by Sarah Lin
It should have been humiliating, yet surrounded by his allies laughing, Bloodwraith found himself chuckling too.
Chapter 16
Bloodwraith took part of a day just to recover. He told himself it was for the sake of his allies, but he recognized that was useless pride: he needed it as well. Though his wounds had been magically healed quickly enough, the deep ache and fatigue left behind needed more time. Besides, he needed to take time to get a proper grip on his new skill.
The name "Rage of Rage" sat irritatingly in his personal box. But aside from the stupidity of the name, which really shouldn't have surprised him by now, it bothered him. Though he thought he could access it again if necessary, it would never be as easy as using other skills and it would always carry with it a serious risk with the loss of control.
Setting aside that problem, Bloodwraith instead devoted time to determining the exact conditions of their current situation. When he used one of the plates to reopen the large stone door that led back, he soon heard monsters on the other side. Fighting all of them would be a greater challenge than the single elemental, so he quickly removed and reinserted the plate to close the door again.
That left the passage in the other direction. Though Gharavi expressed concern that it might contain another large monster, Bloodwraith felt confident that it wouldn't. The box gods liked a degree of symmetry and a single challenge at the end, which they'd already overcome.
As expected, when he placed all three plates into their slots, the massive slab of stone rolled down to reveal a set of stairs. One plate was left behind, which appeared to be intended to activate the doors in either direction. Since the stairs extended upward to unknown threats, Bloodwraith intended to close it again for the time being. Still, he decided to look a little and see if he could discover anything that would help them prepare.
When he stepped onto the second floor, a box immediately appeared in his vision.
[Whoever is reading this, you must have admin permissions. I didn't want to have to leave a message like this, but they're moving me off Alliandelle to the MMO project. I can only hope this message reaches sympathetic ears.
The longer I work on this project, the more I become convinced that the Mirror Court gave us fundamentally flawed designs. Maybe they're only keeping their secrets, maybe they have something worse in mind, maybe they're just raving fuckaloons. Have you worked directly with any Aesidh? Avoid it if at all possible.
If you're here investigating my work or because something went horribly wrong - look, I'm sorry. But our design plans have been distorted and it is NOT a property of the world like they claim. Safety protocols are weaker than standard and there's a degree of bloodthirsty malice in the system that I just can't explain by any normal variance.
If I'm right, we're going to see an unnatural increase in the number of cross-veil attempts in this location and the system will become less stable. HQ thinks I'm delusional, but I'm certain of it. If the Mirror Court is planning something, then things are going to get ugly for any players, and possibly for any admins present too.
I don't fucking know what to do. I just wanted to design games, not get involved with crazy inter-dimensional politics. All I can do is leave the Testing Dungeon active instead of recycling it like I was supposed to. Don't try to take players through it, as the balance is still a bit shit - just turn on Clipping Mode and wrap up the whole thing. The bonuses here should give you something they're not expecting.
Oh, and there's an EXP bonus for each floor if you want to feed any local tools. That's the best I can do.]
Bloodwraith reeled at the implications of the message and all of its strange terminology. Dozens of questions crowded into his mind as he struggled to properly frame the new information. Yet before he could think for long, he was interrupted by a new message.
[Floor 1 Complete!
EXP Bonus: +250,000]
That was a large bonus just for completing the floor, but he-
[Congratulations! You gained a level!
Current Level: 17
EXP: 208,115/984,150
Unassigned Stat Points: 5]
For once, Bloodwraith ignored his new Stat Points - he could decide how best to use them later. Instead, he focused on the long message. After committing it to memory, he retreated back down the stairs to consider. Just in case there were more monsters in range, he closed the door again, then he sat down and tried to think.
Whoever had left that message had seemed scared of the Mirror Court and suggested that the whole game was in some way manipulated by them. If so, that changed everything. It certainly supported what he'd seen before about the tensions between the Mirror Court and Earth. The idea that they would fight against each other like this wasn't impossible.
Yet as Bloodwraith stared over his companions, his eyes fell on Meara. No, it couldn't be that simple.
Based on everything Meara had experienced and how Raigar had acted, it would be simplistic to blame the Aesidh for everything. The Earthians could be just as insane and cruel, in their own way. Both groups were his enemies.
His skepticism switched into higher gear as he became suspicious of the dungeon and the message itself. Alan had claimed that it was designed to keep them imprisoned here, but what if that was a lie? Instead, the dungeon might have been designed to feed him false information and lead him to believe that he should ally with the Earthians against the Mirror Court.
Though Bloodwraith remained suspicious, he discarded that idea. Alan had been adept at manipulating the system, but he wasn't a god, to just create an entire new dungeon on a whim. Even if he'd had time to prepare it, they'd only gained access due to a specific set of abilities that couldn't have been predicted. No, there might be some deception, but it wasn't wholesale.
What did that ultimately mean for them? They still had to escape by making their way through the dungeon. The message suggested that it wasn't meant to be navigated normally, but they didn't have a choice about that. All they could do was prepare as best they could and try to survive.
"Is everything okay, Bloodwraith?" Meara crouched down beside him with a look of concern. He nodded curtly.
