Jade and Amy soon got ready for a potential fight as they arrived at one of the dungeon entrances, Amy handing over her staff so Jade could summon his blue starling. They’d found that, even if he’d been the one to summon it, it would still obey Amy’s commands, giving her an extra minion to work with. She then summoned four of her own pink starlings, the cute looking creatures all swarmed around her. With the addition of her spun obsidian armor giving her two extra minions, as well as the witch doctor’s necklace giving her another addition, she was truly turning into a minion powerhouse. Too bad I couldn’t get her a better minion weapon… He was unsure if there was any minion weapons from the evil biomes, only knowing of the upgraded Vampire Bat Staff and Hellsprite Staff, both of which he had no idea how to get. The former only dropped during a Moon Eclipse Event from Errant, which did not appear to be a thing in this world, while the latter was made from Abyssalite, which only appeared in Hell. Again, no one had heard of such a place according to their research, getting only confused looks when he described the underground biome to both Amy and Yondol. Which means no progressing past the dungeon. Unfortunate.

His thoughts distracted him enough that he barely heard the nearby rustling in the woods, only perking up when Amy and her minions froze in alert. “Scout?” he asked her, noting Yondol break off from the group to join his party.

“We’d be better if it finds us,” Yondol stated, looking towards the noise as well before scanning the clearing around the dungeon entrance. He barely got that out, however, before a loud roar pierced through the air, all three looking once again at the noise before Yondol rushed off towards the tree line. Soon, a massive figure burst through into the clearing, nearly uprooting one of the trees it shoved past and sending snow through the air at its footfalls. It looked just as Jade had expected it to, the massive bipedal deer standing at what he only assumed was three meters tall. An additional meter was added on top, due to the large antlers sitting on top of its head. The rest of it looked like a normal, if severely buff, deer, its hands ending in claws, rather than hooves.

The three party members immediately got into action, having found their fighting styles mesh over the last few weeks into a well oiled machine. Amy and Jade let Yondol get the first hit in, attracting the creature’s gaze as it let out another roar. Dodging out of the way was easy for the elf, his speed having only increased with the boots and armor he was wearing. After the first few hits, with Yondol leading the massive beast away from the other adventurers, Amy and Jade started their contributions, both releasing their wings and flying around the Weredeer, getting in hits with Amy’s Tri-barang and Jade’s diamond wand, with Jade swapping to his meteor wand whenever he ran out of mana in his inventory screen. Occasionally the beast would take a swipe at the other two party members flying around him, though only Jade would get hit every once in a while, and only when he was low on mana. This allowed him to regain mana using his cuffs and use the diamond wand more often, which in turn did more damage to the monster. His pet, the grinning eye, also immediately flew off his shoulder as the battle started, flying into some nearby trees to hide from the beast. As it didn’t have any way of attacking, the party members had agreed that it should stay out of the way.

Definitely a boss monster, Jade thought to himself after several minutes of fighting it, the damage they had given looking to only slightly wound the creature. Too much health, like before. He expected the fight to last at least a half hour, if not more at that rate, though he flew off to the side as a thought occurred to him. Turning to the other adventurers, he gave them all confused, and slightly offended, looks, as they all just stared at the fights with slack jaws. “You all going to help?!” Jade yelled out, flapping his wings to get back up into the air to once again attack the boss monster.

After another minute or so, Jade saw some progress on the other adventurers helping out, the rogues quickly imitating Yondol’s tactics and making the Weredeer even more angry at all of them. The ranged attackers, though, seemed to have a bit of a harder time hitting the boss due to Amy and Jade flying around, most making sure their shots were either no where near the two, or firing when they swooped away to land and refresh their flying items. This seemed to quicken the fight, although the rest of the adventurers seemed to do as much damage collectively as Jade’s party was by themselves. It still left Jade feeling relieved when the boss monster slowly dissolved in a pool of light, Jade surprised that it never used any type of ranged attack like in the game. Guess the boss was a bit too overpowered there…

The shock of the other adventurers was evident on their faces, though it only increased further as, along with the loot marbles any summoned creature could drop, three glowing sacks also appeared in the air where the monster’s head had been. One each, once again, rushed to Jade, Yondol, and Amy, with Jade’s appearing in his inventory.

“What the hell was that?!” someone shouted, Jade looking over to find none other than Tan yelling at him with a red face.

“Looting power,” Jade shrugged off, turning around to head towards Amy and Yondol, who were helping to pick up the loot with the rogues, before being roughly grabbed by the shoulder. A shriek could be heard in the trees at that, Jade’s grinning eye pet rushing over with its blue tentacles waving furiously in the air.

“What the fuck was that fighting?! And the wings?! Where did you get them from?” Jade gave Tan a nasty look at that, if the man’s flinch was anything to go by, and slowly picked the man’s hand off his shoulder.

“Honestly, it’s none of your business,” Jade stated flatly, continuing his glare as he backed up to where his party members were glaring as well. Amy was muttering something about minding his own business, while Yondol turned and gave Jade a calm stare.

“We should head out…?” he whispered, looking around at the other adventurers who were either excitedly talking to each other, still staring in shock at their party, or glaring at them like the three owed them something. “We could just go right into the dungeon,” Amy immediately nodded before grabbing both Jade and Yondol’s hands to drag them over to the dungeon entrances quickly, Tan immediately shouting at them to stop.

Stepping into the snow covered cave, the three quickly headed down to the first room, the voices of the other adventurers quickly fading into the distance. “You think we’ll lose them?” Jade asked, Amy giving an eye roll at the question.

“Once we’re past the first room, they won’t catch us.” Jade nodded at that, the three shuffling into the first room and quickly dispatching the small fuzzy creatures that tried to attack them.

