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Book 4 - Chapter 14

They continued walking, swerving closer to the boundary wall and back toward the center of the floor. It was partially intentional, but it was also just difficult to navigate in the smoke. Owin could just use his map and have it up most of the time, but then he tripped over glowing crystals, and that made him remember back when his dexterity was really low.

Suta kept looking at his fingers as if he was surprised they could still form spells. “No more punching?”

“You can still punch. You can do both,” Owin said.

“There is potential,” Thalgodin said. The tall demon had apparently decided to take the lead, which Owin had thought was a little odd since he was much stronger now.

“Potential for what?”

“Combining the martial arts fighting style with spells.”

Suta had both hands raised as he looked over his hands.

“Are you okay?” Owin asked.

Suta followed behind Thalgodin, still staring at his own hands. “No.”

Owin put his hand on the familiar’s shoulder. “You didn’t hurt anybody. Myrsvai wants you to use spells. Just keep thinking about how happy he’ll be.”

Suta nodded.

They still had yet to see any mobs other than tubeworms through the seventh floor. Stationary enemies weren’t difficult to avoid, even if they did sometimes block the path. With all the grenades, the fifth floor felt more difficult. For others, the sixth might have also been difficult, but it hadn’t really been much of a challenge for Owin. The Vile Fiend probably didn’t willingly let itself get eaten most of the time, but the floor had still been easy. Even if he did skip fighting the water elemental.

Thalgodin killed most of the tubeworms they came across while trying to goad Suta into using more spells. The familiar still hesitated and checked with Owin before ever acting. If he kept that up, it wouldn’t be any help for Myrsvai. Suta needed to act on his own, using spells to kill enemies before they ever got too close.

Thalgodin stopped. His wings extended to their full reach as he lifted his axe. “I believe we may need your assistance, Owin.”

“Why?” Owin walked right under the demon’s wing and arms until he stood in the front. Being so much smaller, yet so much stronger brought a smile to Owin’s face. What would Chorsay say when he saw him again?

It was difficult to see through the smoke, but the glint of gold was obvious. A chest itself wasn’t a sign of a battle, but if it was the chest with a guardian, then the boss was somewhere close.

Flames appeared as little signals all through the water, then quickly extinguished, leaving only a stream of bubbles. In the brief flash of light, Owin caught just enough of the creature to see its size.

“What is that?”

“Prepare your Examine.” Thalgodin drew his neural swords. “I think it may be a prazene.”

“A horror?”

Flames appeared in little bursts all over part of the creature, providing Owin with enough sight to get the information.

Ocean Mob

Ansotorio

Prazene Guardian

Level 65

“It’s definitely a horror.” Owin grabbed the lich bone knife from his belt. “You want me to fight it?”

“Prazene are resistant to abyssal damage. I can provide some assistance if you need.”

“Fight,” Suta said.

“No. Not this one. I’ll get it,” Owin said. He strode forward with the knife inverted in his hand. Between the lich bone and his armor, he could manage a horror. That first fight against Baby Head had been difficult because he didn’t know what to expect. He needed to avoid its blood and any direct hits. That was all easy enough.

Level 65 had once seemed impossible. If Nikoletta or Siora had been that strong, Owin wouldn’t have had a chance to survive. Artivan would’ve died on the third floor while trying to save Owin. It all would have been over so fast.

But now, level 65 didn’t scare him at all. And neither would anything else.

“Thief.”

Owin spun and stabbed with his knife, hitting only water. He glanced around quickly, only able to see the black smoke nearby with Suta and Thalgodin standing together in the distance.

Fire from the horror illuminated the area directly behind him.

“Thief.” The voice was like a hiss directly in his ear.

Owin closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The word repeated, sounding as if it came from his other side, like something was touching his ear.

When he had taken damage from Baby Head, Owin had seen Nikoletta and nearly hurt himself or his friends in that confused rage. Horrific damage messed with his mind, so why wouldn’t a stronger horror be able to use spells to confuse him?

