Chapter 199: All clicking together

Chapter 199: All clicking together

Sofia knew enough about the Necrotic Ooze from the book on slimes that she felt she could fight it without a [False immortality] rune. The layer of the maze with the undead was a pain to navigate due to many dangerous monsters like the long-clawed zombies, that small ogre Pareth couldnt handle. However, she found a whole section with nothing but skeletons. The mage ones were a bit of a pain but overall, [Bone dominus] helped her clean it all up.

She had tried checking the area behind the ooze by having a layer change occurring from there in the other layers but no matter how long she tried, she didnt manage to get it to send her there on the undead layer. After a few hours of trying, she had enough, and the oozes fate was set in stone.

Now that she had all that free space in the maze, all she had to do was to lure the ooze in there. That started with a small bolt. Just a regular one like the original skill? She knew the monster of rot and death would regenerate the damage in less time than it took for the explosion to clear up.

As expected, its coming

Sofia had a coughing fit.

The smell

Compared to her, the ooze was quite slow. It was about half as fast as the amalgam monster from the eye layer, a terrifying speed for a regular person, but barely a jog for Sofia as she was now. She patiently lured the mountain of death into the area she had cleared, sending small electric zaps every so often just to make sure it wouldnt get bored of chasing her. Pareth was acting as a moving observer, making sure no layer change happened during the fight.

Sofia had doubts about whether blasting the ooze like this was a good idea, she had a good feeling that the orb was probably inside it. Wouldnt it be a perfect place to hide an orb, among an oozes many fake cores? But considering how the mana orb had been shattered before she even got to it, she feared that if it was really there, she might destroy that one too.

If its really in there, I dont have another way to get it out anyway, so

With the Ooze busy pursuing Sofia in a loop around the empty corridor, it gave her ample time to charge a huge bolt. The only tricky part being to time it well so she was ready to release it while at one end of a corridor with the Ooze at the other end. Just as a safety measure. It wasnt a huge issue, and the Ooze got treated to the same kind of Angels bolt the eye amalgam had brushed off.

The aftermath of the explosion was about the same, and Sofia chewed on a Healing Candy while Pareth looked at the result for her.

No more Ooze.

Finally, a big monster who has the decency to die when I blast it with more than half my mana in one go. Thank you, disgusting pile of flesh, you wont be remembered. Damn that thing burns well.

Amidst the blue flames and ash, there was only one thing that seemed solid and intact.

Thats the orb, right?

Sofia took out some bones and made a long stick like a giant ladle and gave it to Pareth, so that he could scoop out the orb without having to touch the flames and the remaining burning fluids of the Ooze.

As soon the long bone ladle touched the orb, Sofia was sent to the eye layer.

The giant sculpture of The Annihilator was still waiting, five of his seven hands empty.

One by one, Sofia handed him the orbs. The eye layers orb in the leftmost hand, the wood layer orb in the next. She skipped the mana orb because she didnt have it. Next was the orb she took from the Ooze, then the one from the trap layer. Each hand closed around their orbs, leaving only one left.

The mana orb then Do I really need to go for [Restore command]?

After a minute and a half, Sofia was sent back to the empty layer, forcing her to activate the ritual again. Next she flew up to the empty hand and tried to just send a bunch of mana on it. It was a random idea but she felt it could have worked. It didnt.

Nice try.

Well The other orbs were all full, big spheres of weird stones. The mana orb though, looked like an empty glass sphere. I think its not too far-fetched to guess it used to be full of mana.

And I would think the glass itself was nothing special, because it broke before I even got there, while the Oozes orb survived not only the Oozes corrosive blood but also a triple Angel bolt. So If just mana doesnt work, cant I just make another orb out of anything?

Sofia made an empty bone sphere, put it in the statues open hand and tried to fill it with mana. It only took Sofia a few seconds to realize why this wouldnt work, mana was very volatile and it didnt exactly tend to stay in a ball without moving. As she expelled it from her body without giving it a clear goal through a spell formation, it just spread around, filling up the room.

She tried to focus it and force it to stay there without success. The whole process was being interrupted every ninety seconds by a forceful return to the empty layer which Sofia was starting to find infuriating. She was about ready to give up on that solution and try to find something else when she remembered something. It drove her crazy that she took so long to think about that. She still had the three [Decoy orb] from the trials first phase floor 5, the ones expressly made to be filled up with mana.

Theyre even the perfect size! Lords almighty, how did it take me so long to think about this?

Well, theyre also designed to blow up when filled halfway, but thats all enchantments, right?

Taking out one of the decoy orbs and observing it closely, there were indeed small ritual circles engraved all over it. Subtle enough to be invisible at a glance, but obvious if you knew they were there.

There were clean ways to render these ritual circles useless, but Sofia couldnt be bothered and did it the easiest way, scratching the orb all over with her nails. There, no more traps.

As she was transported back to the empty layer, Sofia didnt go back to fill up the orb with mana yet. She was pretty sure that now her trick would work. And if it did, she might as well be ready for whatever came next. So first of all, feeling safe in the empty layer and with Pareth to look over her, she took out a bed and slept.

When she woke up, Sofia transferred Pareth back to his Alpha skeleton, she refilled her bone storage by cutting off her wings, had a nice meal and toilet break. She put on two [False immortality] runes, brushed and tied her hair, reorganized her items in her storage ring. When she finally felt ready, she returned to the cavern layer, and filled the decoy orb with mana.

She arbored a wicked smile when the hand closed on the orb. Sofia flew back a few meters to admire her work.

The giant statue of The Annihilator was now complete.

Its seven arms started moving.