Tara Pixie Dungeon Part 52 (Patreon)

Metal stabbed her shadow for what felt like the thousandth time and blinked when the darkness in the rather small room vanished and she was able to see everything as if it was illuminated by indirect light. 'I can touch the walls on each side and I could kick the other door, no wonder my shadow didn't have any problem getting to me.'

She looked at her character sheet and smiled when she saw her new abilities listed on her character sheet. 'Fifty points of shadow affinity and shadow immunity, this would be a pretty decent way to recharge but I think I want a bath, that thing was nasty.'

Metal pulled a pebble out of her belt pouch and set it on the ground in front of the door then crawled out of the other door. "I should have grabbed my sword."

"Issues?" Crisp asked, glad that her friend was safe.

"The shadows can't duplicate equipment," Metal replied as she got to her feet and glanced at the metal slime girl that was dueling a shadow, looking forward to picking up a shadow related class when she broke the curse on the belt. "My sword would have made things easier."

"Good to know," the other metal slime girl replied, glad that Metal had tested things first.

"What's the inside look like?" Crisp asked, curious if it was worth wiggling through the pet sized door.

"It was small," Metal said as she picked up one of the shadow doors and started walking along the wall.

"Small?" Crisp asked as she watched Metal move the heavy stone door like it was a chunk of wood.

"I could touch the edges." Metal stopped twenty feet away from the other door. "Give me a minute to check something." She knelt down and wiggled through the mist covered door and looked at the longer hallway that was made out of a black shadowy stone. 'Slightly more than twenty feet, I'd need a tape measure to be sure,' she mused as she dashed down the hallway. She picked up her pebble then wiggled through the door. "The length of the hallway changes depending on the distance between the doors."

Crisp sighed. "Which means we can't use them as a shortcut for getting to the town."

"It's still useful." Metal smiled when she saw Xander, Sirius and an unfamiliar blue haired woman walk into the cavern. "Good news, the shadows don't have our equipment."

"That's good," Xander replied with a grin as they walked over. "Do you want to learn a new spell?"

"Yes," Metal replied without hesitation. "What did you get?"

"My crown teaches the user how to use telekinesis and summon slime filled eggs and hostile demonic strippers that you can loot after they attack you," Xander replied cheerfully.

"What's the catch?" Metal asked, wondering if they were going to have to drag Xander to the altar to get decursed.

"The crown also transforms one of your limbs into a cursed crafting tool every time you put it on," Xander explained as he pulled the crown off and tossed it to Metal.

Metal checked the crown with her enchanting ability and picked up a couple more tricks then stuck the crown on her head, turning her left leg into a smithing hammer. "I was expecting that to hurt more."

"You're both crazy," Sirius muttered as Metal merely cast a healing spell and regenerated her leg.

"We have nice regeneration," Metal replied, then took the crown off and put it back on, causing her left hand to get turned into an awl, which dropped to the ground.

"Not to mention nice bouncing breasts," the voice whispered in Metal's ear.

"That's sort of neat," Metal replied as she took the crown off and put it back on, causing her right leg to twist, wither and turn into a hammer, leaving her balancing on one leg.

"Is it cursed?" Crisp asked warily.

"Yes but it's just voices," Metal replied, then cast another healing spell, restoring her missing limbs and causing her stomach to rumble. "I think I need food before I keep playing with the crown."

"Probably a good idea," Xander agreed as Tara walked out of the workshop with a bundle of leather armor. "What are you grabbing for food?"

"Elves are tasty, right?" the voice asked in a teasing whisper.

"No clue," Metal replied absently as she checked her awl. "Negative ten to crafting while you're using it but it lets you craft leather gear and I need to kill something with an impressive hide to permanently unlock leatherworking. If I make 20 impressive leather items, I'll get more bonuses."

"Sounds about right," Xander agreed, thinking about his fountain pen.

"Can anyone benefit or just the people that created the crafting tools?" Crisp asked, hoping she didn't have to figure out how to temporarily become a slime so she could make a bunch of crafting tools.

"Anyone that breaks the curse," Metal assured her as she checked the smithing hammer. "Same thing with the smithing hammer, except I'd have to kill something with metal in it and craft metal objects."

