I couldn’t believe she cared enough for Travis to fear for him, which meant she must have had a run-in with these creatures before.
Turning back, I saw Travis’s mana glow brighter as he was about to exit the cloud. There was an explosion of power and a wall of smoke wrapped around the cloud like a giant shell. Travis’s mana disappeared. I felt my strand of Light Mana that was connected to his back being severed. He was trapped. I couldn’t even see enough of his mana to pinpoint where he was, and the smoke was now dense enough that I couldn’t pinpoint where the Rogs were either.
It didn’t make sense. How could smoke become dense enough to block a person’s path? No wonder the queen was afraid of these creatures.
Mana Sight’s full power gave me a moment to consider my next move even as I was already soaring toward them like a demonic eagle defending her young. I had to be precise or I was in danger of injuring my friend as much as the mobs.
I landed on the cloud of smoke like a pouncing beast. The cloud was solid as stone. Knowing my friend was trapped inside and that he probably couldn’t breathe became too much. My hastily developed strategy was gone as quickly as it had arrived. My hand seemed to bear the entire weight of my fury, and it changed in an instant. It was no longer shaped like a human hand, but my magma fist had taken its true Primordial Cat Form. It wasn’t just my hand, but my arm, shoulder and even the muscles in my chest and back. Master Muscle Buff helped me lift my oversized claw high into the air before I struck. I couldn’t even tell you how much mana I used at that moment.
I was unable to see my own movement as I brought my claws down and ravaged the dome of solidified smoke. It gave way as if a bubble had popped, and the smoke quickly faded as if it was blown away by a mighty wind. I fell as it gave way and quickly found my friend.
His aura was glowing brighter than I’d ever seen it. When he saw that the smoke had cleared, he spun away from where the shell of smoke had been. His spear blurred and all the energy he was holding back was funneled into his spear at once. The wall of spears spread was condensed into the space of a couple of feet and punched into the core of the closest Rog. Its body of smoke collapsed, and its core shattered into a pile of rubble that littered the air.
Seeing that my friend was okay, I used my primordial claw to rip through them like paper. Travis didn’t even have the chance for another attack. Even enraged, I stole their essence and drained them without a second’s thought.
+20 Str
+20 Con
+120 Int
+60 Wis
I’d been able to Drain them?
When it was all over, I finally calmed down and let my buffs go and my hand return to its Magma Fist form. It was then that I noticed that the world around us had turned amber in color. Shamash was there, not twenty feet away with his boney arms crossed over his chest. He’d raised a territory in the shape of a cube the size of a house that would block my Light Magic use from broadcasting our presence to the entire region.
I’d gone too far. It was as if spending too much time using Bloodlust in my Werewolf Form was a bad influence. No. Even those with high Intelligence and Wisdom had the right to freak out when a friend was in trouble.
“Thank you,” I said, wearing my shame like a cloak.
Shamash saw it and replied, “You used four times the amount of power necessary to break their spell. The Rog have some interesting tricks, but they are far from the most dangerous creatures we will meet in the untamed territories. Forgetting can get you and your friend killed.” His tone wasn’t harsh, but the truth still stung.
“Yeah,” Travis interrupted. “I was about to burst out of there anyway.” He laughed, ignoring the tension of the moment.
Before I could respond, I felt an all too familiar aura. Bursting through the amber shell of the lich’s territory, a Hell Hound appeared with its tail flaming. It wasn’t alone. Over a dozen followed behind it coming from the ramp of the fourth level.
The lich’s territory might be good at blocking excess mana from leaving its confines, but I wasn’t sure it would block creatures from entering. Especially ones that were this powerful.
Travis was already crouched low and ready to intercept the Hell Hounds’ charge. I could sense a connection with him at that moment and knew he felt as I did. We hadn’t exactly defeated the first Hell Hound we’d faced—not without the help of Rock Hard, a Master Earth Elemental.
