Chapter 110 – Completing Floor 1

While waiting for his next free cast of Touch Heal to become available, Tom kept an eagle eye out for any monsters, but none turned up. Midway through he had felt the skill stress lesson enough to allow an extra cast of Power Strike so after that he hadn’t felt as exposed. It was still a relief when the full six minutes ticked over and he was able to get Kang on his feet. With all of his free spell counters reset and the reducing skill stress, they were almost back to full fighting fitness.

He grinned slightly at how gingerly the other boy was moving. His healing was not as comprehensive as either of them would have liked. “I know the leg’s a bit stiff but you should be able to move.”

“A bit stiff. Is any of it not scar tissue?”

“I’m skilled. But there’s only so far I can stretch twenty mana.”

“That little?” Kang asked seriously. “I thought you had like forty to spare.”

“Usually yes. But not now. I’m at my limit. I can’t generate precognition affinity mana, or at least I’m resisting the temptation, as I don’t want to lose access to my offensive abilities.”

“That’s probably a good call. We definitely have to get out of here.”

“That we do.”

They fell into their normal positions. Kang at the rear and Tom leading them. Three minor battles later none of them against more than two opponents. They escaped back to safety without taking any further injuries.

Kang exhaled heavily. “Thank the lord we’re back.”

The girls looked at him suspiciously. The sigh had expressed a bit too much relief.

“What does that mean?” Eloise demanded.

“An old earth saying.” Kang temporised. “Just a way to express relief at being in familiar surroundings.”

“We only came back this early because we agree to be very cautious.” Tom said, taking pity on. They had an unspoken pact not to alarm the other two. “The run went well.”

“Yes, exactly.” Kang cleared his throat. “That was a simple fun excursion with a bit of excitement mixed in… um… it was good wasn’t it. A couple of minor injuries and little danger. I have to say great job girls. You now know what a real battle feels like and you listened super well the entire time. I think we can count that, as the normal group training session. So why don’t you two go and play in the secret room.”

“The no reincarnator club?” Eloise said brightly.

“Yes, that one,” Kang agreed.

Giggling, the two of them linked arms and turned to leave. Tom watched and listened as they did so.

“I don’t think I’m going to be a fighter,” Eloise told Briana as they left.

“Yeah, me neither it was smelly.”

“It’s not that. It’s just that it hurt so much when they bit me. I don’t know how the other two did it.”

The door shut to their private play area, which Adam had modelled on the play equipment in the main gymnasium. Basically, a series of safe spaces, tight tunnels, slides and ladders. It was the girl’s idea to ban the boys from entering an outcome that both Tom and Kang had been happy with, as it had given them free time to train harder.

When the door clicked shut with a finality that confirmed that they were finally alone. Kang let out an explosive breath. “We’re screwed. The next two floors will kill us.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” Tom said, disputing the characterisation. His personal view was that while the floor had presented challenges, provided they showed it respect they weren’t and wouldn’t be at any risk.

“We almost died. Tom.”

“We did not. We had one dangerous moment when you got hurt. Apart from that one fight where the mind spike disabled you I thought we did pretty well. We can’t judge everything through a pessimistic lens.”

“That attitude’s flawed Tom. You need to realise it. Views like that are why humans have struggled so much. Dimitri and I talked about this. Adventurers should go fifty years without coming close to dying even once.”

“Fifty years?” Tom scoffed. “That’s not close to being realistic.”

“It is so,” Kang shouted at him. “It’s what natives and other races do. It’s why they’re successful and why humans are losing. Too many of us died taking stupid risks.”

“I thought that failure was because of reliance on fate and running into a swarm that negated that advantage.”

“That was a symptom of the problem and not the underlying issue. As a competition cohort, we were all too reckless and arrogant.”

“Well, your fears don’t apply to here. We didn’t almost die. I had a few tricks up my sleeve that we, thankfully, didn’t have to use.” He was mainly thinking of the knife, but he wasn’t going to tell Kang about that. Using it would be a gamble and the longer he left it the more likely the odds would pay out in his favour.

“But if we did. If another mob had come when I was injured, do you really think you could have won.”

“I have trump cards,” Tom reiterated. “But you’re right that was an own goal. A completely unnecessary mistake.”

“I shouldn’t have insisted on you healing Eloise first. I can see that now.”

