Venomous Developments

Chapter 22

Looking at the Basilisk venom, my brain filled with question marks. It was a monster I was familiar with conceptually, but its venom ranking mythical threw me for a loop. I realized a little late I didn’t actually know how the ranking system worked. Easy way to fix that.

[Item Rankings]

[Common, Uncommon, Rare, Masterwork, Legendary, Epic, Mythic, Divine/Demonic

Beginning at Masterwork items may exhibit unusual or magical properties or be endowed with them. Items of lower rank can only be given magical properties temporarily.

Divine/Demonic

Items of this rank can only be created by a higher being of an appropriate alignment.

Unique

Items with this attribute occur in Legendary and above tiers. They are not reproducible by the system.]

Okay, so the Gilnamar was special, but Basilisk venom was the most special. Specialist? Specialer? A nightmare item I didn’t know how to feel about owning? All questions to be ignored until later.

[Item Grades]

[F, E, D, C, B, A, S]

[All grades have ten ranks. Items must be at maximum rank for their grade in order to be upgraded to the next grade.]

Good to know. I was still giving the Basilisk venom the side-eye. I hadn’t looked it up yet, but it seemed dangerous as shit. It had corroded metal, fantasy bullshit metal, not just an organic, like flesh. I didn’t know how Z14 would react to it and I honestly didn’t want to find out.

[Basilisk Venom]

[A poisonous secretion from glands in the mouth of a Basilisk rendering its saliva toxic. It is lethal to all mortal creatures, potentially deadly even to immortals, and capable of corroding all metals except those of mythic rank. The speed of corrosion depends on the metal’s ranking and composition. Phoenix tears (Mythical) must be used to resurrect a soul that died from the venom to remove the taint.]

Not exactly cheerful news and I felt an acidic tingle of unease about the potentially deadly even to immortals bit. It seemed fine to have it in my inventory, but I kept having this weird fear the container would overturn and it would start burning me from the inside. Not exactly a sensible fear, but fear wasn’t inclined to concern itself with such niceties.

It was surprising to find the Basilisk itself sounded like an endgame-level boss. I was used to thinking of it as something more like a midgame one. An annoying one you had to slog through a poisoned swamp to get at, but not “can maybe kill that which does die and taint the soul itself”. Just yikes.

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[Basilisk, Monster (Demonic, Unique)]

[A fragment of the World Eater that regenerated into a lesser monster. Its gaze could petrify, its bite was venomous, and it emitted a poisonous gas as a breath weapon. Its very presence was corruptive, turning water acidic and causing mutations in plant and animal life that survived near it.

The majority of its life was spent in hibernation, with brief periods of wakefulness in a cycle similar to the World Eater’s, played out over a small time scale. It was slain, but its body continues to taint the environment around it, creating a massive poisonous swamp.]

Holy shit, this thing was a nightmare even in death. I was deeply happy it was tagged as unique. No world needed one, let alone more, of something like that roaming around. That it was just a fragment of something and defined as a ‘lesser monster’ in comparison was its own kind of disturbing.

“World Eater?” I said aloud when thinking it failed to produce anything. A blank prompt opened and jumbled text and runes started to appear then fade at random before an error tone rang out and it closed on its own. My orbs flickered, today was just chock-full of disturbing surprises.

Yep, all of that was getting filed under “well fuck” and that venom wasn’t going to see the light of day again. Not as long as I got a say in the matter anyway.

Shaking off my unease, I decided to see if the corroded Gilnamar was salvageable. Before, I’d been interested in making magic swords for fun and possibly profit, but now I was concerned for my safety. If stuff like that Basilisk was roaming around the world, I might need to defend myself from something worse than adventurers at some point.

It cost me five mana to produce enough of the damaged Gilnamar to make a usable bar of undamaged F 1 grade. Checking the sword’s requirements, I needed three of the newly fixed bars to make it. That would cost me five points a bar.

I flinched at the cost, but still checked on how much upgrading it would set me back. The answer was five bars to increase it from F 1 to F 2 grade. Interesting, but not something I was inclined to bother with for the moment.

I stopped just short of crafting the sword, needing to think a bit. While I thought, I put the other items for its construction into the interface to improve them. I probably didn’t need S grade enamel and leather, but it was something to do. It was also free, so why not?

I hesitated because of the dilemma about what to do with the sword's original owner. I didn’t have any particular desire to kill him, but the hero vibe I got off him was strong. It didn’t sit right with me to steal his sword.

A well-done villain had its charms, but I must have been a sucker for heroes before. Was a sucker for heroes now. I didn’t know where the feeling came from, but not knowing didn’t change how I felt. This kid could be something really cool and I didn’t want to ruin that.

Either way though, I was going to make the sword. I started the crafting process. It would take four hours, half the time it took to deconstruct it. I felt like the difference was a reflection of the lack of Basilisk venom.

Once the timer was up, I checked on the boy’s status. His hit points were at full and his status was normal. A good sign, even though he was still sleeping. At an earlier point in the day, I'd felt like I should talk to him. Now I’d returned to that idea but felt nervous.

It was still worth a try, but I felt uncomfortable as I approached the room where I'd stashed him and dragged my feet. Tail?

I took my time, which turned out to be a lifesaver as I floated by the remains of the bandits and paused. Laying dismembered and burned in the tunnel, they were a gruesome sight. Time and the fact the hounds had been feeding on them hadn’t added anything pleasant to the scene.

Fuck.

I chucked the bodies into the core room hastily. A shiver reminding me of a cold sweat running down my spine as I did. Yep, that would have been perfect. Have a nice chat with the boy about how I wasn’t going to kill him then have him walk out to that scene. That wouldn’t have been trauma-inducing at all.

“Mary, mother of fuck!” I swore violently. There were still two of his dead comrades just laying around, naked. I’d raided their bodies but left them outside the entrance the entire time.

They were on a tile I owned so I hastily relocated them several feet into the dirt. What I did was too violent and inconsiderate to be called a burial, but it happened. The last thing I wanted to be known for was being the naked death dungeon.

“Beware ye, o’ adventures! This one doesn’t just kill ye, it takes yer dignity!” I could picture the rough sound of a one-eyed crazy man spreading the tale from bar to bar. It would be the literal death of me if adventurers were too weirded out to approach my dungeon and I failed to make my tithe.

“Ow! Shit!” A voice that didn’t belong to me or the hound said, followed by clattering gear. It seemed the boy was awake and had found his pack with his shin.

Daaamn it. Who knew what other horrible things were still laying around. Time for some fast cleaning.