Author Frank Morin
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Ch 111 - Somber Celebration
🕑 Added 2024-12-30 17:00:08 +0000 UTCThat shook the team out of our dark moods for a moment as everyone checked their statuses and achievements. Everyone else got six more levels too, and even I had an achievement waiting.
“Congratulations, Lucas! You have reached level 16. Stat points allocated, plus one free point.”
I closed my eyes to savor the influx of power as my Intelligence and Wisdom ticked up a point each. I allocated my free point to Constitution, raising the base value to 40.8 points. With the extra 10% boost to the final number from my Alan Alan title, my total constitution nearly reached 45 before dropping by 60%. Really needed to get those Efficiencies up.
That was still crazy high compared to anyone else, but even so, I was nearly dying way too often. If I was going to be the tank of the party, I needed to keep adding every point I could into Constitution for a while. I also needed better armor. My Crash Test Dummy jacket was great against impacts, but not so much against slashing claws or fangs. My pants offered better defense than ever, but they were still lacking.
I’d have to see what else I could get from the store to stack on more defense. In the meantime, I scanned my other achievements, again skipping the kill notifications to focus on the most important ones. I found three.
“Congratulations, Lucas! For speed running the third level of the dungeon, you get a Perfect Run platinum loot box.”
The big metallic box revealed a single scroll.
“Upgrade Scroll. Tether Slide upgraded to level 3 and unlocks the effect Implacable.”
“Implacable. Rare. Double your slide speed. Ignore any force attempting to deflect or impede your slide to your next tether point and add 500% more damage to your first strike. Cooldown: 1 hour”
I whistled softly. “Wow. I love this.”
Any new level to any spell was more than welcome, and this new effect sounded amazing. I couldn’t wait to test it out.
Loot boxes were popping into existence around everyone else too. I spotted a bunch of golds and even quite a few platinums. The dungeon had nearly ended in disaster, we’d lost poor Scott, but if I could force myself to look beyond that, it had served exactly the purpose we’d hoped. Everyone was leveling up fast and getting tons of loot. We were growing stronger.
Part of me hated to be that clinical, wished I would have just cleared the dungeon myself. Scott would have still been alive. Everyone else would still be far weaker, though. We had to get stronger to survive, but again, the path was dangerous. Not everyone would make it. With a sigh, I returned to my achievements.
“Congratulations, Lucas! For getting bitten in half and still defeating the dungeon boss in a creative and unique way, you receive a gold Xavier loot box.”
“Only gold?” I grumbled as the brightly shining box popped into view in front of me. Nigel swatted it with a cute little lion growl, sending it spinning past Ruby. She smiled, and I willed the loot box open. It flashed and disappeared 20 feet away. The loot appeared right in front of me.
Despite my lingering grief, I had to bark a laugh as Eva read the description.
“Comfort Boxers. Each pair in this multi-colored 3-pack is a luxuriously soft, must-have base layer. Offers 10% protection against all attacks targeting the covered areas. Immunity to blunt force trauma against the groin.”
They actually looked fantastic, and the defensive bonuses were honestly amazing, especially the immunity for my dangly bits. I wanted to quick-apply a pair under my leggings, but I’d never tried anything like that. Just trying to get a top layer to appear already in place was still hit or miss. If I tried slipping boxers into place, I’d probably just end up totally nude. They could wait.
“Congratulations, Lucas! For plunging half your body into the eye of a Drake and finding yet another unique way to kill a monster from the inside, you receive a platinum Foreigner loot box.”
“Foreigner?” I didn’t get the title until I willed the loot box open. It flashed and disappeared, leaving 2 items behind. One was an old-fashioned record player with a record already playing. The whole thing was ethereal with a 60 second countdown timer above it that ticked down as it blared out the tune to the rock band Foreigner’s hit single “Head Games”.
I loved that song. Too bad I couldn’t take the record with me. The song drew a lot of confused looks from everyone, and an approving smile from Jane. The other item looked like a long, golden drill bit.
“Bone drill. Uncommon. Throw or stab this drill into an enemy and it will instantly drill through any bone, then return to your inventory. Cooldown between uses: 1 minute.”
Yikes. That was freakishly awesome. Scalebiter could build up enough charge to punch through even Overlord Drake bones, but this drill could get me an insta-hole. Nasty, and absolutely welcome.
That was a really good haul, especially when I scanned the huge amount of mana crystals I’d received. I was about to see what else I’d gotten from looting the drakes when another achievement popped into view.
