25. Countdown Until the Apocalypse
13 days until the apocalypse festival. Finalizing patch notes... Insufficient Tower ressources. Recalculating.... Error.... Error.... Recalculating.......
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Having tested Milos and Josh’s abilities and rested for a few hours, we headed out, aiming for the portal to Floor 0. With new classes and the boosted stats that came with them, our group made it to our destination in record time. Contrary to the trip out, none of us were tired by the time we reached the portal to the Slums as we quickly and efficiently dealt with a total of four slimes that squeaked by Slimey’s defenses. We dicked around for a bit near the portal, not wanting to go into the Slums before the others came back, but we quickly grew restless.
“We should check out the base,” I suggested. “See how it’s holding up.”
The others didn’t object, so we power walked towards the valley that hid our base. While we walked, I explained to them how Pyro’s constructs were never there when we reentered a floor and how we were hoping that the base would stay if one of us remained behind. When we arrived where I thought it should be, there was nothing but green grass and even greener slimes. I led us around for a bit more, hoping I had just brought us to the wrong spot. In the end, though, we just quit and went back to the arrival teleporter. It wasn’t too much of a surprise, but it certainly wasn’t ideal. I was glad that I hadn’t been inside of the base when Pyro left the floor, that was for sure. Being phased out of existence or buried under tons of dirt wasn’t necessarily on my bucket list.
When we arrived, we found someone facing off against the slimes. It wasn’t Pyro or Thwain like I was expecting. No, it was a boy with catlike eyes, staring determinedly into the sea of monsters and muttering what seemed to be curses under his breath. When he saw us approaching, ringed in a protective barrier of the one and only Slimey, the boy pointed his finger at us as if it were a gun.
“Stay back,” he said, his voice quivering. We stopped advancing. We were about thirty feet out, but I could easily see that he was petrified. He was wearing a school uniform consisting of dark gray shorts cut off above his wobbling knees, a wrinkled button-up shirt that used to be white and a matching gray necktie that had seen better days. He had a shaggy mop of unruly black hair, typical of every 14-year old boy from across the Tower, I was sure. His skin was so tanned that it looked almost orange. No, I was pretty sure that it actually was orange. I motionned to Milos to take the lead.
“Hey, kid!” Milos called out. “We’re friendlies, I promise. I’m Milos. I’m part of the Tower Militia, sector two, chapter eight.” This seemed to calm the boy, though it only left me more confused. I hadn’t heard of the Tower Militia until I met Milos and his group, but this kid seemed to already know about it. “We’re exploring the floor, trying to clear slimes. We’re going to approach, no need to worry. We’re here to help, you have my word.”
I was surprised when the boy lowered his hand. Really, I felt like I would have been more distrustful if I were in his position. Still, I wasn’t going to argue with results. He let us approach, eyeing me and Josh warily. I noticed that his finger twitched a few times as I unsummoned Slimey to give myself a break.
“You’re an academy student?” Milos asked. The kid nodded.
“What year?”
“Uh… T-two,” the boy stammered.
“Second year and you’re already Awakened?” Milos asked, raising an eyebrow. “Interesting. No offense, but you don’t seem rich enough to have your parents buy you a stone…” He motioned at the kid’s ratty uniform.
At that, the kid grew defensive, balling his fists. “I won my stone, fair and square!”
“Of course,” Milos said, doing a bad job at sounding convinced. “What does it do, anyway? Anything good?” There was a twinge there. A slight flinch in the corner of Milos’s eye, as if he was hoping that the boy would say no.
The academy student nodded enthusiastically. “Explosives! I just…” He deflated. “I don’t know how explosive, or how to kill slimes without aggroing them, yet.”
Milos nodded sagely. “We can help. That’s what we do. What’s your name?”
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“Emblin, but my friends call me Em.”
“Alright, Em. Make your explosion, do your worst. Only one, and not too far away. Not close enough to catch us in the blast, but you don’t want to aggro the entire floor. Josh and I will defend.”
“What about him?” He asked, pointing at me.
Milos grinned. “He’s only here just in case.”
