Might as Well

Sam stepped inside the hole in the mountain, instantly casting Mana Shield, Mana Sense, Mana Sight and conjuring a Light Ball over his head for visibility. His sword was in his hand, ready to strike and thrumming with mana barely restrained.

He took a few steps, then turned around and called out.

“Are you coming, ma’am?”

There was a moment of silence, and then the giant cricket, still in her smaller form, hopped in front of the cave entrance and faced Sam. Then, somehow shook her head. Without having a neck…

“No, child of man. That is your test to see through. I shall stay here and perhaps I may find out why this place seems so familiar…”

Sam nodded, relieved yet a little disappointed. “Alright! Have fun!” Having a powerhouse in his pocket, or rather on top of his head, would have been great, but he didn’t mind leaving the monster behind as he couldn’t exactly control them. With that squared away, he turned back towards the empty darkness, only illuminated by his Light Ball, and took a step forward.

Then another and another, until the only thing he could see was the illuminated circle around him, and only hear his own heartbeat and steps reverberating around the corridor filled with rubble and roots poking out of the ceiling.

While the Blood Contract was a rather motivating force behind his haste, Sam was actually rather interested in preventing the Ironwood Monster Break. Granted, his first plans were based on that break. He planned to amass enough money to buy a few plots that would become valuable after the Break, but now that he had an actual front-row seat to the event, he was pretty sure he could get something much better than a few plots of land.

The quest was rather unique, so Sam didn’t actually have any idea what he would get. Even his inherited memories were no help here as the other Sam wasn’t one of the pioneers that died of unique quests every day, so most of his knowledge about these things was from second or sometimes even third-hand.

Thus, Sam’s gamer senses were tingling…

As he walked through the corridors, he made sure to watch out for everything, paying special attention to the ceiling (he read enough stories about the MC hiding up there because ‘nobody looks up’) as he had no need for a surprise monster to the head.

After five minutes of uneventful walking, dodging rocks on the ground, or giant roots that, over time, managed to break through the hard stone that made up the wall, Sam arrived in a small chamber.

Thankfully, the entrance to the chamber was in a much better shape than the one that lead directly to the outside.

Stepping carefully into the chamber, his senses cranked to the maximum, Sam looked around curiously.

There wasn’t much.

Another arch, leading deeper inside the mountain, a few benches near the walls and a stone bowl with water dripping into it from a hole in the wall. Only, so much time had elapsed that the dripping water eroded the stone bowl, so much that it was standing in a small pool that was trickling towards a hole in a nearby wall, made by a root that has long since rotted off.

His senses told him there was nothing behind the walls either on purpose or hidden, so Sam simply walked around the small pool of water and continued his journey through the arch.

Sam barely took a few steps when he heard an ominous noise.

It sounded like grinding stone mixed with someone yelling from inside a very deep well.

Tightening the shield around him and channeling a little more mana into his sword, his other ready to unleash some of his meagre amount of skills, he began walking forward cautiously, while the sound continued to come ever so closer.

Finally, his nerves a little frayed, and the unknown entity entered the visible patch of the corridor.

It was a mass of rocks, ground and moss, with short stubby legs and arms, no head, just two sinister glowing eyes half-hidden behind moss and other detritus. And to his magical senses, it oozed some kind of black miasma, that caused his stomach to turn.

While his attention was fully on the newly revealed monster, Sam still had enough mind to notice the similarities between the miasma coming from the small moss-slash-rock golem and the noble lady whose ailment he was planning to heal.

He didn’t have more time to ponder the situation as the little monster, barely reaching his hips raised their hand, roared, filling the corridor with the sound of rocks banging together, and ‘charged’ at him.

At the speed, one would expect a moss-covered rock to move.

That is, not very fast.

Sam simply sidestepped the ‘speedy’ charge and, with one steady swing, cut the monster in half.

Ignoring the experience point notification, he turned back towards the darkness.

‘If all the monsters inside are this type, then it will be ea-‘

His thoughts were however interrupted, as the darkness was suddenly illuminated by dozens of maliciously staring eyes that looked suspiciously like the little golem he killed, and sadly, not all the eyes were at hip level.

The next second he was shaken by the roar as hundreds, maybe thousands of moss-covered golems roared at the same time.

