“The gifted path, guiding path, whatever it is called by the hundreds of thousands of worlds the paths translate for is the single most important path that most take in their lives. 60% of people fail to even reach their guiding path let alone finish it, and less than half that do reach their guiding path still fail to advance it. Therefore achieving a guiding path that leads where you wish to go is paramount for further development.”
-Note found in the pocket of a dead tenth floor member of the Delver's Guild on the contested planet Thurmvrel
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Of all the choices open to Thomas there were a few categories that he marked in his head as being the most important to him when considering future survival as being the most important. The mastery paths sounded very interesting as providing him an additional layer of possible offense and defense sounded very worthwhile but with only one weapon the other mastery paths just sounded worthless. Tiered paths sounded as if they could be worth it if they stuck around after his paths were restricted, while X costing paths could be the best bet for current power.
Spear Mastery I (0/45)
Dragon’s Breath (0/X)
Enhanced Strength (0/X)
Alchemy Mastery I (0/55)
Telepathy (0/X)
After several hours of perusing the paths the number of paths that could benefit him were narrowed down to five. Expensive paths were out of the picture no matter how powerful they sounded like Dragonform I or Steps of the Storm Giant both costing seven hundred and nine hundred points respectively were just too expensive. These five paths could push the guiding path in one of five directions.
Spear mastery was such an obvious choice, almost perfectly suited for him as the reward given by the dungeon nearly made him choose before looking deeper into his other options. If the path taught him how to use the spear effectively then it would be a godsend but the additional paths after it might be locked away if his guiding path options were divisive. If he chose spear mastery then he would be locking himself into picking a spear related guiding path and not once in his life as an actor or bellhop had he used the spear before. Choosing a weapon based path to guide him felt like the wrong choice, and so Thomas crossed it off his mental list and moved to the next one.
Dragon's Breath sounded very powerful, it sounded as if it would give him the ability to have a breath weapon but had no clarification as to what type of dragon's breath he would get. There was no fire dragon's breath path or any others based on elements or things like acid and so that was a complete mystery. Perhaps it had to do with how many points were sunk into it but that sounded right but also wrong in his head. Regardless it was again a powerful possibility but unlike spear mastery it wouldn’t lock him into a dragon based path because it was an X cost path and lacked the tiers that held additional power beyond the first.
Being stronger was absolutely important to his continued survival. Thomas' fight against the alpha crab had shown him that if he had been strong enough to stop the monster from grabbing him with its claw, or even just faster than he had been, that the fight would have been significantly easier. Physically overpowering his enemies sounded nice, but most of his battles had been won on the back of his special abilities and pivoting to try and bump up his physical abilities now just felt a little like he was moving in the wrong direction.
While alchemy might be shifting from his focus, with all of the books written by Elindu all around him it was hard to not consider taking a single path that might allow Thomas to understand the books that were left behind let alone use the knowledge of a masterwork crafter left behind specifically for that purpose. It was a tempting choice but based on the gamble that it would grant him enough understanding to truly acquire Elindu’s knowledge. That risk was too high to justify taking the path and possibly destabilizing Thomas’ guiding path options in a direction he wasn’t sure that he wanted to follow. Especially because Elindu himself had failed to escape the dungeon even with many more paths invested in alchemy than he could dream of.
Telepathy, the counterpart to the skill that he had already acquired at the beginning of his journey within the dungeon. Moving and creating things with his mind, and speaking to others with his mind were two sides of the psychic coin and he was most intrigued by telepathy also being a path that cost X amount of points. Did paying more points equate to more range or make the sub abilities of telepathy more powerful such as influencing thoughts or taking over minds? Without taking the path or knowing anything else about it besides the base knowledge that television and comics had provided it appeared quite strong if a little open ended.
