Chilly gazed into a tunnel to hell with no small amount of worry. A sharp dividing line at his feet separated where the black stone of the Tubes turned red, with little molten veins of lava dribbling down the walls and pooling at the floor. An orange haze of brimstone obscured the air, leaving behind a sulphuric scent that stung Chilly’s sinuses.

“...Accept the void...”

Along the walls hung iron braziers lit by grim red flames that bobbed without an apparent fuel source. The flames lit the tunnel in a sinister light, further intensifying the feeling of a descent into the depths of hell.

“...it will grant you power...”

Chilly reached a hand under his helmet and rubbed at his nose. His eyes were watering with every breath.

“...Accept the vooooooiiidddd...”

“Would you shut up already?” Chilly turned to the offending penguin with irritation.

“...it will grant you power!”

“Ahuh, no thanks. I choose life.”

“...the void...”

“That’s it!” Chilly stepped forwards if only to get away from the penguin.

A wall of heat washed over him, smelling of brimstone and rotting eggs. It burned his skin, scalding his already criminally dry throat as he struggled to breathe the superheated air.

>

Chilly grimaced, as his thirst intensified, coupled with a far off sensation of overheating. Tiny, barely visible flames licked at his skin, eclipsed by his plasma cape, but still blackening his armor as they played across his body. He brought a hand up to his face and saw that the superheated air had stripped his forearm of hair; leaving faint streaks of ash and the acrid scent of burning hair. Irritated, he wiped away at the ash and forged onwards.

It's not enough to burn past my regeneration, he thought. With the combined power of his enhanced life regeneration and fire resistance from his abilities, the new environmental effect, that apparently lit him on fire, was not much of a hindrance, though it did reduce his effective regeneration, which may later become a problem.

At least these boots turned out well, he thought. Before leaving the abyss Chilly had collected all of the dropped essences with the help of the penguins to guide the way through the dark. Then he’d returned to Sooty’s Hell, to rest and recuperate. A quick test had revealed that he could in fact wear the level 11 boots even though he was only level 10. That had surprised him for some reason, though it was a good thing overall, so he hadn’t worried about it all that much.

He had slammed an Essence of Arcanite into the boots which had given him a powerful pair on the first try.

Steel Boots

Rare

Boots

iLevel: 11

39 armor

71 life

13% increased life

24 lightning resistance

36 curse resistance

Chilly looked down at the steel boots on his feet that glimmered in the light of the lava, gaining a ruddy discoloration as the bright steel reflected the orange haze. He hadn’t really found many worthwhile pieces of gear recently, but if all of them were this good then he would work harder to search for them from now on. There was a frustrating dearth of high level items though. In the beginning swords and armor were practically falling out of the stonework, but now he had only found this one. There were alters that increased the level of items, but likewise he had not found any of the appropriate levels, so it was a moot point.

He threw up his status sheet and looked at the changes.

Gregory “Chilly” Morhuil

Level

Exp

Skill Points

Spec

10

3/10

0

Fire

Life

Life Regeneration

Starving, Dehydrated, Burning

827/827

246.17

Armor

Fire

Cold

Lightning

Chaos

108

51.92%

139

58.16%

5

4.76%

24

19.35%

0

0.00%

Incinerate

Helmet:

Iron Barbute

Vitality

Body Armor:

Iron Plate Vest

Pious Path

Pants:

Iron Pants

Starfire Aegis

Boots:

Steel Boots

Flame Dash

Gloves:

Hide Gauntlets

???

Jewelry:

Iron Ring

???

Mainhand:

Iron Kite Shield

???

Offhand:

Iron Kite Shield

I’ll pass a thousand life soon, Chilly thought with a grin.

He dismissed the status screen, as two rather odd penguins stepped up to block his path deeper into the Kiln of the Undying Flame.

Something was wrong with chaos child. His normally fluffy plumage was melted and goopy, dripping down the side of its body like chocolate left out in the sun. Little pools of penguins stuff collected around its feet, and wisped into a blue mist that faded into the orange haze.

The other penguin, meanwhile had transformed its version of Realm Walker into a trowel and was desperately shoveling up the melted goop and sticking it back onto the body where it remained for a second before remelting and flowing downwards once again.

