BT - Book 1 - Chapter 31 (Patreon)

Summoning the second Brensen pushed Micah to his limit, but it turned leveling into a joke.  Each Daemon was almost as powerful as Martin, a full Royal Knight, and fully capable of handling most of the dungeons around Basil’s Cove on its own.  With the addition of the second, even the Cavern of Rust, the highest ranked dungeon in the surrounding area, wasn’t a credible challenge.

The dungeons themselves were sorted by the average level of their inhabitants.  Some encounters might involve a ‘mini boss’ in the form of a solitary monster more powerful and higher leveled than the dungeon’s standard denizens.  Others might be with swarms of weaker and lower leveled creatures designed to overwhelm adventurers that don’t have the capacity to attack a wide area.

Entrance into the low and mid-level dungeons was strictly regulated.  Usually in the form of a strict queue only allowing one adventuring team to delve into the dungeon each day.  Every guild in Basil’s cover wanted access to the level five through twenty dungeons.  Between the attunement, physical rewards and experience they were a veritable font of resources for those able to safely and successfully loot them.

Even though higher powered dungeons, in the level twenty to thirty range, weren’t overflowing with applicants the guilds would still raid them with some regularity.  Considering that the average guild leader was between level thirty and thirty five, most struggled to put together a full team of the appropriate level to handle the delve.  Conventional wisdom was that a party should be at least two to three levels above the dungeon’s level in order to ensure the survivability of the team.  After all, when delving adventurers regularly ran into at least ten to twenty five normal encounters before fighting the boss.  Challenging a dungeon at your own level was a great way to run out of resources before the final battle, greatly increasing the risk of lasting injury or death.

The Cavern of Rust was level thirty eight and posed a serious risk to the entire area.  Only the Golden Drakes or a coalition of every other guild leader in Basil’s Cove could credibly challenge it, and even then only at great risk to themselves.  Almost half of the losses amongst Basil’s Cove’s adventurers above level twenty five came in the infrequent raids on the Cavern of Rust.  

Only by paying a stiff price in attunement could the City ensure that the Cavern was regularly pruned of monsters.  Of course, without regular raiding there would almost certainly be a dungeon break of creatures at a level that Basil’s Cove wasn’t even close to prepared to handle. 

Dungeon denizens respawned at least once daily.  By some exercise of Ankros’ will, new spawns and the old dungeon residents refused to coexist.  Almost immediately upon spawning, they would fight to the death with the victors gaining experience just like a blessed.  If left alone long enough, monsters could gain levels or even evolve.  While the increasing difficulty level of a dungeon over time was bad enough on its own, any dungeon born creature that exceeded the dungeon’s level by five or more would break free of the dungeon’s control and attempt to escape.

In short, Micah thought as he threw himself to the side in an attempt to avoid a stream of metal quills stitching the ground toward his previous position, by raiding the Cavern of Rust he was providing a community service.  Digging the butt of his spear into the ground, Micah rolled to his feet, not even bothering to return fire with an offensive spell.  Maybe if he were closer, sonic bolt would be able to do some damage, but the Cavern’s boss monster, affectionately referred to as ‘The Decrepit Behemoth,’ was so far above Micah’s level that directly attacking it was almost pointless.

The Behemoth glowed red as its internal flames stoked higher.  It raised both of its metal clad fists, swinging them futilely at one of the two Brensen’s as it swept past.  The Daemon’s skeletal claws raked across the Behemoth’s metal armor, digging deep and ripping great slivers of steel from them but failing to penetrate.  At its feet, the other Brensen dug its claws into the joints of the armor covering one of the Behemoth’s four knees.  This time the claws punched through the thinned armor, rewarding the Brensen with a fountain of boiling black ichor.

Micah tried to ignore the Behemoth as it towered over him, a monsterous metal clad centaur with access to both fire and earth magic.  The dull red of its decaying armor ominous in the flickering light emanating from the orb hovering between Telivern’s antlers.  It slammed a metal clad hoof at the Brensen on the ground, but the Daemon hopped away with a squawk and a flap of its dark wings.  

The ground rocked beneath his feet, dropping Micah to one knee and knocking Telivern to the floor entirely.  Gritting his teeth against the heat and distractions, Micah mouthed the words to heal as he routed his mana toward the two Brensen on the front line.  Even though the agile monsters had managed to avoid every direct attack from the lumbering Behemoth, the boss was powered by potent fire magic that raised the temperature around it to levels usually only found in a forge or blast furnace.