It didn’t matter what he heard. Ansotorio was behind him, unable to hide with its underwater flames.

Owin turned back around, ignoring the voice still whispering in his ear. The horror had approached. It moved slowly as pulses of light blue energy radiated off of it. As each pulse passed over him, he heard the whisper again. The spell was easy to spot now that he knew what to expect.

He had no chance of naming the spell or even saying how it worked, but knowing there was a spell at all helped his focus stay on the creature in front of him and not the growing chorus of voices.

Flames appeared from the ends of six hairy tendrils on the worm’s face. The whole horror looked like a hairy worm. One huge blue eye was positioned right in the middle of its flower-like face, with the fiery tendrils acting like the petals.

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“Creature.”

Owin lowered his brow and crouched. “The last prazene couldn’t talk.”

“Mob.”

“You can’t scare me.” The eye was clearly the target on the horror, but diving straight at it could open Owin up to get hit by the flames, which could also inflict horrific damage. He wasn’t sure how it worked and he hoped he wouldn’t learn.

Ansotorio continued insulting Owin, calling him mindless and a monster while he slowly approached, still crouched. Insults weren’t going to work. He had already heard it all. He had experienced it all. The only thing that worried Owin anymore was the safety of his friends, and what could this horror do?

“Weak.”

Owin pounced, staying low. The horror flinched like he was aiming for its eye. A membrane closed over the blue eyeball as all the tendrils folded inward, shooting fire and boiling water directly in front of the eye.

Owin’s speed carried him directly over the ground, straight past the worm. The lich bone tore into the creature’s skin, spilling poisonous blood into the water in a burst behind Owin. He stopped and jumped back as the horror turned to attack. Its pulsing spell continued, but as soon as he had started moving, Owin had stopped listening and hardly even noticed it at all.

Dark blood joined the smoke, making it difficult to see the horror until the fire illuminated the area again. It was a slow moving mob, and now with its side cut open, it was moving even slower. There was nothing to be scared of. He could kill it before it could react.

Owin waited for the mob to spot him again, then swapped hands with his knife and immediately dashed again like he was going to cut open its other side. The horror glowed blue as it prepared a spell, but before it could cast, Owin pivoted, jumped, and swiped the lich bone across the horror’s blue eye. Flames erupted as soon as he passed. Heat washed over him without touching his health.

He hit the ground and skidded on the stone as the horror’s body went limp. Blood spilled from the corpse, forming a cloud in the water.

“Stay back from the blood,” Owin said.

Suta sprinted up and ran right into Owin. “No fists.” He mimicked stabbing. “No magic.”

“Because my spells don’t work down here. Remember?”

Suta chittered.

“We don’t have to fight the same to be friends, Suta.”

The familiar made some more noises and pointed to the chest. Thalgodin was already on his way. The demon stood beside the chest, leaning on his axe.

Owin popped the top open and leaned on the lip, looking inside. Suta joined him and Thalgodin leaned over them both to look inside.

“Bone.” Suta pointed at the dark gray bone inside.

“He’s going to be excited.”

“Who?” Thalgodin asked.

“Uh. You’ll find out soon.” Owin grabbed the Bone of the Withered Shade and stuffed it into his bag. There was also a shield potion inside, which Owin took and put on his belt.

“Want to go find Myrsvai and Shade?” Owin asked.

Suta nodded and pointed to the left.

“They’re that way.”

Suta shrugged, but continued pointing. Owin positioned the familiar in front of him and guided Suta forward.

“If you can sense him, I’ll follow you.”

Thalgodin followed silently behind with all of his weapons out and ready.

***

Shade glowed in the dark water with magenta abyssal armor surrounding him. The skeleton shrieked and tried to duck as a massive white claw smacked him in the face. His head popped right off and rolled until it bumped into Myrsvai’s metal leg.

“Dammit, Shade.” Myrsvai spun abyssal fire around his staff. This wasn’t the type of fight he was ready for. Suta had already summoned something, so Mrysvai was limited to summoning a weapon, and there was nothing he could do with that.

