Change- Chapter 41 (Patreon)

Chapter 41- From the Cesspool to the Crypt

After five minutes, the mouse came running back out. “It’s a bunch of stone coffins and crypts. It looks like the dungeon has recently expanded. It has burrowed through the earth and created a second floor. I am still learning but I think the tombs there must be for some old nobles from long ago.”

Tim grinned. An expanded dungeon was a bad thing. On the other hand fighting undead was a classic rpg experience. He found he was actually excited about it. “Did you find any monsters?”

“They were there, but they kept moving back out of my sight. I heard quite a few of them, but they seemed too small to be like the skeletons or zombies you are thinking of. I will say that at least it smells better than here.”

Tim checked his mana and found that it was full again, so other than the two mana per minute drain he was spending for buffs he was fully ready. He had to walk sideways and squeeze to make it through the crevice. It was unlikely he could have made it through in his beastial form. That at least was a reason to be happy about the loss of his favorite form.

As he reached the other side he got a notification.

You are the first adventurer to enter the new expanded Cesspool: Floor 2 of 3. Special rewards exist if you can clear all the monsters on this floor.

New Quest: Bring out the Dead.

Objective: Kill all 22 monsters on the 2nd floor without leaving the floor.

Reward: +200 XP,  First access to the tombs of a now forgotten noble house.


That brought a smile to Tim’s face. Now he just had to find what kind of monsters where down here. Mischief switched into battle form and Tim began walking forward with his sword drawn. There were two large crypts like small buildings with metal doors on their fronts. They were located at the end of a rectangular room. As far as Tim could tell this room was about one hundred feet long by twenty feet wide. The ceiling was about ten feet up.

There were twenty stone coffins in two rows between him and the crypts. Most of the coffins were in various states of disrepair. Some were simply worn while at least half a dozen were cracked with their covers split. Strangely, he still hadn’t seen any monsters. Undead were rarely known for their craftiness or stealth. Other than vampires or liches.

That thought gave Tim a moment of second thoughts. He wasn’t worried about any number of skeletons, but more intelligent undead could present him with problems. The choice was removed from him though as a pale creature suddenly peeled away from the wall near the ceiling to his right.

It leapt at him, flying through the air. At first it seemed like an albino, flying squirrel. Tim didn’t hesitate but fired off an ice blast that sent it flying in the opposite direction. When it slammed into the wall, ice spread all along but the monster wasn’t dead. Damaged for sure, but it was still moving feebly.

That gave him a chance to cast Master Assess.

Leech Rats     Level: 4
Undead    HP: 7/40

Both Tim and Mischief groaned at the same time, “Great, more rats.”

That appeared to be a signal of sorts. Suddenly they could see at least a dozen pairs of red eyes all over the walls. These rats seemed to have some type of camouflage ability. He would have to pay attention. At least the quest told him there were only twenty two monsters.

Mischief leapt into action and finished off the wounded one. Ice was clearly not the attack to use. Simple math told him that they had 50% resistance to it. So while he could still eventually kill them with it, his sword would probably be a better choice.

He shouted and ran at the closest rat. Three of them leapt at him while the other nine moved for Mischief. Apparently the mouse wasn’t the only one who felt the rivalry between the two rodent types. Tim’s first sword blow was a crit and ended that rat. His belt enhanced his attack speed enough that he was able to spin and send a second slash into another of the rats.

This blow wasn’t a crit but it still managed to slice the undead rat almost in half. The third one got through though and latched onto his leg. Bark Skin helped prevent much of the damage. He could barely feel the rat as it was wrapping itself around his leg rather than trying to bite down.

Tim stopped down on the head of the wounded rat and crushed its skull. That took the rest of its HP. Just as he was focusing on cutting the one off his leg he got a shock. Not a literal shock but a blast of necrotic energy into his body. It burned cold if that was possible. Like both hot and cold at the same time as it ripped deep into him. This must be what Life Tap is like or so Tim imagined.

The notification said that he took (27) damage from the attack. That was a staggering amount from a level four creature and more than a little frightening. But the calm of the oak took over and he brought his blade down in a stroke so close to his skin that he could have practically shaved. Back on Earth he would have as likely cut his own leg off with a move like that. But a grandmaster swordsman had no trouble slicing the creature in half.

Virtually every blow he landed was a crit. This was no different. The rat was shorn from his leg and cut in half longways. Tim then immediately looked for Mischief. The mouse was in trouble as his bubble of HP was almost gone. One or two attacks like the one against his leg would end the much weaker mouse.

