#081 – Ow, my brain!

#081 – Ow, my brain!

As I got deeper and deeper into the hole, there was less and less light. And despite my new sleek glove being able to produce sparks, it actually absorbed light instead of producing them – however the heck that worked – so it wasn’t of any help.

My other sources of light used to be my sword... which I’d lost, and then Flameguard, which I didn’t have equipped at the moment. I debated whether it was worth swapping Appraisal out again, but I decided not to yet, since the lava and plasma lakes still produced plenty of light.

As I went on, though, the hole curved and I gradually lost line of sight with the sky. The lava and plasma lakes also became much less numerous. I had no choice but to either swap in Flameguard or continuously use the flamethrower mode on my gun if I didn’t want to be in constant darkness.

Replace [Appraisal] with [Flameguard]?

Note: [Appraisal] will not be re-equipable for 24 hours.

Y/N

I really needed more skill slots... Ugh, but the only way I knew how to get more was through the Limit Break.

Ah, well. I just had to deal with the stupid cooldowns for now.

I lit my left glove on fire and continued through the darkness. Since there were no more lakes or vibrating rocks, it didn’t seem like more monsters would spawn, but I couldn’t help the gnawing feeling of dread. It just reminded me too much of the stupid lockers.

After a few minutes of walking through almost complete darkness, something finally changed.

There was a rumble that shook the ground and even the air itself. A low growl that sent shivers down my spine.

I tensed up, brought out my gun, gripped my–

!@$#*&

@&#*&$

Pumpink dowolerea left. Dodge. Up.

Jetlag. Claw hit my chest.

Bounce. Acrophobia.

...What?

My head hurt and I had no idea what was happening, but the shadowy form closing in on me needed no explanation.

I pushed myself off the ground – when had I fallen? – and threw myself to the side, just in time to dodge the vicious swipe aimed at my prone form.

A quick mental check revealed that my forks were still stunned and confused, so I forcefully terminated all of them and began creating new ones to ask chat what the heck had just happened.

GeorgeDoshington: BOSS TIME

Ugh, did I need to set up what they should return to me again?

Regardless, I managed to quickly stand, I locked eyes with that thing already charging me again, materialized my gun self in my hand and then fired a combination of a water bullet and the crystal shards.

The bullet hit the ground and exploded into a shower of crystals, but the thing easily dodged my shaky attempt to hit it and circled around me.

My mind raced as the forks informed me that I must have been hit by some kind of mental attack.

Shit.

In that case–

The [Rend] skill is still not equipable for 1d20h34m12s.

Oh, crap! I’d forgotten I’d swapped it out only this morning!

Dammit! I fucked up! What should–

@#&^$#5*

#^%$#&)#@

Ufdjklekf jebelie. Off off, my fifth constellation.

Nerd gathering, gun shoot.

Fire hit the shadow. The shadow charged through it.

Ugh, fuck! My head!

My enemy closed in on me once more, and just before I got hit by its claw covered in black sparks – hey those looked familiar – I finally got a better look at its figure. It had wings, a tail, horns, glowing cyan eyes, and of course, sharp claws.

Before I could do anything, it hit me square in the chest, knocking the air out of me and punting me across the place. A split second later, I felt the jolt of not-quite-electricity run through my body as I soared through the air.

What the hell was that?!

Regardless, I was still okay. Thank god I’d invested so much into defense. I would have been minced meat by now otherwise.

Already familiar with the pattern, I quickly rolled out of the way even if the thing wasn’t anywhere close to me, just in case it wanted to psionically punch my brain again. Then I quickly reset my forks again.

Eclipsoon: heat vision

Now, that was an excellent idea. I’d completely forgotten I had that skill.

Replace [Armsmaster] with [Heat vision]?

Note: [Armsmaster] will not be re-equipable for 48 hours.

Y/N

I immediately turned it on as soon as I swapped it in, and suddenly, I could see the vague humanoid outline – with wings and tail – in the darkness, charging me once more.

I took aim once more, and this time saw how my opponent immediately swerved to the side to dodge my incoming attack. I quickly adjusted aim, and fired another fire bullet with crystal shards.

My attack was a little off – probably due to lacking Armsmaster now – but it still hit the thing. I both saw and heard how the water bullet smashed into it and subsequently exploded into crystals a bit further away from me.

My limbs were shaking, my head was spinning from the residual mind-fuck, and my muscles were twitching from the not-electricity, but I knew this was far from over.

