Nadia’s ice AOE killed three Kerberos; Gosto’s Nature bear arrived a moment later and attacked the big guy, keeping its attention while Hawke hacked away at the minions. The Kerberos were wiped out in short order, but even after Hawke went through his full combat spell rotation, the Centurion remained at over a thousand Health, and it landed a couple of shots on Hawke that hurt like blazes. Turned out that half of the damage the monster inflicted was Hellfire, which wasn’t mitigated by normal Fire Resistance. Gosto’s Guardian only survived for a few seconds and Hawke didn’t have time to summon one of his own. He did call an Animated Shadow, for what little that was worth.
Alba teleported in and backstabbed the monster. The damage wasn’t great, but the creature reacted by emitting a burst of flames that exploded in an expanding wave that wiped out the Shadowling pet and scorched her and Hawke for hundreds of points of damage. Hawke only took sixty-odd points from the flame pulse, but Alba suffered more than her full Health of 142, which would have killed her if not for Gift of the Martyr. Hawke was the one who found himself below a hundred Health, but he insta-cast Lesser Healing and kept hammering away at the monster, trusting Gosto to bring him back to full. Marko ran forward and joined in, screaming like a banshee. He didn’t do a lot of damage, unfortunately, and nearly got Hawke killed when everyone in melee range got hit by another Hellfire burst.
Hawke had his Mana Sight up, trying to find vulnerabilities, when he saw the flames explode and his teammates take massive amounts of damage – all of which was rerouted towards him. Time slowed down as he watched the flow from the Martyr spells’ pipelines rushing toward him. He shouldn’t have had enough time to use Transference to undo the damage, but he found himself doing exactly that. It was bizarre, watching each individual tick of Health disappear and reappear in what had to be a tenth or even a hundredth of a second per tick. He had no idea how he could act at those speeds, but was too busy staying alive to question the miraculous event.
Time returned to normal when the flame burst dissipated. Hawke celebrated his survival with a double-power Hammer spell while his companions unloaded everything they had on the big bastard. By the time the Centurion shrunk into a pile of sulfur-smelling dust with a big loot bag over his head, Hawke was down to less than twenty Mana. It had been close, but they had won.
For slaying your foes, you have earned: 848 Experience (106 diverted towards Leadership; 106 diverted towards Node Mastery).
Congratulations! You have learned: Dual Casting II: Dual-cast spell cost is now five times normal before modifiers.
You have learned a new Mana Channeling Ability: Timeless Mind
Current XP/Next Level: 10,275/16,000. Leadership XP: 6,069/10,000
Congratulations! Your Leadership has increased to Level Six (Leadership Abilities cannot be purchased until completing or abandoning a Lair)
Current Node Mastery XP/Next Level: 2,006/3,000
“That was less easy,” Hawke commented as he picked up his loot bag. Eight gold, six silver, and two Healing Potions. “How long before they send two or three of those things?”
“Good. I think I need to stop sending Mana pulses and letting demons know where I am. And I want to activate those Seals and set up a base camp for the rest of the group.”
* * *
I’m glad everyone is okay, Tava told him through Saturnyx as she led the group to the new safe zone Hawke, Nadia and Gosto had created by activating the two Seals.
Yeah, although my Martyr spell keeps making my life exciting. On the plus side, Marko hit level six and Nadia got to nine.
The biggest problem with Gift of the Martyr was that the damage that was transferred over to Hawke wasn’t mitigated by his defenses; it went straight into his Health. Sooner or later, an area of effect attack on the squishies was going to be the death of him. He couldn’t think of anything else to do, however; he would get better if he got killed, and they wouldn’t. And his new Timeless Mind ability gave him a way to survive for as long as he had some Mana:
Timeless Mind: During times of great stress and danger, you can use your Mana Sight at speeds normally available to Masters of Time Magic. When the Timeless Mind effect is triggered, you can react to ongoing effects as quickly or slowly as you wish. Any number of spells with an Instantaneous time to cast can be empowered during Timeless Mind, provided you have the energy to do so, but they will not go into effect until the flow of time returns to normal. Mana manipulation abilities like Transference, however, can be used while Timeless Mind is in effect.
