A while back. Right after Ebony split off from Hector.
Ebony pulled the other golem away as Hector pushed his golem back so Tuffock couldn’t help both. Possibly because Hector told the others that Ebony could handle himself, Tuffock went to back Hector up instead.
Hector looked like he was doing well as he pummelled the golem over and over again. However, it didn’t last.
The golem constantly recovered and pulled mud mass back onto its body protecting its core. Ebony’s help in freezing its arms were removed as well. The golem started retaliating.
Hector jerked back off in a burst of speed. He didn’t dare take a hit from a golem 70 levels over himself. Now that he had the chance to rethink his choices in life, coming to challenge the golem was a pretty bad idea.
Although he was stronger, faster and tougher than Ebony with or without 3 elemental enhancement running at the same time he didn’t think he could take a hit from the golem with the lousy armour he had on.
Tuffock’s mace crossed blows with the golem.
Hector didn’t let the opportunity go as he merged 3 punches which didn’t take as much charge effort as the one he used to shatter Ryley’s arrows. Aimed at the golem’s thinner joints since his earlier effort to get to its core failed. The golem defended it with it’s all.
Turning wind enhancement off for fire.
He did test draining water or earth from the mud golem since mud was just water and earth but it was foolish of him.
Challenging a golem to drain its elements from it was nothing short of madness. It was hard enough to do so on other people much less a golem made of the element themself. Even a lesser elemental or a random third order mage shouldn’t be able to do it.
His gauntlets were customised to take on his elements but the heated punches did little to dry it, unlike Scarlet’s spell. Dents in the golem’s joints appeared but that was hardly harmful to the golem.
Tuffock’s maces turned to locks and weighed the golem’s arms down.
“Nice!”
Hector rejoiced too early as the golem merely got its mud around it like a liquid and freed itself. It used the motion of raising its arms when it freed itself to smash towards Hector who let his guard down.
Hector got his arms up to guard himself reflexively and his feet pushed off from where he was but he didn’t react fast enough. He braced for impact.
Tuffock’s stone locks on the ground spiked up as it turned into a makeshift wall, defending Hector for all it’s worth. He had a skill for it and it was at a respectable strength as he did help build the city’s walls.
“Ghh!” Hector clenched his teeth as the broken stone wall crashed into him. He was knocked back far but the stone wall took the brunt of the damage.
“Thanks Tuff!” Hector was pleased as punch that the mage on his team wasn’t useless like many human mages were. For one that is as young as Tuffock anyway. He assumed he was as young as he looked and gave him a nickname.
Tuffock twitched in displeasure at the nickname but Hector didn’t notice as he looked at the golem. Hector’s arms were in pain, his vambraces didn’t fully protect him. The golem didn’t just stop there either. It jumped. So did Hector.
They were pushed on the defensive as Tuffock got to using the mana and energy in his staff to conjure lances of stone. Skill backed spells obviously did a whole lot of damage more than manipulation based attacks. Manipulation based attacks were like the Mastery skills of weapons for mages.
The mud golem removed any stone that dug deep into its chest. Tuffock and Hector will run out of mana before long at this rate.
“5 seconds!” Tuffock called out to Hector. Hector thought it was the other Tuffock talking with his shouting so loud but seeing the nervous look on his face told him otherwise.
“Alright! Give it a big one!” Hector caught on quickly. Tuffock said he was more of an offensive mage, all of the strongest magic spells took time and effort to cast.
Smashing his fist together with power. Hector burst forward to meet the golem in a direct exchange fully enhanced. Perhaps sensing danger the golem quickly gathered mud and got to protecting his core against Hector’s rush of punches.
Hundreds of stone shards a little bigger than Ebony’s old ice shards formed above Tuffock’s raised staff.
“Now!”
Hector steamed off as he burst away to the side, exhausted and in pain from the conflicting elements in his body. He overshot his time limit a little.
Tuffock’s stone barrage rained down on the golem.
