The BNY Mellon Center, The Pitt - 11:14 AM

Several hundred feet underground, the lowest depths of the Pitt were an absolute pain to navigate. As you descended, the tunnels began to become increasingly more hostile. Near the very bottom, several were small enough that I needed to use the Cable Conglomerate and my Warmind abilities to Push and Pull myself through small crawlspaces. That wasn’t counting the terrible rapids I needed to cross, sheer cliff faces leading both up and down, or pockets of dead air.

The whole thing was a claustrophobe’s worst nightmare, and this segment of my run always made me glad I wasn’t one.

It took me nearly three hours to get through the twisting, winding tunnels to my destination. I stood just outside of a truly massive cavern several times larger than the one that housed the Guild of Guilds. The moment I took another step forward, I would be given a quest to liberate the building.

I looked up at the octagonal skyscraper in front of me. The BNY Mellon Center was one of the largest buildings in Pittsburgh and could be seen from miles away on clear days. Creatures slowly walked behind the dark windows leading all the way up to the top floor 55 stories high, though all but their shadows were obscured. The giant letters that once crowned the magnificent building were scattered across the ground, destroyed from the long fall.

Taking a deep breath, I took a step into the cavern. The quest screen appeared in front of me.

[[Second Scenario Quest: Liberate the BNY Mellon Center!]]

The BNY Mellon Center building is a massive tomb for one of the most terrifying undead creatures the Pitt has to offer. Not only that, but it has been filled up with hoards upon hoards of loyal monster minions to protect its final resting place: the 50th floor.

While it would be easy for anyone with the ability to fly to reach the top, that path leads only to death. The tower holds many secrets, including four objects that will help make the final boss fight much more manageable. Find these items on your way to the top.

This is a limited Scenario Quest for multiple guilds!

Up to 10 guilds may assault the skyscraper at the same time, with a limit of 5 players per guild. All quantifiable rewards will be split up based on player and guild performance, while the optional rewards will be given to those who find the hidden objects.

Objective: Ascend the skyscraper and defeat the boss at the top.

Optional Objective: Find the four hidden objects.

Reward: +20,000 points, +100 Guild Points, the BNY Mellon Center will be liberated, access to the bank’s vault.

Optional Reward: +1,500 points per hidden object to a player who finds one or more.

[[Warning!]]

It is recommended that at least 6 guilds and 30 players enter this dungeon.

I whistled at the rewards and laughed at the warning. Not because it wasn’t true, but because it didn’t pertain to someone like me.

The first few times I came to Pittsburgh for this scenario, I had taken it upon myself to go from floor to floor in order to collect as many points as I possibly could. It was a grueling task that took me several days to get through. Each section had its own platoon of enemies requiring different strategies. Most were easy to get through and rather low level, though there were lieutenants and commanders spread throughout as well as the mid-bosses that protected the hidden objects.

This dungeon was also annoying in that it didn’t tally up your points for kills until you either defeated the final boss or left it entirely. The mid-bosses weren’t so different from the commanders, and everything respawned if you left the cavern so most people wouldn’t remember where they were to find the hidden objects. It was made to be completed in one attempt, even though it was so punishing.

[[Patron Message]]

You know the best way through this, right, Ant?

I’m only asking because I’m looking through the building right now, and it’s a lot even for you. It’s a little surprising that you managed to make it through the whole thing in one piece, actually, and multiple times.

My faith in you is absolute, you know that, but I’m still worried.

Sincerely,

Sara

Smiling as I swiped away my girlfriend’s message, I looked up at the ceiling.

“Thank you for being worried,” I told her. “But, yes, I know the best way up to the top. The quest says not to just fly to the top because there are items to be found, and under most circumstances you would only be able to find them by searching every floor. I already know where they are, so I can skip most of it. Almost like I’m cheating. On top of that, I have a secret weapon today. Do you know what it is?”

[[Patron Message]]

… You haven’t picked up anything specifically useful for this fight in particular, so you’re referring to the picture I sent, aren’t you?

If so, please don’t put it that way. It’s already really embarrassing.

Sincerely,

Sara

My smile transformed into a grin as I snapped open my menu. “I’ve been looking forward to it, and you can't stop me,” I teased. “It’s going to give me the pep in my step I need to really get through this in one piece.”

Pulling the Angelic photo from my inventory. My hand went to my mouth as I stared at it.

The Angel of the End, Esaraphelscion, was a beautiful woman with bronze skin and soft, orange eyes. Her hair was made of fire that fell in perfect curls around her soft face. Six long wings with pure white feathers emerged from her back, and a simple golden ring made up her halo. This was my oldest friend, my closest confidant, and the one I loved.

