To Seraph the answer was always known. “If they do not serve me in life, they will serve me in death. I’d consume their essence, their soul, and use it for my own power, and if within my means reanimate the corpse and add it to my minions.”
When the reading was over the elf stood and walked away down another path that lit up as she walked. Seraph walked wordlessly behind her thinking of the meaning behind the cards she had pulled. The meaning of some cards had not been clear to him, while the meaning of others had been painfully obvious making him wonder if the magic behind the reading was clairvoyant or omniscient or if she was just skilled at guessing at information.
"Where are we going" He asked curiously. Just the reading itself would be of great benefit to him if he could figure out the meaning. He had no doubt in their truthfulness.
"We are heading towards Phase II of orientation which is the start of your actual dungeon experience. In the cards your fate as it has been ordained has been revealed to you, but foreknowledge should not be confused with forearmed. Maybe the words make more sense to you and you’ll benefit from them, but regardless you will not be sent to start your journey defenseless, you will be armed. If you complete Phases II and III, you will gain access to the ability cultivated from the reading"
Notification: Quest - Complete Phase II and Phase III, upon completion Seraph will be awarded a personalized ability.
This was welcome news to him, any advantage or power up was a benefit. "Just how many phases are there?" He asked. "Did anyone one else I started with make it so far?"
The elf turned around and looked at him, eyes probing him looking for something, something he could not guess, a faint trace of surprise barely noticeable on her face. "If you’re asking about your father Seraph. He lives and is likely to survive the remaining two phases. Only one of you humans have died so far. A woman who refused to remove herself from the starting point, her mind unable to accept what it had decided was impossible. She was judged to have forfeited her right to survival and the dungeon consumed her."
This peaked Seraph’s interest, killed not by an environmental threat or an enemy, but by being judged unworthy to live. How was that any different from many of the lives he had taken?
"Why did the dungeon consume her?" Seraph asked wanting clarity.
"She knew her life was in danger and refused even in fear of death to step forward. She had chosen the cosmetics of what you would deem a mermaid and began to asphyxiate without water, she refused the accommodations provided to ensure her survival. We have arrived." She answered.
The dark path had led them to an ornate oak door, just a door, no walls, no ceiling, just a door. Though it was a beautiful door with sculpted bronze and gold leaves. The elf reached with her collar and pulled out a key with which to open the door and motioned for him to go inside.
An elven armory he realized as he stepped through. Inside he saw racks filled with weapons and armor of all types neatly packed away in this pocket dimension. Convenient to quickly transport weapons for an army. He had only heard of these armories in his other life, but he had never seen them.
When he had conquered the elves in the other timeline, he had not been able to secure all the spoils before his few rivals and special resource like this had been very rare. Rare enough that the other humans had destroyed their armories when they found themselves fearful over losing control of them to Seraph. The key itself held the armory and could be opened from any door.
"What weapon do you have an aptitude with, you need to be taught the basics." Asked the elf though Seraph guessed she already knew the answer.
Finally, this was an area were Seraph could show his genius as one of humanity's elites, long favoring an elegant spear over all other weapons. "The long spear, give me the long spear.' The elf arched her eyebrows, clearly questioning how sound of a decision that was.
Regardless of her doubt, it was his decision, and he insisted, so she tossed the spear towards him. His fingers barely brushing the shaft of the spear before dropping it on the ground. "Can you at least pick it up and hold it?" He was absolute in his confidence that he could, but the elf had her doubts and made those doubts well known and apparent.
His own doubts appearing after he struggled to pick up the spear and worsening when he struggled to hold it, his arms shaking with exertion before being forced to drop it. Even with his mana body buff he was still too weak to wield the weapon that in his other life he had been an expert with.
The elf looked at him with open contempt. "Part of being a man is knowing one’s own limits. It seems you can't recognize yours. What other weaknesses do you have? Too prideful to see and recognize. An odd fault considering how physically weak you are that this would be one of your faults, how could you not have known your limits? I have an easy solution for this. In the absence of good fundamentals and when lacking proper physicality, a mace will have to do until you are able to pick some skills."
She rolled the mace over to him on the floor. She had a valid point Seraph had to admit, he wasn't strong enough to wield his weapon of choice regardless of his experience. He picked up the mace, admiring its simple design and its relative light weight, and though he was a pure novice with the weapon he was confident he would be able to master it.
He took a stance and began going through a series of paces to try to get a feel for the weapon. With each movement the power of the armory was fully transparent as pieces of gear and armor began flying off the racks and shelves, until finally the clothes he had been wearing had been reduced to bare thread at his feet, and he found a new outfit being magically put on him. A dusty olive black overcoat with his soft areas wrapped in a gray cloth under armor, and the shoes he was wearing was replaced by a heavy steel toed tan boot. It offered some more protection for him.
“It originally came with a tweed cap, but it was decided with your new horns, it wouldn’t do, and with your new racial attributes, it was deemed you needed something thicker than the jumpsuit you were wearing. Fallen are quite susceptible to the cold.” Explained Sadie.
