatted lightly for a few minutes.
“Gary,” Zack nodded towards him as he walked up to us. “Did you make your choice?”
“I did, I went with Spear and my two skills were Sweeping Strike and Spear Art. I learned Spear Art, it’s a passive skill that improves my dexterity slightly and I think it will help me improve more quickly,” he shrugged,” but I’m not sure about that.”
“Sounds like it will be strong in the long run,” I said. It probably wouldn’t be too much of an improvement for now, but I was sure it would be a strong skill.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
“I was hoping it was more of an active skill,” he shrugged, “I’m sure it will be a good skill, though.” I nodded and listened as the rest of the team took turns telling him about the skills they learned. We challenged the dungeon two times earlier today, but it was still early afternoon and after we ate a quick lunch we headed back towards the cave.
“I think I’ll cast Earthen Might on myself when we’re second in line to go in the dungeon,” I said to Gary while we stepped into the cave. It was hard to say exactly how long each team would spend in the dungeon, but I figured about an average of ten minutes would be close enough.
“Sounds good to me. I think we’ll go with a similar strategy to what we were doing before, hopefully, Aaron and Gabrielle will be able to thin out some of the behemoth demons so we don’t have to retreat when they start to outnumber us upfront.” Gary replied. We had improved a lot over the past ten attempts at the dungeon, but once more than three of the large demons attacked us once we were forced to retreat. The big demons weren’t too quick, but only Zack was able to block their attacks.
“I think Aaron’s new skill can do it, but we’ll all be low on Essence by that point, anyway,” Gabrielle pointed out. Only two teams were waiting in line at the portal so I cast Earthen Might on myself before joining back in the conversation.
“The demons don’t attack the sides of my Fortress, honestly. I’ve been spending about a quarter of my Essence on it each time, it’s not that bad.” Zack shrugged.
“Oh, that’s better than using Wall of Flames, then,” Gabrielle replied.
“Let’s see if we can conserve Essence at the start; the more Essence we have left for the behemoths the longer we’ll last,” Gary said once it was our turn to go through the portal. I cast Earthen Might on Zack, Gary, and myself and I was back to full Essence, now. The skill would only last another seven or eight minutes and I quickly cast Barkskin on all five of us so we could head inside the portal.
I dropped my pack beside the entrance and moved down the hill with my spear and shield at the ready. This would be our first time clearing out the base of the hill without Gabrielle casting Meteor to help out, although the small demons shouldn’t be too much trouble. I followed behind Zack as he pushed the pack of demons out of his way and easily killed a demon with each strike. The four extra strength from my new skill combined with my Orichalcum spear let me slice through the small demons with ease. With Aaron and Gabrielle supporting us we quickly cleared out the area and Zack sent up the walls of his Fortress to protect our sides.
“Good work, don’t bother conserving anymore they’re going to start swarming,” Gary called out as I blocked a couple of the demons. I started casting thornbolts in between blocking demons to hold my position and I saw Aaron take down a behemoth before it could make it to us.
“Flame Pillar,” I heard Gabrielle shout from behind me. I shoved a small demon back with my shield and stepped back to see a behemoth approaching Zack get engulfed in bright orange flames. The flames continued raging as I watched but the demon jumped at me and I quickly turned my attention back to the monster. After a couple of minutes of fighting the smaller demons, the behemoths had grouped up to assault us.
“Snaring Roots,” I sent the thick roots of my skill around the demon's leg and dashed around to its back. I stabbed it in the lower back but I could only penetrate half a foot so I quickly backed off while the monster swung around and tried to reach me with its claws.
“Thornbolt,” I sent a thorn into the monster's face to distract it and slashed across its stomach. I caught a wild kick from its free leg with my shield and rolled back painfully from the blow.
“Piercing Charge,” Gary dashed over and stabbed through the monster's skull while it faced me. I nodded tiredly and swept my spear out in an arc to catch a small demon's throat.
“Snaring Roots, Snaring Roots,” I spent the last of my Essence to slow another two Behemoths striding towards us.
“Back up!” Gary shouted and I focused on blocking the small demons and moved back towards the hill. Zack sent the two behemoths he was fighting flying back almost ten meters with a Shield Bash and jogged back to the hill in the opening.
“That skill looks incredible,” Aaron grinned at Zack and I nodded fervently. If I was offered that skill I would probably take it, those behemoths were about two and a half meters tall.
“Good job, everyone. I think we managed to kill three more behemoths than we have before.” Gary said just before we headed back through the portal. I followed him through and we made our way to an open area to rest while our Essence recovered.
“Did everyone see the demon coming towards us at the end?” Aaron asked. “It was still a good ways off, but it was a different type.”
“I didn’t see it, what did it look like?” I asked curiously.
“It was walking on four legs, not two like the behemoths, and it was closer to black than red. That’s all I could see,” he replied. I saw four behemoths close to us and three in the distance at the end of the fight, so we would probably have to kill all of them before facing the new demon.
“Well, I doubt that’s the boss,” Gabrielle commented. “Most of these teams are a lot stronger than us and I don’t think they’re defeating the dungeon.” We continued discussing the fight and our new abilities for the next few minutes. Once my Essence recovered I cast Rejuvenation on myself, Gary, and Zack to heal any small cuts we got from the demons. I pulled up my Status to check our progress while I waited for my Essence to recover again.
Eli - Lvl 6 Druid
Experience - 570\15000
Strength-12
Dexterity-15
Perception-10
Vitality-12
Spirit- 20
Willpower-15
Barkskin - Level 9\10 Upgradeable
Experience - 2390\25600
Thornbolt - Level 7\20 Upgradeable
Experience - 6440\12800
Rejuvenation - Level 6\10 Upgradeable
Experience - 2070\6400
Snaring Roots - Level 6\10 Upgradeable
Experience - 410\6400
Earthen Might - Level 1\10 Upgradeable
Experience - 50\100
I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of experience we managed to earn from one run through the dungeon. We would probably only challenge the dungeon one or two more times today, but we still had five days to spend here. It looked like it would only take two more runs to reach level two in Earthen Might and I was excited to see how the skill would improve.