Path of the Slayer B3 20. Side Quests & Trap Runs

We had a feast like no other on Gunner’s main deck.

Syleth had done a great job buying as many Rank 5 delights she could stuff in special storage boxes made for preserving food. Each platter came out steaming fresh, and we had a lot of platters. Drake ribs, griffin legs, basilisk eggs, and much more, all flavored and cooked to perfection.

After all that delicious and energy-rich feasting, I did a few Soul Blaze practices with Thumper and Merlin. Despite the wizard’s complaints about the painful results of each session, we kept going until it became obvious that we needed a break.

It only took me half a day to come out of regular soul journey meditation. The others only took a day – eating High-Quality, High-Ranked food sped up meditation to a ridiculous degree. It also made our souls feel far better, especially me. Doomie’s weight felt a little lighter.

I couldn’t imagine going without enriching food and the periodic soul journey anymore.

Still, Syleth had smartly stocked up on enough Path Elixirs and many other concoctions to start up our own giant alchemy shop. We weren’t going to leave any stone unturned, especially me.

I’d already sorted through and claimed what I needed from the two dozen storage trunks filled with crafting materials, manuals, and gear Syleth had bought for me.

Impressively, she’d managed to burn through every credit of the trillions I’d given Merlin.

Next time, I might have to be careful with how I word a shopping spree around the half-naga Charmer. She was a bad influence – I could already see the other girls champing at the bit for another trillionaire splurge.

Granted, I could barely get a word in with her anymore. If Syleth wasn’t training or gossiping, she disappeared with Merlin.

Redfang and Marnarka followed me around and kept offering to help me with anything. They also offered me massages and ways to relax. I gently turned them down.

Noodles pretended to be Thumper’s shadow.

Velira kept courting Weaver. The elf wasn’t even bothering to hide it anymore as she sang romantic ballads in the drider’s direction.

Brug busied himself with weapon maintenance while he entertained Kroker’s passionate tirades about how the God-Dragoness belief was the truest faith. And Grimmy threw herself into double training with Zez and Sharia’s help.

The Veteran Bard provided illusionary adversaries while the Veteran Raider provided the brutal force. If Grimmy wasn’t forced to rest and meditate, the half-gob girl chugged Path Elixirs and went nonstop. Swords ended up broken around her, but there were plenty more of the Rank 4 stuff in stock.

Seeing Grimmy’s fervent passion to improve filled me with so much warm pride, it was hard not to smile around her. I loved seeing someone worthy push their limits and go further beyond mere talent.

It inspired me to go harder.

Soon, the time for my excursion arrived.

We had fifty-five days until the Grand Generational Passing. Twenty-four days before the citadel tour needed to end. And one day before the start of the local tournament.

Today was day one out of ten for my crafting excursion.

After promising to reunite at the Central Diamond Castle, I departed with Thumper keeping me company. Merlin took the Dragon Gunship and the others on a speedy flight to reach the tournament in time.

Sabretooth bellowed softly beneath me while under Thumper’s only spell – a concealment spell – but without Merlin’s additional magic. Still, the spell helped well enough as Thumper raced beside us on his Epic Wolf Shade.

Me and Thumper followed our instincts through the twisting, dilapidated, and danger-filled routes of the Citadel Castle Mountains Challenge Floor.

It didn’t take long for Sabretooth to rip and roar her way beyond the concealment’s limits while in a soft competition with Wolfie – Thumper’s name for his Wolf Shade. He’d kept the name secret out of embarrassment until he finally got over it.

Knowing my doom avatar was named Doomie might’ve helped.

And who cared? We had new sections of the challenge floor to explore as it greeted us merrily with its myriad oppositions.

[You’ve entered the Spiral Gauntlet Tower Section: Rank 4 Trap (Epic)!]

Me and Sabretooth fishhooked out of a collapsing tunnel while Thumper and Wolfie used Shadow Step to slip in and out of the shade.

My giant hunter autocycle inflated her tires and smashed across mounds of rubble in our way as we crossed through a cavernous mountain core with a spinning tower in the middle.

Thumper and Wolfie bounded up close to us, the half-giant rogue pointing up at a corner of the tower.

Following his gaze, I noticed the windows in the turning tower had ancient barrels sticking out of them.

The tower’s turning pace sped up. The cannons shifted, knocking off dust and chips of stone, as they angled themselves to point at us. Then thunderous cannon blasts filled the cavernous mountain core.

“Ha! Let me drive!” I took control of steering, and Sabretooth moved even faster.

Magnetic lightning, cursed energy, and more flowed out of me and mixed with the autocycle’s internal machinery and energy. With an explosive growl, she revved up, hopped over a mound, and shot out lances of electromagnetic ice javelins at the speeding cannonballs.

