Ray would have enjoyed doing so many things except facing off against the Floor Lord just then. He had a whole arsenal full of new spells to check, new stats to confirm that he had received correctly, new strategies to figure out and implement.
Hell, he even had a ton of new rewards from clearing the dungeon that he could have gone over. But no. He had to confront the Handler right this moment.
Not that he was completely against it. The fighting between the Floor Lord and Kredevel had come to a pause, but only because the weaker Sylvan had basically been beaten. Ray’s heart quavered. He couldn’t tell if his friend was actually dead. They were still too distant for Primordial Gauge to confirm Kredevel’s status.
Which was why Ray hurried forward.
The distance did afford him the briefest amount of time to note his surroundings. Ruined though the old Everair palace was, with its cracked walls, fallen pillars, and debris littering everywhere, it was still huge. Still majestic in the splendour it hinted at with the faded murals, the remainder of the stained glass windows, and the auric and argent sheens and shimmers here and there.
It was a little hard to believe that they were the only ones in this entire place. Where were the rest of the Sylvans? He was pretty certain he couldn’t have killed them all in the dungeon.
“Welcome, human,” the Handler said. His voice boomed across the vast open space. “I am Olgolair, the Lord of the First Floor. I am grateful to you for bringing the final piece of my puzzle.”
Ray crossed the vast space until the Floor Lord’s figure was clearer. The Sylvan looked as strong as he had to be. He was bigger, more powerfully built than any Sylvan he had seen yet. Where Ray would have called most Sylvans elvish, this one was clearly more ogrelike. He wore fancy silver armour over his robe, mirroring the fierce yet haughty expression he had on.
A quick look with Primordial Gauge convinced Ray that he was in for a heck of a time.
[Primordial Gauge]
Olgolair Hew Eighth-worn [Denizen]
Race: Sylvan
Path: Path of Core Growth [Epic]
Class: Propulsor Enigmatist [Epic] [Tier 4] at Level 29
Skills:
Propulsive Point [Tier 5]: Imbue any location you touch with Propulsion Mana. At Tier 5, this skill can cast up to 5 propulsive points at once, each lasting 150 seconds.
Sylvan Dominance [Tier 6]: Aura of astral projection that automatically refills Mana. This Aura manifests in the element of the wielder’s Path. Your extended presence will note the aura of other beings in your aura’s vicinity. Domination ensures your aura will supersede any Aura up to a Tier above. At Tier 6, this spell’s range extends to 30 meters.
Blooming Perception [Tier 6]: Claim absolute detection of any living being within the spell’s vicinity, including precognition of any Mana conjured into an ability. At Tier 6, the spell’s vicinity extends to 30 meters.
Propulsive Blanket [Tier 7]: Cover yourself in propulsive force, an aura that repels everything. At Tier 7, this spell lasts 140 seconds, reducing all damage and status affliction below this spell’s Tier, and 21% of the damage of any ability at or above this spell’s Tier.
Armoured Growth [Tier 6]: Imbue yourself with Growth Mana to create a slowly-growing encasing that negates incoming damage. At Tier 6, 12% of all incoming damage is negated per minute of growth.
Weaponized Growth [Tier 5]: Turn your Growth Mana into an armament. At Tier 5, this skill creates a weapon with maximum mass of 10 kilograms.
Projected Growth [Tier 6]: Imbue Growth Mana into your vicinity. When used upon a living target directly, target is infected with Growth Mana and can be used to extend the range of this skill as far as the target goes. At tier 6, this skill’s regular range is 18 meters, while infected Growth Mana lasts until this skill used destructively upon the target.
Compressive Blast [Tier 5]: Compress power before unleashing it in a thunderous, detonating blast. At Tier 5, this spell can compress any Mana up to 5 times.
Stored Rejuvenation [Tier 4]: Unleash stored Growth Mana that rejuvenates your soul. At Tier 4, this spell replenishes 40% of your Recovery and Mana.
Propulsive Enigmatist? Was that even a word?
Anyway, a bunch of Tier 5 and 6 abilities made sense for a Denizen at level 29. He was just glad this level difference wasn’t too much for his new spell, like it had been with the Eternal Guardian.
But beyond just the list of abilities, Primordial Gauge had also highlighted the Floor Lord’s… aura? Ray wasn’t sure how else to describe the shimmering blanket of light around the Sylvans’ leader. No, not light. Mana. Amethyst in colour, just like all the Growth Mana Ray had seen in action.
Except for a few spots underneath in his armpit and the base of his neck. Those areas glowed dull red. Ray frowned. Was Primordial Gauge pointing out weak spots?
He really ought to have seen the spell description before all this madness started.
