Hero

Owin

Deficient Wizard

Nimble Hog Hero Company

Level: 1

Strength: 416

Constitution: 310

Dexterity: 270

Intelligence: 275

Wisdom: 169

Charisma: 160

The sixth floor of the Ocean Dungeon was brighter than the fifth, but it wasn’t sunlight illuminating the colorless coral. Little crystals were spread all about the floor, pulsing with blue, green, and purple light.

A dirty, forgotten tile path led into the coral reef. Owin stepped off the stairs and onto the path. It had been a long time since he had been on an isolated floor. The last time, he had killed two cultists the moment he appeared on the floor.

So far, this was calmer.

Summon the Withered Shade

Shade formed from gray dust and immediately dropped Nikoletta’s mace onto the tile path. He turned on Owin and poked him in the forehead with a skeletal finger. “Never use me like that again!”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know! You were practically torturing those heroes!”

“They killed my friend. I was only making them leave the dungeon.”

Shade crouched until his eye sockets were level with Owin’s eyes. “We both know there was more than that, whether you want to admit it or not. You hurt them worse than you needed to.”

Owin clenched his jaw. What did Shade know about any of it? He had been locked away for so long that he didn’t know what the real world was like or what heroes were like anymore. He didn’t know who Siora and Nikoletta actually were. He only saw them trying to help Avani.

“You’re my summon,” Owin said.

“And I will happily insult Sloswen until he destroys me and forces me into my box if you are going to use me to torture heroes.” Shade poked Owin in the forehead again. “You need to be better than that.”

“I am. They’re not.”

“Who is looking more evil right now?”

Owin scowled.

“And what am I supposed to do with this?” Shade picked up Nikoletta’s mace again and almost lost his balance. “Do you expect me to swing this?”

“No. You can leave it here.”

Shade immediately dropped the mace. “Good. It was too heavy, and I’ll be honest, the room in that box is already cramped. I can’t store items in there. And I shouldn’t have to! You shouldn’t be stealing weapons from others. I thought I taught you better than that!”

“What have you taught me? You just talk until you blow up!”

Shade’s brow dropped, somehow making him look angry. “That’s all I’ve done? Me? Really? Perhaps now I’ll start spewing secrets until Sloswen smites me. You clearly don’t need me. I can just say—”

“No.” Owin grabbed the skeleton’s hand. “I’m sorry. I want you on this floor with me.”

Shade crouched until his eye sockets were even with Owin’s eyes. “You have had a lot of life that I haven’t seen, and stories never truly do the truth any justice, but one thing I do know is that a good person doesn’t use their strength to make someone else feel small.” Shade held his hand out and measured Owin’s height. “My word choice could have been better, but I assume you know the direction I am going.”

“It’s not that simple. I gave them the option to leave. I said they could walk out.”

Shade popped back to his feet. He looked around and poked some coral just off the path. “I had forgotten what this floor looked like. It’s . . . almost pleasant.”

“Are you still angry?”

Shade placed his hand on the top of Owin’s helmet. “Angry? Yes. Disappointed? Also yes. We only hurt heroes when we have to. Deal?”

“But why do you care?”

“Why? Well, I was a hero.” The water surrounding Shade shook. He looked up at the dark water above. “Yes, yes. I know.”

“Sloswen?”

Shade nodded slowly. “I can't reveal the few secrets that I can actually remember or I end up in the box for my punishment and all that. Part of being a Cursed.”

Owin just stared at the skeleton while Shade continued poking nearby things. The skeleton had been a hero. Did that mean the Sovereign One was also a hero before it was a lich? What did that mean for Artivan?

Shade walked over and poked the boundary wall. “There is just water on the other side of this, you know. What else would be on the other side of the Ocean boundary?”

“I have a lot of questions.”

“Shame I cannot answer them. Blame the gods.” Shade flinched. “Just kidding.”

As far as Owin could see, everything was coral reef, just like the first floor, but with a lot less color. The sixth floor was so deep below the surface that there was barely any light from above. Without the crystals all over the ground, he wouldn’t be able to see a thing.

“Do we just follow the path?” Owin asked.