"What about the extra hammer?" Crisp asked, hoping she could have it if Metal didn't need it.

Metal checked the hammer and stared at the description. "It's a shipwright's hammer, I need to kill a powerful fish and I'll unlock shipbuilding. I'll have to make some boats for the extras."

"We might need to expand the pond," Tara mused as she stopped in front of the blue haired girl and handed her the armor. "Here."

"Thank you," the blue haired girl replied then worked on putting the leather pants on.

"And done," the metal slime girl said cheerfully as she took the shadow belt off after killing the last shadow monster she needed to improve her sword skill. "Do you have any suggestions for dealing with our shadow doppelgangers?"

Metal grinned at the other metal slime. "Give me five minutes to grab some food, Xander's hat and my swords and we can kill a brownie's shadow to make sure you won't lose out on picking up immunity to shadow damage by someone else killing your shadow."

"Thanks. Can I play with the crown?" the metal girl asked hopefully.

Metal took the crown off and tossed it to the other metal slime. "Just ignore the crazy voices and I'm going to haul you to the altar to get decursed when we're done."

"Deal," the metal slime replied as she put the crown on, causing her right hand to twist into a paint palette and fall to the ground. "Neat!"

Tara shook her head, glad that her slimes could regenerate. "At least we'll have crafting covered."

"We're going to have to expand the workshop!" Crisp squealed cheerfully.

"It's on the list," Tara assured her, already planning on creating a larger workshop near the keep.

Metal picked up her crafting tools then headed towards the grill that one of the slime girls had set up so she could get something to eat. 'Something to eat then a bath and a nap before I try to kill a bunch of shadows.'

The metal slime girl lifted the crown off her head and put it back on, causing her left foot to turn into a dagger. "No, I'm not making wine out of their blood."

"Voices?" Xander asked warily.

"No, I'm just working on my speechcraft and sense of humor," the girl replied with a grin then cast her healing spell, regenerating her missing limbs.

"You're still getting decursed once you've picked up the spell, same goes for you Xander," Tara told them, wanting to make sure none of her people ended up permanently insane.

"No objections," Xander replied, fairly sure it wouldn't do anything but willing to humor her.

"Spank the girl, summon a stripper and have some fun," the voice whispered in the slime girl's ear.

The metal girl tapped into the crown's magic and cast the stripper summoning spell, causing a pale skinned busty teenage girl with glowing red eyes and crimson hair to appear wearing a pair of soft black leather boots and a rather naughty and short red dress with a long red cloak tossed over her shoulders. "Hi?" she asked, not sure how to feel as the spell had cost her entire mana pool.

The stripper smiled as she snapped her fingers and conjured a metal pole sticking up from the ground and dance music, causing Xander, Tara and Sirius to stare.

"That might be my new favorite spell," Tara mused as she watched the girl swirl and dance around the pole, showing off her moves and athletic body to great effect.

"It's certainly mine," Sirius agreed as the demon took her cloak off and playfully tossed it to Tara before going back to swinging around the pole.

"What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, right?" Xander asked thoughtfully.

"Sure," Tara replied with amusement.

The blue haired girl scowled at the demon that was putting on a good show and pulled the leather vest over her head, wanting to get dressed before the demon finished her show and attacked them.

"I need to learn the music spell," the metal slime girl mused as she watched the demon start shimmying out of her dress. 'Totally worth four hundred mana.'

'Willow would love this,' Xander mused as the stripper dropped her top, revealing perfect breasts and perky nipples.

"Oops, forgot about my boots," the stripper said 'innocently then turned away from the group and slowly bent down to take her shoes off, causing her dress to reveal her panty clad behind as she worked on unlacing her boots.

'Or she'd go beat red and complain,' Xander mused, hoping that his friend was getting help in England and hadn't gone crazy when she learned that he was missing.

'I spent too many years in prison, she's a homicidal demon and I still want to fuck her or not enough years in prison,' Sirius mused as he enjoyed the view.

Metal walked back over with roast bits of meat on a stick, not surprised that some of the people were walking out of the workshop to watch the last bit of the show thanks to the music. 'Hopefully she drops a spell book, with the music spell.'

Melanie walked over and stood by Tara so she could enjoy the show. "New spell?"

