Chapter 24: Fancy Meeting You Here

It was ones and twos. It was a veritable yeti-buffet. Ability Upgrade Available! Will sat on top of a mound of Yetis, panting for breath. “How are you still alive?” Steve demanded. “…I don’t know. Good clean living and always expecting an ambush?” The Yetis had demonstrated basic intelligence, setting up an ambush around just about every piece of expensive gear the previous group had been wearing. But it grew predictable, and after a while, Loth and Will fell into a rhythm: Trap a location, push deeper, empty it out, trap location, then press deeper, always making sure to Yeti-proof their tail. There were a few yeti corpses hanging from snares that hadn’t been there before, slowly decomposing into pale blue Miasma. Will and Steve’s attention was drawn to where one of the older corpses had evaporated enough to drop its loot onto the ice. Followed by another, and another. The party shifted gears, looting and cataloging while Loth kept them safe. Ice cleats, cloak, a warhammer made of Yeti tusk, a nonmagical sword, a sickle made of ice, boots of grounding, a helmet covered in a layer of frost that grew back every time they tried to get rid of it, a wicked-looking dagger, a couple rings with flat stat boosts, a ring of fire resistance…and the loot continued to pour in. The cloak provided a better resistance to hot and cold than nonmagical roc down, so Loth took it. Steve took the cleats and was more effective inside the caves from then on, being able to actually run on the slippery floors. The warhammer was a single tusk on a crude bone shaft that nevertheless felt good in his hand. The whole thing only weighed a few pounds but it looked like it would be effective. Will gave it some experimental swings to give The System a chance to I.D. it. “Boo.” Melee archetype was Tanker, Frontliner, etc. Scout and Infiltrator weren’t on the list. He handed it off to Steve. It suited none of them. “Not bad, definitely worth a few hundred to the right person.” Steve said, adding it to the growing pile. “You’re gonna want to keep the fire resistance ring for the next Floor.” Will tossed the ring to Loth, who secured it in one of his satchels. Will picked up the curved blade made of clear ice that looked as though it had been carved into a razor-sharp edge. “ooh, bad luck,” Steve said as he handled the magic sickle. “If it were a bludgeoning weapon it would sell for a pretty penny, but it’s debuff actively makes the victim stronger against its damage output. It works against itself. Still worth a bit, though. Maybe a hundred? Life drain is usually more valuable, but since all damage after the first hit is nerfed, it won’t sell well.” “I’ll keep it.” Will said, inspecting the blade and pondering how many cubic inches of volume it was. If he could strip the enchantment and put on his phantom hand, maybe he could apply the effect while he used the back of his tomahawk. There was no hard and fast rule that he had to use the Tomahawk of the Serpent for the rest of his life. If he could stack the sickle’s effect on a nice one-handed bludgeoning weapon using his Phantom Hand, Will would gain a significant amount of attack power. Searᴄh the NovelFire.net* website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality. Will added it to the ‘sell’ pile. “Yeah, you don’t want this one,” Steve said, handling the helmet. “Bonus cold damage has an unintended side effect of weakening acid and fire. Cold slows down chemical reactions. Good Focus boost, though. Noobs are always trying to get every ounce they can. Hundred and fifty to the right person.” “Cold doesn’t play well with other damage types, does it?” Will asked. “Not really,” Steve shook his head. “In exchange it usually has the best debuff, a large penalty to movement and attack speed. A lot of Climbers will cuss out someone who busts out the frost damage in the middle of a raid, though, because half of them will suddenly have penalties.” Will marked that down as ‘rude’ in his head. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it. Steve glanced at Will’s axe. “Psychic damage is the only type that doesn’t have any kind of interaction with other damage types. It also completely disregards physical defenses, which makes it…kinda valuable. Where did you say you found that tomahawk again?” “I didn’t.” Will said. “Well you sure as Abyss didn’t find it on the first floor.” Will shrugged. “Because that would be insane.” Will shrugged. “Bah, fine. Let’s go make some more money. We’ve already got nearly two grand in a couple hours. Imagine what we can do in a week.” “We’ve got a few hours left in the day,” Will said with a shrug. “Let’s get rich.” “That’s the spirit!” “Perhaps we can purchase a better priest with the proceeds.” Loth said. “…That’s fair.” Steve shrugged. “Eh, let’s try a different Temple next time. Andover is skeevy.” Will said. Together they pushed deeper into the ice caves, each of them dealing with the slippery floor in their own way. Will by being Will, Steve by using his cleats, and Loth by fashioning makeshift