"It's fine. Just a strange message on the second floor."
"I certainly felt a surge of power. But... there was something more, wasn't there?"
He felt an impulse to keep the message to himself, but decided that was foolish. Instead, he told them all the message word for word and gave his thoughts. It might demoralize them a bit, but otherwise he saw only negatives in keeping his allies in the dark. Though they didn't have any great insight immediately, in the future that might be important.
"I agree that both groups are to blame." Gharavi folded her arms and frowned toward the stairs. "But if this dungeon is a weapon they left behind, can we trust it?"
"I don't think we have a choice," Bloodwraith said. "It's the same weapon as the system within me, after all, and we've seen that it can be effective. Besides, we still haven't found any other way out of this place."
"Umm, but can we go forward?" Danniah glanced between them. "Safely, I mean. Isn't it likely that the second floor is going to be even more dangerous?"
"That's possible, but we have many tools at our disposal. Now that we have some peace, let's do everything we can to get ready."
The simplest option he had was to invest his new Stat Points. He again placed all of them into Might, since even with the previous boost, he wasn't able to kill the monsters in this place as efficiently as he'd wanted. Besides, he had allies that could fulfill other roles better than he could, so it was actually the smart thing to do to invest in raw muscle.
Next, he went to find Izzy. His daughter was sitting amid a pile of bloody corpses, happily eating her way through everything that remained once Gharavi stripped the useful components. He and Meara had stored most of the bodies while they were exploring, since due to their pace she hadn't had the chance to eat most of them - clearly she was rectifying that now.
W
hile she ate, Bloodwraith used the mess of flesh and bones to summon more skeletons - it seemed he could control four now. They might not be worth much, but better to have them prepared than not. When he finished he wasn't sure what to do next, but Izzy looked up at him with a bloody smile.
"I wanna bite fire."
Bloodwraith blinked at her. "What exactly do you mean?"
"I tried to bite the big fire thing but it only worked a little bit. I wanna be able to bite fire."
"That... is something we can look into." Bloodwraith sat down near her and began looking through traits, though her request was a bit difficult to fill. Eventually he did find one that matched her goals, to some degree:
[Elemental Bite
Cost: 61 NP
The Undead Companion will gain the ability to consume mana to cause elemental damage when biting. This skill can be used for any element the Undead Companion has personally experienced.]
"Ooh, that!" Izzy nodded as soon as he read the text, but Bloodwraith decided to push back on this one. She might have the right to make her own decisions, yes, but that didn't mean he couldn't give his own opinion.
"I'm not sure that's the best choice for you, Izzy, since Gharavi already wields most elements. I've noticed that you finish most battles with mana left over, according to the boxes. That suggests you could use another active skill."
"Maybe. Do you have one?"
"No, but we can look."
In the end, they found something that struck him as suitably universal:
[Empowered Bite
Cost: 29 NP
The Undead Companion will gain the ability to consume mana to increase the damage and defense penetration of a single bite attack.]
"Good, good!" Izzy chomped down a lizard foot and nodded eagerly. "Let's do that one!"
Though they talked for a while longer, Bloodwraith didn't find any other special traits that particularly stuck out to him as useful. After finishing all the corpses, she had a total of 126 Necromancy Points to spend. That meant that after choosing Empowered Bite, he could sink nearly 100 NP into her core statistics, which should help her keep up with the rest of them even under current conditions.
That resolved, the main edge they needed for the second floor was equipment. It had been a problematic priority for some time and was even more of an issue now that some of their equipment had been seriously damaged by the acid lizards and flame elemental. Fortunately, when he turned to Gharavi, he found that Meara was beside her and both of them looked vaguely satisfied.
"You have something?" He sat down opposite them and Meara nodded.
"We need you to truly test it, but based on our efforts, this idea should work." Meara closed her eyes and focused internally, leaving Gharavi to finish the explanation.
"We need to leverage your status as a 'player' and your crafting skill, at least to get the process started. You see, Meara thinks that there's a simplification method built into the system for crafting items, so long as a player is requesting it from competent individuals."
Bloodwraith nodded in ready acceptance. "The box gods like such simplifications very much."
"I think I qualify as competent, whereas Meara is... more of an unusual case, since she's manipulating the system. But between the two of us, I think we serve as sufficient 'assistants' - we'll be doing most of the work, of course, but we need your impetus to manipulate everything."
"I understand completely. How do we begin?"
"Welcome, adventurer!" Meara's eyes opened, animated yet lifeless. "What would you like to craft today?"
"Uh..." Bloodwraith glanced at Gharavi, who shrugged. "Let's try a knife. An enchanted one, I suppose."
"Just a moment!" Meara went still and they waited... and waited. Realizing something was wrong, Bloodwraith reached out to poke her, which did no good.
He and Gharavi muttered back and forth to each other about plausible theories as Gharavi tried to contribute. Eventually something clicked into place, though he wasn't sure what, and without warning Meara started moving again.
"Here's your custom item!" Meara pulled a knife from within her cloak and handed it to him with that same empty smile. Then her face relaxed into an expression that looked much more natural on her. "Whew, that was a bit of a mess. But it looks like we made it."
