Elias sheathed the sword and reluctantly reached into his backpack and pulled out sopping wet crimson moss. He was not keen on facing whatever lay ahead with such low reserves.
Why was he reluctant to eat the moss? Other than the texture and taste it came from the understanding that this infected moss was likely to imbue him with more Essence. He doubted it would be much, but it would be more than his current nothing. He felt a mix of emotions towards it; on one hand, Essence equalled power; on the other, Essence equals weird-ass bird claws!
The right answer to whether he should eat the moss or not was simply—get me the fuck out of this dungeon and I won't have to.
But he knew that was not going to happen. So he bit down and swallowed the vomit that came up in his throat along with the crimson moss.
[Essence: 24 / 20]
[Life Force regeneration - Tiny - 29:42
Mana regeneration - Moderate - 29:42]
He nodded at the system prompts as he met the bottom of the staircase. It spanned in both directions for a dozen meters. He wasted no time and began to ascend.
After the first dozen or so steps, the steps ahead and behind slowly became encased in the darkness of the void. Whilst he did not feel an instinctual reaction within him and his heart remained calm, it was slightly unnerving. He had no idea how far up these steps went, nor what lay ahead for him.
Regardless, there was little else he could do but ascend. He had found that following the battle, the immediate surge of frustration he'd felt following the Trial of Conviction had faltered—it was replaced with a numb apathy. In the apathy, however, he found his mind wandering to his earlier questions.
What was that voice that kept emerging from within him? It sounded both ancient and primal, was it the corruption? And if it was, how did it speak to him when he'd had no corruption stored. He had faced the trial of conviction with zero essence. Furthermore, why did the voice keep trying to help him? If it was corruption, surely it just wanted to take over his body and turn him into a mindless vessel of aggression.
He thought on the matter for a while before turning to the results of his battle—despite his numbness, he was impressed with how he had fared, and more importantly he HAD made the right choice.
Spirit body… wow.
It was beyond what he could have hoped for. It would make fighting one of the creatures almost trivial. The fact that he had faced all three, and at their grand levels of ten. That meant they were halfway between Tier one and two and he was still sat at Tier zero.
It made him feel as though he was capable of making at least one good choice—occasionally. Outside of that, the obvious downside of chain armour was still annoying him as he felt the embedded metal within his shoulder slowly push out of his body—the effects of the Life Force regeneration in full effect.
He also finally resolved the final notification he'd received at the time of the Urstoks death.
[Enhancement - Spirit has gained a level. Level 5 -> Level 6]
He wasn’t shocked at the increase in level, he thought that he had employed his new affinities power deftly in the battle and whilst he had essentially funnelled his incredibly high mana pool into the skill in an effort to overwhelm the creatures before they could mount a tactical retaliation—he had also attempted to control the ability during the fight, channelling the mana directly into 'leg' portion of the afterimage. It had mostly worked too—whilst it was crude and likely inefficient with his mana, he had effectively focused its effects.
His thoughts moved to Jacob during his fight with the Aberration in Haven's Point, during their fight, both of them had fought at such speeds that they belied understanding, and, whilst he had felt his speed dramatically increase, he knew it didn't match theirs during the fight.
Maybe they had Enhancement skills?
It still didn't explain why he hadn't heard of them before, but he guessed that there was a lot Jacob had forgotten to tell him.
Over thirty minutes passed ascending the seemingly endless staircase—without his System enhanced stats, his body would have given up a long time ago.
He checked both his life and mana levels—both above ninety-percent. Good. The mana regeneration effect from the Crimson enhanced moss was significantly enhanced, whilst the life regeneration effect seemed weaker. It had also been reinforced by the notification and he was glad it was skewed in that direction.
Maybe luck did have a purpose after all? It was one of the stats he hadn't been able to work out yet. Everything else seemed to fit into the puzzle of the system well, all apart from luck. It didn't seem to do anything—he'd partially awakened with what he had thought was a relatively large amount of luck, only to be thrust into some of the most unlucky situations riddled with more misfortune than most would ever experience in an entire lifetime—all in less than six months. Combine that with his current life-until-now's misfortune, he had thought that his stat should be called 'un-luck'.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
His thoughts returned to the present as the void ahead of his began to slowly dissipate, he was getting close to the end.
A few more minutes passed and the void ahead had completely cleared. He found himself mouth wide open staring at the vista before him.
He was stood on a small 'balcony'-esque platform that overlooked a circular platform, like the previous arena but also, completely different.
The platform ahead was split into three equal sections all full of life—different types of life, granted, but still: life. The first third was a beautiful and thriving plains like area with flowers, moss-covered rockeries—the good kind of moss too, and a small stream that ran across its width.
The plains area ran into an area very familiar to the open caverns that he had explored from to the Well of Ascension, multi-coloured glowing crystals, large boulders, Orus moss and a variety of mushrooms. This third then ran into the final third, which also connected back up to the plains like biome.
The final third was the deep red flora jungle that he had encountered after the Well along with its iconic thorn like pulsing vines.
It was like the Plains of Thedras—the Plains that the catacombs were found, met with both further stages of the dungeon. All besides that of the Trial portion.
His heart and chest pounded instinctively, the aura of the sight before him sent shivers down his spine and a nervous rush of sensation throughout his body. If he faced more of the same creatures here, he reckoned he could win—despite the environmental advantages or disadvantages he would face. But he knew that he wouldn't be so lucky so as to face the same level of foe.
Orus's voice had threatened worse and he anticipated he would be in for a rough time.