“Are you...alright, Mr. Chaos?” Chilly asked.

“Young EMBER!” chaos child said, its manner unaffected by the decomposing state of its body. “Every life is a beautiful story and every moment of that story is a chapter.”

Chaos child’s beak detached with a wet squelch and vanished in a blur of blue mist. Human Bean frantically transformed the trowel into a larger shovel and shoveled with renewed ardor. Chilly scrutinized the duo, unsure if he could help in any way, thought chaos child seemed indifferent to the whole situation.

“We thank you for your continued existence for your old story, your different story.”

Chaos child’s flipper detached with a gurgle. Human Bean leapt forwards, and caught the limb before it could fully dematerialize. The penguin frantically ripped out chaos child’s Realm Walker from the melting flipper and shoved it into the main mass; now resembling a mud pile more than a penguin.

From said mud pile, came chaos child’s slightly muffled voice. “We thank you for continuing no matter what. To live! To thrive!”

The rest of chaos child’s body vanished with a sad boop of black smoke.

Human Bean let out a put upon sigh, gave Chilly a cursory wave, and dropped Realm Walker in a burst of black smoke.

“Thank you,” Chilly said turning to one of the less melty penguins at his side. “Could you pass that message on to him?”

The penguins nodded.

“Also...is he okay? He was very melty.”

The silent penguins at his side gave conspiratorial grins to each other, and nodded in affirmation.

That was good enough for Chilly and he resumed his mission. He approached the first of the braziers that was hanging along the wall of the Kiln’s lava encrusted tunnel. It was forged of rough wrought iron, missing much of the subtle polish and embellishments that made a finished work of art. As it stood, the construction seemed rough and unfinished, as if the smith who had forged it was lacking time, care, or both.

The simple three-pronged structure with spikes at the ends curled around a medium sized bowl that housed the sourceless fire. It reminded him of the braziers displayed on the Runescape homepage.

He peered at the flame, marveling at the intricate beauty held within, before it suddenly flared in his face. He cursed, stumbling backwards as the fire seared his eyeballs. His regeneration kicked in, rapidly restoring the organ as he felt a foreign force shove him back, as his life dropped negligibly.

Spoiler :

Chilly instantly crouched down, cleared his dry eyes and scanned the tunnel. When no foe immediately presented himself, Chilly shot a glance at the penguins who indirectly directed his gaze above a lava pool down the tunnel.

A brilliant bird made of fire beat its wings, sending tongues of flame down with every stroke. Elegant plumage swirled and shifted across its back, leaving behind it little sparks that fizzled and popped. It flew in a tight arc around the edges of the tunnel before turning towards him. He marveled at the ghostly beauty of the creature, as he brought up his shields in preparation.

Living Ember

Level: 8

It slammed into his shield, dispersed then rematerialized behind him.

Spoiler :

He grinned. It had barely done any damage at all.

As it retreated, Starfire Aegis flared, blasting the bird with a dose of concentrated plasma. The Living Ember faltered, but managed to catch itself before flying away.

Chilly idly cast Incinerate, tracking the quick bird with the ray of fire. It noticeably struggled through the flames, but seemed to resist the damage quite well as it circled for another pass. Chilly calmly accepted the charge, focusing instead on burning down the monster.

The Living Ember bulled through his onslaught, and shattered against his upraised shields, rematerializing again behind him only for Starfire Aegis to rip outwards and disperse the bird.

Chilly canceled Incinerate and looked around. No new enemies showed up, and neither did some strange after-death effect materialize from the corpse. It was actually pretty nostalgic, reminding him of his first encounters with the skeletons. Nice and simple without any complex attack patterns.

Star Fuel would probably be pretty good here.

He had yet to revert his augments from the tough fight in the Abyss. He had several Regrets left over, but it still felt wasteful to use one without a good reason. Against the living embers, Star Fuel would be far superior to Coronal Mass Ejection. He spent a lot of the time at near full health, and with his increased regeneration the embers would likely fall without him even needing to raise a finger.

Suddenly the brazier that he had just recently investigated flared brightly. Another small level 8 Ember erupted from its flames and flew towards Chilly with wild abandon. Chilly grinned at the unrestrained attack, but ignored it. He ambled over to the brazier. It was as before; burning with no indication that it had just recently spawned life into the world.