The ground shook. Not just from the spell, the golem rammed its fist on the ground. The ground turned to mud and swallowed up Hector who was still not too far away.
The golem looked like a porcupine with so many stone shards sticking out of it but only a few touched his core. It ejected the shards back out of its body.
Tuffock wasn’t about to let his own stone hurt himself but Hector, half swallowed into the ground, wasn't so lucky. One of them cut into his uncovered shoulder and another ricocheted off his helmet. He didn’t wear an armour piece for his shoulders so that his punches weren’t restricted.
Hector managed to get himself out with a little water and earth manipulation but he wasn’t looking so good. Mana was low and his body exhausted and in pain. His head was ringing from the stone shard that rammed into his helmet.
Tuffock was also huffing and catching his breath. Casting a large spell was mentally exhausting.
They looked upon the golem who went back to full shape and was ready to attack them before watching as its limbs fell off its body. A gust of wind smacked into them at the same time before being hit by a wave of intense heat.
The next thing they knew they received the confirmation of the golem’s death.
‘What in the world? That’s just ridiculous…’ Hector thought. The stories he had heard about the Xengs didn’t seem outrageous now.
❅❅❅
“You okay?” Ebony asked. He observed his new party members' state.
Scarlet was literally steaming as she was breathing hard under that mask of hers. He could tell she was trying to control it but her shaking arms told him that she was not in the best of condition.
Ryley was picking up his metal arrows with a look of disgust on his face as he took out what Ebony guessed was his waterskin cap. It might be a stand alone bottle cap. He was washing the mud off his arrows.
Tuffock had a tight frown but didn’t look like he was injured anywhere. Just some mud on the edges of his robe.
Hector looked like took a mud bath not unlike how Ebony was the first time he got covered in mud.
He was obviously worn out as Tuffock removed the stone shard in his shoulder. It didn’t stab deep since the golem merely pushed it out of his body.
Other than that, they were mostly in one piece.
“Ye..yeah.” Hector replied.
Before they could continue talking, they heard the crackling of thunder. They looked up to see dark clouds gathering at an unnatural speed.
“Hell yeah!”
“Finally.”
“...”
“...Let’s go back.”
The others seem to be aware of something Ebony didn’t know about. Scarlet called for a return even though Ebony thought she would be more than happy to continue hunting.
The clouds moved away from them and it got darker and darker. Ebony could see the crackling within the clouds.
The party wouldn’t be able to make it back to Plainston in time if they walked so they had to at least jog at a reasonable pace. Ebony got another passenger on board his shield. He offered to carry Scarlet along on another shield but only got a glare in return.
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It took 4 days or so to traverse from the edge of Bubble Hills to Plainston on a cargo-filled wagon. With how slow they were going and them only travelling for half of the day it made sense that people could cover that distance in a much shorter time span with stats and running skills.
They made it back to Plainston in a few hours, taking about twice as much time as it took to get them there.
Throughout the journey, the brewing thunderstorm only got worse. There was no rain and neither did lightning strike. Ebony only noticed that the clouds were gathering towards where the dungeon was supposed to be. He also asked them what was up with the weather.
The unexpectedly knowledgeable Hector who got up and running half way through the journey answered.
Basically, something about the world catching on to the fact that a dungeon has or was forming and taking its essence. The weather was caused by the world’s action. It would strike the dungeon and seal it from taking any more of the world’s essence.
This in turn, stabilises the dungeon entrance and locks it where it is. The entrance would no longer be dangerous to get close to and people will be able to enter safely.
It was no normal lightning strike though. So far people have only determined it to have elements of earth, water, wind, fire, lightning, light, dark, shadow, space, gravity, void and astral. Time mana was also hypothesised but no time mage has confirmed the theory.
Time mages were the stuff of legends, Hector didn’t even think there were any living time mages in the current age. Scarlet also shook her head when he asked if there were any Xeng time mages.
The pure elementless mana in the air was getting heavy in Ebony’s senses.