footing of his own. “Couldn’t you use your umm…toe claws?” Will asked. “Yes, but it wouldn’t be comfortable.” Loth replied. “Ah.” “We got a payday over here.” Steve said, drawing their attention to him. The priest was holding up a handful of glowbugs to the wall, where the faintest shadow in the wall rested. “Can I get some heat on here?” he asked. “I got no fire abilities.” Will said, shaking his head. “One moment.” Loth said, starting another one of his personal heaters before hanging it form a chain next to the lump. As the hoarfrost melted away by Loth’s heater, a crystal-clear surface of pure ice was revealed…bearing the perfectly preserved corpse of a young woman, wearing obvious Ranger gear. A bow was suspended in the ice beside her, and she bore obvious Relics on every part of her body…except her head, because that was missing. “Alicia Zodiac.” Steve said. “Daughter of the famed Lord Zodiac.” He clicked his tongue. “It’s like I always say. Women got no place dying in The Tower. A shame. Just a damn shame…” He glanced up at Will, wiggling his brows. “I’m of the opinion that if dies while Climbing, it’s their own fault, gender notwithstanding.” Will said while Loth looked on. “Oh well, let’s take her shit! Boss, if you would,” Steve said, motioning to the ice. “You got more Strength than me.” Will said, handing him the Feral Warhammer. “I’ll watch your back.” “…Damnit.” They spent the next half hour watching for encroaching Yetis while Steve grunted with effort, chipping away at the unnaturally sturdy ice. To be fair, he was doing a good job, but there was just of it, and the bow suspended a few yards away made the total area much wider than they originally planned, and… “Hey, I think I see her head!” Loth said, pointing. He was standing at an angle, peering past the beheaded corpse. “It’s about three meters past her body. And it’s got a Relic!” Steve groaned in exhaustion, but kept picking at the ice using the spike of the warhammer. When he had cut through enough space, Will joined in beside him, cutting away at the ice in tandem. They split around the corpse, cutting away the ice on either side. “Yeah, she had a Ranger build.” Steve said conversationally. “Every shot she made, something died. But her synergy was good. You see, normal Rangers go into The Tower and build their kit a little bit at a time. They figure out what works, what doesn’t, what their weaknesses are. What jobs they should avoid.” “This woman, she did so much damage that nothing ever got close to her. Maybe her father trained her poorly, maybe she got complacent. She went into a claustrophobic Spawning Ground full of of tough bastards. She got separated from the Tanker, shot a yeti in the heart, and while that was enough to kill it, it only took one swipe from the doomed monster to remove her head.” Will’s hair stood on end, recalling the fraction of a second a Yeti had both hands on him. “You won’t get your head knocked off, Boss. You’ve got great Resistance for your level. She did not.” The merchant’s wise words echoed in Will’s mind. The common factor that all Lords have is that they are “Anyway, my point is, she’s going to have a full set of items dedicated to min-maxing ranged damage. This should cover the vast majority of the Corpse Fee, even if we have to fence it.” “Why would we have to fence it?” Will asked. It was common knowledge that Finders Keepers was the rule of The Tower. “Because her old man will be pissed if we sell her keepsakes instead of giving them back to him?” Steve said. “Why not just give them back to him, then? He’ll probably pay a reward.” “A couple problems with that.” Steve said between grunts as he chipped through the ice. “First one: I’m in your party, and he thinks I abandoned his daughter to her death.” “Ah.” “Second problem. If, say, Loth delivers her corpse instead of me, or you – who is , by the way – then Loth will have to tell him where he found her, negating our monopoly on this hunting ground.” “Ah. I’m gonna do it anyway.” Will said. “I just told you why it would be a bad idea.” Steve said. “You also mentioned how promising noobs without families backing them disappear at a staggering rate. I want Zodiac to owe me a favor. That’ll retain it’s value long after I move past the 2nd floor.” “What if he’s the Lord that sicced his Vassals on you?” Steve asked. “Then it’ll be funny when I mail his daughter’s corpse back to him.” Will said with a shrug. Steve gave him an incredulous look, holding it for an awkwardly long time. “…Fine. We’re gonna have to use a service to deliver it, though, and it won’t be cheap.” Steve turned away, muttering. “Can’t believe we’re working for free here…” A distant rumble caused them both to pause. Then six more rumbles, back-to-back, then silence. “Nuker’s having a good day above us,” Steve said, pointing up above them. ***Mason Lanover*** “Back under control?” Mason asked, scanning the smoking remains. “Yessir,” The mercenary Warrior said, echoed by the others as they reformed their line, pushing the kaith back to the choke-point, re-establishing