Rune Seeker

The next section of tunnel they came to – and the traps within – were a little bit different than the previous two. This time, instead of physical objects trying to end their dungeon run rather dramatically, the tunnel attempted to barbeque anything that entered. It didn’t seem to be based off a pressure plate or wind to trigger, but the closest Hiral could figure was something detected body heat.

That something then tried to add a whole lot more heat by hurling gouts of flame throughout the hall. Hiral’s previous trick of using a wall of Rejectionto block where the attacks would come from didn’t work in this hall, the fire somehow consuming even the solar energy he used to make it. It was both terrifying and a bit of a wake-up call, as it was the first time any of them had seen the phenomenon. Luckily, when it came to fire, they had their own resident expert.

With a ball of her own fire spinning in each hand, Seena strode into the tunnel as the blaze began. What started as cones of flames big enough to roast an entire person, quickly became tight twisters of fire that unerringly connected with Seena’s fireballs.

Five feet. Ten feet. Twenty feet, she walked in, more and more of the lines of fire connecting to the balls above her hands.

“I’ve got this,” Seena said, standing there amidst the lines of fire. “You’ll probably want to stick as close to me as you can.”

“The fire isn’t trying to eat yours?” Hiral asked, focusing on the solar energy of Seena’s flames and whether or not it was dropping.

“I’ve got the Mother of Flame on my side,” Seena reminded him, referencing her Phoenix sponsor. “These little sparks know better than to try anything like that on me.”

With that statement, the others huddled up and followed Seena, though Yanily insisted on taking the rear position. Fifty feet into the hallway, it became clear why.

As Seena had apparently gotten far enough from the flames at the beginning of the hall, they broke off their connection. Wild gouts of fire filled the space, rushing towards the party – and the researchers – while Seena dealt with a similar scene at the front of the group. Hiral’s hands moved as he threaded solar energy into his runes, but it was Yanily who acted first.

Stabbing forward into the rushing wall of fire, the spearman seemed to snag the flames on the tip of his weapon. Then, like he’d done before, he pulled it around himself as he spun his spear, like the sheet of flame was a physical thing. Around and around, Yanily twisted, the oncoming flames getting caught in the motion. Not just caught, but diminished.

With every rotation, the fire lessened, until the hall was clear again, just a few short seconds later.

“Keep moving,” Yanily said, eyes on the back-half of the hall.

The spearman had to repeat the action three more times before the party made it to the next section, at which point Seena took over – since the flames were only coming from one direction. While Hiral and Left positioned themselves to try to figure out what was next, the party leader turned to Yanily.

“You’ve done that more than once now, and I kept forgetting to ask about it,” Seena said, the balls of fire in each hand now the size of watermelons. “How are you doing that? Lightning I would get, but fire? And I think you did water against the ChimeraMid-Boss.”

“It’s an ability called Lessening Storm,” Yanily said. “Let’s me cut down the strength of a storm over time.”

“That fire wasn’t a storm,” Seena pointed out.

“Not until I used something the Splinter of the Storm can do,” Yanily said. “The spear needs to feed on other solar energy to grow, but it can’t take very much at once. Slow process. What it can do, though, is bite into the energy and hold on, even if it’s not eating it. Then, using my Primal Chord style, I can drag that energy around.

“Turns out, any element following the path of the Primal Chord counts as a storm.”

“That sounds like cheating,” Right said. “I like it.”

Seena just shook her head at Yanily. “Only you.”

With the spearman’s new’ish ability explained – and a slight lecture from Seena reminding him to tell her about these things – they all turned their attention back to the traps ahead of them.

The next section, they hadto walk on the floor, or they got bombarded by sound loud enough to rattle their bones, followed by a section with randomly opening portals. Similar to what they’d dealt with in the Lost Refuge of the Lost, Seeyela and Hiral took care of those. One after another, the party cleared the trapped sections of tunnel, until they reached what appeared to be the final one – a circular room on the far side. The room looked empty, but it was hard to tell from the angle since they stood at the top of an incline.

Either way, that didn’t stop them from getting ready for a fight. First, though, they had to clear the last section of tunnel.

For this one, as soon as Hiral pushed ahead with his sensory domain – Rejection feeling out the tunnel as it went – the ceiling directly in front of them began to lower. It wasn’t the whole ceiling, and it wasn’t even really fast, just a block that went from wall to wall, and was about two-feet deep. Half-a-second after that started, another similar section of ceiling did the same thing right after the first. Then again, and again, and again, until there was twenty feet of ceiling dropping to the floor.

