The Pinnacle Warrior

Since she hadn’t quite gotten to the point that she could affect herself with Gravity Surge with any reliability, Astrid instead focused on a point in the air right in front of the harpies that approached. As she did so, she was reminded of the fact that she had truly been pretty stupidly close-minded with how she used her Skills. After all, Gravity Surge could be used in various different ways and she’d always been focused on which option with it had the biggest numbers. In truth, many of the times that she used it the way that she did, that was the best way to weaken the enemies she was facing, but since she had been lucky enough to make the right decision several times, she then didn’t think any further about other possibilities.

But what if she’d used Gravity Surge to raise the dragon turtle off the ground? Then another to topple it onto its side or back? That could have effectively ended the fight as soon as it began, if it didn’t have any Skills to correct itself or resist being moved like that. And she’d just never thought of the possibility.

That was how she came to her current attack. Instead of continuing to just force the harpies to come down by force, Astrid had a much more confusing attack to use on them. Just before the monsters slowed to begin spreading out and send poisonous green blades of wind at the party, Astrid unleashed her adjusted Gravity Surge, even from nearly twenty meters away. She smirked at her updated second section of the Skill’s description as the harpies began to fight to keep themselves in the air.

Gravity Surge (Iron): For a Moderate cost of mana and stamina, creates one of two effects. 1. A gravitational pulse originating at the user’s location with a baseline of a 1600% increase in gravity at a radius of 1 meter from the user for everything except for the user and what they are wielding. This potency is halved for each time the radius is doubled. 2. At a location that the user decides within twenty meters, causes everything except for the user and what they are wielding to be drawn to a location that the user decides within five meters of the selected location. If the point is within ten meters, the area is created with thrice that of gravity. If the point is within twenty meters, the area is created with one and a half times that of gravity. Duration of Gravity Surge is dependent upon the user’s Magical Potency.

Instead of its previous limit in this form of only ten meters, Astrid could create a weaker gravitational pull at a greater distance and all that she really wanted to do for now was to keep them together as she got closer.

Instead of flapping just against regular gravity that pulled them down, the harpies squawked in confusion as they started to be pulled forward instead of just down. Their wings flapped wildly as they tried to correct their orientation and they made quick headway against Gravity Surge, but Astrid and Muti were rushing forward. For now, Astrid wasn’t going as a finisher, but as an auxiliary member of the fight, and once she got within ten meters, she used another Gravity Surge to force the monsters to be clumped together as Muti drew both of her swords and jumped into the area of effect.

Frost crawled up the blades as Astrid watched the fight that began overhead. Despite the surprise that Astrid had taken them by, the harpies were strong enough that, between the two activations of Gravity Surge, they could flap their way free of her trap with just two seconds to regather themselves, orient themselves, and make their escape. They didn’t have that time with an Ambusher among them.

Muti very deliberately did not use Shadow Leap while she was in the air. As soon as she entered the strange gravity space in the air, she oriented herself per the dozens of practices she and Astrid had done, and jumped from one harpy to the next, each of her blades making a slash along their wings as she went. Each cut was deep enough to hamper their ability to fly, but not so much so that they would lose all mobility, and her first attacks complete, Muti jumped away. As she tumbled through the air, she kept an eye on the monsters’ reactions.

Around that same time, Gravity Surge faded away, and the harpies had to re-orient themselves in the air once again.

“It is not strong enough,” Muti frowned as each of the monsters maintained flight and then burst out as they spread apart from each other. “It does not seem to have slowed them very much.”

“What do you think?“ Astrid asked Skandr as his cloud became thick with moisture and became nearly three meters across before it shot out like an arrow and covered a harpy for a split second. As the cloud moved away, the harpy fell out, stiff and covered in a centimeter of ice. The body smashed against the ground, feathers shattering from the strange attack.

“You’re not making the magic spread at all after contact,” Skandr answered. “What you did is just cut them with cold steel. It probably hurt more than a regular blade, but it didn’t do anything more than cutting them would have.”

Muti growled, but obviously quickly understood what he was saying. Instead of throwing herself back into the fight, she dismissed her seax and held her straight blade in her right hand as she pushed her mana through her tattoo and ice began coating the blade.

“No,” she growled at the magic, somehow forcing it to coalesce back into the blade instead of the outside of it. The ice disappeared, but didn’t melt. Instead, it became a weapon that left a trail of mist in its wake, and Muti looked down at it.

Without further words, she ran to a nearby tree, sprinted up its side, and leapt towards another harpy. It dodged out of the way, but she only wanted to make a smaller cut, and managed to do so along the monster’s ribs. As she fell from the air, Muti didn’t look to where she would land but instead at the monster. Her feet perfectly found a stable landing spot in a tree’s branches, and she allowed herself a brief, fierce smile as the harpy stopped looking to strike back at her, but instead twisted unnaturally as it shrieked in pain.