"Yeah," Xander replied, not taking his gaze off the demon's behind as she pulled one of her boots off.

Metal walked over and stood by her twin and watched the show, curious where the girl was hiding her weapons.

The demon wiggled her behind then slipped her other boot off, pulled her dress down and stepped out of it. She turned and smiled at the metal slime girl that summoned her then jumped for the pole and did a couple of spins, half spins and acrobatics that showed off her body then playfully pulled her panties down. She summoned her battleax as she spun around the pole then kicked her panties at the slime girl's face and lunged at the girl with a burst of supernatural speed, intent on killing her now that she'd had a last show.

The metal slime girl brought her sword up and stabbed the demon, surprised that she'd managed to move that fast but not shocked to the point of inaction.

The demon stared in shock at the sword impaling her between her breasts, her axe falling from suddenly numb fingers. "How?"

"First strike," the metal slime girl replied as the demon vanished, pulled back to hell. She glanced at the pole as it faded away and the music faded out. She pouted when she glanced down and noticed that the demon's weapon had vanished. "Next time, I'm stealing her weapon first."

Metal glanced at the faintly glowing clothes that were scattered around. "At least her clothes stuck around."

Tara glanced at Xander. "Yeah, we're not telling Buffy about that one."

"I don't know, free clothes," Xander said thoughtfully.

"Hardly free," the metal slime girl complained. "It took my entire mana pool to summon her."

"It's probably designed to summon the most powerful demon that signed up and that you can afford, one show and they get to drag people back to hell if they can kill them," Sirius said thoughtfully.

Xander shook his head. "At least they're more creative than the demons back home."

"True," Tara agreed. "What's next on the list of things to work on?"

The metal slime girl shrugged. "Cooking and the last couple of points of speechcraft. Once we're done with that, we'll have all of our classes and skills maxed out other than the cursed ring."

"We're waiting to see if Metal can break the cursed tattoos," one of the other metal slime girls admitted, causing Metal to stick out her tongue at her.

Metal finished chewing her bite of roast. "We have a shrine that breaks curses and we can always cut them off, I'm not worried about it."

"What are you planning?" Tara asked Metal, curious what her favorite minion had in mind.

"I'm finishing my food then we're going to grab Xander's hat and kill a bunch of shadow creatures so the girls can jump between the doors. I think we should stick one of the doors on the outside of the tower so that we can just walk between them without everyone noticing we're climbing up there," Metal suggested.

"Not a bad idea, can you duplicate the shadow doors?" Xander asked.

"Yes, I'll need shadow stone and five shadow crystals per door but it shouldn't be that hard," Metal assured her.

"How?" one of the metal slime girls asked, knowing she hadn't learned anything from poking at the doors.

"I'm awesome," Metal replied with a grin. "I have more points in enchanting because of my other species and a magical ring."

"We're going to need to work on that," the other metal slime girl admitted, knowing they hadn't really been paying attention to gear.

Metal nodded. "Once we have things set up with the shadow doors, I'll see about killing an army of shadows so I can decurse the belt and get a bunch of shadow crystals. If I want to break the curse and get a really nice belt, I need to kill a thousand shadows without help. It shouldn't take all that long before they're durable enough to count for my enchant for increasing durability which means I can get my sword to a point where it's indestructible."

"Same thing for the arrowheads," Xander said, thinking about his knobby club that should let her speed the process up.

Melanie frowned slightly as she considered the mental toll fighting a thousand monsters was going to cause her twin. "What are you going to do if you get a cursed tattoo that makes it impossible to fight?"

Metal shrugged. "I'll use the altar or take the belt off and start over after I fix it. I don't need to complete the challenge the first time, I just need to get there eventually."

"We should probably move the altar closer," Tara said thoughtfully.

"It would make things easier," Metal agreed as she turned to look at one of the brownies. "How do you feel about being immune to shadow damage?"

"Sounds good," the brownie agreed as he headed for the closest shadow door, not particularly worried about his shadow affinity as he wasn't supposed to be near combat.

"Can I borrow," Metal grinned as Xander dropped his hat on her head, "thanks."

"You're welcome," Xander replied as he handed Metal her swords. "Let's get the doors tested then we can grab the fish coin for your hammer."