Something about the whole thing seemed off, and Hiral threw solar energy into his Runes of Time Dilation and Contraction. Sure, while the ceiling was falling fast enough it could crush somebody, it wasn’t nearly as instantaneous as the sawblades had been. It’d been five seconds, and the first section that’d started falling was only halfway to the floor. Plenty of time to avoid it.

Except – Hiral looked closer – was it his imagination, or were all the sections almost the same distance to the floor? Subsequent sections were dropping faster? Okay, that could be a little more dangerous, but it still didn’t seem quite as fatal as previous traps, unless the speed drastically increased.

Unless… unless this trap wasn’t meant to kill them. They’d been able to sit at the edge of each tunnel section, probing the next one to figure out what the trick was. And how to pass it safely. If they figured out they could do that, wouldn’t Tomorrow have predicted the same thing?

If he was in her shoes, what would he do? He’d make a trap that became impassible if they tested too long.

These walls coming down wouldn’t go back up! The entire hundred-foot section of the tunnel would become completely blocked. They’d fail the dungeon, unable to continue. Sure, they could just rerun it with the knowledge they had now, but something about losing here irked Hiral.

With reality pounding at the back of his head to let go of his hold on time, Hiral focused his solar energy into the scarves produced by his pseudo-aspect. One each to the rest of his party and the researchers meant nineteen passengers. Might as well consider it twenty with how big Wallop was.

Oops, almost forgot Li’l Ur again – twenty-one scarves prepared to reach out to everybody behind him. On top of that, Hiral layered Gravity, Decrease, Separation, Unsealing, Sealing,and even Dreaming to improve the scarves’ ability to bring everybody with him. Then, taking hold of the Edict of Rejection, Hiral prepared to move.

He’d never tried to carry this many people, but he didn’t have to go far, and he had seven Edicts supporting him. He could do it.

Letting go of his time runes, Hiral launched off with a burst of Rejection, the others behind him Separated and Unsealed from the normal laws of acceleration to protect them from a violent whiplash. Faster than greased lightning, Hiral bolted down the tunnel, more and more of the ceiling just starting to drop above him.

Starting to, but not nearly fast enough.

In less than the blink of an eye, Hiral reversed his Rejection and added a touch of Attractionto bring himself to a halt just inside the new room, fingers of one hand and his feet skidding on the floor. Another second to stop, and the others glided in behind him.

“That’s one way to do it,” Seena said, just as the first wall back at the beginning of the section came down with a heavy thud. “Whatever it was.”

“Tunnel was sealing,” Hiral explained, pointing with one hand back the way they’d come, while he turned his attention to the large room. Around him, the rest of the party was doing the same thing – the scarves having released them as soon as they entered.

Hiral couldn’t have risked stopping at the edge of the tunnel – outside the room – with the walls coming down, so they’d have to deal with whatever came at them in here on the fly. So far, that didn’t seem to be a whole lot.

“Tomorrow’s traps were devious,” Vorinal said, rather flatly considering the breakneck speed they’d just moved. “We’re lucky you had ways to counter them. We should be getting close to this half of the ruins’ mechanism. Likely beyond this room.”

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

As for the room, it wasn’t exactly what Hiral had expected from the far end of the tunnel. While it was round and empty – like he’d seen – there was also a fifty-foot-deep pit occupying most of the space. Opposite where they’d come in, another tunnel exited the room, though it was at the same level as the bottom of the pit, thirty-feet tall, and blocked by a heavy portcullis. Actually, with a second look around the room, Hiral revised his opinion.

This wasn’t a pit – it was an arena.

“Mid-Boss time,” Yanily said, having come to the same conclusion Hiral had.

Artwork and paintings covered the walls of the upper levels, though there didn’t seem to be any seating. This wasn’t like the Amphitheatre of the Sun back up on Fallen Reach – it wasn’t meant for an audience to watch below for entertainment. Instead, it was almost like the progression of the paintings told a story as one walked from the entrance of the room, over to ladders on the far side of the room, leading down into the pit. Did each path tell a different story, or two parts of the same one?

Seeyela, having walked ahead of the others, crouched at the edge of the pit, arms braced on her knees as she looked down. “We could leave the researchers up on this level while we drop down. Probably safer up here. They’ll have to come down after, to go through the door.”

“Ladders over near it,” Hiral pointed out.

“What’s stopping a group primarily made of ranged attackers from sitting up here and bombarding anything that comes out?” Romin asked.