To Thomas two clearly stood out and above the rest after considering all of them in depth. Telepathy, and Dragon's breath were the clear above and beyond best choices for how he wanted to influence his guiding path. Alchemy mastery was the next closest one but in time he was sure that he’d figure out what knowledge was hidden in all of the books Elindu had written. Thomas looked between the options and sighed, there was only one true option that would add more versatility and more power to his arsenal and while he wished that he could take dragon’s breath with all his heart, telepathy was truly the best choice for him to round out his abilities even if it didn’t grant immediate firepower to his arsenal.
With a somewhat heavy heart Thomas looked over all the available paths one more time mixing, matching, and crafting other builds that he wished he could play around with. Every single fantasy role that he would’ve been able to act perfectly with just the right amount of points danced in his head, from Legolas needing points in archery mastery and elf form to Superman needing flight and laser vision. The possibilities laughed at him as he began to sink all his remaining points into telepathy.
Path begun. Telepathy
How many points would you like to put into this Path?
WARNING: Points used determine effectiveness
Carelessly he began to think that he wanted to put in seventy, then his hand met his face with enough force to make the room echo with the sound of his stupidity. He needed points to put into the guiding path options. If they were time sensitive he’d certainly lose them before he could get even one point to put into them and then he might not be able to take any paths. With a sigh and a thought he tried to put less points into the path but it wouldn’t budge downward after being specified at least seventy points. With a low growl he mentally accented to seventy points being spent on the telepathy path. It was a future investment Thomas told himself as he watched the path complete immediately.
Path begun. Telepathy
Telepathy (70/70)
Path Complete!
Skill Gained: Telepathy
After several life and death experiences using the power of telekinesis Thomas no longer considered himself a complete amateur at using his first skill nor his second for that matter. It was a sort of mental muscle that flexed and relaxed based on visualization not any sort of physical movement. When the skill of telepathy was given to him by the path it was as if he could feel something shifting at the edge of his perception, at that moment he knew that all he had to do was think about reading thoughts to activate the skill. Which in understanding that was what it took, activated the skill itself which pressed his thoughts up against…nothing at all. Even though he felt his mind was open or actively searching for thoughts. Perhaps there was nothing in range, regardless of that fact he simply thought about being closed off from others thoughts and deactivated the skill. Further use would likely require mastery of his own mind, but in time it would become a powerful tool.
As all these thoughts ran through his head, the words before his very eyes were more important by far. The guiding paths that would shape his future began to appear slowly as if being deliberated on at this very moment by some unknown being.
Guiding Paths
Adept Telekinetic (0/50)
Psionic of the Storm (0/75)
Indomitable Warrior of the Mind (0/100)
He knew that when the telepathy path had accidentally been longer than expected that it was unlikely that he would be able to completely finish his guiding path but now the reality of how rare points were hit him. Without the points gifted to him by not having any natural mana he’d be dead several times over and never would’ve reached this point let alone even be able to consider how difficult it would be to complete his guiding path. However what was done could not be undone and now he had to make a decision with nothing but names and gut feelings to go by.
Off the bat, adept telekinetic sounded good but sounded as if it was only going to help one of his abilities. While telekinesis was his most powerful ability, there was no way he could leave behind his water armor or telepathy to flounder while pursuing a single ability. Meanwhile the word psionic itself made him think of more generalist skills relating to the mind, but that final word of the path is what drew him to it despite the longer and more powerful sounding final option. Of the Storm, what could that possibly mean for his telekinetic and telepathic abilities? On the other hand Indomitable Warrior of the Mind was the longest path both in point cost and word length. It clearly had some serious power behind it even only considering the point total and that wasn’t even the most interesting part about it. What really was a warrior of the mind and what did it mean to be indomitable? Thomas wondered if choosing it would force him to abandon increasing the strength of his water based skill and instead transition to a build that focused more on fighting solely with his mind. At a hundred points it would be the longest single path he had attempted and with how scarce and dangerous it would be to acquire points any potential increase in power would have to be levied against how likely he was to die while pursuing it to the end.