"Okay!" Metal replied cheerfully as she ran over to the other shadow door. "Give me five seconds then step through." She crawled through the door then stood up and drew her sword, waiting for the brownie to show up.

The shadow brownie had barely finished stepping out of the door and into the hallway when Metal cut the creature in half. "Any luck?" she asked the brownie at the other door.

The brownie checked his character sheet. "It worked!"

"Send the Metal slimes through first," Metal suggested, wanting help for when they had to kill Xander's shadow, mostly because she wasn't sure how dangerous Xander's dragon form would end up being. She watched the brownie leave then turned to face the door, ready to stab anything that came out. Thankfully, she only had to wait twenty seconds for a shadow slime to crawl out of the door.

"Show time!" Metal shouted as she hacked the creature's arm off. She took a step back and to the left as the shadow slime tried to slip past her, intent on reaching the other slime girl. "Die already!"

The metal slime girl shifted uncomfortably as she stared into the darkness, not sure how to feel about the battle taking place at the other end of the hallway, it sounded rather one sided or at least she couldn't hear any screams of pain from Metal. 'This would be easier if I could see, at least I'd know how to help.' She wasn't quite sure how to feel when the pitch black hallway was suddenly 'illuminated' with a sourceless light so that she could see everything, including the fading remains of her doppelganger. "Your sword is bullshit."

"You're welcome," Metal replied cheerfully, well aware that her sword made an otherwise annoying fight much easier. "Send in the next slime girl then come back, I'm going to need your help with Xander."

Metal wasn't surprised that the next four fights were easier than the first, mostly because each fight added to the number of people that could see in the dark and use holy weapons to stab the shadows. "I'm going to need everyone to hold the shadow Xander down so I can stab him."

"What happens if his shadow has his ability to rip things apart with magic?" one of the slime girls asked warily.

"Good question," Metal admitted, thinking about some of the spells or magical effects that Xander and Tara could use when they were annoyed. "I've got a better idea, let's move one of the doors to the tower and deal with Tara's doppelganger first."

"How?" one of the girls asked, fairly sure Tara's shadow could kill them with magic.

"She's vulnerable to arrows and weapons unlike Xander. We should have a couple of hundred feet, that should put us out of effective range of her magic. If I put on the silence sash and stay by the door while invisible, I should be able to keep her from using magic long enough for you to kill her with holy arrows," Metal suggested.

"Or we figure out what we can curse her with," one of the girls suggested thoughtfully.

"Touching the cursed book would make her bones brittle," one of the girls suggested, figuring that would at least slow her down.

One of the girls nodded. "The crown would turn her limbs into tools."

"It's worth a shot," Metal agreed, figuring Tara could help them deal with Xander's doppelganger.

"Before we worry about the boss, can Melanie wiggle through the door?" one of the girls asked.

Metal considered the dimensions of the pet sized door. "Probably, she's nimble enough. What are you thinking?"

"I figure she'd be a good test case for the crown and the book," the girl replied, knowing that she didn't have the boss's strange magic.

"It also gives us one more person when we have to deal with Tara," one of the other girls pointed out.

"It's worth a try," Metal agreed. "Grab the book and the crown."

One of the slime girls pulled the crown off her head then tossed it to Metal while another one pulled the cursed book out of her bag and handed it over along with a silence bracelet. "The bracelet should silence the area. I'll tell Melanie that she's next."

"Sounds good," Metal agreed as everyone else headed towards the opposite door, wanting to be ready for when Melanie's shadow appeared. "I might as well turn invisible, just keep stabbing or casting heal spells."

"That's the plan," the remaining metal slimes agreed.

Metal waited patiently as the shadow creature wiggled her way into the hallway, having to twist and compress her shoulders to make it through the door, most likely mirroring Melanie's actions as the creature looked more flexible and less solid. She reached down and dropped the cursed crown on the doppelganger's head as she tried to stand up, causing one of the shadow's legs to change into a shovel and the shadow to stumble through a slime girl, looking like it hurt the shadow as much as it hurt the slime girl.

