System Change

With his fists covered in void, Derek kicked off a ripple using Void Steps and flew at the closest Water Golem. With precision, he launched his fist directly into its core. Using the impact, he flew backwards, away from the now pulsing core of the Water Golem. He kicked off the void once again and landed far away to avoid the explosion.

Once again, a golem exploded and sent both big and small shrapnel flying everywhere.

By that time, the Water Golems had gathered, and Derek could no longer pick them off one by one. He also knew that if he allowed all of them to use their geyser-like skill at the same time, it wouldn’t be good for him. He would most likely have to use Void Shift to cover for himself.

Derek didn’t have the same speed as Shae did, and most probably didn’t even have the same speed that the man had when he was at the level of the dungeon. Shae was fast. He did, however, have the same destructive single target damage as the Savannah Adventurer’s Guild Master. That, and he could get hit without becoming meat paste on the ground.

There were eight golems left. Derek picked his next target. If they’re all going to stand around one another like this… He launched himself into one of the golems in the center of the formation. He used Void Steps to adjust his position in midair, avoiding being hit by the wide swings of the multiple golems.

Immediately after his void covered fist made contact with the golem, he changed his target and launched himself straight into the other center golem. In an instant, the cores of the two Water Golems in the center were pulsing blue.

Derek made a mad dash away from the upcoming explosion. The force of the explosion from one golem core was already big enough. Derek trusted his Vitality and Endurance, but he would rather not risk being in the center of two at once.

Again, a booming explosion rang out, followed by another a split second later. Then another explosion resounded, then another. As Derek expected, the magic and physical damage of the core explosion was enough to set off a chain reaction between the golems. Derek watched with a smile as the golems blasted off, one by one.

It’s never a good idea to stand directly beside a walking bomb. He shook his head. Unfortunately, after all the explosions, one golem still stood tall. “Dammit…” Derek muttered. “It would have been so satisfying if they all popped at once.”

He shook his head and propelled himself to the last remaining Water Golem that he could see. Instead of channeling the void, this time, he stopped himself in midair, a few feet in front of the core of the golem. He swiped out with his fist, activating both Sweeping Slash and Multi-Strike at the same time.

He was in this dungeon level skills. Everything else came second.

A blue arch of mana landed perfectly on the golem’s core. Derek jumped back to observe the damage. Unfortunately, his Sweeping Slash skill didn’t have the increased power it would have if it were augmented by a weapon, so its destructive power fell greatly. Still, when it hit, combined with Multi-Strike, the cracked stone surrounding the core crumbled.

It didn’t do enough damage to instantly destroy the core, but it did much more damage than his fist alone. The results satisfied Derek. He made a mental note to use Multi-Strike as much as possible. Since he could combine the skill with any of his others, including Channel Void, it was the perfect support ability to increase his single target damage.

Since there was only one golem left, and he had tested out his other skills on it. Derek hung back and waited for the golem to set up its geyser ability. It took some baiting and some time, but the golem finally dismantled its arms and surrounded him.

This time, when the geysers went off, Derek used Absolute Nullify. It was the first time he’d tried the skill. He hadn’t run into anything he felt comfortable testing the skill on, yet, so the water jets, which he knew he could handle both physically and magically, were the perfect targets.

Instantly, a purple wall of void appeared in front of Derek. It was bigger than the man himself. Void aura rippled off the sides, visible to the naked eye, but extremely vibrant to Derek, with his Void Sense turned up to the maximum.

With his current mana, he could keep the skill active for just over six seconds. As the geysers approached, only six of the eight water jets were aligned with the void wall and would be blocked. To Derek’s surprise, though, the two beams behind him, that should have fell directly onto his body, bent and were sucked into the wall.

Derek stared in shock as the water geysers poured into the wall. It was like trying to fill an infinite void. It wasn’t possible.

Derek kept the skill up as long as he could, but he soon ran out of mana. The skill was taxing on his mana pool, costing 800 mana per second at level 1.

