God Mode: A LitRPG Adventure (Mythrune Online Book 1)

by Derek Alan Siddoway

  I stared at Leesha’s corpse a few feet away and didn’t even have the energy to get up and touch her on the shoulder, which was all I needed to do to revive her. But I didn’t care at that moment. All I wanted was for my wounds to slowly stitch together and for the pain to stop.

  Worst of all, in spite of the mammoth number of Skill Points we’d gathered across my various Pursuit Spheres, not a single monster had dropped an Attribute Orb. After hours of continuous combat and dungeon diving, I was still stuck at level four.

  After my HP hit the halfway point, I dragged my body over to Leesha and tapped her shoulder. Her eyes flickered awake instantly.

  She let out an exhausted groan. “Ugh, what a pain in the ass this temple is. You get them okay?”

  “I got ’em,” I said, “but the ‘okay’ part is still up for debate.”

  “Yeah, you look like hell,” she said.

  I gave her an unamused glare.

  “Oh, sorry. Was that one of those moments where I was supposed to lie to you?”

  “Couldn’t hurt.”

  “In all seriousness,” Leesha groaned. She glanced over at me. “This has been a lot more difficult than either of us thought it would be. I feel like I have to ask…is this really worth it?”

  “Is…what?” Every word felt like a dagger in my lung. Had one of those things actually stabbed a lung?

  “The pain,” Leesha said. “Don’t get me wrong. I could use the money. But I don’t have to feel one hundred percent of the pain like you do. This is supposed to be a game. It’s supposed to be fun.”

  I shook my head, my mind once again flashing to Brandon. If I failed, would I look back on these three days as time I could have spent with him?

  “It’s worth it,” I finally answered. “Me going through all this pain? It’s something I have to do.”

  I stood up and stretched, feeling my body returning to normal as my HP hit full. Back in business, I headed for the giant door at the end of the hallway we’d just cleared. I stared up at it, hands on my hips. It didn’t take a gaming veteran to see that it was the kind of door that locked away bosses.

  “This is probably the boss fight,” I said aloud.

  “If that skull on the door isn’t a clue, I don’t know what is.” Leesha gestured to a doorknocker roughly the size of a watermelon. The skull was humanoid, but with downward horns protruding out of either side. The whole thing looked to have been shaped from crystal or arcane ice.

  “What kind of sacred temple has a skull on its door?” I scratched my chin as I pondered one of the many questions gamers tend to ask.

  “I was thinking the same thing, but then I realized this is basically one giant tomb. Kinda makes sense, right?”

  “I guess it does.” I made no effort to open the door.

  Leesha gave me a knowing look. “You’re stalling, aren’t you?”

  “That last fight really hurt.” I took another few deep breaths and pounded my fist into the palm of my opposite hand. Game time, Z.

  But then a beautiful thought struck me.

  “Hey,” I said to Leesha, “if this is really a boss fight coming up, I’ve got a few more Skill Points to allocate.”

  Leesha grinned in response. “Take your time, princess.”

  I ignored the jibe, grateful for a little extra break. However, I had been telling the truth about wanting to go through my Pursuits before we faced whatever fresh hell waited for us on the other side of the door.

  I also finally had enough Skill Points in Heavy Armor (seven, to be exact) to put them to use. I opened that Pursuit Sphere next:

  Tier 1:

  Broad Appeal Level 1 — Gives extra 1% Defense Rating against enemies wielding swords. Requires 4 Skill Points.

  Icebreaker Level 1 — Gives extra 2% Defense Rating against ice arcana or ice-infused weapons. Requires 5 Skill Points.

  Firebreaker Level 1 — Gives extra 2% Defense Rating against fire arcana or fire-infused weapons. Requires 5 Skill Points.

  Unbreakable Level 1 — Okay, not exactly unbreakable, but with this skill, it will be twice as tough for enemies to break down your equipped armor to uselessness. Worth it if you plan on spending a long time between smiths. Requires 10 Skill Points.

  This choice was a no-brainer. Given that I was in an ice temple, the odds of facing additional enemies with icy attacks seemed highly likely. Easy decision.

