Blood Shaper

Book 4: Chapter 18

The rest of their first run of the dungeon wasn’t anything to write home about. There were some puzzles, there were some monsters, and there were questionable aesthetic choices everywhere. Kay continued to get more loot of debatable usefulness, ignoring the fact that he could use it to practice one of his Skills, and Darten got a couple of pieces that he said were useful, so overall, it was a decent run. Kay didn’t badger Kyriel and Edgar, the two sentinels sent in to fill out Kay’s party, too much. They seemed focused on being professional and competent whenever Kay ended up sharing one of the dungeon’s rooms with them, and he felt they were doing a great job. Personally, he was more of a “get to know your people” type of leader, but not everyone flourished in that kind of environment or even wanted to be in one.

The final boss of the run was sadly underwhelming. Kay remembered a desperate scramble to survive against an immortal monster while completing the puzzle that would let his team escape from the last time he’d done a run of this dungeon, and this boss was… not that. The boss was a massive octopus or squid-like monster with tentacles that regenerated when they were sliced off, kind of like a hydra's heads. The objective was to defeat the monster before an endless tide of individually weak limbs crushed you as they multiplied since the boss was smart enough to start tearing off its own tentacles if the people fighting it didn’t. There was a puzzle incorporated into the fight, with the monster’s body, which didn’t regenerate, was invulnerable except in certain locations that moved across its body as its skin flashed and shifted through various patterns and tones. For roughly a minute, the creature would be one color, say white, with some kind of pattern on it, like green polka dots. Somewhere on its body would be one dot that was a different color. You had to find it and hit it hard enough to hurt it in that one spot that could actually be harmed. Once you hit it hard enough or a minute passed, the colors and pattern would change, and off you went again, looking for a new weak spot somewhere on the monster.

Kay just covered it in a seemingly infinite wave of blood that changed into massive spikes after coating the boss. They only pierced into its hide in the spot that was vulnerable, but since that spot changed every time enough damage was done to the boss, it was ripped to pieces as spike after spike slammed home inside of it within the span of a few seconds.

Glancing over at the small pile of tentacle ends that were sitting in the corner, then back to the gruesome sight of the dead cephalopodic boss monster that was slowly dissolving against the floor of the dungeon, Kay let out a small sigh. “I guess The Many Trial Rooms isn’t up to dealing with someone with a tier-five Class yet.” He shrugged and moved closer to where the body was disappearing. “Worth a shot to see if I could get some decent experience, and it never hurts to learn about how a group of your people are living.”

“Sorry this was a disappointment,” Darten said as he stepped up next to Kay.

“Disappointment isn’t the word I’d use,” Kay replied with a grin, “Especially not while inside the dungeon we’re talking about. I didn’t get everything I wanted out of this trip, but I did achieve multiple goals. I can’t use this dungeon to quickly train myself into getting multiple tier-five Classes, but that was a long shot anyway. I’ve already got a huge advantage over almost anyone else in the world on getting tier-fives, and just so happening to have a dungeon within our borders that I could use to grind them out quickly was asking a bit too much.” He smiled and shrugged, “And that’s only for now anyway. Who knows how much stronger The Many Trial Rooms will get, or maybe one of the other dungeons we could potentially wake up is stronger? Who knows?” He bent down and started picking up the loot that spawned where the boss’ body had been. “Let’s step outside before I identify these. I’d rather not hang around, just in case the dungeon is sapient and wants to get me.”

The single door that was the entrance popped them out into the same underground room that Kay’s party had found while running from the pterosaurs on that first expedition. Teams of adventurers stood in a neat line while Sentinels stood watch, both making sure that the adventurers didn’t cause trouble while they waited and ensuring that the workers expanding the place had the space they needed to do their work. The entrance hall at the other end of The Many Trial Rooms had a lot more space, due to it being for more than one dungeon probably, but they only had access to one of those dungeons right then, so the expansion had been ordered.

“I’m glad that we’re such a draw to all these workers and various building-based Classes,” Kay mentioned to Darten as they carefully walked past the line in the opposite direction. “They’re damn useful.”

Darten had to hold his body sideways and scoot along past the adventurers. Thankfully, there were only five teams waiting, so after a series of large crab steps, he was free to walk normally. “It’s because new places mean opportunities to build new things and try different techniques or styles you haven’t had an opportunity for, which is a huge leveling opportunity. One of the teachers I had when I was young told me that a lot of cities mandate that they keep their new buildings or repairs within a certain architectural style. That can look nice, but the uniformity and repetition eventually makes it a poor way to level Skills.”

“And the regular workers? The ones who just lift, carry, and so on?”

“More opportunities. There are a lot of things that need to be done, so there’s little competition for the less, uh, intricate jobs. The ones you don’t need specific Classes or Skills for.”

