Chapter 51: Chapter 43, Dishonest and honest work

Chapter 43, Dishonest and honest work

 

 

It isn’t long before the people speaking move close enough to be heard and I remain hidden, seeing no reason to announce myself before having eavesdropped a bit.

“Auch! Don’t poke it like that.”

A neutral male voice says.

“Don’t complain. The wound has opened up again and blood is dripping down your back. Let me close it.”

A slightly higher male voice responds. The first speaker makes an irritable grunt.

“Fucking sneaky rogues. She didn’t display that much skill but the poison she used sure is nasty. It keeps reopening the wound no matter what I do and has barely diminished in potency, even after all these floors.”

“They weren’t formidable per se but they did have a few hidden tricks, didn’t they?”

A third, much deeper male voice says, leaving a slightly longer pause before getting a reluctant response from someone sounding distinctly female.

“How was I supposed to know she’d gotten her hands on a new poison? It might have been received as dungeon loot for all we know. She didn’t use anything like it during the two previous delves when I gathered the information.”

“These people definitely don’t sound like anyone who would miss the chance to gang up on a single adventurer. We should remain hidden, only acting if they force us into a confrontation.”

“Alright, Ari.”

I hurriedly move my ring blade down under the mound of cut vines I’m hiding in, dimming its golden glow and making sure that it isn’t visible. Not even five seconds later I hear their boots squelching in on the remaining gore. Why hasn’t all the carcasses disappeared yet? Well, I suppose it doesn’t matter right now. I listen intently as they whisper to each other.

“I think I heard something before we entered the chamber, do you think someone is hiding in here?”

The previously heard female voice whispers. She’s the only female in the group and a [Rogue] from the looks of her gear. Knives practically hanging from every surface of enhanced, tight-fitted, black leathers.

“No, probably not. Search for tracks though and move slowly. They’re either further ahead or might have gone back up through the other corridor leading in here, just missing us.”

The male with a deep voice whispers. He’s the shortest of the group, a dwarf [Warrior] wielding a large hammer in both hands, the silversteel plate giving him the look of a frontline fighter.

“Shit, why did we have to miss such a good mark. People managing to get this far down usually carry lots of monster cores or other valuables and I need to find myself a new leather brigandine.”

The wounded male whispers. He looks like some sort of [Archer], a bow slung on his back and a fancy crossbow in his hands.

There’s also the man who has to be their [Healer], holding a short, metal rod in one hand that he’d poked the archer with, keeping the other hand empty and at the ready. They spread out through the chamber and I receive information on their movements through my sensors, tracking their progress. The [Rogue] comes close, studying the ground around the pile I’m hiding in before walking away. There’s no tracks to be seen in the blood as I never left this pile after creating this scene of carnage.

My heart nearly stops as she suddenly snaps her head to the side, going back towards me and around the side to where my ring blade had been swept under, leaving a smear that points directly to something having been dragged beneath.

I see her eyes widening and I act before she can cause even more trouble. She’s a perfect target for my new skill, not wearing a helmet of any kind, her hood pulled down showing the short black hair. Mentally focusing on a point close to the center of her brain I activate [Point Compression], receiving the kill confirmation a split second later.

 

 

Ding! You have slain [Poison Dread-Sneak (Rogue) - Level 257]. Bonus experience awarded.

 

 

The skull cracks, barely able to hold itself together but still not managing to protect the brain from compressing and instantly turning to mush. The most gruesome part however is the result as viewed from the outside, her eyes instantly popping into goop forcing itself into the brain, the skin and flesh around the eyes tearing apart and pulling itself along through the eye sockets. The nose breaks and goes flat against the face as lips, cheeks, tongue and more get torn into the back of the throat, going up past the nasal cavity towards the point I’d targeted.

It happens in a flash, one second being a pretty face showing a wide eyed expression and mouth opening to speak, the next split second emitting sounds of the whole face breaking and flesh tearing, leaving a horrifying visage displayed by a corpse. As if cut from invisible strings the [Rogue] collapses without uttering a single word. It’s not really like she had to say anything to get their attention, the sound of her death working as a perfect signal of danger.

