“Well, what did we learn?” Will asked as they ate lunch overlooking the watering hole.

“The monsters are hypersensitive, but not perceptive. They seem to respond to any sign of a Climber within a hundred yards, but they do not wonder where others might be going if they are beyond that range.” Loth said.

“The opal crocs will probably resist Hammer of God,” Will mused. “Maybe the wirehairs as well.” The pig unicorns and birds were likely to go in one hit. The snot monsters were weak to lightning but they burrowed. Will didn’t know how well the lightning would carry to them if they were shielded by the earth.”

“Worst case estimate, we only kill about thirty to forty percent of the monsters we hit.” Will could easily see the chain lightning effect of Hammer of God stopping dead at one of those two creatures, making it’s effectiveness drop drastically.

“I think it would be good to bring home some Sacrifices from the Wirehairs and the crocs.” Loth said. “Remember the metallic slime?”

Ah, a wirehair combined with a metallic slime? Would that be a class that manipulates metal wires or a class that grows wire hair? Food for thought. Plus the crocs are strong, have tough hide and innate magic resistance. They would make good sacrifices for Warriors.

Will was eventually going to need soldiers. Brianna shouldn’t be burdened with the security of an entire Stronghold.

“You’re not wrong. We’ll bring Badur through next time we come through,” Will said. They had assistants coming up the Tower to make Badur’s life easier, which meant they’d be able to bring him up to hunt some high-floor ingredients without disrupting the Stronghold too badly.

Given what I’ve heard about him and the seamstress, Badur probably wants to go back down and get married, so we’ll have to do everything we can to get him some vacation time.

I wonder if I could make a giant-bone wand that preserves corpses? Of course, that wasn’t the only thing Badur did, but it was a big part of it, and figuring out a way to make it a magic item would give the poor guy more down-time.

Add that to the list.

“Here’s what I’m thinking,” Will said, hoisting the Clay Idol of Ouroboros. “I summon about half a dozen of these little guys and have them cordon off the watering hole to prevent the monsters from scattering. Then we hit them with Hammer of God. Loth cleans up, Brianna handles any crocs that slip through, and Travis watches our backs and the sky.”

“Hammer of God will damage the ground, making my traps less effective. You suppose you could hit the back of the group so that the lightning that propagates outward is less intense by the time it gets to our side?” Loth asked.

Will mentally pictured a band of red where Hammer of god would tear up anything Loth had placed down, but the further out the chain lightning effect reached, the less damage it would deal, and traps placed underground would be reasonably sheltered.

So If I shoot…there-ish, it will allow Loth to place traps in front of them without risking losing them, and will also push the monsters towards us.

“Yeah, I can do that.”

Will glanced over at Travis, who conspicuously didn’t have a weapon equipped. Weapons tended to raise physical stats, like Strength or Kinesthetics, although staves often raised Focus.

Will would’ve thought Travis would get himself a staff, even if only to get the stat bonus, but the illusionist seemed to like keeping his hands free out of some misguided sense of style.

Or perhaps he couldn’t afford one.

The last time Will had seen a staff, it was up on auction on the 5th Floor.

In either case...

Manifestation.

Focus 296 -> 282

“Here,” Will said, offering Travis the Sickle of Malignant Silence. “This’ll boost your Focus for the fight. And if we get into a scrape, don’t hesitate to use it.

I’ll remind you that if kill me or you try to steal it, it’ll vanish into nothing, so think of it as more of a temporary buff from me.”

Despite Travis’s abrasive personality, Will wasn’t too worried about him misusing the awesome power of the sickle. And if Will was knocked out or separated from Travis, the illusionist would have a way to handle most problems.

Travis gave a thin whine, eyes bulging as he Inspected the weapon, gradually increasing to hyperventilation.

A moment later, Travis straightened, his expression serious.

“Got it. Also can you make one of these for me on a full-time basis?”

“You wanna be my Vassal?” Will asked.

“No.”

“Then no.”

Will only had four imprinted Relics to spare at any given time and giving them away drastically ate into his flexibility.

