We found ourselves in what appeared to be a log cabin, the type Jacques remembered seeing pictures of. There was a barely lit torch on the wall opposite the door, but Kossa cast a slightly brighter one of her own. I, and I’m sure Onre and Ferret, started up Dark Sight. One of the side walls had a wooden knife switch, with its lever being about five inches long. A sign above it was labeled, EXIT. I guess someone who wanted to leave just toggled it from one side to the other. A member of a normal party would likely appear at the rock outside of the dungeon, but Skawa said if someone from his Adventure exited from a safe room, they would return directly to campus.
The cabin was quite tall, and it would have accommodated Ferret’s 9-foot form. He told us, “I din’ know how high the ceiling would be when we got here, so I reverted to my normal form. It was just about time for the shapeshift to expire anyway; at Level 2 I cannot hold it for more than an hour. The recharge time is only a minute, so I can still be morphed most of the time. And when I get to 3 later, I’ll have an hour and a half!”
I asked him, “How much does it cost to use it?”
“At F, it was mainly just the morph cost itself, 10 ki and 25 SP, along with 5 SP per minute. Now that it is D, there is an additional 2 ki and 4 SP, both per minute. Fortunately that just fits within my Rank D regen rates, so if I don’t do much more, I can remain morphed for the full hour. I can’t wait for Level 3, giving me more ki and SP to start with. I might even be able to keep Clear Mind up most of the time also.”
“It took me 50 morphs – I counted – to rank Shapeshifting from F to E, which seem like forever. But E felt easier to rank, I think cuz it uses more ki.”
I: Yes, Ferret, that is correct. Shapeshifting earns 1 RP per 5 ki expended. Since Rank E added an additional 1 ki per minute, you used more ki and it gained RP at a faster rate.
“Thank you, Interface. I thought it was something like that. An’ now it’s 2 ki per minute!”
The numbers interested me a lot, but team leader took over. “Does anyone want to meditate for a few minutes before we leave this safe zone?”
Onre recommended, “Let’s take 10 minutes. We probably will not need to be fully charged on the first floor, but having spare won’t hurt.” Everyone agreed, and we seated ourselves and did so.
The cabin did not have any windows, so we didn’t know what was outside until we opened the door. We saw another arid plane which looked remarkably similar to the surface we had come from. I asked, “Onre, do you think it will be like this on every floor?”
“No. Expect each one to be different, with no common theme. I am surprised that this starts out so much like where we just were.”
Arrjee said, “I hope there are monsters. It wouldn’t have been any fun to just waste those hyenas.” Onre informed him that system dungeons only had monsters.
I repeated something Asha Yon and others had informed me over the past many weeks, “Deep down, some of the natural dungeons even have sapient monsters and other beings, like Oni. They might not speak Covargh, though.”
We went outside, Sun in the lead. There was a path of hardened dirt leading away from the cabin. “Onre, please scout and we’ll follow you along the path. Sun, you take the lead of the five of us, and I will follow in the rear in the event of attacks from behind. Everyone, we’re dungeon diving! Be at the ready.”
Ferret grew into his 9-foot form, Sun and Arrjee armed themselves, and Kossa gave us her double buffs. We headed out at about 8 and I put up my map. As expected, it showed almost all fog, but each of us was indicated as little dots. It was quite hazy outside, so Kossa kept up her torch, which followed above her. She also buffed us with Encouragement and Enhance HP.
Onre began moving a bit faster than everyone else, to reach a scouting distance. I could still see him, though, when we began to hear a strange noise, like a mixture of scratching, rustling, and meowing.
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OL: The sound we hear is skitterlings. They are low level monsters, sort of like non-flying big locusts. On this floor, probably none of them will be past Level 3. They will attack in small groups, three to five at a time. Sometimes they travel with very low level slimes, which aren’t very smart at all.
ES: Slimy they! || But they are slimy!
ES: Clean they despawn. || They despawn cleanly, though.
From forward and to our right, the sound indicated that a group of them were approaching.