Ray was also pretty certain the Projected Growth description was different from the last time he had seen it on a different Sylvan. That sort of explained how he had been able to strike at Ray from such a huge distance away. Wild. He would have to be wary about it.
“What are you trying to accomplish here?” Ray asked.
He nudged his chin at the assortment of stuff the Floor Lord had gathered in the centre of the chamber.
Though, Ray didn’t pay attention to it for long. His question had been meant to keep his opponent occupied, while his eyes fell on Kredevel.
The injured Sylvan was dragging himself backwards, leaving a trail of blood along the tiled floor. His arm looked broken, wounds of various sizes peppering his back, shoulders, and waist. It was almost as though the Floor Lord had intentionally targeted Kredevel’s torso.
“I am rather curious how your managed to seduce one of my own away from me,” the Floor Lord said, staring distastefully at Kredevel. “I will tell you about my plans, but in return, I want you to tell me what you told him.”
Ray looked up at the Floor Lord. That expression of his was starting to rankle. What Ray had taken to be haughtiness went beyond that. The look of sheer, callus disdain was one he saw only ever in the eyes of those who considered their subject far, far beneath them.
Steeling himself against the sudden surge of frustration, Ray said, “I only told him that he deserved better.”
Stepping forward, Ray reached down and was about to help Kredevel stand, but the Sylvan waved him off. He continued crawling across the floor.
Kredevel: I can sense your concern, but I will be fine. Focus on your battle. The Handler may not show it, but I have weakened his reserves. Now is your greatest opportunity to end him.
Ray: Got it. I wish had something like a health potion but uh…
Kredevel: Worry not, I will survive. Beware that is not just his innate strength. The Floor Lord hoards items that boost his capabilities even further.
Ray nodded just a bit. He had figured as much. If Ray could possess powerful items, then so could anyone else, especially the most powerful Denizen on the Floor.
It felt a little off to let Kredevel continue as he was, but Ray wasn’t one to disrespect anyone’s harmless wishes, no matter how odd they were. So instead, he focused on the Floor Lord.
“Deserve better…” the Handler mused. He shook his head, the tiny jewels on his spiralling amethyst horns clinking and glinting. “Of course. A mantra for the weak and un-achieved. A small saying to make yourselves feel better. For you see, one who is strong enough doesn’t need to tell oneself about deserving anything. One has already taken it.”
“I don’t care to debate you, Floor Lord Olgolair.” The name was even more unfamiliar to Ray than “Kredevel”, so he knew he was pronouncing it a bit oddly. “Your turn now. You’re supposed to be telling me about your little master plan.”
“Was I?” His dark lips slashed into a grin. “Should I? You believe you can saunter in here and demand whatever you want?”
This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.
“Oh, I already know a chunk. You want to convert Mana between different variants. You also want to control the Eternal Guardian using the Tower Node of the Songstress. That was what you had your Sylvans trying to retrieve from the airfield dungeon.” It was Ray’s turn to grin as he called up the Tower Node of the Songstress. “Looks like that part of your plan failed.”
The Floor Lord was about to reply, but he was interrupted by the arrival of more Sylvans in the vicinity.
Ray tensed as the warnings about Total Perception and Sylvan Pride flooded in. None of the newcomers were anywhere near as strong as the Floor Lord, but the odds were definitely not in his favour here.
The new Sylvans had paused upon seeing Ray, but the Floor Lord ushered them in close. A small relief, that. At least, this wasn’t a planned manoeuvre to overwhelm Ray with numbers.
“What is it?” the Handler asked.
The lead Sylvan once more glanced at Ray, with a strong dose of suspicion and anger, before facing his superior. “I am afraid that several of the besiegers have broken through the first perimeter and will reach the palace soon, my lord. We are shoring up the preliminary personnel defences, but I wanted to ask if… if what you were looking into was ready.”
That hesitation. Clearly, these Sylvans—or perhaps, just the Floor Lord himself—was cooking something up. Something they didn’t want to reveal to Ray, in case he warned the “besiegers”.
Speaking of whom, Ray didn’t even know they would come this far. Maya had said they would take the fight to the Sylvans, something that Ray was ostensibly doing here already. But it was still incredible to think they had pushed back the Sylvans all the way to their main base. Unless they meant something else by besiegers.
“You lost to the puny Denizens,” the Floor Lord said, his voice growing quiet but sharp with building rage. “And yet you have the audacity to ask me for assistance?”
All the Sylvans recoiled from the rebuke.
“My lord.” The leader bowed his head deeply. “Let us deal with this mongrel before you, so you may focus on what is truly important.”
“And what of the besiegers who broke through? Who shall deal with them?”
“Lastiel’s contingent is taking care of them as we speak, my lord.”
