#095 – Rember , calamari?!
I breathed out and smiled in relief as I looked upon the water park’s entrance archway that seed a lot smaller than I rembered it.
“Hello there, old buddy. Long ti no see.”
After a short bout of tree-walking training and sleeping through the night, I’d walked all the way back here. It had taken almost the entire day, but it was actually faster than my first trip to the city dungeon.
Probably because I was taller now. And because I actually had a destination in mind, rather than wandering randomly, hoping to find sothing.
Regardless, even after a quick break to rest my feet from all that walking, the sun was still up and I still probably had enough ti to poke inside before I got too tired to continue.
JamieWasTaken3: round two babeeeey
GonguuH: this should go much better than last ti
Irid123: finallyyyy
HellEnna: so thats the first dungeon?
“Yeah, I cleared this place ages ago… in like a week or so. I bet it’s gonna go much faster this ti! Let’s see how much better I’ve gotten!”
I stepped over the boundary and barely even felt the uncomfortable feeling of entering a dungeon. Was it weaker than before? Or had I just gotten used to it after entering a harder dungeon over and over?
Whatever the case, I had no ti to lose. Ti to rock this place.
I boldly walked in with my key sword in hand while looking into the windows to the sides for any incoming zombies.
It didn’t take long for one to appear and proceed to very clumsily haul itself over the wall.
I watched it in amusent, rembering the first ti I’d encountered one and freaked the heck out. Like sure, it was creepy, what with it not having a face and moving like a zombie, but it was basically harmless.
The zombie finished clambering over the wall and proceeded to charge .
I stepped aside and let it run past . It took a whole second for it to reorient and charge again.
I let it continue a few more tis before I swung my key sword and killed it in one hit.
I stared at the orange smoke as it dissipated into the air.
“...Man. I feel like a max level player coming to an early ga area,” I murmured. “This was what I was so afraid of back then? Sheesh.”
I shook my head and continued walking through the hallway.
JamieWasTaken3: fukin smurf
Irid123: wait you can go straight for the octopus right?
HellEnna: I think you just got used to the violence
I scowled.
“I did get used to violence. I can’t really deny that. Doesn’t exactly make happy though…” I mumbled as I decapitated another zombie.
…Yeah.
“...I still hate that it feels necessary. I an… if I didn’t go into the dungeon back then, I would have probably starved to death.” I frowned. “And by the ti I found food, I already got used to fighting monsters… Oh, that was the point, wasn’t it? I was manipulated into this!”
Whether by the fate weaver or the phoenix didn’t really matter. This was all one giant setup.
…Not like I could do much about it though. Unless I wanted to spend the rest of my days just living in this dead world without even trying to get back to Earth.
Which I didn’t.
So violence it was.
“Anyway, yeah. I’m hoping I can just open the gate this ti and skip the first two floors. But we’ll see. Maybe it won’t fit the lock.”
In just a couple of minutes, I made it all the way to the locked door at the end of the hallway without any issues. I hadn’t really bothered going into the windows to loot chests yet, since I wasn’t entirely sure whether the chests would respawn or if they did, if they would be in the sa spots.
“So, do you work then?” I asked my key blade with narrowed eyes before glancing at the lock on the gate.
Then I shrugged, lifted the key up to the lock – oh hey, didn’t need to stand on my tiptoes to reach it like last ti – slid it into the gate, and turned it.
The chains fell off, the lock shimred and vanished, and the gate opened, revealing the dungeon’s third floor.
“It actually worked, chat! Hehe, no need to go through that stupid maze with those stupid lockers!”
JamieWasTaken3: fuck yeah speedrun skip
Irid123: nice
And if I recalled correctly, there were so achievents about completing higher floors before lower floors in a dungeon. That had been kinda impossible for the other dungeons, but this one basically invited it!
GonguuH: I’ll guide you
GonguuH: I got my map from the last ti
I grinned and bobbed my head.
“Thanks, Gong! You’re a lifesaver! We’ll be done with this place in no ti!” I exclaid and boldly entered the dungeon’s third floor.
I wasted no ti in following Gong’s directions to get back to the correct water slide to take to the boss, encountering a few of the swimr zombies on my way.
Unfortunately…
“Gong…? Are you sure it was through here…?”
GonguuH: try going back a step
GonguuH: and now go a bit more left
“Okay…”
I kept following his instructions even as I gradually reached places I didn’t even rember from last ti. More and more of the swimr zombies sward , but at this point, they were all very easy to take out.