“That’s what I would do. I assume you will miss the secret and the chest if you do that, but we can always wander if you’d like. We’re isolated, so we don’t need to worry about some angry, spurned lover entering the floor after us with a vendetta.”

“What?”

“Yeah, let’s follow the path,” Shade said.

Shade rounded the corner, disappearing behind a huge chunk of coral, then immediately reappeared, walking a bit faster than before. “Have you ever seen a starfish?”

“No.”

Shade nodded quickly and positioned himself directly behind Owin. “Well, then I have good news for you.”

A horrible creature appeared from behind the coral. It was dozens of feet across and looked like it was walking on a million tiny legs underneath its ten different arms.

Ocean Mob

Sea Star

Level 42

“That says sea star,” Owin said, already drawing his lich bone knife.

“Sea star. Starfish. Does it look like I really care about getting the names correct? I would prefer not to be eaten by this thing, even if it wouldn’t actually hurt. You know, it still isn’t pleasant—”

Instead of listening to Shade, Owin watched the creature move close before leaping over. He aimed for the center where all the arms met and missed by a few inches. He tore into the sea star with the blade, and scrambled as it shivered and tried to shake him off. A few more quick stabs killed the creature.

“That was easy.” Owin jumped off instead of walking between its many legs.

“And that was one of the normal mobs on this floor.”

“Oh.” Owin fixed his bag and adjusted the wands in his belt. “What are the bosses?”

“I have no memory. I am sure we will know when we see them.”

They had to crawl back over the sea star’s corpse to follow the path. The coral was high on both sides and formed around tall rocks, making it feel like they were in a valley. Owin jumped up a piece of coral onto a rock, and quickly found a ceiling boundary. He didn’t even get to the top of the tall rock, which meant his view of the deep sea coral reef wasn’t any better than it was below.

He climbed back down and stared down the path. Shade quickly followed while poking everything he passed.

“What’s wrong with you?” Owin asked.

“Me? Oh, nothing.”

Owin sighed and kept an eye on the path ahead. There were some spots that looked like he could maybe slip through, but only because he was small. There was nothing that looked like an obvious alternate route for other heroes on the floor. If he was going to find the chest and its guardian, it would need to be somewhere accessible. The chests weren’t specifically hidden, only protected.

The secret could be anywhere, so he would need to figure out how to search for that.

“Okay, fine,” Shade said.

Before he could keep talking, a sea star crawled over the top of the rocks and coral, passed the boundary wall, and fell on top. Everything was so dark that the sea star didn’t create a shadow or give any warning to its arrival. Immense weight shoved Owin straight onto the path. Little legs and feelers moved all around him. The legs and claws on his armor were still busy regenerating, so there was nothing to push the sea star off his back.

“I said I didn’t want this to happen!” Shade shouted.

Owin could hardly move. The sea star’s legs were wider than his whole body. The best he could manage was to let go of the knife and grab anything squishy nearby. With his face pushed directly into the ground, he had no view of what was happening around him.

Discharge.

He flinched as some of the electricity arced back at him. With so much of the sea star surrounding him, it was less of a problem than the last two times he had used it. His mana hadn’t had much time to recharge, so the spell was done quickly, but not before roasting part of the sea star’s arm.

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Owin snatched the lich bone and rolled over, swinging the knife in a wide arc. He severed the end of the arm, then leapt and tore the knife across the center. The mob died quickly again.

“Some help please?” Shade asked, his voice muffled.

Owin stood on the sea star’s corpse, looking down each arm. The skeleton’s voice hadn’t been very clear, and there were a lot of arms. After a second, Shade’s arm popped out from underneath the corpse and waved wildly.

“I see you.” Owin lifted the arm with some effort. Once Shade was free, Owin let the arm fall heavily back to the tile path. “I could’ve just unsummoned you.”

“Oh, right. Well, here we are. Two sea stars down and probably a million more to go. You know what they say. Where there’s one sea star, there’s often more than one.” Shade fixed his scarf and kicked the mob’s corpse.

“Where did you hear that?”

“I made it up.” Shade awkwardly crawled over the sea star and fell off the other side.