  You have learned Icebreaker Level 1!

  I then looked at Combat Assessment. In our dungeon diving, I had acquired ten more Skill Points in the Pursuit, just enough to unlock the third Tier 1 skill. And oh, what great timing it was.

  Weak Spot — Mostly useful with bosses, this skill allows you to identify the weak point in those particularly hard-to-kill enemies — if such a weakness exists. Requires 10 Skill Points.

  “Hell yes,” I whispered. Finally, some good timing.

  I closed the menu and looked over at Leesha. She too was finishing up and swiped away her own menu. “Hope you found some good skills that can help me out in the whole not-dying department.”

  “I hope so,” I replied. “Just try not to die again, all right?”

  After an encouraging nod, we placed our hands on the door and shoved it open. It swung open easily, revealing a large circular chamber within.

  The room’s size rivaled the entrance of the temple, as did its grandeur. Unlike the rest of the dungeon that we’d just traipsed through, this area remained unblemished. The blue-gray marble floors shone as though they’d just been waxed, and the torches lit the room brightly, revealing high ceilings covered in ice stalactites that glowed like the Northern Lights. A rush of cold air washed over us as we stared ahead at the pedestal a couple of hundred feet away in the center of the chamber.

  It stood about four feet high, two empty slots easily seen on the top, even at a distance. We both knew what went there, but silently agreed that it wouldn’t be as easy as crossing the room and dropping the totems in their spots. The hair on the back of my neck tingled even though I saw no signs of danger. Even my Combat Assessment came up with nothing. But someone or something was waiting for us, I knew it. The main question was…where?

  34

  Weremammoth U At?

  The door slammed shut behind us.

  Oh, great. That was never a good sign.

  Thump-click! Far ahead and to the right, what looked like a lever switched.

  The two of us widened our stances instantly, waiting for the moment of truth.

  My eyes scanned the rectangular room again. It was certainly a big space, but there weren’t a lot of places for anyone to hide. If there was an imminent danger hiding in here, I didn’t see it. I even scanned the ceiling to see if there were any arachnid-type creatures waiting to pounce on us.

  Nothing.

  “See anything?” Leesha asked.

  “Nada,” I said. “It can’t be this easy, can it?” I turned around and found just the closed door behind me.

  “I don’t see any traps either,” Leesha said, scanning the room. “Unless they’re above my skill level — wait a second. That lever is coming up as a trap for me.”

  “So…don’t go near it?”

  “Don’t go near it.”

  We tiptoed our way to the altar and stared down at the totem slots.

  “You realize this game isn’t going to let us put down these things, right?” Leesha said.

  On cue, the door from where we had just entered flew open.

  I spun around and was greeted by a disturbing sight of Lovecraftian proportions.

  At first glance, it looked like a wooly mammoth’s head had been sewed onto the body of a man. Actually, no, scratch that. It was humanoid in shape, but the body of this monstrosity was easily the size of a large Urok like Durk. Its pale, bloodless flesh was mottled in black and purple frostbite. Frostbite and muscles on top of muscles. And, to put the cherry on top, he also wore heavy plate armor across this chest and back, as if the brute weren’t tough enough on his own. Com
bat Assessment confirmed my fears in bright red text.

  Weremammoth, Level 9 Mini-boss

  +1 Combat Assessment Skill Point

  Announcing his presence — a loincloth that didn’t quite cover enough goods allowed me to unfortunately confirm it was a he — the weremammoth let out an angry, trumpeting war cry with his trunk before pulling a broadsword from a sheath across his back. There was nothing mini about this hulking brute.

  “Hey, Z, I bet his sword is bigger than yours.”

  “I don’t have a sw — get your mind out of the gutter!”

  Before Leesha could compare weremammoth and Urok anatomy further, the ice age version of a minotaur charged.

  Luckily for me, Leesha’s attacks were as quick as her wit. She darted off to the side and immediately started firing arrows. Bad news was, her attacks pulled aggro, and the weremammoth went right for her. Seeing my chance, I intercepted the mini-boss’s charge and struck him with an Overpowering Blow.

