“I think we should try to do all of the lairs in the zone,” Ira said.
“All at once?” Laura asked.
“No automatically at once, but, who knows. Maybe we’ll find another secret. We’ve done, eleven out of sixteen?”
“If the guide can be trusted. Hopefully, the scouting team didn’t miss any.”
“You know the location descriptor tells you the specifics of where you are. Except on Earth, that is.”
“But there is no way to distinguish if it’s a lair or some local name. Any cave or similar, it’s usually a lair. But outdoor, you might miss it.”
“We do have a lair detector, though,” Ira said, referring to Jonathan’s ability to see guardian chests’ descriptors.
“That assumes we’re in the right place, though. If I can’t see a chest, I can’t tell you it’s there,” the second defender replied.
“Jonas?” Ira asked.
“The archivists haven’t any idea how many of those backdoors there might be. It’s the kind of details they tended not to track. We’ve found one, Cowen’s team found another, and there are two additional possible ones, so far. There’s a small castle in tier four that seem to have a central tower that you can’t get into. And there’s also a mine tunnel with some blockage that seem to be unmovable.”
“And we haven’t seen a door or anything yet around,” Laura noted.
“More reason to visit the rest of the lairs,” Ira replied.
“It’s mostly the opposing side of the zone. We can go through the centre and do the lairs there, but those aren’t very high,” Jonas said.
“What kind of lair route can you give us?” Alton asked.
“The scorpion ruins are next door, then the oasis with the secret chest. Then the centre. Then we start doing the rest,” he replied after a quick mental check.
“Sounds good,” Ira said, looking at the rest of the team.
Everyone seemed to agree, so the team started toward the side, heading toward the first lair they did in the zone.
The scorpion lair was the same sprawling set of ochre-brick ruins they first visited. The black mace-tailed creatures were crawling around, unchanged.
Now more familiar with the ruins, the team immediately headed for the first cardinal point, to pick the first guardian fight. But once they finished the handful of groups located there, they had to stop.
Instead of the spitting elite they had fought the first time, now there were multiple scorpions. Lots of them.
Ruins Arthropod × 11
Level 68 veteran
Health: 1040
Mind: 387
Endurance: 924
Aether: 151
Ruins Unmolted × 21
Level 66 minion
Health: 271
Mind: 101
Endurance: 240
Aether: 39
Jonas raised his hand, signalling for a stop and talk.
“That’s new.”
“Othary. Sometimes, you had slightly different guardians at the hyena lake,” Laura reminded him.
“This isn’t ‘slightly’ different. Although, I remember the badgers too. We once had two elite, and once a single one and multiple veterans,” Jonas acknowledged.
“Chest is still indicated elite, though,” Jonathan confirmed after spotting the half-buried box to the side, under the shade of a three-feet tall piece of masonry.
Scorpid Ruins
Elite Treasure
Common equipment
Requires: Level 66
“I’m not expecting an elite to show up,” Jonas replied. “With these numbers, I think it is mostly an indication of the difficulty rather than the exact type of guardian.”
“Even if there’s a dozen, these veterans can’t be as hard as a minotaur Elder from the trunk. Sure, there’s a lot, but they won’t have multiple attacks,” Ira noted.
“Yes, but we will probably have to tackle one or two you and Jonathan can’t keep busy. And the number of minions… it’s the death of a thousand cuts.”
“So what? You have multiple area spells now,” Alton countered. “They don’t have much life. We all put them in a single place, you burn them, we’re good.”
Jonas acknowledged the facts with a nod.
“Can do. I suggest as a strategy that Ira picks all the veterans, or at least as many as he can, and Jonathan tries to push all the minions. Try to separate the two packs, they can swipe at you. Probably not the small ones, but it’s already going to be a mess.”
“What if they go for us?” Laura asked.
“If it’s a veteran, wait it out. We need to wipe the pack of minions fast, because they are absolutely going to be a threat, even at 68. There’s simply too many of them.”
Given the number of enemies, Jonas thought he had little choice but to throw as many Firefall as he needed. That would drain a significant amount of his Aether, but he did not dare to trade efficiency for time with the higher-tier Fire Funnel. Besides, with the mass of enemies, there were bound to be scorpion minions out of the range.
The team placed themselves at a distance from the ruins. Ira and Jonathan gave a last check to see if there were no other group of scorpions wandering around, before both giving an all-clear signal.
Then, both defenders yelled a war cry and rushed into the fray.
The scorpion creatures reacted nearly as a single entity to the intrusion coming their way. They turned toward the two maniacs running and started rushing as well. The two stayed a few feet apart until the groups converged, and then each started slashing and stabbing, trying to separate the two types.
