Loopshard - Chapter One-Hundred-and-Fourteen

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Not sure if 115 will go up today or tomorrow, but I'm already working on it. Hoping to get a lot of writing done before I dive into my final project. But it should be easy enough to juggle both since I can do it all from home.

I'm the kind of introvert where an open office is my version of hell, so working full-time at my internship was super draining and didn't leave me much room mentally to focus on writing. I might not have mentioned this, or maybe I did ages ago, but I'm in the final semester of a programming education. For my final project I'll be making an ethical gambling site, lol. Anyway, if coding interests you, I'll probably post something on the discord server in the #coding-corner channel in about a month or so. If I can manage to deploy it to Azure, then I might even be seeking some testers to help break whatever unholy code concoction I produce.

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Chapter One-Hundred-and-Fourteen

Adam and Mei continued west through the tunnels, trying to reach the Hispanic guy with the Defender weapon. Although it didn’t seem like she trusted Adam, it was clear that she appreciated them working together to take down the statues. They’d managed to defeat eleven of them before they ran into the guy in one of the large chambers.

He was in the middle of fighting four statues, doing his best to protect himself with his shield, but clearly not able to effectively kill the elementals bearing down on him, since he couldn’t find an opening. Every strike he blocked pushed him back, and Adam knew it was just a matter of seconds before his Stamina ran out and he was chopped to bits.

Adam and Mei came to his rescue, and despite scaring the shit out of the guy, he was quick to thank them.

“You saved my ass there,” he said. “I’m Nicolas by the way.”

“I’m Adam.”

“Mei,” said the Asian woman. It was still the only word Adam had managed to get out of her. She hadn’t even particularly seemed to question the logic that they could all get out of the Altar alive.

“I thought we were meant to fight and kill each other,” Nicolas said. “I’m glad you guys didn’t attack me…”

“We can all get out of this together,” Adam said. It wasn’t exactly a lie, since he knew for sure there had to be a way. It was just more the lack of knowing how that made it feel like a lie when he said it.

But, I would rather instil hope than despair.

“So, are we gonna go save the other two then?” Nicolas asked.

“That’s right,” Adam replied.

The three of them went east from the chambers near Nicolas’ stairwell, going through the chambers and tunnels that Adam and Mei had already cleared before reaching one of the bigger rooms that had six separate entrances. Within they found twelve statues, several sarcophaguses, and a Relic Chest.

Adam opened it and revealed a Stone Talisman within.

< < Relic > >

< Stone Talisman (Uncommon) — Sacrifice the Relic to curse a target with Wither, increasing damage inflicted to the target by 50% with the next attack >

“Who wants it?” he asked the others.

“Mei should take it,” Nicolas said.

She nodded and grabbed it from the bottom of the stone chest.

Nicolas’ setup should likely have been an offensive one, since he’d gone the Vanguard route instead of taking Guardian like Gladwyn. Because his weapon wasn’t a Spellblade, Adam knew that Nicolas had chosen the other evolution after Vanguard, but he had no idea what it was and what it did. Regardless, his setup of Relics seemed kind of random. He had the Scale Trousers which gave 50% Defence at the cost of 50% Speed. On his right arm he wore the Vigilant Fighter’s Vambrace that made parries reveal a weak point on his opponent, even though Adam wasn’t sure the Defender could parry attacks. And he also had the Avalanche Boots which made kicks disorient, as well as the Bark Armour.

As they continued east through the tunnels, killing thirteen statues on the way, Adam found out exactly what evolution Nicolas had. It evolved from Vanguard, which increased the damage of the first strike by 50%, and was called Outrider. The evolution made any movements to close the gap between himself and an opponent twice as fast.

Coupled with the Spear Dancer evolution, the Body of Sloth Relic, and the Slothling Spring Boots, he could end up dealing so much damage.

Although Nova hadn’t said so, Adam highly suspected that he’d been using the Outrider evolution before switching to the Forlorn Knight sword and shield he’d told Adam about.

It makes no sense that he would pick a defensive Relic like the Scale Trousers when the whole point of his evolution is speed, but I guess he might not have had a choice.

Adam told them that his weapon type was Spidersilk Weaver and made no mention of the blood mage. He’d also kept his blood manipulation of the needle and silk rather subtle, since he feared they wouldn’t trust him if they knew he could manipulate their bodies.

When Adam, Nicolas, and Mei reached a large chamber that connected the two eastern stairwells, they suddenly ran into the other two Players they’d been seeking. The pair were fighting off seven statue elementals. The girl with the blond-dyed hair who wielded a spell staff was doing most of the damage while the other woman used her shield to protect her, but Adam could tell they were both running out of fuel.

