by Ryan DeBruyn
Sela examined the Basalt Golems. “My feeling with these Basalt Golems is they will likely add either defense to your other golems, or Tactics. That would make the most sense, after the fight we just had.” She made a quick appraisal of the tar-like golems. “Too bad they dropped down to low Journeyman ranks from the Master class they were at.”
Adam pointed to each in turn. “It says that one adds Inherent Ether protection. What is that?” Not waiting for an answer, he moved to the next, “That one there says it grants a skill of Gaia's Defense. Any idea what that means? That—”
Sela jumped in to answer before he continued, “Slow down, Adam; we have all day. One at a time, alright?”
Adam flushed bright red and nodded.
“I think the first one might very well be why the lasers and ranged attacks didn't damage them as much. Inherent Ether is a body resistance against Ether-enhanced attacks and skills. The second one likely granted the skill for the pillars the golems conjured. I felt something tap into Gaia for a moment, which is also what canceled my Blight skill. What do you think, Rocky?”
He half shrugged. That assumption could be made, but she was better suited to make it.
Adam observed the gesture, and added the last bonus, exaggerating how slowly he spoke. “The last one there has combat maneuvers. Maybe that was why they were all so organized?”
The group nodded in affirmation to the young man, who bounced excitedly as he regarded his new constructs. Rocky motioned for everyone to begin making their way back to the school area. As soon as Adam took a step, the Golem Knights and all the Minion golems moved in unison. Rocky found the sight eerie. The Minions made sense, but Epsilon and his brothers?
They are watching this kid closely.
Zippo asked, “How many spots for leaders do you have?”
“Just one,” Adam said.
“That's awesome. You can flip them into the leader position based on what you need,” Zippo explained excitedly.
Rocky tuned out the rest of the conversation as he considered their next move. Some planning needed to happen before they went to attack the nearby Territory. Before Richard had left, Sela and Rocky asked him if he knew what resided inside. He answered that they always heard strange chirps and squeaks late at night. Still, other than random wildlife, they hadn't seen anything overtly dangerous.
Sela was chatting with Victoria again. As an actual tank class, Victoria may very well be capable of holding the attention of whatever creature resided inside the zone.
Maybe I can get her to tank the Puzzle Dungeon for us. I mean, the Grotto can always use more Dungeons.
He sidled over to the two women and received a look he didn't understand.
What? They look like I just walked in on them in the showers or something.
He felt his heart sink at the memory. He wished he would have taken advantage of the offer when it had stood.
He had screwed up and assumed that he and Sela were related. Now he felt like there might be a rift between them. Sela might have forgiven him for the argument last night, but that didn’t mean she was still interested. What if he had blown his chance? He was pretty sure he liked Sela, but honestly hadn't had time to fully examine his feelings for the woman.
Sweating, Rocky realized he had blanked out. The two women stared at him, waiting for him to speak.
“I was thinking of challenging that Puzzle Dungeon when the party organizes for the attack…”
Idiot, stop blushing. Okay, don’t stop—at least turn away, so they don't see it.
His action provoked a light giggle, and his head snapped back around. Who had it been? They wore identical innocent expressions.
His only way out was forward. “The group of you, Sela, Zippo, and myself, perhaps even Azoth, can head into the Dungeon. There will be a few hours before the attack on the Territory occurs.”
“I saw you down a few Elixirs during that fight already. Isn't the plan to attack Toronta tomorrow?”
“Toronto. And yes. But I think bringing in another Dungeon for the Territory’s growth will be a good thing. Or leaving the Dungeon to defend this Territory, perhaps?”
Victoria looked lost, probably unsure of what her opinion was worth. “I can’t tank the Dungeon, Rocky. I am in charge of the military here.”
“This Territory is close to Algonquin already. We don't need it. Once you capture it, just convert it to a Territorial Sphere and add it to the Grotto,” Sela said.
Rocky winced at her tone. “What? Can you collapse Territories?”