The global strategy didn’t fully function. There was still a veteran trying to snipe at Jonathan, while four or five minion Unmolted were swinging at Ira’s legs. Two of the eleven veterans even managed to bypass the two defenders, continuing toward the rear-guard. Another pair of minion followed the two adults.
Guss had to start healing Ira almost immediately, as the pack of veterans started pummelling him. His Claymore of the Doneri Bull offered a huge amount of defence but having eight veterans trying to pinch you to death amounted to significant damage. The unprovoked scorpions didn’t take notice, though and keep advancing toward Jonas and Alton, their initial targets.
Jonas clenched his teeth and focused on the mass of minions around Jonathan. He picked Jonathan himself as the target, as he wouldn’t be affected due to team membership, and launched a first Firefall.
Firefall burns Ruins scorpions × 18 for 30.7 fire damage (52 aether cost)
A small pack of the minions started backing from the Jonathan. Apparently, a bunch of those were smart enough to recognize that the burning came explosively around the man.
“Dratted scorpions! Don’t move!”
He pushed himself again but missed his mark. Instead of starting a Firefall, he felt a flowing sensation coming through his hand instead.
Skill unlocked: Ice Storm (unranked)
Ice Storm
Aether/Offense
Rank 0: Reduces AGI and FOC by 10% of INT within 10 feet of the targeted location. Does random 5 to 10% of INT in ice damage per second to any hostile within the storm. Lasts 30 seconds. Costs: 1 aether per INT.
“What the?” Jonathan yelled as a swirling fog spread out from his feet. The defender reflexively moved away before realizing he was not getting any effect. The scorpions though started moving more sluggishly. Jonas realized that losing around 10 AGI would significantly slow them down.
“Don’t move. This should keep them packed enough!” he replied.
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“That’s new,” Laura noted as she passed him, headed toward the main pack.
The Calculating Grinder had no real area attack, besides trying to put her hammers in between two closely packed enemies. So she hadn’t even aimed for the mass of minions, and she was now placing herself for the main group of veterans near Ira.
“Yea. Hope it works out,” Jonas replied, before launching another Firefall.
He immediately thought he shouldn’t have. The fire blowing out from inside the icy storm blew fog out, clearing out a bit. He checked his notifications, but apparently the spell had done full effect.
Firefall burns Ruins scorpions × 17 for 30.7 fire damage (52 aether cost)
Well, except for a scorpion that had managed to get out. He spotted the minion trying to come at Guss and threw a Flame Bolt straight at the minion.
Flame Bolt does 86 fire damage to Ruins Unmolted (34 cost)
The lone scorpion was now almost dead following that last spell, and he wasted no time throwing another Flame Bolt. If needed, Guss would use his hammer to finish the critter.
Ruins Unmolted
Level 66 minion
Health: 9/271
Mind: 90/101
Endurance: 200/240
Aether: 39
Jonas turned back to the barely visible swarm surrounding Jonathan and launched another Firefall, then another. The defender had lost two-fifth of his health from the packed scorpions, but unlike the adults, the unmolted lacked the mace-like ball on their short tails to do real damage.
The fog cleared suddenly, the icy storm having run its course. Jonas counted only two surviving minions, along with the lone veteran that was still glued to the defender.
“Ira? Coming to peel one or two veterans from you,” Jonathan indicated.
“Good for me,” the Careful Barrier replied.
“Pick mine first!” Jonas countered, finally focusing on the veteran still sniping at him. Thankfully, the mace-like ball at the end of its tail didn’t interfere with spell casting. But Jonas had lost over half his health now, and Guss was still a bit focused on the two defenders, not wanting to spend aether on healing him yet. Well, not exactly, he now noticed the healing effect that had been applied while he was distracted.
Increase Healing (2): +20% health regeneration (6.13/sec, 48 sec. remaining)
“On it,” Jonathan replied, changing direction.
A pair of strikes distracted the Ruins Arthropod and Jonas could relax a bit more. He surveyed the battlefield, noting that Ira had caught the veteran that had targeted Alton initially. Both melee combatants were bashing, stabbing and otherwise focused on a second veteran, the first’s corpse being half-exploded to the side.
As Ira had noted, the fight was only looking hard, but a 70-75 elite combat was ultimately not on the level of a 100+ elder. Once you passed the initial chaos inevitable with so many enemies around, victory was assured.
Ruins Scorpions × 32: 17695XP/6 contributors = 2794XP.
“Wheee!” Ira yelled.
“That’s a pretty good chunk of experience,” Guss acknowledged.
“I’m pretty sure my ringmail tunic is dented all over,” Jonathan complained.
“That doesn’t happen,” Jonas countered.
“Only way of damaging it is to purposefully dismantle it. Besides, you have a new tunic waiting for you at level 105,” he added.