“We’re here to help!” Adam announced as the trio rolled in and took care of the statues.

Once nothing but sand and broken stone remained, Adam went over to the Spellcaster.

“Are you okay? Looks like you were about to run out of Mana.”

“I’m okidoki,” she replied in a bright voice before pulling out a blue potion from within her Sanctuary Defender’s Robes and downing it.

“You aren’t going to fight us, right?” asked the other woman with the eyebrow piercings and black-and-green hair. Her accent marked her as Scottish, the only accent he recognised so far, since Mei didn’t say anything except her own name and Nicolas barely had an accent in the first place.

“Adam says there’s a way for us all to get out of this together,” said Nicolas.

Mei nodded.

Now I really hope it works.

“How about we clear all the statues out first,” Adam suggested. “That should get us the most Points possible by the end.”

“I like this guy already,” the Asian with the dyed hair said.

“I’m Catherine,” said the girl with the piercings. “And she’s Momo.”

“Catherine?” Momo asked, confused. “You said it was ‘Cat’.”

“That’s what all my friends used to call me,” she explained.

“I’m Nicolas,” said the Hispanic guy.

“Mei,” said Mei.

“That’s the only word I’ve heard her say so far,” Nicolas remarked.

Adam laughed. “Me too.”

Mei just shrugged.

After about twenty minutes had passed, their team had gone down every tunnel and dealt with every statue elemental, racking up a total of 65 kills. Based on how many the others had killed without him, it seemed the total number of statues for the Stage was 75. It would be an absolute enormous amount of Points for each of them when they made it out.

If we make it out, Adam reminded himself.

They had also looted all the Relic Chests they came across, five in total, counting the first one that Mei had looted. As with his last time here, there were only three possible options: the Stone Talisman that cursed a target; the Stone Mask that negated a hit and then cursed the wearer; and the Stone Bracer that could disable someone’s Relics for half a minute but would disable the wearer’s for two minutes.

Adam had graciously allowed the others to pick what they wanted, ending up with the only bracer out of the bunch, while Mei and Momo received the talismans, and Nicolas and Catherine got the masks.

Like Nicolas, Catherine had also picked Outrider, but she had evolved a third time into Kingkiller, which doubled her damage against bosses and elites. It was pretty useless in this Stage, unless Players counted as elites, but it would be strong in the group Stages to come.

Momo had initially picked the Seeker evolution of Spellcaster, which turned her basic attacks from spell balls into bolts, giving them more range and piercing capabilities. From there she had evolved it into Swarm Master, which allowed her to use Mana to split spell projectiles. However, she said that it was really expensive and that even if she used all 100 points of Mana, she could only get her spell to split seven times, despite upgrading her Casting Efficiency several times to reduce casting cost.

Once they reached the dead-end that hid the secret bosses, he told them all to stay back as he opened the way and went in, since none of them were super strong and he feared the fight would just get someone killed. He activated both of his rings to get enough blood and then went into the secret chamber with the Deathguard.

Compared to the stone statues, it felt embarrassingly easy to kill the three Elphin, since they were after all just flesh and blood.

Once they lay dead at his feet, he had the strong urge to strip them of all their flesh to fill his reserves, but he relented, since he didn’t want to scare the others when he came back out. He did however collect as much blood as he could, coating his body with it in a way that made it just seem like random splatters.

After the fight he went up to the shrine that the Deathguard had been protecting and grabbed the obsidian spear.

< < Secret Weapon Obtained > >

< Solbor (Rare) — Spear of a forgotten Elphin hero >

< Unique Skill ( Scattershot ) | Launch the tip of the spear forward as a barrage of piercing darts >

[You are already carrying two weapons and cannot carry a third. Would you like to swap one of your weapons to wield this weapon or return it to your Player House?]

Adam grinned. The weapon rack was such a good purchase.

“Stow it in my Player House.”

[Understood.]

When he exited the chamber, the others looked relieved that he was unharmed, although Nicolas seemed worried that Adam might’ve been hurt, considering the copious amount of blood that now coated his body.

“I’m fine,” he told them. “Do you want to see what’s inside?”

They all peeked into the hidden chamber, but since there was nothing special except for the corpses of three scary-looking Elphin warriors, they quickly lost interest. He was glad none of them asked about the shrine in the back, but fortunately it just seemed like a normal decorative fixture of the Stage if you didn’t know there’d been a weapon on top of it.

