Like most princesses, Cal had never had a particularly strong opinion on scorpion meat. Not until recently, at least. While the first few times she’d tried it had been enjoyable sheerly from novelty’s sake, it had quickly grown bland and boring after so much repetition.
In a strange way, she felt very similar about the creatures themselves. Horrifying and exhilarating the first few times, and certainly not an enemy she could afford to get sloppy around, but nonetheless blandly routine. Even fighting giant magical scorpions lost its appeal after the fiftieth time. For a while now, she’d been itching to clear one of the four starter biomes, if just to experience something brand new.
Today, though, all of those thoughts had disappeared.
Once again, there was a massive scorpion barreling towards her. For the first time in a long time, Cal could barely contain her excitement. While the scorpion wasn’t any different, Cal certainly was.
She felt alive. Strong. It would be the very first monster she faced with her new class.
As per usual, the ground was frosted over, and walls of ice sprung from the sand to funnel the giant arachnid towards Tess and restrict its movements.
The very moment its charge was brought to a halt, Cal was off.
“All right, Tess! Not really great at dodging things anymore, so please keep it busy!” Under the strongest Apex Shroud she could apply, the rogue-turned-warrior sprinted over to the scorpion’s side, lamenting the loss of her Dexterity as each step felt painfully slow. It was a trade-off, she knew. Even as she ran while hefting an actual sword, courtesy of all their crypt looting, her stamina barely budged.
Which is nice, but not really the point. Was the class change even worth it?
She thought so. She hoped so. It had been three days since Cal and Verin had sundered their classes, and by now, they’d long since spent a good chunk of their class points and familiarized themselves with their skills.
For Cal, that hadn’t entailed much. With only 13 points to spend, she hadn’t exactly gone on a shopping spree. With Indefatigable Onslaught’s class space split into two directions -- one for recovery and one for power -- seven of those points had gone into recovery skills. Inexhaustible Wellspring made each point of Wisdom give more maximum mana and mana regeneration, while Unending Tenacity did the same for her Endurance.
Five of those points, however, had gone into one final skill. As Cal got into position, she readied her blade accordingly.
Empowered Strike
A close cousin of Tess’s Overload Weapon, the skill greedily sucked up whatever mana Cal offered to it, going one step further in draining her stamina as well. Wanting to see just how far the skill could take her, Cal made no effort to rein the skill in, feeding it as much as it asked for. Even with her Perception so heavily dulled now, she could feel as her sword pulsed with barely restrained energy.
At least enough to crack the armor, she prayed. Even her armor-piercing daggers had done little against the creature’s thick carapace. At such a low level and with so few class points, Cal knew not to ask the impossible from her class, but it could at least manage that much, right?
With an awkward swing as if holding a bat, Cal unleashed all the stored up energy, slashing her blade into the scorpion’s leg.
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One moment, Verin was simply standing there, calmly watching the fight unfold; the next, she was flinching backwards as an abrupt (and unpleasantly loud) series of cracks and crunches filled the desert air.
While her view of the scorpion was partially obscured courtesy of the ice walls she’d surrounded it with, that did nothing to block the sight of one oversized scorpion leg launching itself over the barrier. The leg sailed straight over Tess, a sprinkler of scorpion blood coating her head with blue speckles before it smashed into the sand with a dull thud.
Before even the scorpion could process what had just happened, one voice offered a deep and insightful commentary.
“Did I just…” it whispered out.
In short order, that whisper transformed into a blaring shout: “Wait, fuck yeah!”
Even as the scorpion began to thrash about, hissing for all it was worth, Calilah vanished, reappearing just ahead of Verin. Dropping her bloody sword, she used both hands to energetically gesture at the scorpion as it swiped at Tess.
“Did you see that? Holy hells! That was just one swing! I got, like, three entire levels in Swords from that! Is this what it’s like to have a combat class? I mean, I did dump almost a third of my entire mana and stamina into that attack, but I figured I’d need at least a few more hits. You saw that, right? Tell me one of you saw-”
So fast did Cal stop that Verin was almost worried she was suffering some sort of backlash from her attack. But no. Just as soon as she stopped, she was back at it again.
“Wait, if I’m packing that kind of a punch, why am I even bothering with the legs? I could just-” Whatever she’d been about to say was lost as Cal grabbed her sword and vanished.