“I am at 104 now with this fight. Should be 105 in a couple of lairs,” the Calculating Barrier replied.
Laura fished out a pair of gloves from the box, with a disappointed face.
“Sorry, should have notified you,” Jonathan apologized.
“That would spoil the surprise. I’ll start seeing those notifications soon enough,” she replied.
Blackened Leather Gloves
Hand
Common equipment
Requires: Level 66
Provides: +6 defence rating, DEX+9
“Alton?”
“Good for me,” the Solid Gouger answered. “Even if I’m reducing in quality and losing some mind vitals, we’re doing fine so far in that department.”
“Don’t cast a curse on us, Alton,” she replied.
“Let’s head to the next. If we’re going to the oasis next, we need to hurry if we want to make it for tomorrow morning,” Jonas added.
“This feels built,” Alton noted as they unloaded their bags and set camp at the Plaza, two days later.
“Yes, it looks that way,” Jonas acknowledged.
Outapis’ Plaza was in the centre of a near-perfect ring of badlands, mesa and terraced hills. From there, you had a perfect view of the ring, with a perfectly flat top. There were a few gorges allowing you to enter the central part, but they zig-zagged across the mountainous parts, so you saw nothing from inside. It looked like a complete enclosure.
“It does feel like you’re in a cauldron or something,” Jonas said as the last ray of the setting sun came across the mountaintops. Shadows were rising inside the central ring.
“Setting camp at the Plaza. It’s a tradition,” Ira said.
“I think it’s common. After all, each zone revolves around the existence of the Plaza,” Jonas replied.
He threw a small Flame Bolt at the pile of small wood that Guss and Jonathan had gathered from the dried husks dotting the barren flats. The ground was still of the slightly off ochre tint that dominated the zone, but the wood itself looked as normal as any wood they’d seen in the Labyrinth so far.
He had no access yet to the Aether-Control skill set with the Flame Hand skill. That one was far more controllable than a pure attack ability, notably one boosted by his own skills and gear.
Flame Bolt
Aether/Offense
Rank 4: Does 70% of INT in fire damage Costs: 0.46 aether per base damage.
At level 105 Intellect with his gear – and notably, the +13 from the robe – firing a bolt to light a fire was more akin to shooting a musket at the wood than using a lighter. He had some instinctive control, but it was still half-blowing the pyre and half-lighting it.
It was also a tradition, for nearly… eight months now? No, nine.
Seeing them seated around the fire under the darkening skies, it was hard to remember that, once, they had been all kinds of simple London youths, trying to make do with their lives in the greatest city of Earth, anonymous unremarkable and unseen.
And now, they were among the most famous Professionals of England – maybe even Earth. Living in strange pocket worlds, handily killing predators that would probably devastate hardened troops if somehow, someone ever managed to bring one to Earth.
Jonas shuddered at the thought. Nobody had found any way to bring any animal through any gate, be it across the Labyrinth or between Earth and the world beyond.
Jonathan noticed his introspection. Having the highest Focus among them at 66, thanks to his original progression, current Profession and gear made him the most sensitive to the moods of his teammates. They had all extraordinary stats overall for their levels, thanks to the Adjustment Milestones, and he was the highest of them in that regard.
“Anything, Jonas?”
“No. Not really. I was just…”
Jonas stopped himself before mentioning their lives prior to the Labyrinth. Jonathan, of them all, was the one most sensitive to that. The assault on the Gate by the French mastermind Jacques Deschanel had caused hundreds of deaths, including all of his family and his would-be fiancée. He hated the French due to that, with a cold, contained rage. Jonas did not want to trigger that wound with his aimless ramblings. He went on a different tangent instead.
“It’s always weird to have an entire world for us.”
“Do we?” Laura asked.
“Nobody really knows. It’s impossible to cross the zone boundaries, no matter what. People have tried to make guesses based on the stars, climate, and all kind of things, but there might be dozens of zones beyond the horizon. Or none.”
Guss turned his poker, cooking scorpion segments sending curiously… bovine smells. The scorpion arthropods had lots of useable meat segments leftover after decaying, which tasted like chicken, and smelled like beef. As long as they had a descriptor, these did not change, but once you cooked them, they lost the descriptor and you had to eat them or they turned rancid and decayed like normal meat on Earth. And well, once you came to Earth, the descriptor vanished after a few days as well.
Desert Arthropod Rings
× 5
Basic item
Requires: none
Provides: cooking component
“Do you think one of the Milestones may provide a way to pass those?” he asked.
Seeing everyone looking at him, he shrugged.
“Who knows, right? We’re doing weird things with the Labyrinth, and nobody else can do that, so we don’t have any guide.”
“Well, so far, it’s mostly us seeing and learning stuff, not doing stuff,” Jonas countered.
