The road, unsurprisingly, was no different than when he left it. With a smirk at what he expected was the creepy sphinx’s reaction to his disappearance he started back down the road, heading towards the town. The walk was faster than he expected as it only took another ten minutes to reach the town. When he had encountered the sphinx on the road, the town had appeared to be a full day’s walk away. More dungeon special manipulation. Guess it saved me some walking. I supposed that I could have flown or TELEPORTED but that would cut the encounters down and I want to keep things as close to authentic for this evaluation. Whatever the case, I’ll take the gift.
Duke casually stepped up to the town’s gate. It was, of course, closed. Duke considered leaping/flying over the gate and into the town but decided, again, to let the dungeon’s story play out. He approached closer and a man in some sort of livery popped up over the wooden palisade to look down at Duke. “What is your business, human?”
“I wish to enter the town.” Duke responded plainly as he observed the simple log walls surrounding the town. He did not think much about the condition of the walls, sure that they wouldn’t slow him down if he had to force his way into the place. The response from the guard, however, piqued Duke’s curiosity.
“We have no use for ones like you. Be on your way, half one.” The guard called down, his voice dripping with derision.
“Well, that’s not a very warm welcome. How about you open this gate, and we talk about it?” Duke responded in as much of a reasonable manner as he could summon. He smiled disarmingly.
The guard’s demeanor turned darker. He reached down and lifted a bow with his left hand. His right hand came back up with a cruelly barbed arrow. “I told you that your kind are not welcome here. Now leave immediately or I will be forced to make you leave.”
Duke shrugged slightly while shaking his head and mumbling to himself. “I tried to do this the friendly way. I really did. But no. You had to go and be all unpleasant about it. Now comes the messy part.” Duke TELEPORTED the bow into his hands along with the arrow that was being nocked. He finished nocking the arrow and called back up. “You were saying?”
The guard’s face filled with panic at being instantly disarmed. He grabbed a horn of some sort from his belt and blew out an alarm. The tone was strong and mournful; it caused an immediate cacophony inside the walls that Duke could hear but was unable to see. He heard the sound of horses charging about followed by the sound of those same horses charging across wood. In moments, more guards stood upon the palisade with bows drawn. They did not hesitate to start firing arrows at Duke.
Duke TELEPORTED to the side to avoid the cloud of arrows, his brain still confused at the sound of horses charging but not seeing any horses come out of the gate. He scanned around himself as he continued to dodge arrows with his TELEPORTATION, but he still didn’t see where any calvary had come out of the town. Those horses were charging hard enough that they had to go somewhere. Are they behind me? Duke whirled around, looking for a hidden passage that would disgorge the charging calvary, but he found nothing. He did, however, receive three arrows to the back for his efforts.
Duke ignored the arrows that had struck him, their damage insufficient to penetrate his ARMOR SKIN. He instead decided to do something about the archers shooting at him. He focused his TELEPORTATION Ability, and, with a flexing of his superior will, had a pile of bows on the ground in front of him. He loudly announced. “I’ve had about enough of that! Now, kindly open the gates and we can have a pleasant chat. Maybe I could even speak with your town leader. What do you say?”
The response was filled with angry cries and one guard rose up into the air and kicked his hooves in Duke’s direction. He was suddenly hit with the realization of what the sound of horses had been – this was a town of centaurs! A smile spread across Duke’s features as he came to the realization which quickly turned to a frown. He didn’t want to kill a bunch of centaurs even if they were dungeon creatures.
As Duke was debating what to do, the gates swung open to allow more guards to charge him. They approached him rapidly, giving him a better look at how these centaurs were dressed. They wore chainmail armor that covered both their human and horse portions. He wondered how they could put the armor on. Do they need someone to help them put that on? Have they contrived some device that lets them drop the armor down onto their forms? Is it put on in sections? Maybe magic is involved. Oh shit. Lance!
The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Duke TELEPORTED a split second before he was skewered by the lance of the lead centaur. The distinct advantage of the centaurs having opened the gates, at least for Duke, was that it allowed him to see inside the town. And with that, he was able to pick a TELEPORTATION target inside the walls. He placed himself at the end of what seemed to be the main road.
