Macronomicon
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Chapter 113: Re-equipping
🕑 Added 2025-02-26 19:18:11 +0000 UTC**Jason***
“HGRFBLE!” Jason let out a string of consonants as he tumbled backwards and hit his head on the far wall.
“What the-,” Jason’s complaint was cut off by a metallic screech as Will’s chest full of gear slid into the white room, the metal corners of the box leaving a faint metallic trail on the otherwise pristine white surface.
Jason didn’t have time to roll out of the way, opting to scrunch himself up as the chest slid up to him, coming to a halt only a few feet away from the wall, nearly jamming his knees into his chest.
“What the Abyss?” Jason breathed a sigh of relief at not being crushed by the chest as he squeezed himself out and rose to his feet. One second it had been a friendly goodbye, and the next he was being shoved at dangerous speed, with no explanation…Why did they…
A streak of red caught Jason’s attention. There, partly underneath the chest was a human hand wearing Will’s gauntlet.
No way…
Jason squatted down and pulled out the shortsword Loth had given him, poking the gauntlet. After it didn’t leap up and try to kill him, Jason sat down and considered what it meant and what to do with it.
The conclusion he came to was that it had become unsafe back in the underground smithy: Will had seen something coming and pushed Jason through the Door, followed by his chest full of miasmatic ash.
It must’ve been Graneshian Climbers, because the natural world simply didn’t have the means to cut Will’s hand off that abruptly.
We were attacked, and they pushed me and the chest in so they didn’t get it.
Jason opened the lid of the chest, inspecting the softly glowing ash inside.
He was vaguely aware that Will’s Ability took a few weeks, so his best bet was to simply wait until the glow dwindled down to nothing.
Jason’s attention turned to the room he’d been shoved into. The Class Creation Room. A white box with three altars, about twenty feet by twenty feet, with white light seemingly coming from everywhere at once.
Exactly the way it had been described to him since he was old enough to understand words.
It was something everyone went through, so there was no great mystery to it, but Jason still found himself fascinated by the room. The omnipresent light, the perfect smoothness of the walls and floor. The altars that rose seamlessly out of the ground.
Jason picked up his three Sacrifices and placed each of them in front of one of the altars, nodding in satisfaction.
Now I just need to wait for these blisters to go away, he mused, picturing how he was going to divide up the room.
That corner over there is the toilet, and I can use the chest as a table and bed so I don’t touch the ground…
All I need to do now is just wait for my feet to heal.
Jason sat down on the chest, dangling his feet over the edge, idly kicking his feet…Gods this is boring.
Jason’s gaze kept being drawn to the severed hand in the center of the room, as if the thing had some kind of invisible current dragging his gaze back to it.
Finally, his curiosity wouldn’t let him ignore it any longer and he picked up the hand, tugging it out of the gauntlet.
The hand was skin wrapped around bone, with barely any flesh to speak of, cut off about a palm’s length past the wrist.
Of course, Jason make it flip the room off first, spending half an hour or so playing with the disembodied hand. Thumb’s up, hang loose, fist, hand-spider, scepter of Power, Sacrifice…
“Behold, the Sacrifice of William Oh!” Jason shouted, holding the hand above his head, imagining himself speaking to an audience of thousands of rapt listeners.
Wait a moment…
Jason frowned, bringing the hand back down to eye level.
They wanted me to sacrifice a bit of an old priest, so it’s definitely possible. And Will said he sacrificed his own hand…so why can’t I?
Jason tapped his chin with Will’s fingers as he thought.
I already have all three Sacrifices I’d need for a Hype Man class. It would be dumb to change it out for ‘hand of orphan boy’. The stats couldn’t be good.
On the other Hand, Will was kicking plenty of ass using his own hand as a sacrifice. It must be halfway decent.
And I mean, if I use the herald sacrifices with Will’s hand instead of the Enchantress, isn’t that just a slight variation of what the Church was planning? Except I don’t have a god all up in my business.
And by all the gods, I can’t imagine anything that would make those bastards angrier than me using Will’s hand instead of their carefully prepared ‘Puppet of Granesh’.
Prophet of William Oh. I kinda like the sound of that…
The hand’s gonna rot if I wait 2 weeks. I need to decide now.
Before Jason could overthink it, he tossed the hand onto the first altar.
As soon as the hand touched the Altar, a beam of light descended on it, gradually growing in brightness until a flash nearly blinded Jason. When he blinked tears out of his eyes, the hand was gone.
Sacrifice detected…attempting to generate Class Seed… Success
Generating seed….