Skandr looked at the blade then nodded in approval at Muti. Astrid wasn’t sure what he was impressed by, but she could see that it was covered in ice again. This time, though, Muti didn’t seem to mind that the ice had escaped, and Astrid chose not to question her about it while there was still a fight going on. The rest of the harpies weren’t going to pose a threat, and Astrid began idly dispatching them with her sling while watching Felix and Benedict fight nearby.

The two men were struggling against three nagas nearby, though not because of the monsters’ strength. Felix was using his Boon of the Protector and Skills to maintain a firm hold on the enemies’ attention while also better learning how to use his armor to turn the blows that landed on him. As it was, the dusksteel armor was perfectly suited for this, but he had spent so long avoiding all hits or parrying with his forearms that he was learning, for the first time, how to truly use his armor. That was one of the main things that Aleksandr had worked on with him, and it was showing its effect as Felix twisted his body just right to have the Naga tridents scrape past him. With Immovable Stance and Tiger’s Pride, the Guardian was more than capable of moving quickly and dodging every attack, but instead, he used just enough energy to keep the attacks from piercing his armor instead of letting each thrust fly past him.

All the while, Benedict was, mostly uselessly, stabbing at the naga hide with his spear. The weapon was strong enough not to be broken as he used it, but that was about it, the mundane steel scraping off of the tough scales that covered the naga bodies. Each one of the monsters was covered head to tail in scales, their humanoid torsos covered in plate-like green scales that served as effective armor while their mouths, if permitted to get close enough to strike, were filled with fangs that could deliver a deadly, venomous bite.

While he was practicing with a spear, Benedict continued to use Hasty Rebuke to hasten himself, though Astrid could hear by the tone that he was working on making it entirely a buffing skill instead of a mix of speeding his allies up while slowing the enemies. In truth, Astrid could think of very few situations where it would be necessary for him to do that with Rebuke specifically, but she didn’t question the practice, as it would carry over to Song of Vindication, if nothing else.

“You’re enjoying watching us, huh?“ Benedict asked in a singsong voice as he continued to channel his Skill. “You’re not going to help us?”

“Wasn’t planning on it,” Astrid laughed as Felix lost one of the naga‘s attention and it whipped towards Benedict. The Bard yelped in fear as he jumped back and away from the monster, but it was faster than him. Its own trident shot towards him, but another aspect of his practice became apparent before the attack could pose a threat. The barrier from his thick duster flared into existence around him, and the trident scraped off of his protection, though the barrier crumpled and evidently wouldn’t support more than one other attack like that.

Benedict cursed as he ducked under another attack and dropped his spear as he pulled out his flute, and a discordant harmony burst out. The naga immediately twitched in agony as the much stronger delver allowed his wrath to descend on the beast in the form of pain made manifest. It recovered quickly enough, given that Benedict wasn’t using Doubletalk or Silvertongue to amplify Song of Vindication, but he then jumped and rolled through the muddy ground to grab his spear once again before thrusting it towards the naga‘s eyes.

It ducked the blow, but before it could continue fighting against him, Felix lunged forward and hooked his axe around the monster’s neck. He roared as he settled his feet and threw the naga through the air back towards its companions. Its tail slipped through the water and mud, tossing both all around and coating what little bit of Benedict remained clean in the putrid muck as Felix seemed to come to the decision that it was time to be more “hewing” than “guardian”.

His axe chopped quickly, and naga arms fell limp to the ground as Felix dispatched them.

Swamp Naga slain. 495 experience gained, split among party.

Swamp Naga slain. 510 experience gained, split among party.

Swamp Naga slain. 495 experience gained, split among party.

“This whole ‘practicing’ thing is not fun,” Benedict said as he wiped mud from his face. “At least we have spatial pouches now and can wash up when we have an opportunity, but this is the worst.”

“Being dirty is not worse than being actively hunted by Steel and Mithril tier enemies,” Muti disagreed. “I can give you the sense of being hunted, if you so desire.”

“Not necessary,” Benedict waved her off as Astrid stifled a laugh.

“We only have so much fresh water. I’m not telling you you can’t take a bath,” Astrid cautioned as Benedict turned a disbelieving gaze towards her while gesturing at the filth that covered his body, “but you won’t be able to take a bath in our drinking water if we want to be able to stay down here for longer than just a couple days.”

He looked at her, obviously wanting to protest or interrupt, but instead just nodded once and began rifling through his spatial pouch. He found a clean rag as he pulled out his barrel of freshwater and dunked the rag in the water before he wiped off his face.

“We’re not going to have an inn to go back to and take a rest in after all this, are we?” Felix asked, his smirk so wide that it was obvious that this was just another thing he brought up to torment Benedict with. Going off of the Bard’s response, he was evidently quite successful.