Sela looked at him as if he was dumb. “Of course you can. You don't want Territories all over the place. How would you defend them?”
Between clenched teeth, he said, “There is no downside to this?”
The group entered the school zone. “Well, you lose some of the Etherience of the zone, just like if you capture a Dungeon Core. It can't take all of its energy with it. However, this is a huge reason for interplanetary wars as well. Armies would capture spheres as they moved, keeping only strategic positions. Those spheres were often loaded onto ships and brought back home. Didn't I explain this?” Sela asked, puzzlement furrowing her brow.
He pointed a finger at her. “No, you didn’t. You alluded to wars for Planetary Essence. You never mentioned how.”
She shrugged. “Well, how else do you suggest capturing Essence and Etherience?”
He pointed to his Bag of Holding. Sela's eyes widened comically. She guffawed at him, and he felt childish. How was he supposed to know that the Bottle of Gaia's Essence wasn't the typical capturing method?
***
A rushed meal and a scant fifteen minutes later, Rocky stood in the entryway of the Dungeon.
This Dungeon, like many other wild Dungeons, didn’t have an entrance large enough for Azoth. Rocky assumed that it was a measure against huge Master class creatures or higher from entering.
Most Dungeons he had fought to date were seriously under-leveled compared to the evolved mobs. He took a deep breath.
“Everyone ready?” Rocky asked. The group gave varying levels of consent. Zippo and Adam cheered and gave each other high fives.
He had been against bringing Adam with him on this delve, but the boy had pouted when Rocky had told him, ‘No,’ and he’d had no choice but to melt and relent.
The Golem Knights had stepped in on Adam’s behalf. They insisted the boy join him, even though they wanted the boy to be out of harm’s way. Adam couldn’t bring his massive golems, and that worried Rocky.
What is their fixation with this kid? They want him to get stronger but also to be protected. That’s a tight line to walk.
He glanced at Adam, who was currently enthralled by Zippo’s slightly rosy story about Maximus, the Arena Dungeon. Rocky recalled the events in a very different light. Unbidden memories of all the lost survivors and the subsequent zombies... just thinking about the undead made his skin crawl.
The boys stopped talking when they reached the entrance to the Science Building—the entrance to the Dungeon. Richard had warned them that each room was a puzzle that needed to be solved. Passing the problem rewarded the group with a loot basket. Failing the puzzle would release mobs into the room. The Dungeon escalated the strength and number of the mobs based on the number of failures.
I should have asked what type of mobs were in here. Should I put this off?
Rocky had always enjoyed a good puzzle, but he wasn’t sure how he would fare when the stakes were high. He would likely need to rely on Sela’s judgment, as she had experienced Puzzle Dungeons in the past.
“You ready to head in?” Sela asked.
If she wasn’t worried, then he probably didn’t need to be.
She turned away and opened the door before he could answer.
Guess it was a rhetorical question.
The two boys followed her.
“See you in a bit, buddy.” Rocky gave the Chimera plenty of head scratches. Azoth had no chance of fitting into a standard sized human en
closure. If this Dungeon agreed, they would hopefully be able to add it to the Grotto and maybe make it larger.
Welcome to the “Philosopher’s Conundrum”
You have entered in a group of four, suggested group size 5-10.
Good luck!
Level: Unknown
Age: 54 Days
Best time: N/A
Clears: 0
Ether Concentration: Moderate
You can exit this Dungeon at any time. Simply leave the way you came in.
He looked around and immediately thought of high school science class. Beakers, bunsen burners, test tubes, and copious shelves filled with chemicals lined the room. His eyes searched the room for the puzzle.
Zippo called. “Create the element of life.”
Rocky found the clue scrawled on a chalkboard that Zippo had read from.
Well, that was straightforward. Water. But how would he make water from the chemicals in front of him? Rocky scanned the shelves and tanks. A hydrogen tank and oxygen tank stood in the corner of the room. He had the necessary components for creating water.
