Ch.58 Baring your Fangs
Sha'la exited Peridasa with confusion all over her face. She didn't expect the priest could get inside after killing the spirit so many times. However, after seeing her group she excitedly ran to them, forgetting all about the priest. "A'um! A'um!! Guess what! You can get arm..." she suddenly stopped her sentence upon seeing the paladins.
Although she was normally nonchalant about this sort of thing, even she knew that she should keep good things away from outsiders. Her actions made Ba'pu raise an eyebrow, but he quickly noticed the bearkin half-breed he was so fun of running to her side. After the girl said something that sounded like a secret code, both of them moved away from the group.
Their actions made the Paladins suspicious, but he scoffed at their direction forcing them to wearily back off. Although those kids went some distance away, it was only out of earshot of the humans, he and the Elfs had no problems hearing. Ba'pus eyes immediately widen in shock at their conversation, his breath quickly becoming unstable.
The other beastmen ran to surround Sha'la wanting confirmation, their eyes bloodshot in excitement. The elves were also shocked but would have to see the finished product before they judge its worth. Unlike the beastmen, they've got their own metal resources and are already well versed in crafting magic weapons. However, they shouldn't be simple or at the very least worth researching, considering they are made by an entirely different lifeform.
Ba'pu couldn't stay still any longer and walked by Sha'la side when she was done explaining. "So little girl, where can we get E.M from? You said it mainly comes from Quest or monsters but look around." He pointed at the vast land full of large crystals with smaller ones in the shape of different flora. "This Dungeon floor seems more like a decorative garden than a battlefield, there's nothing hostile in here."
Sha'la rummaged thru her bag, passing a black slate with carvings in the common language to him. "Um... mister uh... I mean Sir Ba'pu! The lady inside the town hall told me this Dungeon is sealed by some God. They call him Lord Holy, she also implores me to break the seal although she warned it would be dangerous." Ba'pu took a look at the writing carved on the slate, a weird smile on his face.
[Quest: Set Peridasa free!]
Description: The fourteen Primal Gods have sensed the successful birth of a lifeform housing all the elements in perfect harmony. However, they are horrified to find its vessel so malformed. This, and its mother planet's near destruction, have prompted them to act. After making a deal with the World's Will, they've chosen to seal pieces of their individual Holy Kingdoms into this Dungeon. The leader of the angels, Kantra, has acknowledged your strength and requests you to brake one of the said seals.
(Quest Objectives)
Open the Hall of Rest (0/1)
Eliminate: Tree of Life (0/1)
Obtain: Rune of Life (0/1)
Open the Hall of Relics (0/1)
Eliminate: Tree of War (0/1)
Obtain: Rune of War (0/1)
Kill: Thousand Eye Angel (0/15)
Kill: Bladed Angel (0/1500)
Kill: Roots of the Father Tree (0/5)
Unseal the Golden Passage (0/1)
Eliminate: ??? (0/1)
Obtain: Holy Grail (0/1)
Reward: 5,000 E.M. The Job class (Saint). The favor of Lord Holy.
The dumbfounded Ba'pu wasn't sure what to believe right now. He'd never heard of the fourteen Primal Gods. To his knowledge, there are only five Gods, the God of War, the God of Light, the God of Storms and Waves, the God of Nature and Life, and the God of Freedom. Though from what he remembered of his noble upbringing, there used to be a God of Magic and a God of Wealth.
However, those last two Gods were erased from human history by the Church. It all sounded too strange to Ba'pu, almost like someone made it up. But... he re-read the sentence pointing out the 'World's Will' and 'destruction'. Although the rest could be made up, only the strongest families who have had rank nine warriors, or those with connections, should know about the Voice of the World and its warning.
Ba'pu didn't know Brian had suggested Malpetios mix in lies with the truth. It was all in the goal to elevate the standing of their Dungeon. This would shock the unaware into awe while scaring the knowledgeable into hesitation and confusion. One could say that Brian knew what the invaders would think and do, and was using it against them.
