Earth
Hillside Lake Dungeon, Ontario
August 17, 2019
20:08 EDT

I couldn’t see what Ben was unhappy about. As on the previous floor, we were standing up on a platform overlooking the room. This time it was a straight shot to the other side rather than a curving room, though the end seemed to be pretty far away. A kilometer at least. Judging by the goblins appearing and disappearing in the long room, there also seemed to be a number of possibly large rooms adjacent to it.

“What’s up?” Mason asked, looking at Ben.

“I’m not a hundred percent sure, but I think this is a gauntlet. You see the goblins walking into rooms and coming out of them? You can consider each of those barracks, likely holding hundreds, if not thousands of goblins inside. I don’t have any binoculars, but I’m guessing if you looked across the room you would see a floor boss or something waiting. We have to make our way up those steps to stop the gauntlet. The longer we take, the harder it gets.”

“Well, we don’t have binoculars, but I do have something better,” I said before beginning to transform.

About a minute or later I was done. Spreading my wings, I jumped up onto the railing. It only took a second to balance myself and then I looked across the room. It was my first time switching to this form, but I was amazed by the distance at which I was able to see, as well as the clarity.

Sure enough, as I looked across the room I saw a group of hobgoblins sitting around a fire. They looked as though they were only a few dozen meters away, rather than the kilometer or so I knew they were. There were six of them sitting there, each of them apparently doing a task of some sort.

The warrior was dragging a whetstone across the head of his axe, as did the assassin beside him with one of her daggers. Next to them, an archer was fletching arrows and depositing them into his quiver. There were three casters, though I had no idea what they were, besides the one with the gnarled staff. He was clearly a druid, though the others could be mages, shamans or even a necromancer for all I knew. There was simply no way of knowing without engaging them.

“Aww, pretty birdy,” Anja said as she stroked my back.

I turned my head to peck at her hand, but it was already gone, a mischievous little smile on her face. I flew a short distance away and then shifted back to my human form before relaying what I’d seen.

“I doubt one of them is a necromancer, you usually see the signs of that. They’re either shamans or mages, though the former is more likely. Goblins aren’t the smartest of creatures,” Ben explained.

“So how do we deal with this?” I asked, walking over and placing my hands on the railing.

“Regular goblins will probably be the first thing we meet but they’re fairly weak, so we can probably just ignore them for the most part. We should just sprint past the first few rooms until we start facing hobs. Even then, we should just kill the hobs and keep moving. If we get bogged down, we’re going to be in serious trouble. I doubt Teleport works in this room, so we can’t just teleport to safety.”

“They shouldn’t attack right away, right? That should give you some time to summon your elemental and they’ll probably avoid it like the plague, which will give us some breathing room. Besides, I’ll be able to roast any that are near us since I’ll be in my dragonkin form.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Mason said. “I’ll also summon my elemental and send it out ahead of us. It should be able to clear a path for us.”’

---

With a strategy in mind, I shifted into my dragonkin form and waited until both Ben and Mason had summoned their elementals. Since the elementals wouldn’t last forever, we started moving as soon as they were ready.

There were few goblins milling about, but they swarmed out of the adjacent rooms as soon as one that was moving between rooms noticed us and cried out in alarm. Heedless of the danger, the lone goblin charged forward, only to be crushed below the earth elemental as it moved forward.

Mason and I were right behind it, cutting at any goblins we could as we advanced, while the twins were doing the same just behind us. Their jobs would be to take care of the first few hobs we came across, though Anja would also be keeping Precognition up as much as possible in case there were assassins around.

Ben was at the back with his fire elemental, making sure that we didn’t get attacked from behind. I had looked back once to see that the goblins were avoiding it as much as they could, instead deciding to go for Ben, without having any luck. Especially when the fire elemental could simply wave one of its large ‘hands’ over Ben’s Mana Shield and set any goblins around him ablaze.

[Stop!] sounded in my mind, the source of it being Sonja. [There is a trap just ahead!]

[Where?] I asked as I cut through two goblins in quick succession before turning my attention to one of the hobgoblins that had appeared.

[Just in front of Mason’s elemental. I’m seeing a thin aura that cuts through the room, so we’ll have to trigger it before we can advance.]

I narrowly avoided a slash from the hobgoblin, dodging to the side while thrusting forward with my cutlass. The attack found its mark, but it wasn’t life threatening. Raising my leg, I kicked the hobgoblin which had the effect of pulling my sword free, while also completely crushing his chest. It was impossible to tell that there was a trap in front of us as I turned, the interlocked brick floor looking the same, as did the walls and the ceiling.

[Alright, Ben. You’re up!]