Owin cleared the corpse in a single hop, landing just in front of the skeleton. “Do sea stars travel together?”

“I have no idea.”

“Oh.”

They continued down the path, stopping occasionally as Owin found something odd or Shade tried to stick his arm into the coral and got stuck. Four different times.

“What if something is back there?” He started to reach into a coral again but was pulled back by Owin.

“Stop!”

The path continued for hours, interrupted by four more sea stars. Each one was a difficult fight, though they didn’t feel particularly dangerous. They were big and heavy, but even when Owin didn’t react fast enough, little more happened than getting shoved or having one land on top of him. Even without armor, the damage would’ve been minimal. As far as dangerous mobs went, the sea stars were far down his list. Even the eels on the first floor had felt more dangerous.

Shade tried lifting a sea star arm, grunting with the effort. He let go and caused himself to tumble backward. “How many Shades do you think that weighs?”

“Uh.”

“Don’t think too hard. We don’t want to trouble that little noggin of yours.”

Owin pulled Shade off the path. The coral and rocks surrounding them made the floor feel so cramped, but as Shade had said, it was beautiful. The glowing crystals caused bits of the coral to shine, even though the coral itself was mostly gray and tan. It felt like it was a moonless night, though Owin knew the floors got darker the deeper he went.

“Why are these mobs so easy?” He asked as he shook part of the sea star. A single dungeon coin popped out.

“Well, you’re still a higher level than the sixth floor mobs. I assume the bosses on this floor will start to challenge you, and the next floors are where the real challenge will probably start, though if we find some potions to pour down that throat of yours, we will probably have less of a challenge than we otherwise might.”

“What?”

“Oh, this is just like the math conversation I had with Avani.” Shade ran over, snatched the piece of gold, and flicked it at Owin’s face. “More potions equal tougher goblin, right?”

“Uh.”

“And therefore—”

“Can we keep moving?”

“Ugh, fine. I never get to use the word therefore in a full sentence. It’s a tragedy.”

Shade grabbed Owin’s shoulders and guided him down the path. The skeleton was too weak to actually push him forward, but Owin still let the skeleton try.

They followed the path through the reef until the rocks opened into a little dirt path. It had been hidden until rounding a turn, and would have been the perfect place for an ambush. Instead, Owin found a girhuma on the ground with a splinted leg and a broken cart. A wheel with broken spokes laid on the ground beside the tilted cart, which the water elf leaned against.

A glowing dark red orb hung above his head.

“What’s that mean?” Owin whispered.

“That’s a mandatory quest. You haven’t seen one before?” Shade had apparently missed the part where Owin had been quiet.

The girhuma turned at the skeleton’s voice. Her face was bruised and she kept both webbed hands on her injured leg. “A traveler! Please—”

“If she finishes her sentence, you will automatically get the quest,” Shade said.

The girhuma scowled at the interruption.

“The key is to keep talking and not let the mobs talk over you. Now, if I was to say that I had a special skill set, even without my skin, or my . . .” He pointed to his hips. “You know. I, uh . . . What was I saying?”

“Talking.”

“Ah, yes. I am extraordinarily skilled at such an endeavor, though I suppose if the quest is required to continue onto the seventh floor, it would likely be in our best interest if I was to stop talking for even a few seconds.”

“Yes.”

Shade pointed at Owin, then used both hands to force his jaw up. He tried to open his mouth and seemingly struggled to hold it closed with his skeletal arms.

“Please help us,” the girhuma continued. “I was on my way to collect the stolen batteries, but I fell and broke my leg.”

“Oh, likely story. How did the whole wheel of a cart break if you tripped?” Shade asked. A look from Owin made the skeleton slam his own jaw shut again.

“How can I help?”

New Quest

Unstable Gateway

Reward: Passage to the 7th floor

Note: Check the Journal for more information

Owin opened his journal and read through the short bit of information given. “It says the girhuma village was destroyed by an unstable gateway.”

“Well, I got that from the name of the quest.”

Owin gave Shade the same look that made the skeleton force his own jaw shut.

10 Hours

“Why does it say 10 hours?” Owin moved his eyes around, but the time remained in the top left of his vision.