But that didn’t change the fact that I was clearly not on the right path.
GonguuH: I think it changed from last ti
I let out a sigh.
“Of course… I an, it changed whenever I took a new slide, so of course, it would change when I cleared the dungeon too… I should have expected that…”
Dammit. If only I still had my map! It would have made this so much easier! Argh!
“Well, I guess we’ll have to do this the hard way…” I grumbled.
Which really sucked, because I was pretty tight on ti here if I wanted to get back and clear the city dungeon in ti.
This better be worth it…
I took a deep breath and began randomly exploring, hoping to map out the stupid non-euclidean maze again. Unfortunately, Ebiko wasn’t here to help with the mapping like the good old tis, but Gong was proving to be a very good assistant as well.
It took about an hour before I finally found a way to the slides again. The zombies that popped out of the pools weren’t even worth ntioning with how easy they were to dispatch.
Especially with the invisibility skill that I’d stolen.
[INNATE] skill: Chaleon Presence (imitation) – Use Tempor to bend light and muffle sounds to render yourself invisible.
Upgrade: Shadow Shroud (LOCKED)
Upgrade: Zero Presence (LOCKED)
Upgrade: False Trail (LOCKED)
Granted, the upgrades for it weren’t available and I couldn’t get them either – couldn’t even see what they did, in fact – but it was still useful if I didn’t feel like taking the zombies head on.
The only disadvantage to doing that was that it used up Tempor, which wasn’t ideal, but at least, as far as I could tell, it used surprisingly little.
It only took a little over an hour before I made it back to the slides.
“Finally… Well, what do you think, chat? Are the slides shuffled too? I bet they are,” I said, eyeing the spiral slide that had led to the octopus boss the last ti. “Or maybe it’s even gonna be a completely different boss this ti?”
All the randomly generated levels reminded of roguelike gas and those always randomly picked from three different bosses for each floor, so it wouldn’t surprise if the boss was sothing else this ti.
JamieWasTaken3: poll?
Irid123: at least you can levitate now
HellEnna: which one was it last ti?
HellEnna: that led to the boss?
I humd.
“Levitate and control water, yeah. It was the spiral one. The other two led to chests.” I smiled. “One of them had Mr. Gargles!”
Now that I thought about it, it wasn’t that big of a deal if I picked the wrong slide and got a chest instead. Sure, it would take a while to find my way back in the re-randomized third floor, but I was only ant to poke in here today anyway. Tomorrow was for full exploration.
“Well, whatever. Let’s just go with the spiral chute again and see where it takes ,” I said with a shrug and walked to the slide to sit down.
My fear of heights wasn’t quite gone, but having the ability to slow fall definitely helped with my confidence, not to ntion my crazy durability.
I breathed in, out, and then without any further ado, pushed myself forward.
Unlike the first ti, I properly prepared myself for the crazy twists and turns of the slide and even utilized my Featherfall skill in short bursts when I lost balance to reorient myself.
I ended up safely making it to the drop off point and proceeded to float down onto the surface of the water inside the tunnel. My feet touched the water’s surface and stayed there, thanks to my ninja sandals. Although… it felt a little wobbly. Standing on water seed a bit different from walking up trees.
I took one careful step forward…
And then sunk right in.
“Gah! Ugh, this is hard…” I complained as I took control of the water around and made myself float half-way subrged in the water to prevent myself from sinking all the way.
“Well, whatever. It’s probably better if I go underwater anyway…” Since I had several skills that improved my underwater mobility.
JamieWasTaken3: u giving up?
“I’m not giving up! I’m just… leaving it for later. We’re on a schedule, you know?” I argued as I swam forward through the tunnel.
JamieWasTaken3: uhuh
I ignored them. I would learn how to properly waterwalk later. Right now, I just wanted to beat this dungeon again and hopefully get my gun back.
A splash of water interrupted my train of thought and I reflexively slashed with my sword. I missed and the plush fish that had erged from the water began charging , but now that I got a better look at where it was, my followup swing easily took it out.
“...Right, forgot about these.” They had been weak even back then, so they shouldn’t be an issue.
And as it turned out, they weren’t.
I breezed through the rest of the tunnel until the point where gravity suddenly tilted and sent plumting down.
I quickly caught myself with Featherfall and took a deep breath.
“Okay! Okay, chat. Looks like this still leads to the boss!” Unless the chest tunnels had changed as well.
JamieWasTaken3: go invis
JamieWasTaken3: fight invis with invis
Irid123: are you gonna steal one of his skills?
