(---) Jim (---)
He moved, silent and stealthy through the tunnels. His people's darkvision wasn't the most prolific, but he'd earned himself two skills over the years that made his current work easy - invisibility and heat sense. The invisibility was a good one that almost completely masked his presence - and was usually the way he got himself out of trouble. The heat sense was his way of figuring out where his targets had gone. After the poop cave, they'd kept up an absolutely brutal pace that Jim didn't care to match, but he'd still been able to track them down.
Roc was a shifty, lying, narrow bastard. He wasn't Vuxarinan. He wasn't even from that sector. Buying the information from Thad had been expensive - and buying his forthcoming silence was even worse. It was worth it, though. A monopoly on information was how you stacked advantages.
But that wasn't the only lie. Roc had at least one skill he'd been hiding. Jim met an osteomancer once, and he knew what bone looked like. Getting close enough to see the three of them together had been risky, but the confirmation was worth it. It wasn't the little one's skill - not with the way he'd struggled to put on the armor.
He had some good evidence to extort them with - but more was always better. His oversized pack was stuffed to the gills with supplies - including a water pouch with a straw that went directly to his mouth. He could follow them as far as he needed to figure out what secret they were hiding this time. With his heat sense, he didn't even need to keep pace.
The path forked again. Jim stepped into the one that had the residual bodyheat present. A ways in, there was the normal path ahead, in addition to a hot spot on the wall where the group must have sat to rest. Jim was getting close to them. He had to be.
He slowed his pace, and pulled his pack around himself to the front. The top pouch unzipped, and he grabbed a ration bar without bothering to close it. He missed real food so much. Whatever these three were hiding from him would be his ticket out, and he'd use their secrets against them to ensure he got what he wanted.
Then he could have a feast. He daydreamed about soups and breads, pastas and meats as he chewed on the ration bar.
Jim was still mid-daydream when he plunged into the crevasse.
----------------------------------------
+ Reid +
Reid repositioned himself against the wall half a dozen times before he gave up on being comfortable, and just tried to relax. He tuned out Lycra and Win's quiet, excited conversation, and re-read Requiem's trait description.
----------------------------------------
Smith's Recall
As the bonded creator of this weapon, the osteal smith is forever connected to their creation. Whether the original is damaged, destroyed, or lost - the smith may completely recreate Requiem through the use of mana alone. Whenever Requiem is recreated using this method, any existing versions of the weapon are immediately destroyed - even if the recreation fails. Requires sufficient energy, and a clear mind.
----------------------------------------
The original weapon was broken - and technically lost, or converted. Making it the first time had required extensive, concentrated use of his skills and a great deal of energy. This time... Reid had the distinct feeling it wouldn't be nearly as arduous. He'd gained plenty of levels since then, and stats. His energy itself was more dense and plentiful - and he was using a trait instead of making something truly new.
Even with his weapon gone, he could feel the two-way connections within himself where it was supposed to be. In each of those connections, there were links. Not like the strings of his other skills, but a silk-thin strand that ran from one to the next in a complex web. There wasn't any reason to change what had worked for him in the past, so Reid pushed himself into the strand and followed it. The circuitous, rambling path brought him up, around, and back to the same nodes and connections, revisited just a little differently, or connected to a new neighbor.
It was puzzling and odd and overly complicated, but he continued anyway. Strand to strand to node to strand to node to node to strand - the more he delved, the more connections he saw. They were so fine, so small, that he hadn't seen them before - just the tangle of the web itself. Patterns began to emerge. Each node, where strands intertwined and connected, had a myriad of taut and slack strands connecting it to each other node he could see. The nodes themselves - at first a jumbled mess - were patterned against each other like the arms of a snowflake. Once Reid saw the arms - he realized there was a center to the pattern.
Part of the reason he'd missed it is that it wasn't a node, and it wasn't a singular point. Strands weaved and wound their way around a pair of empty spaces. Each one was long and arced - like a curving tunnel - and when he followed the arc into and then out of one empty space, it lined up with the entrance to the next empty tunnel. His heart thudded in his chest. A ring. It was an intentional structure, sitting within him. Waiting.
It took slow minutes, but Reid guided energy from the internal well within himself over to the ring in a continuous line, until the energy wound back in on itself - and completed the loop. Orange-yellow light flashed out from the ring as energy pulled out of his well and spun rapidly in the ring. It accelerated and drained at an exponential pace - then all of its momentum ceased. The bright glow flashed into every strand and node the ring surrounded, then went dark. The entire process, once energy hit the ring, had lasted mere seconds.
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
Reid opened his eyes. In his lap, under his hands, a long ivory mace glowed with residual light.
It was almost exactly how he remembered it - with the six bladed flanges and the intricate grip - but there were changes. Changes that surprised and excited him.
The last time he'd used the weapon, he realized the spiked rings on the haft between the grip and head caused more issues than they solved. The rings remained, but the spikes were gone - so while they could stop the momentum of a blade, Reid wouldn't hurt himself trying to grab there. Every inch of the thing felt... more significant. The same way his skeleton did now with the increases he'd done to hit his new limit on Constitution. There were other bits - the top spike was shorter, and the blades themselves were more reserved and reasonable than he'd made them the first time around. All changes he'd thought of during his prior fights. All things he wanted to see himself do - that he already had in mind. The trait, Smith's Recall, didn't just regenerate the version of the weapon he was replacing - it made the version of Requiem he wanted his weapon to become.