I moved back to take his place, while he took mine and began summoning a skeleton to walk forward and trigger the trap. While he was busy, the fire elemental did little than just stand there, but it did block a decent part of the room, leaving me to cover the rest. All of the goblins coming from behind us were the regular variety, so it was very easy to take care of them.

“Holy fuck!” Mason exclaimed from behind me.

I breathed in before exhaling, sending a jet of flame towards the goblins charging towards us. Some of them tried to dodge, though none were fast enough to get out of the way. Knowing that I had bought some time, I turned and looked to see what got Mason to react like that.

I was confused by what I was seeing at first. There was a wall that had sprung up out of nowhere, though it had bits and pieces of goblins sticking out of it. Upon closer inspection, I saw that it was actually an insane amount of spikes. They shot out from both walls, the floor and the ceiling, and interlocked together, totally blocking our progress forward. I could already see them being pulled back into their hiding places, though it seemed that it would take a while at the current rate.

[Let me know when we can proceed!] I said as I turned back to the goblins who were coming up from behind us.

Between their fellow goblins being on fire, and the fire elemental standing beside me, it seemed that the rest of the goblins hadn’t wanted to move forward. Now that most of those fires were out, they renewed their attack. While breathing fire did buy me a little bit of time, it also allowed the waves of goblins to stack up, and now there were hundreds of them charging towards us. We would also likely see the same scene ahead as the traps receded, though there would be hobs mixed in.

Ben suddenly reappeared beside me and his elemental began moving forward.

[I thought you said movement skills wouldn’t work,] I said as I cut through a goblin and turned towards another.

[No, I said that Teleport probably wouldn’t work,] he replied. A moment later meteors started falling from the ceiling, crushing any goblins who were dumb enough to run under that spot. Which was a lot of them.

Since they weren’t needed in front of us, the twins turned and helped Ben and I clean up the goblins who were charging towards us. We knew that the elementals wouldn’t last too much longer, so we wanted to clear as much of them from behind us as we could before proceeding once more.

What seemed like ten minutes later, Mason finally called me back to the front. With Ben and the twins covering for me, I blinked forward as the spikes were about five or six feet away from receding completely. Goblins were already firing arrows at us, or launching rocks with slings, but they just bounced off our Mana Shields, or the earth elemental’s body.

There were truly a mind-boggling amount of goblins in front of us, and we still had at least half a kilometer to go, if not slightly more. So many goblins bunched together was an opportunity that I couldn’t pass up. This time when I breathed in, deeper than I ever had before, I felt something different inside my chest. Focusing on that feeling, I exhaled.

This time it wasn’t a jet of flame that was projected from my mouth. It was a cloud of extreme cold. After realizing that I had learned how to breathe something other than fire, I began turning my head, sweeping the freezing cold breath from side to side. The first few ranks of goblins, the regular and hobs alike, were frozen completely solid, their faces a visage of surprise, fear or anger.

The goblins further back weren’t faring much better, either. Some were shivering uncontrollably while others seemed to have varying levels of frostbite. I turned to look at Mason, the smile dropping from my face as I saw him. His teeth were chattering while his arms were crossed in front of him. There was actually frost on his eyebrows and what looked like a small icicle forming in his left nostril.

[Are you okay?] I asked, concerned.

He was looking at the goblins in front of us and turned when I started sending. [Warn a guy when you’re going to do something like that. You may not be affected, but it’s fucking freezing in here now.]

[It wasn’t planned, I just learned how to do it. At least know I know not to use it around friendlies.]

He seemed to be doing better and was no longer shivering as much, the suit probably providing a decent amount of protection. [Well, time’s a wastin’,] he said, at which point the earth elemental began moving forward.

Goblins fell over and shattered into pieces as the earth elemental plowed forward, clearing us a narrow corridor through the ranks of frozen goblins. After jumping up and down and flexing his arms, Mason channeled mana into his halberd and followed after it. I turned to look at Ben and the twins, to see that they were still battling the endless horde of goblins that were behind us.

[Time to go, guys!] I called to them.

[Be right there!] the twins replied as they started a fighting retreat with Ben right behind them.

I waited until they were in the corridor being formed before turning and joining Mason who was beginning to fight the goblins that hadn’t been frozen. I used Blink to catch up and then took the left side while he took the right.

I breathed in again, this time focusing on breathing fire rather than extreme cold. My control and power seemed to get a bit stronger each time I used it, so I was able to maintain the jet of fire and sweep it over the goblins for a longer amount of time. It still wasn’t that long, at only five or six seconds, but it was enough to take out at least a hundred goblins in that time.

