I stood outside Richard’s smithy as I scrolled through the skill tree, the sounds of the Dwarf pounding away at the forge filling my ears. I’d come back here to sell the stuff I’d gotten from the Crimson Hall, as well as to get him to craft me some new boots.

While my current boots that increased the drop rate of gold were decent, I knew that Richard was offering a better pair of attack boosting chainmail ones as long as I had the materials.

That frolic in the dungeon had given me enough aluminium plates and scraps of cloth to get them, as well enough skill points to grab another skill. In celebration of gaining In the Dead of Night, I decided to get a skill that complemented it.

I scrolled through the Kobold skills, eventually settling on the one I wanted.

Invisibility (3)

5 base MP cost, drains MP while active. Cooldown: 4s

Turns the caster invisible. Enemies stop aggroing. Drains MP over time. Attacking in this state guarantees a crit hit.

Invisibility was not as bad as it seemed. It may be a 3 cost skill, and it may seem pointless in battle, but it has its uses.

The first effect stopped enemies from aggroing to you, which, to be fair, was not that useful unless I found myself in another situation like the Redcap Tower back at the Crimson Hall. It was even more pointless in a boss fight, since if you were soloing the boss like I liked to do, Invisibility wouldn’t do anything to remove aggro. Maybe a lot more useful in multiplayer, letting you keep the boss aggro off of you and on the main tank, but otherwise, it was pretty pointless.

However, the other effect was a lot more valuable: guaranteed crit hit if you attacked while invisible. In short, big damage while Invisible. Well, of course, it wasn’t like you could keep critting endlessly, since Invisibility was dispelled the moment you attacked. Still, a crit was a crit. More damage was always welcome.

Back when the game was in beta, I’d discovered an exploit surrounding Invisibility. Back then, there were no “base MP cost”s or cooldowns. As an active skill, all it did was drain your MP when activated, and could be activated immediately after it was dispelled. If you activated and dispelled the skill fast enough, you could actually get away with the guaranteed crit without losing any MP.

Naturally, I exploited this. I’d go Invisible right before an attack, take a swing, take my guaranteed crit, and repeat the process without losing so much as a drop of MP. This meant that every single one of my attacks were able to crit as long as my fingers moved fast enough, granting me absurdly big damage every time at the cost of nothing.

Crit hits became reliable, and not a matter of luck. So I stacked everything on crit damage, used my signature Short-Range Teleport plus basic attack combo, and went around slapping bosses, becoming the one punch man of the tiny speedrunning community that was around at the time.

Then everyone started doing it, and Kobold became the only viable option for speedrunning. The devs eventually caught on to this, and patched the skill, making the tactic no longer viable. Activating Invisibility now took off a base chunk of MP on top of the MP drain, and had a four second cooldown, so people couldn’t spam it endlessly as they were able to before.

After the nerf, it stopped being as useful. Why spend the base MP on Invisibility for a crit when you could instead use the MP on a much more powerful skill? There were plenty of Briar Elf skills that did big damage, even if they didn’t crit.

The cooldown was also annoying, since it meant that even if you had the MP to spare, you couldn’t just spam it. So even with the MP cost reducing effects of Sorrow, these reasons were partially why I opted for more versatile skills like Throwing Knives and Short-Range Teleport way back at the start.

However, with In the Dead of Night, the story changed.

In the Dead of Night (B)

Passive

Mobs do not aggro unless the caster is in their line of sight. Increase movement speed by 300% in the first 1 second of casting Invisibility.

A blessing from the Kobolds of the Light Marshes in recognition of your feat.

In the Dead of Night was a skill that did essentially the same thing as Invisibility. It stopped mobs from aggroing to you. Nothing special. But the additional property was interesting.

Increase movement speed by 300% in the first 1 second of casting Invisibility.

Now, I don’t know what the momentum result of all the increased speed is, but I do know that it’s pretty large. I also know that the increased 300% in 1s could take you as far as Short-Range Teleport as long as you prepare yourself properly before you activate Invisibility.

While you didn’t get invincibility frames from activating Invisibility, moving at that speed meant that there was a good chance you could dodge an attack even if it was just about to hit. It also let you jump and dash farther on top of being faster, letting you cover more distance even if it only lasted for a second.

It also cost half the MP of Short-Range Teleport. If you add on the 10% reduced cost from Sorrow, and then the next 10% reduced cost from the crit (Sorrow’s weapon description), then the cost could be lowered even further, making it my poor man’s Teleport now that I was still at low Level and didn’t have much MP to spare.

Teleport was still better, since there was still a difference between going really fast and actually teleporting, but unless I had to fight the final boss version of the Decay again, Invisibility + In the Dead of Night would suffice for basic dodging.

Soon after I’d finished reorganising my skills and my Inventory, Richard came out of the smithy, carrying my new boots, and with Emmie riding on his shoulder.

“Here’s your Chainmail Boots, Luck,” he said in a gruff voice, setting them down in front of me. “The best that my meagre skills could make. Increases your attack by 10%.”

“Thanks, Richard,” I returned, swiftly equipping them. “I’m glad you were willing to take all that random stuff off of me. I had like, three hundred Red Caps in my Inventory.”

“Nonsense!” Richard laughed. “One man’s garbage is another man’s gold. What was random stuff to you was a fat load of gold to me.”