Ray blinked, recalling well the Sylvan who had absconded with Derrick Orden right before Ray had landed the killing blow. If that asshole had died, none of the Wild Tides would have been a problem any longer and Maya and the others would probably already have swept through the Sylvan defences to take over the palace.
Before the Floor Lord could accede to the Sylvan’s suggestion, Ray came up with his own. “How about another deal, Floor Lord?”
“Silence, mongrel,” the Sylvan commander said. “That you have not been killed where you stand is already a greater mercy than the likes of you deserve.”
Ray ignored him, summoning up the Tower Node of the Songstress. The floating ceramic crystal made everyone stare, including the Handler. “How about this? You beat me in a fair, one-on-one battle, and I will concede this Tower Node to you. But if I win, then I want your little puzzle for myself.”
Shocked mutters went up from all the Sylvans besides the Floor Lord and probably Kredevel somewhere farther behind. Several of them even pulled out their weapons. Ray, however, kept his eyes fixed on the only one who mattered.
“Your bargaining skills are quite lacking, human,” the Floor Lord said. “Do you not realize your terms are meaningless? The victor of this little bout you fantasize about will surely take all that is left behind by the dead.”
“Alright, fine.” Ray knew that, when bargaining and deal-striking, it was best to start higher that his actual goal so he could come down to it and claim to have “lost” when in truth, he was still winning. “How about this? If I beat you, I get a free pass to the Second Floor of the Tower. I don’t care about killing anyone. All I want is what I deserve—the Second Floor.”
“The audacity!” one of the Sylvans exclaimed.
“We will take your head for your presumptions,” another said.
Ray did well to ignore their angry mutterings because the Floor Lord held up his hand for silence. The rest of the Sylvans went quiet.
“Fine,” the Handler said. “You have proven yourself to be more capable than any other human I have seen this far on the First Floor. I agree to your little deal. If you can defeat me, I will ensure that nothing bars your path to the Second Floor. We need not speak of what happens when you perish.”
Fair enough. Ray would be dead so it wasn’t like it would matter what the Floor Lord did once he was gone.
“My lord,” the Sylvan commander began, but was interrupted pretty quickly.
“Leave us. Tend to the besiegers and let me handle this interloper. I will complete the ritual afterwards. Let none interrupt.”
Reluctant though they seemed, the Sylvans couldn’t disobey a direct order. They spared a few scathing looks at Ray before bowing at their Floor Lord and retreating back the way they had appeared.
“Prepare yourself, human,” the Handler said. “You’ve come far, killed many, ruined a great deal more than you should have. But it all ends here.”
“I don’t even know what I ruined, but alright.”
A tiny scowl passed over the Floor Lord’s silvery face. “This ritual is one of resurrection. The Everair possessed fantastic marvels that allowed them to become the world-spanning empire they grew to be. It is a crime that such marvels be lost to time, used only as set dressing for the Towers that the System draws up.”
“I thought you Sylvans were here to collect Mana. Is that too boring for you now?”
“Mana can be collected anywhere. We are doing that on all three Floors of the Tower. But to disregard the true secrets the Floors hold would be a grave sin.”
Three Floors? Ray noted that information down. It didn’t sound like a lot of Floors, but then again, this one Floor had been huge. More importantly, Ray was now intrigued on what lay beyond the Tower.
“Are these secrets that enticing?” Ray asked.
An eager, avaricious light glinted in the Floor Lord’s deep green eyes. “The Eternal Guardian is but one secret, and you already know that there exists a method to convert Mana from one form to another. But did you know that they have a device to imbue Flight Mana in everything? That they have created a means of enhancing genes with Mana itself?”
It was easy to tell that the Floor Lord had been waiting for an opportunity to talk about it all, to regale his audience with his exploits on the First Floor.
Of all that Ray heard, it was the genes one that intrigued him the most. He already knew the Everair had some capability along those lines, what with the way they created monsters in their image. But it was intriguing to realize that the Sylvans knew about genes, which suggested they possessed a lot of other advanced knowledge like humans did.
Ray barked out a short laugh. “You know, you honestly make exploring all that sound amazing. If you’d just been a friendly, cooperative guy instead of a destructive asshole, we could have had a nice time figuring it out together. I could have helped you. Instead, you went out of your way to kill me.”
The Floor Lord didn’t react to any of the insults. “You are tainted with the influence of a Paragon. More than one by this point. A mutt who will soon lose his own will. I am doing you a mercy by putting you out of your future misery.”
“We’ll see who’s putting who out of misery.”
With the conversation drawing to a close, the tension in the air continued to rise. Ray hadn’t expected things to come to a head in quite this manner. It almost felt peaceful. Weirdly natural. Maybe he was just too used to the general chaotic nature of almost all the fights he had been embroiled in so far.