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Psionic of the Storm just called out to him in a way he wouldn’t fully explain. Whether it was the allure of possibly adding more to his best defensive skill or getting more skills like it he didn’t know. The fact that it was the middle of the road path in terms of points and didn’t have the specificity of the other paths was a definite plus as well. So with his heart clenched in anticipation Thomas mentally selected his guiding path.
Guiding Path begun. Psionic of the Storm.
Psionic of the Storm (5/75)
Putting the points into the path felt right. There was no other way to describe it besides a sense of fulfilled purpose that nearly made Thomas cry. He spent his life searching for that feeling, of knowing what he was doing was the right thing deep in his bones. He had to finish the path as soon as possible just to know if there was anything beyond that purpose. Because if there was then perhaps everything that happened to him in this place happened for a reason.
It was with a heavy heart that the sensation faded and left behind only a shallow desire to finish the path and reveal what lay at the end of it. It was then that the need for sleep sunk its teeth into him. Hunting crabs, fighting the alpha, and escaping the aftermath with his loot had taken a lot out of him let alone the raw feeling that the guiding path had imparted upon starting it. Speaking of the path, he wondered if it would change the paths offered to him if it wasn’t yet complete and once again summoned by his thoughts the now familiar words appeared in front of his eyes once more.
Guiding Path: Psionic of the Storm (5/75)
Points: 0
Perks: Silvertongue, Lesser Regeneration
Skills: Telekinesis (75), Water Armor, Telepathy (70)
Available Paths: None
The answer to his unspoken question was a single word that simultaneously made him sad and nearly had him laughing to himself. Of course not every path would be open to him after starting his guiding path, if such a workaround existed then it would be much less enticing to finish a guiding path.
Now with a guiding path and an additional skill that Thomas had a handful of ideas for already he no longer felt out of his depth inside the dungeon. In fact he was discovering that he quite enjoyed fighting and discovering new things about the paths and the dungeon itself but something was missing. It had been two days since he had seen another person or had any interaction with another human and it was starting to wear on him. He was starting to get loney. There was nobody to talk to and celebrate his victory against one of the alphas or even to talk about how weird paths were.
Only books and bones kept him company now, and they couldn’t talk. So Thomas began to wonder what was happening to everyone outside of the dungeons. Were they all stuck in dungeons the same as him? Despite his sometimes rocky relationship with his family he hoped that they were safe, and even some coworkers. He wasn’t trapped in hell by any means but Thomas wasn’t planning on revisiting this particular dungeon once he escaped. Hopefully nobody else was trapped in a dungeon alone like he was.
The thought of other people being trapped, or even killed inside dungeons filled him with sadness. Not everyone would be as lucky as he was with the skills and perks he was able to get through the paths he had taken. When he got out of here, he was going to try and help people trapped inside dungeons, that is if he didn't get saved first. With how quickly militaries all over the world could mobilize he was sure that the whole dungeon infestation would be handled in a week or so and then new jobs would start popping up. Maybe saving people from dungeons would pay better than a bellhop. That thought made him smile despite the odd sadness that had been growing inside him.
No matter how sad or reflective Thomas got there was only one thing that he could actively do about his situation and that was finding the exit guardian and escaping. However with how exhausted he was from fighting the crab alpha there was no way he was going out to fight again without sleeping for at least a few hours. Even without a pillow or a comfortable place to sleep, a wooden desk feels like heaven after surviving a fight to the death.
As sleep overtook him the world faded away and his dream began. Standing on top of the hotel he had worked at and looking down on the city as it burned. Six legged cats prowled the streets as massive vultures circled him from above. He looked down as a cry of fear echoed through the streets only to be suddenly cut off to the sound of a snarling cat. While he tried to find out where the sound had come from a massive shadow loomed behind him. As he turned to face what was coming the last thing he saw was massive talons reaching for his body.
