by Seth Ring
His goal was to keep the golem occupied but alive so that Nellourous Belle would not be able to resummon them, so the last thing that he wanted was for the blasts of energy that she sent out to kill the golem. Blocking a thick fist aimed at his head, Thorn slammed the golem into the ground and jumped back out of its range. From the corner of his eye he could see SoulSeeker and the other tanks blocking the boss, and he had to suppress the urge to rush over and join them.
There was a strong desire in his heart to rush over and attack, but he forced it down. Thorn had handed control over the Titan Squad to Seven Twisted Leaves and he did not want to do anything to compromise the Fae Druid’s ability to command. Still, he was chomping at the bit to get into the thick of things.
“Thorn! Watch your attacks!”
Jerked from his thoughts by Heidi’s yell, Thorn looked down at the golem at his feet. While his thoughts wandered he had failed to control the strength of one of his kicks and had sent cracks radiating through the stone monster’s chest. Afraid that if he touched it again the golem would simply fall apart, Thorn took a quick step back.
“Sorry, sorry.”
“Keep your focus people!” Seven Twisted Leaves called out as he surveyed the courtyard. “We’re on a clock so stay focused!”
Though Seven Twisted Leaves’ words were addressed to the group, Thorn’s face burned with embarrassment under his helmet as he knew that Leaves was specifically talking to him. Taking a deep breath, he centered himself and focused on his job, leaving the fight with the boss to the players who were engaged with her.
For the next fifteen minutes as the floating staff continued to spit out an increasing number of balls of energy, Thorn kept his attention on the struggling golem who continued to try and attack him. Finally the golem’s stone body simply could not withstand the injuries that had been inflicted on it and with a gravelly roar it fell apart. Grimacing, Thorn looked at Nellourous Belle but did not see any change in the way she was fighting. Unsure if there was a threshold for the boss’ resummoning, Thorn was hesitant to join any of the other fights and for a moment, he just stood where he was.
“Thorn, you can join the ranged DPS attacking the boss. Just take directions from SoulSeeker. But keep an eye out in case the second tank team needs more support.”
“Sure.”
Hiding his sigh of relief, Thorn got out his arbalest and began to fire thick bolts at the boss whenever he had an opening. With how small her figure was, he did not always hit, but enough of his bolts connected that he felt like he was at least contributing something.
The tanks of the first team had spread out around Nellourous Belle and were doing their best to keep her contained. Swinging her two maces, the boss was bouncing around the inside of the circle, being pulled this way and that as players used their taunts from across the circle before enduring a barrage of attacks. By chaining their stuns, they were able to keep her from switching her attention to the DPS players who were steadily chipping away at her health.
Slowly but steadily the boss’ health fell until only a sliver remained. Spotting the lag in her movement with a practiced eye, Seven Twisted Leaves gave a quick command and all of the members of the Titan squad focused on burning the boss down as fast as possible. All of the tanks and melee players rushed forward to attack her while the ranged DPS focused their best single target attacks on her. Within less than sixty seconds the rest of her health burned away and she fell to her knees with a choking scream.
“Nooooo! Nooooooo! How could you defeat me?! Impossible! You are nothing but pebbles on my road to greatness! Nooooooo!”
During the next three minutes the team wiped out the remaining gargoyles and golems, all the while enduring Nellourous Belle’s incredibly dramatic death throes. As the final gargoyle died, Nellourous Belle finally rose up on her tiptoes and held her mask with both hands as she writhed in pain. With a scream she seemed to collapse into herself as her robe suddenly fell into a heap and her empty mask bounced across the stone ground.
“Good job, everyone! Healers, get everyone back to full! We’ll take five minutes here before we go into the next area.”
“Looks like the door is magically locked.” Alabaster appeared next to Leaves, pointing at the door that led to the mayor’s mansion.
Rummaging around in the cloak that the boss had left behind, Mina found a variety of loot, but nothing that looked like a key to the next section of the dungeon. Frowning, she looked around but did not spot anything beside the silver mask. A quick examination showed it to be a piece of equipment, but it had no relation to the door.
