The Pinnacle Warrior

The night spent in the passage was uncomfortable, but generally uneventful. On his watch, Felix’d had a couple gnolls attempting to come in from the fourth floor below them, but between his fist and Skills, he was able to take the two of them out. If there’d been an irregular, he might’ve had to wake one of the others up, but he was fine and just told the rest of the party once they all woke up. For the first time, as Astrid walked out their impromptu camp and into the fourth floor once again, she saw the quick decomposition that the Dungeon enacted on all of its killed creations. Felix had harvested the ears and fangs, then left the bodies to be reclaimed by the Dungeon. The mechanics of how it all worked were entirely unknown to her, but Astrid knew that unharvested materials were reverted back to mana when left in the Dungeon. The two bodies already had most of the flesh dissolved, and the bones were sagging, having lost their integrity as the mana leached out.

“Kinda gross.“ Skandr said as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes. 

“Are you gonna be able to actually do anything today or are you gonna be too sleepy?“ Astrid smiled as she asked as much. He had taken the first watch, and given that Astrid was second, she was positive that he’d stayed awake much longer than he’d been supposed to, hyperfocused on whatever spells he was working on.

“I’m always tired.” Skandr smiled as he said as much, though his eyes were obviously blurry and he’d need to get good rest tonight, given that they were looking at two more days of delving without real rest. As soon as that crossed her mind, Astrid squinted at him.

“What?“

“If we have to cut the delve short because you’re not at your best, I’m never gonna let you live  it down. In a big way.”

“I’m always tired, I mean it. If I’m struggling, you’ll be able to tell and if you can’t, I’ll say as much. I think I’ve just about figured out a spell that will be great against the Boss when we get there, but it’s not quite there. But you’ll see me in action today, and I’m sure you’ll be impressed.”

“There is nothing impressive about magic.“ Muti called from a ways away as she did her usual routine of doubting magic’s potency. Surprisingly, Skandr didn’t just take it like usual. Instead, he bristled and squared up, getting in her face.

“The only reason why we, as a whole, are able to be as successful as we are is because of each of us in the party. In that fight yesterday, if any one of us were absent, then we all would have died. On top of that, if we’d had an extra Muti instead of me, there would’ve been deaths on our side. If there had been another me instead of a Muti, then people would’ve died. There’s a reason why parties are the way that they are, and I’m sick of you acting like you have to be a physical fighter to be a valuable member of the party. Stop talking to me and Benedict that way when we’re carrying our fair weight.”

Muti recoiled a little at that, her eyes narrowing as she forced herself to listen. Astrid perked up and made sure to be ready to interpose herself if the Barbarian reacted negatively. Instead of anything that she’d worried about, though, Muti bared her teeth a little. Her ears flicked for just a moment before she inclined her head ever so slightly.

“You are not incorrect. It was a tease, as you call it.”

After that, she didn’t say anything more, though she did turn her attention back to the field spread out in front of them. They were continuing to sway in the strange breeze that the Dungeon always seemed to have, and Astrid sighed as she turned to Skandr.

“I suppose that’s as close to an apology as you’re gonna get.” Astrid shrugged. “I didn’t realize she was trying to tease, though.”

“Honestly, I shouldn’t have let it go as far as it has. We’ve seen,” Skandr raised his voice as he continued speaking, ensuring that, even if she tried to ignore him, Muti would have to hear what he was saying, “that our Rogue needs someone to stand up to her in order for their voice to be heard. If what she’s saying is stupid, I need to call her out on it. And I should have said how I felt earlier.”

Again, Muti turned from her attention scanning across the fourth floor and again she bared her teeth at Skandr. This time, Astrid could tell that this look was instead a sort of approval being granted to him. As Felix and Benedict stepped up beside the rest of the party, Felix was the first to speak. “You know, this is not what I pictured when I thought about becoming a delver someday. Don’t think I’d call what we have worse than my thoughts, though.“

Astrid couldn’t help but see her childhood “party“ replace each of her current companions. Jan in Felix’s place, Liesl standing where Muti crouched, keeping an eye out on the Dungeon while snarking back at the rest. Boris would be near the Ranger, even though he shouldn’t have been, but it was expected given how he was enamored with Liesl. And Ahna. Ahna would holding the party together with her kindness and patience, baking pastries for everyone on days where they weren’t pushing themselves in the Dungeon as much.

The idyllic scene remained in her mind for a short time, though Astrid smiled, she also thought about how delving in Schteldt would have been different with a full party. Would she have learned as much about herself if she hadn’t been alone? Would she have forced herself to be trying and working as hard as she was on mastering her emotions if she’d never snapped at Tobias? Would she be a couple days away from level 11 if she’d had the comfort of being with people she’d known her whole life? Could Astrid have been as much of a driving force for improvement if her support system had been right next to her the whole time?

Dozens more questions flooded through her mind, and though Astrid wished that she could see Ahna every day, she also forced herself to be grateful for the paths she had tread so far, since she liked where she was. 