Just as they were lining up to enter the city, everyone who was staring at the sky saw a pitch black cylinder of ‘light’ descend in the distance.
Ebony imagined the atmospheric mana feeling anger and at the same time something else. Merely imagination or so Ebony thought.
According to his party. The city would send a party to check it out almost immediately and the dungeon should be open to approved parties by tomorrow.
They planned to split up and gather by morning tomorrow to find each other going towards the Z&Z company store.
Ebony bought more food because they were going to be in the dungeon longer than he thought. He bought 2 more bags like his current one, folding them and keeping them in his bag. Ebony was actually quite the hoarder, a very possessive one. He didn’t know what he could get in the dungeon but it would be a shame if he couldn’t carry it out.
The Souper Bread expands in water or soup but is only about 5 times its size and Ebony could eat quite a few every meal so he bought loads of it. He also bought a lot of thick, sliced and barbecued jerky. Together with dry-packed biscuits with dried fruits. Unfortunately, there were no plum flavoured ones, much less frost plums which most people couldn’t eat.
It wasn’t really enough for meals but enough to survive on as snacks for at least a week or more. With his reduced need for sustenance and Constitution stat he could survive much longer as long as he doesn’t consume too much energy and stamina fighting.
Scarlet said she would take care of the food so this much should be enough even if they were to separate for whatever reason.
Ebony didn’t forget to get daily necessities as well like this world's version of mouthwash. Ebony had been using a toothbrush made of ice though his breath doesn’t really stink or how food doesn’t stick to his teeth much anymore. It was a habit.
He got a spare waterskin just in case too.
There was a small tube called a lighttube that he bought as well. It was basically a flashlight. The technology to convert mana to light mana was not there yet so it uses a light elemental shard of mana ore. Those were pretty rare, the one in the lighttube was only an inferior rarity piece.
It could be controlled by twisting a knob. The maximum range would be a 5 metre radius and could last about 3 hours at full power. It was better than nothing. Ebony didn’t think there would be a source of light to charge his phoslamp all the time in the dungeon.
The last things he got were a few iron ores, pieces of leather, fabrics, 2 wooden planks, a tynite bison scale. He had long wanted to mess around and practice his Mana Moulding but never had much time for it.
Seeing the party getting exhausted in one fight and his experience with Z&Z escort party told him that there would be quite a bit of down time to rest.
Another cause of concern for him was travelling. If the dungeon was as big as they believed it to be they would travel a whole lot. Running at full speed the whole way was not possible. They only did that today since they were planning for a short hunt.
They needed another mode of travel. One that was reasonably fast and took much less stamina. Riding on monsters or a horse was out of the question. They would need to feed a mount and skills for riding for it to be more effective as well. Ebony could only think of cycling but there weren’t bicycles here.
The other’s went back and so did Ebony but Scarlet didn’t follow back. She was going towards the market. They were likely still going to spar again later since neither said anything about cancelling it.
Ebony hasn’t cast and trained any of his magic since after the golem fight. He wanted to charge up his ores and trade them in for more.
His source of water was mana, inferior mana ores or Blacks disintegrate after 5 or so charges and he had no idea how many times they had been charged before he obtained them.
Ebony was kinda excited to go into a dungeon but It didn’t stop him from meditating.
❅❅❅
“Big boss Pet, boss Hard, boss Tough. Reporting.
“Speak.”
“Yes, boss Hard. A total of 133 of our men including me have managed to gather. 26 parties and the other 3 have gotten into another party.”
The man recognised his boss’s voice over the callstone easily. Boss Hard was usually the one doing the talking when they commute anyway.
“...their relative strengths?”
“Ah. 75 of them are in the 90s, 39 already level 100 and just need to reach evolution requirements. 9 of them are in the low 100s, 5 of them 110s, the other 2 120s while Ged, Lalt and I are in the 150s. Don’t worry boss! Our men are all elites and can each take any monster 10 levels above themselves alone without much harm.”
The man reporting started sweating as he bowed when his bosses scoffed when he called their men elites. He also didn’t know what to say since their men were scouted by the bosses themselves.
