Chapter 40 - 40

After the first boss, the spider riding Elves give way to more elf packs on foot. These are more tricky to deal with, as they're small and love to attack the most vulnerable among them instead of staying focused on the tank.

Elmira starts using the Shadow Field defensively. Casting it over the group as a form of concealment that helps deter attackers. Because it does damage, they are hesitant to enter the dimly lit area, keeping them away from the living group members.

The elf groups have also begun to come with healers and mages in their ranks. It feels more like they've gone to war with a Dark Elf village than a horde of monsters. It's an odd feeling for Cain, fighting against Elves. Especially with one in his group.

But they've reached a downwards curving ramp, taking them deeper into the dungeon, and gremlins and trolls are replacing the Elven defenders. The new creatures are vicious and don't speak an understandable language, making them much less disturbing to fight.

"Ah, it's good not to be insulted anymore." Mythryll laughs as they clear the first group of gremlins, led by a single giant cave troll. "Those Dark Elves have a filthy mind."

Cain is glad he's not fluent in elven. It was annoying enough, just with the things they called out in the common language transfers use. Cain wonders if it was his original language or if it was something he learned from the system. They're all from different places, but they're all using the same language, after all.

They've come to the second boss now, a massive rock colored troll shaman. He appears to be alone in the room. An oddity for a caster-type boss.

"I think he might be a summoner type." Cain cautions.

"Okay, keep the lesser golems around us to start then, until we find out what abilities this mountain of Troll has," Misha suggests, and they move forward to engage.

The boss greets them by setting out totems and then summoning up a group of Cave Trolls, as Cain had feared.

"Kill the totems first," Char calls. "They'll heal the summons and increase their armour."

"Elmira, you're on totem duty. I'll handle the summons as usual, and everyone else can deal with the boss."

Roles are now clear, and everyone gets to work. Elmira soon finds that the totems are easy to destroy and always appear at the boss Trolls side. So just leaving the Shadow Field up gets most of them, and she only has to adjust her tactic if the boss moves.

There are four summoned trolls, so two are being held back by the Lesser Golems that Cain is calling back regularly as they are demolished. The summoned trolls are dying at a reasonable pace, though. Their health is high, but they're vulnerable to Cain's Poisoned Arrow, and it's quickly eating their health.

Now down to two enemy summons to fight, Cain reassigned his Lesser Golems and turned his attention to the boss. It's a durable thing, as expected of a giant troll. And even the sustained attacks of the group are only slowly whittling away at its health.

After he got the "Modifiers Increased" message when his strength hit 100, Cain had been doing noticeably more damage, so he brings his Lesser Golems to the boss, leaving just the tanks and the Poisoned Wasps to deal with the summons. That makes a significant difference in how fast the boss is dying. The 300 percent damage bonus from that legendary necklace is no joke with this many summons.

The extra trolls succumb to the mass of attacks just before the boss, giving Cain a notification.

[New Form Gained: Summon Greater Golem Giant Cave Troll]

Cain looks it over, finding the Form has not only higher defence but higher damage reduction than his shield bearer type tanks. Wielding that giant club, it still probably does impressive damage too.

Cain quickly switches the option and summons a fresh set of tanks after warning the group what he's about to do. They're impressive, to say the least. Three meters tall and nearly 2 meters wide, with thick bodies and stumpy legs, they're strong enough to parry attacks from the boss with their club, and the impact of their blows makes its skin ripple. Cain might have gotten a perfect thing this time.

"Impressive," Mythryll notes. "Those new tanks are no joke. We need to find you stronger summons to fight if you're going to be able to keep stealing their forms for your own."

"I second that. The more summons, the better. These are taking so little damage that I could even cast a few shadow bolts without worrying about my mana." Misha adds.

After the second boss, the group comes to another change in targets, the Gremlins are gone, replaced by a form of black barked Treant, but the cave trolls remain. Large, but not as massive as the summons that Cain duplicated with his Summon Greater Golem spell. Their damage is impressive, staggering the trolls and breaking branches from the treants with heavy blows of their clubs.

In response, the tree monsters start summoning nymphs. Mostly grey, with black branch like limbs and twig like hair that makes a leafy cape down their backs. They're not large, no bigger than the diminutive Mythryll, but those branch like fingers are ripping pieces from his Golems.

The first group is cleared, and Cain gets another notice.

[Form Gained: Summon Lesser Golem Dark Nymph]

"Hey, I got the summoned nymph form for my Lesser Golems," Cain shouts in excitement, forgetting they're all standing right next to him.

"It will be hard to be cuter than the Gargoyles, but call them out and let's see them." Char laughs.

Ten small nymphs appear. Shorter than the ones they faced by a little, these ones barely make 140cm in height. They also have black togas on with a Vine belt instead of the leaf bikini of the ones they faced. Other than that, they are identical. The same Grey skin, the branch like arms fading to a black, bark texture skin and long, pointy twig fingers.

They've got Elfin faces with the same branch like hair, covered in an assortment of leaves, the varied colours making each one distinctive instead of them being identical like the gargoyles.

Cain's skill description says they're more easily damaged than the gargoyles, but with significantly more substantial damage and the ability to learn spells after level 100.. He reads it all to the group, which agrees to give them a try as they head for the end of the dungeon.