“Copper for your thoughts.“ Felix asked, pulling Astrid from her musings. “Don’t know if I won’t get lost in them too, though.“

Astrid chuckled. “I had a whole plan for how I was going to delve before I got my Class. Full party, plans of where to go, how fast we would gain each level, all of that. Much of the maths that I can still remember were practiced to figure out exactly how much experience we five could get as we were killing monsters, and how many minutes of fighting it would take for us to get a level.“ She shook her head. “I figured all five of us would hit level five in something like two months.”

“I propose a new rule.“ Benedict jumped in, interrupting what Astrid was going to say next. “We don’t trust Astrid with money, because she doesn’t know basic math.”

She waved off his complaints with a dry smile. “I knew the maths just right, I just didn’t think about how long it takes between individual packs of monsters, as well as travel time, and you can probably figure out that I wasn’t particularly considerate of rest time.”

“Wait, did you get to level 11 as well yesterday?” Benedict asked. “Because I think you must have taken the Skill ‘Take a Break’ or something like it. Because otherwise, there’s no way that you learned what that word means.”

“Don’t think I won’t literally throw you into a fist fight with a gnoll.“ Astrid pointed at the Bard with an exaggerated scowl on her face. He put both of his fists up into an approximation of a Pugilist’s stance, though he didn’t say anything else. “Anyways. To answer your question, I just didn’t understand what goes into delving. For some reason, my thought process was basically just that we would go into the Dungeon, fight monsters with a little to no break for eight hours, then come out of the other side and get tons of experience. I was naïve, and I don’t think there’s any reason for me to say anything to the contrary. And, just now, I was just thinking about my friends from home, and what life would look like if I had been delving with them.”

“Any regrets?“ Felix prodded as Astrid went silent for a couple seconds.

“No.“ Astrid smiled when she said it, and she knew that was the truth. “If everybody had gotten the Classes that we hoped for, I probably wouldn’t have met any of you. That’s neither here nor there, but I also don’t think that I’d be much higher than level 6 right now if I was delving with them. I was just thinking about it, and realizing that, while there are definitely things that I regret, I’m happy to be here with you all.”

“You regret calling me—“ Benedict joked, though whatever it was going to be was cut off as Felix sent a quick rabbit punch into the Bard’s ribs. As he wheezed and tried to get some distance with a grin on his face, Felix raised his eyebrows, to which Benedict raised both hands in surrender. Astrid shook her head, and gestured with her chin out into the Dungeon.

“No time like the present. Let’s go.”

***

The day was much the same as the one before, but with Muti’s enhanced ability to sense where the enemies were, the party was able to avoid detection whenever they needed a break. On the other hand, Skandr looked a little disappointed when they didn’t come across any impressive packs of gnolls. The largest group they found was a group of 13 with two irregular brawlers, but they succumbed quickly to the party’s attacks.

“It’s not worth it for me to use my new spell on these ones.“ The Lightningmage explained. “It’s too mana intensive for me to use it when it’s not at a good time, so despite wanting to use it, I’m not gonna be an idiot and waste my mana when there’s no reason for it.“

Muti started to say something, then seemed to think better of it, and instead said, “It is wise to conserve your energy for the dragon when hunting the antelope.”

Skandr’s eyebrows rose, but he inclined his head, an acknowledgment of the reasonable comment that the Barbarian made. As soon as he acknowledged her, the Rogue spoke up again.

“There is a pack that we have avoided. There are multiple irregulars and at least fifteen individuals in the pack. Do you wish to test yourself?”

Though the Rogue asked the question to Skandr, she looked at Astrid in confirmation. The always cautious Skandr, to Astrid’s surprise, looked pretty excited at the prospect, and he glanced at Astrid eagerly. “I absolutely need this. Having multiple irregulars to see exactly what this adjusted lightning curtain will do is perfect. I anticipate… No, I’m not gonna tell you. I wanna see what happens, and have you all be as surprised as I am. So, I think we should.“

Astrid pursed her lips, looking at the two lower level, newer members of the party. Felix rolled his shoulders before nodding, while Benedict did look a little nervous. Astrid herself wanted to test her new blocking strategy with the bigger packs of gnolls to better keep herself steady and safe, but she wasn’t going to force anything.

“Ugh. I’m the one who said we should do this, I’m not gonna hold us back.“ Benedict patted his cheeks as he tried to get his blood pumping. “Let’s do it.”

“Then lead the way, Muti.“ Astrid gestured for the Rogue to do as much, and she leapt into the fields. The rest of the party followed suit, stepping as silently as they could manage. Astrid idly checked to see how much experience she had left to the next level and smiled, seeing that there was only 847 experience left. 200 gnolls, which meant that almost certainly not today, but definitely before they all left from this multiple-day-long delve, Quick Recovery would reach Bronze tier.

Thinking about her own progress aside, Astrid focused on the hunt. Once they were close enough that they suspected the gnolls would detect the party, Muti signalled to the rest of the party where the gnolls were coming from and slunk off to the side. As always, her focus was going to be on the backliners, whether it was just ranges or if there was a shaman who was holding themself back. The rest of the party gathered together, ready to do as they usually did. After all, this was just routine, wasn’t it?

As they split up, Skandr said the first thing that made Astrid think that there was a chance that things were not going to go as she expected.