“...not enough. Communicate with each other when the entrance to the next levels are found. Only engage in levelling when the dungeon monsters are at least 30 levels above them.”
“Thi..thirty!? But boss Hard, the monsters will group up and 20 levels above is already hard enough even in a party of 5. We’ll suffer many losses if we order them to fight up till 30 and above.”
“We?”
“N..no I mean you, boss Hard.” The reporting man wanted to slap himself for saying that the orders were from him as well. Their men always took orders from him and probably never met their actual bosses so he accidentally misspoke.
“If they die, they die. I only need strong men. The current group isn’t enough to take those beasts down. Did you forget that a new dungeon's monsters are greatly weakened?”
“...the Xeng?” the man wondered who his boss referred to as beasts. Even if practically the entire city was aware of the Xeng’s presence, she was still so young and low levelled. Most thought their renowned strength to be a load of bull. Funny thing, few tried to test the truth of their fame.
As for the weakened monsters, rather than forget, he just didn’t know about it. It wasn’t like he ever saw or been in a freshly born dungeon.
“And the mana slave.”
“The one that the new recruit Boom or something told us? Why did we even bother saving that trash that got caught so easily? He was lucky they wanted to bring him elsewhere to get information out of him or we wouldn’t have a chance to get him.”
“...did you send men to test him out? What did those that tried say?”
“Monster.”
“That’s right. A monster.”
“But why not just take them down now? At their level we can easily take them down now but if they were to get stronger we would lose the chance.”
“You don’t understand that mana slave's value. You were born after mana slaves were abolished so it’s no surprise. Meditators do one thing to level up. Meditate. Even at the end of their life, few have levelled beyond a hundred. Those that do are those high trash nobles who had mana slaves. This mana slave is of a combat class.”
“...he will be a cash cow if he manages to evolve further?”
“Close. His strength changes things. We want him on our side. While he’s still young we can pull him to our side. Inform me when our men complete their evolution. Same tactic. Observe the dungeon’s behavioural patterns, get a hang of what to do to make it spawn and gather as many monsters as possible. The men will attack together and you’ll swoop in with Ged and Lalt to save them.”
“...Will you be showing up boss?”
“If we need to.”
“Yes boss.”
“One more thing. Include the Xeng. She is to be kept alive.”
“Yes big boss Pet.” he noticed the change in speaker and the absolute graveness of the order. He didn’t need to know the reason. The man, Tewa, couldn't wrap his head around some things. Letting the new recruit Boom live was one.
He couldn’t possibly have sent his level 90 men to spar with the level 50 mana slave. So he only paid some random people to pick a fight with him. They weren’t even harmed or injured but seemed to be spiritless or disappointed in something. Tewa could tell, their pride was crushed if they had any.
Tewa sent people in increasing levels from 50 to 70 but they all couldn’t even touch the mana slave. No one higher wanted to pick a nonsensical fight over a small sum of Greys or even Greens.
The Xeng on the other hand, had his men itching to challenge. No one would laugh even if they had a 40 level or more against them.
It was even worse. They feared the monster in human skin.
A 40 level difference was a 400 stat point difference. Considering Sub-Class, assuming they were roughly the same level would put them at a 600 stat point difference.
How the el does anyone cover that difference in base stat and strength?
The first few he sent said she was too damn fast to even counter. So he sent the fastest rogues that haven't evolved but it made little difference.
Also coming to a new dungeon was a waste of time and effort.
Even if it was a large dungeon, Tewa doubts it to have monsters much higher than his own level. They were gathered by his bosses and trained at different places to one day help his bosses rise in Lure.
Coming here honestly seems to be a waste of time. At least for him and the others who are further into the hundreds.
He was actually in a different dungeon before coming to Plainston but orders were orders.
At least he didn’t face complaints from the guys since a new dungeon had its allure and they should still be able to gain experience unlike him who would have difficulty even finding something his level to hunt.