What made him stay driven at this point was hope. This was truly the final part of the dungeon. It had to be. If he finished this, he would be free. The thought alone was enough to bring a small tear of relief to his eyes—he dismissed it and steeled himself, it looked as though he needed to drop down to the arena before anything further would happen.
As he dropped into the plains before him a portal began to form.
This one larger than any he had witnessed before, it was at least three meters in diameter.
He could only tense in disbelief as what emerged both defied his expectations and met the unbelievable nature of the System-fucked-dungeon. A chimeric transfusion of all the creatures he had just fought emerged, they were merged in a horrific mixture of the six-legged Urstok forming the main body and lower limbs, stretching up to a Mooshroom like body and head, all its giant twisted mouths full of an array of Urstok tongue, spouting out from the Mooshroom body were two Naeru like shoulders that led into the familial fleshy chain-like limbs linking to pincers, both the body of the Chimera and the pincers were covered in the green mana mist that engulfed the Mooshrooms normally.
He gulped as the creature that matched the size of the entire portal emerged. He tried to scan.
"Name: Trail of Defiance - Race: Unknown - Level: Unknown - Skills: Unknown"
Skills? He thought, this was the first time a prompt from scan had revealed the Skills section—it was for one of two reasons, either his ability with scan had improved to such an extent that it revealed more than it had previously, which, it hadn't. Or the 'Trial of Defiance' ahead of him had actual skills.
This was going to be shit.
A small pause from both Elias and the chimeric abomination was quickly broken by a bellowing voice emerging from the many mouths of the Trial of Defiance "Come, Pather, come and die!"
He broke from his stunned daze and immediately bolted to the red flora jungle—it could take his Essence—provided it gave some cover from the undoubted barrage of flesh like chains that were about to come his way.
He forced mana—and essence into his Spirit form and began his traverse at immense speed.
As he neared the edge of the plains biome his instincts screamed at him and he forced himself to a stop, just ahead—where he would have been, two pincers struck into the ground, spurting earth into the air—less than a moment later a fiery shockwave forced him into the air as an enormous fireball engulfed the same spot. his eyes opened wide as he crashed into the ground, he looked over at the Trial beast and gaped.
As the pincers and enlarged fleshy chains had been engulfed in the Mooshrooms blast of fiery mana, the Naeru like portions had simply released the limbs—followed by the shocking revelation that it could grow new ones, in less than a couple of seconds another pair of pincers span out from the shoulders like an unreeling chain.
He pushed off the floor and hesitated—the fireballs and willing expenditure of its limbs meant that maybe the flora jungle was not a good idea. He'd just end up on fire.
"Close the distance" he said aloud as he charged forwards.
The mouths of the beast ahead of him perked into what looked like an array of open smiles—the smile was followed by a barrage of yellow-slug-like tongues darting towards him. “Surely they were too far away?” he thought—
"Ugh!"
He yelped as the tongues detached from the mouths and harried towards him like bolts from a crossbow.
He pressed all the essence that hadn't been infused into his Spirit Form into Mana Barrier along with a tenth of his mana. A crimson-orange meld of runes quickly emerged and the visible mana-essence combination embraced his entire body. The barrage of tongues smashed into it, instantly crisping into seared-slug, but still passing through and splatting against him—gross, but not harmful. The Essence-mana combo was enough to prevent the immediate threat.
[Essence: 0 / 20]
That was the last time that his essence would pull off a miracle like that—he pushed more mana into his Spirit and traversed the plains, now aware of the threat that he faced he made sure to keep his eyes on the target. Chain-like limbs and fireballs thrust out towards him, and each time, he had to infuse a surge of mana to just dodge the attacks.
At the same time he was reinforcing a mana-erected Mana barrier, just in case one of the devastating attacks connected—he wasn't sure if he could take a direct hit.
As he neared the edge of the plains, towards the centre and where the Trial had emerged, its legs began to move rapidly as it charged towards him, meeting his momentum without hesitation. He brought his sword to the ready as he sprinted forwards and dodged a final pincer that crashed with force into the ground beside him, covering him in dirt.
As the legs were about to make contact and another barrage of tongues shot out at him, he committed to his strike, turning his body to the side as he leapt through the air, his sword arcing down towards the right hand first leg of the Urstok, right at the joint and in-between its tough carapace plating. His sword struck true and piercing into the leg—but it didn't stop the momentum.
He felt the sudden crash of momentous power slam into him as he was carried along with the body of the giant beast—at the same time as three of the acidic tongues pierced straight into his body, two in the stomach and one in the leg.
He screamed out in pain and flew through the air, he slammed into the ground many meters away and the wind was taken from him.
He rolled to the side, his shield already parted his possession in the air as a fireball slammed into the ground. He didn't avoid it as he felt his flesh ignite with pain and fire. He screamed loudly.
He released his sword and rolled to face the beast that was almost atop him again. "I can do it too! FUCK YOU!" he screamed as he pushed his hand into the air and channelled Flames of Orus with an uncontrolled torrent of mana.
Ethereal Flames met the Trial as it staggered backwards slightly—he dropped the skill and brought himself to his feet, the smell of his own burnt flesh leaking into his nostrils and filling him with adrenaline.
The Trial had barely moved back a meter after coming in contact with the flames and to his dismay—it only looked mildly singed by his trump card.
"Shit…" he cursed as he stood facing the Trial in front of him, outmatched in every way.
How upset would you be if I slowed down released chapters to 3 times a week, with increased length and editing?