“Try to keep them all together. Even the backliners, for as long as you can. Also, Muti, don’t throw yourself into combat immediately. Instead, just wait for a split second while I get my spell all finished. I don’t think that I’m going to have nearly as much control over it this time, and it’ll be bad if you get hit.”

Despite him saying it quietly, Astrid knew that the Barbarian heard and she stayed relatively close to the rest of the party. 

“Do you want me to pull them all in with Draw Anger?”

“No. I want them to still be a ways off when I use this, this is my first time using this amended version.“ Skandr waved off the offer. 

As the gnolls cackled their war cries, Muti crept closer and whispered, “There is one irregular of each.”

Astrid rolled her shoulders and made sure her grip was tight on both her shield and hammer, while Skandr didn’t do anything to show acknowledgment of the report. Instead, he continued making sigils with his hands as he muttered the spell. Instead of the couple of seconds it usually was, whatever he was doing now took nearly a full 10 seconds of chanting, and as the shrieks of the gnolls grew closer, Astrid stood tall, prompting the rest to do the same. She was ready, and shifted from one foot to the other, making sure that she would be able to keep her party safe if necessary.

The gnolls were about 5 meters away when everything changed.

Skandr’s voice grew to a shout as he threw both hands over his head and finished his chant, the words sounding more like thunderbolts than a Human’s voice. Then, as he finished, his voice was drowned out by the booming of thunder, and a crackling mass of lightning exploded into existence above the gnolls. Seemingly without any control, the magic sought out each individual, some of the strikes smashing against the ground and sending dirt flying in the air while lighting the fields on fire. The gnolls that were hit, though, fell to the ground. An irregular shaman went down, twitching and howling in agony, and three rangers were struck with one bolt that chained between them. Kill notifications went up for the first two, the third thrashing, helpless, on the ground. Another bolt struck the irregular brawler, chaining to another gnoll that rushed alongside it. Both went down, neither dead. The storm continued raging for several more seconds, and as Skandr sagged to his knees, he weakly laughed.

“You all should be able to take care of the rest.“

Muti and Astrid wasted no time, the Rogue running to the backline with her blades flashing. There were three more rangers left alive, the one that was crippled, and the other two weren’t in great shape either. Astrid saw Muti cut through the backliners like they were chaff, and once the rangers were dead, the Barbarian threw herself at the shaman. Not to be outdone, Astrid rushed in against the brawlers. Four of them were basically untouched, but Astrid didn’t need to struggle. They’d already lost their momentum, and as Quickened Step pushed her to greater speeds, Astrid used hammer and shield to take two out of the fight before they were able to get a single blow off on her. The other two seemed to reconsider continuing to fight, but Astrid destroyed one’s skull with one quick blow of her hammer while Felix strode forward and, after parrying one overzealous blow, punched it so hard in the throat that Astrid heard bones crack.

It took only a couple more moments for the rest of the gnoll pack to be dispatched. Astrid settled her hammer on her hip as the overwhelming scent of ozone and burning flesh filled her nostrils. The several fires that had been started continued to crackle as they died in the ripe fields, and Astrid turned her attention to Skandr. He’d regained his feet, and he stood steadily, though the exhaustion of mana deprivation was obvious in his face. Seeing that there were no more enemies nearby, he pulled his notebook out and started to take down some notes, muttering to himself about formulas and how the individual sigils had impacted the mana draw. Astrid wasn’t going to interrupt or stop him from what he was doing, and she turned to the rest of the party.

“I don’t think so, but did anybody here get injured?”

“Might need to change my pants,” Benedict said as he looked at Skandr, “but I’m OK. I’m feeling a little inadequate if I’m honest.”

“I’m feeling pretty similar to that.“ Felix added. “I don’t know if my little fist can ever compare to that.”

Muti didn’t say anything, simply turning to collect the materials from the monsters. Astrid decided to follow suit, though she kept a large portion of her attention on the Lightningmage as he finished up taking his notes. Just a couple minutes later, he was done, and he seemed to regain consciousness, at least attention to the rest of the world. He grinned widely at the party as he said, “That was a pretty good experiment.”

“That’s not a finished product?“ Astrid demanded. “What are you gonna do to make it stronger?”

“I’m not gonna make it stronger.“ Skandr dismissed. “I don’t have deep enough mana reserves to make it worth making that any more potent. In fact, I’ll probably weaken it a little to ensure that I don’t waste half of my mana spent on setting fires where I don’t need them.”

“Well, that sounds like he’ll keep it just as powerful, but spend less mana and make it safer for us to be around? If that’s the case, that’s pretty impressive.“ Felix said as he smashed the fangs out of an irregular corpse’s mouth.

“Honestly, the control will probably make the mana cost about a wash. And, if I had to guess, this took about 60% of my total capacity to summon. I’m gonna need to take a break.”

Muti couldn’t help herself as she grinned. “So you can kill a whole pack. Impressive! But I do not need a nap after I kill mine!” She turned to Astrid for confirmation if that was a good tease.

Despite herself, Astrid giggled a little at that, and the rest of the party followed suit as each person pulled out their rations for lunch. Once they were done, the rest of the day’s delving still waited for them.