Metal reached out and lifted the hat off the shadow's head then stuck it back on the shadow, causing her other leg to turn into a rake and the shadow to start crawling towards Melanie. "I might have overestimated their intelligence," she admitted as she lifted the crown and dropped it twice more, causing the creature's arms to change into a dark ceramic glue pot and a mining pick. She touched the shadow creature with the book and frowned when nothing happened. "I don't think that worked."

"They probably don't actually have internal organs," one of the girls said as she worked on stabbing the doppelganger with her holy sword.

Metal put her book and the crown in her bag then drew her swords and stabbed the shadow, wanting more shadow stones and wanting the mockery of her face gone. She hacked the doppelganger's head off, causing it to fade away. "These things are worse than the mirror."

"How are they worse?" Melanie asked as she walked over.

"Because they're stupid," Metal replied as she picked up the rake and checked it with her enchanting senses, annoyed and a bit relieved that Melanie's doppelganger hadn't put up more of a fight.

"Probably just as well," Melanie pointed out as she stretched her arms over her head, not a fan of having to wiggle through the narrow opening. "Anything useful?"

"Using it drastically increases the number of weeds you have to deal with but it enriches the soil and makes plants mature 50% faster."

"How do you break the curse?" one of the slime girls asked.

"You kill a powerful plant monster. You also get something interesting if you can trick 100 different people that don't know about the curse into stepping on the pointy bits and getting hit by the handle," Metal explained as she stuck the rake in her bag and picked up the pot filled with glue.

Melanie shook her head. "That sounds like more trouble than it's worth."

"We can probably use the weeds for crossbreeding or just to expand Tara's list of available plants, nettles count as weeds," Metal replied cheerfully as she checked the pot of glue. "The glue pot drops the user's crafting by 10 while you're using it and unlocks fletching when you kill a powerful monster with feathers. Crafting two hundred exceptional arrows unlocks a special ability."

"You're going to spend a lot of time crafting, aren't you?" Melanie asked with amusement.

"I like crafting," Metal replied with a grin as she stashed the glue pot in her bag and grabbed the mining pick.

"Incoming Tara in ten seconds!" the metal slime that had left to recruit Tara called out after slipping back through the other door.

Metal stuffed the cursed mining pick in her bag then slipped the silence bracelet on, wanting to make sure that Tara's doppelganger couldn't cast spells on the off chance that she wasn't as single minded as the rest. She turned to face the door and drew her swords, hoping they weren't making a mistake. She wasted no time when a shadowy pixie stepped out of the pet sized door and went to town on the twisted doppelganger, wanting her dead before she could kill everyone.

Tara shifted back to her normal size then tossed two holy crystals down the hallway, wanting to light everything up and cause her doppelganger problems.

Melanie shivered as the shadow tore itself apart trying to fly through the holy aura and the slime girls that kept jumping through it. "That wasn't quite as bad as I was expecting."

Metal took the bracelet off. "Nope."

"At least the holy stones hurt the doppelgangers," Tara said as she glanced around the room, trying to get used to the lack of light and the fact that she could still 'see' everything. "Let's grab Xander then we can run everyone else through."

"On it," one of the slime girls said, then slipped through the door. "Xander, it's your turn."

"Any trouble with Tara's doppelganger?" Xander asked warily as he walked over to the shadow door.

"No, they're a bit single minded," the slime girl replied, figuring that covered things without explaining anything that might help his doppelganger avoid their trap.

"Anything I need to know?" Xander asked.

"Just walk through and we'll stab your duplicate," she replied then slipped back through the doors.

"Sure," Xander replied as he adjusted his sleeve to cover his left hand then followed her through the door. "Ready?"

"Ready," Night replied as Xander walked towards his doppelganger as it charged through the slime girls and the field of holy energy that the stones were producing, looking visibly ragged but angry as it crossed the distance in a burst of speed. He grinned as he reached up and grabbed his doppelganger by the neck with his left hand and drove Night through it, completely ignoring its attempt to life-drain him thanks to Night's protection. "That was easy."

"How did he grab the shadow?" one of the metal slimes asked.

"Ghost touch shirt," Xander replied with a grin as he looked around the hallway, enjoying the fact that he could see in the dark rather than just seeing souls. "Thank you Night."

"You're welcome," Night replied.

