[https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1021114179333148682/1208496437575426119/arthelad1_a_metallic_golem_with_guns_instead_of_hands_on_a_gras_805ee31d-d5b7-4db9-9592-38e87ae5a6ba.png?ex=65e37f03&is=65d10a03&hm=cb8b79d06777b69bcdb0a3b3557b4934474844da4f38bb791173c25fc1d7692b&]
Someone knocked at the door. Isla groaned, pulling a pillow over her head. Cora, on the other hand, continued to sleep blissfully, the tip of her tongue hanging out of her mouth.
That was a night to remember…
Protocol or decency was the least of his worries, so Rowan opened the door of the tree hut for two inches. Outside, Hubert, the priest.
Who else? Man, he’s a pest!
“What do you want?” Rowan hissed.
“We need to talk.” Despite addressing Rowan, the Paladin’s eyes tried to peek over Rowan’s shoulder. If Rowan would have to compare the priest's gaze with something, it looked exactly like a nosy old lady's. Pushing the man back, Rowan stepped on the balcony and closed the door behind him.
“Talk.”
“I wanted to… apologize for yesterday when I doubted you. It’s just… I thought you didn't realize the limits of your power and got drunk with the idea of charity and saving people… It happens a lot to newbies.”
“Look, dude, I apologize for giving you the Stare. I didn’t do it on purpose.”
“It’s OK,” the priest waved off the excuse. "I was in the wrong to start with."
“The thing is… please don't be offended… I’m not a nice or religious guy. I think religion is BS. Not faith, to be clear, formalities. When I can help, I help, that’s all. I lived on the streets, as a kid, and—”
“I know… Your father told me.”
“He did, didn't he… Big mouth Papa Allinder… One of the hardest things I ever did was to leave behind my friends. There were other kids there, you know… Some nights, I couldn’t sleep, thinking: I had a good dinner, do they have anything to eat? Is there rain, where they sleep? I don’t know what happened to them… forgot their family names, their faces… Take this as the confession I owe you. I had a tough life, got lucky but I don’t think I owe anybody to help back. Life is tough, shit happens. If I can make other people's lives easier, I do it, but it’s not like my mission. My mission is to take care of myself and my family, first. The rest is a byproduct.… You’re not crying on me, are you.”
“N-no…” Hubert said, pretending to blow his nose.
“Get yourself together, for goodness sake!” Rowan tried to pull the Paladin by the lapels, but failed, as there were no lapels on a full metal armor. “And never, ever, wake me again if I have a late morning sleep, or I kill you. I'm not joking. I know you can Rezz.”
Hubert turned and left, taking precautions in stepping down the frail ladder. Taking on the village view in the morning, Rowan decided to go down himself. Orcs and Ogres were doing push-ups and sparing, meaning they were eager for battle.
“How did you manage to get more than a raid in the dungeon?”
Startled by Hubert’s voice, Rowan missed the last step of the ladder and fell on his back.
“Dude, are you a stalker or something? I’m not interested,” he blurted, raising on his buttocks and rubbing his ankle.
“Why does everyone assume I’m gay only because I dedicated my life to the Church?” the priest yelled back.
“Tone it down. I don't care. But seriously, you’re hanging around me too much. Go. Away.”
“Where?” Hubert showed the forest with a large gesture. “You’re our leader, for better or for worse, and it’s normal to be interested in that. The world is going to shit, if you didn’t notice. Are you able to save the county?”
“Feels good to hear you speak some normal words. Say again: shit.”
Hubert offered his hand, helping Rowan rise. “You’re annoying.”
“The feeling is mutual. That said, we have to stick together and cover each other’s backs. This dungeon is glitching or something. Cora says something must have triggered the core’s auto-defense mechanisms. This is an artificial dungeon, it was built by some folks, they inserted some security protocols… We can talk about it over a pancake. Is there something to eat?”
“Yeah… Breakfast is ready, by the way, in the farthest longhouse.”
----------------------------------------
One hour later, their small army started marching. After an uneventful but boring hike through the cleared floors, they reached the sixth level of the dungeon, an uneven plain, a steppe going forever, with tall grass, groves, and rock formations here and there. After five minutes of hiking, they met their first monster: a giant metal golem, a robot with a machine gun instead of a left hand, and a mace as its right. The leaders' group took cover in the grass, debating.