Since he was currently wearing the Ring of Explosive Doughmaking, Will’s Sourdough Ability was essentially instantaneous. It still didn’t make 2 items from one, but it made any consumable spammable just by spending Charge.

Sourdough.

255 -> 249 Charges Remaining.

Will broke the Clay Idol and watched as it instantly recovered, repeating himself six times, each time a massive Immortal Serpent manifesting out of thin air and heading off in the direction he instructed.

The nice thing about the Clay Idol of Ouroboros was that it created a more imposing serpent depending on the amount of Miasma in the air. The higher the Floor, the bigger the snake.

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During the tournament on the 5th Floor, it had been about 40 feet long, but on the 14th Floor, each snake was several hundred feet long and nearly as tall as a building.

The snakes slipped down into the woods below. Will watched their green backs through the canopy, encircling the watering hole without alarming the occupants. That wouldn’t last forever, though.

Dimensional Storage

248 Charges remaining

Will stored the Clay Idol and switched to Hammer of God.

Manifestation

Focus 315 -> 259

Will manifested 4 cannonballs and aimed at the far side of the clump of monsters.

A flash of lightning seared their eyes for a moment, and when the light faded, the rear of the group was a smoking ruin, the earth glowing white-hot where the sand in the dirt had been turned into glass.

You are now a level 60 World Traveller!

Primary Ability Upgrade Available!

Secondary Ability Upgrade Available!

Tertiary Ability Upgrade Available!

Nice, but we’re just getting started.

Each strike from hammer of god would chain to about 40 targets, so the maximum number that 4 attacks could chain to was 160. Will was certain it wasn’t anywhere near that amount, thanks to overlap and resistances.

Still, it did take out a sizeable chunk of the monsters to the far side of the lake.

Will summoned another 4 cannonballs and began walking the shots back towards themselves, stopping when he got to the imaginary line where Loth’s traps would begin to take over.

The monster tried to scatter from the explosions, but the enormous Immortal serpents wove past each other, tightening the encirclement and leaving only one direction to go: The narrow pathway leading up to their campsite.

The edge of the lake boiled off as the disturbed water lapped up against the white-hot glass, sending up a massive cloud of steam that concealed the rear edge of the area.

Thankfully we know it’s mostly empty, but I should be careful not to block our field of view by hitting the lake closer to us.

Wait a minute.

Will squinted as he spotted an unnatural movement in the silt-clouded water.

“Something moving in the water.” Will said, thinking back to the mouth that had dragged a pig unicorn underwater.

A rotund shape emerged from the lake. It was a black, egg-shaped body with five tentacles with mouths at the tip. At the top of the egg-shaped body was a humanoid shape, sticking off the top like a pimple. It was an emaciated figure with gaping holes where its eyes used to be, wearing a tattered Nuker’s kit.

Oh hey, a staff.

The egg-shape swelled and Will watched as miasma rushed into the massive mollusk-creature through valves in its side.

The mouths at the end of the tentacles turned towards Will’s Party, snarling as their fangs spread unnaturally wide.

Will grabbed Brianna and Flung himself to the side, shoving Loth and Travis backwards.

A beam of striated purple energy hollowed out their campsite and continued upward, carving a hole in the mega-canopy looming high above them.

Floor-wide Alert!

The Raid Boss, Simon the Indigestible has been engaged on the 14th Floor!

Simon was a powerful Climber who cursed the creature that consumed him with his dying breath.

His fear and anger have twisted the very Miasma of the creature, preventing it from absorbing him. Over time the two have become one.

Simon’s mind is long since gone, only his Class Abilities are retained.

Please put his corpse to rest.

Bounty: 8000 Ivory Ten-pieces, 50,000,000XP, to be shared among the Parties that claim the bounty.

“Well, shit,” Will muttered, looking up at the smoking hole in the canopy above.

“Travis, I think this qualifies as a ‘scrape’.” Will called across the gaping trough in the cliffside camp.

“Gotcha.” Travis nodded and began sprinting to the right, while Brianna moved back, out of the creature’s line of sight.

Loth made a grabbing motion with her hand and several of the monsters charging up the prepared path burst open, revealing dozens of man-sized wasps, who began gnawing on the magic-resistant crocs.