Before Verin could make a shred of sense out of the princess’s antics, it was over. Another sickening crunch heralded the end of the fight, the scorpion crashing to the ground. Lodged horizontally into its head, Cal’s blade had cut nearly halfway through the creature, pulping its brains in an executioner’s strike. Right behind the blade stood its wielder, wildly grinning atop the back of the beast.
“Tremble! Quake! Fear my mighty power!” The princess cackled with glee.
Despite herself, Verin did have to admit she looked quite impressive perched above the felled scorpion.
That was, until she slipped on some blood and tumbled headfirst into the sand.
“Ach! Damn. I miss my Dexterity. But still! Fear me!”
Shaking her head, Verin went to help the newly-clumsy warrior up. Even as she did so, she couldn’t help but feel a little jealous.
Happy too, of course. It was undeniably a great boon that Cal’s class had ended up being so strong. But after that, how would Verin possibly compare?
She was all too well aware that she was about to find out.
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Just as the trio had set things up to let Calilah test her skills, so too did they set up for Verin. This time, however, things were a bit different. Whereas Verin usually only summoned a handful of ice walls, for the upcoming fight, she created as many as she could, layering them behind one another.
Rather than forcing the scorpion towards Tess, Verin hoped to cage it entirely. She’d positioned the walls in a wide U-shape, leaving a small opening in the front for her to see through. Once Tess led the beast in, Verin would add more walls to the back, locking it in entirely.
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Not permanently, of course. No matter how many layers of ice she conjured, the sheer bulk and strength of the scorpion would undo them in time. Time, however, was the key word. More than she had realized when she’d chosen it, much of Verin’s new class revolved around time.
“I believe my preparations are complete. I will be activating my defensive skill, after which point, I will be unable to communicate. I will be relying on you to keep me safe, but as a reminder, please do not intervene until I appear to be in danger. I am hoping to see just how thoroughly I can slow it down before it reaches me. With that being said, please bring it over after a minute or so.”
Thus said, Verin activated two of her new skills in tandem, pulling up their descriptions as she did so.
Advancing Glacier
Entomb yourself in a clear glacier of protective ice. Within the glacier, you can turn about, breathe, and cast spells as you would normally, but are otherwise immobilized. While this skill is active, the advancing glacier will gradually siphon off your mana regeneration to grow in size, quickly at first, and then more slowly as it expands.
This expansion can be toggled off at any time.
This skill may be canceled at any time, at which point the glacier will crack open to release you.
As advertised, ice began to sprout from her skin, growing as if alive until she was held firmly in the center of a small pyramid-shaped glacier. It was a bizarre experience being able to freely breathe in such an environment, but not at all uncomfortable.
Not until Verin had first entered her new class space had she realized just how important Advancing Glacier was. As best she could tell, somewhere between a third and a half of her class skills interfaced with it in some way.
Many of those skills were defensive in nature, increasing the ice’s durability or repair rate. Some, however, were passably offensive -- or at least as offensive as her skills could be. The second skill she activated was in this category, with a neat circle of frost coating the ground in a wide radius around her glacier.
Glacial Zone
Create a ring of frost around your Advancing Glacier. As your glacier grows, the glacial zone does as well.
Any enemies within the glacial zone have their frost resistance reduced and receive a minor, stacking slow for each second spent within. While within your Advancing Glacier, increases the range of your class skills and non-damaging frost spells, allowing you to target enemies anywhere within the Glacial Zone.
On reading the description, Verin had briefly entertained the notion of spreading the skill over the entire desert at once, hailing down debuffs on her enemies while safely nestled within her glacier. And perhaps she would be able to do such a thing -- in twenty levels or so.
Ignoring the fact that her mana regeneration was nowhere near high enough to grow the skill that large, it didn’t actually grant her any perceptive powers. Even if an enemy was within her Glacial Zone, Verin still had to be able to see it to target the foe with any spells, which she wouldn’t be able to do after a certain point.
For now, it had a much more modest radius, about five meters out from her glacier. Verin watched as the zone slowly crept into the cage of ice walls she’d built. When at last the skill covered the bulk of her cage, she toggled off her glacier’s expansion. At the same time, Tess shot off, returning soon thereafter with a scorpion in tow. With her Dexterity now uncontestedly the highest out of all of them, Tess had no trouble leading the creature by the nose, depositing it perfectly into her makeshift cage.
The very moment the scorpion stepped into her Glacial Zone, Verin got to work. Admittedly, that work wasn’t anything too complicated: So far, Verin had only grabbed two targeted class skills. In quick succession, she activated them both.