No sooner had he finished inspecting his new look when felt an intense killing intent again. The elf was moving towards him to attack, her hand brandishing a short-curved sword. In his other life blocking and countering the attack would have been easy. Instead, he was struggling with rare indecision at the worst of times, he made his choice, he was unsure if he could block the attack with his current body, rather than try he jumped out of the way as the blade descended.
As he jumped, he heard the sound of a blade slicing through the air but heard nobody shifting and still had vision on Sadie. Someone or something was attacking him from behind and without the ability to maneuver in the air he had no choice but to block as he slammed his mace into the downward slicing sword, and as his mace connected with the steel of the blade for a moment his eyes locked with the pale blue orbs of the Spectral Knight that had attacked him, which disappeared immediately after its blow had been blocked.
"Well done" Said the elf in simple compliment "Two more of you humans died during this iteration. One neither attempted to block the attack or move out of the way, the fool thought his new-found stature as a Minotaur made him somehow immune to attacks, and the other assumed skill with a blade based on new eleven stature that he didn’t possess, both have learned a deadly lesson."
That made sense to Seraph. “Learning firsthand is different from being told, it's a valuable experience, though I thought it would be more complicated. All you did was try to attack me and sent your Spectral Knight after me. Besides, what about my father? How did he do?"
"I didn't try to attack you, I loudly broadcast that I would kill you, and I would have if you did less than required to survive, move, or block my attack and I made sure my minion was loud enough to warn you of the danger. This isn't a trial it’s a tutorial. The intent is to help people live, even if it kills a few. And yes, your father is fine though you may be surprised at his changes." said the elf. "Considering how unimpress
ive your performance was, he's a natural prodigy and a genius with the blade. He actually asked for a long knife and had to explain a bit to us what exactly a long knife is."
The elf continued "And no human this wasn’t it. This isn’t phase 2. You remaining humans are going to do a quick run through a trial dungeon to get you used to what to expect from the dungeon. You’ll be given abilities based on your reading to assist you."
The elf pulled out her key again and headed towards the door. "Come on now, time for Phase II, this is the field work portion, the trial dungeon."
Chapter 7: Phase II Begins
* * *
Seraph followed the dungeon guide as she walked off into the gloom that surrounded them. His eyesight boosted by his new racial attributes he had no difficulty keeping up with her in the dark. After they had walked for some time, she held up her hand in a closed fist to get Seraph to stop in place as she pulled another item from her spatial storage and threw it on the ground.
Without any noise an aged looking brown door grew up from the spot in which she had thrown the item. She looked back at him as if to say, “Come along.” and opened the door, and though only darkness could be seen within that doorway, she stepped through it without hesitation.
Seraph looked at the door in suspicion, he had reason to hesitate. He had no way of knowing what he would find on the other side until he stepped through the door. He didn’t hesitate long, the only answer for him was forward, following behind her. As he passed through the door, his eyes were temporarily blinded by the sheer light that glared down at him with an intensity he had never struggled with before. He covered his eyes with his hands trying to shield himself from the white glare and give his vision time to recover.
“Your eyes will get used to it.” Remarked Sadie. “It’s the racial change, I’m sure you’ve found your eyesight in the dark has dramatically improved. This is a passive of all Fallen you’ll find that you’re more suited for the dark than the light. Fitting really considering your background Seraph.”
Notification: Passive Unlocked – Due to your racial change to “Dire Fallen” You have discovered a weakness to light, manifesting as temporary blindness when exposed to light. Alternatively, you have discovered that you now possess “Dark Vision, which grants the user limited vision in the absence of light and increased vision in reduced light environments”.
“There it is again.” Thought Seraph as Sadie made yet another comment suggesting she may know his true identity. Seraph couldn’t rule out that she still had her memories from the other timeline. He couldn’t rule out that all the elves still had their memories from the other timeline.
Red flags went off in his head at the realization of the danger he was in hit him. “Blind” He cursed. “This is the last thing I needed.” Seraph almost missed the sound of footsteps running towards him, pounding against the wooden flooring he felt beneath his feet, heading his direction.
In the absence of one of his senses, he knew a method to supplement his other senses but could not currently use it due to his low stats. But in this situation, he didn’t need better senses to tell him something was going to crash into him. He braced himself for the hit, unable to see what was coming his way and unable to defend himself.
“Can you help me Sadie?” Seraph asked, assuming the dungeon guide might be responsible for assisting him in this situation.
“I’m just a guide, not a babysitter.” She answered in a cheery tone, a tone that no one but Seraph could tell was full of mockery. The message was received, he was on his own.
As the sounds of running moved closer to him, Seraph resigned himself for the hit as impact was upon him. But the hit never came. Instead, Seraph felt hands grab him and pick him up, wrapping him in a long extended hold, threatening to break his ribs. “No, not a hold.” He thought with a sigh of relief. Just a hug.
"Kiddo! This is amazing!" Said a familiar voice. The voice of his father Paul and though Seraph’s vision was only just now starting to adjust to the bright light, he could make out the biggest smile on Paul’s face. The man’s happiness was evident.