William Oh’s Left Hand
1 resistance, 1 focus, 1 acuity, 1 kinesthetics.
Myth, Relic.
**William Oh**
“How does an enormous suit of shiny armor keep sneaking up on us!?” Will demanded as the two of them burst out of the hole in the ground, volcanic dust following them out as the tunnel collapsed behind them.
“An Ability, obviously!” Loth said, pointing down the mountainside before sprinting at full speed.
Will joined her in a heartbeat. A moment later, shouting began to fill the mountainside around them, hunting parties orienting on the plume of volcanic dust serving as a flag marking their exit point.
“Really could use some Charge right about now!” Will shouted as the trees whipped past them. He nearly had Deca-dailies, which was supposed to be some great accomplishment, but that just meant he would have to wait three hours for his next Charge to return.
BOOM!
Will and Loth both snapped their heads to look behind them, where a gigantic armored figure emerged from the hole in the ground, hard volcanic rock flying away from him as he sprinted out of the hole.
“I don’t think we can kill that guy,” Will said, picking Loth up and running harder. Going downhill made them faster, bounding from stone outcropping to boulder, tens of feet between each one.
“Agreed,” Loth said, peering behind them. “But we can slow him down. You remember the Crawling Tar you bought a few months ago?”
“Say no more,” Will said, turning mid stride.
He’d purchased quite a few consumables from the town of Coalton on the Third Floor, holding them in his Phantom Hand’s dimensional Storage for emergencies when he was low on tricks and needed to dip into consumables to make up the difference.
This seemed like an appropriate time.
For about the space of a single cannonball, he was able to store his three fireball beads (recovered by Sourdough) the crawling tar, and the bottle of lightning.
Kinda wish I had more cannonballs, though.
Between the one that had exploded on the paladin and the one he’d used without recovering while rescuing Jason, Will was out of them.
He still had the Clay Idol that summoned an Immortal Serpent, but that was largely dependent on the miasma of the Floor he was on. If he summoned it outside The Tower, it would only be about six feet long, and unable to do much more than distract a single enemy for a moment.
The paladin was charging through the forest behind them, plowing through trees with no discernable effort, not slowing at all as he crashed through several feet of living wood.
Will released the Crawling Tar from the Dimensional Storage, straight at the paladin’s dull armor.
The little jar burst into a cloud of glass and splatters of black goop that deposited droplets of the living tar on every inch of the man’s armor.
In a matter of seconds, leaves, tree branches, clumps of dirt and stone began to adhere to the paladin as he charged through the forest after them.
It was subtle, but their pursuer began to slow down as his weight increased and maneuverability decreased.
Their lead started growing, until Will skidded to a halt as the treeline ended, revealing two lines of staggered squads, giving each other plenty of space to engage Will as necessary. The line of soldiers wearing the colors of Granesh over their highly polished armor tensed as he came into view. A ripple that spread through the opposing army.
Weapons rattled as thousands were leveled towards him.
The vast majority of these people must be level 15, Will thought.
The 4th Floor saw the harshest drop in survival rate. If a large organization wanted a lot of soldiers, it would be in their best interest to stop before they started dropping like flies, keeping the rank and file at level 15.
The Party leaders are probably in their thirties, though, Will thought, eyeing the commanders of the squads, wearing the golden tassels that separated them from their squad. At least a hundred of them.
Can I take on a bunch of level fifteens and a level 30 with no Charge?
Will shrugged his shoulders, relaxing his neck. He could definitely take a bunch of level fifteens, and maybe a typical level thirty. But not in those numbers.
Maybe if I had some Charge.
Will’s best move against other Climbers was stealing a critical piece of his opponent’s Kit. Typically the rings or necklace.
Unfortunately, this took Charge, and Will was tapped out. His next Charge wouldn’t come for another hour or two at best.
The army began to move: The inside circle began to close ranks and approach, one deliberate half-step at a time while the outer circle backed off, creating a wider net to catch him if he made it past.
Screw it.
“Do you have a way out?” Will asked.
“I have a way I could escape, but I don’t think it would work for both of us,” Loth said.
Works for me.
“It’s been fun,” Will said, setting Loth down. “I think…I think I’m gonna find out if I’m as dangerous as they say I am.”
Loth followed his gaze towards the approaching army, eyes widening.
“Very well. If you survive, I’ll meet you with the others on the 5th Floor,” Loth said, spreading her arms wide and flopping backwards onto the loamy soil of the volcano’s side.