“WHAT THE FUCK?! IDA!”

The [Archer] screams at the collapsed corpse, completely losing his composure, a deranged look on his face.

He’s only 7 meters away and I target him next, trying to use the same skill but failing as the cooldown is still in effect. I’d forgotten it had a cooldown. I instead pull out the ring blade from beneath the pile, throwing vines in all directions and uncovering me enough to be seen as the surprised [Archer] is almost cut in half, spine severed but a strip of flesh still holding the two pieces together, the attempt at dodging having come too late.

 

 

Ding! You have slain [Sharp-eyed Sniper (Archer) - Level 251]. Bonus experience awarded.

 

 

The [Warrior] and [Healer] look panic stricken but still show great battle experience as they both ready their weapons, the dwarven [Warrior] dashing towards me at an incredible speed, lightning crackling around his feet and hammer held high as the [Healer] manifests a fireball. Wait. A fireball?

Sending the ring blade in an arc towards the “healers” back I simultaneously exert 2000 mana worth of telekinetic force on the dwarf from above, pushing on nothing but his steel helmet, making his knees buckle but not managing to bring him to the ground. Insane strength or what?

The “healer” casts the fireball at me before dodging my ring blade, or so he thought. Stopping the arcane power holding the weapon assembled and spreading the blade sections outwards it transforms from a single edge to an eight blade killing field, severing the arm holding the metal rod at the elbow and slicing half of his head off.

 

 

Ding! You have slain [Discipline Of Cremation (Fire Mage) - Level 248]. Experience awarded.

 

 

The dwarf, obviously seeing his comrade die, tries to roll out of the way as the blade sections move towards him next and I stop his attempt by redoubling the force pushing him downwards, bringing him to his knees. His plate armor is very well made though and the three axe-shaped blades hitting him in the side only penetrate a few centimeters before getting stuck.

I’m not in any real hurry to finish this one off and instead decide to steadily increase the amount of telekinetic force he’s put under, slowly crushing him until he can’t take the force and slam sideways into ground, lightning spreading out like livid snakes. He’s still alive but unconscious if the nosebleed and rolled back eyes are any indication. I watch him carefully though, waiting for him to suddenly jump up and attack but nothing like that happens. Sighing, I wait the last seconds for the skill cooldown to end before once again using [Point Compression].

 

 

Ding! You have slain [Lightning Bone Breaker (Warrior) - Level 270]. Bonus experience awarded.

 

 

“Luckily they weren’t of a higher level and I managed to take them by surprise. Might have been a tricky fight if they were the ones to ambush us.”

“Yup. That skill though… It’s honestly pretty terrifying, Zel.”

I chuckle.

“You can say that again.”

Looking down upon the dead corpses I think for a few seconds before I swiftly pull the three storage rings and the strange rod I can sense on their persons with telekinesis. Using more telekinesis I throw all four corpses in a pile, lobbing a ball of condensed celestial flames at them and pushing much of my remaining mana into burning it down as quickly as possible, turning it all to ash and only leaving molten gear behind.

Dumping a few of the lizard carcasses upon the remains I walk out from the chamber, taking the corridor leading further down into the dungeon and leaving the evidence behind to hopefully be cleaned up before the next group of adventurers arrives. Quickly searching through the storage rings I transfer all their money and monster cores into my own before throwing them away into a corner with thick moss and grass.

There might have been more items that I could have used in there but who knows if there’s some sort of magical tracker placed on one of the items. I have no idea if that’s even possible. Better to be safe and only get about 40 monster cores, 1 gold, 230 silver and 40 copper. There are more cores but my storage ring is full, I’d still call that a good haul though. Inspecting the metal rod in my hand also explains how the [Fire Mage] had been able to act as a healer.

 

 

[Lesser Runic Mending Rod - 2/30]

 

 

Does it only have 2 uses left?

Not seeing a point in keeping it I throw it away before turning a corner and coming upon the floor guardian’s chamber.

 

---

The ring blade travels in a wide arc towards me, cutting the last lizard’s head off before stopping dead behind my back as if stopped by an invisible barrier, casting the blood from its surface and cleaning it up. The floor guardian had been a plant monster guarded by two three tailed scorpions and about 20 lizards.