He couldn’t recall how to combine those elements to create water. Did he need cold air? Once the water evaporated, the coolness of the stratosphere created clouds that rained the water back down. That didn’t sound right—steam didn’t break up into separate atoms. It was merely water changing states.
“Anyone know how to make water?”
Everyone shook their heads, and Rocky ran his hand through his hair. He took a deep breath and tilted his head back.
Phosphorescent lights and pipes ran along the ceiling. The classroom didn’t have faucets in it, which would be a huge safety issue in a real laboratory. Some of the pipes reached the counter spaces and fed the lit bunsen burners. A fire suppression pipe ran down the center of the room. Not all of the tubes were for gas. He followed the pipe with his eyes, stopping at the joint where it connected to a sprinkler. There was nothing under the sprinkler, and it was too high up to hold a bunsen burner near the heat-sensitive device. Even if he stood on a chair, there was no way to reach it.
“Zippo, create a Fireball near that Safety Mechanism.”
Right, fire mage.
The heat of the Fireball broke the mercury with a click. All the furniture in the room sunk into the floor. It was eerie, almost like they had been standing in an illusion. Rocky vowed to touch something in the next area to ensure it was real. Over in a corner, a woven basket appeared, filled with what looked like a leg of meat that could feed 100 people. Or provide Azoth with a snack.
He wondered if the Dungeon created items that the survivors needed. It would make a great deal of sense. Dungeons required challengers that they could leech off and attempt to kill. If the Dungeon created loot to lure people in farther, it would have more opportunities to do both.
If all puzzles are going to be that easy, though...
Rocky summoned the haunch and basket into his Bag of Holding and then followed the group into the next room. The room was a long hallway.
Adam was the first to spot the clue. “The more you take, the more you leave behind. What am I?”
“Footsteps. The answer is footsteps, but how do we use that?” said Rocky.
Sela pointed up at a counter midway down the hallway. The number Twenty was displayed and counted up a few ticks. Zippo and Adam moved around, examining the walls.
“Both of you stop for a second,” said Rocky.
The counter stopped moving up the moment the boys stilled.
“The more you leave behind,” he mused to himself. “Zippo, take a step backward.”
The young man complied and the counter dropped down to twenty-three.
Rocky clapped his hands together. “We need to cross this hallway to the door and have the counter at zero. Sela and Adam will walk forwards, while Zippo and I will walk in the same direction but backwards. As we near the door, we will adjust as needed.”
They cleared the room with relative ease and another basket appeared. This one had four glass bottles, filled with a transparent liquid. He sniffed the contents. “No scent.” He poured some on his finger and tasted the liquid. “Definitely water.”
The others gave him strange looks that indicated they had already assumed that.
Maybe I am a bit paranoid. Have they never heard the saying, ‘don’t take candy from strange dungeons’?
He gathered the basket and the bottles into his Bag of Holding, and the group continued.
The rooms that followed were all relatively simple, and the group continued to gather food and water. The tenth to the eleventh challenge required them to climb a staircase and enter a door on the ‘second floor.’ The room they entered didn’t contain a written clue, or at least no one saw the hint they had grown accustomed to finding.
Coming up empty, Rocky took another look around the room. Crates. Nothing but crates stacked haphazardly. The same phosphorescent strip lights lined the ceiling as they had the previous chambers. The floor contained a checkered black and white tile pattern. Four of the checkers were slightly sunken holes. He walked over to one and spied a symbol etched into the simple grey bottom of the depression. The symbol represented fire to him, and he glanced at the crates. On the nearest box was a symbol that looked like a wave of water.
Right out of a video game.
“Match the boxes to the symbols?” asked Sela.
Zippo and Adam jumped into action, figuring out what each sunken pit contained. They soon called out, “Earth, Water, and Air.”
The amount of food gathered thus far on the first level would barely feed a portion of the North Bay survivors for a single day. Based on the gaunt look of those survivors, he had expected this level to ramp up in difficulty.