Wakefulness came with the familiar feeling of fear taking root in Thomas’ bones while the memory of the dream began to fade. Standing up helped shake off the feeling before it settled and with his headache gone it was time to get back to what mattered. Escaping the dungeon by any means necessary. The ring on his finger still showed no signs of changing or doing anything else for that matter while the spear that was laying on the floor was still shining with an inner light.
Thomas reached down to pick up the spear and hesitated before he left the room once more. Looking back at the three books that were still laid on the desk, two unread and filled with probably valuable information. Thomas shook his head and started to walk towards the door once more. No matter how important the information in those books were, information alone wasn’t going to help him kill the alphas let alone the exit guardian he thought to himself as he opened the door.
Stepping out into the root system once more and standing on the wooden platform he took a deep breath and considered his options. Aside from the now dead crab alpha, there were at least two more that would give him loot and possibly more points as well. The problem was that he didn’t want to hunt them down when he could spend his time trying to escape. However without further honing his new abilities it was unlikely that he was going to defeat the exit guardian and escape. Therein was his problem because he didn’t want to spend the time to hunt down both alphas and then the exit guardian. There was no reason he couldn’t just hunt down one of the remaining alphas and then make a run on the guardian, he thought to himself as he formed water armor once more.
While he descended into the mud Thomas began to consider which alpha to go after next. There were only two left and both were likely very powerful given how much stronger the crablord alpha had been. His thoughts went back to the bird that had descended to feast on the massive crab and immediately made the decision to go after the cat alpha. If the bird alpha was bigger or stronger than that thing, he wanted no he needed the loot from the cat alpha and to figure out what his spear and ring could actually do besides looking pretty.
Elindu had mentioned that the cat alpha was a few trees over but not exactly in the exact direction or any waypoints to help Thomas find it. So he picked one at random and started walking while keeping his eyes peeled for ambush hills. By the time he reached the edges of the root system he still hadn’t spotted any crabs and even looking out at the large stretch of mud between the trees he couldn’t spot any.
In order to get to another tree Thomas was going to have to cross what looked like a no man's land of empty space between the root systems. Fully exposed to the massive birds that might just be waiting for something to move down here. His saving grace was the knowledge passed down by Elindu that the birds rarely descended into the mud. Shaking off his fear of a bird ripping him apart like the alpha he had killed, Thomas took a step out of the root system and began to walk across the wasteland that separated the trees.
A few hundred steps later and several near heart attacks when the shadow of a bird would flow over him like a harbinger of death, Thomas made it to the root system of another tree. It was quite the long distance from his original tree and the more he looked at the distance between the original tree and all the others revealed something to him. That the tree he was sleeping in was the biggest, and not only was it the biggest but that all fifteen other trees were arranged around the central one in a circle. What shocked him further was that beyond the circle of trees there was only mud as far as the eye could see.
While he had been in the center of the circle it was impossible to see beyond the circle of massive trees, but now that he was in that outer circle he could see that there was nothing beyond it. Thomas tried to put the terrifying existential nature of this dungeon out of his mind and looked on the bright side. At least there were only so many trees he’d have to search in order to find the cat’s alpha. He thought to himself with a grim smile and gripped his spear tighter as he began to look around for signs of the cats in question.
There was no way Thomas was going to be able to find a massive den of cats on his own. He had never learned how to hunt or track any kind of large game and certainly not in these conditions but he had one thing that no human on Earth had before the paths. Telepathy. With a single thought he felt his awareness open up to any other range, not that he knew what range he had.
Unlike the last time he had used the skill, this time he felt at least fifteen other minds press against his own. It felt as if he could see their thoughts and feel their position relative to his own. Not in any concrete measurements like feet or even meters but in the sense that certain minds were closer to him than others, their thoughts felt more concrete. A slight breeze made his water armor ripple softly with the wind and he wished that he could feel more of it on his skin than what made it through the faceplate of his armor.