It was a good-natured greeting and Seraph matched the smile. "It is pretty amazing, as I’m sure you can see for yourself.” Said Seraph as he tried to bring attention to his legs.
"Yeah, I noticed you’re upright on two legs. I wish your mom could see this. I’m not so sure about the rest of these changes though, they remind me of when I watched Powder with your mom to be honest Luca. Is any of that reversible" Said Paul still smiling as he wiped a few tears from his eyes on his outfit as he looked and examined Seraph’s new horns, the change in his skin tone, and the darkening of his pupils.
"You know this place really is something." Paul said, quickly changing the subject. Seraph could tell the man was uncomfortable with Seraph no longer being quite human, and Seraph didn’t want to spoil the overall mood, as the subject changed, he went with it.
"It really is something, everyone is going to get a chance at it," Replied Seraph. “But what about you, I was positive you’d be an elf by now, you seemed very interested before, what happened?”
"Well you know, I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to pick. I was mostly afraid of misunderstanding the prop I selected, I didn’t want to dress up as like a dragon and end up having to role play as a lizard man. I figured everyone else would want to be an elf, and that's boring. But I do have a surprise, you might be able to walk, but I can do one better, I can walk on the air."
"Oh really?" Asked Seraph with genuine interest, "How is that? Show me?"
With a huge smile on his face and not waiting for any further prompting, Paul proceeded to jump into the air. It wasn't an impressive jump, but rather than fall back down, his feet seemed to catch on something, like a piece of resistance in the air, and he pushed off again, repeating the process before falling back to the ground with a heavy thud.
"A double jump? That’s going to be really useful later." Said Seraph with envy, whatever the arena, mobility was always a strength.
"Not quite kiddo, this isn’t a double jump. This is my new passive ability. Here, I’ll show you." Seraph wasn’t sure what Paul was doing, but he made sure to pay attention in case Paul had learned something he didn't. Paul seemed to reach out to grab an invisible prompt and threw it towards Seraph, Seraph had never before seen this share-based mechanic but did what he thought might be the most appropriate, he tried to catch it."
PASSIVE Ability - To the Top - The holder of this ability is able to create temporary stairs of air that fade after being stepped on. This is limited to 5 steps + total levels.
"Amazing right?" Laughed Paul. "I’m assuming since I decided to stay a regular guy, the powers that be decided to give me an ability to make up for it. Aside from a few questionable cosmetic changes, did you get anything else out of your orientation?”
Seraph didn't really want to say he wasn't given an ability, likely because of the abilities he had unlocked as a matter of balancing. He didn’t want to divulge that he had instead earned the Mana Body passive ability and the Thousand Hands active ability. Information about one's capabilities shouldn't be given so freely.
Seeing his hesitation Paul lost some of his good humor and frowned, suddenly very concerned. "They didn't do anything weird right Luca? Or something wrong? I know this is all so unbelievable, I wouldn’t believe it myself if I didn’t see it for myself. It’s ok to tell me what you got; I promise no judgements here. I’m sure they hooked you up with a good ability.”
Seraph looked at his guide for clues on how to react. She only shrugged and put the responsibility back on him. Though what his father said made sense, it was also hard for Seraph to get an idea of the best course of action to take and his father wasn’t the only one listening. Though he had foreknowledge, his foreknowledge was limited, he had not done this tutorial previously, and with this many changes occurring so fast, there was no guarantee that his limited foreknowledge could be used here.
As for his father,
the man appeared to have already accepted and adapted to some impossible changes in his life, it was something Seraph felt was unbelievable and it made him wary of the man. One thing he had always known to be true, and had always proven to be true, people change with power.
Eventually the pause between them grew awkward and Seraph continued to not respond, Sadie finally intervened "The general manager was prepared to offer this boy an ability the same as the rest of you have been provided. However, as I manage Phase I of this tutorial, what you might refer to as the orientation, I have sole discretion on whether he receives anything, and this boy has enough advantages, it's generous enough that we've allowed him to walk again."
Seraph was hardly surprised by the answer, for whatever reason Sadie had deemed herself to be hostile to him, though he was unsure if she was his enemy as well. But the rage on his father’s face in response to her was intense, his hands shook in anger and his skin turned an obvious shade of red as his blood boiled to match his fury. Paul leveled his finger against the elf woman in accusation, but before it could escalate, a young elvish man pushed past him, getting between Sadie and Paul, trying to prevent the situation from getting out of hand and out of control before anyone did anything they might regret.
This man instinctively knew something that Paul did not, something that Seraph knew firsthand, this Sadie, the elf who was their guide, was not someone any of them could lay hands on and live to regret later. The elves of the dungeon were currently far beyond them, though Seraph knew they would not always be.
"You know that decision isn’t right, it’s not fair, would you perhaps reconsider?" Asked the elvish man. From around the room Seraph could see another elvish man and elvish woman nodding their heads in agreement, all familiar faces he had seen during preregistration, all faces now sporting pointed ears. "We’ve all got abilities, so why didn't he get anything, where do you get off on that?"
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