by Lucas Dunn
Temporary spear of shadows: Damage: 50. Ignores armor.
Well that was definitely useful and from what I could tell it cost me barely twenty-five mana. Continuing randomly through the tunnels I kept my head on a swivel but could only hear the scratching noises of rats. Growing bored I picked it up to a jog ignoring my sneak skill.
“AHHH!” I screamed when I came face to face with a skeleton. Calming down I stared at the propped up thing in disgust. It smelled disgusting and had chunks of rotten flesh hanging from its bones. Covering my mouth, I was about to continue on when I heard a chattering sound coming from down the tunnel. Looking in direction of the sound I felt something hit my mana shield from behind taking down fifty of its hit points. Swiftly turning I had just enough time to see the previously inanimate skeleton swing a sword down at my head. My mana shield flashed again but the force of the impact was enough to send me to my knees. Thinking quickly, I mentally thrust my dark spear forward only to have it go harmlessly through the skeletons ribs. The skeleton ground its bones making a chattering noise that sounded like laughter as it struck me again. My mana shield was only down a third of its health so I confidently took the hit to provide enough time to form a dark ball that shot at the skeletons grinning face.
-10 of 1,000 damage done to level 20 Skeleton.
Well that was very underwhelming I thought to myself before taking another strike. The chattering from behind me was getting closer and if these things had magic resistance I was pretty much screwed. Kicking myself mentally I cast charm on the skeleton and felt a small connection in my mind form. Ordering him in front of me I turned to see what was coming down the hall and was not disappointed. Eight skeletons poured into the hall. Four held swords while three others held poleaxes. The final skeleton had glowing red eyes and a robe that was clearly supposed to be a mage. Analyzing all of them I got a prompt saying they were all level twenty-five. Grinning I ordered my skeleton forward as the mage conjured a decent size fireball. Charming the mage, He turned from me to the closest skeleton and launched it at him and everything turned to chaos from there. Four skeletons with swords jumped at me causing me to stumble back. My mage skeleton was bombarded by two other skeletons while the one that was struck with the fire ball battled my sword skeleton. Ignoring the others, I pulled my short sword from its sheath a sent a fireball towards the nearest skeleton blasting him backwards but doing little damage otherwise. Changing my tactics before the skeletons could strike again I cast earth spike and got the desired effect.
-500 of 1,000 damage done to level twenty-five skeleton.
I only had enough for five spikes with my mana, but I wasn’t limited to just my mana. I called upon the castles mana and made quick work of my skeletons turning to see how the others were doing. My mage had fifty hit points and I watched as he took his last hit. Unable to kill the poleaxe skeletons at such close quarters. Disappointed in his performance I charmed one of the poleaxe skeletons and had him fight his fellow skeleton for fun. My original charmed skeleton was just finishing up his original skeleton but it looked like swords were pretty useless against skeletons. I watched as the charmed skeleton with the poleaxe slammed his weapon on top of the unaware skeleton taking him down to half health. From there my other skeleton joined in and it was over quickly. I should have known blunt damage did so well against the skeletons but I guess when you’re in the heat of combat you think a little slower sometimes. Annoyed at my mistake I sent the two skeletons in front of me and we continued on eliminating any others we could find allowing me to level up charm. Sadly, I didn’t get an extra slot to control someone.
When we came upon a boss with twenty-five skeletons Guarding a chest, we had to stop. The forts mana was only a quarter of the way down but I didn’t trust myself to rush in without a plan. The boss was ten feet tall with thick bones that were clearly stronger than the others. Not only that but the boss seemed to have bone armor that covered most of his body making him look pretty menacing. On top of that, appraising him showed nothing which meant he was a lot higher level than me. I looked closer at the small army of skeletons and noticed some of them seemed to be wearing armor also but one thing they all had in common was that their weapons and armor were all extensions of themselves through connecting bone which was interesting.