The earth began to churn beneath her as her earthshaping insects drew her underground in a matter of seconds, leaving a kobold shaped disturbance in the soil that was erased a heartbeat later.
He could’ve asked to go with her, but Will was the one they were after, and burrowing insects couldn’t possibly be the fastest form of transportation. They would intercept them and pluck him out of the ground in a matter of hours.
They weren’t as interested in Loth The Luminary as they were in William Oh, the Deceiver, and they had proved they would never stop chasing him. Will might be able to used that to his advantage.
Abyss, they might not even have noticed Loth escaped. That’s how narrow their focus is.
Will turned back to the approaching army.
If he charged them right now, they would pepper him with so many Abilities that he would be annihilated in a matter of seconds.
Will could vividly picture being paralyzed by a hundred different debuffs landing simultaneously, followed by hundreds of Nuker Abilities, and guided arrows sinking in to his vital organs.
Will glanced back up the mountainside, spotting the buildings of Basalt.
Some of the paladin’s army had to be in the town as well. Many of them had been taken by Loth’s collapse of the volcano, but there were likely more stationed there. And they likely weren’t as densely packed as the ones marching towards him.
One of them’s gotta be the one using the Ability that lets him sneak up on us. Let’s start with the easy ones and see how far we get.
If Will bought enough time, he might be able to expand his options and escape.
…Or maybe just take a bunch of them down with me.
Will turned and began sprinting uphill, diving back into the treeline.
In a matter of minutes, he crossed paths with the paladin. Will was faster by virtue of not having living tar covering heavy armor.
The paladin turned towards him as he sprinted past, and Will gave the ground a sharp stomp, causing the ridge of earth to catch the man’s toe and send him diving forward, missing Will by inches.
Will danced out of the way of the paladin’s dive and kept running towards Basalt, skidding to a halt as he arrived at the town’s edge.
“Hey, there he is!” A voice shouted.
Five soldiers leaning against the side of a wall were seemingly shocked out of their boredom by Will’s unexpected appearance, straightening and raising their weapons.
Will hefted the Shortsword of Perseverance, the only Relic he hadn’t tossed in the chest.
Will took a deep breath and fell back on Ghoul’s lessons, adding the little half-step hitch to his stride that caused the jutting earth he summoned beneath his feet to propel him forward at outlandish speeds.
It was a juggling act he hadn’t mastered: He couldn’t keep it going for long before he lost the rhythm, but it was enough to close the distance with startling speed over three steps.
“Oh shi-“
Will landed beside the group, swinging wide to attack them from the side, lining them up and keeping the wall of the building on his left side, and their right.
As he landed, Will sent a ripple of earth through the ground.
The one in front weathered it well, assuming an over-defensive stance, while the one directly behind him stumbled.
Channeling his fighting ‘lessons’ from Lord Bakton, Will overwhelmed the first enemy’s overly defensive stance, charging in recklessly, locking their blades together and giving him a firm shove.
His opponent toppled backwards into the stumbling man behind him, and Will proceeded to jam his shortsword into the lightly armored inner thigh while his lower half was unguarded.
A shrill shriek filled the air as Will kept going straight forward, stomping down on the first man’s weapon-arm, trampling over him with callous disregard and stabbing the stumbler tangled up behind his first opponent in the neck as their three friends retreated in fear.
He’s got a warhammer, Will thought, spotting his next target. I’m going to need that sooner or later.
Twang.
Will heard a bowstring, prompting him to drop down and roll away from the wall, approaching the hammer-bearer.
SSS…THUNK!
The archer must’ve had a good Ring of Accuracy, because the arrow twisted in midair, burying itself in Will’s back and tweaking a nerve, causing him to stagger in place, nearly toppling over as the Shortsword of Perseverance slipped through his tingling fingers, sending up a tiny plume of dust in the earth between the feet of his opponent.
Warhammer charged Will, eyes white all the way around, screaming in terror and fury mixed together as he saw an opportunity to take advantage of Will’s weakness. His warhammer glowed with an Ability that would surely kill him if it landed.
Sooner it is.
Will’s hackles rose as the visceral popping sensation filled his body, switching from one finger of the Phantom Hand to another.
Switching Slotted Relic from Stormfists to Sickle of Cold Harvest.
+4 Focus
+ 6 Strength
4% life drain
Applies Hoarfrost debuff to those damaged by the user, 10 seconds.
(Hoarfrost: the victim’s attack and movement are slowed up to 65% as crystals grow on their joints. The sharp crystals boost bludgeoning damage against the victim but interfere with slashing and fire damage.)