‘Food, nearby, follow’
One of the closest minds thought and Thomas immediately turned towards where he could feel the mind moving through the mental space towards his own mind. By looking deeper at their thoughts he could feel certain things about them like how they moved through the mud with grace or how they were so very hungry. Canceling telepathy would essentially blind him and open him up to a surprise attack from any direction. So Thomas kept it active and tried to pull his perception back in order to keep his focus on the physical world.
Setting up a counter ambush was easy enough, he felt them coming and all he had to do was stand with his back to them. Leaving himself apparently exposed to an easy attack while in reality eight invisible tentacles surrounded him. Three wrapped around his armor clad body for additional protection and five swayed gently above him ready to strike at any moment.
Just as soon as Thomas had completed his preparations, the thoughts of all five cats pressed against his own. They had arrived. With his back turned it was impossible for him to actually see the five cats as they stalked closer but within his mindsight it was as clear as day. Suddenly the closest mind surged forward with a burst of speed and as it suddenly halted a sharp roar of frustration filled the silence.
Thomas knew he had them right where he wanted them, and without even turning around directed a tentacle to strike at the mind practically glowering right behind him. Using both telepathy and telekinesis together felt as natural as breathing, the telekinetic strike guided as much by his visualization as the allure of the target's mind. The sound of bones cracking and another yowl of pain made the other minds in the group begin to reconsider as two of them split off to get a different angle of approach on him.
Simultaneously five invisible tentacles lashed out at the bright shining thoughts of the cats that sought to kill him. Two bright points of thought winked out instantly and two others gave off thoughts of hate and frustration. Through reading their thoughts Thomas was able to tell that they were leaping through the air towards him and slapped them out of the air and into the roots with ease. Their thoughts two nearly instantly went dark like blowing out a candle.
Five minds had become one that felt nothing but abject fear that its entire pack had died in only two exchanges. That fear led to that mind retreating rather than face him alone. As it fled Thomas expanded his range once more and tracked it running past other groups and finally it escaped his active range and into the darkness beyond. However every single pack that it crossed began to move towards him, sometimes linking with other groups.
Turning around revealed the aftermath of his counter ambush. One cat lay dead just a few feet away, its skull turned to putty as blood leaked from its ears. Two more were wrapped around some roots and a final body was only a few feet away missing its head as it laid in the mud. A stark contrast to how far he had come since his first experience with a lone hunter nearly killing him just a few days ago. Returning some of his focus to the mental world of telepathy and started to run after the cat that had fled his mindsight.
In a few short minutes there was a group of thirty cats headed in his direction and there wasn’t much he could do about it besides make a note of what direction the fleeing cat had gone. That and get moving through the root system to follow it. Evading the thirty cats moving as a group was difficult but being able to see exactly where every single one of their thoughts were made it possible. Without the advanced radar of telepathy he would’ve been fighting for his life within minutes. As it stood he was barely outmaneuvering them as they tried to follow his scent. Carrying a spear with him didn’t help and his arms began to burn with the strain.
He had to move faster, and the battle with the crab alpha had revealed that there were better alternatives to just running. Thomas’ legs surged as he leapt into the air, the force of the jump carrying him just a few inches above the mud. Instead of landing with a splash, a platform made of his mental energy caught him and began to move far faster than he could run. Air whipped through his watery helmet and the pinpricks of thought faded slightly as he started to focus on not hitting the roots of the tree.
The empty space between the trees in the circle around the main one was significantly smaller and he cleared it with little difficulty. As the second tree came into view his mindsight also lit up with significantly more minds than the first. His platform slowed down with a thought as the sheer enormity of how many beings were living inside this tree.
Luck was apparently with him because a focused look through the thoughts of the beings alive inside the tree revealed that it was the main home of the cats inside the dungeon. Failing to kill that single cat had led him right where he wanted to go, but he got confused the more in depth he looked into the minds of the cats. The alpha wasn’t in the tree, or at least there was no mind or thought that led specifically to the alpha being in a chamber or part of the tree. Thomas pondered what that could mean. If the alpha wasn’t in the tree, then where was it and what was it doing?