Looking everything over, I decided I would split the boss skeleton with earthen walls and take out the boss last. Raising the barriers, I forced my charmed skeletons to charge while I started shooting earth spear after earth spear into any skeleton that got close quickly decimating their force. Into a pile of bones. With my skeletons dead and the boss pounding on the wall, I decided to end it quickly and dropped my earth spell.
Unprepared the boss skeleton fell face first onto the ground. My laughing stopped instantly when it got back up and formed its arm into a huge bone sword that looked more than sharp enough to kill me. Getting serious I decided to start my barrage of earth spears that lead to a dull battle of me constantly spearing him as he tried to reach me. As his health reached halfway I was fairly confident in my ability to beat him when he started to glow red. Stepping back Cautiously I saw the pile of bones that I had massacred earlier turn red also. Feeling a sense of foreboding as the bones started to float towards the giant skeleton I tried to kill him before he finished using his power but was too late as I saw the bones start attaching itself to the skeletons body. The skeleton quickly started to grow three times its previous size with two new arms.
Staring at the massive skeleton I knew I wouldn’t be able to even hurt it with my earth spikes. Seeing the skeleton slowly walking toward me I knew I had two choices. Running away came to mind but passed just as quickly. With no time left to spare I poured the rest of my mana into my dark magic, thinking back to my elemental summoning book. I knew the elementals were supposed to be immensely strong, but their strength completely depended on the amount of mana I used to summon it. With only ten thousand mana I wasn’t sure. My other option was for a golem but I was afraid it would be too weak.
A swirling portal of black energy formed in front of me and slowly a shape emerged. It was shrouded in darkness but as soon as I saw it I gasped. I was so screwed. I summoned a frog the size of my hand. Feeling its discontent at the situation the frog looked at me a croaked before turning to the skeleton. With chattering the jaw bones the skeleton raised its massive foot and promptly stomped on the frog.
Grunting at the anti-climactic moment I turned to try and run but stopped when I saw the skeleton fall over. It was still moving but struggled to get up. Looking down at its foot I was stunned as I saw what was happening. Anything that touched the frog quickly turned black and withered away to ash. Staring at the frog, it started jumping back and forth through the skeleton like a shadow slowly corroding it until there was nothing left but a prompt telling me of my new level. Putting five points into wisdom to bring me to fifty, and two into dexterity, I awaited the prompt for my new ability.
After reaching level fifty in Wisdom you have gained a new ability. Mana sacrifice: Trade health points for mana points.)
This was obviously useful in a life or death situation but right now my health was too low to risk it. Happy of my good fortune I quickly went to the chest in the middle of the room excited at the prospect of treasure. I sent the frog back to his world, which was free of mana since it was included in the cost. The book said the longer I kept the elemental in this plane the more likely he was to turn on me, so I sadly watched the underestimated fella leave.
As I opened the chest I held my breath and was not disappointed at what I saw. Twelve platina were in the chest laying on top of a medium sized leather-bound book and a small black bag. Ecstatic, I picked up the coins and looked over the book.
Received: Book of Necromancy. (Requirements: Dark Magic level eight.)
Deeply interested in the book I sat down in the cave and started reading through until I received a prompt.
Sub magic learned: Necromancy. Current level: 1
Spell learned: Soul Steal. Need gem of equal quality or better for soul. Spell requires no mana and collects all passing souls in area
The book was only for skeletons but after reading through I saw the endless possibilities it truly had. Sadly, it required bones which I would have had plenty of if froggy didn’t corrode them. Looking at the bag I found it was the first inventory item I received. It only had five slots, but it was still incredibly useful since I could put anything in that could fit into the opening. Sighing at the thought of my next job, I went through the tunnels to pick up all of the bones from the previous skeletons bringing be to a total of 32 skeletons which stacked easily into the first slot of my bag labeled as “bones”. My second and third slot were filled with swords and halberds while the others carried the book and coins. Hurrying out of the caves, I made it to the front of my gate and saw Jake, Grimm, and all my NPC’s coming towards me from the plain. Looking oddly shiny, I waited for the group to reach me before I realized they were covered in slime.