“How do we fight that?” Martha, one of the fighters brought by the Paladins, asked. Rowan was now able to remember most of their names.
“RPGs?” another warrior said, taking out a portable rocket launcher from his inventory.
“Wait,” Fenrri said, slapping the man on the shoulder. “Give it to the little one, we’ll make a test.”
A tiny goblin hopped forward, his eyes bulging in eagerness, stretching his hands up for the weapon. “I prove muhself to muhmma.”
A little hesitant, the man handed the rocket launcher. The Goblin dashed through the tall grass, only a faint movement showing his trajectory. In no time, he arrived near the construct, and shot the RPG at point blank, directly in the monster’s head. Despite the huge explosion and the smoke, the effect was minimal. The robot’s mace crushed the goblin dead the next second.
“Noooo…. The child….” Hubert wailed.
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Fenrri must have some teleport skill, Rowan thought. The Ogre disappeared and reappeared in the golem’s back. Her fists hit the robot’s ankle, smashing it, and then, as the construct fell, Fenrri climbed on its back and bashed the metal head into pieces.
Fenrri, army co-leader, has destroyed Gun Golem (Elite), level 80 (1/20)
Meanwhile, the Paladin rushed forward, shoving the earth with his hands, until he found the body of the small goblin. “Please, live, please!” he wailed, applying his Rezz skill.
“Is he mad?” Fenrri whispered to Rowan.
“Absolutely. Spare the spawn, or he’ll waste all his Rezz stack,” he susurrated back.
“Yes!” the priest bellowed, happy, as the little creature revived.
“That’s not a child,” Rowan tapped his shoulder. “It’s a sort of a bipedal dog, with a bit of intelligence. They breed and train them. All lifeforms on their planet are Goblinoids.”
“And this is supposed to make its life less important?” Hubert yelled.
“No, just saying, for when you’ll have to make the choice between it and one of your friends. Life does offer those choices, you know. At least, you two seem to get along,” Rowan pointed to the ecstatic resurrected Goblin, who was in the process of humping the Paladin’s leg.
“Get away, you monster!” Hubert screamed, shaking his foot.
“The next one is five hundred feet ahead,” Victoria appeared near them. “And the pattern keeps on, in a grid formation. I couldn’t find the portal to the next floor yet.”
“Have you tried to pass through, in the Space?”
“The floors are not next to each other. You can't pass through if there's nothing on the other side.”
"What do you mean, nothing. There must be something, right?"
"The Void," Cora said. "A sixth dimension. It's said it gives to other universes with totally different laws."
"I'll stick with nothing, thank you very much."
"He was not good at math," Papa Allinder rushed to say. "Like at all."
“I’ll go see if my rockets work on them,” Cora said, taking off. A minute later, a notification announced:
Cora Shemeows, army co-leader, has destroyed Gun Golem (Elite), level 80 (2/20) No XP was awarded.
“It took me three rockets, it’s too much,” she yelled as the army approached. “Trying the machine gun next.” Thirty seconds later, the next monster had been slain.
Cora Shemeows, army co-leader, has destroyed Gun Golem (Elite), level 80 (3/20) No XP was awarded.
“It was worse… I can’t sustain this level of ammunition consumption,” she complained when they joined her.
“Do you have some reserves outside?” Rowan asked.
“I have plenty of reserves in my inventory, the problem is the perk that charges them with Mana. It’s a once-per-day process. I’m at ninety-five percent in rockets and ninety-three in bullets.”
“Guys, they’re joining,” Papa Allinder said, pointing in the distance.
“Like a super golem?” Rowan asked.
“No, like an assault formation.”
A group of robots was growing larger, but still waiting for the rest.
“Fenrri, grove or rocks?” Rowan asked. In the vicinity, they had two options for an improvised redoubt. The Ogre was a Tactician too, like Grace, and her advice was valuable.
“Rocks. Wood shrapnel is a killer,” Fenrri chose.
“Understood. Troops, move! I, Bree, Isla, Papa, Snemc, and Priest, team together, go behind them and hit the left flank. Cora, destroy those who are still coming, then return to give us fire cover.”
Rowan started running. There were incoming notifications about Cora’s progress, but he ignored them. The Golems, fifteen or so, were now grouped together, with those on the flanks releasing bursts of fire in the air, to keep Cora at bay.
“Let’s attack before they reach the troops,” Hubert said.
