My night continued on like that, with me calmly walking to the evil signatures I detected and either avoiding the skeletons or killing shades. I had a few close calls when groups of skeletons would cross paths but Etheric Step let me get out of there quickly.
As invigorating as fighting shades was, it ended up being depressing as hell. All of the lairs had one thing in common that made this the world's worst city tour. Each lair was where a huge gathering of non-combatants had been sheltering, this was nothing new and I'd seen my fair share of mass murder sights. However getting desensitised to huge piles of body parts or puddles of unknown suspect liquid still takes a very long time, even for a Soul Reaper.
This did, unfortunately, have an effect on the shades. The sheer strength of the shades had increased dramatically as they had gorged themselves on so many souls. Most of them had evolved to specialise or become a variant of some type.
I came across a communal hall that was just covered in gore and broken improvised defences, it housed a particularly quick shade that dodged most of my attacks. I stumbled across another shade that resided in a barracks of some sort, it was a lot denser than the others I had fought and took more slashes to kill.
I was in a foul mood when I came to the last source of evil in the city. Lesser Regeneration was working on overdrive to heal the latest set of cuts on my arm and a mostly healed limp I picked up, when a shade almost cut off my leg. I only had half of my mana left from the constant usage after a few bad fights. I looked around and I saw a sign that made my mood darken even more. It read 'Tyre Hospital'.
The hospital was 4 stories tall and the size of an entire block, it looked like the person who designed the building was a big fan of castles. The main bulk of the building was featureless and brutally uniform, there had been 4 towers reaching up into the sky with walkways between all of them for ease of access.
It would have been an impressive sight if not for the massive structural damage. 3 of the towers still stood but they looked like reeds that had valiantly tried to defy a fireball. Sections of wall had fallen away revealing the rooms inside and all of the walkways had been destroyed when one of the towers collapsed into the center of the building.
The side of the building I was facing looked to have been the worst hit. Most of the front of the building had collapsed into the ground floor, around what would have been the entrance, was littered with bodies and large parts of the building. After a little bit of looking, I found a section where the rubble looked sturdy and reached up to the 2nd floor.
I didn't want to go inside, it was just going to be people slaughtered in their beds and mass amounts of gore and viscera. The thought of it made my stomach churn, I fought to swallow the bile that rose in the back of my throat. Then my rage reared its silent head, like the emotionless edge lord my class kept pushing me to be, it pushed the bile back with a figurative glance and firmed my resolve with its icy touch. I would not allow a creature to feed on the suffering here, the souls deserve their rest and not eternal torment.
I made the blade of my scythe fade away as I slowly began to climb, the last thing I needed was to cut my arm off if I slipped. I was only about 5 feet off the ground when my Danger Sense screamed at me like a toddler being told they can't have any candy. I dove off the rubble and rolled as I hit the ground, I came up holding my scythe ready as the blade appeared. A large dark black shadow arm thrust out through the rubble where I had just been climbing, I hit the arm with my Identification spell.
Name: Alpha Shade
Level 25
Type: Uncommon
Description: A shade that was born in the deepest pit of despair and fought its way up through the hierarchy of monsters. It stands at the top of the ladder through the assimilation of Lesser Monsters. Shades tend to feed on wayward souls however this one has also grown feeding off of its own kind.
Health: 5000/5000
Mana: 4000/4000
Effects: Immune to non-magical attacks, immune to shadow magic.
*Note, as this creature is recognised by your Soul Reaper class as an adversary, all combat restrictions are removed from all class abilities (excluding disabled abilities or skills) and you will be able to gain xp from defeating this monster.
The shade clawed its way through the rubble, the monster was so large, I saw the physical rubble move as it passed through. I gulped as my mouth suddenly went dry, that normally didn't happen. I cast Empower Attack on my scythe before using Etheric Step. I teleported to the right of the shade and slashed at its left leg, a claw lashed out and caught the strike, metal screeched on claws for a few seconds before my scythe bit into its claws and partially cut through one.
I was caught off guard as I looked on in slight horror as it swung its other arm at me faster than I could block, its claws aimed to impale my right kidney. I let go of my scythe while dropping to the ground and rolling backwards, I cast mage hand to throw my scythe back at me. Lucky for me, the shade was enraged and focused on me, it roared in anger and didn’t notice the scythe flying back to me, the blade sliced cleanly through its neck.
I held out my hand and caught the scythe, I let the momentum bring the blade back around to cut through its chest, unfortunately the head had reattached itself to the main body again just in time to continue the roar but now it was a roar of pain. I stopped the momentum of the swing and rammed the Soul Lantern into the open wound. The roar of pain ratcheted up a notch to more of a squeal than a roar, as the lantern began to drain its energy. I had to pull the lantern away as the shade flailed an arm in my direction.