And it was a good question. Could they exploit the terrain for an advantage?

“Even if just Seena and Gran stayed up here…” Hiral said.

“You trying to keep me out of trouble?” Seena asked.

“No,” Hiral said. “Just thinking how much damage you could do if you could focus on that and not worry about defense.”

“There might also be something like the Vassal of Ur’Thul had,” Seeyela said. “Some kind of field blocking anything from the outside.”

“I agree,” Seena said. “And, Hiral, you said you were on a bit of a timer with your inspiration. It doesn’t look like anything is happening until we go down there. Want to take care of it now?”

Seeing the researchers spreading out to inspect the paintings – instead of running ahead and getting themselves killed – Hiral nodded at the party leader. “Should only take a few minutes at most.”

“Do it,” Seena said.

Moving away from the others – in case there were any explosions involved – Hiral picked an empty space and sat with his back to the wall. There wasn’t any of the artwork near where he was, so all the researchers were off safely doing their thing. It was only Left and Right who came over to talk to him.

“Got something in mind?” Left asked.

“Yes,” Hiral said. “Though it doesn’t actually have anything to do with the Edict of Rejection.”

“Will it still work then?” Right asked. “Whatever it is.”

“It should,” Hiral said. “The initial connection with the Edicts comes with a burst of solar energy, like a gate opening from… I’m not sure where, exactly? Maybe wherever the runes themselves originate? Or, something like the notification windows that give us our other abilities, hidden between the folds of reality.

“Actually,” he said, thinking about it more. “I bet that’s exactly what’s going on. Dr. Benza and the others had to have gotten the inspiration for how the PIMP gives us abilities from somewhere. And since the runes interact with fundamental laws of how reality works – and the Edictsare bigger than that – between reality could be exactly where they normally reside. I can only kind of see them before I connect with them. After, though? It’s like peeling back the layer between me and where their territory is.”

“Could it be that simple?” Left asked, and Hiral immediately shook his head.

“Oh, I bet it’s all kinds of levels more complicated than that,” Hiral chuckled. “This ‘explanation’ –if I can even call it that – is so rudimentary, it’s like trying to explain advanced math with a stick and a few leaves. Either way, what I’m trying to say, is I’ve got access to the energy used to open that gateway where I connected with the Edict. It’s still there, though it’s bleeding off a little at a time, but it’s unfocused.”

“And you’re going to use it to… what?” Right asked. “Create a new skill?”

“Nothing so ambitious as that,” Hiral said. “Creating a new skill from scratch would take a whole lot more energy than what I’ve got. I honestly don’t think I’m anywhere near ready to attempt it, either. No, I’m just going to modify something by attaching it to my advanced class.”

“Another party-wide buff?” Right asked, catching on to what Hiral was thinking.

“Exactly,” Hiral said. “Maybe two, if I can swing it.”

“Which ones?”

“Gourmand and Beauty Sleep,” Hiral said. “Gran and Romin don’t have either of them, and I’m the only one with the second. It actually hasn’t been that impactful, with how ‘rest’ seems to work, but I don’t want to risk either of our new folks falling behind. Or me getting too far ahead. I’ve already got a bit of a lead in levels, and this should help the others catch up.”

“Can you do both?”

“Hoping so,” Hiral said. “Neither is overly powerful – or the plus-version – and my gut is telling me it’s doable.”

“What are you waiting for?” Left asked.

“You two were the ones asking me questions!” Hiral pointed out.

“I saw the glazed-over look in your eyes,” Left said. “You were already rearranging the abilities while we were talking.”

“That’s true,” Hiral said, most of his attention on pulling apart the different strands of the two abilities, and then overlaying him on the section of his PIM where his advanced class resided. Enduring Mind+ really was showing its worth, allowing him to take care of the preparatory steps while chatting with his doubles. “Now for the real work.”

Recognizing he’d actually need to concentrate on the next part, his doubles gave him a nod to wish him good luck, then went off to make sure the researchers behaved themselves. As soon as they were gone, Hiral closed his eyes and immersed himself in his own PIM universe. Constellations of abilities floated around him, while the advanced class spread ahead.

Looking at his handiwork from when he’d combined the Runic General with the Duelist of the Runic Cycle, he couldn’t help but feel a bit of pride. He’d really managed to take the best of both classes – though it didn’t seem unusual for a second advanced class to build off the first, if Yanily was any sign – but this combination was almost perfect for him.