Tom grimaced. He appreciated the maturity Kang was showing by saying that, but he had had time for self-reflection as well. “No, that was my blunder. You were the one with significant blood loss, you weren’t in a position to make the call. I saw the puddles and your skin tone. I knew the state you were in and didn’t act on that knowledge. I don’t want to use excuses, but I’m just not used to fighting with people and I hadn’t considered the ‘what if more enemies come,’ use case.”

Kang shrugged. “Me neither. When I play out desperate situations in my head, I always assumed that when it came down to either me or one of them that I would always choose to sacrifice myself. But that’s wrong isn’t it. A lot of the time if either one of us dies, then all of us do. It’s not a simple equation. I’m starting to think that generally we’re going to have to prioritise ourselves even if it means one of them dies, if only to keep the other alive.”

“This is a shitshow.” Tom agreed. “Not that we should be surprised we knew how it was going to be when we decided to accept the blackmail and enter.”

“We’re like fish in a barrel.”

“No, we’re not. I keep telling you that I have stuff in reserve.”

“I don’t know how you can possibly possess a trump card that I’m unaware of given how open you’ve been about the intricacies of your build.”

“You can say that if you want. But I do.”

“Then what is it?”

Tom said nothing.

“I’m going to assume it’s a GEAs that’s stopping you from talking, but whatever secret you have aside I still think we’re screwed.” Kang repeated. “You saw what we were fighting today. That wasn’t a random match up. It was tailored for us to beat. It was super favourable and we still almost died. The next two waves of enemies are just going to be harder and harder. These guys were supposed to be nothing. The easiest of stepping stones to ease us into the real thing. Instead, we were almost butchered.”

“We’ll be stronger when we face the next floor.” Tom promised. “I’ve almost got Lightning Javelin already, so I’ll have that available at a minimum and hopefully Remote Power Strike as well. Once I have that combination, it’ll massively increase my deadliness.”

“And I’ll have dark missiles, but I’m not sure that’s enough.”

“Talking ourselves into a tizzy doesn’t help anything. We make it all we don’t. All we can do is prepare as best we can.”

“That’s gloomy.”

“Yeah.”

“Tom. Don’t change strategy. Let’s keep this from the girls, right.”

“I’m not an idiot. I won’t let anything slip. Telling them has no upside.” He looked up at the ceiling. “Adam, can you tell me how much of the floor we cleared.”

Excluding the boss 40%. 10% will regenerate overnight, which will leave you with 70 % to clear tomorrow.

Next to him Kang nodded appreciatively at those numbers. “Two smaller sessions tomorrow. If we clear twenty to thirty percent per day, we can have this finished within a week.”

“Agreed. We went half an hour too long today.”

The next morning once more both Eloise and he were the first people up and she came to him holding one of the more elaborate spears he had created. It had a butterfly design stretching all the way up the shaft. She held it out to him. “It’s my favourite. You broke your spear saving me, so have it.”

Tom didn’t need her favourite one. Her worst would have been fine, but nor was he about to reject the spear and risk losing the bonus. “Thank you, Eloise.” He plucked it from her grasp and put it straight into his soul storage before she could take it back.

Curiously, he checked what it had transformed into.

Item: Spear of Swiftness – Tier 3.

Applies a minor buff to movement speed based on your perception.

Tom smiled at the evidence of his title at work.

It had come from the GODs and he had known it was powerful from the description but seeing it in action, especially here in a resource starved environment was amazing. Now that he had this weapon the title had proved itself to be more valuable than either of his traits and they, particularly the one Everlyn had gotten for him, had been important in the recent fights.

While a trait that let him cast every single spell with ten mana invested every six minutes had been huge this weapon was better. The primary benefit was that it was a tier three item. It would have let him cut through the monsters they had fought like they were made of tissue paper. Every blow would have landed as if it was infused with an extra strong Power Strike and all without causing skill exhaustion. There was no question if it was safe to show this to the others that he would be able to solo the entire floor that he and Kang combined had struggled to defeat without pausing once. All the fights would be rendered trivial.

That benefit didn’t even take into account the apparent movement buff associated with the weapon. That was an example of more title shenanigans because it sounded like it was going to synergise with the time dilation that occurred when creatures faster than him locked onto him. While he doubted it would boost him to be as fast as them any closing of the gap would help.

Unfortunately, he didn’t have the freedom to use it openly, or at least not yet. The upgraded tiers would only be persistent if no one knew that it had originally been gifted to him in a tier zero state. One slip up and he imagined the weapon would revert back to its near useless base status and who knows what other longer-term penalties might be applied to his title. 

Secrecy and deniability were called for and it was lucky he had been planning for this moment since he started creating the weapons for the girls.