He was pleased with the results of his tests and skills… especially Absolute Nullify. To the best of Derek’s knowledge, the skill made of pure void not only consumed any magic based attacks that hit it, it also warped the surrounding space to draw in any close attacks. Once I level this skill up, the casting cost will reduce exponentially and be more than worth it.

His first thought when he read the description of Absolute Nullify was that it was an overpowered defensive skill. Now, after testing it against eight magic attacks at once, he confirmed it. It was an extremely overpowered defensive skill.

With the testing finished, Derek rushed the final Water Golem and ended it with a void covered fist.

As the final debris fell to the ground, Derek prepared himself for the next wave of enemies. He waited, but they never came. Instead, the dungeon orb appeared before him in the center of the marsh. Derek frowned. He didn’t receive a notification about completing the dungeon, nor did he expect to. One wave of Water Golems wasn’t what Shae described. Of course, he didn’t go into much detail about the dungeon with the Guild Master.

Derek walked to the dungeon orb and carefully placed his hand on it. Instantly, a new notification popped up.

Area Completed

Participants: 1/1

Continue to the next area?

Oh… that’s pretty cool. This was the first dungeon he’d done that had this feature. Something like this would allow a party to rest up in between waves without worrying about making it back to the safe room. In fact, if it was like it seemed, the entire area turned into a safe room. I wonder what makes a dungeon do this.

Derek had a guess, but he would have to move on to the next area to find out. If he wasn’t mistaken, the next area would be one with the same attributes of whatever golem type he had to face. There’s only one way to find out. He kept his hand on the orb and mentally chose to continue.

Moving to the next area in 3… 2… 1…

The same blinding light appeared and Derek vanished. When he next opened his eyes, he was in a cavern. The cave was about the same as the first one he and Thomas entered on this world. It was a small room with a sliding stone door blocking the exit.

Derek walked up and pushed the door to the side, revealing a giant volcanic area covered in molten lava. Again, multiple boulders were scattered throughout the area, which Derek could guess were Fire Golems.

Putting his suspicions to the test, he moved to the closest one. Soon, the giant rock gathered the stones around it, forming into another humanoid golem. This time, the magic that joined each stone was a crimson red. Now, Derek was certain that it was a Fire Golem. Still, he used Identify.

Fire Golem

Level 160

A golem formed of stone and held together by the fire element. This monster has high defense and strong physical and elemental attacks.

The description was almost identical to the Water Golem, other than its level being five levels higher and the monster being held together with the fire element.

Derek backed away, careful not to aggro more than the one golem. He wanted to test its skills just as he did with the Water Golem.

Apparently, the Fire Golem didn’t have the same type of attack as the water one. Instead of splitting and forming jets of fire, which is what Derek thought would happen, the golem covered its limbs in flames and rushed Derek.

The golem was fast. It was a little slower than Derek, but not by much. Derek kicked off the ground, then landed in the air using Void Steps. The other golem was able to use its water attack to hit Derek from a distance, but it didn’t look like the Fire Golem had ranged attacks.

Derek floated in the air, slowly exhausting mana, but surely leveling his Void Steps up at a rapid pace. He was in combat, and all skills leveled faster when something was trying to kill you. Unfortunately, it seemed this area of the dungeon was designed with the golem’s attack in mind.

The ceiling of the area stopped Derek from hovering completely out of the range of the Fire Golem’s attack. The explosion that came off the fist of the golem was able to just reach the ceiling. That, coupled with its speed, made it hard for Derek to dodge while in the air.

Hard, but not impossible. Derek’s Void Steps were like having multiple platforms all around him to jump to. So, while it looked like he was hovering or floating in the air, he was actually standing directly on void ripples. As the skill leveled, the ripples became more tangible to him, allowing him to find and stand on them easier and longer.

The cost of using the skill slowly decreased as it leveled, as well. At level one, it costed 100 mana/s, but after using it so much in the previous days, it was already level 3, causing it to cost 90 mana/s. By level 20, the skill would either be free, or cost so little that it didn’t matter.

In his head, Derek was forming a training plan for all his skills. Now, he just needed to check out the remaining areas of the dungeon.

He dashed forward and landed his punch on the unsuspecting golem. He would make quick work of this area.