The most dangerous monsters for me were still the scorpions as I only had to use [Point Compression] on the hidden, bulbous body protected by its thick vines to instantly kill the floor guardian. Not that I mind cleaning up some weeds and making the world a better place but I hope the next floor guardian is more fun.

 

 

Ding! You have slain [Mutated Sticky Brawn Kudzu (Floor Guardian) - Level 250]. Experience awarded.

Ding! You have cleared the 15th floor of the Grizklesat dungeon.

 

Ding! You have slain [Spontaneous Surprise Strangler - Level 215]. Less experience awarded.
…
Ding! You have slain [Agile Bone Breaker (Warrior) - Level 270]. Bonus Experience awarded.

Ding! [Arcane Telekineticist] has leveled from [37] to [48]. +[55 AP]

Ding! [Arcane Telekineticist] has new skills available [1].

Ding! General skill [Identify] has leveled from [61] to [62].

Ding! General skill [Aerial Acrobatics] has leveled from [92] to [93].

Ding! General skill [Dodging] has leveled from [298] to [302].

Ding! General skill [Unarmed] has leveled from [224] to [228].

Ding! General skill [Arcane Spatial Ring] has leveled from [158] to [160].

Ding! Skill [Sensors] has leveled from [347] to [355].

Ding! Skill [Passive Power] has leveled from [568] to [570].

Ding! Skill [Arcane Manipulation] has leveled from [656] to [660].

Ding! Skill [Capacitor] has leveled from [391] to [392].

Ding! Skill [External Modules] has leveled from [298] to [301].

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Ding! Skill [Power Profiler] has leveled from [128] to [135].

Ding! Skill [Telekinetic Force Manipulation] has leveled from [339] to [344].

Ding! Skill [Point Compression] has leveled from [1] to [9].

 

 

Extracting the floor guardian’s core with telekinesis I ignore all the other carcasses, having no need or space for all these cores. Throwing out some 20 odd Grade 0 cores I put the new one in my collection before moving into the stairwell and sitting down, the double doors closing behind me. Manifesting my pipe I lean against the wall, a leg thrown over a knee as I watch the bowl pack itself before lighting it and just relaxing.

The addition to the decor in this stairwell is some sort of dimly glowing, emerald crystal that seems to ever so slowly pulse with power, almost imperceptibly. They’re scattered seemingly at random on all surfaces but don’t protrude outwards, leaving no risk of getting stuck or tripping on them. I lower the glow of my own eyes to enjoy the effect and it’s quite pretty, complementing the lacking illumination in the dungeon and making it a feature instead of only being an annoyance.

“What do you say, Ari? Should we overhaul our vessel here? It’s not a great spot perhaps but we’ll be able to hear anyone fighting the 15th floor guardian or someone walking up the stairs, giving us time to prepare ourselves if need be.”

“Yeah, I suppose now is as good a time as any. I’ve already collected an insane amount of data thanks to [Power Profiler] and I doubt we even have the skill required to make use of it all.”

“That’s excellent, darling. How should we go about this?”

Ari takes some time to consider it as I finish the last of the pipeweed and disperse the pipe.

“We should probably not be intoxicated when doing this for starters. It might help us share ideas between each other more intuitively but I think we’ll manage just fine without it. A clear mind is probably preferable. As to how we’re going to go about this? I say we start with reworking every arcane mana structure in our body, using the information from the power profiler to increase the overall efficiency while improving upon everything with what we’ve learned since the first iteration.”

I chuckle weakly at that. We’d learned an insane amount in the short time outside the core chamber compared to the 60 years spent in it. The varied impressions, battles and other sources of inspiration have propelled our knowledge by leaps and bounds.

“Yes, yes, Zel. I know. We’re practically going to rebuild the arcane mana structures from scratch. Anyway, after we’ve done that I say we should think on the design and decide on any changes we might want to make.”

“Changes? Do you already think us ugly?”

She rolls her eyes at my obvious sarcasm.