The largest building in the town stood before him and it had one distinction that Duke picked up on quickly. Whereas all the other buildings had wide ramps leading up to their entrances, this building had both a ramp and stairs. The ramps made sense for the centaurs as climbing stairs would be awkward for them. But, for the same reason, stairs made little sense to be leading up to the most prominent building in the town. Duke hurried up the stairs and slipped in the large door, hoping that he had not been spotted.
Inside the building, it was nothing like Duke had expected. He had anticipated some sort of town hall but what he saw was more of a horror show. There was all manner of body parts such as arms and legs of various beasts hanging from hooks along the walls with shelves and shelves of sealed jars containing smaller body parts such as eyes, horns, tails, and ears. There were also cages and pens that held various beasts from small woodland creatures to large predators and monsters. All appeared to be sedated in some way because they did not react to Duke’s presence at all.
In the center of the building was a large laboratory set up with a man dressed in multi-colored robes. He looked up from his work on what looked like a squirrel with a rat’s head and smiled at Duke. “Welcome. Welcome. You must be what has all my centaurs so riled up. You didn’t kill them all, did you? I hope not. They are some of my best creations. Have you come to purchase one of my creations or perhaps you would like some work done on yourself? I could upgrade you rather easily.”
Duke stood there, in shock as memories of his torture flashed to the forefront. He shuddered as his mind wrestled with what he was seeing. Memories began overlapping and intermingling with what he was actually seeing. He saw hands reaching for him with a scalpel, ready to cut parts off from him. He saw his body parts being used to make his torturer anew. Remembered pain and helplessness washed over him, rooting him in place.
Primal instinct combined with his PURPOSE to take over, causing Duke to erupt with power. His arms flung outwards as his Mana drained in an instant, focused into a single spherical blast of FORCE energy. The blast propagated through the building, crushing everything in its path. The roof shattered into splinters along with the walls but the blast continued outwards, propelling the splinters and broken pieces ahead of it. Next to be impacted were the buildings of the town itself. They were crushed by the force wave and carried along like a spherical tsunami.
In a matter of less than a second, the town and its inhabitants had been wiped away, crushed, shattered, and deposited in an expansion pattern five kilometers away from where Duke collapsed in a compacted crater. Splinters and similarly destroyed pieces of the town rained down for several minutes afterwards. By the time the rain of debris stopped, Duke had recovered both his Mana and his mind.
Duke stood to his feet goggling at the destruction surrounding him. Gone. Everything is just gone. I thought I was past that helplessness, that trauma. Clearly, I have a ways to go still. Duke’s thoughts were interrupted by a message:
*** You have killed the dungeon boss. The Chimeric Dungeon has been completed.
You receive 50,000 experience for being the first to complete the dungeon.
You receive 15,000 experience for soloing the dungeon.
Within the dungeon, you killed a total of 169 creatures of various levels and ranks. You gain 7,050 experience.
As an additional reward for being the first to complete the dungeon and doing so as a solo delver, you receive enhanced rewards. ***
A glowing golden chest manifested next to Duke. He opened it and gathered up what he found. Among its contents were 216 gold coins, 405 silver coins, 17 copper coins, and pair of boots. He IDENTIFIED the boots.
*** You have found the Boots of Shifting. These boots allow the wearer to change the size and shape of their feet for one hour per day. The change in size and shape can be significant as long as they do not change by more than 100% of their mass. The duration of the change may be split up into any smaller increments as the wearer decides. This is a set item. Collect other items in the Shifting Regalia set to gain additional benefits when worn. ***
Duke put the boots in his INVENTORY and smiled at the thought of a set of equipment. And then he dismissed the thought as he remembered what happened to virtually every other magical item he wore. With a shrug, he started looking for the exit portal since it wasn’t down at the bottom of the crater where the chest had appeared.
He flew up, out of the seven-meter-deep crater to see the door just beyond the edge. Landing next to the door he offered his farewell to the dungeon. “It was mostly fun, except the part at the end there. That was not cool. Not cool at all. Anyway, I’ll let others come in and try their luck when you are ready.” With that, Duke stepped through the portal and reappeared in the hallway, neither waiting for nor expecting a response.
Interesting that I got the experience awards while still in the dungeon and didn’t have them deferred until I slept. Duke forced his mind away from the resurfaced trauma and focused on the tasks at hand. He did, after all, have an entire kingdom to put to rights.