“Congratulations, Lucas! For discovering a unique approach to completing the internal rewiring of your mana channels more than 4 times faster than average, you receive an emerald Merlin loot box.”
Emerald? And, hey! I hadn’t even realized my mana pool had abruptly filled at some point. My mana bar was full, the blue bar now including a slightly wavy pattern. My mana pool felt deeper than before, and when I scanned it, I sensed entire magnitudes more power coiled within. Maybe Cyrus had been right about that near-death beating from Fulvia being worth it in the long run.
If only I’d gotten my mana pool back a moment earlier. If I could have leveraged my other spells, I might have been able to save Scott. With a sigh, I glanced up and focused on the present.
“What unique approach?”
“Again, a fantastic show, Lucas! Ha! Like Fulvia had suggested, the big reason you had to wait 2 full days was for your old mana channels to fade fully from your body.”
I understood then. “Half my body got ripped off.”
“Exactly! Such a clever plan. Even I hadn’t expected you to sacrifice so much to get your mana back faster. Brilliant intuitive thinking. Growing new flesh locks in your new mana channels since all memory of your old channels are gone.” No one reacted to his voice, so apparently he was keeping this conversation private.
Of course Cyrus knew I hadn’t done that on purpose, but he was clearly using the unexpected event to give me another reward to push his little experiment forward. If it resulted in me getting stronger, I’d take it and not look back.
Cyrus and I agreed that I needed to progress faster, and Cyrus was promising to help me do just that. I’d deal with the ultimate price for all his meddling when it came due.
“So, is that why I was able to cast Soul Feed without doing permanent damage to my mana channels, even though my upper body must have still had memories of those old mana channels still there?” I asked softly.
Cyrus chuckled again. “Daring move. You pushed the limits yet again, Lucas. If your body hadn’t been so brutally traumatized when you cast Soul Feed, things would have gone very badly. Despite shaking your mana channels pretty badly, they couldn’t revert to your previous baseline while your system was so shocked. Now that you’ve successfully cast a spell through those mana channels, you’ve locked them in place, allowing you to keep using your mana.”
Wow, that had been close. It had been the right choice, but getting magically disabled would have likely been a death sentence in the long run.
“Pretty,” Nigel yipped and leaped atop the huge floating emerald loot box. It bobbed under his weight and spun away.
“First you get more emeralds than anyone, and now you have an adorable kitty to play on them?” Jane exclaimed, scooping Nigel off so I could will the loot box open.
“I will have you know I’m a big, strong, deadly Mammoth Lion,” Nigel said, suddenly swelling to full lion size. Jane grunted, but kept her grip around the huge lion’s midsection even as his rear paws stretched to the ground and his massive head loomed high above hers.
“He prefers you to think of him as mighty.”
She squeezed his soft torso, making him grunt. “Of course he’s mighty. Our big, mighty, fluffy hunter.”
Nigel snapped back to kitten size and nuzzled Jane’s shoulder. “You may scratch my ears.”
I passed that along and Jane happily obliged. Nigel glanced over at me and added, “Death Stalkers catch fire when they feed.”
“I can’t wait to meet one and see for myself.”
“Don’t. They are most scary.”
“Noted. Thanks.”
I left him to get scratches from Jane and Lana, who had finished with her loot boxes and wandered closer, pulled by the inexorable tractor beam of fluffy kitty. Petting him seemed to ease the raw edge of her grief. Finally, I glanced at the single scroll I got from the cool emerald box.
“Scroll of Runes. Gain the new ability: Runesmith, level 3. Gain a basic understanding of mana-focused runes. Plus 10% per level faster learning of new runes. Plus 10% per level improved mastery over creating your own rune words.”
“Note, due to your Merlin title, you start this ability at level 5.”
A warm shiver pulsed from my mana pool through my entire body as the new ability settled over my heart. Huh. I had no idea what it meant, but it had to be important.
“Runes?” I whispered.
“A wonderful topic of discussion,” Cyrus said, again limiting his voice to me alone.
Hint taken. Something to discuss in quieter moments.
I quickly scanned the loot we got from the Drakes. So many mana crystals I ended up with two entire tier-6 crystals, plus a few health and regeneration potions. Good. We’d burned through way too many potions to beat the dungeon. I also found a couple of interesting items. Probably came from the Overlord.