The odd thing was that we were sharing our Bloodlust connection and neither of us was transformed. It was having far more of an effect than it should, but I’d have to worry about that later. There were close to fifteen Hell Hounds coming and all of them were between levels 1,200 and 1,500. Travis and I felt the same way. It was time to pay them back, even if they weren’t directly responsible for making us leave the Head Mistress’s Dungeon.
Casting In the Buff on Travis, and letting my wings fade into nothing, I lowered my stance as a solid spike of ice based on Ice Shard formed in my hand that was the size of a dagger.
Good Doggies. Come here and I’ll give you a treat.
Chapter 12 – Mr. Marshmallow
Killing the Hell Hounds with Ice Shard seemed appropriate. When we’d faced Mistress Nava’s pet, it was only when Rock Hard had held it in place and allowed me to drive a massive ice spear into it that we were able to defeat it. As fast as these mobs were, that speed didn’t translate as well to tight areas because they couldn’t make full use of having four legs and their long strides. They also didn’t have the Dexterity advantage on Travis and me any longer.
I drove my spike of ice into the throat of the first Hell Hound that reached me. Instead of attacking head-on, the pack of hounds stopped short and began surrounding us. They showed much more wisdom than normal mobs. One at a time and from different angles, they nipped at us. Travis met them with his Firazite spear while I happily folded my hands behind my back.
“What are you doing?” he shouted.
I responded by pointing up.
Before he could look, he pushed the hounds on his flank back with a spear wall, causing them to think twice. I smacked a hound on the nose as it went for my ankle, sending it skirting across the ground. He finally got a chance to look up, and instead of giving me a look of astonishment, he ran away.
Two Hell Hounds jumped him at once upon seeing him turn his back. One came from the rear and the other his flank. He was already a few steps ahead and they were too late. It started to snow. More accurately, over a hundred Ice Shards, each the size of a snowman, dropped from where they were hanging in the air all at once.
One of the Hell Hounds in the back yelped, warning the others, but only a few made it out from under the razor-sharp ice. I laughed through gritted teeth. Even where there weren’t direct hits, the hounds were knocked aside, or crushed. Over half of them survived with only two of them making it out completely unharmed.
I heard the stampede of a single set of feet a moment before Travis returned and finished the three injured Hell Hounds with his spear wall. He bounded from there without losing much momentum to attack one of the uninjured ones as it tried to flee the scene. He cut off its retreat, but it hadn’t lost its speed.
It darted around Travis, and when the other remaining Hell Hound saw them facing off, it joined the fight from a different angle.
Instead of cutting it off, I warned him. I’d taken enough for myself and didn’t want to hog all the experience.
Travis hesitated for a moment before launching himself into the air. The hound behind him leaped. When he’d easily reached fifteen feet, he spun and shoved an extended energy spear into the hound’s mouth, impaling it.
He circled the final mob and I half expected him to wait for a counterattack, but suddenly he rushed forward. The hound jumped to the side and Travis spun toward it while continuing to pressure it. Instead of using a skill, he pushed the beast until its weight was on its rear legs as if it were going to pounce. A seemingly endless series of thrusts overwhelmed the hound, and it was pushed
back until it was sitting on its rear. With nothing but raw speed, Travis covered it in puncture wounds.
There was no further Blue Magic to learn from them, even though I tried. Drain wasn’t through with them though.
+46 Str
+234 Dex
Everything was suddenly quiet.
Travis and I realized what were lying before us at approximately the same time.
“Orbs,” I said, turning up the sides of my mouth, but I was drowned out by his yell of “Jackpot!”
It was a bit messy, but soon we were swimming in 16 Lesser Fire Orbs. We were so excited we almost forgot that we’d yet to loot the Rogs or Ventilating Arachnids.
I contacted Richard and told him about our dilemma with the spiders. He didn’t just bring Lydia into the conversation but went to her crafting station so that he had access to her stuff in case it came up in conversation. While we waited, we sifted through what was left of the smoke monsters.