Tim wasn’t about to allow that to happen. He leapt in and went to town hacking away with his sword. Mischief might be mouthy, but if the time every came to put him in is place that would fall to Tim, not some undead rats. Because they were focused on Mischief, he managed to kill four of the nine before they even reacted to him.

He absently wondered if it was still called killing when you did it to an undead, but either way they were ended. Mischief finished off the first of his opponents now that the pressure was easing up. The remaining four rats split between the duo. Which turned out to be a mistake for them. Tim killed the first as it leapt at him. He took another (26) damage from the other one, but it was ended a second later.

Mischief meanwhile snapped the neck and stole the last HP from one of his foes just as his protective bubble crumbled. He was still hard to hit between the combination of his high Flexibility and his defense buffs. Tim watched as he danced around the larger rat. Tim wanted to intervene but it just didn’t seem right. Mischief deserved the chance to stand on his own four feet.

Instead of killing the last rat, Tim shouted encouragement. “You’ve got him, Mischief. Make him regret ever crawling out of his grave.”

A few seconds later Mischief's superior speed won. He removed two of the leech rat’s legs and then finally bit down twice to sever the spine. Tim had to respect those jaws of his were pretty powerful and likely to only grow from here.

Tim said, “Let’s back up and catch our breath. I want to rebuff you before we get attacked again.”

“No argument from me,” Mischief said while panting. Or rather he squeaked. Tim almost laughed but kept it to himself. It was sorta like with a toddler. Pretty much everything that the mouse said sounded cutesy. Well other than when he was being a dick.

They waited while Tim’s mana recharged. He was glad that these rats seemed to be more hidden hunters rather than the mindless undead that kept coming. It was good to see that they had progressed on the quest with 13/22 dead. Hopefully they could manage to deal with some of the monsters before they closed. Ice might not be ideal but it was his best ranged attack.

Or maybe it wasn’t. The burial chamber was overgrown with vines. Tim had to take better stock of his surroundings. He had a number of weapons at his disposal and needed to be ready to use the best one.

The other good thing was that Mischief had leveled again. He was now 4th level and half way to level 5. His battle form was now over 7 inches long and he weighed in at nearly half a pound. Tim placed the new stat point in Hardiness as requested and they discussed strategy.

“I think those were the ones hiding on the walls. I bet the rest are either hiding inside one of the coffins or on the back side of one,” Mischief said.

“That makes sense. It will be harder to draw them out that way. I wonder if I can get Ice Blast to arc and come down from above,” Tim said. Then he added, “I know you want the XP but I think I should try to draw them out. Okay?”

“Why do you think I joined up with a big meat shield like you. Remember, I don’t have to be faster than the bear, just faster than you,” Mischief replied.

With that Tim ran forward. He stopped at the first coffin and began working his way around each of them. He first wanted to check the outside of each before trying to open any of them. It might not technically matter where he took the damage, but he sure didn’t want one of these rats attached to his face.

After he cleared the fourth row of coffins, he was jumped by four more of them. His reflexes were fast enough to drop one from the air but the other three all landed on him and in a second he had lost over 80 health. Maybe he hadn’t thought this through well enough. While the rats had trouble latching onto the much smaller Mischief, he provided a sufficient target.

He would have to ask later, but apparently defense didn’t help when they were only trying to latch on. The physical contact didn’t actually cause any damage. It was only afterwards that their life drain effect came into play. Tim managed to scrape another off, cutting it in half. Then a gray bullet flew into him as Mischief latched onto one of the rats.

Tim was drained for another (54) HP and was now below 50% health but Mischief was finishing off one. He managed to kill the last one a second later. Then promptly cast Nature’s Lesser Heal. The spell didn’t act fast but it was still faster than his normal regen. It was significantly faster than even his Ring of Enhanced Health which only healed 10 HP per minute.

After the first spell had run its course, he cast it again and then began moving forward. There were only five monsters left on the floor but Tim was ready to be done with it. This might not be so bad if he had more than two necrotic resistance plates for his armor. Probably the worst part of it to him was that he was dealing with level 4 monsters and they were causing him headaches.

When they passed the seventh row of coffins three more rats leapt out. Two at Tim and one at Mischief. The agile mouse dodged and then went to work on avoiding his opponent while simultaneously lunging in and out for quick attacks..

The surprise again was too fast for Tim to catch more than one of the monsters with his sword. It was finished but the other one latched onto his sword arm. This would be tricky. Except as soon as it latched onto him, it let out a high pitched screech. It let go entirely and fell to the ground. Tim didn’t question his good fortune. Instead he used a quick sword blow to end this rat too. About the same time, Mischief finished his foe.