I jumped backwards and rolled to the left as the shade barreled into the ground where I had just been standing. The ground around where it landed cracked from the impact causing me to gulp again. I cast Haste on myself and Empower Attack and I waited for the shade to attack again. I felt sweat begin to trickle down my neck as the shade launched itself at me again like a ballista bolt.
Thankfully with my Haste spell, the shade was moving at normalish speeds. It was still flying at me fast, but I had enough time to move a few quick steps to the side. I left my arms extended and watched as the shade rocketed through my scythe cutting off its own arm with my scythe.
I dived after the separated arm as it flopped to the floor, I grabbed it as it started to flow back towards the main body of the shade. I stabbed the soul lantern into it, the shadow that had been flowing back to the shade stopped and was sucked into the Soul Lantern, like a greedy child being told the child finish the rest of the cake. The shade screamed in pain and outrage as its arm disappeared.
I watched the shade shrink a little as it used some of the shadows to regrow its arm and realised that this was going to be a battle of attrition. I settled back into my rehearsed attack patterns and combos, which mainly consisted of me using my scythe like it was a boa staff. Each swing of my scythe brought the blade back around to cut at the shade. Every dodge or withheld strike added extra momentum and power to the next attack.
I felt the rush of adrenaline when Combat Grace kicked in, my movements flowed smoother and reduced the distance I needed to move to dodge attacks. My skill was not mastered so it was by no means a cheat to easily win fights. The Alpha Shade was still an extremely dangerous monster and could easily kill me in seconds, Lesser Regeneration was working so hard I was convinced it would evolve any second.
It took longer than I wanted but eventually I stood over the dissipating Alpha Shade with my Soul Lantern thrust into the remains, it clawed at me ineffectually as it was sucked up. I panted from the exertion of the battle, my health was slowly running out from the various cuts. I pulled out a health potion and drank the contents. My body began to tingle and itch as most of the cuts closed and I felt more aware as it replenished most of my lost blood.
I didn't enter the hospital, I couldn't sense anything evil left in the building so I didn't feel the need to go inside. I was more than a little glad I didn't have to add those scenes to my nightmares. Exhausted, I made my way back to the camp, I had notifications blinking at me but I ignored all except one.
Quest complete
Quest: Things that go Bump in the Night
Description: You went bump in the night and all the shades in Mountain Guard died.
Rewards: 200xp, death mana in the ruins has been significantly lowered.
With the 10 shades that I killed I was only 300xp off of getting my next class level. The excitement of possibly getting a new class level wore off as I remembered I had to avoid more packs of ghouls and a few roaming bands of skeletons.
I thought over my fight with the Alpha Shade, it had been sloppy. There were too many times where it had managed to slip into my shadow, sure I had managed to force it out but not before it had cut me a few times. I could still feel a cut along my ribs that hadn't fully healed, the bleeding had stopped though. I tried to think over what I could have done better but before I had a good idea I found myself walking out of the ruined city.
I cast Message and shot the spell to Harold, to let him know I was alive and wanted to locate them. A few seconds later I had a small butterfly appear in front of me and flashed a colour coded message. I smiled and walked the rest of the distance back to camp. As I got closer to the camp and let go of detect evil and instead replaced it with mana sense. The camp exploded into bright multi coloured light and I slammed my eyes shut to stop me from going blind. I filtered through all the magical emitting and consuming things that I was detecting and I wasn’t looking for, eventually I found a small amount of mana being released in bursts that I recognised.
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I began sneaking back through the camp, dodging marines and using the last of my slowly regenerating mana to avoid bumping into people. The mana signal led me to a white tent that was only slightly larger than most, I pushed inside to see the rest of my party sitting around. Raven was playing cards with Taylor and Clair while Harold paced, Clair occasionally let out a small green burst of mana. I deactivated Right Clothes for the Job and let them fade away before deactivating Man on the Job.
“Luca.” Harold sighed in relief. “I'm glad that you're back, are you hurt?"
“I am okay, a few cuts and bashes but nothing serious.” I lied, there had been a few close calls but I was okay.
“You want in on the next hand?” Raven asked, she tossed a few coins into the middle of the table.
“Nah, I need to lay down, there were far more shades in the city that the captain knew about. Some of them were really nasty and would have ripped through the soldiers.” I said moving over to the only free cot. I dropped my bag down at the side of the cot and sat down.
“What’s it like in the city?” Taylor asked.
“It’s not pretty,” I replied while taking off my shoes. “There are packs of ghouls and skeleton warriors like the captain said. Some of the buildings in there are completely destroyed and others are so badly damaged that they will have to be torn down.” I shook my head, “as for the bodies, I can see it taking a long time to cleanse the city and it may be a few years before they start rebuilding.”