What I assumed was their blood was a thick red-brown liquid that was slow to pool. Their core, or body, had been hard as stone, but it was more of a shell or skin than ore. I didn’t know what to think of them, but they didn’t have anything on their person besides what they were made of.
Lydia was almost panicked she was so excited when she joined us through Richard’s communication ability. She quizzed me on the spiders for five minutes before telling me exactly what she needed. She wanted the entire corpse—every one of them. In the end, she settled for their eyes and the pinchers they had for mouths. It was tedious, gruesome work.
I did ask her about the Rog, but she wasn’t interested. She was interested in the Lesser Fire Orbs but less so than the spider parts.
Richard spread the word about the orbs, and within minutes half the guys in Sanctuary had contacted me to call dibs.
It took another hour before we were ready to move on. We hadn’t seen a single creature since we’d finished with the Hell Hounds. My golems moved up with us to keep a close guard and were stationed at the ramp to the fourth floor. When trying to observe the structure on the fifth and final floor, I could see the vein despite the stone walls between us. It was like a fountain of mana near the center of the building. There were no signs of any monsters.
Before heading up, there was one more thing I had to try. The Rog were interesting creatures and I had yet to test out their Blue Magic Form.
I brought up its information before casting it.
Rog Form
Cost: 10,000 Mana Per Minute (1,000 with buffs)
Special Abilities: Body of Smoke, Smog, Crystalized Fog, Smoke Mastery.
Body of Smoke: Your body takes on the mist-like characteristics of smoke. You’re able to solidify and gasify your body at will. Makes you immune to the effects of smoke. When in the presence of smoke, you can use it to expand your senses like an aura.
Note: Even if you gasify your body, there will be a physical core made of Earth, Fire, and Air that will remain vulnerable inside your smoke. You are able to manipulate the placement of this core.
Smog: At the cost of mana, you are able to crystalize a large mass of smoke and compress it into a projectile. The crystallized shell shatters on contact with your target and unleashes the mass of smoke. The mana cost depends on the cubic footage and smoke density.
Crystalized Fog: When in physical contact with your Smog, you are able to manipulate its density to the point of solidifying large areas to create barriers and structures.
Smoke Mastery
Level: 1
Maximum Smoke Density: 1 out of 100
Toxicity Level: Minimal
Heat Level: Minor
Next Level:
Level: 2
Maximum Smoke Density: 2 out of 100
Toxicity Level: Minimal
Heat Level: Minor
I let out a loud whistle and Travis was soon peeking over my shoulder to see what I was looking at.
“That’s from the smoke monster?” he said.
I nodded without looking at him. Just as the Rog were the most complex creatures we had faced, their form was unlike anything else I had. The form itself didn’t level up, but it came with a mastery that did. Perhaps the strangest part was that it didn’t seem to affect my stats at all, even though it would change my body into a mostly gaseous state. That left me scratching my head.
“Its Smog ability might be extremely powerful against certain mobs,” I replied. “Especially lower-level ones.”
“Well, let’s see it,” Travis said.
I glanced back at Shamash who understood at once. He erected his amber cube around us in case the form caused my Light Mana to leak too much. The Faeastein queen had been closed up with us and was obviously uncomfortable. I asked the lich to warn her, and he did. She stiffened all over as if to brace herself. Unless this was her version of relaxing—I really didn’t understand her kind yet.
All my different forms I was using while multicasting were automatically uncast as my Rog Form started to take shape. It was an odd sensation. I’d long ago grown used to the scorching power of my Fire Incubus Form, but the sudden lack of it made the transformation even more obvious. I felt…less. It was almost as if I was dissolving, but I didn’t lose form entirely. I held my hands up and watched them dissipate. They expanded until they were twice as large as before, as did the rest of me.
Curious. I wasn’t grey or even black like smoke, but dull white, like a cloud or fog. I could even see through my hands if I turned Mana Sight all the way down. As easily as flexing my muscles, my smoke condensed into a much more solid mass. During the process, I shriveled up like a raisin. I wasn’t left with a bunch of wrinkles, but a smokey sheen as solid as stone. I rapped my knuckles on my forearm and heard an audible knock. Changing back to my gaseous form was a simple release of tension.
