“What do you think Alice wanted to talk to Maven about?” Ellie asked idly, tapping away at her phone as she did.
“Dunno.” Tess replied. “I guess we’ll just have to ask when we see her next. Chances are it’s not really our business, though, otherwise Alice probably would have just talked to her with us there.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” Ellie said. “Anything you wanna do while we wait for bedtime?”
“I was in the middle of looking at the core for the boss of this dungeon when everything went down.” Tess said. “I think I’m gonna take a minute and look over that now. After that we can play a game or something, I guess.”
“Sounds good.” Ellie said. “Let me know when you’re finished.”
Tess nodded, and pulled up the log of past windows. It was a feature she tended not to use much, since combat windows were rarely useful outside of combat, and she only ever really got non-combat windows in safe situations, but it did have a couple of niche usages like this.
In this instance, it was nice to be able to look at the initial core absorption message, as it helpfully listed out new Attributes and Skills, as well as showing her what the degraded versions she got were without her having to rifle through her Skills to find ones she didn’t have before. Fortunately, she hadn’t received many windows since that time, so it didn’t take too long to find.
You have absorbed a Basic Bushland Boa Core!
Slots filled: 23/30
You have gained 1,500 EXP in Monster Breeder!
New core absorbed! Scanning for abilities…
New Skills detected!
Attempting to degrade and obtain Highly Based…
Congratulations, you have successfully obtained Based!
Based:
Rarity: Rare
Type: Passive
Description:
Damage dealt by bases you apply is increased by 50%. Damage dealt by the reaction of a base you applied and an acid you applied is increased by a further 50%.
On what?
Displaying core information:
Basic Bushland Boa Core:
Level 63
Estimated Power: 1,000
Estimated Maximum Power if Enhanced: 2,000
Stats:
HP: 10,000
MP: 5,000
Stamina: 15,000
Power: 1,250
Defense: 400
Magic: 110
Magic Defense: 400
Agility: 275
Luck: 300
Current Skills:
Highly Based
Poison Magic (High)
Current Attributes:
Apodous Adaptation
Base Neutralizer
Bountiful Bases
Scales (Fundamental)
Sharp Fangs (Major)
Stereo Smell (Greater)
New Attributes Discovered!
Base Neutralizer:
Grants the user immunity to bases, and renders any bases that touch the user’s body (and were not produced by the user) inert.
Bountiful Bases:
Coats the user’s natural weapons in a base, causing them to deal an extra 100% of their attacks’ damage as base damage. This base is similar in composition to ammonia hydroxide, but is far more concentrated than most natural ammonia hydroxide, allowing much more severe burns to develop quickly. The user and their possessions are immune to this base and any side-effects.
New Skills Discovered!
Highly Based
Rarity: Epic
Type: Passive
Description:
Damage dealt by bases you apply is increased by 100%. Damage dealt by the reaction of a base you applied and an acid you applied is increased by a further 100%.
No, really, based on what???
Fortune: I know it’s been a bit since this has been relevant to your build, but there’s a combination with the acid and base Attributes. It shouldn’t take any more room in your storage, so you just need to temporarily make a slot or two of room so you can combine the neutralizer Attributes and the…uh, producer Attributes? Whatever we want to call the ones that produce the acid and base. And, uh, I’ll let you know when important ones come up in the future, so don’t worry too much about trying all possible combinations unless you want to.
Tess: Thanks, Mom. That’ll make the decision-making process a lot easier.
Fortune: Any time, sweetie!
Heeding her mother’s advice, Tess took the opportunity to shove two Attributes onto the core, waiting the minute or so it took for them to actually leave. Once they had, she put on Base Neutralizer and Bountiful Bases, waited for the combination window to pop up, then initiated the combinations.
Possible combinations detected!
Would you like to try and combine Acid Neutralizer and Base Neutralizer? If you refuse, you may attempt to combine them later at any time.
Would you like to try and combine Ample Acid and Bountiful Bases? If you refuse, you may attempt to combine them later at any time.
Acid Neutralizer and Base Neutralizer have been successfully combined into Natural Neutralizing Agent!
Ample Acid and Bountiful Bases have been successfully combined into Countless Chemicals!