“Oh,” Kay looked disappointed for a second, “I was hoping it was something more magical or System-based than that.” He glanced up at Darten’s face, “Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that we can provide opportunities to people, but I was hoping for something less… mundane.”

Darten’s shoulders heaved in a massive shrug, “Not everything is fantastical and awesome all the time. Although I will say, even as a native of this world who’s seen it a lot more than you have, a lot of that fantastical stuff is awesome.”

“Right?”

The stairs led up into a small clearing that was much more cluttered than Kay remembered it. The impact craters from the pterosaur monsters slamming into the ground and impaling with their beaks were gone, and there was a small collection of buildings spreading away from the dungeon entrance. There was a lot less development than Vibrant had had, but the circumstances didn’t really allow for that much growth yet. Since the “main” dungeon entrance was so much closer to Avalon and the population that lived there, it was easier to start building a settlement there because there was less travel time. And while you could magically move through The Many Trial Rooms to get to the other side, you had to finish an entire run to do it. Kay was too powerful to really be stopped by the dungeon as it was, but that wasn’t true of everyone. A majority of Avalon’s population was tier three or lower, just like the rest of the world, and it would take an experienced team of tier three adventurers to clear the Many Trial Rooms without it being a significant risk.

With only the cream of the adventurer crop making it all the way through the dungeon and arriving here, there was less need for amenities and supplies, which meant the first few people that had made their way here and set up had cornered the market and push out any late arriving competitors. That would change eventually whenever enough people made it through, and the one bar, inn, and store got overwhelmed, but for now, the five buildings that Kay could see were the only ones around. The other two buildings were a small Adventurer’s Guild office that handled the limited number of jobs that were out here and took any wholesale loot that the one store didn’t buy up and the combination office and barracks for the Sentinels that came through on training runs.

“Alright, let's figure out what this loot is, divvy it up, and run back through after a rest.” Kay gestured at the open door of the bar, “We can grab some food while we do it, but we need to get back to Vibrant sooner rather than later. As much as I’d love to run the dungeon a few extra times or hang out and chat forever, I do have work to do and more training opportunities to look into.”

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“This feels familiar!” Darten shouted over his shoulder.

“Yeah, it does. Keep up the good work!” Kay replied without looking away from the item he was fiddling with; a small ball he’d gotten from the dungeon that his identify told him made it easier to level the Dancing Skill by a small amount. In fact, according to the description, it increased your leveling speed by a “minuscule” amount. Still, Kay was delighted with the drop, mostly because items that provided leveling bonuses were as rare as hen's teeth. Eleniah, who was centuries older than him and had traveled all over the place, had seen exactly none. Ever. The downside of it only working for someone who was humanoid and held the ball between two of their toes made it a bit of a bitch to actually use, but Kay didn’t care about that at all. He had Meld Blood, and a lot of his plans for leveling that Skill now revolved around modifying the magic that he took from the items he melded with. That, and potentially duplicating those effects, because while an item that made it easier to level Dancing would be a money maker, the second good item he’d gotten as loot would be a military revolution.

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Bracelet of Cephalopodic Shimmers

- A thin, stretchable piece of jewelry that feels fleshy to the touch, its enchantment can be activated by feeding a small amount of mana to it. For a small continuous mana cost, this bracelet’s surface will change colors to match the colors of the surfaces around it, making it blend in from any angle.

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If he could modify that, he could make a broken piece of equipment. If he could modify and duplicate it? A lot of information coming in was indicating that trouble was on the horizon for Avalon, which was one of the reasons he’d come out here to see if the dungeon would be a useful place for him to try and level grind. But the bracelet had made the entire trip more than worth it.

Kay briefly imagined a squad of his Blood Guard ambushing a faceless group of enemies from stealth, their armor shifting from the color of the walls around them into a deep crimson. That segued into ideas for a flexible skin suit for spies. Or even…

“Are you going to help at all?” Darten demanded.

“No! If I start helping, I’m just going to kill it, and you’re not going to get anything out of it. If you don’t get enough levels in to satisfy your uncle, he’s just going to make you do more runs, and then you won’t get to see your girlfriend for even longer.”

“She got recruited into one of your secret projects, so I don’t get to see her for ages anyway!”

They continued to bicker while Darten slowly wore down the boss of their run to get back to Vibrant, the rarely encountered two-person boss room a good place to let Darten grind with a tier five watching his back. Kay switched from staring at his two valuable acquisitions to using some of the less useful items as sacrifices to his Meld Blood levels.

After Darten finally killed the bright-green, floating, four-faced head with a third eye on each forehead, they stepped out of the dungeon to find Kyriel and Edgar already out waiting for them, along with Meten and a tense group of Blood Guard.

“Sorry,” Meten murmured as the Blood Guard formed up around Kay, “But it looks like we’re going to have to cut your little training vacation short. There’s been some trouble in Avalon that they need you to come deal with.”

“What kind of trouble?”

“At least two assassination attempts, and maybe an attempted coup?”