I touched one hand with the other. Feeling the pressure, I was immediately aware of the lack of texture. Pushing harder, I was able to push one hand through the other. My opposing hand didn’t break up or have to reform. With the additional pressure, my hands joined together in the same space and the other simply passed right through it. With enough momentum my hand could push the other way like a breeze, but never would it lose its form. It was like an all-powerful magnet was holding it in place.
Observing my core, it hovered in my chest. In my least dense state, I stood over ten feet tall and must have looked like a giant cotton candy monster. My core was the size of a watermelon and it was taller than it was wide. Manipulating my core placement was confusing at first. I tried to use my hands to move it, but that was like pushing against my human body. It didn’t move my core, but my body as a whole.
Focusing on my core and how it felt, I found it was easy enough to command it to move. It was a little awkward the first time I did it, like trying to alternate between flexing one pectoral muscle then the other. I got the hang of it soon enough and place my core in my stomach. Despite it residing in a different part of me, it didn’t seem to affect my mobility or how I felt. Moving it again, I pushed it up and found that my neck expanded to hold its mass as I moved it into my head. My vision blurred for a moment before returning to normal.
Almost as soon as I did, Travis howled like a laughing wolf. I almost expected to see him transformed when I turned to look at him.
He was already holding his armor-covered gut when he saw me face to face. His eyes went wide as the hilarity seeped into the features of his face. The muscles of his neck drew tight with tension as he tried to hold back.
“My head is large, isn’t it?” I said.
He was too tense to react like a normal person, but the little spastic headshake he gave me was clear enough.
“Is this better?” I said, before drawing my smoke into its densest, crystalline form. My vision stretched until it was like viewing the world through fisheye lenses and then snapped back into place.
Air began to escape from his mouth even as he clenched his jaw. It came out like the hissing sound from a deflating
balloon. Then the balloon popped, and he vomited laughter, forcing him to his knees because his breastplate wouldn’t let him bend as he needed.
I turned to the queen, whose eyes shot to the floor when she saw that I was looking at her. Unless I was imagining things, I thought I saw the smallest hint of a sense of humor in her face. Not that she gave in as Travis had. She was a hard rock to crack.
I held myself back from the sudden urge to dance, not wanting to waste any more time. There were enough possibilities that I tested the form a little further. 1,000 MP formed a Smog projectile the size of a volleyball. I threw it down to the third floor and watched it burst into a thin cloud that could have filled a small house. I was pleasantly surprised to see Smoke Mastery reach level 2.
Throwing a second Smog with ten times the amount of MP behind it, it crashed beside the first. The projectile had only grown slightly larger than a basketball, but when it touched down, it was as if a miniature atom bomb had gone off and the entire third level was covered in the white smoke. It began rolling over the third floor’s edge and covering the second floor soon after.
“That’s not going to help us search for ore,” Travis reminded me.
“I think I’ll be able to manipulate it when the time comes,” I replied. “I’ll leave it for now to help cover our backs.” I imagined that the dungeon was still filled with mobs. Once the Mastery had leveled up and I could manipulate its heat and toxicity levels, how quickly would I be able to clear this dungeon? The rock mobs may not have been affected, but the Faeastein queen’s reaction put that conclusion in question.
Changing back to my Fire Incubus Form, I folded my wings tight against my back and let Magma Fist replace my left hand. My skeletal vertebra-like tail flicked into place and I thought for a moment how to implement my new form. It deserved more attention later. For now, I’d cast it as a partial form, but how?
The idea that came to me also freaked me out. If somehow I could make room inside my body by manipulating Fire Incubus Form, I could carry around the Rog Form like an organ. Maybe even move it at will. I nearly threw out the idea but remembered there was someone here I could ask.
Underworld - Vampire Gate: A LitRPG Series Page 9