We ended up making it another hundred meters or so before the magic holding Mason’s earth elemental ran out and it collapsed into a pile of rubble. The room also got a tad darker shortly after, so I knew that Ben’s elemental had dissipated as well. Mason quickly moved to the back and Anja joined me as we slowly made our way down the long room.

I was occasionally able to breathe fire at the goblins, but couldn’t do it all the time as my throat got sore if I used it too much. That left us to use our normal abilities and weapons, but it was enough. Anja was like a demon, disappearing and reappearing all over the place. Each time, a goblin’s head fell from its shoulders or it simply collapsed into a heap.

Things did end up getting more difficult at around a hundred meters away from the base of the steps, as hobgoblins were the only ones coming out of the two or three adjacent rooms. They didn’t come out of the rooms as quickly as the regular goblins did early on, but the constant stream of them was enough to stop us in our tracks.

We were completely surrounded by goblins and it looked like we were in trouble until I had an idea. Turning back, I put a hand around Sonja’s waist and lifted her up while turning to do the same thing with her sister.

[Jonathan what..?]

[Hold on! Mace, Ben, activate Mana Shield and follow me!]

With a twin under each arm, I lowered my head and began sprinting through the goblins in front of us. Goblins moved in front of me to try to stop me, but the combination of Mana Shield repelling them and my sheer size and weight meant that none of them could. It really reminded me of playing football in highschool, barreling through the opposing team’s defense with Mason next to me.

Before I knew it, I was climbing the staircase two steps at a time. Looking up at the top I saw the six hobgoblins standing there, though they turned and walked back as if inviting us up. I set the twins down and spun around as soon as I had reached the top. I was surprised, and relieved to see that none of the goblins below had so much as set foot on the first step. It was as if there was a barrier preventing them from following us. That didn’t stop them from shouting something up at us in their native language, but I soon saw them dispersing to go back to different rooms.

Glad that we didn’t need to worry about the goblins behind us, I lowered Mana Shield and turned back towards the six hobgoblins with whom we shared this platform with. It seemed as if the twins were waiting for me to turn, as they each delivered a soft slap to the respective side of my face.

[Next time let us know before you do something like that,] Sonja said with her sister nodding, though not adding anything.

I shrugged, [We needed to move and that would’ve delayed things. I’m not sure if you noticed, but we were completely surrounded.]

[We’re not saying we aren’t appreciative, it was quick thinking. Just let us know, first,] Anja said. [We could’ve attacked you if we didn’t know it was you.]

[Alright, alright. If a situation like that comes up again, I’ll let you know before picking you up. I think I would rather get the two of you Mana Shield as well, because then you could’ve just followed behind us. Now do you mind if we turn our attention to the matter at hand,] I finished, gesturing to the goblins in front of us.

They nodded and spun around.

It was one thing to look at the goblins from over a kilometer away, and another from up close. The warrior that had been sharpening his axe was shirtless, his muscular chest being covered by scars of various sizes. He had a set of leather bracers and pants, though his feet were left bare, as was common for goblins, it seemed.

The female hobgoblin next to him was clad in dark leather armor, and seemed to have some sort of mask or ability that hid her face from view, absorbing the light almost as if her face was a black hole. There were two sword pommels sticking out above her shoulders, as well as two smaller pommels that could be seen peeking from beneath the shroud she wore.

The archer was garbed in something similar to the assassin, though it was more green than black and went without the shroud that the assassin wore. He used a type of bow I had never seen before, but Sonja identified it as a reflex bow. In addition to the quiver on his back, he also had one on his hip, which was something I hadn’t noticed earlier.

The three casters were all dressed differently and there were two males and one female. The female wore the least clothing of any of them, having a simple strap of cloth that covered her breasts, and a loincloth to cover the rest. She was wearing quite a bit of jewelry, though they seemed to be made out of bones and feathers, for the most part. She had some sort of charm in one hand, and a short walking-stick like object in the other. Ben said he thought she might be a shaman, but we would have to wait and see.

Both the druid and the unknown hobgoblin were dressed very similarly, the only difference being their staves. The druid’s staff had a gnarled head on top of it, looking almost like he was using a very old root as his staff, while the unknown hobgoblin was using a straight, featureless staff. The only decoration on it being the cloth grip about halfway down it’s length. Ben couldn’t make heads or tails of the unknown hobgoblin, which meant that we would need to be wary of it during the fight.

We decided to change things up when engaging this group of hobgoblins. Rather than have Mason or I go after the druid, Anja would deal with it. Between Precognition, Stealth and Shadowstep, she’d be able to avoid the vines the best out of any of us, as well as keep an eye out for where the assassin would strike. Sonja would take on the warrior, while also keeping an eye out on the unknown hobgoblin, since she would be able to react the quickest.