9:59

“That is counting down,” Shade said.

“Please, find the batteries. Close the gateway.” The girhuma pointed down the path. “Hurry!”

***

Vondaire had, admittedly, fallen asleep. A good touch of alcohol was just the right hand he needed in finally getting some rest. Unfortunately, that rest had let him be surprised by the two most unpleasant women he had ever had the fortune of meeting.

“Egnatia Lucan,” the heavily-armored one said. Her sneer was twisted even farther by the horrible scar across half her face.

“Am I expected to know who you are?” Vondaire sat upright in his chair. Of course he knew who she was. He wasn’t some kind of moron.

Egnatia glared with enough intensity to tear a hole through Vondaire’s head, which he was sure she would happily do.

“Stop acting like a moron,” the other said.

“Ah, Vephthru Veriss. The world wishes to know if the face you hide behind that mask is one of beauty or sorrow.”

She had her infamous wand pointed at his throat with such speed that he didn’t see her move. “Want to try that again?”

“Good morning, ladies. How can this homely man be of service to you?”

“Better,” Egnatia said. She eyed the exit. “Why are you waiting here?”

“I have some friends within who I promised to wait for, despite knowing it would be a few days. You see, I am just that kind of kind hearted person.”

Veph pulled out a chair and sat heavily. Her spy lingered a few feet away and only hesitantly approached as Veph waved her closer. Potilia hadn’t seemed keen on hurting this one, so Vondaire would leave her be.

“The goblin and the Maimed Magus,” Veph said.

“Indeed.”

“What of my heroes?” Veph leaned her elbows on the table. “I know you are familiar.”

“They exited after the fifth floor. You must have missed them on their way back to Atrevaar.” Vondaire’s stash was running low, but it seemed as good a time as any for another drink. He produced a bottle of wine and the same four glasses. One could only tell they had been previously used if they looked too close. He had swirled them in the ocean water, but that was just as likely to taint the glass as it was to clean it.

Sylmare sat down and stared right at Vondaire with a confidence he hadn’t seen during their last encounter. Her leader inspired her, unlike any leaders Vondaire had ever followed. Chorsay was a nice man, but . . . not inspirational.

“They left early?”

“Indeed. It appears the fifth floor was too much of a challenge for the three of them.”

Veph raised one eyebrow. “The fifth floor is far from a challenge.”

“For inexperienced heroes,” Egnatia said. “I never let my trainees go past the fourth.” She stood near the edge of the sandbar, watching the water lap against her boots. “People don’t leave the fifth floor. They die on the fifth.”

“Not in this case. Maybe Void Nexus is just better than Magna Regum.” Vondaire poured a glass and smiled at the two company leaders who cast glares at him. “How could I really say? I’m a Nimble Hog, after all.”

“A joke,” Egnatia said. “An old man that took you in out of pity.”

“I was having a nice time until the three of you arrived. You don’t seem keen on having a drink, so how can I help you move along?”

Egnatia vanished and reappeared behind Vondaire with a knife pressed to his throat. “You insult my kin.”

“Actually,” Vondaire said. He stifled a yawn and stretched as he walked across the sand behind Sylmare. All three women looked over, then back where Egnatia held a knife to nothing. “I insult everyone. Magna Regum or not, everyone is inferior. If you take it personally, well, that is a personal choice.”

Vondaire prepared more spectral clones, ready to fan them out if Egnatia moved against him again. She would never know where he actually stood. A talented soldier was dangerous, especially when they had three more shards than him, but a soldier was only dangerous if they could land a hit.

Realistically, Veph was the bigger threat to Vondaire even with less shards than Egnatia. Dodging a swing of a weapon was easy. Dodging a fireball was significantly more difficult.

“Stop fooling around,” Veph said. “Sit down, umbra.”

Vondaire crossed his arms and smiled. “Ooh. No. Let’s try that again.”

“Once you have your second shard, I’ll say your name. Sit.”

“I’d prefer to stand.”

Egnatia sheathed her knife and leaned on the back of Vondaire’s chair. “You think you’re stronger than us.”

“I will be.”