The butterfly etchings that had made it both distinctive and Eloise’s favourite were deliberately shallow. With Living Wood, he would transform them into mini dragons and make the weapon unrecognisable. The higher tiered base material would make it a slower process than what it would be on a weaker weapon, but the number of changes he needed to implement were small. Living Wood had to be a peak skill in its tier. It would still work on higher tiered materials and only demanded additional time to do so. For the prize of using his new glorious murder tool freely, it would be worth the effort. Once the redesign was complete, he would create another spear as a clone of Eloise’s favourite butterfly one.. Then, with some sleight of hand, he would allow them to witness the decoy being destroyed and after that he would be able to use the dragon spear without fear of contaminating the upgradability of future gifts.

He would discuss it with Adam, but he was pretty sure the trial would let him lie and say that he had found it as a mini reward which would cover the rest of the bases he needed.

Later in the day, they entered the first floor again. Kang moved with noticeable worry, and Tom felt like kicking him. The almost naked fear risked setting off the girls and, while he couldn’t tell him than they had been the day before.. With a second tier three weapon in his inventory, Tom was confident of their success.

They didn’t overextend, and everything went smoothly.

Four days later, completely refreshed they approached the boss’ room.

They peered through the doors before entering to see what they faced.

A single large pink wrinkly mass slept on the floor, facing away from them. Its positioning made it impossible to determine its features, but Tom was guessing they were facing a bear, or possibly a giant cat or wolf. Whatever it was, it must have weighed two hundred or more kilograms versus the trash mobs were the heaviest was only twenty.   

“It’s a big one.” Kang said quietly.

“I’m worried about its mind attacks. I’m kind of thinking it’s best if I take it by myself.” Tom told him. If he could use his new spear, the fight would be beyond trivial. “You guys hide behind the door so you won’t get struck by any stray mental assaults.”

Kang’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “That’s ridiculous.”

“Do you think the mind attacks will be that strong?” Briana asked.

Tom nodded at her. “Yes, I do. If that part of its skill set has scaled up the same as its size, you three might be in danger.”

Kang stared suspiciously at him, and Tom wondered what he was thinking. “How much of this is based on your top-secret stuff.”

Tom hesitated. He didn’t actually think this boss fight was going to be that dangerous even if he couldn’t use his new toy. The correct choice was clear. His priority had to be to protect his future upgrade capacity. “None of it. Just speculating on its likely abilities.”

The other boy bit his lip. “It’s a gamble isn’t it.”

“Also, I have all my skills available and with a single monster to fight I’m not sure adding you to the battle makes much of a difference. If it can hurt me, your toast.”

“With Quick Step I’m not that helpless.”

“It’s doesn’t help that much Kang. Even without me using magic you can’t beat me head on. When my life, as opposed to pride, is on the line, Danger Sense is even more powerful.”

“I’m not there to beat it. I’m there to pile on the hurt once you stun it.” Kang told him. “Even with access to all your Power Strikes you might not be able to do enough sustained damage to take it down.”

“If that’s the case I can call you in mid battle,” Tom countered. “I still think I should solo it.”

“I don’t,” Kang said quietly. “If you die, we’re all going to join you, anyway. I’d prefer to be there to fight with you. Rather than have a month of knowing my deaths guaranteed.”

“But if it has an area of effect attack.”

“We have fate in play.” Kang reminded him. “I don’t think its base attack will be lethal.”

Tom thought about the most effective method to make his argument.

“We’re coming in,” Kang told him firmly. “I won’t commit recklessly to the fight. We’ll hold back and won’t get too close. My job will be to defend the girls, but also be ready to rush in once it’s stunned to help kill it.”

Tom really couldn’t see a way to push a different outcome without causing longer-term problems and even if they promised to stay out of the room, there was always a risk they would peak which might reveal the nature of his new spear, anyway. It wasn’t disguised enough to be revealed, and he shouldn’t risk it for a small advantage. “Fine.” He declared.

“I’m glad you agreed,” Kang told him. “Your part of a team and you need to get used to that.”  

With the decision made, they wasted no more time, and Tom immediately jogged straight at the monster. It unfurled and leapt to its feet the moment he entered the room.

He was facing a giant cat whose head was on a level with Tom’s, but it was thick with solid muscles. If it stood on its hind legs its head would be higher than Dimitri’s.

The creature hissed at him and then his brain felt like it had been struck by an ice pick but the discomfort was only there momentarily before it vanished.

