Chapter 420: 43rd Floor (2) – Battle Unrelenting

Chapter 420: 43rd Floor (2) – Battle Unrelenting

“Fine!” I shouted and rushed forward. Sticky white goo was shot at me from the spiders and the boss spider was constantly moving away and staying in the edges of the room where there were null skill areas.

That was cheating. Acid Shot. Acid Shot. I began to close in on the level 4 monsters and disable them. One at a time while I kept dodging. Thankfully the white goo they shot turned to dust after 100 seconds or so. That meant they couldn’t completely cover the boss room.

Once I began to disable the minions the fight became a lot easier. But the boss kept hiding in the null skill areas on the edge of the boss room. My Acid Shot would just collapse the moment it entered that area of the floor. The boss leapt out to attack occasionally at range, but was content to scurry away.

“Stop running away you Donkey!” I shouted out. Unfortunately, my taunt didn’t work or make it change its behavior. I moved to the center of the boss room and dodged while regenerating energy. The boss was content to take pot shots at me while staying back at a distance.

This was like the Invisible Centipede Golem but a lot more annoying, since it had range attacks and it wouldn’t approach me. Even when I retreated to the opposite point of the floor, the boss kept to the null skill areas, hugging them closely as it circled around the edge of the room to get to me.N0v3lTr0ve served as the original host for this chapter's release on N0v3l--B1n.

I had thought that this kind of fight might come up, but the answer had always been just alpha strike the hell out of the boss monster before it could get to this point. I looked at the boss room door and it had shut after I had entered.

As I dodged and regenerated my energy, my guess was that the boss wouldn’t leave the room. Instead, the minions would just race out after me. On the later floors, luring the minions out and then having the door shut would be a powerful tactic I could use.

Right now, it didn’t help me, but I was struggling to come up with any good ideas on how to get myself out of this situation. My ability in physical combat sucked against level 4 monsters. I was not Divine Empress to get up close and start punching things.

The boss was content to take pot shots at me and remain in an area I couldn’t use skills. The boss could also keep going forever and ever, which would make things far more difficult. I needed to force it to leave the null skill portions of the room and move towards the center. But the boss didn’t want to do that at all, content to battle me from range shooting goo and spikes at me.

I kept dodging as I thought over this problem and it wasn’t simple in the slightest. I could only kill the monster with my skills, but I couldn’t use my skills where it was located. Out of all the things in the tower, the null skill areas were officially the most annoying.

Once I got back my energy and I was sure none of the small monsters would recover soon, I acted. Just being passive and dodging wasn’t going to do anything. I rushed at the level 5 Spider Golem. It moved away and I pursued it.

A chase began around the edge of the room. I had to avoid the blade and pit traps in the corners, but that wasn’t that hard since I knew where they were. That was when I realized what I needed to do. I quickly kicked off the ground as the boss monster raced into the corner. I flanked it to some degree.

Every floor I was feeling more and more capable of handling a level 6 monster no matter the conditions on the top floor. That promised meta-point kept me motivated. While I would climb regardless, I had been fantasizing more and more about what I would pick once I reached the top.

It was a bad habit, but I didn’t want to waste this opportunity if I could help it. I glanced at my bulging gut again and mentally cursed the Astrologer for putting me in the position of having to use a meta-point to counter the bomb he had placed in me.

My mind began to turn to the next floor and I winced. It was going to be annoying since the level 4 spider golems could move on walls and I wouldn’t be able to use them to find long stretches of pit traps. There was also a lot of null skill sections on the floor as well. Which meant that if there was a pit trap I would have to go around it if I couldn’t move diagonally.

Without Air Burst it would be foolish to try and cross a pit trap in a null skill area. If there was a second one behind it, I would be shredded by the hidden saw blades spinning underneath the illusioned floor. That was a good way to die horribly.

It was also annoying that I couldn’t spot the illusioned floors either. I had spent a lot of time on that, but they weren’t like the illusioned walls. There was a difference. And with the illusions not breaking, it seemed that the difference was arbitrary. Still I wouldn’t be complaining about being able to spot the illusioned walls.

If I couldn’t spot them, then things would get a lot more troublesome. While they wouldn’t be impossible, they would be a lot harder. That might happen in a future floor, so I would have to watch out for that in the future. I couldn’t blindly assume anything.

All that backtracking on the last floor had been quite annoying. There was probably going to be a lot of back tracking on the next floor as well. With all manner of traps and illusioned walls thrown in to make things as difficult as possible. At least the level 4 spider golems got close to attack and didn’t remain at a far distance like the boss had.

That meant I could disable them. That seemed like the best option for handling the floors and giving me space to work with. If I hadn’t figured that out, there was no way I would be able to clear the tower. The constant barrage of respawning level 4 monsters was a nightmare.

If there was a way to cash in the point crystals, then this place would have been amazing for grinding. I would have just sat on the forty second floor and just piled up the level 4 crystals from all the spawners. Just stay in the tower and grind safely forever.

Perhaps a portable store would be useful as an item from a meta-point if that were possible. That would allow me to separate from the cities for a long period of time. I shook my head at that, since grinding was no longer the best source of income. Having an empire was. Fighting was for combat experience, not grinding.

Still, the idea sounded quite intriguing as a possibility. If for some reason, I got healed up, but couldn’t kill the Divine Empress, got away again, and got another meta-point, then a portable store might be a good option so I could just hide in a remote corner of the Systemic Lands without any worry.

If it was a year or two ago, I would have probably done that in a heartbeat. But now I knew the immense grinding power of an Empire, so there was no way that was going to happen if I could help it. I wanted all those points to be flowing to me.