Ba'pu's train of thought was interrupted when Sha'la brought out a small statue. "Oh! I also got this item as a reward for helping Emily, the spirit that looks similar to an angel. Kantra said it was a key for the glasshouses to the sides of the temple. She also said it would have a different use once Peridasa is freed."
Sha'la had already shown the group what E.M looked like. A golden four-sided crystal star with a liquefied mana ball in its center. Ba'pu even shook it, watching it scattered into exactly five-hundred drops of golden mana, before settling back in the middle. This statue, however, looked like a tiny version of the temple with 'Emgib' written in golden runes on the flat top.
The runes looked identical to the ones used by the Church on its rituals and armaments. After his scrutiny, he focused on the large glass structures, choosing to go left first. They soon were face to face with a wall made out of opaque glass pillars that came out of the ground at an angle. The statue started to glow, its light becoming brighter the closer we got to a large rune on the floor.
The statue flew off Ba'pu's hand landing in the middle of the rune. With a flash, a beam of golden light descended from the sky to the statue, as the ground started to shake. One by one, the pillars retracted back to the ground, revealing a large golden hall with a tree bearing golden apples. Upon laying eyes on it, the group felt hostility for the first time in this Dungeon.
Ba'pu sent a signal to his guards with his eyes, as they slowly walked forward. The bovine guard spearing the advanced suddenly fell into the floor with a splash, revealing that the golden hall was actually a holy water pool. The guard quickly stood back up with something sharp having pierced about an inch of her thick fur cover skin. Without a change of expression, she yanked the unidentified object sticking out of her waist examining what it was.
At first, she thought it looked like a crystal blade or an insect leg, however, she quickly noticed three fingers on the underside of the blade with stumps where the rest should be. The rest of the group also recognized the object as a broken crystalline arm with a blade protruding from the back of the hand. The material it was made from soon made them think of someone, the angel-looking spirit!
The party got a creepy feeling all of a sudden, as they tried searching the pool with their aura. However, they found that it wasn't possible to peer inside the pool, the feedback they got was nothing more than a thick golden mist. The golden water here was different than the one found inside the temple, it was heavier, denser, and brimming with golden mana. Ba'pu frowned, making a signal with his hand. The guards understood and jumped into the pool advancing shoulder to shoulder.
Not even five seconds later, the guards stepped on something. In a quick motion, the object was pulled out for all to see. A half-broken crystalline upper body whose head had bearly any facial features. This thing looked a lot alike to the spirit, however, it gave the feeling of a cold, lifeless statue. The group was quick to toss this eerie thing away in a hurry but it wasn't long before they found more.
The closer they got to the tree, the more broken body parts they found. Some were limbs, others headless bodies, others still were just wing-like fragments. They crushed or threw the crystal body parts, their splashes echoing across the large empty hall, with nearly a ripple. After getting within ten feet of the tree, an invisible wind rustled the leaves of the large tree. One of the golden apples dropped into the water with a plop.
The feeling of danger started to grow even clearer in the empty hall, the group focused their attention on the spot the apple fell into. Suddenly, something familiar poked out of the water, it was a crystal hand. The group was stunned for a moment but soon saw something brown moving inside the hand. It looked like some sort of worm-like appendage, digging thru the crystalline flesh in an unsettling manner.
More appendages were soon visible, seemingly trying to find an exit. The arm twitched and twisted at its invader's whims until it finally found an opening. The appendages exited at the location the missing fingers should've been, before flattening into clawed ones. Small, golden protrusions, started to appear on the new fingers before unfolding into a tender golden leaf. The image of the tree flashed thru the group's mind, and when they focus on the new fingers its texture was bark-like.
The arm suddenly plunges back into the water, at the speed of the peak of rank three warriors. Silence returned to the hall, while the group got the feeling that they were being watched by a hidden snake. On high alert, the beastmen change their formation while watching for any movement. Now with their backs against each other, the anxiety of being blind to whatever was in the water greatly ease.
The moment they relax, a large splash greeted them with a blade aiming at the neck of the weakest guard, mere inches away. One of the guards that looked like a green cheetah quickly kicked his colleague, pushing him away in the nick of time. The blade, having missed its target, suddenly sprang wooden claws, shredding the left side of the target's face.
"AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!" The burly blue bearkin was now holding his hand to his face, the light of water elements attempting to ease his pain. The attack had taken an eye and an ear, his blood falling like a waterfall. The group didn't have the time to comfort him as they finally got a clear view of the enemy. Floating above the water, a crystal angel whose insides were full of wiggling roots stared back at the group with cold hollow eyes.
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In its torso, the remains of a golden apple could be seen nurturing a small sapling, many roots coiling themselves into the rough shape of a human skeleton. The crystal angel housing this disturbing site was incomplete, the roots twisting themselves into the missing parts. This abomination didn't allow the group time to admire it, quickly turning into a golden-brown flash.
"RAWR!!!" The bovine guard rallied her mana, but with no soil nearby, she spent a large amount of element earth to create her armor. The cheetah beastmen rested his tail in the middle of the bovine's back, his eyes moving rapidly, seemingly following something. With a quick motion of the cheetah's tail, the bovine guard moved in a certain direction. The flash appeared once more, however, this time a rock cover fist intersected its flight path.
"Crash! CRAAACK!!!" The abomination had its head burst open like a watermelon, the golden crystals were surprisingly brittle. The bovine guard held unto the neck stump, trying to aim her other fist at the sapling with her next attack. Sensing her upcoming fist, she saw the abomination swing its blade in a chopping motion.
"SCEEEEEEEERCCCCHHHHH......!!!" The bovine guard's large eyes widen in surprise! Her rock armor was pierced thru, the crystal blade nearly chopping her fingers off. The blade was now cracked into shards of different sizes, all stuck in her flesh or rock armor. Meanwhile, the roots inside the Crystal angel husk decided to gift her the hand and neck she was holding on to.
After braking the compromise parts off, it quickly flashed away at its great speed. Now some distance away from the group, the vines plunge into the golden waters, retrieving replacements for itself. Seeing this, the bovine guard wanted to puke up blood. Nearly crippling her hand for damage the opponent can just ignore was as disgusting as fighting those lunatics of the church!
Before she got a chance to curse, she felt a warm soothing feeling ease some of the pain in her fist. After taking a look, she saw her hand actually healing quickly, the source was some golden droplets attached to the crystal blade. A crazy idea suddenly went thru her head, turning her attention to the golden waters around her. She dipped her damaged hand into the waters, her flesh immediately feeling itchy before squirming back together, the blade fragments pushed out.
The bovine guard looked at her completely healed hand with both parts confusion and disbelief. She didn't get much time to be distracted, as she felt her colleague's tail warning her of an attack to the flank. She instantly sent her fist at the empty space, that familiar flash appearing a second after. She faired a little better this time, having turned a portion of her rock fist into sand. This dampen the sharpness of the crystal blade but couldn't cancel the momentum its speed had given it.
Although her colleagues wanted to help her, she was the only one fast enough to keep up with the abomination's speed, the aid of the cheetah indispensable. The only other earth-type warrior in her team was a male pigmen, and although males are strong, their size and extra bulk made them slower. The male cheetah's warning, and her slightly faster speed, was the only thing keeping the abomination from chopping someone's head off.
In the short intervals the abomination took to replace its broken parts, she had flung the golden waters at her injured colleague's face. The rest of the group widen their eyes as they saw the flesh regrow in a few seconds. However, even with this boon, trading injury for injury wouldn't work in this fight and one mistake will have your head flying off your neck. Although the last of her colleagues, a horsewoman, increased her speed and explosiveness with fire arts, she was always half a second too slow.
She was forced to stop when the abomination did a fake-out, chopping her outstretched arm in two, before proceeding to her head, only to get blocked by the alert pigmen's rock fist. The group was stuck in a stalemate, they couldn't kill the abomination in one hit, and it would run off to lick its wounds the second it failed its attack. The abomination wouldn't fall for any of the group's tricks, strictly relying on its advantages and ignoring any faints or attempts to infuriate it. They felt like they were fighting a seasoned warrior whose goal was to weaken his prey, before killing it.
