Arthe stood next to the steps leading to the first floor repeatedly banging his head against the wall,
-10hp
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all the while muttering to himself in angry tones.
"Stupid, stupid, stupid. Lost the (bang) only lifeline i had in this place (bang) probably lost affection with Mathis too (bang) failed the dungeon clearing quest as well probably (bang) failed as a knight (bang) most likely die in this bloody dungeon (bang)"
After another couple of minutes of self recrimination and bodily harm, Arthe turned around and prepared himself to journey on to the fourth floor.
"Might as well head on, if I'm lucky I'll find Cadfael at the bottom. Hopefully he'll be in one piece and he won't be too angry with me for letting him get kidnapped."
He gathered his gear and made the descent down the dark staircase. The walls were thick with some kind of slime and the steps were coated with dust and Freya knows what else. As he neared the bottom he used his Benevolence of the Goddess buff and raised his sword, just in case the entry room was filled with monsters like it was on the third floor. However to his surprise the room was abandoned, instead there were signs of a struggle.
A backpack was dropped in the corner and there were splashes of green blood on the floor.
"Hmm this is Cadfael's backpack, so he must have fought back against whatever it was that took him. Injured it as well, not bad for a priest. Means he's alive anyway, that's good maybe I've got a chance to rescue him." Arthe said to himself, after having a look around.
The blood spatter lead to a corridor on the left hand side of the room, Arthe had a quick look down the hallway and noticed a distinct lack of torchlight. He rummaged through his knapsack until he found one of the torches he had procured from the floors above, lighting it he preceded to walk down the hallway sword held in one hand with the torch held high in the other.
He didn't want to call out to Cadfael in case he attracted the attention of more monsters than he was capable of handling alone, so he crept along making as little noise as possible. Eventually he came to a fork in the path, one way lead to complete darkness and the other had a faint, flickering, light at the end.
"please let them have gone towards the light, please let them have gone towards the light." Arthe prayed, he had no desire to try and fight off a monster without either his shield or a source of light. He entered the lit passageway and made his way along until he came to the entrance to a circular chamber.
In the center of the room was an altar of some kind, caked with old blood and other indescribable body parts. Tied to it was a humanoid figure wearing robes.
"Damn that's Cadfael! But i can't just rush out there, i mean it's obviously a trap of some kind. Still if i just stand here and watch him get butchered by some unholy monster I'm not likely to make the list of greatest knights of all time am I."
Dropping the torch and his backpack Arthe raised his sword and shield, warily entering the chamber. As he neared the altar Cadfael spotted him and started mumbling something through the gag on his mouth. It sounded like a warning of some kind, so Arthe spun about and prepared to do battle.
However it was too late, pouring from small alcoves in the walls came dozens of small goblin-kin.
"Crap! Boggarts! This doesn't look good, I have to find their leader."
Searching around, Arthe spotted a Boggart crouched on a rock holding a staff that was dripping with malevolent energies. The beast was directing his kin towards Arthe with high pitched squeaks and shrill cries.
"That must be it, if I can just gut that thing quickly the others should lose heart and begin to flee."
Setting his legs apart and bracing himself, Arthe backed up against the altar passing Cadfael a small knife as he did so. The flood of Boggarts rushed at him and he activated his Spirit of the Stalwart Defender and his Stoicism skill at the same time. Unfortunately he didn't have enough Mana to maintain Stoicism indefinitely, so he had to try and hack his way through to the Boggart Warlock before he ran out. Luckily, however, Boggarts were kind of weak in comparison to the other monsters Arthe had faced so far.
They had low attack power and low defense which is why they made up for it with sheer numbers. Still Arthe was able to kill one Boggart with only two strokes of his sword, so by swinging his sword in a wide arc in front of him, he was able to clear himself a bit of a path forward. His biggest concern was that he would be surrounded and that Cadfael would get mobbed as well.
It turned out though, that Cadfael was more than capable of defending himself. From out of nowhere he had equipped himself with a shining war-hammer in one hand and a Tower shield in the other, as well as this he was also wearing steel plate armor all over his body.
"WTH! He looks like a paladin, wait a minute he is a goddamn paladin!" Arthe exclaimed, momentarily distracted from his task of slaying Boggarts.