Sara had posed for the picture. One of her eyes was closed in a wink, and she held up two fingers to make a peace sign. I couldn’t gloss over the fact that she was wearing a white Warmeowger shirt, but I could admit that she made it look a lot better than Jeff did. There was a nervous quality to her smile and face that I found endearing, as though she was silently terrified that the picture wouldn’t go over well with her boyfriend.

That was not something she had to worry about.

[[Patron Message]]

Ant, why are you staring at it so intensely? Is it that bad?

I couldn’t help but smile warmly at Sara’s latest message, and shook my head as I imagined the expression she had to be making. “There’s just so much beauty in the world, you know?” I asked. “This is perfect, Sara. Thank you. It’s exactly what I need before I siege a dungeon.”

There was no answer as I stared at the image of my girlfriend, my heart beating faster at the sight of her than it did at the prospect of completing this dungeon.

“Alright!” I suddenly yelled, perhaps a bit more enthusiastically than I usually would, and I thrust the photo back into my inventory. “I’m fired up and ready to go!”

Running towards the skyscraper, I pulled out my Vague Stick and Golden Bowling Ball. Mounting the former like the broomstick from before, I started flying towards the fourth floor by Pushing and Lifting at the same time. 

Casually tossing the bowling ball, I Pushed it into the window I was heading for, shattering it before Pulling it back into my hand. The moment I crossed the threshold into the dungeon, I dismounted and slid across the ground on my Heelies.

Everything in the building, aside from the lobby, had been changed to fit a theme. Instead of something like a modern office, the interior had been changed so that everything from top to bottom, aside from the windows, looked like they were made from limestone. This floor was large, and if the walls didn’t come to my chest then the whole thing would have been a labyrinth.

The moment I came to a stop, I stabbed my Vague Stick forward. It slammed into a Kobold corpse, piercing its eye socket and coming out of the back of its skull. Raising it up, I swung it towards another, and they both fell to the ground. The screams of the damned rose all around me as the corpses I hadn’t attacked already started to stand up. 

Even before the first corpse fully stood up, I jumped up onto the chest-high wall to get my bearings.

Unlike the ones back in Etson, these Kobolds were of the reptilian variety. Their brown scales were pulled thin over their bodies as if they had spent too much time baking in the sun, and it easily flaked off onto the ground with every move they made. Empty sockets and gnashing teeth turned towards me. The ones closest to me picked up broken bronze-age swords, spears, and shields when they stood, and they came up to just above my waist.

A musty and slightly spicy smell filled my nose. Unlike other undead, these desiccated corpses had been well taken care of, and the room didn’t reek of death and decay. It also meant that these monsters were in better shape than others.

My eyes focused on a large column on the far side of the floor. There wasn’t as large a concentration of Kobolds there, and the damn thing nearly blended in with the walls behind it since it looked like everything else. It was a good thing that I knew what I was looking for, and I started jumping from wall to wall to get there.

All around me, the corpses were still rising. It started with the ones closest to where I made my entrance, but rippled out through the whole room. That wasn’t just happening here, but everywhere in the skyscraper. My intrusion was the trigger for waking up the whole dungeon. Nothing was going to go as smoothly as it did on this floor.

Despite the precarious footfalls, I didn’t slip on any of the walls as I quickly made my way across the room. I was outpacing the rapidly awakening undead by a good margin. By the time I made it to the next floor I’d have to get to, those above would be fully awakened, and that made my task a lot more demanding.

Once I was within twenty feet or so, I came to a stop and jumped down between the walls. I stomped on a corpse when I hit the ground, crushing a Kobold’s skull with my foot, and raised My Golden Bowling Ball. Throwing it, I Pushed it straight for the column.

Enemies grabbed onto my ankles with short, clawed fingers, and I activated Shield around myself before they could deal much damage. Not taking my eyes off of the ball, I swung the Vague Stick and obliterated one’s head even as I lifted my foot out of the other’s grip and broke its neck.

My Golden Bowling Ball struck the column as hard as I was able to make it, and the thin sheet of limestone obscuring the hidden item crumbled. I Pulled the ball back to my hand as the dust cleared, and I could see the object I was looking for.

Inside, still partially obstructed, was a spear. The haft was made from a sanded, reddish-brown wood with a set of three feathers hanging right below the spear’s point. The tip itself was made of bronze. Even though I couldn’t see it from here, I knew that it was etched with the likeness of a falcon’s head as seen from above, and that’s the bird its feathers would have come from.

Climbing back onto the wall, I lashed out at two more corpses that tried to reach up for me. Even though they were sloppy, hasty strikes, my Strength was high enough to dispatch them with relative ease. I surged forward towards the column, catching glimpses of a fast moving enemy sprinting through the labyrinth. All I saw was bronze scales cresting the walls before it disappeared.