“Oh, Duchess above,” Benedict groused as he ran his hands over the back of his neck and slung the mud off there before he started to wash. “This is the Verdant Sanctuary. It’s filled with trees. Of course they don’t have houses. Oh, dammit. Oh…”

“We haven’t had a building that we’ve gone in in months,” Astrid tried to be reasonable. “Aren’t you used to it by now?”

“Can a man not hope for civilization when he is under the hospitality of a nation? It can’t be called unreasonable to want to sleep in a bed surrounded by walls once a week, right? To want to have a bath and food that isn’t grilled over an open fire? Do any of you remember what real bread tastes like? You know, not the stuff that’s so hard it would break teeth if it wasn’t dipped in soup, but the soft, warm stuff?”

“Oh, I miss fresh bread,” Astrid agreed, thinking of Ahna and her bakery. And what of danishes? Oh, the thought almost had her eyes rolling back in her head. Sweet treats of all kinds began to plague her, and Astrid, usually so willing to subsist off of much simpler fare, became entirely unable to think of anything else and found herself grumbling as much as Benedict.

Regardless of any mental distraction and general displeasure, the days in the Dungeon continued passing quickly, though, unlike the Wandering Trials, very quickly. Astrid and the rest of the Wanderers were reminded of how much more slowly monsters would respawn in regular Dungeon branches. Not wanting to upset the balance of the Dungeon, they were forced to wander up and down floors to not provoke the branch into producing more monsters.

As such, they were severely limited in how much they could actually do in a day. The monsters, just like everywhere else, were aggressive and would seek out a fight whenever they could, so they ended up killing at least 250 of the harpies and Nagas every day. After briefly doing the math, Astrid quickly began grumbling again. Even though she’d known it was coming, the adjustment to only 24 to 25,000 experience a day was a difficult one. They were pushing themselves harder than typical delvers, and it would take over a week of them monopolizing a Dungeon branch to go from the beginning of level 42 to 43. Fortunately, they all had gained experience from the 50th floor of the Wandering Trials, and after a few short days of delving, Muti was the first to reach level 43. 

It was no surprise for any of the party members as for what they would gain at the level 43 watershed. Each had a single Skill to upgrade to Iron, and Muti, then Benedict, and Felix all passed the watershed without incident. Each noted that their Status had updated to show their new attribute growths as influenced by the boons (and Skandr’s long since had with the addition of Warlock’s Constitution), and they shared how the display had changed as they gained their next levels.

Status

Name: Skandr

Class: Storm Wizard (Iron)

Total Level: 43

Attributes

Current

Per level growth

Power

114 (+10)

+3

Alacrity

139 (+22)

+4

Fortitude

183 (+37)

+5

Magical Potency

439 (+65)

+14

Self-Mastery

273 (+18)

+9

Acumen

251 (+12)

+8

Skill List

Storm Magic (Iron)

Storm Administration (Iron)

Lightning Enchantment (Iron)

Summoned Stormcloud (Iron)

Warlock’s Constitution (Iron)

Boon of Fortification

Status

Name: Muti

Class: Dread Ambusher (Iron)

Total Level: 43

Attributes

Current

Per level growth

Power

385 (+32)

+12

Alacrity

341 (+43)

+11

Fortitude

206 (+36)

+6

Magical Potency

91 (+23)

+2

Self-Mastery

160 (+17)

+5

Acumen

227 (+22)

+7

Skill List

Ambusher’s Aura (Iron)

Dread Ambusher’s Equipment (Iron)

Vital Strike (Iron)

Dread Master (Iron)

Shadow Leap (Iron)

Boon of the Mana-Touched

Status

Name: Felix

Class: Hewing Guardian (Iron)

Total Level: 43

Attributes

Current

Per level growth

Power

338 (+47) [+68]

+10

Alacrity

272 (+41) [+27]

+8

Fortitude

427 (+70) [+85]

+13

Magical Potency

95 (+25)

+3

Self-Mastery

207 (+25)

+7

Acumen

71 (+12)

+2

Skill List

Guardian’s Equipment (Iron)

Guardian’s Wrath (Iron)

Whirling Blades (Iron)

Immovable Stance (Iron)

Tiger’s Pride (Iron)

Boon of the Protector

Status

Name: Benedict

Class: Caustic Bard (Iron)

Total Level: 43

Attributes

Current

Per level growth

Power

115 (+12)

+3

Alacrity

205 (+25)

+6

Fortitude

204 (+35)

+6

Magical Potency

384 (+52)

+12

Self-Mastery

273 (+18)

+9

Acumen

228 (+24)

+7

Skill List

Song of Vindication (Iron)

Hasty Rebuke (Iron)

Doubletalk (Iron)

Silvertongue (Iron)

Restful Reverberations (Iron)

Boon of a Gentle Touch

And then, finally, the only exciting level was gained only a few short minutes after Skandr got his own level, and Astrid excitedly looked at her boon options.