Warning: Mortal minds are not meant to exist outside the normal flow of time. Every time you use Timeless Mind, there is a cumulative 1% chance to suffer a negative side effect. This chance resets back to 1% after you suffer from such an effect.
The description didn’t mention what sort of side effects to expect, but it didn’t take a genius to know he wouldn’t enjoy any of them. Next time he had a near death experience, he would have a two percent chance to find out how little he would like the effects. And so on. Nothing was easy.
Seals of Order Activated (3/4)
On the plus side, both Hawke and Nadia had activated three out of the four required Seals to complete their Quests, and Gosto had gotten his part right after Hawke explained things to him. The Druid still needed to participate in the opening of three more Seals to complete his Quest. The Order Inscriptions had created force fields around two large sections of the massive chamber, each about the size as the statues’ room. If Hawke’s understanding of the new inscriptions was right, Fae, Demons and Chaos beings wouldn’t be able to see the protected sections unless someone attacked them from inside them, and even then their spells couldn’t penetrate them and they wouldn’t be able to enter them without taking massive amounts of damage.
That was pretty sweet, but the best bit of news was Saturnyx’s claim that one of the Infernal signs his Mana pulses had uncovered pointed towards an exit. Hawke went off to meet the main group, moving invisibly thanks to Twilight Shroud. After a happy reunion with Tava, he used Twilight Mantle to render almost everyone invisible, which helped a lot. Tava and Crommen used their own stealth abilities to help disguise the handful of people who didn’t fit inside Hawke’s AOE invisibility.
As they headed towards the safe zone, they discovered that their precautions were necessary. Demon patrols were out and about inside the vast chamber. They had been too away far for their status boxes to show, but the larger specimens looked just like the Centurion and they were in groups of three or four. They definitely didn’t want to tussle with them. After a few nerve-wracking minutes, the large group arrived at the Order-attuned sections and crossed their defensive force field. They should be safe there.
Hawke and Korgam’s teams moved forward, protected by Twilight Shroud. As soon as they left the protected zone, Hawke ‘saw’ distant flares of Mana, indicating more spells and Inscriptions were coming alive, powerful enough for his Mana Sight to pick them out even beyond normal visibility ranges.
The Labyrinth was waking up.
Forty
Along the way, they found three more Seals and activated them, with the non-casters keeping watch while the rest went through the ritual. Practice made perfect; they empowered the Order patterns in less than ten minutes, as opposed to the nearly half hour it had taken the first time.
Quest Complete: Restore the Seals
You have earned: 960 Experience (120 diverted towards Leadership; 120 diverted towards Node Mastery).).
Current XP/Next Level: 11,235/16,000. Leadership XP: 6,189/6,000
Current Node Mastery XP/Next Level: 2,126/3,000
You have found: 40 gold.
You have found: Lesser Shield of Order
Lesser Shield of Order (Masterwork Quality):
Level 15 Item (Minimum Level 10 to use)
Block Bonus: 36%. Damage Absorption (Successful Block Only):
Physical: 60/50%, Elemental (All): 30/40%, Forces (Chaos): 50/50%, Forces (All Other): 30/40%. Durability: 500/500. Requires Shield Skill
Attribute Bonuses: +5 to Strength and Constitution, +3 to Willpower and Spirit
Special Abilities:
Enhanced Bash: Striking with the shield inflicts Strength + 10-30 Physical damage and 20-120 Forces (Order) damage.
Dome of Order: One per day, the shield can generate a dome of Order energies surrounding a twenty-foot radius. Any spells cast from outside the dome will have no effect on those inside; this includes Area of Effect (AOE) spells, and both inimical and beneficial spells.
“That’s one nice shield,” Hawke said.