Seeing the situation, the cheetah beastmen took advantage of the time the abomination was gathering new parts to make hand signals to the group. After they all nodded, he retrieve his tail from the bovine beastwomans back, gathering all the mana in his body. This time around, the abomination seemed to not want to come out of the water, wary of their actions. However, the group was no longer in a hurry, patiently waiting as they gathered mana.
The abomination's patience ran out, as it appeared next to the blue bearkin in a flash. "NOW!! VACUUM FIELD!!!" Large amounts of wind elements suddenly burst out of the cheetah beastmen, creating a small field where two different wind currents circle the group. The top current pushed the wind outwards, while the bottom one gather the wind to itself. Similar to having two turbines on top of each other, it created a small donut-shaped air pocket where movement was nearly impossible.
The group immediately took advantage of the paralyzed abomination, aiming all their attacks at the sapling hiding inside! The crystal body, brittle as it was, wasn't capable to withstand the damage. The roots inside did a much better job but were burnt to ashes with a vengeance by the piss-off horsewoman. The sapling didn't last much longer, following in the root's footsteps.
Having lost the sapling, the abomination started silently screaming and twitching rapidly, its action similar to a deathrattle. The mana around the dungeon reacted to its actions, rushing to the crystal angel husk. Both the body and remaining roots of the abomination slowly turned gold, brimming with overflowing golden mana. The now glowing body reached one hand forward as if trying to grasp onto something, before stopping all movement.
With the hand as a starting point, the body started disintegrating into golden dust, bursting apart shortly after. In the golden dust clouds, firefly-like dots appeared, speeding past the guards unto Sha'la's bag. Taking the E.M crystal out, ten more drops had joined the ball of mana. Ba'pu witnessed all of this in silence, happy that his guards managed to deal with the problem without his help.
Before he gave his guards the command to continue, the male elf had approached the tree without anyone's notice. Placing one hand on its trunk, he started to sing in the elf's spiritual language.
Back on Malpetios's Mindscape, Q'ill tried to ease her headache from having the body she was hosting destroyed. "Are you ok mom?" Malpetios worriedly canceled the partial fusion with Q'ill, disconnecting his tentacles from her shoulder blades. His tentacle-like hands melted back together in a fluid motion, moving on to holding Q'ills hand in comfort.
With a gentle smile, Q'ill picked him up. "It's fine, that cheetah beastmen surprised me with that skill. I didn't expect a rank three warrior to be able to use a rank four skill like that, he is rather talented. Though I did better than expected! You managed to make that body have near-perfect muscle memory!" Malpetios gave a 'praise me more look' before he started to boast.
"He-he, It took a lot of effort but I managed to extract all the fighting experience from the memories of the different warrior's wills! However..., the way the different races fight made it so messy. Beastmen would rely on their bulk too much, while humans do way too many useless movements. And those elves! Give me a break! Why do they look more like dancing noodles than people, there's a limit to how flexible the body can be!"
"Bark! Bark! Bark!" Malpetios's grumbling was interrupted by a dog's happy barking, a stick flying past him. A black and green dog was playing fetch with Brian, his red eyes full of joy. After what'd happened to Brian, he and the System had a battle of words resulting in a trade of Pure Mana. In return, roaming bosses were unlocked on both his floors. He immediately used sixty Pure Mana on making Kira a boss, gifting her to Brian.
Although he couldn't get too attached to what was essentially a tool to him, he still dearly liked that dog. With that in mind, Brian shouldn't have the mental barrier he had and could truly bond with the recreation of our old dog. Malpetios secretly gave Kira the mission of acting as an emotional support dog at all times.
At that moment, Malpetios felt a powerful will trying to communicate with one of the Lily's clones. He sneakily intruded on the connection, using the Dark element as a cloak of shadows. "Oh spirit of nature, hear my plea! Quench your anger so that we may live in peace!" Malpetios heard the same message over and over, actually making this clone start to second guess its command presets.
