Zalia gently put Boreal down, having finally calmed the now large feline. She was getting much too big for Zalia to comfortably hold anymore, a sad reality but the truth of it. She looked back towards the bunker, the disintegrating corpses and the heirloom glove she knew to lie far beneath.
“There is something down there I really, really want to get,” Zalia said to Boreal.
“Glove!” Boreal exclaimed.
“Yes young one, glove. It might solve some of our more carrying based issues,” Zalia explained.
She stepped back into the bunker and began the long process of making her way back down.
Now that she had a known clear escape route, a lot of the stress and unnecessary sneaking was eliminated. She began slowly clearing out room by room, floor by floor as they descended towards the layer she knew to have the glove. Along the way she had to kill many of the undead and searched many rooms and while she found many interesting bits of instruments and artefacts, she didn’t find anything particularly useful at the moment until reaching the fifth floor.
Finding the door with the small marking she had made in front of it, Zalia gently pushed it open for Boreal to see. Killing the Silver undead would be easy, the thing weak enough to be asleep and definitely not on the level of the guards in terms of combat skills. She assumed.
They made quick work of the undead, finding it indeed didn't have much skill in fighting at all. They had found a similar thing on the way down, most of the Bathar being incredibly bad in comparison to the guards at the keep. It made sense, if the undead maintained some of the skills they had when alive then the researchers wouldn’t be the best at combat.
And so, a blade impaling it to the desk, a violent cat and an unhealthy dose of magic later, the Silver researcher lay dead in its chair. Zalia let her sword fade away to mist, pushed the undead’s remains out of the way and picked up the glove.
Ethereal Vault Gauntlet (Heirloom) - Unbonded Bronze rank.
She had a slight feeling that this would be much harder for her to bond than the other two had been. Being Bronze rank already where she was not, it only made sense. She slipped the glove onto her right hand and flexed it, testing her mobility in it. She had to take off her armour’s gauntlet to do so but it would be worth it if she could get the thing working.
“Any ideas?” She sent to Boreal.
“Feed it?” Boreal asked tentatively.
She looked at Boreal incredulously.
“That’s really all you can ever come up with, isn’t it?” Zalia asked back.
“Food works,” Boreal retorted.
Annoyingly, food had worked for the most part so far.
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“Let’s get out of here,” Zalia said.
They left the bunker and started flying back to the island holding the god. Maybe Delphi would have some insight into bonding heirloom items.
She inspected the glove as she flew. It was a supple leather with metal rods extending above where the tendons on the top of her hands were. They went all the way to her fingertips and strangely didn’t seem to inhibit her movement at all, shrinking or growing to fit the movement of her hand. The bottom side of the glove had an intricate design inlaid in a pale blue metal.
After having defeated a whole bunch of undead on the way down into the bunker, she checked her profile for the level ups.
Profile - Zalia Taori
Health - Excellent
Mana - Full
Stamina - Full
Class one - Hunter - Iron 13
Linked attributes - Strength, Dexterity
Active skills
Kill shot - Iron 18
Hunter's mark - Iron 19
Fight or Flight - Iron 18
Passive skills
Hunter's Sight - Iron 13
Survivalist - Bronze 1
Class two - Herbalist - Iron 9
Linked attributes - Vitality, Resilience
Active skills
Flora identification - Iron 9
Preparation - Iron 10
Stasis - Iron 10
Passive skills
Harvester - Iron 10
Herbal magic - Bronze 1
Unity class - Druid - Iron 12
Linked attributes - Wisdom, Intellect
Active skills
Nature’s wrath - Iron 17
Protection of the wilds - Iron 12
Passive skills
Healing presence - Bronze 1
General Passives
Heat resistance - Bronze 1
Cold resistance - Bronze 1
Aura observation - Iron 2
Low light vision - Iron 5
Poison resistance - Iron 7
Mobility - Bronze 1
Stealth - Bronze 1
Trapper - Bronze 1
Teaching - Iron 7
Flight - Tin 15
Physical resistance - Bronze 1
Mental resistance - Bronze 1
Weapon proficiencies
Bow - Bronze 1
Sword - Bronze 1
Throwing Knives - Tin 17
Bonded Items
Druidic bow, Blessed by Starlight (Blessed Heirloom) - Deeply bonded Iron rank.
Duskwraith Armour (Heirloom) - Bonded Iron rank.
A few abilities had gone up by one and Hunter’s mark was swiftly approaching Bronze. All of her Herbalist abilities were still far behind but she could work on them later. Her combat abilities would be much more impactful in her current activities anyway.
She still hadn’t managed to bond the item by the time they arrived back at the island so she left it for the moment as she walked into the temple. Going downstairs, she found Delphi as well as the other collective members arrayed in a semi circle facing the god. While no sound came from them, she was surprised to see that the god was speaking clearly.
“Welcome back Zalia, we have a bit to talk about,” Delphi greeted her.