“Ok… If you insist…”
Em raised his flying crystal book finger, pointing it out into the legions of slimes and activated his skill, pushing in as much mana as he could. A ball of orange energy phased into existence a few meters away, hovering just above the gelatinous monsters. A few slimes turned, slowly taking in their new neighbor with their large, dull eyes. The orb wavered, as if it were a heat mirage or a ball of bright orange water trying its best to hold itself together. The edges of the mana facsimile of the sun were suddenly sucked inwards, the whole thing folding in on itself, compressing into a tight ball of blinding light before exploding outwards in a rush. The slimes in the immediate vicinity of the blast were instantly vaporized, leaving nothing but a six-foot hole where grass used to be. Farther out, slimes were hurled through the air, only to splatter into motes of light upon landing dozens of feet away. A deafening boom split the air before a shockwave of force rocked us off our feet. The shockwave continued for at least a hundred feet in every direction, from what I could see, pushing and jostling almost every slime in sight.
Milos, Josh and I stared at the explosion with mixed reactions as we got to our feet. Milos was afraid of what that level of power meant, both for the incoming aggroed slimes and Em’s future destructive potential. Josh was intrigued, craning his neck to look between Em’s finger and the explosion, trying to find a link or a hint at how the skill worked. I was excited. Depending on how many times he could use his skill, Em was a walking gold mine wrapped in a cloth woven from hope for the future of the Tower.
The kid was a monster, and we needed a lot more monsters if we were going to clear the backlog of slimes. Even after such an explosion, slimes were both rushing in to fill the gaps and spawning into existence, shunted from the Tower’s no-doubt overfilled reserves.
We braced for the onrush as an innumerable amount of slimes crashed towards our defensive line. Milos swept out with my spear, the flames from Josh’s skill boosting its damage considerably. The rest of us used likewise Josh-reinforced shields to buy time while I conjured Slimey. Em’s shield was little more than planks, but with its durability enhanced, it held up fine as we beat back the monsters.
I distractedly lashed out with a looted (and admittedly shitty) short sword, worried about summoning Slimey so soon after dismissing him. I could afford the mana cost, I was sure of it, but I had wanted to regain a little more mana and give whatever mana networks I had a rest for a while. As my panicked summoning concluded, I gratefully hid behind Slimey’s ever-increasing bulk, thankful that I had him in reserve. He joyfully and greedily soaked up the incoming enemies, forming a circle around us like he had done when we crossed the floor.
“Again?” Em asked, using his shield to push ambitiously jumping slimes into Slimey.
“Sure, can’t really make things worse. But make it the weakest you’ve got,” I said, similarly standing on guard for anything that slipped past Slimey’s defenses. There were so many slimes rushing in that they piled onto each other, leaping over Slimey like they had done with Pyro’s barriers. Still, we beat them back slowly. “And as far away as you can. Test your limits.”
Em obliged, creating an exploding orange orb off in the distance. It condensed and exploded like the last orb, but the damage to the environment as well as the shockwave were significantly reduced. Still, at least twenty slimes in the immediate vicinity 75 feet from us were blown to smithereens and a handful more were catapulted into nothingness. Having figured out his range, Em triggered his skill much closer to us a few times, immensely lessening the strain on Slimey.
A rogue slime snuck by our defenses as we were watching Em’s skill, smashing into the back of Josh’s head. He crumpled to the ground, a green glob of evil slowly trying to envelop his head. Milos darted forward, precisely slicing off slivers of slime bit by bit until it died. He rushed to his friend’s side, cradling his head and looking around frantically.
“Quick! Help!”
I looked around frantically for something to use to help. I had food, water, a few knives…
“Shield!” Mylos cried, racing towards me in a blur of green hair and a tangle of limbs. I held up my shield dumbly. It wasn’t charged, so I wasn’t sure what to do with it. Milos raised his fists and sent a fury of blows at the shield. His fists smacked into the wood of my shield until it glowed green. Understanding his plan, I triggered the shield’s healing pulse, sending it directly at Josh’s face. Skin that had been sloughing off of his face reattached and regrew, leaving a few bald spots where the slime had eaten through parts of his scalp.
We weathered the rest of the waves, careful not to miss any more slimes. Josh gingerly stood, nervously twitching at any sign of movement. Once Slimey ate the rest of the wave, Milos and Josh collapsed together onto the stone circling the portal, exhausted.
I made Slimey help me gather the handful of loot orbs that had spawned before I collapsed as well. Most of the loot was mundane, but I managed to loot another slime card. I placed it up against the other slime card, the matching intricate copper borders overlapping. Nothing happened. The slimes painted on the cards just sat there, staring back at me blankly. It must have meant that I needed more cards to merge them, apparently. Looting done, I dismissed Slimey and slunk into a deep sleep.