“Gold!” cheered Emmie, pounding her tiny fists on Richard’s head.

“Yes, gold, my little munchkin!” He swung her down from his shoulders, whooping in delight. “Gold!”

“Shiny! Pretty!”

“Yes, it is shiny, isn’t it? Does Emmie want Papa to buy her some pretty trinkets?”

“Yay!”

I didn’t want to intrude upon the wholesome father-daughter moment, so I opted to leave.

“Well, I’ll be off,” I waved goodbye. “Still have to see Princess Rosa before I set out for the Mounds.”

“Then don’t let us hold you up, Chosen One. Safe travels!” Richard turned to Emmie. “Say goodbye to Uncle Luck, Emmie.”

“Bye bye!” Emmie shouted as I left. “Bye bye!”

I made my way up the Great Oak.

There seemed to actually be two Rosas in this dream. One was what I dubbed real Rosa, who was flirty and a bit creepy, but otherwise behaved like a normal person. The other was a hologram of Rosa, that was permanently situated at the bottom of the Great Oak. I wondered if it was there because the real Rosa couldn’t be there in person to talk to everyone.

When it came to turning in quests, I wasn’t sure whether I actually had to see Rosa or if the fake one would suffice, but then again, I had a reason to talk to the real Rosa. So I made my way all the way to the top of the Great Oak, where the canopy formed a small, leafy platform on which to overlook the entirety of Briarwood.

Marge and Trix had said that this was where I could summon Rosa, but…

I looked around the small platform, searching for maybe a call button, or some magic script I could use, but alas… nothing.

Maybe if I just yelled for her really loudly?

“Rosa!”

No reply. I tried again.

“Rosa!”

“ROSA!”

“Shh… no need to shout, Chosen One,” a gentle touch slid down my arm as the Princess herself appeared behind me, her sky blue eyes as unsettling as ever.

“I hear every fleeting whisper of my name clearly,” she paused, and smiled. “Yours included.”

“Hi, Rosa,” I greeted her. “I’ve cleared the Crimson Hall.”

“You called me so loudly just for that?” she scoffed, pressing a finger to her cheek. “For nothing but a quest reward…

“That’s…”

“Well, here you are.”

Quest Completed: Crimson Mayhem

Received materials: Aluminium Plates x10, Red Thread x20

10k G

“Thank you,” I waved the screen away.

“Anything else to say to me?”

“In terms of pleasantries, no, but—“

“So cold! You called me here only for quest rewards? I’m terribly upset, you know…” she turned away, acting hurt.

“Rosa…”

“But I’m a kind and compassionate princess, so I’ll forgive you. I’m eager to see what we can do together.”

“Haha…”

“Well, either way. I hereby thank you for your service,” she leaned away, chuckling. “Is there anything else you need from me?”

“I was told that you could give me the quest?”

“What quest?” she asked coyly, a look of faux innocence in her blue eyes.

“You know, the story quest?”

“No, I don’t know any story quest.”

“The story quest in the Mounds?” I was starting to get tired of her leading me around. “The one about the rumbling sound?”

“And who are you asking?

“Rosa, please.”

Rosa smiled in triumph.

“Oh! That quest! Why didn’t you just say so.”

She tilted her head and put her finger on her lips in a mock, cutesy manner.

“Oh Champion, there’s been terrible news! I’ve recently received word that the Dwarves in the Mounds have been hearing a terrible rumbling sound. What’s worse is that it’s coming from the hill that houses the Ruler’s Grave!”

”What if it’s the Parched Baron hoping to escape his prison? Someone must investigate. But I’m oh so weak and ill suited for combat, and the Mounds are sure to be dangerous! Oh dear, whatever shall I do?” She turned her eyes to the sky, her expression straight out of a Shakespearean play. “If only there was a kind and noble hero who could help me out!”

“I’ll investigate the Mounds in your place then,” I raised my eyebrows.

Rosa dropped her tragic charade and smiled.

“Wonderful! Here’s your permit,” she clapped her hands together and pushed a medallion into my hands. Looking down at it, it was red and coppery, and seemed to be depicting the image of a rose.“And your quest.”

A quest menu appeared in my face, seeming to almost shove itself against me in its eagerness.

Story Quest: Bloody Baron

Investigate the rumbling noise in the Mounds.

“By the way,” I waved away the screen. “I never did see your mysterious confidant.”

“Oh? A mysterious confidant?”

“I meant yours.”

“I have many confidants,” Rosa cupped her cheeks in her hands. “Some more mysterious than others. Which one are you referring to?”

“The one that you said would be waiting for me at the Crimson Hall.”

“Pardon?” like a switch being snapped off, Rosa dropped her cutesy act and frowned.

“I didn’t see him anywhere.”

“What do you mean?” Rosa’s eyebrows furrowed. For once, there did not seem to be any hidden layers to her expression.

“I went into the Hall, and I looked in all the rooms, and he wasn’t there.”

“No… No,” Rosa shook her head resolutely. “He should have been there. Right next to the entrance to the dungeon, ready to greet you. You must have missed him somehow… Unless—“

Her eyes widened, and she turned suddenly.

“I have something to attend to. Farewell, Chosen One.”

And then she was gone.

I sighed.