The Ember crashed into his back but barely did any damage, taking more itself from his cape than it dealt.

I wonder if it'll spawn more Embers if I wait here, he thought. There were several ways for this to go. If pop culture was correct, this spawner could do one of a few things. The worst case scenario was that it spawned enemies continuously and indefinitely, regardless of whether other living entities were around. This would be problematic because it meant that the longer he waited the more dangerous the area would get.

It doesn't seem to be doing that though, he thought. Rather than continue spewing out little firebirds, the brazier burned normally. Like a mimic waiting for the perfect moment to attack. Chilly narrowed his eyes.

The Ember dematerialized as it destroyed itself on Chilly's cape. He crossed his arms and stared at the brazier pensively. Precisely five seconds later, it flared bright, birthing another small level 8 Living Ember that resumed its predecessor's aggression with zeal.

Well that answers that. Now the question was how to disable the spawner so that it didn’t continuously spawn little pests. It was likely activated by proximity, considering that there wasn't an Ember in the tunnel when Chilly arrived, so continuing down the tunnel would probably work to disable the spawner.

Instead, Chilly went with the traditional approach. He jammed his shield directly into the brazier, jiggling it around until the bottom clipped the flame. The tiny flame burnt the bottom of his shield, reducing his life marginally before snuffing out.

Spoiler :

It suddenly got darker in the tunnel.

The Living Ember behind him went into a rage, which Chilly promptly ignored. It charged him. Tiny sparks made of white gold trickled out of its plumage as it struggled valiantly to take down the creature that had destroyed its home.

Chilly flickered Incinerate on and off, destroying the bird and returning the lava encrusted tunnel to solitude.

“Looks like this zone is full of spawners,” Chilly said conversationally. “At least they don’t spawn continuously. Even the minecraft style spawners would be worse than this.”

He glanced down the long tunnel, identifying at least one smokeless brazier burning every couple of meters as far as he could see through the orange sulfurous haze.

“Boy, are there a lot of them though,” Chilly said. He pulled his helmet off, and scratched his nose. It felt raw and chafed, despite being in perfect condition due to his regeneration. On a whim he felt at his nose, and realized that all the hairs had burnt away. A quick inspection of the rest of his face revealed no eyebrows or eyelashes either.

He replaced his helmet with a sigh, and continued down the tunnel. As he got within several meters of the next brazier, he cast Flame Dash, appearing right next to the brazier before slamming his shield into the fire.

The flame extinguished without even a puff of smoke.

Strategy acquired! That would make the rest of this zone much easier. Though taking down the cute little angry birds wasn’t much of an issue anyway. Chilly continued down the tunnel, periodically taking care of the braziers along the walls, and avoiding the stagnant pools of lava that became more numerous as he descended. After the fifth spawner, Chilly concluded that neither the Embers nor the braziers dropped any form of essence.

He shelved his disappointment, as the tunnel opened up into a large chamber. The orange haze was thicker here. Obscuring the room in a sickly miasma that burned the skin, and chafed at the eyes. Drips of lava dribbled down stalactites and into pools that covered most of the floorspace. In the largest, most central pool, a giant semi-transparent bird was napping with its beak curled around and hidden in its plumage.

The sub-boss.

A dozen lit braziers ringed the room. They emerged out of both rock and lava on stilted pillars of forge iron. Driven carelessly into the underlying rock, with little regard for symmetry or alignment.

“Fifty bucks that thing is a phoenix.” Chilly said to one of the penguins. It glared at him. Unimpressed.

“Fine, be that way.” Chilly said, “but that does bring up the question of whether it comes back when I kill it...”

Whether or not it revived, Chrain’s damage was probably comparable to the Void’s Last Embrace. On the other hand it was made entirely of fire, which was good since that was his highest resistance by far. He just had to make sure it didn’t enrage and he would probably be able to tank it indefinitely. He glanced at the 12 braziers circling the room. Less indefinitely if there were dozens of the little Embers flying around.

Dealing with the sub-boss and his minions sounded unpleasant. Hopefully killing them didn’t enrage it, but he’d still rather deal with one enraged boss than a normal boss and a dozen Embers. Minimize the variables, as the penguins would say.