Will wrenched his tingling arm behind him, tore the arrow out of his back and whipped it across the attacking Graneshian’s leading arm, dealing almost no damage.
Almost.
Warhammer exploded with hoarfrost as mobility hampering ice crystals erupted from all his joints, stopping at his neck and feet.
As Warhammer tumbled forward, Will stepped in and snatched the warhammer out of his opponent’s numbed hand, did a quick spin and whipped the warhammer around into the back of the man’s helmet, creating a lethal puncture in the armor.
His opponent dropped to the ground, twitching as the wound in Will’s back sealed itself, the tingling in Will’s arm fading to nothing.
Will scanned the battlefield. The one he’d stabbed in the inner thigh was losing consciousness, the neck wound had already died, and Warhammer was never getting up again.
In about three seconds, all that remained of this group were two Climbers on the ground in front of him and an archer in an unknown location.
Speaking of the archer…
Will dove back towards the building’s wall, able to dodge the follow-up arrow this time, the curving attack missing his foot by a fraction of an inch burying itself in the packed earth.
Will covered his head and smashed through the wall, diving into the house rather than take the predictable path.
“Pardon.” Will said, dusting rubble off his shoulders as a terrified woman shrank into the corner of the room.
Will heard the sound of boot on rubble and kicked the ground before whipping the warhammer around.
The Graneshian climbing through the hole in the wall collapsed as his one foot outside the wall was dragged backwards by the ripple of earth, causing him to dip precariously forward, using his weapon-hand to try and stabilize himself.
Will exploited this half-second to deliver a blow to the man’s undefended temple, causing him to go limp, eyed bloody and staring in death.
Will scowled.
Is this what a Lord is? Cheap tricks repeated ad infinitum?
He glanced above the corpse to the last surviving member of the squad assigned to watch the town’s border, framed by the Will-sized hole in the wall.
“You’re welcome to try.” Will said, pointing at the last survivor with his newly acquired warhammer.
The soldier ran away.
Will inspected his warhammer. Handles a lot like a tomahawk, Will thought approvingly.
Warhammer of the exterminator
+4 Strength
+4 Kinesthetics.
+15% Bonus damage to insectoid creatures.
For Kaith and fire beetles, I guess? Will thought. Insectoid enemies weren’t common outside certain floors, which made the hammer of limited use save for its boosts to his stats.
But I’ll take what I can get…
Will glanced down and spotted some Relics on the corpse twitching where it lay halfway through the wall. Will could hear approaching troops shouting, but they were still twenty seconds or more away.
Will tore the man’s helmet off and grabbed the his amulet and slipped it over his head, the whole process more awkward than it had been before Will destroyed the Ring of the Eidolon.
Amulet of the legionnaire
+4 Strength
+4 Resistance
Shields and one-handed weapons gain 15% effectiveness.
Not bad. Not good, but definitely better than nothing.
Will tucked the warhammer in his left armpit, tugged the ring off the man’s left hand and put it on with his mouth.
Gods, I miss the Ring of the Eidolon.
Ring of The Quartermaster
+3 Strength
-1 focus
Gradually repairs and cleans equipment worn or carried by the wearer.
…Again, better than nothing…but let’s keep our eyes open for something better. The ring slot is valuable and this is just…
The shouting was much closer.
It was time to leave.
Will glanced down at his bare feet, wiggling his toes. His Resistance was high enough that running through the wilderness wasn’t a real problem, but it would be nice to get some new shoes.
Let’s see if we can scrounge up a good pair.
Comments
William Farrar
I love this story
Castleking 2005
Humans don’t require 2 livers. Why isn’t there a black market for high level climbers livers to use in sacrifices?
Castleking 2005
Will needs to sacrifice his right hand as an upgrade to his phantom hand ability. It might give him two phantom hands.
Naork
Damn it Jason, Will could get that healed a instead of having to regenerate it if you didn't do that. Also i can already see Will as a lord handing out his own body parts.
ALEXEI
Ya thanks I forgot what some f his gear actually did.
Macronomicon
IIRC the only reason the phantom hand could touch things for free was because of the Ring of the Eidolon, which is gone now, sacrificed to give the set an Eidolon theme.
ALEXEI
Am I missing something? What us stopping him from just using the hand to fly them away at hundreds of miles a hour like they did every other time? It was already stated that the hand takes no charge.
David Burchfield
I absolutely love Jason's choice here. As cool as everything else has been this is absolutely the biggest development of the last few chapters. I also continue to love Loth's pragmatism, she doesn't bolt when things get bad, but when it is a sound tactical decision, and there isn't much to gain from staying around and, Will brings it up, she gets out clean.