“Prismatic Drake scale, times 100. A single scale, worked into a piece of armor, adds plus 20% defense against magical attacks and plus 80% defense against any light-based attack.”
“Scroll of Incineration Breath. Unleash a devastating beam of pure destruction that can pierce most defenses. 80% chance of consuming at least 50% health. 10% chance of consuming at least 90% health.”
I whistled. Those were powerful items. The Incineration Breath might be just the ticket to take out Alpha or Noctarus, if he ended up double-crossing us like I feared.
Within moments, everyone was ready to move out. The many levels and shower of loot helped ease some of the sadness, but we still marched back up the stairs a somber group. Jane and Lana carried the stretcher with Scott’s body.
On the way through the other caverns, we looted everything we could. Ruby brightened noticeably when we looted the Radiant Guardian hall and all those sweet diamonds. We each ended up with two of the huge diamond clubs and at least 5 gallons of diamonds, some of which put the famous Cullinan diamond to shame back on Earth.
“These have got to be worth millions,” Steve breathed as he looked at me through the rough-cut face of a diamond as big as his fist.
“What do you think?” Jane asked Tomas, showcasing a tiny diamond the size of her thumb like a ring.
“It’ll be hard to put gloves on,” he said with a critical eye.
“Who needs gloves when they have diamonds to keep them warm?”
We also each ended up with a pair of pure diamond bracers with excellent protection for the forearms against physical and elemental damage. They included a sunburst flash area effect spell that emitted blinding light that only enemies could see. Cooldown 10 minutes. That could prove really helpful in a critical moment.
Most of the team would probably sell those, but my bracers were getting pretty battered. So I tossed my trusty old bracers into my inventory and tried on the new ones. As usual, they fit perfectly.
From the vaporized Shardslingers and Melded Battle Shards, we still got a decent amount of loot, including 2 scrolls of Light each that did just what they said, summoning a bright light for 10 minutes that followed the caster.
We also randomly got 5 scrolls each of Water Breathing, even though we hadn’t had to deal with water in the dungeon. And the final scrolls were just bizarre.
“Scroll of Baby’s Bottom. Remove all friction, allowing the caster to slide at speed in any one direction, along any surface, up to 60 seconds.”
“I don’t know whether to be impressed or offended by that description,” Jane said.
I shrugged. Despite the silly name, they still sounded pretty great. We also got hundreds of crystal shard throwing spikes, listed as common, so they didn’t sound like they’d be worth much. No one else wanted them, so I took them all.
Shaped like throwing knives, the shards were long and thin, with raised ridges, giving them a total of 8 razor-sharp cutting edges. Cool, except they would cut my hands too if I threw them. My gloves offered decent protection, but I could easily wear through them if I started throwing a lot. Maybe I’d find a way to use them.
Back at the surface, we paused just outside the dungeon to soak in the late morning sunlight and stare across the high mountain plateau and the gorgeous mountains ranging to the west and south. Over the eastern hills, beyond the forest where Midmount Vale stood, and far below our elevation stretched the great expanse of the central valley of stage 1, extending out to more mountains.
Oh, yeah, I could use Spellseer’s Gaze again. I activated my vision ability to zoom in on the distant view and it confirmed the valley was still flooded. If anything, the water looked deeper, although the flocks of flying monsters were gone from the skies.
“I can’t believe it’s still morning,” Andy said.
Yeah, it felt like it should have taken a lot longer to experience so much. We pulled together a huge funeral pyre in moments, placed Scott’s body on it, and all lit torches together. As the flames roared into the sky, Ruby stopped close to me and slipped her warm hand into mine.
Steve appeared beside us barely a single heartbeat later. “Hey, you two. Looks like the team’s getting closer than ever.”
Ruby sighed, dropping my hand. “You know, Steve, I had hoped Susan would keep you more distracted.”
“Susan . . .“ Steve whistled with appreciation, eyes going distant, a smile playing across his lips. “Distracting is not nearly a strong enough word for what that woman can do.”
“Then focus on that and drop it,” Ruby said, tone flat.
“And disappoint you? I would never.”
“You’re incorrigible.”
“Yup.”
The pyre burned to simmering ashes in record time and we headed home, maintaining a steady jog the entire way. Nigel ranged out ahead of us, warning of potential monsters. He found a couple, but they fled when they sensed the larger party approaching.
Thankfully, we made it back to Midmount Vale without having to deal with werewolves. Hopefully they had to hide from the sun during daylight hours. Either way, I was happy to not have to deal with them.