“Getting weird gear when we started and reactivating Gates is a bit more than seeing,” Guss replied.
They had left their last pieces of “Starter gear” at the Archives. Gear with the “Starter” quality and its “none” requirement had never been seen. Normal Professionals in the early days had to make do with whatever mundane clothes and weapons they had – muskets and pistols being useless in the Labyrinth. The team, though, had received one piece of gear for every kill until they had all of the basic equipment needed. As they started by killing minions, that had been “starter” gear, as minions normally never dropped any piece of equipment, and only rarely some food. Then, the loot had turned back to normal odds.
Starter gear was probably rarer than any artefact ever. More so since they’d thrown away most of it as they kept finding better, at least until Cowen and her team had met them and told them how unusual those were. They might be useless to a Professional, but they were unique to the team.
“Still, the outside of the zones is even more desert than this,” he said, referring to the strange appearance of the world beyond the circular barriers that enclosed each zone.
Beyond the soft, squishy border that felt like some invisible rubber, the ground softened, the mountain, sand or features of the zone slowly flattening to a uniform plain, covered by sparse grey moss-looking plates. As it was impossible to reach any, no one had any idea what the moss was. Or even if it really was moss.
“Yea. We might have a hard time crossing that,” Guss acknowledged, starting to suck on his steaming scorpion. The cooked chitin served as a support on which his teeth raked the soft meat.
“But the scientists think each zone is a separate world. So… unless some Professional slinks around, we’re probably the only six humans in the entire world here,” Jonas said.
No one had ever found people. The closest thing to humans were various man-shaped creatures, and all of those were very obvious products of the Labyrinth. Every human came from the Earth. Unless you counted the ultra-rare kids born in the Labyrinth by accident and luck, and those obviously counted as earth-humans, being able to cross the Gates and all.
They unrolled their bedsheets. That’s what they mostly carried with their side bags and backpacks – basic provisions in case there was nothing good to eat from the zone, sleeping accommodation, and room for some loot. Well, lots of loot – unlike most Professionals that had to share zones with multiple teams, they had an empty zone to themselves, with dozens of lairs if they found the time emptying them.
It wasn’t hard to understand why they were popular figures at the weekly Faire these days. Probably even more so this run, as the previous lairs had yielded little upgrades. Laura had picked a tunic, Alton a new dagger and that was all. They’d gotten more upgrades from the five chests of the scorpion ruins than the nine next chests combined. All they found was at best equivalent to what they already had, or slightly worse. Luck worked that way. Well, maybe he’d finally get something from the faire. His old focus dagger started to look positively ridiculous for someone in tier three wearing an Artefact.
Jonas contemplated the stars, slowly moving across the black empty sky. The Moon hadn’t risen, and might not even do so. He’d spotted it on their first foray, noting that it seemed entirely normal. Usually, it was the first thing that deviated from the norm across zones. Weird alterations, traces, lights. Here, it was normal. Even the sky looked like Earth’s. He could spot Orion the Hunter and its easily recognisable shape, and all the familiar constellations that one could see from London at night.
Sometimes, sleep never came, but this time, he blinked, and the first ray of the sunrise was already starting to brighten the sky he was looking at. And it was time to lit another fire for breakfast.
Jonas Mark Sims
Health: 833/833 (662)
Mind: 969/969 (730)
Endurance: 468/468
Aether: 1928/1928 (1742)
Effective level: 94
Level 22 Solid Aethershaper
Level 42 Aetherist
Level 30 Arcanist
Experience: 2395/52800
Strength: 37
Dexterity: 38 (35)
Agility: 46 (37)
Constitution: 41 (30)
Stamina: 31
Wisdom: 36
Focus: 34
Presence: 51 (40)
Fortitude: 32
Intellect: 105 (60)
Defence rating: 120
25% faster levelling
1% regeneration
15% elemental damage
2% fire damage
Milestones: Adjustment V, Arcanist II, Aetherist III, Solid Aethershaper I
Skills: Flame Bolt (3+1), Air Burst (1), Ice Dart (1), Fire Funnel (1), Lightblast (0+1), Firefall (0+1), Everburn (0+1), Freeze (0+1), Earth Grasp (0), Ice Storm (0)
Equipment: Fiery Newt-head Crown (7INT/83hp/+1flamebolt), Adept Robe of the Doneri Bull (13INT/11PRE/11CON/9AGI/150mind/116aet/ +1everburn/+1firefall/2%fire/1%regen), Simple Leather Gloves (6INT/+1freeze), Standard Felt Belt (3INT/3DEX/70aet), Miner Burlap Trousers (6INT/89mind), Ochre Burlap Sandals (8INT/88End), Basic Focus Dagger (2INT), Old Mangled Codex (+1 lightblast)