Mason would work on the archer since he had a longer reach than I did, and that longer reach would make the archer spend more time dodging and less time attacking. That meant that I would be dealing with the shaman, which probably wouldn’t take very long and would allow me to help out wherever I was needed. Along with buffing the rest of us, Ben would pretty much be a floater, helping out where he could.

As soon as we were ready, Mason and I ran in, using our respective movement skills to close the distance. For me that was two quick blinks, but for Mason that involved running for a bit longer. I had actually appeared behind the shaman with my second Blink only for my sword to connect with a staff rather than the shaman’s neck. Looking over, I saw that the wielder of the staff was the unknown hobgoblin.

His intervention allowed the shaman to move away, and she did, but not before buffing the hobgoblin that had saved her, first. He grew just a tiny bit larger, and his staff began putting off a soft white glow. Pulling his staff back and going through a quick routine that looked an awful lot like something that someone who practiced martial arts would use to intimidate. He even raised his hand, palm up, and waved me forward.

I indulged him, using Siphoning Strike with one sword and following it up with Quick Slash from the other. He managed to dodge both of them, parrying one to the side while sidestepping the other and actually hit me in the back with his staff as he moved around me. Spinning, I attempted to land a hit or two, but they connected with nothing but air, the hobgoblin being nowhere in sight. What there was, was an impact to the back of my head. My armor absorbed the brunt of it, though it still stung a bit.

Rather than put up Mana Shield as I normally did, I activated Precognition instead. Spinning again, I saw that he was standing where he was when we waved me forward, and was in the very same stance, hand raised in front of him and all. Going on the offensive again, I launched a series of attacks that the hobgoblin successfully dodged, though I was looking for an opening.

It didn’t take me long to find it thanks to Precognition, and I immediately ceased channeling mana into one of my swords while reaching to my waist and pulling out the handle for my spear. Quickly channeling mana into it, I thrust forward to where I knew the hobgoblin was going to appear, though it didn’t strike its mark as I was expecting it to. I had seen it impaling the hobgoblin’s heart, but he managed to dodge out of the way somehow, if only slightly, causing it to lodge itself in his gut instead. It had been a strike using Barbed Spear, so it meant that the hobgoblin would be bleeding for the rest of the fight, barring some sort of intervention.

With my spear still stuck in the hobgoblin’s chest, I stopped channeling mana into my cutlass and activated my shield, this time hitting him with a Shield Bash. He didn’t try to free himself from my spear, instead raising his staff to try to ward off the attack. It didn’t work as well as he had hoped, as he couldn’t move as freely as he was accustomed to, and because I had put so much force behind the strike. It struck with his neck, stunning him and nearly knocking him over, my spear being the only thing keeping him up. With the time I now had, I ripped my spear free before thrusting forward once more, this time hitting my original target.

The hobgoblin choked up some blood as my spear shredded his heart, and soon ceased all movement. With one down, I scanned the room to see where the shaman was, only to see her dead not too far from where the druid and I had been fighting, an arrow sticking out of one of her eyes.

Sonja was still fighting the warrior, though he had a few broken arrows sticking out of him, and seemed to be bleeding quite a bit, while she didn’t even have a scratch on her. Anja was battling some vines as she was fighting the druid, but she wasn’t getting bogged down like Mason and I had.

Speaking of Mason, I turned to see how he was doing just in time to see the head of his halberd cut clean through one of the limbs that made up the archer’s bow. Quickly pulling his halberd back, he started a sweeping motion, letting go until his hand was holding onto the very end of his weapon. The archer tried to dodge, but wasn’t fast enough. While Mason’s halberd didn’t knock the archer off his feet, it was in prime position to do so, thanks to the hook on the opposite side of the axe head. The hook captured the archer’s foot, which sent him to the floor with a quick pull from Mason. All it took after that was a quick thrust from Mason, and that was half of the hobgoblins dead.

Realizing I hadn’t seen the assassin since the fight started, I looked around the room until I saw her fighting Ben. Or trying to, at least. She was wielding what looked like two short katanas, though I didn’t know what they were actually called. I was sure that Anja would fill me in on them later, but I didn’t dwell on them.

Watching the fight, I saw that while the assassin wasn’t doing any damage to him, he also wasn’t doing any damage to her. Every time he would finish casting a Fireball, she would have already moved. He also didn’t have any abilities that did damage in an area around him, so the only other option he would have is casting Meteor Shower on himself. That didn’t seem like something he would want to do.

I had no doubt in my mind that the assassin would be dead if she had been fighting Mason. With so many abilities that can knock people down, or back, she wouldn’t be able to dance around as freely as she was currently doing.

