Vic started to cross the stream, walking through it slowly, trying to get his footing right between each step. I guessed that for a skeleton, crossing a river was probably more challenging physically. Despite the slowness, it took him about half a minute to completely cross the 3-meter wide stream. Then he took a step up the ledge, and we were both standing on the other side, safe and sound.
“Good job, Vic,” I complimented him, “Now go bring the others.”
He shook his head, “Sorry boss, that’s not gonna happen.”
I stared at him with surprise, “Why not?”
“Because,” he slowly answered and pointed at himself, “This!” His body promptly fell apart, bones raining down to the ground, leaving behind them the amorphous purple substance that was Vic’s true body.
Vic reshaped himself back to a goblin shape. “Sorry boss, time has run out, seems like it's just you and me now.”
I stared at the glowing sword that now lay on the ground before us. It weighed about 20kg, almost as much as I did. There was no way that either Vic nor I could wield it now, not to mention actually use it in combat.
Well, it was still illuminating the surrounding area and that was its major selling point. I grabbed its hilt, and barely managed to heft it onto my shoulder, its point still laying on the ground.
“Can you grab the other end Vic?”
He approached the tip, and although his goblin shape was smaller than mine, he managed to lift it, and apparently much more easily than me.
“You guys,” I called to the other goblins, “get back to the clan. Run all the way up, in case any more beasts come out of the water. Once you’re out, guard the cave entrance until I return.” They all nodded.
“Alright,” I turned my head toward Vic, “Let’s go.”
We resumed our descent into the main tunnel, leaving the stream behind us. We walked for maybe another ten minutes, while the sword kept us and the surrounding area well illuminated, keeping the darkness that was oozing from the walls at bay as we passed.
About ten minutes later, another light became visible from further along the tunnel, a dark-red menacing light. We proceeded carefully, still carrying the sword with us, until we reached another large cavern, which had another stream running through it. This time it was a stream of lava.
The lava was flowing slowly, heavily. The molten rocks seemed thick and their flow could be described more as oozing than actual flowing. The lava current was about five meters wide. Behind it, I could see the tunnel continuing on downward. Will we ever reach its end?!
But now I had another problem on my hand, how the hell are we going to cross that lava flow? It was too wide to jump across, at least for a goblin. All my spells were combat oriented and ill-suited for this task. How I wished I knew some sort of ice spell! Then I could have easily frozen us a path to cross.
I checked my inventory, in the vain hope I’d find something that might help. Short of the Outrider bracelet, I didn’t have anything that could have helped, and I was not prepared to waste such a valuable artifact on a simple logistic problem.
I wrecked my brain trying to figure a solution. What to do? What to do?!
“Vic, any chance you can reach the other side and grab a hold on some rock to pull me through?” I asked.
He seemed unsure, “I don’t know, I’ve never tried to reach that far, let me try.” He stood on edge of the lava river, raised his arms and slowly started to elongate them. The arm reached further and further. Vic’s own body became thinner, as he poured more and more of his mass toward extending his hands. After reaching about 2 meters, he nearly lost his balance and toppled to the lava. Seemed as if he couldn’t anchor his body while his own hands reached so far. He quickly retracted them, shifting his main body mass back into his body and managed to steady himself before falling down the stream.
He shook his head, “Sorry boss, it's just too far. My body isn’t large enough to reach all the way to the other end.”
Body not large enough… I mused. That gave me another idea. “Well then,” I replied with a grin, we’ll just need to enlarge your body, now wouldn’t we?” He seemed puzzled at my comment, especially when I added, “Now, would you please jump into the lava?”
He stared at me incredulously for a moment, then he finally got my meaning, grinned back at me and actually sounded a bit enthusiastic as he replied, “Sure thing boss!”
He turned, took a leap and head dived into the lava stream. His body was destroyed instantly, the purple matter that comprised it was boiled away by the intense heat.
Your companion Vic had died
Good. now for the next part, resummoning him. Last time I summoned Vic, I used 100 hp and 200 MP to create his amorphous body. Since then, my power has increased significantly, I could invest much more points in the summoning ritual this time. It's been awhile since I’ve checked my character sheet, so I opened it now to check my available health and mana.