"Let's take a break and get something to eat, we can rotate people through once they max out their shadow affinity," Tara suggested.

"Let me know if you need me, I'm going swimming then I'm stabbing some shadows," Metal said as she headed for the door, looking forward to increasing the power of her swords and making sure they wouldn't break.

"We should be fine, have fun with the shadows," Tara told her.

0o0o0

"I like crafting as much as the next brownie but this seems like a lot of work for one arrow," one of the brownies pointed out as he watched Metal stick her shadowy index finger into the back of the rune etched arrowhead she'd just finished crafting.

"I only need one," Metal replied as she wrapped the rest of her fingers around the cursed staff.

Brownie winced as he watched Metal use the staff on a strawberry plant and turned her hand and part of her arm into a shadowy purple wood. "I thought you needed 200 for a quiver?"

"I'm planning on boosting the edge and the durability using the shadows then having someone copy them with the mirror," Metal explained as she used her other hand to carefully pull the shadowy hand off her stump and set it on the workbench so she didn't accidentally mess up the annoyingly fragile arrowhead.

The brownie shook his head. "That's going to take a while."

"It doesn't have to be perfect, just exceptional," Metal replied as she drew her sword and carefully grabbed the shadow wood finger in front of the arrowhead with two fingers without touching it, doing her best to leave room to cut on the other side of the wooden finger.

The brownie frowned at Metal as she carefully cut through the wood near the palm. "But then you don't get to craft a bunch of arrows."

'They're worse than I am about crafting,' Metal thought as she trimmed the handle of her new stabbing tool. "Did you miss the part where I had to use alchemy on the metal? I'm not fighting an army of imp champions so I can create enough enhanced metal to get two hundred arrowheads that match the exceptional arrow, which was random chance."

"You might get something better," the brownie argued as Melanie walked into the workshop carrying the shadow belt.

"I'm not wasting the next couple of days or weeks making two hundred exceptional arrows that match, especially since the rune etched arrow was a happy bonus and I only managed to pull it off once in twenty arrowheads," Metal argued.

Melanie gave the brownie a look when he opened his mouth to argue. "She can worry about making perfect arrowheads after we get some decent quivers for the archers."

"Let's go," Metal suggested as she headed through the door, tired of arguing about the best way to make the perfect quiver.

"Are you going to want help with the shadows while you renew the enchanting quests?" Melanie asked as she worked on securing the belt around Metal's waist.

"Might as well," Metal agreed as she double checked to make sure Xander's hat was still on her head then stuck the cursed ring on her finger, causing half of her skin to melt and improving the rest. "That's unpleasant."

Melanie paused working on the belt when she noticed the spots where Metal was oozing slime. "You're oozing."

Metal quickly cast her healing spell on herself, repairing her skin. "I'll grab a bath after I run some tests."

"Probably a good idea," Melanie agreed, trying not to think of what the ring would do to someone that wasn't a slime. "Do you want to wait for Xander and Tara to get back with the altar or do you want to start?"

"They should be back before I manage to increase my enchanting skill," Metal replied after thinking about it for a couple of seconds.

"Worst case, I'll just steal the belt. And done," Melanie warned her as she finished putting the belt on her sister.

Metal drew her sword that created elemental crystals then swung at the first shadowy rat that appeared out of thin air, cutting it in half. "Thanks."

"No worries," Melanie replied as Metal stabbed the second rat with her arrowhead on a stick, causing a decent wound thanks to her strength more than the quality of the swing. "You're going to run into some trouble when you hit a shadow knight."

"It should cut through their armor and resilience," Metal replied as she killed the next rat with her sword. "This might take a bit to find something nasty enough to upgrade the arrow."

"If you need me to step in, just ask," Melanie offered.

Metal stabbed a shadowy wolf with the arrow then hit it with her sword, finishing her enchanting quest for sharpness on the arrowhead. "Spoke too soon, take a turn," she replied as she cut down the shadowy wolf that lunged for her out of the shadows.

Melanie drew one of the holy swords and cut down the next shadow monster, giving Metal a chance to focus on enchanting the arrowhead without messing up.

Metal took a step back and focused on enchanting her arrowhead with another sharpness quest without affecting the rest of the makeshift weapon. "That's harder than I was expecting, I'm going to need help."