New Attributes discovered!
Natural Neutralizing Agent:
Grants immunity to damage and corrosive effects from acids and bases, and renders any harmful acids or bases that touch the user’s body or equipment (and were not produced by the user) inert.
Countless Chemicals:
Coats the user’s natural weapons in both an acid and a base, causing them to deal an extra 100% of their attacks’ damage as acid damage and another 100% as base damage. The composition of the acid and base are the same as those produced from Ample Acid and Bountiful Bases. The user and their possessions are immune to these chemicals and any side-effects. These chemicals will not react with anything until two seconds after they have left contact with the user or their possessions.
“Alright, I’m done.” Tess said. “We have an hour or two before bed, so I’m sure we can fit a game or two.”
Ellie smiled, looking up from her phone. “I have a couple of handhelds in my bag, let’s take a look and see what strikes our fancy.” She reached into her bag and pulled out a pair of consoles. “Catch.” She said, tossing one to Tess.
Tess deftly caught the console, giving Ellie a shocked look as she did. “What if I didn’t catch it?!” She exclaimed.
“If you didn’t catch it, I would be absolutely shocked.” Ellie said, turning on the console she still had. “We’re basically superhumans, and you do way harder stuff without breaking a sweat. And, even if you did fumble it, I could just catch it with magic, not a big deal.”
“I guess.” Tess replied, turning on the console she had been given. “When’d you get two of these, anyway?”
“I got them just before the expedition, because I figured we’d be in a situation like this.” Ellie explained. “There should be a bunch of multiplayer games on there, pick whichever strikes your fancy.”
“And you got the money where?” Tess asked idly, thumbing through the games. “There are a lot of games here and we don’t exactly have much income on Mael.”
“Death hooked me up. I paid her the equivalent amount of gold, which…honestly was surprisingly little compared to how much we make nowadays, and she got me the console and the games.”
Death: Little did you know I already took the liberty of adding you two as friends on my system, without so much as your consent. Truly evil, I know. However, this great act of villainy brings me to my true aim in all this…I wanna play too.
Fortune: You dastardly fiend! To think you would go take such extreme measure and not even include me in them! The unmitigated gall you have astounds even me!
Death: Worry not my loyal henchgod, I am a villain who rewards loyalty! Look within the deepest recesses of your pockets and you will find the reward for your years of loyal service!
Fortune: Your evilness, your foresight and grace astounds even me! Truly, you are a master worth following!
Ellie: You two are nerds, you know that, right?
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
Death: Hey! That’s goddess of the nerds to you!
Ellie: Yes, yes. Anyway, I’m down to have you two join as long as Tess is fine with it.
Tess: That sounds good to me. Lots of games are better with four players anyway.
The group took a bit to browse the list of games, chose one, then booted it up and began to play. They spent the next couple of hours relaxing and enjoying each other’s company, using the group chat to communicate with each other in lieu of voice chat or the barebones in-game quick chat.
It was a nice way to unwind and wash away all the stress from the very long day they had had. And, as it turned out, Tess was more tired than she had realized; it seemed as if one moment she was playing games with everyone, and the next Ellie was shaking her awake. “Wake up, sleepyhead.” Ellie said, giving her a smile. “If you want to sleep, you should do it in bed and in your PJs, not in a chair in your normal clothes.”
“Mm, yeah, sorry.” Tess mumbled, absentmindedly transforming her gear into a set of pajamas and giving Ellie a hug. “Guess I was more tired than I thought.”
“It’s nothing to apologize for, silly.” Ellie chuckled, giving Tess a kiss on the forehead and then scooping her into her arms. Ellie carried her over to the bed, then gently placed her down. Ellie walked over to the other side of the bed, got in, then pulled the covers over the two of them. “I love you.” She said, cuddling up to Tess.
“Love you too.” Tess replied, then drifted off to sleep once again.
----------------------------------------
“Alright, let’s see what’s so important that we needed to spend another day here getting it for you.” Alice said eagerly, rubbing her hands together. “Not that I’m complaining, mind you, we’re getting stuff out of this too, I’m just dying to know.”