Malpetios frowned, quickly connecting to the (Soulstone) Brian came up with. Although the System prohibits me from using Manastones on non-bosses, it doesn't say anything about not being able to make a neutered version. Using shameless reasoning and exploring the System's bottom line, we were able to create something akin to a battery and memory card. This Soulstone would allow a monster to fight invaders above their rank, as well as enjoy a Boss-like rebirth privilege with a chance of failure.
It also came with the bonus of being able to receive the muscle memory and instincts of others. However, these were in essence add-ons or a battle handbook, unsuitable for all situations and unable to replace real experience. Their best use was in making monsters with no minds, and only instincts, into AIs or NPCs. They're also useful in passing information, orders, and triggers, something like not showing hostility unless attacked and such.
He quickly made a new scenario for it to follow, and left it to do its thing. It was then that Brian called him. "Hey, kid... I think... I think I know how to introduce the Light element in the Dungeon." Brian turned his head to us with a self-mocking smile on his face. Malpetios wiggled until he was free from Q'ill's hug, happy to hear Brian finally talk again. "Sure! Anything! Are you ok though!? I mean, how about you rest until you're fully recovered?" Brian's smile grew bigger, "it's ok kid, I need to thank you for bringing Kira back to me!"
"Actually, my little outburst would have happened sooner or later anyway. I have very few good memories, I can only guess they were passed on to you. I'm always stewing in my problems and jealousy. I'm... I'm envious and jealous you got to start over with only the good things in our life left." Hearing this, Malpetios started to feel he was the reason why Brian is so gloomy and mean-spirited all the time.
Before he could say sorry, Brian stood up and grabbed him into his embrace. "Well, now that I got that out of my system, can I ask you for a favor?" Malpetios nodded in haste. "Then... can you let me baby you? I feel so happy near you, like when you held my hand back then! I just felt awkward in treating you like that again, after finding out we are intrinsically the same person." Malpetios jump out of Brian's arm and wrapped his hands around Brian's neck.
"I felt awkward and shameful too! However, I already kicked my pride aside! So what if we used to be the same person! As far as I'm concerned, you're basically my father!" Brian's red eyes widen, before hugging me tightly, "a father huh? Maybe I can finally be one this life." Malpetios felt something wet hitting the back of his neck, but before he could raise his head, Brian spin him around, placing his head on top of mine.
"Let... ha-ha.. let me explain how we can add the Light element ok? Don't move and let me hug you like this." Malpetios nodded while getting comfortable in Brian's embrace. "S-so... sob... here's what I'm thinking. No matter what it is, too much of a good or bad thing will eventually break someone. With this in mind, let's change the Boss into a tragic one, something like a fallen angel or something...?"
Malpetios chewed on Brian's words carefully, coming up with an Idea. "I got it! Good thing too, I just haggle with the System about unlocking roaming bosses. I'll change the Lily into a roaming boss, it's main body will now stay in my Core room and become my body. This would be helpful for the pity show you asked me to make. As for the original boss idea, I'll have the main roots of the Lily's clones split in half and replace it."
Malpetios then looked at his Pure Mana. "I got thirty-two points left, that's just enough to make a floor one boss. The only question left is who to make into the new boss?" Both of them were tossing ideas back and forth, but everything they came up with felt forced or cheesy. "How about you boys make use of that angel you left outside of Peridasa? I remember the story you made for her was so sad. Her father sacrifices himself for their God, leaving her alone with nothing but her grief and the longing."
"That poor thing only has her lord left, it's her everything, her emotional pillar, the only thing to remind her of her father! Her love born from dedicating herself to her master is bittersweet, for she's not but a lowly servant!" Both Malpetios and Brian turned to Q'ill with a weird smile. "What? I-I've read some books in the Fairy Army's library whenever I had time. T-the things you guys were saying sounded similar!" Q'ill's blushing face turned to the side, avoiding their weird looks.
Brian broke the silence first. "How much you wanna bet the female dragon was reading some slimy teenage romance novel or something?!" Before Malpetios could agree, he was yanked out of Brian's arms before Brian got kicked across the Mindscape. "Who are you calling a female dragon, bastard!!!
Covered in a cold sweat, Malpetios tried to soothe the raging dra... I mean the gentle maiden! Yeah, that...