Nodding, he turned the knife over in his hands, examining it.
[Steel Knife
Base Damage: 5-7
Durability: 50/50
Rarity: Custom (Common-level quality)]
"This does appear to be a real knife... but it's not a very good one. Not even as good as the knives that Izzy currently uses."
"That barely matters." Gharavi took it from him, her eyes widening. "We just created an object in a matter of mere moments..."
Meara raised an eyebrow. "I do that all the time, you know."
"I do know, and you know what I meant." Gharavi set aside the knife and smiled at both of them. "Let's see about doing this properly, shall we?"
They quickly discovered that trying to get something from nothing got them nowhere. Though they managed to create a slightly better knife, with 6-9 damage, that was their limit. Given that the system operated using real energy and mass, that was unsurprising. Once they began to add other elements to the mix, however, that significantly expanded their ability to improve the final product.
The most obvious was Gharavi adding in mana for the enchantment, and Bloodwraith discovered that he could add some of his as well. While watching for a while, Danniah pointed out that you usually had to pay for that kind of work and they discovered that paying Meara a small amount of money helped. The coins were consumed inside her cloak, but they weren't going to be spending much money in the dungeon anyway.
But the true breakthrough was when they began to add the components they had been gathering. Bloodwraith's Extra-dimensional Bag was filled with wolf pelts, crab carapaces, and lizard skins, not to mention some of the other random items they had picked up.
The pelts and skins did little to help with weapons, but a carapace combined with all the other ingredients finally produced something worthwhile:
[Fellcrab Knife
Special Traits: Might +1, Vitality +1
Base Damage: 17-20
Durability: 50/50
Rarity: Custom (Very Uncommon-level quality)]
It wasn't an ideal knife for Izzy, but it was a significant improvement over the ones she was currently using and the enchantments would be downright useful. They produced a second one and then Bloodwraith gave them both to Izzy, who happily began rushing about and stabbing imaginary things.
"This is a major breakthrough." Gharavi sat back to take a break with a smile of satisfaction. "We're not going to be making legendary items here, but we're also not working with amazing materials. If this is what we can create with the components of the monsters here, then we can bring all our equipment up to a minimum standard."
"Yes, well done." Bloodwraith eyed their stores of components and money, calculating that they had more than enough to experiment. Considering that they were still using some sub-par equipment, this could be a significant boost for them. "Well done on the enchantment, Gharavi."
"No, I should be the one thanking you. I'm impressed, Bloodwraith. I had my doubts if such a multidisciplinary approach could ever function, but you made it work."
Meara elbowed her in the side and wiggled her eyebrows. "Bet that's making you feel pretty affectionate toward Bloodwraith, huh?"
"Wh-what? There's no call for..." Gharavi's green skin shifted slightly in something that might have been a blush, but then her eyes narrowed as she understood. "You're right, that should have triggered another box. I certainly didn't feel any pain... did you see one, Bloodwraith?"
He shook his head and summoned her box:
[Gharavi Affection: 1/1]
"Currently it says 1/1... but not zero," Bloodwraith said. "Curious."
Meara closed her eyes, but beneath her eyelids she was looking b
ack and forth between them. "I'm not surprised. Zero is a number with unusual properties, especially in a system like this."
"But what happens if Gharavi goes through her ritual again?"
"Give me just a little more time." Gharavi also closed her eyes, touching her bone necklace. Though the ritual she used was a simple routine by now, this time it seemed to take more time.
Soon enough, a bright red box appeared in Bloodwraith's vision:
[WARNING
There are signs of non-trivial manipulation of AdventureCorp systems from a native inhabitant of this world. Though this could be a coincidence or accident, it could also be a matter of critical security importance.
Please recall that AdventureCorp cannot actively monitor your journey. Though we strive to offer the highest quality of guidance at all times, if the system is compromised, you would no longer be able to trust official notifications.
This warning appears connected with an official AdventureCorp quest already in your Quest Log. Finish that quest to remove the threat and receive a unique reward.]
"Did it work?" Gharavi opened her eyes, expression serious. Across from her, Meara gave a smiling nod, but Bloodwraith opened her box just to be certain...
[Gharavi Affection: N/A]
When he nodded, she heaved a sigh. "That's a huge relief. I haven't ever collaborated with someone so easily before, and I'm deeply glad that I met you. But the idea that we were being manipulated by the boxes... well, it feels much better to know that the influence is killed once and for all."
"I don't know," Meara said with a smirk. "That didn't sound very 'N/A' to me."
Gharavi rolled her eyes. "I'm deeply glad to have met you too, Meara. Happy now?"
"What did I ever do to earn such abiding affection? I never even ran trivial errands for you!"
"Alright, can we get back to work?" Gharavi shot a glance at both of them, but she was smiling. Bloodwraith smiled as well and they devoted themselves to their task.
One of their first experiments proved an utter failure: they were unable to create enchanted rings. Meara speculated that they fell into a different class of item while Gharavi suspected they required heavier enchantment, but whatever the reason, it restricted their options. Instead, they focused on other types of equipment.