The group was currently standing in front of the dungeon’s Rewards Crystal, having just finished their fifth run of the dungeon. Unfortunately, Maven wasn’t able to bring them straight to the Rewards Crystal or change the number of runs needed to get a reward without changing the dungeon for everyone, so they had to do things the normal way. Maven had offered to disable all the monsters and traps to allow them easy passage through the floors, but if they were going to be moving through the floors, The Rumors wanted to actually have some stimulation in the form of fights.
The four runs they had done that day had been a lot faster than the ones they had done the previous day; now that The Rumors had gone through the dungeon and knew what to expect, they took significantly less time going through it, pausing only briefly if an unexpected situation turned up. And, as a result, it only took them a few hours to reach the Rewards Crystal again.
“Alright, let’s take a look…” Tess said, placing her hand on the crystal. As always, she received a window a moment later, displaying her new acquisition.
You have gained the Skill Together Strong!
Together Strong:
Rarity: Mythical
Type: Passive
Description:
If you would be subject to a debuff that would also apply to an ally, if the debuff would fail to apply to you or the ally, it instead doesn’t apply to you or any of your allies. If you or an ally would normally not receive the opportunity to apply your resistance to this debuff, you or that ally receive the opportunity to resist the debuff.
If you wanna be my debuffer, you better debuff my friends
“Ah.” Tess said. “I think I see.”
“What?” Alice asked. “What’s it do?”
“It makes it so any multi-target debuffs that include me in the target have to successfully debuff all my allies they target or none of my allies get debuffed. And if any of us wouldn’t get the chance to resist, we do. The last Skill I got makes me share all buffs, debuffs, passive Skills, and the like with my attendants, and so if they got targeted for the debuff, and it hit them, I would get it, even if it normally couldn’t affect me.”
“Oh, it’s just plugging a hole that last Skill introduced, I see.” Ker said. “I can see why it was so important you got it.”
Fortune: If you’re willing to repeat this dungeon enough to get one more shot at the Rewards Crystal, there’s another Skill in this series. The buff isn’t quite as big as the first but this is your only shot at it for a while, it’s a pretty new Skill.
Death: By that she means she helped make it specifically for you and got it put into this Rewards Crystal so you could get it
Fortune: Hey, that was supposed to be a secret!
Death: She was gonna find out eventually
Fortune: I mean, yeah, but it’d be less embarrassing twenty or thirty years from now
“Fortune says that if you’re willing to go through this dungeon enough to get the reward again then there’s another Skill for Tess that she wouldn’t otherwise be able to get for a long time.” Ellie said. “It’s apparently not as powerful as these first, though, so we don’t have to stay if we would rather do something else.”
Jin paused, thinking on that for a moment. “Maven, how many more times would we need to run through this dungeon to fully clear it? He asked.
Maven was silent for a moment before answering. “Seventy.” She said. “Five more to the next reward, fifteen more for the reward after that, and twenty-five more each for the last two rewards. And, like I have mentioned, there is no Challenge for this dungeon, so no need to worry about that.”
“I think we can go through five more times.” Alice said. “We’re going to have to finish this dungeon eventually, and if we go five more times, we should still have enough time to make it back to the expedition camp before nightfall.”
“I agree.” Ker said. “Though…Maven, are there any other dungeons reasonably close to the expedition camp? If not, we might as well continue working through this dungeon, instead of exploring normally.”
“Will that not reduce your evaluation for the coming rank changes?” Maven asked. “While we have found this dungeon, and that is indeed a good look on your resume, I worry that failing to do more exploration and focusing on yourselves will be a negative point. Yes, you can provide information on this dungeon, but…that’s not the main focus of this expedition, mapping and general exploration is.”
“Ugh, she’s right.” Alice said regretfully. “That’s unfortunate, really. I would rather just continue working through this dungeon with you guys but this is kind of important for us.”
“This is only a negative if there are no other dungeons we can find.” Jin pointed out. “So, Maven, are there?”
“Give me a moment to check.”
Dungeons: Within easy reach of your group? One. There are six others that we intend to have the expedition find, but those each require treks of at least two days to find. If you want to maintain a good evaluation for The Rumors, you can probably only visit the close one and maybe two of the others, and you can’t spend more than a day at any.