“Let’s not!” Rowan countered. “That’s the point, let them engage the army, and hit them from behind while their attention is on our people. Now please shut up. Whoever has a gun, if you see Hubert speaking again, shoot him in the head. He can Rezz, right?”
“I’ll do it,” Martha volunteered.
“Hey!” Hubert protested.
“Not now, next time,” Rowan barely stopped the woman in time. “Shush… hide.”
They plunged into the tall grass, to make themselves less visible. The Golems passed them by, attracted by Cora’s sporadic fire, and the rain of arrows from the Goblin Army. At a hundred yards from the rock formation, the robots started firing their machine guns, and opened hatches in their torsos, revealing cannons.
Stupid me… Gun Golems, duh… “Let’s go!” Rowan roared.
Bree and Hubert run forward, the latter preparing his spells, and the Ranger imitating Fenrri’s example, grabbing a robot’s foot, throwing it down, and smashing the head with a war hammer. Papa Allinder started to throw ice bolts and fireballs, and Isla stepped forward, protecting him with a large riot shield, over which a blue light shined, similar to Hubert’s. At the same time, Snemc’s invoked a large area of healing and buffing, and Rowan felt its effect in every fiber of his body.
Letting his team work on their own, he rushed to reach farther behind the enemy line, attacking the middle, using the Snowstorm. Albeit not destroying the Golems in one go, it did a good job of freezing them in place.
The only thing he hadn’t taken into account was the friendly fire coming just from a hundred yards in front of him. Cora approached, a line of deadly rockets shooting out of her rocket launchers. Just a second before he was on the point of activating Joint Trip, Hubert arrived at the rescue, blocking all projectiles with his energy shield. The Paladin’s mouth was tightly shut, lips tightened together. He was faulting Rowan's plan.
Yeah, I should have thought about that. Then, it was over.
Improvised Army has cleared the Shore’s dungeon’s Sixth Floor. No XP and no APs awarded.
Rowan felt a little sad, if not for the levels, for the AP. On a whim, pushed a point into Strength, then another into Dexterity, because he felt his fighting skills were underwhelming, and wished to raise them to the third threshold, but stopped, remembering Cora’s obsession with delaying investing APs as much as he could. To compensate for the hunger of rushing to the next tier, he put a point into Constitution and Charisma, to make all four stats fifty-five. He felt like an alcoholic trying to drink a beer to stop thinking about moonshine, or somebody on a diet eating a raw cabbage to stop yearning for French fries.
“The guy is good,” Hubert said.
“Who?”
“The Shaman. He regenerated not only our health but also our shields.”
“He’s a pro, true. See, you should be friends. Bith priests, both healers.”
"I guess…" Hubert sighed.
The target of their commentary had not tarried, rushing to heal the wounded in the main camp. Fortunately, there were no fatalities. In the distance, a big sign had appeared, floating in the air, signaling in big letters: To the Next Floor. They walked toward it and found the portal.
“Wait!” Victoria said before anyone could pass on. “Let me go Scout first.”
She lit a smoke and vanished. Ten minutes later, she reappeared, her cigarette spent.
“The next floor is an enclosed water tank, about a hundred feet in diameter. Swimming across is OK but there are countless piranhas around. Then we have a floor with Sand Sharks combined with Golems, then another deep water passage, with water sharks. And the tenth is a beach infested with zombies. The eleventh floor is strange, an empty town. There was no monster in sight. I tried to find the next portal but failed, and had to return before the smoke was spent.”
“Give,” Rowan forwarded his hand. The Vampire gave him the cigarette, and he inhaled the last bit of smoke. Trying not to exhale too soon, he passed through the portal, staying near his side. He unleashed his Snowstorm as soon as the effect of the cigarette vanished. In that small space, it killed the Piranhas instantly.
You have cleared the Shore’s dungeon’s Seventh Floor. No XP and no APs awarded.
He pushed the water with his arms and feet, going back to the sixth floor. Passing through the portal felt strange, the water’s resistance still restraining his legs while his arms trashed in the air, to keep his body’s balance. “It’s done. The exit is straight across. Maybe we can put a lifeline, a rope or something.”
“Or guides. Snemc can stay half an hour underwater,” Fenrri said.
“And I can stay indefinitely,” Cora added. “I hate swimming, but one must do what one must do. We’ll take care of it.”