Tom managed not to stumble and continued to charge forward as he prepared to fight spear tip to claw so to speak. However, within a step, the cat’s eyes rolled back into its skull, showing its pinks the equivalent of a human’s whites, and it collapsed dramatically.

It was not dead because its chest still moved up and down as it breathed, however it was comatose. This was a chance to cheese the entire fight.

“Kang,” he yelled as he brought the spear down and stabbed the tip with the aid of Power Strike as hard as he could into the closest eye socket. The squishy orb burst as its skin was cut by his skill, but even enhanced as it was his weapon bounced off bone and failed to penetrate as deeply as he had been aiming.

Tom didn’t care. He had a singular focus, and there was no room for hesitation.

He repeated the attack and felt the bone crack under the blow.

No axe wielding fighter moved to join him and when he glanced back, all three of them were prone on the ground. A pang of concern went through him, but he couldn’t worry about them until the monster was dead.

Briefly, he considered switching weapons. The tier three version would not need these multiple strikes to blast through the bone. He refrained from indulging in the impulse. While it remained unconscious, there was no need to change anything. 

Out, up, down and in.

He thrust the spear tip deep and on the fourth attempt something gave and the weapon sunk a good six inches in. That was a full adult’s hand, length of metal and wood, that had penetrated right into the creature’s brain. He immediately jimmied it, using the leverage of the long shaft to scramble the brain like you would eggs.

It was probably enough, but Adam had told them how the place was structured and there was no need to hold back.  

Without hesitation, he used the free trio of Spark, Electricity Explosion, and Lightning Bolt within the cranium simultaneously. Thirty mana of heat and power was released into a confined space.

There was a hissing, sizzling sound that sounded far better than what the monsters produced, and then the undamaged eye burst open in a spray of super heated liquid. Steam billowed out of both eye holes and to stop his hands from getting burnt he dropped his spear and stepped away, leaving the weapon embedded where it had been.

It was almost certainly well and truly deceased, but Tom didn’t take that for granted. He ducked into the stinky cloud of steam, the stench of blood filling it, and dropped a hand to touch the wrinkly skin.

Touch Heal activated and confirmed it was very much and very permanently dead even if most of the body currently lived. The brain had mostly been vaporised and there was no way it was healing from that outcome.

He immediately ran over to the others and one touch of Briana confirmed that while she had knocked unconscious by the mind attack. She had not suffered any concerning damage. There wasn’t anything for his healing to fix.

All he could do was wait. He sat down next to them.

They had won, but it felt anti climatic, probably because this was the first and easiest of the three challenges they were to face. Yet with them all unconscious, it all felt hollow, a challenge they shouldn’t have been doing. One they had only been sucked into because of how they had treated Briana.

It took them two lonely minutes to awake.

Briana was first. “My head, I can’t see properly.”

Once more, he tried healing her, but it was futile. “You’re safe,” he assured her. “Keep you eyes shut and it will pass.”

Kang was the next to stir and he, unlike Briana forced himself to open his blood-shot eyes and look around. “Is it over?”

“Yes, the boss is dead.”

“You were right about the mental attack weren’t you.”

Tom smiled. “Yes, and you’re suffering the aftereffects. Unfortunately, it’s not something I can heal.” Briana next to them was whimpering softly. “I already tried with her.”

“I guess we should have stayed outside, after all.”

Tom shrugged. “All that matters is that we won and your reasoning was sound. We’re six-year-olds. It’s not like any of us have had a chance to buy proper identification skills.”

“I’ll need to push Dimitri to rectify that.” Kang said.

Tom chuckled. “I’m sure he didn’t factor in that we’d be fighting in the dark hole trials. Advanced identification is not typically a skill kids our age need.”

“True. So, was the fight challenging?”

“Not at all. It was just an execution. Its mind attack was reflected back on it, which knocked it out. I stabbed it through the eye and then fried its brain. It took about six seconds total and it didn’t even twitch a muscle while I was doing it.”

“Good. That’s good,” Kang said with a yawn. “I guess the floor wasn’t very difficult after all. When are we doing the next one?”

“A week,” Tom said after a moment’s thought. “It took us five days to complete this floor. Future floors will take longer. So, I’m not sure we can afford to wait any longer than that. Two weeks for floor two and four for the last one.”

Kang just groaned in response and lowered his head to the ground. “Ten minutes. Give us ten minutes and then we’ll go back.”

AG. No promises on a chapter tomorrow. I'll be starting late and can't even do a delayed release on the weekend as I'll be away from the computer the whole time.