Steadying himself, ignoring as the entire mountain shook with the roar, he read the notification that popped up.

“Well, fuck…”

Inside his shadow, he could feel Lucky shift, and there was no time to think as the monsters were upon him.

They charged at him on the ground, hanging from the walls and even skittering on the ceiling. They were all made of rock and covered by ancient moss, some solid, but most of them were loose rocks and stone fallen from the old stone walls, held together by shadowy miasma.

He opened with a wide Mana Slash, creating a gap in the front of the charging monsters, then began a deathly dance.

Striking every monster that came close, making sure that none of them got behind him, while Lucky, like some weird shark, snapped out of his shadow, and with his jaws turning every small monster that got through Sam into powder.

For every step, he fought, striking down several monsters, ranging in size and shape from small corgi to full-sized humans, including some terrifying cat-sized ones, shaped like a spider, that liked to skitter up on the ceiling.

Those he shot down with simple Wind Blades, and the ones that were fast enough to evade his shots were torn apart by Lucky, who was prowling behind him.

And thanks to his new skills, Flow and Shadow Footsteps, he was managing to evade most of the thrown rocks. With Flow, he could see a sort of wake in front of the monsters with his Mana Sight and, using that, he could predict where they would strike or move.

It was a fascinating development, but sadly he couldn’t really make use of it anywhere else, as the black miasma dripping from the monsters stood out very well in front of the generally homogenous mana of the mountain and ruin.

Maybe when it leveled up…

He moved in a circular motion, slashing his sword forward then instantly backward, creating two Mana Slashes in the same instant, then he didn’t even get to watch as two hog-sized moss golems disintegrated, the miasma sinking into the ground as two more took their place and raised their rather rigid hands to strike Sam.

Continuing the motion with his sword, he dispatched them with Mana Strikes, then carried on with his journey towards his goal, which his still-lit Light Ball was starting to illuminate. As on the edge of the space, he could see thanks to the spell, Sam could see another arch, which hopefully led to a chamber where he could rest.

Though, he felt that if his luck held up, then it was probably a mini-boss fight instead of resting…

Slowly but surely, he continued to cut down the monsters that came pouring from beyond the arch, then with a last, heavy step, he crossed a threshold, stepping over slowly dissipating monster corpses and crumbling rocks only to come face to face with a giant chamber, walls crumbling leading to what was, once in the past, rooms. And in the middle of the chamber was one giant rock, levitating in the middle. Though it wasn’t whole, as through its spherical body several cracks crisscrossed, filled with the oh-so-familiar black miasma.

The moment Sam stepped through the arch, there was a stillness in the air and the still-attacking monster fell back around the giant sphere of rock and miasma while the archway was locked behind him with an opaque black curtain that felt solid under a brief touch.

Fortunately, Lucky was also fast enough to enter the room. The fluffy wolf stood next to him, tail down and nose pointed at the floating rock and softly growling while the shadows that partially made up his body writhed in apparent anger.

Sam patted the wolf’s head for a few seconds as he took in the situation, absentmindedly noting that Lucky had once again grown.

Then the floating rock pulsed once again, and his Mana Shield dipped a little, and the small monsters congregating around the rock fell apart.

Sam watched, fascinated, (though he fired off a few Mana Slashes and Wind Blades at the construct, to no results) as the rock, moss, dirt, small roots, and corpses of rodents were slowly mixed together and then rose into the air.

At the same time, the miasma from the rock began to leak out, mixing with the detritus on the ground, hefting it into the air to float around the rock, like asteroids around a planet.

Then the dirt orbiting the rock began to take shape, bolstered by the material taken from the rock.

Several seconds later, Sam stood across from a rock golem standing twelve feet tall (cursing cinematic transformations), held together by black miasma, with hundreds of malicious eyes upon its body and a very visible core under all that armor in the middle of its body.

“Well, at least they made it easy to figure it out…” he spoke out loud, then before the enemy golem could finish its first step, he exclaimed.

“Shadow Burst!”

Using the superior speed granted by the Shadow Burst skill, his own Mana Body Reinforcement skill, and pumping a little more mana into them than needed, Sam was fast enough to immediately launch himself behind the behemoth.

He arrived, looking up at the craggy back of the golem, which immediately began to slowly turn around.