"That's what I'm here for," Melanie replied as she killed another shadow wolf. "Are you good?"

"I'm good," Metal replied as she stepped forward and stabbed a four legged shadow beast with the arrow then hacked its head off with the sword, causing the shadow crystal growing out of her head to get a bit larger. "It's hard to focus on just the arrowhead in the middle of a fight."

"Would it help if I was using the belt and I just held the arrow out when you needed to enchant it?" Melanie asked thoughtfully.

"What would I be doing?" Metal asked as she finished off another shadow creature with glowing flames for eyes.

"Dark magic?" Melanie suggested.

"Grab the hat and my sword then carefully grab the arrow," Metal suggested as she kicked the shadow beast, sending it flying backwards to buy some time for them to trade hats.

Melanie quickly swapped hats after ripping the shadow crystal out of her sister's head then grabbed the arrowhead on a stick and worked on killing the shadow creatures while Metal worked on putting her cursed sword away without damaging it. "At least they're never boring."

Metal grinned when the sharpness quest let her know that it was finished. "Hold the arrow out."

Melanie held the arrow out while she used her holy sword to kill the shadow creatures that kept appearing, fairly sure most people would die before they reached fifty shadows, let alone a thousand.

Metal grabbed Melanie's wrist to keep her arm steady then focused on enchanting the arrowhead with sharpness. "You're good."

"I know," Melanie replied with a grin then stabbed the next monster with the arrow, fairly sure they were going to be there a while but happy that they were going to have a really nice quiver when they were done.

Metal cast her magic leech spell on the creature, causing the creature's 'spells' to cost double which wasn't particularly useful but helped increase her experience towards increasing her dark magic skill. 'I need a better collection of spells.'

Melanie fell into a routine of stabbing everything with the arrowhead then finishing it off with her holy sword, with the occasional break where she had to hold her arrowhead out so that Metal could reapply the sharpness quest, thankfully or not, the interruptions slowed down as the monsters weren't scaling as fast as the requirement for the sharpness quest.

Metal scowled when she cast another magic leech spell and she felt a burning pain from her left forearm as a strange runic tattoo started appearing, line by burning line. "Ouch!" she cursed as the pain from the sickly green flames increased as more of the cursed tattoo appeared.

Melanie scowled as one of the shadows clawed her as she glanced over at her sister. 'Oh, right resilience and shadow immunity,' she mused when she realized the creature's claws hadn't actually done any damage. "What's the matter?"

"Tattoo hurts," Metal complained as she focused on her cursed tattoo with her enchanting ability, trying to get an idea what the curse was supposed to do other than hurt.

"What does it do?" Melanie asked as she stabbed a shadow turtle through its shell with the arrowhead, causing it to breathe a stream of shadowy flames at her and Metal.

Metal dodged the flames, mostly so she didn't get in the habit of face tanking things then lunged forward and kicked the creature in the head, causing it to flip over and expose its much softer belly. "It drops my unholy affinity by double my dark magic skill."

"That's useful as long as you can remove it," Melanie mused as she stabbed the turtle three times, wondering how much health the damned thing had because it wasn't dying.

"Not really, it just burns it," Metal complained. "I'm going to have to fix it."

"Yuck, at least you can fix it," Melanie replied then jumped back when the turtle pulled its limbs in and started spinning around on its shell. "The hell?!" she sputtered when black flames shot out of the holes and the turtle lurched towards her.

Metal gestured and cast a water bolt at the beast with her non-cursed hand when the turtle skidded towards Melanie, sending it skidding towards the wall. "Do you want my sword?" she asked as Xander and Tara walked into the room with the altar that decursed things.

"Sure," Melanie replied as she jumped into the air and landed on the spinning turtle point first, pinning it to the ground with her holy sword and killing it as it ripped itself apart. "This would be easier if I had a bunch of extra limbs."

"They're handy," Xander offered as they walked over. "Having fun?"

"No," Metal grumbled as she cast a magic leech spell on the shadowy bear that appeared. "The tattoo hurt and screwed up my unholy affinity."