“Don’t ask” Jake said curtly walking straight past me with Grimm, clearly headed for the stream that ran down the mountain and into the village.
With one eyebrow raised I looked at Elif who reported to me. “We found the dungeon my lord. We traveled into it for some training and were able to clear the first floor extremely easy, but the boss gave us trouble. The floor consisted of slimes and the boss was a gigantic one that exploded upon its death.”
Laughing out loud I promised myself to never let Jake hear the end of this.
“Very good Elif. Have your group clean up and then report to me in the courtyard.”
Having set my plans with her I headed to the courtyard myself to get ready.
Chapter 26
Using my twelve platina I went through the hiring process and hired people to fit my plans. I hired 24 different NPC’s and split them into squads which consisted of 6 people so they could use the group feature. Each squad consisted of a mage, healer, tank, ranged dps, rogue, and finally a regular dps. The atmosphere quickly turned excited as I proceeded to turn them into worshippers and as the last NPC finished, my group showed up.
Clapping my hands together I addressed the whole group. “Listen up. You have two hours to get situated within these walls and get to know your squad, after which you will report to these people here” I said, pointing at Elif, Blade, Jackson, and Elizabeth. “They will then lead you to the fields and teach you how to work in your squad and hunt. Once you all reach level ten you will then go into the dungeon and train there as much as possible. I will allow you to keep 50% of the loot that you find in the dungeon.” As I said the last part there was some excited whispers. A smile appeared on my face as I hear them. Normally the lord that owned the land of a dungeon only allowed for its people to keep 20% so this was a big deal for them. It would also bring me a great wealth once people started to come into my town.
I dismissed the group and laid out all of the skeletons on the ground standing over the first one I felt the dark essence around me and activated my necromancy skill and was quite surprised when quite a few tabs popped out. All were greyed out except for one which said basic skeletons. Going into the tab, I looked at my one option. I could resurrect the skeleton as it was now and that was all that was available. Selecting the option, I slowly brought all of the skeletons back to life taking frequent breaks for my mana to recharge. All of the skeletons in front of me were half my level and would continue to rise with my level. I distributed all of their points everything except for wisdom and intelligence since those required soul gems for the skeletons to use. In front of me stood a small skeleton army, all equipped with weapons. It was truly an epic sight. Despite that they were basic skeletons and my bonus points didn’t carry over, they were still highly magic resistant and very strong due to their points being mostly in the warrior stats.
“No way Lucian! How did you learn necromancy! The forums have been going crazy trying to figure it out!” I turned around and saw Jake and Grimm wide eyed in amazement.
“Definitely not from a slime” I said grinning.
Jake and Grimm’s smile instantly turned to a frown making my grin increase. While I was explaining about the mines, My NPC’s filed out making Jake and Grimm’s jaws drop once again. Before they were about to head out I told them to be careful as well as collect any bones they got from the animals. Satisfied I turned back to Jake once again having to explain.
We all agreed to take a break for breakfast and head to the dungeons once we were all back on.
Chapter 27
Once in the game I decided to put my skeletons on the wall even though they didn’t have any ranged weapons, I still planned to use them as a lookout in case we were attacked. Jake and Grimm weren’t back yet so I went to Gannon to see how he was doing.
His permanent forge was complete which was relieving and massive stack of refined iron was outside along with 20 or so gems all of common quality except for three that were flawless, which made me excited. Basic skeletons didn’t require any gems, but if I wanted to create more advanced skeletons that could think or use magic, then I need soul stones which I made with these gems and my new soul steal spell.
“I’m going to be taking the gems Gannon, if you could start making shields and armor for all of the tanks that would be great. I don’t want you to hand out any armor or shields until they are at least common quality”
“Of course ye lordship. It shouldn’t take but a few days for me to reach that level with the armor. However, I have already made the first shield for ye tank and it is already common quality.” Pleased, I told him to ask the new tanks what kind of weapons they would like when they got back from the fields since they only brought basic swords with them and continued on my way to the tanner.