That left only two monsters to face, but Tim started backing up. He wanted to figure out what had just happened. So he checked his notification.

You have dealt 16 points of positive energy damage to Leech Rat.
You have dealt 16 points of positive energy damage to Leech Rat.

Tim grinned. It dawned on him what was happening. The regeneration effect of his spell had still been in effect when he was attacked, but he had been at full life. The energy apparently then flowed into the rat after it latched onto him.  Unlike ice, they were apparently weak against the positive energy and because of his level the spell must have critted.  Definitely useful information to file away.

After that they checked out all the coffins. The twenty of them were completely free of monsters and all were magically sealed. He got a message saying that the coffins could not be opened until the floor was cleared.

So that really only left two spots for the monsters to be. He assumed they were in the crypts. After discussing it with Mischief, they decided there was nothing to do about it but to try opening one of the doors. The mouse climbed up on top of the crypt over the door while Tim went to the door.

It appeared to be in disrepair so he decided to kick it in. Inside it couldn’t have been more than 10’ x 10’. So hopefully if he launched an Ice Blast inside it would catch any monsters inside. Once they were both ready Tim nodded at Mischief and then did a thrusting kick with his left foot. The rusted metal gave way and the door flew inside to bounce off the stone coffin inside it.

Atop the coffin was another leech rat. But it was the size of a St. Bernard on steroids. Tim almost shrieked in shock as he launched an Ice Blast and jumped back.
He just knew he was gonna hear about that later.

The spell didn’t crit. In fact he realized that none of his ice spells had critted. But it still hit for (33) damage. The massive rat leapt out and Tim was forced to keep backing up to hold it at bay with his sword. His slashes made massive cuts, but the creature didn’t seem to care. He had to assume it had a huge health pool.

Mischief then pounced on the creature’s back trying to bite at its neck. It was here that Tim got to see just how good the mouse was at clinging onto something. The giant rate bucked like a rodeo bull but Mischief hung on like a champ.

Unfortunately this meant no more sword slashes and definitely no more Ice Blasts or he might hurt his friend. So Tim summoned the vines from around the crypt. In retrospect, he should have done this all along. The plant tendrils moved like snakes across the ground and coiled their way around the legs and then the body of the rat. Tim pushed against the spell. It was the first one that had a channeling option so he kept pouring more mana into it until the monster was completely immobilized.

Then he cast a healing spell on it and watched as it shrieked. Mischief continued biting down and soon between the spell and the mouse, their foe had fallen. Tim then took the time to assess it.

Enlarged Leech Rat    Level: 8
Undead, Mini-boss   HP: 0/600

“That was a big rat. There should be a law against the blighters growing that big. Good thing we are here to put them down,” Mischief said.

“Agreed. The other one is probably in the second crypt. So hopefully we can finish him the same way.”

“Maybe you try that vine trick right away this time,” Mischief said.

Tim took the rebuke with a grin. Now he was getting battle strategy tips from a mouse. His gaming buddies back home would never have let him live that down.

Despite all the trouble they had with the second floor the second mini-boss went off without a hitch. Tim kicked the door in and instead of wasting time with Ice Blast he went straight to his Healing attack. That spell alone was worth more than 2/3rds of the creature's health and drove it crazy. The vines worked even better this time as Tim got more pratice with them. After all that, Mischief was still quick to point out that he had landed the finishing blow.

Tim didn’t mind because it pushed Mischief up to level 5 and that was before the 200 XP from the quest. They assigned this point to Acuity to keep the balance and then went to look at what loot they had won.  

They ended up with three pieces. Tim felt sorta bad with all the gear but wasn’t sure if there was a way for Mischief to use any of it. None of it was amazing but then again this was supposed to be an E rank dungeon. Something told him that was not the case anymore. Maybe he was being unfair though. The more he looked at the items the more he thought they might actually be worth somethign.

Adept Magic Ring          Wt: 0.1

Mana: +50

Gloves of Life Drain          Wt: 1.0
Requirements: Sojourner, Level 8

Gloves grant 10% resistance to necrotic energy and once per day can be used to cast the spell Life Drain even if the pre-requisites are not met and without costing any mana.

Life Drain     Rarity: Rare

Pre-requisites: Sojourner, Acuity: 22, Level 12

Mana: 50

Description: Drains health from a single target within range of Acuity x 5’. Health drained equals 6xAcuity. 50% of health gained heals the caster up to a maximum of normal health + 2%/accuity. Excess health is lost at a rate of 1 per 4 seconds.

Crest of House Avon
May be affixed to any armor by a master smith. All stat and defense bonuses for the armor are increased by 100%. Once affixed it can not be removed without destroying the object.