I finally managed to completely calm down most of my forks as well and began properly consulting with chat on how to beat this fucking thing.

The thing was fast. Although not as fast as the octopus boss. The main problem was how crazy versatile it seemed to be. Super strength, sharp claws, regular fire, that black fire, the black sparks, and a psychic attack on top of that all? Worse still, something told me that it still had more tricks up its sleeve. If the flashes of crystalline cyan I’d seen on it were anything to go by, it could probably use those crystals as well. Worst case scenario, it could maybe even do the sapphirication like the dragon.

I couldn’t let my guard down.

I tensed up, my eyes sharpening at the dissipating mass of steam and smoke...

But then, once all the steam and smoke and fire cleared, instead of the demonic lizard thing person waiting to pounce on me, I saw a huge chest-shaped object with a soft glow around it in my heat vision.

It took me a whole second to process what I was seeing.

I blinked.

“Wait, what? Did I do it? Seriously? That was it?! I thought it was just getting started!” I complained, but inwardly, I was glad it was already over.

Although short, that fight had been intense.

It was my first time fighting an enemy with a mental attack, and boy was I not looking forward to fighting more of those in the future.

I sighed and finally let myself relax and turn off my heat vision as people in chat either cheered or were disappointed at how quick it was.

‘Mighty adventurer’ achievement unlocked!

+3 Skill points

‘Phase skip’ achievement unlocked!

+1 Skill point

‘Speedrunning fan’ achievement unlocked!

+1 Skill point

I flinched at the sudden pop-ups – goddammit, they got me everytime – and then lowered myself to my butt with an exhausted sigh.

Dammit, my head. Stupid psychic attacks... Ugh, I hoped this wasn’t going to have any lasting impacts... Gah, I really shouldn’t have tossed Rend this morning!

Another sigh.

“Yes, yes. Calm down, chat. Here’s your stupid achievement descriptions.”

Mighty adventurer - Conquer an Ether-based dungeon. [COMPLETE]

Phase skip - Deal damage quick enough to completely skip a dungeon boss’s phase. [COMPLETE]

Speedrunning fan - Conquer any dungeon in under three days after first entering it solo with no outside help. [COMPLETE]

...Hold up.

“Wait, that’s it?! The dungeon’s over?! It only had two floors?! That’s... Huh... Well, alright, I guess.” I tilted my head. “And look, it was an Ether dungeon. We were right, chat... Hold on, I skipped a phase? Huh, funny. I didn’t even know... And wait, why are those two achievements tier one? Aren’t both of those pretty hard to get?”

The speedrunning one especially. Since you had to do it all on your own... then it wouldn’t matter even if I had teammates to party up with.

I shook my head.

Well, whatever. No use in arguing with how the system did things.

Jeofffff: I’m guessing phase skip is really easy with a big party

I shrugged.

“Maybe. I still feel kinda ripped off, though...” I grumbled.

I sat there in the darkness, waiting to recover just a little bit before someone pointed out something strange to me.

Eclipsoon: what was the flamethrower for?

“Hmm? What about a flamethrower, Eclipse?”

Eclipsoon: wasn’t it a key item?

Eclipsoon: you didn’t even need it

Hmm. Good point, actually. So far, every key item from a dungeon was vital in accessing the dungeon’s next floor in some way. The bracelet, the key, the map...

“I... Well, I needed it to light this place up, I guess...? Feels like a stretch, doesn’t it...? Heat Vision was more useful than the flamethrower...”

GeorgeDoshington: it’s not over yet

GeorgeDoshington: dun dun duuuuun

I pursed my lips and looked out into the darkness. I couldn’t see well, but... the hole seemed to keep going for a bit. Would there be anything deeper in? If so, why would it say that I’d completed the dungeon?

Something was strange about this.

I hummed.

“Well, I guess we can look around a bit and see what we find. First though...”

I narrowed my eyes at the chest. Then I took out my gun self, set it to the crystal shower setting, and fired it like a shotgun.

The shards hit the chest with hundreds of tiny clinking sounds. Some of them stuck to it and some of them were deflected and fell to the ground.

“Hmm... Either this mimic isn’t afraid of needles or this isn’t a mimic...”

Jeofffff: gee I wonder which one it could be

I nodded seriously.

“You’re right Jeoff. This thing is definitely a resilient mimic.”

Jeofffff: god fucking dammit