I had deactivated Precognition when I finished with the unknown hobgoblin, but reactivated it while watching Ben fight the assassin. As soon as I found an opening, I blinked forward, appearing behind the assassin. Gripping her shoulder with one hand, I thrust with my reactivated sword through her back before twisting and pulling it free. She collapsed to her knees, and that was four goblins down.

Or five, actually. I looked over to the side and saw that the warrior had finally fallen, which meant that Anja was the only one still fighting. Again. This time she didn’t seem to be playing, however, as she was still battling the vines that the druid was using.

[Is that all druids can do?] I asked, looking over at Ben.

[On a floor like this, and at this level, pretty much,] he nodded. [It would’ve been a nightmare if we had faced one on the big floor. He would have been able to awaken the trees and get them to do the fighting for him. At higher levels, they can transform into a few different animals, and they gain some additional attacks. Besides the roots or vines or whatever you want to call them, it’s likely that all he has is some minor healing ability.]

[If you four want to stop standing around, I could probably use some help here! This guy isn’t nearly as easy as I thought he’d be…] Anja said.

I heard chuckling from beside me, and then there were four arrows flying at the druid in quick succession. He had his back to us, so he wasn’t able to see them coming. All four struck the hobgoblin in the back and after stumbling forward, he fell to his knees. The vines stopped their attack at the same time, allowing Anja to cut off the hobgoblins head with a flick of her wrist.

[Thanks, sis!] she said.

After cleaning off her sword, she put it away and waited for the body to disappear. Once she collected the Mana Gem, she walked over and joined the rest of us.

[So what was that unknown hobgoblin?] Anja asked. [Was it a mage?]

I shook my head. [It was some sort of martial artist. I tried taking the shaman out at the beginning of the fight, but my sword was blocked by his staff. We started fighting and he was dodging all my attacks. Got a few in on me as well before I activated precognition.]

[Ooh, that sounds like a monk, or something like it, anyways.]

[Are you sure?] Ben asked. [I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a hobgoblin that was a monk.]

[He didn’t seem to cast anything and he fought in melee using his staff. I don’t know what else it could be.]

[Huh. I’ll have to do some reading later tonight. I suppose it could be something unique to this dungeon, but stuff like that is rather rare.]

[Well I’m not complaining. I’d rather fight a monk than have another caster to deal with. Especially if that caster is a mage.]

---

We took a minute to gather the few Mana Gems that were scattered around us, and that’s when I had a thought.

[Hey, Ben. Should we be heading back down there to see if there is any loot?]

He looked over and shook his head. [Nah. You don’t get experience or loot for killing monsters during a gauntlet. It would be too easy for a team with a good strategy to farm the monsters to level up quicker and get high quality loot.]

[Oh,] I said, walking back over to join the group.

We made our way down the staircase that had opened up and immediately went through the door. There was a common theme with the last few floors, as each of them gave us a view of what we would be facing. This floor, for example, was a massive rectangular room with a maze taking up all of it.

The walls of the maze were at least six or seven meters tall, which would make climbing them very difficult. Still, the vantage point we had would probably allow us to plot our way through the maze, had we been patient enough to sit there and do that. We were working on limited time, so that meant that we just walked down the steps and got started.

Ben and Sonja led the way as they usually did when we were dealing with narrow corridors. Ben so he could see to command his skeletons, and Sonja so she could detect and point out traps. Ben also had his luminescent chalk in his hand so he could mark the directions we had gone in, just in case there was a disorienting aura present on this floor.

We had been walking for about ten minutes where we had to backtrack three times, and disarm two traps, before I had an idea.

[Hold up a minute, guys.]

I began shifting forms, soon standing there in my Scyftan fox form. I looked up at Anja pointedly before beginning to scan my surroundings. I was able to tell that there was another dead end around the turn ahead of us, so we turned around and went back the way we had come once more.

It wasn’t completely foolproof, as the room we were in was massive and I could only scan about one hundred meters away from me, if not a bit less than that. Still, it did increase the rate at which we advanced through the maze. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to detect the traps like Sonja was able to, so that meant that I had to stay at the back and direct Ben and Sonja on where to go.

The amount of traps we had encountered slowed us down quite a bit, but we finally got to the end of the floor about fifty minutes or so after we had entered. The end was a comparatively small area, and all that was waiting for us was a lone hobgoblin. He was a bit bigger than others we had come across, but he was still alone.

He was seated with a one handed axe draped across his lap, while another identical one sat on the bench beside him. He looked up as he brought the whetstone across the head of his axe, but looked back down and continued working, as if our presence didn’t bother him one bit. After a few more passes of the whetstone, he tested the axe’s edge and then set it off to the side and grabbed the second one.