They finally went towards the Altar, but Adam stopped them on the way when he found the special statue. It was now the only one in the entire Stage that hadn’t come to life, which made it really obvious that it was special.

He placed the Skyblue Pearl into the statue’s hollow eye-socket, revealing the secret room and stone chest, within which was the round map. It could be slotted into the Navigator’s Telescope from Stage Six and then be used to find treasure in Stage Seven.

< < Map Obtained > >

< Golden Map — Follow the trail of this map at thine own peril, but at its end awaits a treasure unlike anything known to thee >

No one protested him taking the map, since there was only one, because, as Nicolas put it, Adam had been the one to kill the most statues and was the ‘man with the plan’.

After they went through the rooms they had cleared earlier, they walked in a procession through the snaking tunnel that led to the cavern with the stalactites that dripped water onto the uneven floor. In the centre of the naturally-formed chamber was the Altar with the fifteen plinths, four of which were larger than the rest, and the large stone orb in the middle of the round base between them all.

They all shared uneasy glances as they approached the Altar, but Adam reassured them it would be fine.

It has to work.

The All-Seeing System loves our suffering, but it also claims to be fair.

We are defying the logic of the Stage in a way that most might not consider, because they’ve been told that only one Player may claim the Altar.

The Trials have shown, time and again, that we cannot trust the cubes. And since it is only the cubes that tell us we cannot claim the Altar together, and not the System itself, then it should work.

After all, the System’s message was just to claim the Altar before the timer ran out. Nothing else.

Adam took a deep breath.

It has to work.

“We’ll do this together at the same time,” Adam said. “I think we should hold hands for this.”

Mei frowned. “Why?” she asked.

Nicolas and Momo both gasped, before laughing at each other’s reaction.

“The God that we are appealing to is the God of Life,” Adam said. “Surely a display of cooperation isn’t a bad idea.”

“That’s pretty gay,” Cathrine remarked, before quickly adding, “I’m allowed to say that word.”

Mei snorted and laughed loudly. Then she immediately took Adam’s left hand and grabbed onto Nicolas with the other.

Despite her comment, Cathrine grabbed Adam’s right hand, already holding onto Momo, who was bouncing up and down excitedly.

“Alright,” Adam started. “I’ll count down from 5.”

[Only 1 Player may claim the Altar,] said their cubes in unison.

The others froze.

“It’s lying,” Adam said.

Mei nodded. “It told me my parents and grandmother would die if I died, because anyone related to me would die alongside me. My sisters are both dead and yet I am still here.”

“Said the same thing about my nan,” Cathrine added.

“No hesitation,” Adam told them, feeling his hands starting to get sweaty with nervousness. If it didn’t work, then he would have to do something fast to survive, and it wouldn’t be pretty.

“5…”

“4…”

“3…”

“2…”

“1!”

All five of them, hands interlinked, hopped onto the base of the Altar.

[You have reached the Altar,] their cubes announced. [Place your hands on the Worshipping Stone to lay your claim.]

Adam grinned at the slight change in its wording from last time.

It said hands, plural!

They all let go of each other and ringed around the stone orb in the Altar’s centre.

“On 3,” Adam said.

“Counting up, or counting down?” Cathrine asked.

“Down,” he replied.

“Just making sure.”

“Alright, here we go,” Adam said.

“3…”

“2…”

“1!”

All five of them put their hands on the stone orb.

< < Stage Alert > >

< Player Adam has claimed the Altar >

< Player Cathrine Boyle has claimed the Altar >

< Player Nicolas Sánchez Romero has claimed the Altar >

< Player Mei Wu has claimed the Altar >

< Player Momo Manalo has claimed the Altar >

[Congratulations! You have successfully claimed the Altar.]

“Yes!” Adam shouted excitedly.

Nicolas rushed forward and embraced him in a hug. “We did it!” he exclaimed.

A clump formed in Adam’s throat.

“We actually did it,” he replied, feeling lightheaded from the flood of emotions rolling through him.

“Thank you, Adam,” Mei said.

“Sorry for calling your idea gay,” Cathrine apologised.

Adam laughed. “You meant ‘happy’, right?”

“Uh, sure…”

“What happens now?” Momo asked.

Before Adam could reply, all of them vanished.

< < Stage Complete > >

< Tallying Score >

Shit! I should’ve informed them better before this.

I honestly can’t believe that really worked though!

The Tome Keeper is kind of an asshole for not giving me this solution when I asked, instead teaching me such a roundabout way. I guess his answer did fulfil my request, but it’s a lesson to be more specific when I ask for a solution.