Unfortunately, his skill level with the spell wasn’t high enough to fully heal the burns on both of the Daemons, but it went a long way toward supplementing their natural regeneration. Silently, he cursed his level.  Even with his advanced class, limited mana would restrict him to only casting the spell six to seven times in a row.

Another geyser of blood erupted from the Behemoth as the flying Daemon landed on its lower back and began shredding its way through the heavily worn armor.  The boss bellowed as it tried unsuccessfully to reach behind itself and dislodge the Brensen from its back.  Ordinarily, an attack of this nature wouldn’t be possible.  A normal human like Micah would ignite if they remained in close contact with the monster.  Worse, the heat radiating from the Behemoth would quickly soften and melt any weapon to the point that it couldn’t even scratch the creature’s leathery skin let alone its armor.

Micah cast heal once more, targeting the Daemon riding the bucking centaur.  Instinctively, as the spell took hold, he could feel the damage from the heat aura accumulating on his summoned monster.  Already, it’d lost more hit points than Micah even had.

He winced as another gush of blood from the Behemoth soaked the Brensen, the scalding liquid shaving off another fraction of its total hit points.  Luckily the Daemons regenerated and were fairly resistant to environmental stressors such as extreme heat and corrosion.  WIthout their resilience, the entire battle would have ended almost fifteen minutes ago and Micah would already be dead.

The Brensen at the Behemoth’s feet ducked under the creature in its confusion, slashing its underbelly with both of its deceptively sharp bone claws.  Micah hurried behind a boulder and began recovering his mana.  The last thing he needed was for the Behemoth to fire another swarm of needles, any one of which could kill him in a single shot if it hit him cleanly.  

There wasn’t much he could do other than heal his Daemons.  Even though his air magic held the advantage against the earth magic that powered its rusty iron armor, air knife didn’t pack enough of a punch to actually damage the boss.  Of course, his wood magic was completely pointless against it.  The fire aura around it held the advantage, and any wood spells he cast would be negated before he could even finish them. 

That said, he wouldn’t need to to step in.  Micah couldn’t see the Behemoth’s HP, but it was covered in wounds and visibly tired from the Daemons’ harassment.  So long as he fulfilled his support role and kept healing the Daemons, it was only a matter of time before they brought the creature down.

A bellow rang out as one of the Brensens did more damage to the Decrepit Behemoth.  Micah smiled as Telivern walked over to him, lowering its head slightly.  He ran his hand through its off white fur.

Accomplishment.

“Almost friend,” he chuckled slightly.  “The Daemons have everything in hand.  Pretty soon all we’ll have to do is collect the experience and rewards and then we can head back to the cave.”

Discontent.  Unnatural.

“I know you don’t like the Brensen buddy,” he scratched Telivern behind the ear.  “Just trust me that there isn’t another way.  Something big is coming, and they might be our only chance to fight back.”

Acceptance.  Discomfort.

“I just wish I could control a couple more of them,” Micah frowned slightly.  “None of the books say anything about a maximum number of creatures that can be summoned at the same time, but I think that’s because no one tried to summon Daemons this powerful at a level as low as mine.  I’m pretty sure that summoning is tied to my mind attribute.  Unless I do something drastic, I’m going to need to gain a fair number of levels before I can summon a third.”

Confusion.

Before Micah could answer, the ground shook.  Glancing over the boulder, he took in the Decrepit Behemoth, splayed out on the ground and soaked in its own steaming blood.  One of the Brensen grasped the rusted over iron plate surrounding the monster’s throat and tore into it with its hooked beak.  A couple of seconds later, his status updated, displaying the huge amount of experience he’d gained from his contribution to the boss’ death.

Checking his status, he smiled grimly.  One more level until he could learn his class speciality once again.

Micah Silver

Age 16 [ERROR] / 26

Class/Level Thaumaturge 19

XP 4,100/15,000

HP 355/390

Attributes

Body 10, Agility 10, Mind 33, Spirit 33

Attunement

Moon 13 Sun 2 Night 10

Mana

Moon   209/810 Sun 562/788 Night  503/804

Affinities

Time 10

Wood 6

Tier I - Refresh 10, Mending 9, Plant Weave 9

Tier II - Augmented Mending 10, Root Spears 11

Tier III - Heal 6

Air 5

Tier I - Gale 7, Air Knife 15, Air Supply 4
Tier II - Wind Shield 6, Sonic Bolt 8