[What’s the deal with this guy?] Mason asked.

[There are two possibilities, I think. The first is that he is a berserker. They hit harder and move and attack faster as they take damage, which makes them exceedingly dangerous in a prolonged fight. The second possibility is that he is an axe thrower. They’re less dangerous, but still pretty formidable. Typically, they’ll have an ability that makes their axes behave like boomerangs. If they miss, they’ll circle through the air so he can retrieve them, or if they hit, he’ll be able to call them back to him, almost like telekinesis.]

---

It ended up being the latter rather than the former, as the axe-throwing hobgoblin leapt up, doing some sort of acrobatic flip before throwing both of his axes while he was still in the air. He opted to throw both of them at me, since I was the largest target now that I was in my dragonkin form. I channeled mana into both of my weapons, intending to bat them out of the air, which is when I noticed that they were glowing red.

I dodged the first one, though that put me right in the path of the second one. Knowing I wouldn’t be able to move out of the way in time, I raised my left sword to block it, only to have my sword literally shatter as the axe head connected with it. The collision did knock the axe slightly off course, but it did continue on, easily cutting through my armor and opening up a few inches of my side.

I cursed, and placed my hand on the wound. Immediately afterward I felt pain in my chest signifying that another healing agent had been injected into my system.

[Jonathan, get down!] Anja shouted.

I let myself go limp, falling to the floor just in time to see the two axes soar past me on their way back to their master. Getting up, I looked at my wound to see that it was already getting smaller, and would soon look like I wasn’t injured at all. Besides the rip in my armor, that is.

I got back to my feet, putting the shattered sword back into my suit’s storage while grabbing a brand new one. Activating Mana Shield, I rushed towards the hobgoblin knowing that he wouldn’t be able to use the same ability for a while. Mason and Anja had already closed the distance and were surrounding the hob, though he seemed to be just as good in melee as he was at throwing his axes.

He easily parried the attacks that came from the two of them, all while dodging the occasional arrow shot by Sonja, but it left him with very little time to counterattack. As I ran forward, I watched the hobgoblin’s axe cut through the air where Anja had been milliseconds before hand, and he was visibly shocked when he didn’t connect with her. He was even more shocked when there was an intense pain that suddenly flared up as Anja cut through one of his hamstrings, effectively crippling him for the rest of the fight.

Or so I thought.

He shouted and glowed red, the wound getting smaller and smaller as I got closer. Or maybe that was him getting bigger and bigger. He also got noticeably faster after taking the hit.

[Oh shit, he’s a berserker!] Ben yelled.

It seemed as if the axe throw was only his opening move, and that is why he was so proficient in melee combat. I finally closed the distance, using an overhand chop, but the berserker raised his axe behind his head, easily blocking the attack while also blocking an attack from Anja, and dodging a thrust from Mason.

[You’re up, Mace!] I said as I thrust forward with my other sword, meeting nothing but air.

Anja and I used our respective movement skills to get out of the way, just as Mason lifted his foot and brought it back down. About three meters all around him, the ground shook and started breaking up. Mason was unaffected by Tremor but the berserker wasn’t. His foot fell into a newly-formed hole, which sent him crashing down to one knee, just as a Fireball and a number of arrows and Ice Shards were fired at him. He attempted to dodge to the side, but with his foot trapped he could only move out of a few of the attacks.

The Fireball flew past him, as did some of the Ice Shards, but all four arrows connected. They didn’t hit anywhere vital, but that didn’t seem to matter. The berserker glowed brighter and grew bigger, likely reaching, or surpassing, eight feet in height. After the tremors stopped, the berserker planted his free foot on the solid ground and then crouched down.

With a powerful leap, he pulled his foot out of the ground and tossed his axes again, this time spreading them out and going for Ben and Sonja. Both of them were easily able to dodge out of the way, and they also kept an eye out for their return trip.

Realizing that I had an opportunity here, I stopped channeling mana into my weapons and let go, before using Blink twice in quick succession, each time grabbing one of the berserker’s axes. Apparently that wasn’t enough to stop them from returning to the berserker, as he had his hands raised in front of him as he dodged attacks from Mason. Planting my feet on the floor, I tried to stop them from moving, but had no such luck.

[Mace, get out of the way!]

He wasted no time turning and activating Dash, while I was already breathing in. When I was about ten feet away from the berserker, I unleashed my breath weapon, projecting a cloud of extreme cold towards him.

Dense fog formed as soon as the cold reached the berserker, totally obstructing him from view. I knew he was still alive, however, because I was still being dragged towards him. He wasn’t obstructed from view for long, his hands reaching out and grabbing onto the axes. As he leaned forward, I realized that the cold hadn’t done any damage at all to him. He got even bigger.

