Author's note:

Alo, alo. Big chapter here. I'm afraid the next one will be a lot of reflection, notifications, then consequences. But, we're diving into the meat of Liberty for the next big arc, as I've established what Cass and Crew do in Dungeons (a little), as well as the properties of the long forgotten Hybrid Quests. No ReaderQuest this week. Taking a breather on it before hitting the next.

Note: This is an early release as I work on the next.

Chapter 35: Bane

Pellin stopped looking at his weapons as the brightness in the cavern doubled, “I’ll never get tired of seeing that. You have no idea how much System energy is built into that thing. If I could figure out a way to duplicate it…Actually, I don’t know what I’d do.”

None of them had noticed Gary’s sprint to the other side of the cavern except Adya, who gave him a cool look as she ignored the brightly lit object in his hand.

This needs to work the way I expect it to. We’re not in here to play games, and I’m not a warrior. But I can still be useful in ways people won’t expect. His hand tightened on the ethereal grip of the Quill. I will matter.

Joran scrutinized the Quill, “For a one-eyed Administrator, you have an odd complement of skills.”

“In my experience, Callings tend to move along strange paths,” Cass replied, his mind focused on the task in front of him. “Alright, in a few moments, Gary’s going to have some guests following behind. I’ll then activate Bane so we can do a test run against the Slipfangs chasing him. It should bring an awful lot of experience for all of us.”

“You said awful experience wrong,” Orla whispered, but in the cavern, it clearly carried to all of them.

Joran looked from Cass to where Gary had run to before stepping forward with his arms in the air, making himself the target yet again. “I’m not a fan of you taking the initiative this way.”

“Neither am I,” Adya added.

Cass shook his head, slipping back into the role he’d taken on in the defense of Liora, “It’ll work, and Gary was the one who pointed out that we needed a test run. This is the best way to see if Bane does what I think it does. He’ll be returning in just a moment with a small amount of what’s over there.”

“Why not ask us first instead of sending Gary as your whipping boy?” Orla commented.

A flicker of guilt passed over his face, “Maybe I should’ve, but I stand by my choice. Gary isn’t in any danger, and I wouldn’t have sent him if he were. His instructions are clear. Get just close enough to be noticed before running back.”

Cass heard Gary loudly swear and knew the time was upon him. With the Outline before him, he had already set it to Bane and filled out the options. Similar to his first time creating a Lure Quest, Bane’s choices were simple. 

A set of monsters he’d encountered across his life had appeared in a dropdown list, including the newly discovered Slipfang. The next section had an inverted time-to-distance ratio. The greater the distance Bane traveled, the less time it would last. Each time he’d increased the radius by half, the timer had halved as well. There was also an intensity portion, and as he selected high, the timer quartered.

But that was to his benefit, because these, after all, were Slipfangs. They would bunch up and weren’t much to look at, mass-wise. 

He’d also curiously noted that there was no Questor option, a first for any Quest-type he’d ever run across. Instead, there was a switch between Item and Environment. 

Cass dourly remembered how much energy it had taken out of him to activate his first Hybrid Quest, and there was no reason Bane would be any different. He couldn’t go around popping it willy-nilly. Not if he wanted to activate the second part of the plan after testing things out.

By constricting the radius to two-dozen feet and setting it to high, the timer had updated to ten minutes. Then he’d selected the final option, damage, rather than weaken. A range of options appeared, though the names did not tell him precisely what they did. Discharge sat alongside Tendrils and Warping, but Cass went with his gut and chose Burn.

And so it was, with his incandescent Quill in hand, Cass lifted it up and declaratively drafted the Quest into the world. The luminescent Quill brightened perceptively until it reached a tipping point. Then, the dark color of energy starting at Cass’s feet lifted from him and began to filter into the Quill as he drained himself to power the Quest.

[Bane Active]

A Zone Quest has been activated within your area.

Targeted monster-type: Slipfang

Bonus experience granted to all parties if more than 20 Slipfangs are slain within the effect of Bane.

Oh my god Iforgothowmuchthissucked, Cass thought as exhaustion crept into every part of his body and he lost his hold of the authoritative figure he was trying to present to everyone.

His arms felt like lead, his legs, weak and thin as the cheapest fence-posts. It was as if the weight of the world was bearing down on him as he strained to watch what happened next.

Rather than filter into the people around him, the golden words pooled into the ground, spreading and rising up in a ten-foot radius just as he’d instructed. With a small flash, the golden light settled into a barely seen circle surrounding Cass’s current location. As Gary traveled back with speed and not a little cursing, he entered a golden ringed area with one number less than a dozen Slipfangs drifting behind him.

Then the monsters entered the ring, and…

“Holy shit!” Orla yelled, her weapon popping as she fired into the small group of monsters. “They’re on fire! Get me that experience, baby!”