If Shade was even the slightest bit competent, Mrysvai would give him a weapon, but that was likely a waste of mana. Mana he couldn’t afford to lose at the moment. The strain of multiple summons was already taking its toll.

Hellish Torrent was the best option, but it could incapacitate him, and if the boss was still alive . . .

He needed to do something else.

“Insight,” Myrsvai said as he used the ability. He knew for a short time, Suta would see the same as Myrsvai. They could swap it so Myrsvai saw Suta’s perspective, but now wasn’t the time. He needed Owin or Suta to fight properly.

“I didn’t used to be so weak,” Myrsvai muttered.

“Weak? You look strong from here,” Shade said.

Myrsvai kicked the skeleton’s head aside.

Ocean Mob

Straca

Decapod Mutineer

Level 65

The crab boss was white, making it stand out in the black smoke. Yellow hair-like spikes covered every bit of its body. Even when Owin and Suta arrived, Myrsvai wasn’t sure they would have a way to fight the creature. Owin’s strategy usually involved jumping onto things, which wouldn’t work against this.

“Abyssal Barrage,” Myrsvai said, sending the magenta flames from his staff into a powerful spell. It battered the crab, breaking some yellow spikes off, but did nothing to the white shell.

“You might want to hit it harder,” Shade shouted.

“I don’t have that many spells.” Myrsvai lifted his staff and cast Dread Bind. He channeled as much mana into the spell as he could afford, draining his bar by half. Abyssal tendrils appeared from the ground, wrapping around every limb of the crab before smashing it against the ground. Weaker mobs could be crushed to death.

Mrysvai only hoped to stall for the moment.

“How did you get this far if you can’t fight?” Shade asked.

“I’m a summoner, Shade.” Myrsvai cut off Abyssal Armor from the skeleton since it wasn’t helping anyway.

Shade’s body drunkenly walked over, picked up the skull, and fit it back on. “And you still willingly split up? I feel like this was a bad idea. At least Owin can fight without me. Actually, he probably fights a lot better without me! It doesn’t mean I won’t force my way into the fights because I do love the attention, but I can be distracting. Did you know—”

Straca broke free of the tendrils and smacked Shade with its claw. The skeleton poofed into gray dust. Straca, the decapod mutineer, whatever that meant, advanced slowly, methodically. It was difficult to tell if a boss was intelligent in the ordinary sense or if they were a mindless mob.

Either way, it no longer had a distraction and walked straight at Myrsvai. Its white, chitin-covered legs tapped against the stone ground.

Myrsvai sighed. He was going to have to use Hellish Torrent and hope it didn’t get him killed.

Something exploded far off to his right. It reminded him of an alchemist’s bomb, but there weren’t any alchemists on the floor. He would’ve known if there was one ahead or behind in their long journey through the Ocean.

Was it one of the hydrothermal vents?

A sharp pain pricked his brain.

Worry.

Anger.

Desperation.

Suta was panicking.

Myrsvai swapped his Insight vision. Shade and Thalgodin stood at Suta’s sides with a crater directly in front of him. Bits of rock fell from above, drifting down in the water. The explosion had been right in front of Suta. An explosion . . .

Owin appeared like a meteor, moving so fast Myrsvai only registered what he saw as a green and red ball. The Incandescent Blade ignited, boiling the water as Owin spun right before landing on top of the boss.

His red chitin boots crushed the yellow spikes as he hit Straca. Cracks slithered from the point of impact on the crab’s back. With the momentum, Owin finished the swing of the fiery Incandescent Blade, slashing straight through half of the boss.

Owin shifted his stance and ripped the sword out, tearing through the rest of Straca. The flame vanished, likely as the rest of his mana ran dry.

Straca collapsed and some meager experience floated in Myrsvai’s vision.

“Are you okay?” Owin asked.

Myrsvai nodded slowly. Even if he had words to say, he couldn’t even think of how to speak anymore.