I could not believe what was inside this chest. I reached down and picked up the solid black metal chest piece. It had skulls on both shoulders, and it could see the back piece waiting to attach to the front.

“Oh, shite that's badass!” Dirk shouted as I held up the treasure from the chest. “I wish I had something like that.”

Turk groaned and shook his head.

“It’s plate. You don’t wear platemail. That is a piece for Dad or Vreek.”

Vreek laughed and shook his head no.

“That is for Zolb. It screams that it was designed for him.”

I smiled and undid the old leather armor I had been wearing for over a month. It was barely held together by a spit and small leather straps. I could not wait to put this armor on.

“Turk, help me make sure it's fastened right.”

I held the chest piece up, and it was like it knew my size. No matter how massive my chest muscles were, the plate seemed to reshape itself to barely touch them so there would be no chafing between it and my shirt. When Turk put the back side up against me the clasps connected on their own, and I felt like my armor was hugging me. I felt power flowing through me, almost like when I held my sword. I was unsure what the armor provided, but I could feel my muscles bursting with more power and strength.

“I feel so much more alive. Like I could easily lift things I could not even dream of picking up before.”

I grabbed the massive ten-foot sword and could almost now hold it in one hand and swing. I had grown a lot stronger with the addition of the chest piece.

“Did you really just get that much stronger?” Vreek asked as he watched me move the sword around with one hand.

It was difficult and impractical, but I figured out the balance aspect of the sword and could get a few small, controlled swings in.

“This is crazy,” I mumbled as I dropped the massive sword to the ground and pulled out my sword.

I could feel even more raw power and energy flowing through me with both of these pieces. I now knew why the goblins and orcs had spent time farming in here. A year in here with the same party would make that party much stronger and better equipped.

“Who is ready to try the next boss?” I asked with a grin.

Dirk laughed and raised his hand while Vreek shook his head and chuckled.

“Here, you can have my sword back. Maybe this time you won’t need so much help.”

I laughed and took Vreek’s sword and could feel the difference in speed when I swung both swords now.

“Ok, which boss next?”

We decided on doing the yeti boss next. Why not stay with the order we had originally fought these creatures in? The golem was to be the last one we might attempt. If it blew up like all the others did, we wanted to ensure we had as few people as possible near it. It would also be better to have the use of the whole open area if that happened.

“Possible boss skills?” I asked as we stood outside of its cavern.

“Something cold-related. Frost breath, perhaps?”

I nodded and shrugged.

“Maybe that, but I know fire doesn’t work on it. Same plan as last time?”

“You mean you almost die, and we save your butt?”

I went to thump Dirk, but he dodged me and laughed. Even when our lives were on the line, he always seemed to be the source of humor in our group.

“Only one way to find out, charge like Dirk does,” I joked.

With that, I ran at the yeti boss with both swords, ready for action.

The yeti boss turned and roared at me as I charged at him. He started to swing his arms like he was almost swimming. Seeing a fifteen-foot yeti waving his arms at you is a weird sight, but it gets even worse when ten-foot-long ice spears magically start flying from his hands.

Stolen story; please report.

I dodged as fast as I could, barely avoiding the onslaught of spears that rained down at me. I tried closing the distance, but the boss never seemed to run out of these magically appearing spears. Every time his hand came forward a spear was launched at me. They would shatter and splinter the moment they hit the bricks that lined the floor of his room. I had small pieces of ice clinging to me from all the ones that shattered on the ground near me.

I spent a good two minutes running and dodging, but there appeared to be no end in sight of how many of these he could throw.

“DIRK I NEED HELP!” I shouted as I deflected one of the spears that had almost hit me with my sword. Splinters came off of the spear as it slid off Light Drinker, and I felt the cold sting of the splinters lodge into my wrist.

I could not understand why I was having a harder time dodging his attacks. I saw Dirk appear under the boss, and he struck a blow to the right leg with both his daggers right behind the knee.

The boss yelled and started stomping his feet, ice shards projecting out from them and almost impaling Dirk as he jumped back and away from him. The boss turned to face Dirk, who was moving back to get a little space between the two of them.

With his attention on Dirk, I dashed toward the boss and realized I was slower. Glancing at my feet, I saw my skin turning slightly blue.

