Asheron's Fall: The Power of Ten, Book Six

What made you think they ever stop?, I asked archly, waving my hand. The mess of a hundred-some scarabs was cleaned up and poured into the collection of stuff on my Disk.

I could probably Cast Silver spells, and even make a stab at Gold, but without any way to get additional components, that was just asking me to burn through raw materials. I had No Materials as a bonus feat for Sorcery, but obviously it didn’t apply to the Isparian style of Casting, or perhaps only reduced component burn.

I could feel Mira’s burning desire to get powerful enough to attempt these new and more powerful spells, obviously stronger than anything known back on Ispar. The scarabs alone represented a heck of a fortune back there!

-Our Focus went up by 21!- Mira suddenly blurted out, as she took a look at our Casting skill, and compared it to yesterday. -How did that happen?!-

The Mark activated, I informed her. +1 Sacred Bonus to Intellect, which carried over to Focus. Favored by Faith means when I receive a Sacred Bonus, it is increased by 1. So, +20 to Focus.

-A permanent magical boost?- she asked, shocked at such a thing being so easy, and so powerful.

It’s more akin to a magical item. It can be suppressed if targeted, although it’s very difficult to get rid of once it is filled with Karma, but that takes time.

-You mean... it increases further?!- She was agape at the news. It was already as strong as Copper Creature magic!

It’ll go up to +4 (5), but that will take a full month of fighting every day to feed it.

-Just like the Ring?- Mira verified.

Aye. And if we had a decent Weapon, that, too.

It meant fighting every day to get the Karma to advance our stuff, and finding something worth building up. Every day I didn’t have something was a day delaying uberness.

Well, such was life. The best thing I’d found so far was a sword I wasn’t even proficient with, and it was barely masterwork.

But now, I had to hose this room down with vivus, and then go through that door.

---

A chest, intact, of all things?

It had been buried under a heap of resin, hardened goo growing over it flaking off and exposing the corner of it with my first shot. A couple follow-up Darts, and the front of it was mostly blasted clear and exposed.

I warily made my way down the stairs along the wall to the lower level, half-turned towards that door at all times.

It wasn’t locked, although it looked like it had been hacked on and battered a little bit, but had somehow weathered the degradation of direct attacks and the leeching goo alike.

I opened it up, and saw the three vials inside, their insides coated with dried-up residues. Minor TK lifted them out, and I let the lid drop as I eyed the vague red, yellow, and blue colors.

-Potions to restore health, stamina, and mana!- Mira said quickly. -Alas that they’ve dried up...-

I popped open the first one, the Health potion, and Created Water atop it with a soft prayer to Amana, a stream of the stuff coming off my wand and filling up the container. I swirled it around once with Prestidigitation, agitating it nicely, and the alchemical residue shimmered and thickened up to a bright crimson quickly.

-You know Alchemy,- Mira murmured, shocked and delighted at this discovery.

Alchemy, Spellcraft, Artifice, Casting. The four foundations of Arcane magic, I answered smoothly. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any easy way to carry the thing that wouldn’t fall out if I had to run, so on the Disk it went. I started working on the blue Potion, able to feel the residual mana in it, still caught in the remains.

In a minute, all three Potions, once again bright and viable, were sitting on my Disk, propped up by Air Gold coins.

There was a fwzap from the chest, and then it seemed to creak and shrivel in front of me as the last gasp of magic in it gave way. I hurriedly opened the lid of it, and it fell over and back, disintegrating as it did so.

There were three more whole Potions, one of each color, sitting there.

I looked at them, considering a chest which could just cough up endless amounts of such things, the sheer amount of magic that would take, and just shook my head. It would be a major artifact if it could create endless amounts, so this was probably taking them from a hidden reserve somewhere... and this was the last time it would do so.

Regardless, I added seconds of the Potions to my Disk, before turning and steeling myself for that membrane-door.

They definitely had acid-spitters, so I bit the bullet and Cast Resist Energy to Acid. It took a II Valence and would last close to an hour. It would also protect me from the first 20 points of acid damage from any effect.

-Truly? Life Protections only reduce the damage you take, they don’t neutralize all of it!- Mira murmured.

I glanced at the mental list of spells she had there. That would mean they would stack, then, wouldn’t it?, I asked thoughtfully. However, I don’t like their duration.

She couldn’t argue that, especially with our restricted mana problems. The additional Focus had certainly helped our raw numbers, but we just went through it so quickly. It didn’t help that I didn’t have a lot of Valence support on my side of the equation, either.

Ah, the wonders of being low-level, even if my Intellect was much too high for said Level.