< < Score > >

< 29 Minutes 26 Seconds Completion Time >

< 0 Players slain >

< 1000 Point Secret Boss Bonus added >

< 800 Point Flawless Bonus added >

< 800 Point Pacifist Bonus added >

< 150 Point All Secrets Bonus added >

< 0 Damage Received >

< 9250 Points Awarded >

9000 Points!?

That means that all the statues I killed gave me 100 Points each!

Wait, we almost ran out of time… I should’ve kept a closer eye on it. That could’ve ended poorly.

Before Adam could absorb everything that had happened and the huge influx of Points, the whole world suddenly blinked.

***

Adam reappeared where he’d been standing, but all of his Relics were gone, along with the Eye and his weapons. He was wearing the clothes he had started with, even though the shirt should be long gone.

I forgot about this…

This time, only six of the fifteen plinths around him lit up with potential energy.

Controlled like a puppet, he bent down and picked up the stone orb in front of him, causing all of the water on the base of the Altar to stop moving and become reflective like a mirror.

His eyes scanned the plinths from left to right as his head was forced through the motions. The first plinth for the Tome Keeper was not lit up by the haze of energy, but the second one marking the All-Mother was. The next four were dark, but then out of the four larger plinths three were lit. Of the last five on his right, only the first two were lit.

As the cutscene released its grip on him, the stone sudden felt heavy in Adam’s arms.

< < Worship > >

< Select the Absolute you wish to serve >

Adam looked over the options, but only two were new to him. From left to right, they were:

< < The All-Mother > >

< Lord of Sustenance and Fertility >

< Mother of all Elphin >

< Boon: All-Mother’s Fruit (1-Stage Cooldown) >

< < The Eternal Serpent > >

< Lord of Eternity >

< Icon of immortality and time >

< Boon: Pause Time for 10 seconds (1-Stage Cooldown) >

< < The Void > >

< Lord of Nothingness >

< The dark of the cosmos, the null and the empty >

< Boon: The End to the Suffering >

< < The First Light > >

< Lord of Light >

< The spark of creation and the seedbed of life >

< Boon: Heal another Player to full (1-Stage Cooldown) >

< < The Flayed Lady > >

< Lord of Blood and Betrayal >

< Primogenitor of Envy >

< Boon: Blood Dagger spell >

< < Nwetrou > >

< Lord of Black Holes and Deep Places >

< Primogenitor of Gluttony >

< Boon: Breathe underwater | Black Ponds traversal >

The Flayed Lady is literally the Lord of Betrayal and origin of Envy…

By comparison, the Tome Keeper being the origin of Greed doesn’t seem that bad.

There’s just no way that worshipping her will not end poorly.

I also don’t like that if I meet anyone who worships the Tome Keeper, then I will feel compelled to attack them…

I’m sure the weakness I’d get from worshipping her would also not be something great.

Adam sighed.

But the Tome Keeper is of course right. Knowledge is a key. It unlocks many doors. And I am perfectly positioned to worship her now, since she is also the Lord of Blood.

I mean, who knows what tricks I might learn from her.

At the same time, the idea of picking the First Light is really intriguing, but taking damage if I hurt other Players is going to make it difficult to deal with murderers I’ll no doubt encounter from here on…

He also considered picking the All-Mother, since her healing fruit could work well with blood mage’s ability to turn Health into spell material.

Plus, she seems like one of the good ones.

So long as you’re nice to children.

The Serpent could also be really useful down the line, and there’s the fact that his weakness is kind of a boon in the way it doubles the duration of all effects. It might even work on Princely Raiment’s duration, depending on how that skill is classified, since it’s kind of a buff.

He thought about it for a while and had to adjust his grip on the heavy stone quite a few times to avoid dropping it. He was pretty sure that if he let go and it fell to the ground, he would be screwed.

At the end he had reached a decision, although he was sure it would come back to haunt him.

I really want the gift that the Tome Keeper is willing to give me in exchange for fulfilling his request.

Adam heaved the stone orb up over his waist as he reached the plinth. With a huff of exertion, he pushed it up over the edge of the short pillar and it rolled down into the recess where it quickly came to a rest.

The haze of potential energy lighting the other five plinths immediately drained into the mirror created by the water below him. Then that energy flowed into the pillar he had chosen.

< < Worship Chosen > >

< The Flayed Lady >

Immediately, darkness filled his surroundings and he was dragged out of the Forbidden Altar.

< < Now Entering > >

< The Garden of Thorns >

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