As Sabretooth threw up a curtain of anti-artillery defenses, I drove her hard and fast, whipping us around and over various obstacles.

Thumper and Wolfie stayed in our shadow, ducking, slipping, and dodging with slick moves, making the cannons miss every shot.

Together, we used the debris-strewn floor of the mountain core to our advantage as we circled around. It took a while before I realized there wasn’t an obvious exit.

“Thumper! Send me a clone for crew-firing!” I shouted.

“Nah! I got it!” Thumper urged Wolfie forward, and the slick shade half-sprinted, half-slithered up.

Huffing merrily with his tongue lolling out, Wolfie shrank down from his larger size to something closer to Sabretooth’s bulk. He matched the autocycle’s velocity and maneuvering while under a curtain of hostile cannon fire.

I gave control over to Sabretooth and reached down where my new Epic Rank 5 Veteran Adventure Belt waited.

It was the most impressive new gear I had outside of storage. The Railcannon Warrior Armor had been dismissed back into my profile, leaving it under the System’s care for now.

Replacing my usual armor was a well-fitted and enchanted Exquisite Rank 5 leathers, which included a helmet and enchantments for strength, toughness, and speed. It was decent, but not as impressive as my coveted storage device.

The Epic brown belt had four spatial pouches, and each one had an immense amount of storage space. One pouch held all of my weapons, garnering my immediate attention.

With a flick of my hand, and a simple intentful yank, the overly long and mighty Exquisite Rank 4 Thundergun came out.

By this point, I had my most reliable powers activated, with one exception that I didn’t get to use often enough, my Great Skill: Undaunted Calvary Charge.

Better yet, Thumper’s newly evolved Great Skill, Velocity Raptor Pounce, synergized with mine. Together, we hooked around a fallen fortress, blew past some raining cannon blasts, and charged at the tower itself.

Thumper took the extra railcannon bolts from me and stuffed them into a pouch on the same Epic belt he had. I filled myself with a high electrical charge in record time even without my armor and sent it jolting down the railcannon.

Once more, the Thundergun lived up to its name.

The railcannon bolt blasted off a chunk of the tower’s base. Yet, the centerpiece of the trap kept turning and firing cannons.

Before I finished refilling myself with another high electrical charge, Sabretooth used her tundra magic to cool down the orange-hot weapon to a cool dark gray. Thumper reloaded the weapon with blurring hands while standing on Wolfie, moving far faster than a Shadow Clone.

Then I was firing the Thundergun again in record time, blasting away another chunk at the base of the tower. Because we were moving so fast, we had to twist away, flee using cover, then hook around and return to racing straight at the tower.

We fired even faster now that we had more confidence and better timing. The Thundergun tore through the base of the tower in a rapidfire fashion that shouldn’t be possible. We made it so anyway.

By the time we had to turn away before crashing directly into the base of the tower, the trap section’s central piece groaned to a definite stop.

A rumbling noise resounded across the entire cavernous core as the entire tower collapsed on its side, taking down all of its mechanics and the cannons with it.

[Congratulations, Pathwalkers! You’ve annihilated the Spiral Gauntlet Tower Section: Rank 4 (Epic)!]

“Onto the next?” Thumper asked, patting Wolfie on the head. The shade bounced around in front of Sabretooth and wagged his tail in thrill.

“Let’s go!” I shouted, patting my autocycle on the handlebars. The artificer creature let out a deep and rumbling purr, her tail sweeping about casually.

We found the exit in the demolished base of the knocked over tower. Two hours later, we found another interesting challenge.

[You’ve entered the Inverted Battalion Barracks Section: Rank 4 Trap (Epic)!]

We came out of a hole in a massive blocky wall overlooking a deep and dark lake covered in mist and dim moonlight. The wall merged with a more natural mountainous formation that had a heavy shelf overlooking the lake’s surface.

In our way was an upside down fortress that was big enough for fully sized giants to live in. There was only one route forward, and our broken and halfway-collapsed lane kept flowing to our right before going up along the wall at an angle that led toward the upside down gate.

Wolfie found rocky crevices and protrusions to pounce along just fine. Sabretooth extended her tire claws and sprayed forth an icy ramp for her to tread across easily enough.

My instincts as the Slayer blared with warning, and I knew why. The inverted barracks was in front of us, but the trap section was already upon us.

I was rewarded for my paranoia when Thumper jerked his head around. Looking in the same direction as him, I saw an actual enemy that wasn’t human or monstrous.

A seven-foot tall armored construct covered in glowing purple runes came flying at us. Its body was bulky, the limbs cylinder. Thick fingers extended from the ends of its metal hands.

The way it flew toward us wasn’t out of curiosity or wariness.

It was like most things – out to kill us.