Spores and acrid smells wafted out to me after I blasted the membrane open, but the Resist Acid warded them away. I had most of an hour before the spell went away, so no sniffling or eye-watering from the much more intense odors here!

I left the vivus to start the process of eating the place, joining the stuff that was flowing down from the higher walls in the room behind me, building up a calf-high mist eager to expand into this place and start the munching.

I heard the skittering and teeth-grinding skritches of the olthoi, one of them from not far away, possibly feeling the air pressure change with the open membrane. The others were pretty muted.

-If we do anything here a bunch of them are going to come running,- Mira murmured.

It looks like we’re going Copper if we have to, then. I could use Toppling to knock a whole bunch of them down, but I’d still have to finish them.

The tunnel went ahead, and curved left. It almost felt like there was one right around the corner.

I flicked up eight Shards, rotated them into spheres, and stepped around the corner, saying “Zojak Quareth!” as I did so.

The Summoned olthoi Worker had bare stone under its spindly legs. It paused on seeing me, and then shrieked as the spheres detonated against it, spraying it all over the membrane behind it.

Instead of retreating, I advanced the three steps to the s-curve, and noticed the tunnel split right and left, both of which had membranes on them.

Well, color me lucky, I thought, promptly V-Darting the dead Summons to stop the re-Summon back in. I found myself looking down the corridor and debating right or left, wondering which way to go.

Good thing I hadn’t advanced, because the membrane off to the left side suddenly dilated, and another olthoi Worker stepped through, freezing instantly as it sniffed the air.

It saw me a second too late, and then eight colored spheres sprayed it all over the open portal behind it.

That death cry and the pheromone release got an immediate reaction, however.

I heard the distant shrieks of alarm, but I didn’t stop, turning around and booking it instantly.

I was out the entryway, turning left, and raced up the stairs with all speed. I looked back sharply as I cut through the vivic mist on the floor, wand out and ready for the first thing to follow me through.

When it did, Mira half-shrieked inside my head at the sight of it.

This one was far more spidery, with no manipulator limbs at all, its walking legs longer and almost humanoid, the middle and upper pedipalps hooked and sharp and as long as spears, made for cleaving and sticking things, with yet another pair of finer manipulator limbs down low. The thing was purple-violet in hue, and looked like an entirely different species than the beetle-like and fly-like things I’d killed earlier.

It saw me right as the two Lightning Darts detonated on it and smashed it back into the wall behind it, screeching the alarm, arms splayed wide and looking pretty big and huge.

A Soldier and a Worker came out of the doorway behind it, looking around and locking on me at the top of the landing, my feet still moving, wand still pointing as I closed in above them.

And I was blasting Silver this time.

I gave four Shards to the one that was tagging as a CR 80 Olthoi Eviscerator, one to the worker, and two to the soldier... and all the Silver damage went into the walking spider.

Its frontal carapace shattered and exploded, while its inferiors were blasted off their feet by Toppling. Standing out of reach above them, I hammered them down with Darts as they struggled to get to their feet and chase after me in territorial aggression, while I was also keeping an eye on the doorway for more things bound to be coming.

I was glad I did when another Worker, with a Needler right behind it and another looming Soldier behind that, came out of the tunnel. The green Needler instantly spread its wings... and then I flattened it to the ground.

A Silver War magic bolt had a damage spread of 50-100. That was approximately 10d6+40.

Dice meant my +/die Metas were working on it, and the more dice, the merrier. 10d6+80, +Warcaster Razor of 8, plus specialization of 2. Average damage of 125, and then three Shards with Kickers, another 3d6+5d6, and yes, that thing was hammered to the ground and flattened before it could get into the air, while one Shard each to the remaining olthoi smashed each of them to the ground again.

They were not having good days.

The Soldiers were the biggest threats, with more Health to absorb what I was unloading on them, but the Workers were the easiest to kill. I’d hit the first two a grand total of three times now, Holy Banefire doing the work of the gods’ flyswatter, and they were both down about eighty-five Health, my Razor not applying to Cantrips.

A Copper spell was 40 to 80 damage, or 8-48+32... which increased to 8-48+62, or 90 average damage.

I gave the wounded Worker a Shard with a third of the Shockwave’s magic, the Soldier two-thirds, with four Shards on the Soldier, one Shard each on the two ‘fresh’ ones, smashing them all back to the ground as they scrambled to get to the ramp leading up to me.

Two more olthoi splattered on the ground and floor as their carapaces ruptured, and unstable insides coughed up glowing green blood that turned to acid when it hit the air.