“No, love. We’re perfect appearance-wise. I’m thinking more about the internal workings of the vessel. I’ve got a few ideas on things we might be able to improve upon, we’ll get to that when we’re done with the arcane mana structures though.”

“Alright, let’s ride this high before we get started then.”

The rest of the hour is spent in comfort as we make out and share our feelings of love, enjoying the short respite before the grueling task ahead.

 

---

 

7 weeks later.

 

 

“I feel so heavy! Are you sure we can’t adjust the received signals responsible from the mana nerve to compensate for it?”

Ari facepalms.

“For the third time, Zel, yes we can but are we really going to confuse our sense of mass, possibly resulting in unexpected and perhaps dangerous consequences just because you suddenly feel fat?”

I pout but drop my complaints. She’s correct, as usual, but a girl can dream of a solution magically appearing out of nowhere.

 

We’d spent the first five weeks going over every mana structure in our vessel, finding all of them severely lacking. We practically remade every arcane mana structure from scratch and only used the old ones as reference. There was more to it than merely remaking the structures though as Ari’s collected data on efficient power usage had us designing every structure to interlock seamlessly to the neighboring structures.

It was a pain in the ass to do as we had to streamline multiple mana structures with very different purposes into a cohesive system, sometimes having to consider the consequences of up to seven different neighboring structures when changing a single one. The result was worth it though as the efficiency almost doubled.

It was insane how much power the previous mana structures had wasted when simply transferring power between each other without the interlocking system. One can compare it to the energy spent ramming a closed door open to simply turning the handle and walking through.

The most important improvement however was of course in regards to the arcane mana structures themselves. The soulcore got reworked and the finished construct took 8 hours to manifest even with our increase in control, power and knowledge. It’s about 6 times as durable as the last one though and we’d both felt relief wash over us when it was done. Our old mana structure was terrible in comparison to the new one and I’d been worried that it might crack or shatter if it received a single blow from a monster at our level.

 

There have also been massive improvements to the mana flesh, tripling the maximum load before it started tearing, also becoming sturdier and harder to cut or pierce as the flesh tried to pull itself together. The same went for tendons and sinew. The result was that shallow cuts closed by themselves, only the skin needing to be regenerated. Deeper wounds didn’t close on themselves at all but they were harder to inflict.

Then there was the mana bone, if one could even call it bone at this point. The old arcane mana structure had closely followed the pattern of my biological body, resembling bone at least in some aspects. This iteration of the mana bone only has the ivory-look in common with bone. It’s more akin to a dense and solid metallic alloy, resembling the ring blade more than the previous mana bone. They’re also the largest contributor for the massive increase in weight, even if every improvement we’ve made has added some on their own. It’s sturdy though and I feel much safer having the soulcore encapsulated in it.

The mana nerve also got a huge overhaul in its arcane mana structure and here the data collected with [Power Profiler] really shines. The resistance that every signal has to overcome to travel the nerve has lessened greatly, decreasing the cost in mana for each pulse transmitted and also their speed. This has nearly halved our reaction time in theory but we’re not there yet in practice as Ari still hasn’t fully adapted to parsing the information at those speeds. She’s steadily improving day by day though and it won’t be too long before she gets there.

The extent of the mana nerve has also vastly increased, giving more information than ever before. This couples well with the improvements made to our sensory organs, enhancing our vision, hearing, smell, taste and touch to levels far beyond what a normal human would have at our level.

 

We’ve made so many tiny changes that I’m not sure I can remember them all and only one greater change to the internal design of the vessel. We considered other modifications but eventually settled for working that out in the next overhaul when we’re even better at this. The one change we made was to remove the normal mana blood and the spine marrow creating it entirely. The power coursing through our body even in its passive state is enough to warrant celestial blood at all times as of now. Instead of having two kinds of spine marrow we simply made it work with one.

It’s a much more elegant solution as [Passive Power] creates the celestial blood just fine and Ari can manually increase the amount of power going into the blood at will, making it glow and shimmer with golden light when containing as much power as we can currently put into it. It’s both pretty and practical. I honestly can’t be bothered to care if someone gets curious about my strange blood color as there’s plenty of strangeness with me as it is. Anyone closely inspecting me would find my blood to be normal compared to the rest of me, relatively speaking.