Letting go of the axes, I quickly locked my hands around his wrists so he wouldn’t be able to get away. I breathed in again, this time projecting a jet of fire at him point blank. The flames obstructed my view of him again, but I did hear him briefly cry out in pain as he let go of his axes, sending them clattering to the floor. There were a few strong tugs before he fell to the floor, and I was able to see him again.

I let go seeing as he was very, very dead. The upper half of his body was burnt to a crisp, while the lower half looked fairly normal, considering. His body started disintegrating shortly after, a single Mana Gem in its place. I bent down to pick it up just as my friends walked up beside me.

[Y’know, maybe if you opened up with that, then maybe things like this wouldn’t happen,] Anja said as she poked my side where there was now a new hole in my armor.

I shrugged as I turned my head toward her. [That would make things way too easy though.]

[Probably,] she nodded.

I took out my phone, gently manipulating the controls to check what time it was. I saw that it was now past 22:00, which meant that we had been inside of dungeons for something like fifteen hours or so now. Letting them decide, I asked whether they would like to continue or call it for the night.

[I’m fine with whatever,] Mason said. [We said that we wanted to clear this dungeon, so we’ll have to come back tomorrow anyways.]

[I say we wait until tomorrow. We still have all of the next floor, and the one after that to clear before we can fight the boss, and who knows what is in store for us. It could be another two or three hours or so before we even reach the boss.]

Nodding I turned to the twins. [Ladies?]

They looked at each other briefly before turning back to the rest of us. [We agree with Ben. We’ve been fighting or walking all day and it will be good to get some rest. We can come back tomorrow and knock things out before deciding where we want to go next.]

[Alright, give me a minute to switch forms and then we’ll head back to the surface,] I said before beginning to shift back. While that was happening, I had to make sure that our transportation would be ready. [Hey, Zaszi. We’re calling it for the night and will be back at the parking lot shortly. Can you meet us there?]

[Sure thing. How’d it go today?]

[It was probably our most successful day so far. I’ve even got the holes in my suit to prove it,] I chuckled. [I don’t even remember how many times we leveled, but we all got at least one piece of gear.]

[Great!] she replied. [Well, I’m here in the parking lot so I’ll see you in a few minutes.]

[Cool. I’m still shifting back to my human form. It’s annoying how much time it takes to switch between forms.]

I heard her laugh within Mindspeak. [It gets better, I promise you. As you shift, it will gradually get faster and faster. It will never become instant, but it will decrease the amount of time it takes to shift by at least half, if not more.]

[I can’t wait for that,] I said as I finished shifting back into my human form. Reaching up to my head, I channeled mana into my helmet which loosened it and allowed me to pull it off. Stowing it in my storage, I turned and joined my friends who were standing just at the top of the steps that led to the nineteenth floor. [Alright, we’re headed up now.]

“Zaszi will be waiting for us up top. She’ll open up a portal so I can just drive us back to HQ,” I explained.

“Man, Portal is the best thing ever,” Mason said as he led the way down the steps. “Without it, we’d have a very long drive ahead of us.”

“Or we’d just sleep in a hotel,” I replied. “It is a very nice ability though. We’ve definitely gotta practice using it, then we could open up a portal from here to there all by ourselves.”

---

It was a longer staircase than we had seen previously, taking nearly three minutes to reach the bottom. I was tempted to open up the doors to see what we would be facing on the nineteenth floor, but I stepped onto the waygate instead. Making my way outside, I saw that Zaszi was wearing her civilian clothes and was leaning up against the SUV.

“You really weren’t kidding about the holes in your suit,” she said, walking forward to examine them. “Let me guess; penetrating attacks?”

“That’s right. This one was from a two-handed axe, I think,” I replied, reaching up to the one on my shoulder before pointing down to the one on the left side of my torso. “And this one just happened. A goblin berserker threw his axes at me and it cut right through my sword. It deflected slightly, but still gave me a nice gash as it flew by.

She nodded. “Penetrating attacks are a bitch, even at higher level dungeons. The next set of armor you can use will provide a bit more protection, but you’re a ways off from being able to use it. The armor you’re in is shot, though. I’ll make sure another set is delivered to your room when we get back.”

“It can’t be repaired?” I asked.

“Nope. As soon as there is a hole in it, it begins to lose integrity. It’s similar to the old ballistic vests in that respect. They’re good at protecting against a few shots, but after that they aren’t nearly as effective.”

“I see. How about we get going, yeah?”

“I’m ready when you are,” she said with a nod.