Title: Esteemed Totem
Level: 11, (90%)
Race: Monster Race [Goblin]
Type: Boss I [Totem]
Deity: Corgoram
Followers: 5
Attributes: [0 points available]
- Physical 2
- Mental 13
- Social 0
Pools:
- Hit Points: 162
- Mana: 329
- Armor: 7
Skills:
- Lucky Bastard 13 (11%) (prime)
- Analyze 5 (52%)
- Tracking 5 (29%)
- War Party Leader 3 (10%)
- Mana Infusion 13 (59%) (prime)
Skills (Spells):
- Mana Manipulation 12 (60%)
- Drilling Arrow 11 (25%) (prime)
- Mana Shield 15 (80%)
- Blood Wrath 11 (90%)
- Heal Followers 2 (60%)
- Mana Drain 3 (62%) (prime)
I decided to invest 150 of my health points and 300 mana in forming up Vic’s new body, that ought to increase his mass by 50% I hoped it would be enough, though it seemed unlikely. Based on what I’d seen, he’ll need at least double that. Regardless, I already started this course of action, and now I had to see it through.
I initiated the summoning ceremony. Once again thick tendrils of mana and blood poured out of my body, combining together to form up an amorphous blob of magical substance that could host Vic’s consciousness. When the process was finished, the blob fell to the ground with a thud. It immediately started to change shape, as Vic often put it ‘took the controls’. He reformed once again as a goblin, but this time he was even larger than me! The top of my head now barely reached his chin. His body even seemed to be more muscular now. He examined his own hands with fascination, flexing his muscles and appeared to be very satisfied with their response. He reached toward the sword that we laid on the floor, grabbed the hilt with both hands and with a grunt managed to lift it up in the air all by himself, though his entire body seemed to strain just to hold it upright.
“Congratulations on your new body,” I said to him, “Now will you please stop admiring yourself and check if you can reach the other side of the lava?”
“Sure thing boss”. He replied and let go of the sword. He walked toward the ledge, lifted his arms once more, and elongated them as before. This time he managed to reach about 3 meters out over the lava before starting to lose his balance - more than half way through, but it was still not enough.
“Damn!” I said in frustration and shook my head.
“Sorry boss. If only we could find a way to cross the two remaining meters, I could get us the rest of the way, but what can we do?” He asked.
Two meters, eh? That got me thinking.
“Alright Vic, I have an idea. It's a bit crazy and dangerous, but at worst we’ll simply die and respawn back in the cemetery, so let’s give it a try. But first, the sword. Think you can throw it to the other side?”
He nodded, “I should manage that.”
He grabbed th
e sword again, and walked toward the edge. Then he started to spin, harnessing inertia to his aid, like they do in throwball sport. When he reached a sufficient velocity, he let go of the sword, the momentum of the force carrying it clear above the lava, to land with a clutter on the other side.
“Good. Now back to my shoulders,” I instructed him.
He shrugged, but reshaped himself back into his Vicloack shape around my shoulders.
I walked away from the lava, putting about 10 meters of distance between me and the stream of molten rock. I activated Mana Infusion, which other than supplying me with magical stamina, also had the nice side effect of increasing my speed and strength by a whopping 22% percent.
“Ready?” I asked.
I took a big breath, steadying myself. Then I exhaled and started sprinting. I run as fast as I could, closing the 10 meters distance in a few seconds. When I reached my top speed right at the edge of the stream, I jumped as hard as I could, sailing through the air over the lava. I managed to jump over 2 meters, almost half way through the lava, before my momentum ended and I started falling. “NOW VIC!” I shouted. Vic’s cloak body bellowed forth and spread on either side of me, sending tendrils of his body forward, grabbing rocks and cracks on the other side and pulling us as hard as he could, adding to my jump momentum.
We made it, but just barely. My crazy idea somehow worked, as our combined effort managed to make us cross over to the other side of the lava.
We landed with a crash on the stone floor and rolled around, hitting some rocks and losing some hit points until we finally came to a halt.
I stood up, brushing myself from dirt and dust. Once again, we stood at the entrance of the large circular tunnel. I really hoped there wouldn’t be any more rivers to cross.
This place seemed safe enough for now, so I decided it was a good time to take a little break to catch our breath and recuperate. Well, for me to catch my breath at least, as Vic himself didn’t actually have to breathe. I sat down, leaning against a rock and stared at the flowing lava while my mana and health slowly regenerated.
Even though it was only game graphics, the lava flow was a mesmerizing sight. The color play of dark red and brown had a hypnotic effect on me, as I stared at them for a long time without any actual conscious thought.
It took me a while to realize what I was staring at. Just on the edge of the flow, a low flat rock sat just on the level of the lava, without actually being covered by it. On that rock, I could see some weirdly shaped objects which glowed with the same incandescent red-black colors as the lava itself.
I stood up and approached the objects. Those were mushrooms! But none like I’ve ever seen before, they looked like they were made of lava! I analyzed one of them:
Magmashroom
Description: A rare type of magical mushroom that can only grow in a close proximity to flowing lava.
Type: ingredient, crafting component
Seeing as it was magical allowed my Analyze skill to decipher its description. Well, rare was always useful. I gingerly touched one of the Magmashrooms with the tip of my fingers. It was warm to the touch, but not burning hot. I quickly picked up the total of 7, and stored them in my inventory.