Almost, because unlike Yanily, Hiral still hadn’t solidified his internal concept. He didn’t know what he represented, like Nivian and Yan did. He was still finding his path, and the Vanguard of the Runic Cycle represented that. It was the next step towards the goal he was searching for.

And, the best part of what he’d done in making this class? He’d left some room to modify it by sacrificing some personal, upfront power. The Runic General had offered some strong self-buffs and abilities when leading others, but Hiral was already getting pretty strong in that department, thanks mainly to his runes. The more he learned about them, the more he believed they were an existence outside of the PIM or what the PIMP could control. An advantage – a strength – unaccounted for in the balance the PIMP was constrained to.

So, instead of trying to increase his own fighting power, he’d opted to strengthen his party. No matter what, he’d still benefit from the Vanguard’s Presence ability, so it wasn’t like he was losing anything, though he’d had to dilute Killing Spree to make it work. Still, totally worth it in his opinion. Now, he planned to do something very similar – though hopefully without weakening either of the abilities.

One thing he’d learned while modifying skills – and his class – was that combat abilities took far more power than non-combat abilities. That gave him hope for making this succeed. With that hope – and his plan in mind – Hiral reached out to the two abilities and got to work.

Starting with Gourmand, Hiral ‘picked up’ the ability and simply moved it over to where Vanguard was, slotting it into an empty space within Vanguard’s Presence. There wasn’t even resistance as it fell into place, but Hiral wasn’t done there. He hadn’t changed the ability yet, and right now it would still only apply to him.

Reaching out with threads of solar energy, Hiral grasped the section of the ability that dictated it was a ‘self-only’ ability, and erased that part of the script. Then, pulling on the energy from the Edict he’d unlocked, Hiral created a new set of script for who the ability would affect – the party. It wasn’t a difficult change, but it did make the overall ability… larger. Strange how changing just one character within the ability made the constellation-size of it balloon. To a point he frowned.

There wasn’t enough room for the second ability – especially not if it grew when he changed the targeting of it from self to party as well. Unfortunately, it was really the second ability – Beauty Sleep – he wanted to make work too. Should’ve started with that one…

Still, he was there in his PIM universe, and he had the power from the Edict. It’d be a waste not to at least try. Not entirely sure how this was going to work, Hiral latched on to the Beauty Sleep ability, and dragged it over to the space left in Vanguard’s Presence. Could he… maybe shove it in and see how it fit? Force it?

Or…?

Hiral slowly turned the ability, reorienting it to see if he could slot it in at a different angle. That didn’t immediately work, but his gut told him to keep going, so he did. Turning the ability around, over, under, and even to the side. No, it just wasn’t going to fit. No matter what he did, the ability was too big. Maybe he could smoosh it in, but there was no telling how that could change – or ruin – the ability. Would he have to give…?

Hiral stopped as he looked at the ability hovering above Beauty Sleep. There was… overlap. No, it wasn’t just that… they were almost perfectly the same. The script dictating the two abilities were exact matches in those sections.

Of course! I don’t need to fit them both if I combine them! Here… and here, and here!

Enduring Mind+ working overtime, Hiral ripped apart sections of Beauty Sleep, cutting through them with metaphysical blades of Separation. Then, with Connection, he took those new ends and wound them into where Gourmand left off. Thread after thread, he bound the two separate skills into one, combining their constellations until they glowed as one bright whole.

One that fit perfectly into the slot in Vanguard’s Presence.

Letting out a breath, Hiral exited his PIM universe to find a notification waiting for him.

Class Modification – Gourmand and Class Modification – Beauty Sleep have combined to create a new ability as part of Vanguard’s Presence: Party Interface: Healthy Living

Party Interface: Healthy Living – Eating and resting well will result in buffs from food, and bonus experience (double) for up to eight hours, based on duration of rest.

Note: Ability does not stack with other abilities with similar effects, only the strongest taking effect.

That was pretty much exactly what Hiral had been hoping for. Even better, actually, since it had combined everything into one ability. It’d also taken all the extra power from unlocking the Edict of Rejection, but he couldn’t complain about that. The benefits to the rest of the party were well worth it.

Noting the researchers were still completely engrossed in the artwork around the room, Hiral gave himself a minute to recover from the effort of modifying the skills. With Enduring Mind+, the process had felt almost effortless. Now, though? Outside of his PIM universe, he could feel the built-up fatigue. It wasn’t bad – this time – but he’d have to be a lot more careful about doing anything like this again during a dungeon run.

Still, he smiled at his success, and got mentally prepared for the coming Mid-Boss.