“Hmmm. Thorn, Leaves? Any ideas? Did we miss something on the way here?”
Chapter Twelve
The courtyard of the mayor’s mansion was damp and dark. Flickering torchlight struggled against the gloom that shrouded the whole dungeon, but no matter how the torches burned they could do nothing to fight back the creepy feeling that emanated from the large stone building that lurked like a crouched beast in front of them. Running his eyes over the garish stone carvings that decorated the front of the mansion, Thorn noticed that there were a variety of gargoyles like the ones on the fence that had returned to their places.
Turning his gaze to the front door of the mansion, Thorn examined the thick wooden double doors. A faint layer of magic glimmered across them, locking them tight. Missing Oberlin and his nearly magical ability to unlock doors, Thorn shook his head as Leaves replied to Mina’s question.
“I’m not sure. The description of the dungeon only mentioned two sub-bosses. We should have gotten another key out of this fight. Or something to dispel the magical lock.” Leaves frowned, opening up the window with the dungeon description.
“Dungeon quest says that we have ‘gained the means to open the door’ so there must be something around here. Everyone keep an eye out.”
Seeing the magical staff that Nellourous Belle had left hanging in the air, Thorn reached out and grabbed it. As his fingers closed around the shaft a slight tremor ran through his body.
*ding*
“Uh...Mina?”
“Hmm?” Wandering over from where she had been looking around, Mina’s eyes paused when she saw the shock on Thorn’s face. “Is something wrong?”
“What is special about a legendary item?”
The already quiet courtyard fell into complete silence at Thorn’s questions as every single eye turned to the staff in his hand.
“Legendary items are artifacts with lots of power,” Mina explained as she read over the description that Thorn shared with the team. “They can be practically anything, but the most common is a weapon. They usually have a crazy effect, but they are either super hard to unlock or have a negative effect when they are used. Like this one.”
“Wow. That is terrifying. But hold on,” Thorn scratched his head as he read over the legendary weapon’s description. “What a strange thing. You only get one use out of it. Am I reading that right?”
“Mmhmm.” Mina nodded. “But don’t underestimate it. You can use that [Animate Stone] ability all you want. I mean, imagine having an undying army of stone golems. And carrying around the threat of being able to exterminate everything around you? Can you imagine if someone dropped into the middle of a huge battle with this thing?”
“Or Moon Wolf Citadel.” Thorn’s tone was somber as he thought about the ways that a weapon like this could be used.
“Exactly.”
As Thorn was focusing his attention on the staff he felt a ripple inside of it. A familiar energy seemed to be circling from the tip of the staff where the gem was set, down through the body until it reached the bottom and back up again. Curious, Thorn’s will moved into his hand. As his will seeped into his fingers they grew more sensitive, granting him a clearer picture of what was happening inside the staff.
The energy that flowed through the staff vibrated faintly, giving Thorn a familiar, almost comforting feeling. A slight furrow creased Thorn’s brows as he let the circulating e
nergy continue to run past his hand, trying to figure out where he had felt the energy inside the staff before.
*BZZT*
Like a spark jumping from one piece of metal to another, the spot where Thorn’s hand held the staff flashed with a yellowish brown light and then suddenly both the light and the staff disappeared as if they had never existed.
*ding*
Thorn was so shocked by the words on the windows that popped up in front that he forgot to be surprised that he had just absorbed a legendary staff.
“Um, Thorn? What just happened to the legendary magical staff I was looking at?” Mina’s concerned voice brought Thorn back to the present.
Instead of answering, a strange feeling overtook Thorn and he crouched down, waving his hand over the flagstone under his feet. As his hand passed by, a bump formed in the stone. Slowly stretching up as Thorn lifted his palm, his fingers danced quickly, as if he was playing an instrument that no one could see.
“Thorn, is that..?”