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Retaliating with a heavy overhead blow, Arthe split the skull of the creature that had hit him. Grumbling about the duplicity of Mathis and the deceitful nature of modern paladins, Arthe waded through the horde of beasts. His grim visage striking fear into the shriveled hearts of his opponents and the curses spewing from his mouth causing even the bravest Boggart to falter in its tracks.
"ding"
You have Leveled Up!
You have learned Death's Gaze
Death's Gaze
This skill lets you stare into the souls of your opponents, striking them with terror and reducing their combat effectiveness.
-50% damage received from opponents of your level
-25% damage received from opponents up to 20 levels higher.
Reduced by 5% every 10 levels higher than that.
Passive skill
His new skill made the hits from the Boggarts feel like a summer breeze, instead of slowing him down they invigorated him. Arthe roared at the beasts and pummeled his way into the midst of the mob, laying waste to all those within range of his sword. The creature quivered under his gaze and began to back off slightly in apprehension and fear of this invincible warrior.
Even the Boggart Warlock was taken aback at this human who could not be brought low even with 30 Boggarts working together. He began to cast a spell which would summon a Hell-hound, even though he knew that it was beyond his control.
"Stop that beast! He is summoning a beast of Hades! If he completes the spell, neither of us are leaving here alive!" Cadfael shouted to Arthe whilst crushing the heads of the Boggarts nearest to him with his Hammer.
"Damn if it's not one thing it's another with this dungeon. First; giant smelly Kobolds; then disappearing priests, who are actually paladins; now it's Hell spawn summoning, friend snatching, Boggarts! This game just loves to surprise me, doesn't it." Arthe thought to himself whilst using his shield to force his way through the mob of enemies between him and his target.
"For Freya and the King!" He shouted as he hacked and slashed at the beasts near him, at one point he even picked up the head of one of the beast and threw it in the face of another Boggart to prevent it stabbing him in the thigh. As he drew nearer to the Warlock it began chanting faster, its fear of Arthe overpowering its fear of the spell backfiring should he mispronounce a syllable.
Finally Arthe stood free of the mob and in front of the Boggart leader. He raised his weapon high and began to slash downward towards the fiends skull.
Fearfully it faltered in its spellcasting, suffering a Mana burn as it backfired, but still managing to raise its staff in an attempt to block the inexorable strike descending upon him.
"CRACK!"
Arthe's mighty blow split the staff in two, releasing a cloud of noxious fumes from the break, and splitting the Boggart Warlock completely in two!
The other Boggarts saw this and ran shrieking in terror back down the holes they had come from. Thinking it was over Arthe leaned on his shield and tried to catch his breath.
You have Leveled Up!
"So you were a paladin huh Cadfael? Did you not think that maybe that was something you could have mentioned, before I made an ass of myself treating you like a priest?" Arthe asked Cadfael irritably.
"My apologies Sir Arthe, Mathis asked me to accompany you so that i might judge your worthiness to join my order. He suggested that you may be more comfortable not knowing you were being observed and provided me with the means to do so." Cadfael replied sheepishly.
"I might have known it was his idea. So have you learned what you needed to about me, or do i still have to prove myself. Because I'm willing to pretend you're not a paladin if you want to go back to wearing the robes, I know you like the feeling of the wind around your legs."
"Hahahaha, no that won't be necessary, I shall be recommending you for recruitment when we get out of this dungeon. If you slay other evil with as much zeal as you have shown here, you will go far in our Holy Order. A real priest should come by after the grand melee to anoint you as a member of the military arm of the church of Freya. But before that, look sharp! That black cloud appears to be up to something."
The cloud Cadfael pointed to was roiling and growing in size, mini flashes of lightning could be seen within it. Red lightning! It began drifting towards the entrance as if searching for something, as it headed out the room it became thicker and larger almost as if the darkness beyond the doorway strengthened it somehow.
"After it! We cannot let it escape, who knows what evil it could unleash if it is able to leave this place. We must slay it or purify it somehow before we or it leave this place." Cadfael shouted and chased after the mysterious thing.
Arthe swept up as much of the loot laying around as he could before following on behind.