I took out everyone's backpacks from my bag of holding and put them on the floor. I looked up to see the rest of my party staring at me. Clair and Taylor had tears in their eyes, Raven had let her hair cover her face but I could see the rage on Harold’s face. He moved to grab his helmet but Taylor walked over and stopped him.
“Harold, it’s not our fight.” Taylor said, resting her hand on his shoulder. “We have more important things to be doing than fighting the monsters in the city.”
“But...” He started.
“No.” Taylor said more forcefully, “I know you want to go and right the wrongs of the world but we need to stick to our objective. We are hunting the necromancer so that this,” They waved at the tent wall in the direction of Mountain Guard, “doesn’t happen again.”
I could see Harold’s internal struggle, his need to protect people and fight off evil warred with his drive to complete the quest.
Harold was a good man and he always did the right thing, most infuriating was that he was extremely stubborn about it. Taylor was the only person that could talk reason to him when he was like this. They had been adventuring together for so long, they were closer than most married couples.
Harold’s face twitched and many expressions passed over his face as he struggled to come to a decision, he growled a few times during his internal debate but eventually let out a long sigh. His shoulders drooped and his hand, that was reaching towards his helmet, flopped limply to his side in defeat like a dead eel.
“Fine.”
“Come on, let’s get some rest, we all need to get some rest.” Taylor said, looking around at everyone, they guided Harold away from his armour.
I nodded and lay down on the cot, it was a little too small and there was no proper support but when my head hit the pillow, I was out for the count.
When I woke up the tent was bathed in a green glow. I yawned and stretched feeling my sore muscles from the fighting last night, I cast Lesser Regeneration on myself, again, and I felt the tension in the muscles ease out of them. I looked around to see the rest of my party were just waking up as well. As I sat there I saw that I still had a few blinking notifications that demanded my attention.
Through a special action your ability Soul Lantern has gained a new effect.
Effect 1: The Soul Lantern shelters and holds lost souls safely until a time when they can be put to rest. Effect 2: The Soul Lantern can be attached to the user’s weapon of choice. Effect 3: Souls can be drawn to the Soul Lantern from 500 feet away. *New Effect* Effect 4: The Soul Lantern can be used to cleanse corrupted souls.
You have slain a Shade Level 15 x8, as this creature is recognised by your class as a foe, you do not receive any penalties. You have earned 400xp.
You have slain an Alpha Shade Level 25, as this creature is recognised by your class as a foe, you do not receive any penalties. You have earned 150xp.
Your skill Combat Grace (greater) has increased to level 6. Your skill has an increased change to avoid attacks and an increase to damage dealt while the skill is active.
Your spell Empower Attack has reached level 8. Your spell now costs less mana to cast and deals more damage.
Your skill Modify Spell (greater) has reached level 8. Your skill has an increased chance to change the effects of a spell.
Your skill Stealth (greater) has evolved. Your skill has become Stealth (Master) level 1 and has a significantly increased chance to fade from view even while being observed, it has also increased the difficulty to track and follow you. Your skill has gained a new effect; biological, physical and magical impressions will fade over a short period of time.
By the time I had read through my notifications the green glow had faded. The sun beam became brighter as it started reflecting off the metal on my scythe rather than the Soul Lantern, I had to move my scythe as it became too bright. I could hear the camp starting to stir outside but I wasn't ready to face it yet.
I took a little bit of time to think about my improvements, I was pretty happy about the new effect on my Soul Lantern as it would mean I had a faster way of taking down 'soul stealer' type monsters. Yes, I know it's a stupid name, but it's a good description for what the monster does. Those fights always lasted for so long, it was nice to have a quicker way of killing them, plus I would directly absorb the souls they consumed.
The evolution to my stealth skill was just as good, I'd been trying to evolve the skill but had hit a bottleneck and it had stalled in growth. I must really have put the skill to the limit last night while hunting, or perhaps it was walking past the 4 guards leaving the tent that did it, the skills they would have been using to guard the command tent would have been very strong. Either way, being the scout of the party meant I was constantly using the skill so I was glad it had finally evolved, now I could avoid being spotted by monsters better.
I sat there for a few more minutes after going over all my notifications, which were mainly combat notifications that I dismissed, as the rest of my party woke up.
"How did everyone sleep?" Harold asked, he stretched before starting the long task of putting his armour on. Taylor, dressed in trousers and a shirt, moved over to tighten his back straps.
"These cots are okay I guess." Clair said as she wiped the sleep out of her eyes.
"Military's finest." Raven quipped, she did not look like she'd had a good night's sleep.