I lost sight of it as it ran through the maze of walls, but I could hear it scraping against the limestone as it hustled through the level. This was the boss of this floor, and destroying the wall concealing the spear had made it wake up much faster than it would have otherwise.

Dropping into a long hallway, I brought My Golden Bowling Ball down on an undead Kobold with a shield, breaking its wooden protection and then its face. In one smooth motion, I threw the ball into my inventory and placed both hands on the Vague Stick.

The corpses here had already woken up, arming themselves with whatever weapons and shields they had laying around. A brief glimpse of the boss showed me which direction it was going to come from, and I placed a Force Field behind me to stop the Kobolds there. The ones this early were still mindless, and due to their small size they bumped into the ability without causing it much damage.

While there wasn’t a lot of room to swing my Vague Stick left or right given the hallway’s dimensions, there was plenty of space above. As the Kobolds from the other side of the hall started coming at me, I elongated the Vague Stick into a long spear. Downward swings and precises thrusts had a pile at my feet in no time.

There was no roar or scream that announced the presence of the boss. Instead, I heard it trampling over the Kobolds behind me. I turned to face the beast as I willed spikes to grow out of my Vague Stick. This naturally made it shorter, though I kept the thick spearhead at the end. Instead of attacking, I threw it on the ground and started backpedaling over the mound of corpses I had created.

The boss was a fifteen foot long crocodile with bronze-plated scales and a golden mask covering its face and the inside of its mouth. Although it looked like it was too large to fit through the hallways, the monster moved with surprising agility. The long, knife-like claws on his fore and hind legs tore up both the limestone floor and the Kobolds it trampled to get to me.

Something behind me struck my Shield, but I didn’t turn to look. Instead, I kicked backwards, pushing it back but keeping my eyes on the crocodile. The timing here was critical in order to get this fight over with quickly. Its bronze scales were hard to break through, and because of the mask it wore, the soft parts of its mouth like the throat and tongue were covered by metal. That made it so there weren’t many weak points when fighting it head on. Since it didn’t need to eat or breathe, the mask made sense.

The second it was about to trample over my Vague Stick, I Lifted it from the tip. While the top of the boss was well protected, there was almost no need for its belly to be. The spearhead pierced through its soft, undead flesh as it tore through the hallway, and I started Pushing and Spinning the weapon to churn its insides.

Regardless of how much damage I could do with this method, the boss was incapable of feeling pain. It continued to charge me as the Vague Stick pushed deeper into its guts. I charged forward in kind, arms ready to subdue it. Mentally, I readied the Vambrace of Wires as well.

The closer it got to me, the wider it opened its terrifying maw. It came to the point where it couldn’t see me due to the unnatural angle its mouth was sitting at. That was when I kicked the top Kobold from the pile forward.

Its jaws snapped closed the moment the corpse hit its teeth, and I jumped as it charged through the pile. I readjusted myself midair to land on its back, the Vambrace of Wires already spewing out rope for me. Snaking the Cable Conglomerate around its massive golden muzzle, I kept its mouth closed while attempting to steer the beast forward.

This was the first time that I had this particular item for the fight, but it was proving to be a lot of fun.

Even though I couldn’t see it anymore, I still had a mental hold on the Vague Stick. I made sure that it kept Spinning inside the crocodile’s huge body, and I knew it was only a matter of time before it took enough damage to stop. Until then, I did my best to steer it through the hallways, trampling any corpses that dared to come near. The boss ran into a lot of walls, though I managed to keep it from any head on collisions.

Still, this creature was meant to be a tanky one, and its hit point pool was truly fitting for such a creature. It was the first real challenge of the skyscraper that wasn’t just pure numbers. The hallways were set up so that it was in a prime environment to protect itself and keep people from efficiently ganging up on it.

I rode around on it for nearly two minutes crushing Kobolds before it finally collapsed. Not dead for the second time, as the boss was still moving its claws and tail, but it was no longer a threat. Recalling the Cable Conglomerate back to the vambrace, I jumped over its head and onto the ground, having to avoid a few newly flattened Kobolds.

Now that its mouth was free, it attempted to crawl and snap but there was no power in its movements anymore. Because of my position in front of it, I started Pushing and Pulling the Vague Stick inside as I continued to make it Spin. It was a lot easier now that it had stopped.

There was no fanfare or victory screen when it finally stopped moving for good. Taking a breath, I shook my head and pulled out my knife; not only did I have to retrieve my weapon, but its head and scales were a gold mine for the Monstersmith. Luckily, almost every other bad guy on the floor had been taken care of, and I could take my time.