“Shhh.” Travis shushed a wirehair, causing it to collapse, and the curse spread outward from there, affecting the entire frontline.

MMMMM

With a strange hum, another blast of purple energy hollowed out a part of the cliffside where Travis had been sprinting, missing the illusionist by a hair’s breadth.

Will took the opportunity to duck out of cover and shoot another four cannonballs at the raid boss.

The cannonballs were converted to four massive lightning strikes, and the strange black egg-shaped mollusk shuddered in place, rendered insensate by the lightning as its exterior carbonized and flaked away.

It’s pretty tough, huh?

“Up!” Travis cried, still sprinting along the frontline. The few monsters still capable of moving tracked him with their gaze, but one by one, Loth’s traps and insects tore them to pieces.

Up?

Above them, a swarm of flying monsters had come to investigate the sudden attack, and located their Party.

Will briefly considered attacking them, but it wasn’t his job. It was Travis’s. Will should focus on the raid boss that had appeared in the center of the lake.

Just as Will thought that, Travis created a swarm of birds with daggers for bills, who flew up into the air and stabbed the flying monsters who dare to approach their Party.

There were at least a dozen of the opal crocs climbing the steep hill, unhindered by the curses and bugs, only slightly bothered by Loth’s traps.

From the woods where Brianna was hiding from the raid boss’s attacks, over a dozen Bee shot forward, their fists shapeshifted into thick spikes. They jumped onto the opal crocs and punched their homemade weapons through the monster’s hide and into their brains, causing them to die twitching.

Will scanned the chaotic battlefield littered with rapidly decomposing corpses, thrashing and dying monsters, the screams of wounded creatures, the hum of giant wings, and the smell of ozone.

This is a total mess, Will thought.

You are now a level 61 World Traveler!

On the other hand…We’re making good time.

Will had wanted to pull out as soon as they hit level 60, but they were in the thick of things anyway. Might as well clean up this mess before they left.

Will eschewed defense and began sprinting through the air, shooting an endless stream of cannonballs at the enormous creature.

Will fell into a rhythm as he attacked the creature, pummeling it with lightning then sprinting madly to dodge its counter-attack, making sure to keep its attention on himself, rather than letting it attack his teammates.

Eventually it stopped shooting at him, and when Will came back to his senses, he was standing in midair above the raid-bosses charred corpse, panting from the sustained effort.

Will was covered in tiny scrapes gotten from the flying monsters, bruises from gods-knew where, and burns from close-calls with Simon’s energy beams.

But he felt more alive than he had in the last three years in the Stronghold, and the Raid Boss was gone.

Floor-wide Alert!

The Party of William Oh has claimed the bounty!

Many thanks to our Climbers for their efforts.

You are now a level 65 World Traveler!

Primary Ability Upgrade Available! (X2)

“Whooohooo.” Will wheezed, raising a tired fist.

“Real impressive,” Carrie Envar said, hovering in midair beside him on a billowing shiny black membrane that extended from her shoulders like a cape. “You going after raid bosses without even telling me you’re here? I’m wounded.”

Will started. His world had narrowed down to attack and dodge for so long that Carrie’s arrival came as a surprise.

“I didn’t even know there was one!” Will said.

“Me neither, I’m just messing with you.” Carrie said. “That being said, how much of the Sacrifices do you want?” She pointed down at the charred corpse. At the edge of the lake, a crew of nearly a dozen Climbers were assembled, preparing to haul the raid boss out of the water.

Will thought about it.

He didn’t bring his logistician, and she did, so Carrie was due a large portion, and she was the Floor’s lord, due a certain amount of consideration if he ever planned to use her Stronghold as a safe zone.

Despite having to give up most of it, this is still an opportunity to walk away with a lot more than I would have otherwise.

“Half.” Will said.

“A quarter.”

“A quarter of the raid boss, plus the crocs and wirehairs, and the raid-boss’s kit,” Will replied.

“Deal.” Carrie said, taking Will’s hand.

A few minutes later, Will had a contract, and he flew back down to where his Party was resting amidst the ash and churned earth of the former watering hole.

“…Let’s go home.” Will said.