Once done, I stood up. My hit points and mana had fully regenerated. “Right, let’s go Vic.”
We continued walking in silence. I led the way, my Mana Shield active, while Vic followed, carrying the sword.
We didn’t have to walk far. After a few minutes, we finally reached the end of the tunnel.
A menacing onyx colored stone wall blocked our path, sealing the tunnel. As we approached, I could see a small entryway, slightly taller than a goblin right in the middle of the wall
The wall was extremely thick. From where I stood, I could see the opening reached deep into the wall without seeing its other side. It must be several meters thick at least, I thought perplexed.
The wall was constructed from huge and heavy blocks of what seemed to be obsidian and it had massive metal chains stretched across it from side to side as if trying to contain the wall from bursting outward. Most of the chains were bluish, some were silvery and some even appeared to be made out of gold.
As we approached even closer, I realized the wall was actually one large gate, one that could be split in the middle and could be opened outward. The chains served as a locking mechanism to prevent that from happening. The small passageway was directly in the middle, like a small door embedded in a larger gate.
I slowly crept toward the intimidating gates. Their architecture made my skin crawl with apprehension, thinking what might be locked behind them. I edged forward, until I reached the gate wall. Slowly, I slid toward the open hatchway, being careful not to make any noise.
I reached the opening and paused. Now I’ll take a peek and there’ll probably be some terrible fire wreathed monster of death and darkness, I thought pessimistically. I braced myself and peeked over the edge.
There was a huge beast, engulfed in darkness and fire.
Figures.
17 - Oh My God!
“A...analyze”, I stammered.
Nihilator, Lord of Darkness
Level: ??
HP: ??
‘Lord of Darkness’, are they kidding me? Couldn’t the creators come up with a slightly less cliché and unimaginative title? I thought with distaste.
How do you know that?! I thought back to him. Other than his name, everything else appears as a question mark.
That was rubbish. As a former programmer, I knew that as long as you had access to one type of data, it was just a matter of creating the proper adapter to make it match any other format. Well, can’t you simply add the extra pieces of information to the displayed message on your own? I asked impatiently.
There was a long silence as Vic contemplated my suggestion.
You do that all the time, I reminded him, or do you want to tell me that when system messages mention you as ‘Vic the awesome companion’ it's being sent by the actual game engine and not tweaked by you?
The information message blinked, and then updated itself.
Nihilator, Lord of Darkness
Boss tier: 8
Level: ??
HP: ??
What?! That was a possibility? I asked in shock.
Before I could say anything to stop him, the message flickered again.
Nihilator, Lord of Darkness
Boss tier: 8
Level: 500
HP: 62,000
Resistances: physical 90%, mental 100%, magic 80%, armor 500
Holy shit! That was some rare boss! It was widely known that the higher level the monster, the higher level the loot it might drop. High-level bosses especially had a high chance for extra rare and powerful artifacts, but they were quite rare and hard to find. The large guilds would kill for information leading to this location. They would run a bidding war for the chance at an epic level raid and the epic level loot.
How the hell did you do that? I demanded of Vic.
Before I could answer, the dim lights suddenly started to flicker, the world shuddered and my vision blurred. I doubled over as screeches sounded in my head and cupped my hands over my ears, trying to ease the pain it caused. WHAT IS GOING ON?! I shouted in my mind.
The screeching continued, the pain grew more and more. I clenched my teeth to hold back my scream falling to my knees, the world shaking around me.
Then, everything turned black.
***
I slowly regained my senses.
I was laying on my back next to the gate, in the same place I lost consciousness. Vic was sitting nearby, the glowing sword on the ground next to him, as he kept watch over me.
I groaned and sat up. What happened? All that pain and noise… I just couldn’t take it anymore. It had felt like I was going to explode into a million pieces… But now, everything felt normal again, there was no pain, the world seemed just as it was before.
Vic noticed my movements. “You’re finally awake. It’s about time, you meat suits really lack mental fortitude, don’t you?”
“It’s good to see you too, Vic,” I replied. I tried to stand up, but the residual headache flared up, making me wince and remain hunched over for a moment longer. “How long have I been out?”
He shrugged, “Almost a full day, it’s mid-morning right now.”
What!? Full a day?! That meant that disaster from the vision would occur tomorrow! How the hell could that happen? The game was supposed to protect players from literally losing consciousness. At most a player’s vision would turn completely all black, simulating passing out, while he remained fully aware. That was just one more aspect of how screwed I was compared to other players. The game engine considered me to be partly an NPC, making me susceptible to afflictions that were spared from normal players. Like those stupid enhanced pain levels, I thought with a grimace.
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