 

The last two weeks were dedicated entirely to testing, profiling, reworking and memorization. Making absolutely sure that every part of our overhauled vessel worked flawlessly as seen by the limit of our skills. The last five days of those two weeks were spent in silence as both Ari and I memorized the completed construct down to the tiniest detail, dispersing and regenerating every part of our body again and again until we couldn’t forget its blueprint even if we wanted to. Well, we could remove the memory with [Soul Manipulation] but that’s not the point.

The strangest part of these seven weeks had nothing to do with our overhaul though. No, the most bewildering thing was the complete lack of a single adventurer disturbing our concentration. There hasn't been a single person going down this far into the dungeon or coming up from the 16th floor. I can understand someone spending 2 months on the floors below me, grinding levels and having fun, even if it might be rare for most adventurers to delve that long without resurfacing.

What I can’t figure out though is why no one has even challenged the 15th floor guardian. There’s obviously adventurers strong enough to get this deep but it’s like they’ve all left. Just abandoned the dungeon to go somewhere else. Baffling.

Whatever the reason I suppose it was good news for us as it gave us some peace and quiet, speeding up the process of overhauling our manabody and finally making us ready to head deeper. We’re going to conquer this dungeon for no other reason than to prove that we can.

 

 

Ding! General skill [Aerial Acrobatics] has leveled from [93] to [97].

Ding! General skill [Dodging] has leveled from [302] to [304].

Ding! General skill [Smoking] has leveled from [43] to [45].

Ding! General skill [Dancing] has leveled from [12] to [13].

Ding! General skill [Unarmed] has leveled from [228] to [229].

Ding! General skill [Arcane Spatial Ring] has leveled from [160] to [179].

Ding! Skill [Sensors] has leveled from [355] to [382].

Ding! Skill [Passive Power] has leveled from [570] to [591].

Ding! Skill [Arcane Manipulation] has leveled from [660] to [703].

Ding! Skill [Capacitor] has leveled from [392] to [426].

Ding! Skill [External Modules] has leveled from [301] to [307].

Ding! Skill [Power Profiler] has leveled from [135] to [147].

Ding! Skill [Telekinetic Force Manipulation] has leveled from [344] to [358].

 

 

“Now we only have to do two more things before we’re ready to continue, check out the new class skill and distribute our attribute points”

“Lets!”

 

 

Ding! Attribute [Intelligence] has been increased from [163] to [193].

Ding! Attribute [Wisdom] has been increased from [1000] to [1025].

 

Attribute Points: [0]
Strength: [110] -50%
Constitution: [110] -50%
Vitality: [110] -50%
Agility: [175] -50%
Dexterity: [110] -50%
Intelligence: [193] +400%
Wisdom: [1025] +395%

Mana: [7142 / 9650]
Capacitor: [34,719 / 41,109]
Mana regen: [5073] / Minute

 

---

-[Arcane Telekineticist]-
Combining the rare ability of telekinesis and mana without a naturally occurring elemental structure you walk a path of your own making. You can not tell where this path leads but there is surely greatness to be found when delving into the unknown. Embracing the infinite possibilities, you seek to master the essence of the intangible power you have come to rely on.

Perks:
-[Intelligence] + 100%
-[Wisdom] + 100%

Skills:
-Telekinetic Force Manipulation - [358]
-Point Compression - [9]
-Empty
-Empty
-Empty

 

Available skills [1]

---

 

 

[Kinetic Lock]
Nullify the kinetic energy of the target by counteracting it with adaptive telekinetic forces. Adjustment speed + [Skill Level]%. Maximum mana expenditure calculated by [1000 + (Skill Level * 40)] mana per second. Skill will break if mana expenditure exceeds limit. Cooldown [10 / ((Skill Level + 99) / 100)] seconds.

 

 

Ding! [Arcane Telekineticist] has gained skill [Kinetic Lock].

 

Skills:
-Telekinetic Force Manipulation - [358]
-Point Compression - [9]
-Kinetic Lock - [1]
-Empty
-Empty

Available skills [0]

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