It was true. As soon as the Slipfangs crossed the outline of Bane, their skin caught aflame. With such small creatures, being instantly covered in Bane’s harmful golden energy had caused them to scream in fury as their bodies burned. The moment each stepped into the circle, they slowed as the madness of pain caused each to lash out in every direction possible, including toward each other.

It was, altogether, completely over-the-top from what he had expected.

The system wasn’t kidding around with that high damage setting. He reflexively kicked a Slipfang across the face when it got too close, though the action caused him to fall to a knee. I thought it would do a little damage, not this much-

With a burst, one of the monsters on the ground exploded from the inside out. Golden flaming gore spread across the area, including atop one Slipfang just smart enough to stop at the edge of the circle. It too was set on fire. 

Orla’s right, holy shit.

There hadn’t been too much work to do. Though they’d been outnumbered almost two to one, the Slipfang’s madness from Bane had made killing them rather easy. Joran’s thick helmet shifted to look at Cass, then at his shaking legs. 

“Are you scared, or does that really take it out of you?”

He took a breath, steadying himself with it as he stood back up, “Why not both?”

He snorted and pointed his sword at the burning monsters, “Is that going to happen to us?”

Cass replied by pointing at the barely luminescent ground beneath them, “Doesn’t seem so. Nothing I’ve ever created has ever harmed a person. And it’ll last for a little more than nine minutes.”

“Hrmm,” Joran put his too-long sword on his shoulder, “We can work with this. Can you do that often?”

“No, but I can do something else to bring more of them into it. I just need you to trust me.”

“Hrmm.”

“I’m fine by the way,” Gary replied, stomping forward. “Just had fifty monsters chase me, no big deal. Just risking my life for one of Cass’s crazy plans.”

“It was eleven,” Pellin commented, though his eyes were on Cass.

“Surely, eleven,” Orla added.

“It looked like more! God! If we were in a Bakery right now, you’d be freaking out, too.”

Pellin shook his shoulder-length dark hair, “I highly doubt that.”

“Wanna bet?”

“Children!” Joran yelled. “We have the chance right now to significantly reduce the population of this dungeon. Can you please focus!”

“Sorry.”

“Sorry.”

“It’s Orla’s fault.”

“What!”

Joran slapped his metal thigh with a gauntlet, the sound crashing against the walls of the cavern and silencing any further arguing. “Vale, is the something else you mentioned dangerous to the person you’re using it on?”

“I mean, I was fine when it ended,” Cass replied tiredly. “But after I use it, I’ll be pretty much useless here. You may even have to carry me out.”

“Gary can manage that, right, boy?”

“Why is he, Vale! While I’m a boy?”

“You’re a boy? I was wrong this whole time.” Orla snickered, giving the Baker a grin.

Joran looked about fed up with them, and it had only been an hour, “Can you carry him is what I need to know.”

“As long as I’m holding a piece of bread, I can.” He said, holding up a long, thick tube of what might almost be called that.

“Your Calling is so weird,” Pellin replied instantly.

“Look who’s talking! I heard you muttering to the system on the way to Liberty. Did it ever say anything back?”

“I was working!”

After Gary and Pellin calmed down, Cass explained his plan to the rest of the group. Seeing the success of Bane’s uses, they were all for him bringing more monsters, and thus experience, to the fore. 

As the timer reduced to less than half, they were all ready for the next step. Since he didn’t have to follow the system’s instructions this time, Cass outlined a Lure, setting it to run out just as the remnant of the previous hybrid Quest would naturally run out. Unlike Bane, he warned the group that he couldn’t restrict its range.

Joran assured them he could handle anything that came their way, so just as he’d asked the large man to, Cass put his trust in him.

Sadly, once the golden flames had touched the Slipfangs, their bodily materials were unharvestable, burned up, and useless. But that was a small price to pay for the experience to come and a lessening of monsters in the world.

Quill up in the air, Cass gave Joran a direct look, “You ready?”

The helmet tilted up and down, “Hit me with it.”

The red glare of Lure exploded out of the Quill and sought out the armored man, sword drawn and by his side as he held the tip just off the floor. All at once, his body lit up red and blue as the Quest mixed with his armored powers.

Oh, was all Cass thought before his legs collapsed and his brain slowed down to the speed of a crawl. Adya and Gary, by plan, caught him on both sides before gently setting him down. Relaxing on the floor, a second went by before hundreds of screeches announced the monster’s rage coming forth.

Like a swiftly moving current, near innumerable Slipfangs emerged from the other end of the cavern in their rush to attack the living Lure. There were so many that they began to crawl over themselves in their haste to reach the man. On Joran’s part, he stoically held still, blade still by his side as he waited directly centered to Bane’s glowing circle.