Glaciate was a fairly standard slow debuff, stiffening a target with frost on top of applying a small Dexterity penalty. As Verin fired the skill off, a few thin patches of ice sprouted on the scorpion’s carapace, not doing much more than changing its appearance. Even without looking at her notifications, she could tell the creature had partially resisted the skill, its level dwarfing her own.
Clinging Permafrost was technically an immobilization skill, but a fairly weak one, creating a thin shell of ice connecting the target’s feet to the ground. Against something as massive as the scorpion, Verin had low hopes for the skill, using it more as a trial run than anything else. She activated it with the expectation that the beast would barely notice it.
On one count, she’d been correct. Faced with the weight and momentum of the charging arachnid, the skill stood no chance, the ice shattering the very second it formed. What she had greatly underappreciated, however, was how much stronger the skill would be on something with more than two feet. Facing even the small amount of resistance on eight limbs at once, the scorpion’s coordination gave out. Even as Tess cleared the cage and escaped through the small opening, the scorpion sprawled out on the icy sand, bleeding a great deal of momentum.
That didn’t mean it had stopped, however, as multiple layers of her ice cage gave out from the resulting collision. Already fast at work, Verin summoned more of them, a few to reinforce her side of the cage, but most to fence off the other side, locking the beast within.
Success. Now to see how long I am able to hold it.
Just as Verin was able to see the scorpion, so too was it able to see her, a fact it made clear as it moved straight for her, hissing and screeching all the while. So single-minded was its fury that Verin wondered if the back of the cage had even been necessary.
Glaciate. Clinging Permafrost. Glaciate. Over and over, Verin applied each debuff the very moment she was able to, watching with grim fascination as the repeated applications broke through the level barrier. What had begun as tiny circles of frost were now well on their way to covering the creature. Better yet, Clinging Permafrost actually started to work now that it didn’t have the scorpion’s momentum to deal with. Naturally, the desert arachnid still managed to pull itself free, but each second it wasted was another chance for Glacial Zone to slow it further.
I will confess, this is going more smoothly than I would have imagined. Truthfully, she’d been half sure that the scorpion would barrel through all of her ice in a few seconds without Tess to hold it back. Instead, she still had half her initial ice walls between her and the beast, and she watched in real time as its movements gradually slowed.
Bit by bit, however, its giant pincers cleared a path forward. When at last the final ice wall fell, Verin decided she’d tested her skills enough.
As good a time as any for one of the others to step in, yes? Slow as the enemy was, Verin had no doubt that either of them could finish it off in this state.
It was somewhat curious, then, that the scorpion continued to amble closer, and closer, and closer, slowly covering the short distance between its cage and Verin’s Advancing Glacier.
They do… They do not perceive me to be in danger. In fairness, the glacier had advanced a solid two meters out from her, a great deal of ice still between her and her target. On the flip side, Verin was traditionally a backline fighter, which meant she’d yet to get so close to one of the creatures while it was still alive.
As the scorpion raised its pincer to crack open her glacier, she decided she vastly preferred it that way. Down came the beast’s wrath, judgment descending with a slow surety, until-
Plink.
A few small chips of ice came off of her glacier.
Momentarily stunned, Verin even stopped applying her skills before hastily remembering herself.
Glaciate. Glaciate. Glaciate. At some point, the permafrost had fully taken hold, rooting the scorpion in place and allowing her to forgo the skill. Instead, she sank more and more of her mana into her slow, at times having to pause for it to recharge. Even then, Glacial Zone went to work, bit by bit slowing the creature over the course of minutes.
Until, eventually, Verin stopped.
After all, there wasn’t any reason to keep going any longer.
Now covered in a complete coating of ice, the scorpion lay curled up before her. At any moment, she half-expected it to break free and continue its assault, but it seemed her continuous barrage of slows had finally done the job. The once mighty creature no longer could move a muscle.
I… did that. By myself. It was a heady experience, tempered only by the fact that she would need one of the others to actually kill the thing. Right as she thought that, however, an unexpected notification rolled in.
You have killed a Sand-encrusted Scorpion! You have earned 308xp.
Wide-eyed, Verin took in the frozen corpse, only belatedly realizing something important about her class.
Just because my skills do not deal any direct damage does not mean my enemies will be immune to low temperatures. This was no Law’s Embrace -- even with a peace-aligned class, her skills did not magically protect their targets from the environment.
With the realization, not even the endless black sky was enough to keep her down.
For the first time since sundering her class, Verin smiled bright and wide.