“That type of confidence is unfounded with the little Hogs. You’re a unique one. You threatened Caspius, which in turn threatened me. And you were stupid enough to do it within my city. Do you expect that I’ll let you just sit on this sandbar and wait for your little friend?”

“Yes.”

She grabbed his glass of wine from the table and took a long drink. “And why is that?”

“Because I left Caspius alive and allowed your two little spies to finish their jobs before sending the Hog away. Everyone was successful. All three lived.” Vondaire placed a hand on the back of Sylmare’s chair. “Isn’t that right?”

“It is,” Sylmare said.

“What will you do when they leave the dungeon?” Veph asked.

“I am waiting to escort them to Atrevaar. Nothing else. As soon as they are safe, I will be off to acquire my second shard.”

“So soon? You will overwork yourself,” Egnatia said.

“Says the one who has underworked herself. How long have you been at four? And you’re not even fused.” Vondaire held up four fingers and pointed to his thumb. “What is it that’s so scary about that fifth?”

“I don’t like him,” Egnatia said to Veph.

Veph nodded slowly. “Why the Nimble Hogs?”

“I saw an opportunity to gather valuable information from Chorsay Eoghet. Information I didn’t expect Void Nexus, Magna Regum, or the Three Heads to provide to a new member, especially a member that is set on getting all seven shards.” Vondaire finally sat again with his back to the Ocean exit.

Egnatia sat in Vondaire’s original chair and continued to drink his wine. “What use would we have for a Shard Hero like you? No reasonable client is going to hire someone with shards. What are the Hogs going to do with you or the two in there now?”

“That’s for Chorsay to know. I don’t know what goes on in the old man’s head. All I know is that he sees me getting the shards as a favor to him, in some odd way. Now, you two, have much bigger and more important operations to oversee than anything the Nimble Hogs are doing. You are not my enemies. In fact, I have five enemies, all within Izylia.” Vondaire held up a single finger. “Let me rephrase that. I have five people who I absolutely despise and intend to subtly murder in the future, but they are all personal vendettas that do not involve your companies or even your countries.”

“From the Unity Force?” Sylmare asked.

“I feel saying more could put me in some deep water, and . . .” He gestured to the nearby ocean. “I’d rather not get my feet wet again.”

“You just admitted to an intent to murder,” Egnatia said.

“And you put a knife to my neck while I was unarmed and not provoking you in any reasonable way. We all have some crimes we commit. I keep my secrets, you keep yours, and we all continue on our little happy ways all the better. I have no intention of making enemies out of either of you or your companies, but it also doesn’t mean that I will wail under the boot like some injured puppy. Before long, you will be hearing about me everywhere you go, and I’d prefer to tell the press that I had the pleasure of meeting leaders from two of the big three right after getting my first shard.”

“Confidence,” Egnatia said.

“Arrogance.” Veph was fiddling with her wand. Vondaire watched the little piece of wood flip around her fingers so carelessly. It was such an odd habit, whether conscious or not. It was like trying to scratch an itch with the point of a knife. One little mistake could kill, but in her case, it would kill everyone.

“I’ve heard enough,” Egnatia said. She picked up the bottle of wine as she stood. “Straight to the portals once you return on the ferry. If you return to Minolitana Prima in the future, it will be on your own as a peaceful visitor. No goblin. No Hogs.”

Vondaire nodded. “As a tourist enjoying the delightful wine and seaside cafes.”

Egnatia gave him a smile. “Let’s go, Veph. I have something to show you.”

Veph slipped the wand up her sleeve. “Fine.” She stood and tapped Sylmare with her metal hand. “Satisfied?”

The spy nodded to Vondaire. “Yeah.”

Vondaire leaned back and kicked his feet up on the table. The three women walked back to the ferry, which had remained at the sandbar the entire time. Apparently Egnatia was also in control of that.

Sylmare and Veph boarded and immediately took seats and talked, while Egnatia looked back at Veph with the same smile that caused her scarred, purple cheek to wrinkle.

The ferry lurched into motion with Egnatia still staring at Vondaire.

He pretended not to notice. Nothing made him uncomfortable. He glanced over and caught her gaze.

Alright, he was uncomfortable.