David Burchfield
They generally refer to the human sacrifices as Saints, which is apparently what climbers with church based affiliation/sacrifices are called once they max out (or reach?) the tenth floor. So this sort of implies that is where the cut off is in that case, not sure if it applies to everyone or not. It also might happen sooner since they wanted the body back of the one priest guy who faked his death.
Patrick Chang
THIS! is how he can get loyal climbers to support him as lord. By giving them sacrifices
Patrick Chang
this is an excellent question i hadn't thought of. TBH i imagine for the church it isn't the connection to the god necessarily since it could be used just for healing and not religion related stuff like with Wyrd.
Scott
I await the awkward conversation when Jason comes back with an unused sacrifice.
Scion
Also clean equipment funny... Why is he so shiny
Scion
Why didn't the kobold agree to help pick up jason? If Will dies...
SV
What is the difference between using Will's hand and the remnants of other climbers as sacrifice? The church has remains of previous higher level members to use as sacrifices. Is it the level of the individual? Connection to their god? Miasma saturation? The saint said Will is not fully human since he could use his hand as sacrifice, are you no longer "human" when you level up sufficiently?
ParadoxFox
Hype man you mean
Mundane
Equipping random greens after a wipe so you can run back to your body. Eh, something is better than nothing. <3
Ryan Naquin
Doesnt he have the Amulet of Homefield Advantage still? He put the Amulet of the Dimensional Assassins in the box. Doesnt matter much since it does nothing without charge.
Ethan Barrow
TFTC!! Can't wait to see more, Will gonna be getting some new relics one way or another.
JTP
One of the coldest lines yet
Moon Winchester
Hype Prophet would be a hilarious class
Cyrus McEnnis
Also, looking at the Hand of Oh purely from a sacrifice perspective - 4 stat growth is more than most sacrifices we've seen thus far, only the Uru Drake Scale at 5 stat growth beats it. So even leaving out the possibility of Jason gaining a Phantom Mouth ability, he's definitely ahead of the game using it.
Cyrus McEnnis
"William Oh is never outnumbered. At worst he merely has a wide choice of targets"
Gaunt
Personally, i think Stab by the pine box boys fits the best.
CAPTAINCAEL
Great chapter can't wait for Jason's results
Nate Oppy
“William Oh once fought the greneshy army for relics instead of shopping” - carpenter to his buddy outside a store his wife was shopping in
Malcolm Haynes
He’s a prophet. Gonna need some escapability.
Evgeny Münch
I love where this is going. U are my first author i support on patreon. And i Read a lot on royalroad. Take this as a compliment
Sam
"Listen here you little shit. You. Have. No. Left. Hand. Stop trying."
ParadoxFox
Jason bout to summon exodia
Andrew
Thank you!
Uroš
The priests can't regrow it because it belongs to the tower. But he can regrow it himself :)
David Giles
Will telling Loth to save themself was such a sweet moment.
EDMANGO
If some goon doesn't perma capture will to use his limbs as endlessly regenerating sacrifices, wills gonna be able to make a pretty good baseline of his soon to be cult by chopping off arms. I wonder if Jason's gonna get a phantom will arm too, that'd be neat
Joshua Gunty
*Cue Yakkity Mad Max, the mashup noone asked for*
Cyrus McEnnis
Alternatively, Benny Hill theme (and yes I'm aware it's called Yakkity Sax ; )
Cyrus McEnnis
That being said, the ring might be worth keeping to use with Sourdough if he needs to repair something...
Aaron Greene
Yay!
Aaron Greene
I think he'll continously regrow that hand, only for it to be chopped of in increasingly bizarre or dangerous circumstances. Like the tower enforcing the meme that William Oh has no left hand.
Macronomicon
Not really, was just trying to come up with a few low-level rings people would have on hand. Obviously he's not gonna get better stuff off some mooks.
KipBR
Wow, Will is going to be in for a tough trip. Good news is he is the only one struggling, Jason is going to be really really thriving.
Thomas Issa
I think it’s more likely that he will be able to raise tons of classers by continually regrowing and chopping off his left hand, Myth and relic aligned and a good stat spread
Crombell
It would be pretty funny if Will got locked out of regenerating his left arm because it got used as a sacrifice to the tower *again*
Logan
Tftc
MurkyTruths
That ring has consumable synergy?
Joshua Gunty
"I think I'm gonna find out if I'm as dangerous as they say I am..." *Cue Mad Max soundtrack*