I shook my head and realised that I hadn't taken my clothes off last night when I lay down. Sure they weren't covered in blood but they did have more than a few cuts where the shades claws went through my robes and cut me. I wondered why no one had commented on it last night, but considering what I had told them, I guess it was understandable.
"Forgotten Gods Luca." Clair said, as she looked at my clothes, "How many were there last night? I don't think you actually gave us a number."
"10 in total," I replied absent-mindedly while looking for a new set of clothes from my bag of holding.
"How did they fight?"
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"Well normally when monsters like that appear, you usually deal with them before they get close to us." Clair said, "what do they attack with? How do you kill them?"
"Huh, you've never come across them before?" I was a little surprised if I was honest, then again I didn't see Clair visiting many sites like I did last night. "Well, the first thing to know is that they are made of shadow stuff. It's not shadow magic or shadow mana exactly but for the purpose of this explanation it'll do." I looked around to see that I had everyone's attention.
"When they aren't hiding in the shadows they are taller than myself and have extra long arms that drag on the ground when they stand up. They mainly attack with their claws that will cut through non-magical or enchanted items like they don't exist." I pointed at my shredded shirt as evidence. "They are very fast and always attempt to dive into your shadow. Once they are inside your shadow they use a drain attack that saps your strength and health. The only way to force them out of your shadow is to nullify or lock down shadow magic." I cast my modified Light spell and let the orb float in the air bathing the tent in the dark blue light. "This is my method, the spell nullifies shadow magic forcing them to fight rather than sap my strength till I can't move."
"That's not cool man," Raven complained, "you have to warn me if you ever use that, it would cut off my shadow step and I'd be unable to retreat from a close encounter or dodge a strike."
"I wouldn't use this unless we were fighting shadow monsters and if we were, you wouldn't want to dip into the shadow realm." I said, giving her a teasing grin. I let my Light spell end. "In the end, the way I kill them is by slicing them up." I did neglect to tell them about the Soul Lantern absorbing the corrupt souls, it wasn't really something I wanted to explain.
"Why are you so cut up?" Taylor asked, it was the question I was hoping they wouldn't ask.
"Because one of my abilities has been disabled."
"What!?" Everyone said almost at the same time.
"Yeah, it's not a big deal really." I said, rubbing the back of my head, I felt my cheeks go a little red.
"Yes it is." Harold and Taylor said at the same time. "What ability was it?"
"Touch of the Reaper, all it means is that I don't one-shot everything." I shrugged. "I still have Man on the Job and Clothes for the Job so I'm not impeded that way. I don't really attack with my scythe so it hasn't affected the way we fight either."
Taylor nodded in understanding, Harold took longer but also nodded at my reasoning. I felt a bit of tension leave my stomach. I have to admit I was worried about telling them, any class impositions were big deals, with Touch of the Reaper disabled any really big scary monsters were going to be a huge problem.
"What level was the highest one last night?" Raven asked, I could hear the intense curiosity she was trying to mask with nonchalance.
I smiled ear to ear as I looked her dead in the eye. I was going to enjoy what was going to come next.
"Level 25." I deadpanned.
Raven slapped the table and jumped up. Her face had gone from barely hidden curiosity to shock, the disbelief before outrage.
"No way. No way, I need proof." She said, slapping the back of one hand into the palm of the other. "There is no way you can beat a level 25 monster, I call minotaur shit. Show me proof. You know the rules, for a kill to count toward the highest level monster trophy, it needs proof. I have held it for 4 years in a row. Show me a…"
Her words died in her throat and she slowly lost steam as she looked at the palm I held upwards. I used some mana to project the kill notification.
You have slain an Alpha Shade Level 25, as this creature is recognised by your class as a foe, you do not receive any penalties. You have earned 150xp.
"Witnessed." Clair said breathlessly.
"Witnessed." Harold added.
"FUCK." Raven shouted
She grabbed her pillow and let out a loud scream into it. After a second she put the pillow down and turned to her backpack. She rummaged around inside of it before pulling out a small golden decorative arrow. Reluctantly she walked over to me and held it out to me.
"Game. Fucking. On." She said, as she let go of the arrow.
I smiled as I looked at the little golden arrow. it looked like a cheap gift you'd get at a stand near the exit to a city, when you'd forgotten to get your mother a souvenir. The arrow was sat on a small black plastic stand with a painted gold plaque that read 'Highest Level Monster Killed'. However, the trophy meant so much more than its monetary value.
"It's okay Raven, you can always claim it back." I said sweetly before my smile deepend, "when you can kill on my level!"
"Oh I'm coming for that trophy,” Raven whipped around and I could see the fire blaze in her eyes, “you're just borrowing it."