On the other side of the tunnel, Lycra and Win were both swearing and rubbing their eyes. Reid ran a finger over the names the Mace's handle - and added two more.
#
"So, what do we need to know going in?" Reid asked.
Lycra excitedly jumped on the explanation "Sometimes you can leave, but others - you get locked in until you finish the quest. We have rations and water, we should be fine if we get locked in." He pointed to his backpack, overstuffed to the point where it looked almost comical, strapped against his armored frame. It reminded Reid of how porters were depicted in animation and videogames. His hero-sword hung on his waist.
"The quest is going to be killing moles." Win added. She held her bone spear like a walking stick. "I've always had my suspicions because every one I've ever seen killed had 'escaped' in the description, but this is where all the moles have come from. When a space like this stays incomplete for too long, what's inside can grow enough to affect the area around it, then creatures that should be stuck there are able to escape out into the world. Deterrents keep them from going too far up, but it don't stop them from reaching us in the tunnels. I think - nevermind. Let's do this."
Armored, armed, and ready - their trio stepped through the brick ring together.
----------------------------------------
NOTICE: You have entered Challenge: [Mole Den]
Group participation detected. Shared notices, experience, and rewards activated.
Challenge Quest: Defeat Moles ( 0 / 5 )
-
NOTICE!
Skill Triggered - Accelerated Growth
Challenge Quest Difficulty Updated
Challenge Quest: Eradicate the Mole King and his Progeny.
Objectives:
1. Kill the Mole King (0/1)
2. Kill the Mole Princes (0/5)
3. Kill Moles (0/23)
4. Secret Challenge: Complete all objectives in the time limit and without losing a party member. ( 1d 23h 59m 57s )
NOTICE: You may not exit the challenge area unless all objectives are completed.
----------------------------------------
Win's jaw hung slack, and she slowly turned her head towards Lycra and Reid. Her voice was unnervingly calm.
"What is Accelerated Growth?"
Reid bit his lip and nodded. "It's a skill."
Win focused on Lycra and lifted her eyebrows.
"It's a zero skill like mine! But it makes Reid grow faster the more achievements he gets, and it makes his quests the hardest they can be! He is a storm of fates!" Reid stared. "What? You were ready to tell her anyway."
Win took a long, drawn breath. "Clown car. Full of secrets."
#
When they made it to the first fork inside the challenge area - which Reid was just going to call a dungeon, because they were underground and it sounded better to him - Win took a reflective marker out of her bag and tossed it to him. It had a ridged spike that protruded out the back.
"Path marker. Set it into the wall about 10 feet before the fork, with a good amount of force. If we need to get out of here in a hurry, those will reflect lamplight and lead us back."
Reid nodded, and slammed it into the side of the tunnel with two blows from his palm. The ridges on the spike created and undulating vibration as it buried itself into the rock.
##
They only needed to walk for ten minutes after the fork to find the first moles. A trio were assembled in an excavating formation, where two furiously scraped at a tunnel wall while the third seemed to suck up the chunks of dirt and stone they threw back like a vacuum.
The rear mole was the first to notice them, and it hissed at the others. The two diggers continued for a few seconds, pelting the more alert mole with bits of dirt and stone until it vocalized a louder series of hisses. They were each slightly larger than the level 17 had been, and their fur was a distinct chestnut brown. Each mole had puncture wounds along the snout - just like the level 19 from the poop cave.
Win and Lycra staggered themselves behind Reid, and stayed put as he charged forward.
The closest enemy flicked stone and dirt towards him, and Reid jumped up over the projectiles - straight towards the ceiling. He managed to get a forearm above him before impact, and redirected himself back down towards the trio. One grabbed for his ankles with its mouth, and another had a strike lined up for his chest. Reid let the first mole bite down on his armor, and smiled when its teeth cracked against his greaves.
Still in the air, he brought his mace down in a one-handed arc, and smashed the attempted biter in the skull. His mace cleaved and tore through chestnut fur, bone, brain, and everything else. The momentum of the blow continued and carried through the creature so effortlessly that the arc of his strike nearly brought Requiem back around to hit Reid in the foot.
You have defeated Elder Deep Mole - lvl 18. (+55,000xp)
Reid's change in momentum, brought on by the swing, made his second attacker miss. Its strike continued down and cracked the tunnel floor - which left it open. Reid landed on both feet, miraculously didn't stumble, and made an overhead swing down into the ??'s side. It came apart like cutting butter, an oversized rend ripped down through it that sprayed gore in a cone onto the tunnel floor. The massive ?? heaved out three gurgling breaths, then collapsed in a heap.
You have defeated Elder Deep Mole - lvl 18. (+55,000xp)
Weak. The moles were weak.
The final enemy looked ready to run when a spear sailed in from behind and buried itself in the creature's flank. It screeched in pain, leg twitching and useless. Reid lined himself up for a lefty baseball swing and crushed its snout back to the base of its neck.
You have defeated Elder Deep Mole - lvl 18. (+55,000xp)
Win casually walked forward, and pulled her spear back out of the beast. She stared at the discolored section that had been buried in the mole for a long while. "Good spear." Then looked at the bodies. "Great mace."
Reid shrugged. "Weak moles".