  My arms shook like they’d just hit a cement wall, but the weremammoth was knocked aside. His health bar dipped maybe a tenth. This was going to be a long fight.

  And then the entire world shook as the monster let out another battle cry easily ten times louder than the first one. The whole room shook and I stumbled backward, dropping my axe and clutching my ears.

  Debuff Added — Ruptured Eardrums! You are deaf for the next sixty seconds.

  Ears ringing like an alarm clock from hell, I opened my eyes just in time for the mini-boss to scoop me up in his tusks. Before I could react, he tossed me into a nearby pillar like a football. I collapsed in a heap on the floor, now dazed as well as deaf.

  Groaning — I thought I was groaning, anyway, I couldn’t hear a thing — I rolled over. Why did all the powerful monsters we fought have to be big powerful bruisers? Playing linebacker was child’s play compared to this.

  Through watering eyes, I saw the weremammoth arch its back and twist around. Leesha circled him at a distance and wasn’t letting up on the arrows. They weren’t very effective in terms of damage, but they made for a good distraction. Hopefully she had plenty left.

  The beast bellowed in frustration and whirled on Leesha, huge nasty feet pounding on the marble as it closed in on her. She dodged aside with perfect timing, and the weremammoth slammed into the wall. It turned around, teetering with every step, but soon shook off the stun debuff. Even in my dazed state, I didn’t miss the obvious weakness

  “It can only charge us in straight lines!” I yelled at Leesha as the ringing in my ears faded. This was classic video gaming at its finest. Jump the bad guy.

  “No shit, genius!” Leesha said, unleashing a couple of arrows as the weremammoth continued to chase after her like a bull versus a matador. Only problem was she’d need a thousand arrows to kill the mini-boss with the current method. “Mind doing your job here and pulling aggro for me? Or something? Anything?”

  Before she could chastise me further, the weremammoth forced my cheeky companion to focus on another last-second evasive maneuver as it careened into another pillar. A plan formed in my mind. We knew the pattern, and I had a shiny new skill to help me figure out the most effective way to take this beasty down.

  “Keep it distracted! You’re fast enough you can make it happen, right?”

  “Oh, I hate you right now. Just because you can feel pain doesn’t mean you can skip out on —”

  “That’s not it! I’m trying to find his weakness!”

  I flipped open my menu and activated the skill. My vision flickered for an instant and the world turned a light shade of gray. As the weremammoth trumpeted in frustration and chased after Leesha again, one spot on his back shone in bright red. A moment later, the skill timed out. With normal vision, I saw the thick plate armor covering the front and back of the mini-boss.

  “We’ve got to cut off the armor on its back!” I shouted across the chamber. “I’ll distract it while you expose the weak spot!”

  “Oh, amazing skill, genius! Tells us his weak spot is under his armor. Real helpful!”

  Rather than respond to her smarmy comment, I let out a roar and barreled toward the weremammoth, axe held high. The dumb thing was so stuck on Leesha that I ended up chasing it around the chamber while it chased her. Leesha led us on a merry dance, ending with the weremammoth colliding into another wall.

  Before it could recover from its stunned state, I triggered Overpowering Blow and swung at its back plate with all my might. The attack rebounded as before, but left a big dent in the armor. The weremammoth’s HP bar dropped to about eighty percent.

  An instant later, Leesha jumped onto the back of the mini-boss. Her timing couldn’t have been worse.

  The moment she landed, the weremammoth’s stun debuff ended. With surprising intelligence, the mini-boss slammed her against the wall, once, twice, plummeting her health down to two-thirds. She slid to the floor, concussed. A glance told me she was down, but not quite done for yet — though if I didn’t distract the weremammoth, she would be.

  “Hey, ugly! Behind you!”

  The weremammoth ignored me and raised his broadsword to chop Leesha in half. Driven by pure athletic instinct, I swung my axe over its head. The swing missed the hideous mammoth head — as intended — and the curve of my axe caught the broadsword before it could descend, yanking my axe out of my hands, but saving Leesha nonetheless.