"You could always try cutting it off," Melanie replied as she stabbed the bear with the arrow, causing it to hit her in the face with a large paw, sending her tumbling backwards because of the force of the hit and sending her sword flying.

Metal took the belt off and dropped it on the ground. "Plan B."

Xander tossed the altar to Tara and charged towards the shadow bear. He stabbed the shadow bear with Night in the throat, causing the creature to try to maul him. He yanked his sword sideways through the bear's neck and sighed in relief when it died and vanished. "What's plan B?"

"Using the altar," Metal replied as she walked over and focused on the altar. She frowned when she felt the magic wash over her and the tattoo refused to fade or even react. "So much for doing things the easy way," she mused as she walked over and swapped hats with Melanie.

"I could try to move the tattoo to parchment," Tara offered.

"Let's save that for something halfway useful," Metal replied as she pulled her main sword out of its sheath and hacked her arm off.

"You could have just tried to cut the tattoo off…" Tara trailed off as Metal cast a healing spell and her arm regenerated without the tattoo. "Never mind."

Metal handed Melanie her sword and hat then picked up the belt. "You should probably have someone toss the arm in The Well before it falls apart."

Xander picked up the severed arm with the cursed tattoo, ignoring the purple slime slowly oozing out of the severed part. "What did the curse do?"

"It dropped my unholy affinity by double my dark magic skill and not in a good way, I'm going to have to fix it," Metal complained after checking her sheet to make sure that removing the cursed tattoo hadn't fixed things.

"That's nasty, are you sure we want to toss it into The Well?" Xander asked.

Metal wiggled her fingers of her regenerated hand to make sure everything was working. "Using the ring unlocks magical tattoos for crafting but it doesn't come with any patterns which means we're going to have to get creative if we want useful patterns."

Tara looked away from the severed arm and focused on Metal. "How long do you think it's going to take to get your enchanting maxed out?"

"Probably a couple of hours unless I can talk the slime girls into helping stab the shadows with holy weapons enchanted with life-drinking, undead bane and shadow bane. It would increase the amount of experience I'm getting and be a decent start on their weapons," Metal suggested, knowing the girls needed better weapons.

"Especially if I'm the one wearing the belt, then she could just walk around and enchant all of the various trinkets that needed it," Melanie suggested as she adjusted Xander's hat, wanting to make sure it stayed on.

Xander glanced towards the group of metal slimes that were working on their cooking skills around a campfire. "Now that we know we can just cut the tattoos off, we should probably pass the ring around once you're done."

"The stripper spell should count as dark magic," Metal suggested, fairly sure it would boost her skill faster than using magic leech on the shadows.

"Let's move this a bit closer to the fire so they can keep an eye on their food," Tara suggested, fairly sure they could get away with combining the training with combat.

"I'm going to find someone to drop the cursed tattoo in The Well," Xander said as he headed towards the other cave with Metal's severed arm.

"Best of luck," Tara offered as she headed towards the slime girls, looking forward to having the girls finish maxing out their skills and classes.

"What's up boss?" one of the slime girls asked as the group walked over.

"Can you mix some combat in with watching the food cook?" Tara asked the girls as she looked at the rabbits they were roasting over the campfire.

"As long as you don't mind us stopping in the middle to make sure nothing is burning," one of the slime girls replied.

"That should be fine," Melanie assured them. "You just need to stab the shadows with holy swords so you get enchanting quest credit for killing them so Metal can boost her enchanting while we're working on upgrading her sword and the arrowhead. Once she finishes upgrading her enchanting skill, we'll hand the ring to someone else and they can work on their enchanting."

"What about our dark magic?" one of the girls asked.

"The stripper spell should count as dark magic, you're summoning a demon," Metal pointed out.

"That sounds a lot more entertaining than summoning unbound greater demons," one of the other slime girls said as she turned her roast, wanting to make sure it didn't burn.

"Let's get started," Melanie said as she held her hand out towards Metal. "Belt?"

"Sure," Metal replied as she put the belt on her sister. "Let's do this."

Tara smiled as a shadow rat appeared, glad that the girls had immunity to shadows and enough resilience that the shadows wouldn't be able to hurt them for a decent amount of time. "Grab your swords and stab the shadows. Feel free to stop to check on your food, it's more important."