The ice shard! They must be freezing my legs and slowing me down!

I noticed that the areas of my arm that had gotten struck by the ice shards were now turning blue, and I could feel my forearms getting colder.

I put that all out of my mind and focused on the boss before me. This was not a boss we could fight long-term. The effects of his attacks would slow us down to the point we could offer no resistance, and we would die or have to leave the labyrinth.

Two spears had already been tossed at Dirk as I finished covering the twenty yards that were between the boss and me.

The moment I got within ten feet of the yeti, it turned to face me and started to prepare to stomp.

“TURK!” I shouted as I changed direction and watched as the Yeti slammed a foot down, and an ice spear erupted from the ground and out at where I was headed a moment ago.

A lightning arrow struck the yeti in the back of the head and every second after that, another one continued to pound its head. Roaring, it held up its arm and tried to protect its face as it swung one arm in the direction Turk was, throwing a spear where it believed Turk was.

I glanced across the room and saw Turk strafing as he fired magical arrows at the boss. He was able to keep the same speed and focus on the boss while moving to the side the boss had to protect with his arm, thus limiting the area the boss could see and attack from.

“Now, Dirk!”

Both Dirk and I rushed back in while Turk had the boss distracted. I came for the same leg that Dirk had already injured, and he went for the left leg.

Both swords connected in a full-strength swing, and I saw a chunk of flesh and fur fly from the side of the yeti’s knee. It was as if I had attacked a tree trunk and managed to chop off a large piece from the trunk. I knew I still had a lot of work to do, but soon we could take this leg off and use the lack of mobility against it.

The yeti started to lift its left foot and stomp at me when Dirk came under its foot and jabbed both daggers right into its tender sole. That attack caused the boss to jump onto its damaged right leg and howl in pain and anger as Dirk jumped into the shadow underneath the boss and disappeared.

I started to swing for another hit on the yeti’s bad leg when I saw his hand coming down for me and rolled to the side. An ice spear slammed into the ground near me, and my side was impaled with multiple small shards. Tiny amounts of pain erupted across my entire side, but worse yet was the feeling that my body was starting to tighten up.

As I rolled and came to stand up, the boss had turned toward me and was ignoring Turk and his salvo of arrows. It raised both hands high in the air, and I saw a white glow from around its fist start to form.

“Run!” I shouted as I tried to move away from it.

As I ran I saw Dirk had jumped back under the boss and swinging his daggers for the same knee we had been working on.

As Dirk drove both daggers into the boss’s knee, it bent forward and slammed both hands into the ground, releasing a shockwave of ice spears that erupted from the ground in a full circle around it for twenty feet.

I found myself impales in the leg and side closest to it. Blood was running down my side as I desperately glanced for Dirk.

As I looked, trying to find him somehow under the yeti with all those ice shards going everywhere, I felt my eyes not working. The world started to go fuzzy, and I heard the boss roar as I started to crash for toward the ground. Just before I knew I was going to hit the stone tiles, the world went dark.

“DAD! Wake up!”

My head felt like it had been crushed under a few hundred rocks, and then I had been rolled over and had the process repeated on the other side. I could feel pain in my legs, side, and arm where I remembered getting struck by the ice.

Groaning, I opened my eyes and saw that we were no longer in the boss's room. Vreek must have broken the gem. I could barely get my eyes open, and I felt hands rolling me onto my back.

“Chew this now!”

I recognized the voice. It was Vreek. I felt something being shoved between my teeth and hands working my jaw. I felt cold. So cold. I could taste something on my tongue as my jaws were being manhandled. A heart. They were feeding me a heart. I chewed as best as I could but it was more of what they did. I swallowed when I could and felt another piece forced into my mouth. Over and over, this happened multiple times. I could feel myself getting feeling a little more normal and could finally chew and swallow on my own.

Then I remembered what I was forgetting.

“Dirk!” I called out with a groan. “How is Dirk?”

I glanced up and saw Vreek over me and putting another piece of a heart in my mouth. His eyes were wet, and he was shaking his head.

I tried to sit up but my body was still frozen.

“Turk! Where is Dirk?!”

I heard crying to my left and finally managed to force my body to let me roll enough and look at where the crying was coming from.

The moment my eyes saw what was next to me of me, I felt the tears running down my cheeks.