Mina’s voice trailed off as two thin sections separated themselves from each side of the growing chunk of stone. After the thin sections were fully formed they reached down and stabilized the stone against the ground as two distinct legs were pulled from the flagstone, revealing the form of a small stone golem that stood slightly less than two feet tall. Two small eyes that glowed yellow appeared on the little golem’s head as it looked around for an enemy.
“Oh my…”
“Is that a golem?”
“Isn’t it a bit small?”
“Yeah, but it's a golem.”
Whispers began to swirl as the members of the Titan Squad watched the small stone golem stamp its little feet on the ground. With a flick of his fingers Thorn sent the golem to circle around Mina. The thick earth element that filled it called out to Thorn, giving him a sense of kinship that was similar to the feeling that Akira gave him. If anything, the little golem felt even more familiar, almost as if it carried a part of him in its body.
“That wasn’t an ability, was it?” Mina’s voice trembled slightly as she spoke, though Thorn could not tell if it was with frustration or excitement.
“Uh, no. It was more of a...feeling?” Thorn looked at his hand, slightly confused.
Mina snapped her fingers, causing ice to spread out under the stone golem’s feet. Watching it slide around as it tried to complete Thorn’s command, she giggled.
“Can you make a bigger one?”
“No, not right now. When I created it, it felt like I was channeling some sort of earth element energy into it. Once I used up all of that energy, it stopped growing.”
“Hmm? Maybe it is earth attributed mana? How did you figure out how to do that? And without a chant? Magic without a chant is pretty advanced.”
“I think I might have just absorbed the staff?”
“Haha, I knew you were a glutton, but legendary weapons? That is some heavy taste right there. So what you used was probably [Animate Stone], right? Don’t tell me you absorbed [Death Rain] too?”
“No, it doesn’t seem like it? At least, I can’t feel that sort of power.”
“Whew. For a second I was worried that we needed to be even more afraid of you. Haha.”
Hearing Mina’s giggle, Thorn knew that she was not upset which took a weight off of his shoulders. Standing, he waved his hand, releasing the golem which melted back into the flagstone. The members of the Titan Squad were still looking at him, so he removed his helmet and glanced around at the group.
“I’m sorry, I did not know that was going to happen. Leaves, what is the cost of a weapon like that?”
“Tough to know. It’ll depend on the drop rate of the normal version and what the normal version’s abilities are. Legends are single instance items. There is only one in the world. Next time someone runs this they’ll get something that is a toned down version of the staff. First clear is the only one that guarantees a drop, so we’ll have to wait and see.
“Assuming that it has both abilities, just a bit weaker, with a fairly standard 0.001 percent drop rate, that would put it at about two hundred thousand gold. However, with the drawbacks the staff has, I don’t think you could get more than one hundred and fifty thousand. Honestly, even that would be a stretch since its major offensive power is one use only.
“To get the full value out of it you’d need to find someone who has some strong summoning support abilities which is pretty rare. Besides,” Seven Twisted Leaves held up his hand to prevent Thorn from speaking, “you have the first gear pick so you are clear to take it. Just try not to absorb any more if we get another legendary after we beat Gelish.”
“Heh, I’ll try not to. Still, I think it would be appropriate for me to reimburse everyone since no one even had the chance to compete for it. Plus, it was really helpful for me. I’ll give a thousand gold bonus to everyone here, but only if you help me spread the word that I’ll be buying copies of Death Rain that drop for two hundred thousand gold.”
Pleasant surprise lit up the faces of all of the members of the Titan Squad at Thorn’s words. Though none of them had expected to get the legendary staff, even after Thorn shared its stats, the sight of Thorn making it disappear had tugged on more than a few heart strings.
“Can you, uh, eat more of them?” Mina asked. “What about other legendary weapons?”
“I’m not sure. I have a feeling that it had something to do with the type of energy that the staff used. Since I am pretty tightly bound to the earth element and the staff shared that element I am guessing that is why I could absorb it. But it is worth checking, so if we get another legendary I don’t mind giving it a shot.”