This upcoming battle against the Floor Lord felt ritualistic in a way. Like they were meeting at a tournament.
Except, with the stakes that made Ray’s skin shiver in anticipation.
This was it. His moment. His chance. Everything he had gone through on the First Floor had built up to this single confrontation. Even if Ray had entertained some sort of idea to use a Brighthorn, real or fake, to complete the challenge, he had known it would come down to this.
A test of his prowess. A test to see if he could force his way through to the Second Floor, no matter what stood before him. And who better to conduct that test than the Floor Lord himself.
There were more reasons Ray couldn’t fail here. Somewhere far behind him, Maya, Dory, Joaquin, and all the others were continuing their battles. They fought on, determined to win. They were winning.
Ray had to keep up his end of the fight. If they could beat the Sylvans, then he couldn’t falter against the Floor Lord.
Because Ray’s defeat of the Handler would finally force the Sylvans to capitulate. This paradigm of the Sylvans being some sort of guides or caretakers, one that had been patently false from the very beginning, would finally topple for good. Ray wasn’t quite certain how they could manipulate the System itself to accept this change in paradigm but first, they had to achieve it.
So, with the electric feeling of True Mana coursing through his body and soul, Ray prepared to fight.
An obvious burst of power was building where the Floor Lord stood as well. Streams of pure white energy flickered like lightning around him. Spiralling, violet growths clad him like armour made of horns.
Ray remembered everything he had seen thanks to Primordial Gauge. All the abilities, all the powers. The worse aspect was that Ray himself didn’t know the full breadth of his new spells. There just hadn’t been enough time to peek at their descriptions, much less come up with the best strategies to use them.
That was alright. He had checked the newest one, and the rest were upgrades, not completely different abilities. Ray had a good approximation of what to do.
The Floor Lord’s eyes were fixed on Ray, flashing with burgeoning power. Energy gathered at his hand, blinking and pulsing as it was condensed. “This ends now.”
“Agreed,” Ray said.
With a shout, the Floor Lord thrust his arm at Ray. A blast of that same, twisting vortex of white light punched in Ray’s direction.
Mottling Spiritguard came the response. The black-and-white orbs a manifested around Ray, a dozen of them this time, all of them edged with burning scarlet energy. When the Compressive Blast from the Floor Lord arrived, one of the Spiritguard orbs absorbed it.
And exploded.
Ray had already thrown himself back, recalling the description that Primordial Gauge had offered him. Still. The little shockwave was nearly strong enough to make him fall.
With a laugh, the Floor Lord threw more. Shot after shot of his Compressive Blast arrowed in at Ray. It reminded him of the times he had used Chaos Chymify relentlessly, usually to proc Insanity. Ah, crap. Did the attacks from the Floor Lord have a status affliction? Ray hadn’t felt anything, so maybe not.
He didn’t block the Floor Lord’s attacks using Spiritguard this time. With how strong they were, it wouldn’t be effective, even if he could ensure his overall safety.
So instead, Ray used Goliath Eater, then dodged.
The skill charged through up like nothing else. If using True Mana constantly made him feel as though he was tensed up like a bowstring, then Goliath Eater doused the bowstring with gasoline and set it ablaze. Ray’s soul burned. His skin turned smoother and firmer at the same time, his muscles strengthened, his body lightened.
All of which combined to make evading the Floor Lord’s Compressive Blasts without too much difficulty.
All of which allowed Ray to zip in and get into position to counterattack.
He didn’t have to travel far. With Soulstrike At Tier 3 instead of just Tier 2 as Shatterclaw had been, the range had to have increased. As such, when Ray was an estimated 15 meters away from his opponent, he slashed his arm and used his new spell.
It was, essentially, a True Mana version of Shatterclaw that he had used before. The only difference was that it didn’t restrict itself to the form of an arm tipped with claws. No. As the Spirit Sculptor evolution description had stated, his spells were a lot more malleable now. So, with an instinctive knowledge driven by Primordial Gauge, Ray sharpened his spell into a stake.
The Floor Lord’s body glowed at the moment of impact. Spiralling horns clad his torso, forming more of the armour.
But Ray had been ready for it. He had used more Mana than strictly necessary, using the extra with the Mana Infuser ring to raise his spell’s Tier to at least 5. The draw was sharp, and he felt his Mana store decreasing rapidly. But his plan worked.
The jutting spear of black-white energy tipped with ruby red impaled through the Floor Lord’s armour, thanks to the Thoroughness bonus of piercing defences a Tier above his spell.
But despite the massive wound, he grinned.
“Ah, a true challenge.” More and more white energy writhed around him, twisting like they were alive. Yet his brilliant teeth shone unmistakeably through them. “Then allow me to hold nothing back!”