Walking around the SUV, I took out the keyfob and unlocked the doors so my friends could get in while Zaszi walked just in front of the vehicle and waited. After starting it up I nodded at her, and she began opening the portal. It took very little time to form, and she was soon waving me forward. I drove through as I had before, and then pulled into the parking spot that seemed to be mine.

“There wasn’t much point in us getting in as well,” Sonja laughed. “We could’ve just walked through and waited at the door.”

“Meh, it was nice to rest my legs, if only briefly,” Ben said as he opened his door and got out.

I locked up the SUV after everyone had exited and then made my way over to Zaszi. “Thanks for helping us out today. We’ll probably be going back tomorrow, so we could use your services again in the morning.”

“I’ll be on duty tomorrow, but I’ll see if I can spare some time to transport you guys there again. If not, then I’ll see about getting one of the members of the team that was shadowing you today to do it.”

“Works for me. I’ll let you know when we’re going to leave in the morning.”

The two of us walked over to the door where my friends were waiting, holding it open, and the six of us entered the building before heading over to the elevator. A quick security check later and we were descending to the portal room which would take us back to the base. Vixa appeared in front of us as soon as we appeared in the lobby, though I had to pick her up and move to the side as there was another team of people right behind us.

“Hello Vixa! Did you stay out of trouble while I was gone?”

She made a little noise that sounded like she was insulted that I even needed to ask, but soon began purring as Anja walked up and began petting her. After a few minutes of making plans for the next day, we split up, each going to do our own thing with the rest of the night.

I made my way to my room with Vixa following beside me, and immediately got out of the armor I had been wearing for fifteen-plus hours so I could take a shower. With that done, I got dressed in regular clothes and then walked back over to my armor and began taking everything out of it. Just as I finished doing that, there was a knock on my door.

Walking over to it, I opened it to see a young man waiting there carrying a brand new set of armor.

“Wow, that was fast,” I said, waving the man in.

“Commander Alzizsi asked that we deliver a new set to you as soon as possible, since she didn’t know how much longer you would be up. Where would you like me to put this?” he asked.

“I’ll take it,” I said. “I went ahead and took everything out of my old set, as I wasn’t sure what you guys do with them.”

He passed the new set to me before turning over and looking at the set that was laid out on the floor. “We recycle them. The injectors are still functional and the suit is laced with cut Mana Crystals, so after removing those the rest of the armor is destroyed.”

“Destroyed?”

He looked back at me and nodded. “The armor is rather useless after it’s been damaged a few times, and we haven’t come up with a way to recycle the entire suit. There’s really no point in keeping damaged sets stored, so we just incinerate them.”

“Oh.”

He nodded again. “Well, I’ll grab the damaged suit so as to not keep you busy any longer. If you ever need more suits, let us know. You can find us just across from the firing range. Do you know where that is?”

“I do,” I nodded.

“Perfect. I’d better get back to work. It was nice to meet you, sir.” he said as he picked up the damaged suit.

“Nice to meet you, too. What’s your name, by the way?”

“Cody Fulton.”

“Nice to meet you, Cody,” I said, escorting him to the door.

After closing the door behind him, I walked back over to my bed and grabbed the new suit before placing it next to everything I had taken out of the other one. It took no longer to put everything in as it had when taking everything out, and I walked over to my closet and hung it up before shutting off the light and exiting it.

Vixa was laying on her bed cleaning herself, so I didn’t bother her. I had planned to go to the cafeteria to grab a quick snack but grew tired rather quickly. After undressing down to my underwear, I walked over to the bed and climbed in, being followed shortly after by Vixa. She jumped onto the other side of the bed, and after walking in circles for a moment, plopped herself down.

After making myself comfortable, I called out to the room.

“Alarm set: 06:30. Lights: Off.”

The two quick beeps, as well as the lights turning off let me know that the two commands had been recognized. Closing my eyes, I went to sleep. Or tried to, at least. I had the feeling that I was forgetting something, but couldn’t figure out what it was. I had just dozed off when I finally remembered, and I woke back up, my eyes popping open.

“Lights: On.”

When the lights turned back on, I turned to Vixa.

“I’m going to shift into another form, okay? It will still be me, but I just wanted to let you know.”

Her eyes had opened when I began talking, but she gave a little dismissive yip before closing her eyes and tucking her nose under her two bushy tails. Shrugging, I began shifting into my Scyftan form, opting for that rather than my dragonkin form. I wouldn’t gain as much intellect, and mana regen as a result, but it would still be more than I had in my human form.

I saw Vixa look up as the weight on my side of the bed decreased, but she seemed unperturbed about it. She just closed her eyes and tried to go to sleep.

Once I was done shifting, I got comfortable once more and then called out to the room again.

“Lights: Off.”