Everyone else, on the other hand, was a dozen feet away or more, waiting for the moment to attack. The Defender didn’t budge as they sprinted forward on four skeletal legs, nor did he move even as they lit on golden fire, covering him from foot to the top of his helmet.

If Cass weren’t so exhausted, he’d have noticed how beautiful and terrifying the moment was. The glowing, angry red of Lure played out over the steadfast Defender’s blue armor, covered in the golden flames of dying monsters. They blended together, casting curious shadows along the cavernous walls as simple, tired thoughts twisted through his mind.

I’m…probably not…going to get a lot of experience for this, actually.

But as Gary, Adya, Pellin, and Orla got in on the fight, he couldn’t do anything but rest on his laurels as monsters died by the hundreds. Gary smashed, Adya stabbed, while the two weakest members of Team Deadweight carefully fired their shots, picking off monsters that had fallen from the Defender but weren’t quite dead.

As for the big man himself, every so often he’d swing a gauntleted hand to crush a particularly troublesome Slipfang, then go back to stillness. He didn’t swing his sword once as Deadweight got their fill of kills and experience.

Joran…

This kid’s abilities are seriously overpowered. I’ve met a few QuestWrights in my time, but never any who could do something like this. Kill a hundred monsters? Don't mind if I do.

Splat

Bastard was trying to get in my skivvies.

Joran tilted his head, looking at the thoroughly drained and collapsed QuestWright on the ground. He’ll be fine as long as he doesn’t overdo it. We’ll be heading back before Alan wanted, but the longevity of our time in the dungeon is being seriously offset by how many Slipfangs we’re killing.

Plus, as he requested, the kids are getting plenty of experience. This was a good run.

Then he heard something troubling. Doing his best to tune out the mewling and soundless roars of the Slipfangs around him, Joran turned his ear to the tunnel’s entrance. A loud clacking came back to him.

Oh no.

“Greybeards incoming! Don’t let their saliva touch you!”

As soon as he said that, a deep roar shook the cavern, taking over all sound in the area for far too long. Even as the Greybeards slowly came forward, necks extended, and with gripped hands already reaching, Joran heard only that one sound.

“Run!”

The large Baker pulverized one of the last living Slipfangs, then took a gasping breath, “I thought you said you could handle anything.”

“You need a dedicated team of Tier 6’s to take down a Rake. Go, boy! Grab your friend and run. I’ll slow down the Greybeards before catching up.”

To Gary’s credit, he didn’t question anything else. Dropping his mace, he performed a dead-out sprint, picking up his friend from the ground and throwing him on his shoulder before running again. The other three quickly caught up, with the spear-girl staying in the back to guard them.

Joran began to lay into the nearest Greybeards as they slowly approached, the golden ground not affecting them in the slightest. Greybeards were mid-tier monsters. High when you didn’t know what signs to look for, and low when you forced them to come to you. Their guillotine-like jaws could snap a limb in half if you weren’t careful, and they liked to hang from shallow ceilings.

Joran had made a living out of hunting them, as they were one of the few monster types that appeared in every dungeon and place in the world.

His sword, Sheila, made quick work of the reaching arms coming his way. A spinning slash took out enough legs to be useful, then he kicked on Defender’s Rush and left the area behind as he became a blur of speed.

The pounding steps of the Rake and the clacks of the Greybeards followed him as he quickly caught up with the fleeing group. The blood-red ability Vale had used on him faded to the air, and while he could no longer hear the Greybeards snapping, the pounding steps continued as the Rake continued on.

Furthest back, he turned around, staring as the vibrating lights showed their doom. The Rake was an impressive specimen. Twenty feet in length, it had a crocodilian back end that it dragged forward with two massive arms. 

It was named Rake because they had a tendency to swing their tail forward, three long, impossibly sharp bones on its rear, ready to tear the unsuspecting to pieces. The best way to manage them was to split their attention and try to hit their sides, breaking through the thickened skin covering their bodies.

The door was behind them, but it still had to be unlocked.

This is where I die.

He set his arms, blade held forward, fully prepared for the glorious end he’d worked for all his life. At just fifty-years old, he couldn’t have wished for a better way to meet his maker. Protecting a group of ambitious kids with designs on a world gone to hell.

Then he felt a jolt of electricity run through his body. His hands, holding the previously steady blade, vibrated with the feel of it as the world slowed down.

What the hell is happening?

He looked behind himself and saw the Baker boy holding an unconscious Cassio Vale just as the glowing Quill faded out.

“He said it’ll help awaken your reflexes. We’re going to try to get the door open!”

Joran nodded and yelled, “Go! I’ve got it from here!”

The scared boy nodded, then ran. Joran turned around and grinned at the monster's open mouth, “Now I’ve got a shot.”