He had started out as a sword-and-board Paladin when he’d arrived at the Realms, until finding the paired swords, which were too good to pass up. But if he ran across a one-handed weapon that could outdo the Twins, he would have a fitting shield to carry alongside it. He put the shield in his inventory. As the four spellcasters completed their Quest, they all got some decent rewards as well. Nobody leveled up, but almost everybody was getting close to it. Hawke had a feeling they would need all the levels and gear they could get before they left the damned Labyrinth behind.
The small army spent an hour moving into the new safe zone before the two teams set off again. The invisible group stayed near the outer wall, occasionally spotting Demon patrols which were thankfully far away. They moved slowly and carefully for another hour before the sword told Hawke they were close.
They couldn’t see anything, even after Hawke turned Mana Sight on. The door must be dormant.
“Guess I have to do an active scan again,” Hawke muttered. “Buffs up, people. We might attract attention after I look around.”
He sent a short Mana pulse, only ten points’ worth, and extended it no further than thirty feet. Hopefully, that wouldn’t be enough to alert any roving patrols. The last one they had seen had been on the edge of their vision and headed away from them. Hawke figured that it was worth risking discovery.
Once again, his Mana Sight spotted multiple magical inscriptions and symbols that had been lain dormant until he fed power into their ‘wiring.’ The pulse also uncovered a doorway-shaped outline on the side wall they had been following.
“It’s an inactive door,” Hawke told everyone. “I want you guys to stand way back. I’m going to have to add energy to the door until it turns back on, or explodes.”
“Why explode? No explosions!” Nadia protested.
“Thing is, any traps the door might have are also dormant. Not sure what happens when I start to wake everything up.”
“Okay,” she told him, and placed an Elemental Shield between him and the door. “For whatever it’s worth. Don’t want Tava to get mad at me for letting you die.”
Hawke waited until the rest of the group was a hundred feet away and behind a couple of support pillars. He redid all his buffs and sent a few more Mana pulses at the door, examining it before he started feeding it energy. Magic door, check. Web of energy tendrils… not so far. He added a little trickle, and thin filaments grew around the door briefly, only to disappear when he stopped feeding them.
“I think that the whole Labyrinth was powered off,” he said. “Almost feels like an abandoned amusement park. Until we arrived, of course. The rides are all coming back to life.”
The idea that Proving Grounds needed Adventurers to feed on had fascinated Hawke since first hearing of it. The set-up seemed designed to increase the power of the winners on either side, but for what purpose? It was all about leveling up, but Hawke didn’t understand why people had to risk death to gain power. He would hopefully learn the reasons behind it all as he progressed along the Path. The endgame was going to be rough.
Shaking his head, Hawke turned to the job at hand. It took him half an hour of studying the magical construct before he thought he had figured out how to activate the door without awakening the traps. Here goes nothing, he thought as he sent a steady stream of Mana into it. The door-shaped section of wall disappeared, revealing a dark tunnel. He spotted a few mechanical traps, but no magical ones. The power was still off for that ride. He did a few more energy pulses to read the signs on the door at the other end.
“What do you think, Saturnyx?”
“Awesome.”
Now all they needed to do was bring everyone there.
* * *
Making their way back didn’t take too long, but they had a few close calls with demon patrols, which were growing more numerous. Hawke’s Twilight spells worked on the demons, however, and between him and Saturnyx’s senses, they were able to spot the monsters before they came too close. As long as everyone stayed still when the monsters passed them by, they were able to evade them.
Using the invisibility spell meant Hawke couldn’t use his Light Magic buffs, but it was worth the risk, if the group could make it out of the Labyrinth without a fight. He had never meant to drag a bunch of normies and low-level Adventurers into this monster-infested hellhole. He just wanted to bring everybody out so they could confront their real enemy.
They reached the Seal where they had left everyone. After everyone was ready, they headed towards the exit, with Hawke in the middle of the Volunteers, keeping them inside his Twilight Mantle. Crommen used the Song of Not-There, which created a similar but smaller stealth bubble, to do the same for Korgam’s team.