“Uh, maybe don’t. Though, it could be a really helpful ability if your enemy had one.” Mina tapped her chin in thought as her eyes gleamed. “Can you imagine that? Someone tries to attack you with their legendary sword and then you just make it vanish? Haha, that would be hilarious.”
“Only for us, I’m sure. Have you ever heard of someone doing this before?”
“No, I’ve never heard of someone who was able to absorb legends before, but I really haven’t seen that many. Again, most of them are pretty strange and most people don’t go around sharing the fact that they have one. Maybe Corvo knows something?”
“I’ll ask when we get back to the castle. I guess we should focus on the next fight for now.” Dismissing all of the screens, Thorn looked at Seven Twisted Leaves. “Sorry about that.”
“No problem. You seem to have inadvertently solved our next challenge when you took the staff, so that is good. The magical lock on the door is gone, and once we finish up our rest we’ll be moving into the building.” Clapping his hands to get everyone’s attention, Seven Twisted Leaves pointed to the mansion. “We’re going to be moving out in five minutes, so make sure you’re ready to go. I’m pretty sure that this is the last stage of the dungeon which means it will probably be the hardest as well. We have no idea what is beyond those doors so be prepared for anything.”
Chapter Thirteen
Even though he was not missing any health, Thorn was feeling mentally fatigued from everything that had happened so he sat down on the ground with his legs crossed and rested his hands on his legs. Keeping his back straight, he closed his eyes and began to breathe in and out calmly. As he settled into his breathing pattern he quickly found that the [Spiritual Sense of Earth] in his body was slowly establishing a connection with the ground under him.
The feeling was elusive and fled as soon as he tried to grasp it. Startled out of his meditation, Thorn looked around at the flagstones he was sitting on but did not see anything out of the ordinary so he closed his eyes again and restarted his breathing pattern. After about a minute the strange connection began to form again, but this time Thorn left it alone and concentrated on his meditation.
Over the next few minutes the feeling did not get any stronger so Thorn reluctantly opened his eyes and joined the rest of the Titan Squad who had gathered by the mansion’s front door
. Setting everyone up in a tight formation, Seven Twisted Leaves gestured for Alabaster to open the double doors that led into the mansion. The thick wooden doors opened with a creak as Alabaster stepped to the side. Looking down the dark, empty hall, Seven Twisted Leaves gave the command to move in and the tanks began to advance cautiously.
“Make sure you watch the corners and shadows. This whole place gives me a bad vibe.”
Like something out of a horror movie, the mayor’s mansion was a textbook haunted house. The gloomy air that hung over the dungeon seeped through the halls, causing Seven Twisted Leaves to shiver even as he warned the team to be careful.
The mansion entrance had led them into a large open foyer that split into three different hallways, each leading to a different area of the house. The main hall stretched straight back, leading to the kitchen and back garden while the left and right hallways led to the two wings of the mansion.
“Do we split the team and clear it all at once or do a single sweep with the whole team?” Glancing between the two hallways that went to the right and left, Mina asked Seven Twisted Leaves.
“Why don’t we just head straight through the back? I have a feeling that Gelish is in the back garden,” Thorn interjected, pointing to the large double doors at the end of the main hall.
“Uh, they’re probably locked. See the double key holes?” Leaves answered casually, his eyes still scanning the room.
“Sure, but can’t we just kick the door in?”
“Haha, I wish…”
An awkward silence fell over the party as Leaves’ voice trailed off. He had replied automatically, but as soon as the idea actually registered he had to pause. Looking at Thorn who had an entirely serious expression and then at the doors at the end of the short hallway, he gulped.
“Um. I mean. It’s probably worth a try? Right?”
“Yeah, totally worth a try,” Mina said, her eyes glowing. “Since we’re in a rush we should take whatever shortcuts we can. Plus, lots of dungeon teams bring thieves like Oberlin so it makes sense to try it. If we can cut the length of the dungeon down it’ll be good for everyone.”