Guess not.
They moved the crates to the corresponding symbols on the tiles. They neatly stacked the rest of the containers until each area held three vertical boxes. The lighting turned red and the crates sunk out of sight.
The ominous red light was a first, and he worried they had messed up the puzzle. A wall slid into the ceiling and revealed five stone statues. He wasn’t sure what to make of it.
The statues drew an assortment of weapons and advanced. Now, he was sure they had failed.
He Analyzed one of the stone combatants.
Gargoyle
Apprentice-Axman
Level 22
Health Points 230 / 230
He stepped forward and shot out a single charge of his Dark Blade ability. He was beginning to feel like a button masher with an individual skill to his name. He clenched his jaw, hoping that his next tier would open up some new combat options. Right now, he only had his clone and the Dark Blade Skills as offensive options. His new class of Chimera Knight was rather disappointing, especially when Azoth couldn’t be with him.
The statue wielded a sword, forming a slab of stone onto its forearm. It knelt and angled its stone shield. Rocky’s Dark Blade bounced off the protection and deflected diagonally toward the ceiling, where it screeched in protest as it dug into the steel supports.
He cursed at the ease with which the creatures countered his skill. He used Shadow Clone and his second self popped into existence and shook its finger at him. He had forgotten to use the ability during the battle outside and it felt like this was his scolding. Finger still waggling, his second self disappeared in Stealth.
Sela took no notice and waded forward, engaging two of the creatures. Adam backed up and started casting his leash. Zippo threw fireballs at a spear-wielding gargoyle. It formed a buckler and deflected them up and away, just like Rocky’s ranged ability.
Rocky rushed forward, and a swinging ax greeted him. He planted his front foot hard and leaned back, swaying out of the path of the half-moon blade. Stepping forward again into the opening, he raised his sword and chopped down. The blow cracked the stone of the Axman’s demonic cranium and bounced off. Rocky dove forward as the ax reversed direction and speed toward him.
Back on his
feet, he charged his blade with his skill, holding it on the edge and causing the black steel to grow darker. He brought the blade up to block a strike from the sword and shield-wielding Gargoyle.
Blocking was a mistake.
Rocky’s arm crumpled under the strength of the attack, and he almost lost his sword. His block was partially effective, saving his life. Instead of the blade cutting deeply into his chest, it deflected just enough to cut into his pectoral muscles. He cried out as the thick sword tore him open.
A bleeding and fracture debuff floated up to his status bar, and he swore. The two creatures advanced, and he used a double Dark Mend on himself as he backpedaled away. These things were ridiculously powerful. His coated blade had barely cut the dense stone.
There was no time to admire what little damage he doled out. A massive hammer smashed through the sword wielder. As the creature broke into three large chunks, one of its brethren stood behind it, brandishing a two-handed war mace.
The ax wielder attempted to engage the traitor gargoyle, But Rocky’s shadow clone leaped onto the ax-swinging Gargoyle’s back, unbalancing it and changing its blow into a faceplant.
His clone jumped off the Gargoyle as the warhammer rose and fell, dispatching another creature. Within moments, the battle ended, and Rocky pulled up his party’s display. He wasn’t the only one missing health—Sela had also taken a few hits.
She was doubled over and panting. Rocky’s Ether was low, but he managed to cast a double stack of Dark Mend on her as well. They decided to wait to regenerate all resources before the next room. The spell congealed onto her stomach, and as it dulled the pain, she looked up at him thankfully. Her stomach didn’t have a noticeable wound, but her hardened armor displayed spiderweb cracks. She pointed at the hammer golem. She had taken a blow, before Adam gained control of it.
No door to another room opened when the last mob died, and he asked two questions to his sweaty group. “Where is the door, and why was that considered a failure?”
“We only saw one symbol on each box, right?” asked Zippo. The group all nodded, remembering each crate they had moved around. “I feel like we should have placed the symbols in the corresponding direction to the floor symbols, and facedown to match.”