They almost made it all the way to the entrance. Almost.
A patrol – six Imps led by a Centurion – was following the wall and moving in the opposite direction. Hawke spotted them from a hundred feet away and guided his group away from the patrol before gesturing at them to stand still. But when the monsters walked past the huddled Volunteers, one of them panicked. His name was Ulus Bastardes, a cabinetmaker’s apprentice who had joined the guard after the liberation of Orom; when a couple of Imps said something in Infernal and laughed like a pack of hyenas, he took off at a run, becoming visible as soon as he left the Mantle’s area of effect.
The Imps reacted like cats, pouncing on Ulus. The Centurion turned toward the spot where the unfortunate Volunteer had come from.
Get the normies away from the fight, Hawke sent to Tava and Nadia before Twilight Stepping behind the big demon. The six Imps had just finished tearing Ulus apart when Hawke enveloped their boss in darkness and stabbed it. The Demonic patrol focused its firepower on him, filling the darkened area with Fireballs while the Centurion tried to stab him with its trident. Hawke stayed on the defensive while he tossed all his buffs on. Half his Health was burned off by the attacks before he started fighting back.
The pain and suffering had paid off, however. The zero-level Volunteers were herded out of the line of fire while the rest of the Adventurers jumped into the fray. By the time the demons realized they weren’t just fighting one crazy Paladin Ninja, they were surrounded and being cut down. Hawke traded blows with the Centurion as the rest of the team dealt with the Imps. Realizing the odds were against it, the big demon started to cast a Hellhound-summoning spell: Hawke recognized the spell’s code immediately.
Oh no, you don’t, he thought, and sent a spike of a hundred Mana at the spell, disrupting it.
The Centurion didn’t have human expressions, but its shock and surprise were visible to Hawke’s Mana Sight. He didn’t give it another chance to try anything. Hawke kept pounding on it with magic and sword. The fight was brutal, but the Imps were wiped out fairly quickly and their boss got dogpile
d and shredded in short order.
For slaying your foes, you have earned: 640 Experience (80 diverted towards Leadership; 80 diverted towards Node Mastery).
Congratulations! You have learned a new Mana Channeling Ability: Dispel Magic I
Dispel Magic: You have a chance to cause any spell you know to fail by spending more Mana than the normal cost of the spell. Base Chance: 10% per Dispel Magic level, +10% for every 100% of the spell cost you add to the Dispel Magic attempt.
Current XP/Next Level: 11,875/16,000. Leadership XP: 6,934/10,000
Current Node Mastery XP/Next Level: 2,206/3,000
Hawke glanced at the spot where the Imps had caught Ulus. Nothing even vaguely human was left of the Volunteer, just some charred bits of clothing and melted chain mail. Marko and a couple of volunteers wrapped up the remains and carried them away.
Why did I bring them here?
The words didn’t make him feel better. Neither did hearing that all the newbies had hit level three and that two more Volunteers had become first-level Warriors.
“All right,” he forced himself to say. “I will recast Twilight Shroud and we will get moving again. I’m sure we’re all sick and tired of this place.”
Forty-One
You are about to leave: Ostium Tartarus: The Gates of Tartarus
If you do not return to the Labyrinth in six hours, all incomplete Quests will be Abandoned.
Are you sure? Y/N
Summoned minions didn’t count towards their kill totals, so nobody had completed the basic Quest. Hawke didn’t care. Leaving the damned place was the only thing he wanted to do. Maybe when he had a group of higher-level veterans, he’d come back and clear up the entire Labyrinth. He stood by the door while everyone else marched past. The new Adventurers were the last to leave; their expressions held a mixture of fear and excitement. Hawke understood why Kinto had been so worried about his children. There was something addictive about the Path to Power, despite the fact that most who followed it only found death at the end.
Lord of the Dead: A LitRPG Saga (The Eternal Journey Book 2) Page 23