I bobbed my head and activated Chaleon Presence, since there wasn’t really any downside to doing that.
“Not sure about that, Irid… I would have to drop the one I have… Hmm…”
I kinda liked Chaleon Presence, but if it was the octopus boss again, I imagine he would have a lot of cool skills for to steal…
Super regeneration? Portal making? Whatever the heck the other tentacles were about?
It was very tempting.
…And also, I probably wasn’t going to keep going after this anyway, so using up most of my Intra and Tempor wouldn’t matter.
Ah, dammit.
With my mind more or less decided, I slowly floated down the tunnel, and just as expected, it led to the large open circular area filled with water.
I imdiately summoned John and had him scan the place while looking with my own eyes. I didn’t even land on the water before so of the chatters noticed sothing in John’s vision.
I turned my head and sure enough, I could see the barely visible tentacle-shaped white shimr near a wall.
I landed on the water, making no noise or disturbing the surface in any way and then proceeded to very carefully take a step toward the invisible octopus.
The first step was fine, the second step was a bit more wobbly and I had to stop for a mont, but I ssed up on the third step and my foot fell through the water and the rest of followed.
I cursed inwardly, but imdiately took control of the surrounding water and tried to swim as fast as I could toward the octopus.
It must have noticed the unnatural water movent though, because before I could reach it, it lashed out with its pink tentacle that ca out of invisibility, forcing to react.
I slashed at it while activating the black fire and managed to slice it right off. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to stop its montum and the severed tentacle smacked right into , montarily plunging underwater.
Fortunately, unlike last ti, water hardly bothered .
I aquaported right below where I’d seen the invisible octopus, took a second to reorient myself, and then, with a bit of hydrokinesis, I burst up toward the spot where the octopus was hiding.
Apparently, the octopus had seen coming though and lashed out with one of its other tentacles – the purple one with afterimages – and threw to the side.
But I wasn’t done yet.
As soon as I splashed back into the water, I aquaported to the other side and jumped out again, readying my key sword for a swing.
The purple tentacle lashed out again as the octopus broke its invisibility to back away from .
But I already expected it and turned my swing to the side instead, cutting the tentacle off, sohow dodging it as it flew past , and tackling the octopus.
Then I did sothing I had completely forgotten I could do and chat had very kindly reminded while I’d been on the way back here.
Immolate.
The effect was imdiate. The octopus began thrashing like crazy with all of its tentacles, but its slaps barely did anything to with all my durability. Not to ntion, I had managed to grab it by its white tentacle full of eyes – gross – which I rembered was its weak point.
Got you by the balls, bitch.
It continued thrashing as I kept on pouring more Ether into Immolate and we both fell into the pool of water.
I held my breath and used hydrokinesis to move water away from my face, just in case, but didn’t dare let go of the tentacle.
It only took a few seconds until the boss’s struggles turned into limp flailing.
I knew I had it in the bag.
And that was the only reason why I decided to risk this.
I released Chaleon Presence and imdiately activated Skill Snatch.
I was greeted with a whopping five different sensations. All wildly different, yet having one thing in common – They were all about empowering a single limb, changing its physical form and the way it interacted with the world.
The first was sothing about stitching together space, the second refracted light, the third would change the limb into sothing that could rapidly restore itself when damaged and stretch indefinitely, the fourth made it very brittle but allowed its user to view the world in a way that I couldn’t describe, and the last one ssed with spaceti to speed the limb up.
For a brief mont, I was overwheld, and hesitated on which one I should pick.
I had wanted the portals, but now that I saw the spaceti speeding one, I couldn’t resist but snatch that instead.
I was imdiately overwheld by heavy ntal fatigue the mont the snatch went through. My head was pounding and it was hard to focus on keeping the water away from my face with hydrokinesis and holding my breath, but I managed to hold on.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the octopus stopped moving, and then poofed into orange smoke, leaving a chest behind… which imdiately sunk to the bottom of the pool.
I ignored it for the ti being and swam up to get so air into my lungs again.
“Guah!”
I breathed in the sweet sweet air and leaned on the wall to keep myself from sinking. My head was killing though.
God, why was I doing this to myself, knowing what using Skill Snatch did to ?
Because I was greedy.
Now I had a fun new toy I could play around with.
I brought up my status and quickly zeroed in the new innate skill I had.
[INNATE] skill: Voidspeed Tentacle – Select a limb to permanently modify over the course of several hours. Said limb will then drain your Tempor at a constant rate in exchange for constantly dilating its own ti to be faster.
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