FR: Onre, if these are low level like you think, it is your choice to attack them from their rear or flank as they attack us. For close to equal and higher foes, I would like us to fight together, however.
OL: Agree. I should be able to work these from the rear, but I’ll stay close enough for Kossa’s buffs to affect me. There seem to be about seven skitterlings coming at you. It’s hard to see beyond them, but there may be some slimes following.
FR: Didn’t you say expect three to five?
OL:
AS: Maybe this isn’t a beginner one.
ES: Intermediate it. || It might be intermediate.
FR: First floor should still be easy, right?
OL: Yes. The First Duchy’s academy would often send low-level teams, but where everyone had classes, to intermediate dungeons. I remember once a team came back and they said even the first floor boss was easy.
FR: Even if it seems easy, let’s be careful.
I could see the skitterlings hopping toward us now. Well, I assumed that’s what they were. They were insects from about 6 to 10 inches tall, reminding me of crickets. I didn’t really know what locusts looked like, but if that’s what Onre said they were like, I believe him. Kossa buffed us with Sensory Filter, which is supposed to reduce battle confusion by filtering ‘unimportant’ sounds, smells, and sights. She also laid down a Void Field around us. It had about a 3-yard diameter at her rank, and would slowly drain life energy from opponents within it.
I almost wanted to laugh when they reached us. There was one Level 4, two Level 3s, and four Level 2s. Even at Level 2, with his buffs I think Ferret could have taken care of them all. Sun taunted, Ferret started stomping, and Arrjee started swinging. I prevented any of them from reaching Kossa, who played Lethargy to slow them and attacked individuals with Absorb Warmth.
By the time Onre reached us, the Skitterlings were all gone, but a mass of slimes approached converging onto the trail ahead of us. I don’t think they were smart enough to do anything else but head straight our way. I couldn’t count them, but I didn’t see a single one greater than Level 3. Most of them were Level 2. Maybe 2 is the base difficulty on the first floor of this intermediate dungeon.
Ferret began stomping these as he had the previous foes and Sun joined in with his truncheon. Everyone else followed Ferret’s stomping lead, realizing that bladed weapons would have minimal impact on slimes. There were over a dozen of them to squash, and then they were gone. As promised, their slimy remnant disappeared as they rejoined the aether.
There were minimal rewards from such low level foes. There were some copper coins, a few small gems, and some herbs which Onre recognized might be used in basic alchemical recipes.
As we continued following the path away from our starting point, we encountered three other such groups. The further we traveled, there were less Level 2s and more 3s and 4s. It took us just over 30 minutes to reach a cave, which Onre speculated could be where the floor boss would be. He told us this floor was likely to be fairly small, and it was.
All three of our magic users cast their Torch within the cave, which after a couple of turns got quite dark. It was a winding, but apparently single-path cave. At the end there was a huge skitterling. “Huge’ being relative in this case, about four feet tall at its head and a body length of about six feet. It stood angled at about 60 degrees, err, one sixth, from the ground. This one was Level 5, over twice Ferret’s current level, but still less than our tank’s Level 6. As we approached, it sprayed us with some sort of mildly toxic yellow-green fluid. The smell was worse than the poison. Both Onre and I began using Bless Blood, while the rest of our party went on the offensive. It was easy for Sun to hold our single foe’s attention, while Kossa had both the Lethargy skill and the flute’s native Somnolence detracting from its ability to attack efficiently. Arrjee stood back and experimented with hurling stones via his Push.
Sun was parrying its leg attacks with his shields and pounding at it, while Kossa and Ferret knifed it. Arrjee approached it and split his attention between sword attacks and bouncing a large stone off of its head with a repeated Push & Pull combo. Onre and I were happy to let the others get the largest XP weight when it died. It left behind what might be a moderately valued Algodonite gem.
When Kossa picked up the gem, we got quest completion notices, and we received 5 bronze each. At that, a new quest was given.
Quest: Defeat the floor boss
Reward: Varies
Do you accept?
The words were the same, but Onre said that when we all accepted it, we would appear in floor 2’s safe zone. I said ‘yes’.