#

Once they were several floors in, the group slowed their pace, Yondol giving a slightly frazzled smile. “So what did you get from the loot sack?” Jade quickly looked into his inventory, skipping over an ice skate that they’d already looted. Clicking on the sack to open it, his eyes widened at the items that came out, quickly getting distracted by the first item.

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[Mini-Chestling]

He’d honestly forgotten the item was a thing, being excited about it for a moment before sagging with disappointment. The item was another pet summoning item, summoning a miniature chestling, which acted as an additional inventory of sorts. Each player would have a separate inventory inside of it, meaning it doubled each player’s inventory space. But they can’t use it… Jade though dejectedly, looking at the grinning eye that was curiously looking around from his shoulder. And I don’t want to get rid of this guy… Though… can they use it?

Looking back at the expectant siblings, Jade pulled out the pet item from his inventory, it appearing as a small chest-looking token. “Can you guys use this at all?” Amy immediately snatched it up, looking excitedly at the token before frowning.

“How do I…? Do I just run magic throu-” She cut herself off when the token shone with a bright light, making everyone wince away from the stark shine. After a few seconds of blinking away after-images, Jade looked back at Amy to see her no longer holding the token, her eyes wide as she looked off in the middle distance.

“Welcome player?!” she shrieked, causing both Yondol and Jade to jump and look at her with wide eyes.

“Wait… do you have an inventory now?” Jade excitedly asked, looking between Yondol and Amy with growing glee. Amy immediately glanced off to the side as she presumably looked at her new inventory, her eye going wide at what she saw.

“All of my items form my personal space are here… Also the magic thing you gave me is there too. Where do I put it…? Oh the pet slot. Makes sense.” After she mumbled that last sentence, another, softer flash went off right in front of her, Amy quickly catching the pet creature in her arms. It looked… somewhat like a chest, if a chest was covered in dark, spruce-colored fur. It had four tiny feet and a large mouth that it excitedly panted out of, yipping at Amy as it cuddled into her chest.

“That’s… so unfair,” Yondol breathed out, looking jealously at his sister. “Did any of the… screen things say why it activated now?” Amy looked off to the side once again, absentmindedly petting her chestling.

“It says… ‘conditions met’? ‘Two sacks consumed to make inventory. Will be lost if pet item is removed from inventory.’ So it looks like we just need to get a pet item for you Yondol, and you can use it too.” After tapping on the invisible screens for a moment, her necklace disappeared, leading Amy to smile. “Looks like I can also do the accessory thing you’ve been doing Jade. Should mean we can use more items like you’ve been doing without having to wear them.” She looked down at her spectral boots, frowning a bit at the garish green color. “These are not exactly fashionable.”

“Where else can we get pet items Jade?” Yondol asked, causing Jade to frown in discomfort.

“I… I only remember the boss pets. Which means either waiting for a boss to spawn normally, which could be months, or summoning one.” Both siblings’ eyes flashed wide at that, Amy nearly dropping her pet in surprise.

“You can summon them? Since when?!” Yondol asked, losing his composure for a moment, before relaxing back down. “It’s a part of the game, isn’t it?”

Jade nodded. “We would need a lot of materials, as well as we would need to choose which boss monster to fight. Two of which… are in the evil biomes.” The siblings only frowned instead of flinching at the mention of the biomes their parents died in, both looking to the other as they thought.

“Either that or we have another harrowing fight with the bosses we’ve already fought,” Amy muttered, carefully dropping her pet onto her shoulder, where it seemed to stick to her clothing. “Don’t think we want repeat pets though…”

“As long as I get an inventory, I don’t care,” Yondol interjected, looking to Jade. “What bosses can you summon?” Jade winced at that, looking to the ground in thought.

“I can only remember two other bosses dropping pet items. The Brain Eater and The Madness Worm.” Amy and Yondol did wince at that, clearly recognizing the boss monsters from the evil biomes. “They’re also the easiest to get, as the worm was usually the first boss a player handled, even before the eye of madness.” Yondol gave a quiet sigh, looking over at Amy’s chestling in contemplation.

“Okay. We’ll try and fight them if our first foray into the forests goes well.” Yondol held up a finger before Jade could say anything, giving him a stern look. “But if we can’t handle it, can we get the materials for the Weredeer in here?” Jade nodded at that, looking at the pet on Amy’s shoulder before his eyes went wide.

“Wait… can I…?” He reached out towards the chest with his magic, similarly to when he reached out to loot a non-dungeon or non-boss monster. A separate inventory screen appeared for him, making his eyes go wide. “Amy, reach out with your magic towards the chestling?” As she did so, Jade put one of the random material stacks from his inventory into the chestling’s inventory, Amy letting out a gasp as hers opened up as well. “Is it empty?”

“Yes. It almost… doubles my carrying capacity,” she mumbled, Jade giving a wide grin at the answer.

“And it gives me additional inventory as well that only I can access.” Amy grinned at that bit of information, fiddling around with her inventory as Jade turned to Yondol. “We will get you one. First, though, we need to get the materials we need form here.”

#

Item Stats:

#

Custom Spun Obsidian Helmet

Defense: 5

Body Slot: Helmet

+9% Increased Minion Damage

+5% Throwing Damage

#

Custom Spun Obsidian Chestplate

Defense: 7

Body Slot: Chest

+1 Minion

+5% Throwing Speed

#

Custom Spun Obsidian Leggings

Defense: 5

Body Slot: Pants

+1 Minion

+5% Movement Speed

#

Set Bonus: +2% Increased Minion Damage.

#

Witch Doctor’s Necklace

+1 Minion

A necklace commonly worn by the magic doctor of a village.

#

Spatial Cuffs

+5% Magic Damage

Restores Mana when hit

Handcuffs that have been imbued with the power of the stars.

* * *