Tier III - Updraft 2

Blessings

Mythic Blessing of Mursa - Blessed Return, Ageless Folio

Skills

Anatomy  7

Enchanting  11

Fishing   1
Herbalism  5

Librarian  5

Ritual Magic  17

Spear   11

-Wind Spear 8

Spellcasting  23

He chuckled.  Thaumaturge really was a broken class.  He wouldn’t even need a ritual to cast foresight. Between his incredibly high mind attribute and level in spellcasting, the spell would cost roughly half the mana it had when he was at the Academy.  That fact, combined with his mana pools being roughly twice what they were when he was last level twenty, would make the casting of the spell a trivial matter.  altar

Micah stepped out from behind the boulder and walked over toward the altar to Ankros where the reward for finishing the dungeon had appeared as soon as the boss expired. A book.  He shrugged to himself.  Books weren’t uncommon, but usually they just had introductory spell formulas, martial arts or enchantment recipes.  Valuable and powerful items, but not usually something that would benefit Micah at his current level.  

He’d expected a bit more from the Cavern of Rust.  His last couple of runs earned him an enchanted suit of chainmail and a gem covered in indecipherable runes that could turn earth and metal into lava if he fed it enough mana.  Unfortunately, without a fire affinity the process was slow and required an obscene amount of mana.  In short, the rewards were usually powerful and valuable, even if he couldn’t directly use all of them.

Micah picked up the book and turned it over in his hands.  The book was simple, only endorned with the word “Haste” and the picture of an hourglass.  The leather enveloping the wooden cover was old but well maintained.  As Micah opened the book, a smile lit up his face.

The book’s interior didn’t contain any superfluous information.  No page devoted to the scribe.  No sheet on the author.  Just the spell formula for a fifth tier time spell called haste.  

Quickly he scanned it, not entirely able to commit the spell formula to memory but gaining a decent idea about its effect.  The smile morphed into a full on grin.  Haste sped up the flow of time around a target, allowing them to move and act between ten and two hundred and fifty percent faster depending upon the level of the caster.

Packing the book away, Micah motioned to the Brensen.  Both of them immediately looked up from the corpse of the Behemoth, their beaks soaked in its blood from their feast.  He motioned to the exit of the boss’ chamber as he began walking toward the exit.  He’d need to drop them off at the grove before he returned to Basil’s Cove to avoid suspicion, but beyond that his mind was awash with the possibilities of the new spell.

Silently he thanked both Mursa and Ankros.  There was no way that spell was awarded to him randomly.  He wasn’t sure which god, but one of them was looking out for him.  

After hours of walking, the walls of Basil’s Cove began growing on the horizon.  It was a shame that he couldn’t use his teleportation ritual every day, but given his registration as a solo adventurer, the guards would just assume he’d found a way to sneak in and out of the city and ask him questions about avoiding taxes.  It was simpler to just pretend to be a normal adventurer two to three days a week just to avoid suspicion.  

Quickly he joined the line to get into Basil’s Cove, a long winding thing at the end of the day filled with farmers, adventurers and merchants waiting for their turn to be inspected and taxed.  Just as he was about to pay his attunement and enter the city, a familiar voice jolted him from his musings on the new spell.

“Micah!”  He looked up to see Trevor walking over to him, a big grin on the larger man’s face.  “I can’t believe how busy you’ve been as a solo.  Still, there’s no excuses now.  We’re both done with adventuring for the day.  Nothing to stop us from catching up over a drink.”

“Sure,” Micah replied, letting a genuine smile creep across his face.  Trevor had a point.  He’d spent every waking moment researching or adventuring.  He needed to take a minute to relax every now and then or he’d lose his edge.

“Great,” Trevor punched him on the shoulder and winked.  “My new team and I are a bit behind you in line, but if you wait for us inside we’ll catch up with you.”

“New team?” Micah asked, cocking his head.

“Apparently I tried flirting with the guildmaster’s daughter at a party,” Trevor blushed, scratching the back of his head.  “Although everyone but him was amused by it, I’ve been assigned to help protect a squad of new Lancers while they train up to the point that they can handle themselves.”

“Anyone I’d know?” Micah replied, an uneasy feeling starting to settle in the pit of his stomach.

“Maybe?” Trevor shrugged.  “Do you know a big guy with a cleaver, a guy that can turn to stone or a pair of sisters?  I don’t think I’ve introduced them to you but everyone but the stone guy has been around the guildhouse a couple times before so you might have seen them around.”