Levi immediately put everyone's stat points into Spirit. The centipedes were tanky enough that running out of stamina was their biggest weakness at present, Skarm was a fast attacker anyway, and Levi wanted to get his own stamina regen up ASAP.

The building mound of melted hive in the center of the chamber began to solidify into something more like a lumpy egg, about as tall as Levi's waist, and he knew he didn't have much time left. He brought up Skarm's character sheet, hastily glancing over his options.

Sharpened Claws (0/5)

Increase damage dealt by unarmed attacks.

(1 ability point)

Sneaky (0/5)

Increased stealth, and increased damage from stealth.

(1 ability point)

Gorer (0/5)

Horn obtains barbed protrusions, inflicting more damaging bleeds.

(1 ability point)

Leap (0/5)

Ability to jump is doubled, and attacks landed from the air deal significant additional damage.

(1 ability point)

There wasn't time to do a deep analysis, but given Skarm's current fighting style of lashing out with his claws, Levi put two into Sharpened Claws immediately, and one into Leap. It would give him increased mobility and damage potential, and make it easier for him to remount Centoo in combat. Compounding the jump bonuses with his upgraded claw swipes could make for a powerful finisher.

He'd barely made his selections before the egg-thing split open with a crack and the creature within emerged.

It was not what Levi had expected. He'd imagined a smaller swarm of upgraded scarabs, or perhaps one giant scarab come to avenge her children. Instead it was... some kind of slime? A rust-colored gelatinous blob, it slowly grew to completely envelope its former shell.

For a moment the egg's fragments remained visible through the murky translucence of the thing's body as they rapidly dissolved in its expanding bulk. By the time it finished expanding, it was close to half again as tall as Levi and equally wide.

The room suddenly felt insufficiently large, being trapped inside it with something like this.

Level 2++

(Destruction Essence)

Health 100%

The pieces clicked into place. He'd never personally fought a Destruction Essence inside a dungeon, but he knew how they worked.

Any dungeon type could form an Essence, which were uncommon but far from unheard of. According to rumors, it happened most often either immediately after a dungeon increased in level or if a dungeon's boss went unchallenged for too long. Or both.

One of the biggest reasons for always clearing a boss when running a dungeon was to mitigate the creation of an Essence. Unlike normal dungeon creatures, Essences were strong enough to leave their dungeon behind and roam freely across the world for weeks or months without dissolving.

They weren't exactly shapeshifters, but once split from a single unit they could take the form of any of the creatures a dungeon of its type could spawn. Those split pieces would be stronger than regular monsters, but still less dangerous than the essence itself. A pure Essence could destroy anything in its path.

The ground sizzled as the Essence rushed forward, faster than Levi had expected. It looked like it should be ponderous and sluggish, but it surged forward like a flooded stream in a narrow ravine.

"Spread out! Don't let it corner you!" Levi stabbed into its corrosive body, Beast Bite snapping off a chunk of its bulk, then tossed the glob aside as he ducked and sprinted away. Immediately upon being separated from the main Essence, the disconnected lump formed into an oversized scarab and took off into the air. Skarm, taking advantage of his new improved abilities, leaped on it and slashed wildly, tearing its wings off and riding it to the ground.

Level 2+

(Essence Scarab)

Health 58%

Despite the scarab being advanced and oversized, Skarm's attack had brought down close to half its health in a single attack. It got in a few bites of its own in the process, but it was outnumbered. Centoo joined in, stomping on the downed scarab with his many bladed legs as Skarm continued to slash at its shell until it stopped twitching.

Levi had no time to congratulate his minions. The main body of the Destruction Essence smoothly shifted direction to follow him.

"Stay clear," Levi warned, as Cen looked like he might go rushing in. The destructive nature of the Essence's body meant that anything but an active manablade would be ineffective against its base form. "I'll split it up, you guys deal with the pieces."

He slashed in a diagonal arc, splitting off a gremlin-sized portion which promptly took a gremlin form.

Level 2+

(Essence Gremlin)

Health 100%

The Essence Gremlin immediately charged Levi, horn leading. Between its charge and a surge from the main Essence, Levi would have been trapped if not for Cen's quick intervention. His centipede intercepted the gremlin, but the first strike from its horn stabbed straight through Cen's enhanced plate and dropped the centipede’s health by 15 in one blow.

Levi was forced to leave the Essence and focus his attention on the gremlin form, lest it do too much damage to Cen. Skarm leapt into the fray a moment later, landing unerringly atop his essence mirror - which was actually a good bit larger than Skarm, now he saw them in close proximity to each other. Again, putting his new mobility and damage multipliers to good use, he clawed madly at it, then jumped back away as Centoo joined the fray, reclaiming his perch out of the line of fire.

Skarm seemed to really be coming into his own as a skirmisher/ambusher now, the increased mobility and damage proving to be a great combination.

Levi spun away from the ongoing fight between his minions and the essence gremlin, the main Essence itself still drawn toward him.

The room was too small to keep evading forever, the Essence growing more elongated as it moved, taking up more space while growing a bit shorter. Levi sliced off another tiny piece, rushing to stomp on the scarab it formed before it could take to the air, but it was too resilient to be so easily dispatched.

The main body continued flowing relentlessly after him, forcing him to keep moving. Any time he stopped or slowed, it threatened to engulf him completely. It could only move in lines or curves, its momentum the only thing that prevented him from being crushed or dissolved by it. As long as he frequently changed direction and kept moving, he could stay ahead of it.

A rapid flurry with his shortsword sliced off even more of its mass, sending three scarab sized pieces flying, which immediately constituted and flew off after his team. Cen had just finished off the first when these three joined the fight, but the centipedes had enough legs to fend off a handful of them. As long as it didn't get to insane swarm quantities like the first stage had been, Levi knew his team could handle it.

With an abrupt reversal, Levi skirted the edge of the Destruction Essence as it surged past and sliced off another piece in the process.

This one was a bit bigger than the scarab ones, and smaller than the gremlin one, so he glanced back curious to see what it formed into. It became a gremlin, just a smaller and stunted-looking one. It ran at Centoo, whose rider gleefully jumped down on the tiny essence gremlin with a flurry of slashing claws.

He found himself wishing Gremlin Two were here. There was still plenty of the Essence left, and while this should be doable for a team of four it would be easier for a team of five.

Levi spent another minute evading, not trying to strike back, buying his team time to finish off the essence creatures he'd already sent their way before he started slicing off more. He could have chopped it into a hundred pieces in less than a minute, but then they'd be facing a whole swarm of enhanced scarabs and he found the slime form easier to control for the moment. It may be relentless, but it was also predictable.

He began to feel again the exhilaration he'd experienced early on, the feeling of running along the edge of a precipice, confident in your ability not to fall.

It took all his attention, but even as basically the worst thing a level 2 dungeon could possibly throw at him, he could take it.