“There is one relatively nearby.” Maven relayed. “The rest are at least two days’ journey out. Dungeons estimates that, if we wish to maintain a good evaluation for you, we can visit the nearby one and perhaps two of the others, provided we spend no less than a day at each.”
“Better than nothing, I suppose.” Alice said. “Alright, let’s get to work clearing this thing again.”
With that decided, they began the process of running through the dungeon again. The runs themselves were much the same as the ones they had done earlier in the day, but, on their second run after decided to go for the next Rewards Crystal, they bumped into another group of freelancers in the lobby.
“Hey.” One of them said, stepping forward. “You’re The Rumors, right? Anything we should know before running this dungeon?”
“That’s us.” Jin confirmed. “We’ve logged everything we know in the guild’s app. If you study up on that and be careful, and if you’re within or above the level range of the dungeon, you’ll be fine.”
“If you say so.”
“We do.” Alice said, hurriedly shepherding Tess’s party into the first floor. Once they were safely inside, Alice turned to the girls and began to speak. “Be careful when freelancers ask you for something.” She said. “Sometimes they’re just trying to get their foot in the door to ask you for something else. Given the circumstances, these people could be legitimately seeking for advice, but like Jin said, everything we know about the dungeon is on the app now, they don’t need to ask us for anything.”
“As callous as it may sound, you need to remember that your time is valuable.” Ker said. “Even if you only end up as famous as our party, which I find highly unlikely, you’ll get a lot of requests for advice or for help with some problem or another. If you get a reputation as people who will help any freelancing party, you will get people trying to take advantage of that, and clients for prospective jobs will want to pay you less.
“If you become as famous as The Titans, which I could see happening, you wouldn’t have time to do anything if you helped out everyone. You’d just spend all day doing meaningless things, and the three of you have much, much more important things to do. You don’t need to be rude about refusing people, just be careful with how you act.”
“We will keep that in mind, thank you.” Maven said.
The rest of the day went without incident. They didn’t run into any huge variations in the dungeon, no monsters snuck up on The Rumors and caused them to get hurt, it was just…normal. And, soon enough, Tess found herself laying a hand on the Rewards Crystal yet again, waiting anxiously to see what she would get.
You have gained the Skill Uniform Upgrades!
Uniform Upgrades:
Rarity: Mythical
Type: Passive
Description:
If you would receive a percentage stat-increasing buff or percentage heal that would also apply to an ally, you and all allies who would receive that buff or heal instead received a modified version that grants the largest absolute gain in stats or HP that the buff or heal would give to a recipient.
Our buff.
Tess frowned, trying to make sense of that. “Um…one sec, let me make sure this does what I think it does.”
Tess: Mom, this Skill, it makes it so that if me and another thing share a buff or heal that uses percents, everyone like…gets the most benefit anyone would get out of it? Like, if Ellie and I were both healed, and she would get healed for 1,000 and I would get healed for 100, it instead heals us both for 1,000?
Fortune: That’s exactly right. Sorry, I couldn’t find a good way to word it and we prefer to shy away from examples inside Skill descriptions, so I figured you could just ask me if you were worried, and others would just get info from the guild or the internet.
Tess gave a nod. “Yeah, okay, that’s what I thought. Basically, if a buff that would increase stats by a percent or a heal that would heal a percent is applied to me and an ally at the same time, all allies involved in that buff or heal get the most benefit out of it that anyone would. So, if Ellie would heal one thousand and I would heal one hundred, we both heal one thousand.”
Ellie’s eyes lit up. “And that’s less powerful than the first one?” She asked. “Are we sure?”
Tess nodded. “This is just numbers go up. The other basically allows me to have extra slots for Attributes, and that opens the door to a lot of things.”
“Well, either way it’s super strong.” Alice said. “Now…why don’t we go start the trip back? I’d like to be back before they stop serving food.”
“We have our own food.” Jin said, smiling slightly. “It won’t be a huge deal if we miss out.”
“Yeah, but that’s our food.” Alice countered. “And everyone knows that food someone else is paying for tastes better. We’re not doing anything important here, so we might as well move, we’re burning daylight!”