the line and cutting them down in droves. “Thanks, Mason!” Reggie said, his voice rising above the others. He hadn’t been the one to fold, but one person’s problem was . The duty of a Nuker was to…observe. To do nothing for extended periods of time, until it was time to rain fire. Similar to a Healer, a Nuker must always be observant and able to read the larger battle. They must not waste Charge where the warriors were going to win, unless softening up the enemies would save the Warriors a significant amount of time they could use putting their muscle to work somewhere better. They must judge this in an instant and guide the progress of battle. Mason felt like a conductor in one of those fancy orchestras his father had taken him to. It was beautiful. He checked his Charges. “I’m about hallway spent, prepare to pull back!” “Halfway spent ?” Mason heard one of the mercenaries grumble. His face grew hot, but he didn’t lose his cool. That was unbecoming of a Nuker. His father had advised him not to spend any of his spare Ability points into Focus despite the temptation, saying that while at low levels, Focus was important for Charge, at higher levels, it became less of a critical issue. Three per level was plenty for Nukers. By level 35, The difference between 105 and 140 Focus was minimal in anything except for the longest engagements, and if a Nuker was required to carry an engagement that long, something had gone very wrong. They might grumble about it, but everyone knew that without the safety blanket a Nuker offered, they might be overrun, and it was a stupid idea to push a Nuker to the limit of their Charges. “Fallback point set!” June shouted, standing at the next chokepoint. “…Move!” “Fire to the Van!” On her signal, Mason dropped three Conflagrations into the tunnels, roasting the kaith and giving his army the opportunity to break away and pull back. The warriors broke away and sprinted back towards them, while June picked off anything that moved to follow. A moment later, they assembled a line at the new choke point. “Barely got any loot,” one of the mercenaries muttered. “This is roc shit.” Mason’s eye twitched. A lot of people forgot that a Nuker’s Acuity was one of their primary Stats, which meant they had excellent hearing, on par with a scout without any sense enhancements. “We did get pretty deep,” one of the mercenaries replied quietly as they braced themselves and slammed into the wave of kaith. “We could’ve got deeper and actually hit a kaith depot. The lordling’s just throwing his weight around like a bull Hokk in a glasser’s, wasting his Charge.” Mason’s eye twitched. Mason turned to tell the uppity merc that, when he noticed a crack in the wall, moments before a telltale claw penetrated the façade. “BREACH!” Mason shouted. ***William Oh*** A mind-numbing amount of chipping later, they disconnected the main corpse, dragging the stiff block of ice away from the wall. Loth slid her out into the sun and got started on the detail work while the two of them split up, Will chipping toward the head while Steve went for the bow. Will got to the head shortly after Steve came back with the bow. The left side was horrifically crushed, but the right side was a young woman, no older than him, with a surprised expression. Will examined the leather headband that came with the head. Whenever a Ranged Archetype activates a Ranged Ability, split the resulting missile into three, which go on to seek out their own targets. “Dear Gods!” Will shouted at the simple leather headband that was worth more than he was. now, “You still wanna give ‘em back!?” Steve asked from where he and Loth were inspecting the bow, which was surely amazing in its own right. “I don’t know. Maybe!” Will shouted back. “Shit!” Will was tempted to just keep it. Decency be damned. He had never felt so cheap in his life. A rumble shook the cave system. Will mused. The floor beneath him let out a musical as a crack propogated from their tunnel through the ice beneath him. Will saw the crack spreading underneath him, and dove back toward the main room. A section of the ice wall, weakened by their excavation and the quakes, sloughed off, leaving Will lying in the main ice cavern, his feet hanging over a sheer drop. Will pulled himself away from the drop and peered down at where the ice on the underside of the floating mountain had cleaved away from the stone. In the distance a massive chunk of ice was shrinking rapidly into nothing as it fell. “Kinda forgot we were on the underside of the mountain,” Will mused, glancing up at the stone that the ice had been attached to. The stone exploded outward, revealing a half-dozen kaith facing off against an isolated Nuker in his traditional evening gown. “Mason!?” Will asked, peering incredulously at the familiar Nuker warding off the onslaught of kaith, his team struggling to reach him. “Will!?” Mason said, frowning. With a seismic rumble, a massive chunk of stone fell out from beneath Mason’s feet, sending the wide-eyed Nuker plummeting straight down with a girlish shriek.