“Haden, I got some new jobs for you. We have new recruits and I need you to make all of us besides the tanks armor out of the hide of the rhino”. I discussed with him about all the arrangements for a little longer and left pleased once again at the initiative that was shown by my people.
My last stop was to the Carpenter Jorgen who I told him to start repairing the town because we would soon have new residents. I hired him some workers with the recently replenished Mana pool and headed back to the courtyard to meet my friends.
Jake and Grimm were standing patiently in courtyard waiting for me to show up. I took a moment to appraise them and both were at level 18 making me whistle at their level increase. I could tell Jake was going for the barbarian class and Grimm wanted to be either a rogue or an assassin. Confident in our strength I suggested we start heading to the dungeon and see how far we could get.
The entrance to the dungeon was on the exact opposite side of the town parallel to the mines. There was a crystal ball that asked which floor we would like to travel too, but I noticed all but the first one was greyed out meaning I would have to defeat floors to get the option to fast travel to them. Jake and Grimm were not ecstatic about having to face the Giant exploding slime again, but I assured them I had a plan to keep us clean. As we formed a group we were able to see each other’s stats, but only as a bar which greatly relieved me because I didn’t want to explain my large point lead.
Entering the dungeon, there was a slight sense of distortion before my view changed to that of a cavern filled with slimes that were spread out every few feet. Torches lined the brown earthen walls sufficiently lighting up the area. Appraising the green slime cubes that came up to my knees showed them to be level five. Needless to say we quickly swept through the first floor until we got to a door. The door was made out of sturdy oak but instead of a handle, it had a square bronze plate that upon touching would transport the group to the boss room. Jake explained all of this as well as the fact that we would be put out of detection range upon entering. We prepared ourselves and entered the room.
The slime in front of me was big, but not nearly as big as I had thought it would be. Disappointed I surrounded Jake and Grimm in a one-point mana shield and cast
ed Soul Steal while blasting the level ten slime with lightning until it exploded. Its slime was about to cover us when my shields popped up protecting us from the goo. And a small silver stream entered into my bag confirming I captured a common quality soul.
I saw an object that the slime dropped on the ground and walked up to it. “Did you guys get this last time?”
Received item. Tossing goo potion. Toss at an opponent to coat them in goo reducing dexterity by 40% for 60 seconds.
Looking at the potion Jake responded “No, it must be a luck kind of thing.”
Snickering, I placed the item in my bag. It wasn’t amazing but it would definitely come in handy if Jake or Grimm got annoying. Continuing to the next floor once again we came across low leveled opponents except they were large bats. Continuing on we swept through the next few floors getting various drops from mobs until we reached a level that seemed to be just a little below our average group level. The landscape was a swamp and we could see huge dark green alligators, excited I charmed the first two alligators we came upon and quickly created a water freeze spell while Jake and Grimm were paying attention to the surroundings. This spell would freeze water in a three by three area making a solid block of Ice. It was relatively useless since my water level was so low, but once I started upgrading water magic, my spells in that area would get an upgrade also.
We swept through the floor relatively easy while I spammed my water spell leveling up my water magic once which was fine with me. Once we came to the boss floor we all got excited because it would at least be on par with Jake and Grimm’s level. Entering in the room we were not disappointed. We crossed into its range and the level 19 20-foot alligator made a huge roaring sound and charged after us on the muddy ground of the swamp. I sent my two 11 foot alligators but they were quickly whipped out of the way with the alligator’s tail. Unsure what to do I tried raising and earthen wall, but the ground was to soft and the alligator smashed right through and again used its tail as a whip. All three of us were swept off our feet and thrown to the other side of the room. As I stood up I saw that half my shields health had disappeared and the Alligator was charging once more. I tried summoning an elemental but was promptly told I had insufficient mana which meant I couldn’t access my castles mana when I was in the dungeon. I sprinted to the side using my high dexterity to my advantage and used flame gout to distract the alligator. My mana ran out after ten seconds, but by that time the beast had already caught on fire and Grimm and Jake flanked it causing extra damage from the critical and surprise attack finally putting it down.