  The mini-boss rounded on me. Poor, weaponless me.

  I did the only thing a brave, ex-linebacker playing as a giant warrior could do given the situation. I stared the mutant creature down as it shook its tusks at me and bellowed. Then I ran like hell.

  “Catch me if you can!”

  I took off at a dead sprint. Given my current stats in Speed and Agility, it was more like a lumbering jog. Hearing the pounding footsteps of the mini-boss fast approaching, I turned around just in time to see a mammoth head lowering to fling my slow ass into the air. Before I knew it, I was airborne again, on a collision course with the nearest wall.

  Debuff Added — Broken Ribs! Your movement is restricted, and you will gradually lose health for the next 60 seconds.

  Debuff Added — Concussion! Health regeneration is slowed, and attacks based on Intelligence will do half-damage for 30 seconds.

  I’d just managed to push myself into an upright sitting position when the weremammoth’s broadsword stabbed straight through my armor and deep into my chest.

  My entire body went cold and limp. Each breath was torture, and I felt as though I were drowning in my own blood. I wanted to fight it, but I couldn’t so much as think, let alone move. Instead, I stared up at the ceiling, which I had to admit looked a bit beautiful with the translucent icicles hovering overhead. My eyes lost focus as the sword was jerked free, and I knew I was about to pass out, unable to handle the trauma.

  And then a warmth filled me from within. I sucked in a deep, shuddering breath, and Leesha’s face appeared as I opened my eyes. She winked and was gone.

  My HP rose quickly, and my body started to repair itself once again. Although it was only seconds, it felt like hours as I watched the weremammoth continue to chase a flagging Leesha. She still managed to leap, spin or dodge aside, but her movements were less fluid and extravagant than they’d been when the battle started. We needed to end this.

  I hauled myself to my feet just as Leesha sent three arrows into the back of the weremammoth before he could stop his collision course with a nearby pillar. Right before he hit, I saw his back armor fall off and clang against the floor. This time, the mini-boss went straight through the column, and the whole room trembled. That was all the warning I needed. Not only was this abomination wearing us down, he was likely going to bring the whole chamber down on us if we kept screwing around.

  “Bad news!” Leesha shouted as she ran toward me. “Those were my last arrows.”

  A few dozen yards away, the weremammoth bellowed in rage and shook himself free of the debris. Apparently his deafening trumpet had been a one-shot
wonder. Not that he needed any more nasty tools in his arsenal.

  I frantically tried to think of a plan. Leesha’s last few hits into the mini-boss’s weak spot had lowered his HP down to about a third. His armor was gone, but we had nothing to hit him with at a distance. It was time for me to earn my keep.

  “I need you to try to get him to crash into the wall as close as you can to me,” I told Leesha. “My Speed and Agility are crap — you’ve got to keep aggro on you.”

  Across the room, the weremammoth was now back on his feet and preparing to charge again.

  “With what?” Leesha shouted, voice cracking. “Hello — I’m out of arrows!”

  “Something — anything!” I drew my axe and focused on the mini-boss. “Just do it.”

  “Freaking a — hey, woolly tits!”

  The weremammoth shook his head at Leesha. I had no idea if he understood her insult, but it captured his attention, which was all that really mattered. And then he charged.

  But the mini-boss didn’t just blitz for Leesha — oh no. Broadsword held out to the side, he impossibly cut through every pillar he passed, running down the length of the hall toward us. As the weremammoth passed each column, it shuddered, teetering back and forth like a freshman sorority girl drunk at her first college football game.

  “He’s bringing the whole place down!” Leesha hollered from my left, full of panic.

  “Wait for it…”

  “Z, it doesn’t matter what happens if he buries us in a pile of stone!”

  “Wait for it!”

  “Z!”

  “Now!”

  Leesha summoned the last of her energy just as the weremammoth approached, and leaped over the mini-boss’s head one last time. Her timing kinda sucked — both her feet caught the big mammoth head and flipped her head over heels onto the hard floor. But it was good enough.