Sam didn’t let it. Using Mana Strike, he concentrated a lot of mana into the tip of his sword, and then he thrust with full strength.

The sword, enhanced with his mana and supported by his body enhancement penetrated the back of the golem, the tip of the sword deeply embedded into the core of the monster. Its body frozen in mid-movement, the noise previously filling the chamber vanishing and the miasma also froze as if surprised then it began leaking from the body of the golem, followed by the monster’s body falling apart, while Sam stepped back with a satisfied expression on his face.

‘Apparently, the tactics to fight golems are still valid…’ he thought while watching the ‘death throes’ of the golem.

Finally, the last piece of rock fell with a small thunk upon the giant pile of rock and dirt in the middle of the room, and Sam was greeted with a small collection of notification screens.

[Your companion, Lucky, has reached Level 13!]

[Lucky has gained a new skill, Shadow Strike!]

[Shadow Strike: Level Max (Active/Passive) All attacks started from the shadows receive bonus damage, and the wolf can clad itself in shadows while striking at an enemy increasing its range of attack.]

Taking a look at the wolf that was now visibly bigger, wagging his tail and curiously sniffing the pile that was a few seconds ago a very threatening golem, Sam shook his head with a wry smile.

Then he refocused on the screens.

[Thanks to fighting in sync with your companion, your skill, Spirit Link has reached Level 12!]

[Shadow Footwork has reached Level 3!]

[Shadow Burst has reached Level 1!]

[Mana Shield has reached Level 24!]

[Sustained Mana Shield has reached Level 2!]

It was a pity about Mana Shield as he was looking forward to what would be the Level 25 sub-skill, but it couldn’t be helped as the fight wasn’t really dangerous, so he didn’t really need to use it much. The most damage it suffered was when the dark miasma tried to strike at him directly.

[Light Ball has reached Level 6!]

[Wind Blade has reached Level 7!]

[Mage Sight has reached Level 7!]

[Mana Strike reached Level 9!]

[Efficient Mana Slash has reached level 1!]

[Mana Body Enhancement has reached level 19!]

[Flow has reached Level 3!]

[Multitasking has reached level 39!]

Then came his favorite notification.

[Thanks to your dedication to your craft, you managed to perform two Mana Slashes almost at the same time, granting you the Double Mana Slash skill!]

[Double Mana Slash: Level 0/10 (0%) (Active) Allows you to enhance the damage of your slashes with any weapon capable of slashing while slashing so fast it doubles the effect. The sub-skills of Mana Slash also affect this skill.]

It was a simple concept, doing two slashes after each other fast enough that there was barely any pause between them, but it took some practice. Luckily, he had some practice time with the giant grasshoppers, so he finally managed to do it against the miasma golems.

Finally, he dealt with his lone level up.

[Congratulations! You’ve leveled up!]

[You’re now Level 20!]

[Gained 2 unassigned attribute points!]

[Gained 1 END point for enduring everything that rose against you!]

[Gained 1 AGI for demonstrating speed above the average man!]

Sam added the two extra points to AGI and DEX respectively, as he had enough MAG for now. He now needed to bring his body up to a satisfactory level.

Then, when he was finished reviewing the changes, he made sure to check over his sword as he was fighting rock golems, but thanks to running mana through it, the sword didn’t suffer any damage.

Following that, he began the age-old tradition of digging for loot.

Sadly, the only thing he found was a small marble-sized and shaped bright white crystal in the middle of the pile of rock left behind.

Sam lifted the small crystal to his eyes and fully focused all of his skill upon it. But the only thing he could sense was a very dense concentration of raw, unadulterated nature mana. The same mana he could sense in the symbols he followed to this place.

“So, this is one of the keys right?”

Lucky just huffed in agreement, and Sam nodded, then placed the marble into his inventory, took another look around the chamber, and then stepped through the only arch that didn’t lead to a room full of fallen rocks and plants that thrived in the darkness.

Unsurprisingly, he was once again met with hundreds of maliciously glowing eyes, all staring hungrily at him.

He lifted his sword up, and his other hand shone with the light of mana.

The ground shook, the monsters roared, and the mountain also began to shake, causing dirt and dust to fall on Sam’s and Lucky’s heads.

Lucky answered with his own howl, and Sam only had one thing to say.

“Shadow Burst!”