Chilly glanced at his augments and switched out Coronal Mass Ejection for Star Fuel. He had enough regrets to facilitate the change, and he had a suspicion that Star Fuel would work wonderfully against the dozen baby phoenixs that would likely swarm him the moment he entered the room. He glanced at the other augments, but nothing seemed to stick out as particularly useful here, so he straightened his armor and entered the room.

The Undying Flame woke from its rest, flaring its majestic plumage and unleashing waves of fire that splashed harmlessly against the stone walls.

Let’s see how much damage it deals. Chilly stood at the entrance, patiently waiting for the boss to unleash an attack. At least this time around he wouldn’t run in and get lost in the dark, like he had in the Abyss.

The Undying Flame arched its neck letting out a silent scream that sounded like wind rushing over a chimney. A hint of a melancholy warble staining the sound. It spread its wings and beat down hard, lifting its powerful body into the air. It hovered there, flapping ponderously under the low ceiling as it glared at him.

Chilly’s only response was to interlock his two shields and grin, not getting baited into entering the room.

The sub-boss let out another whistling warble as a wave rippled across its feathers. Another ripple passed, and Chilly hunched down. A third seemed to coalesce the heat in its body to its mouth, where a miniature sun formed. It spun lazily, nearly blinding Chilly despite the brimstone haze attenuating the light.

On either side of the fireball, another two identical spheres appeared.

The three suns flew out of the bird’s beak...slowly? Chilly frowned as the spheres floated towards him with the inevitability of a 100,000 tonne ocean liner. They separated, one traveling directly towards him as the other two veered to the sides.

Chilly hesitated, then ducked back up the tunnel. A charged attack from a boss should hurt, but a charged attack from a boss that also was super telegraphed. No way he was willingly tanking it, that was one shot material.

He jogged up the tunnel, until he had what he believed to be enough space, when the three suns landed.

The world went white as fire raced up the tunnel, engulfing him in a blazing inferno. Chilly cried and fell to the floor, instinctively trying to protect his head as his skin melted. Everything was fire. White hot and white bright. Blinding him as it drained his life.

Spoiler :

Chilly gasped for air as the fire vanished as quickly as it had come. The consecrated ground at his feet cast a reassuring light as it helped him recover from the attack.

Wayyy bigger radius than I thought. Despite the breadth of the attack, the worst it had done was blind him. It had dealt some damage, but nothing he couldn’t handle. About as much as the enraged Voidling in the Abyss. In other words, he could do this. He grinned and raced back into the main chamber.

The moment he reentered the room, the phoenix restarted its trifold breathing exercise. He winced as another three fireballs coalesced in its beak.

He would just have to tank them head on.

Take out the braziers first.

Chilly dashed towards the nearest brazier, his world going white mid step as the fireballs landed. He tanked the hit, somehow managing to keep his balance as he rushed towards his goal. As he stepped deeper into the room, the other braziers flared to life, birthing Living Embers that immediately took to the air, and filled the room with trails of sparkling starfire.

Chilly ignored the display, and jammed his shield into the nearest brazier, extinguishing the fire and removing one spawner from the room. As soon as the fire went out in its iron cage, he rushed towards the next one.

The Living Embers dive-bombed him with every step, causing Starfire Aegis to flare bright as it reflected damage back at them. He cast Flame Dash, vanishing in order to gain a bit of distance, only for him to be immediately swarmed once again. He narrowed his eyes and took the punishment as he stumbled over to the next brazier. A moment later he slammed his shield into the fire, extinguishing it once and for all.

Spoiler :

Another triplicate of fireballs floated out of the Undying Flames beak, turning the world white and chunking Chilly’s rapidly diminishing health. Before the light even faded, Chilly channeled Incinerate, casting it wildly around himself in the hopes of catching the birds and reducing their numbers.

Spoiler :

The light faded and he saw several Embers succumb to Ignition. There were significantly fewer birds now, luckily he had managed to catch a good portion of them in the ray. Combined with Star Fuel that meant the few birds continuing to harass him would not survive long.

He raced towards the next brazier and extinguished it, as the next wave of Living Embers erupted from the braziers that were still lit.

He flashed Incinerate on the closest birds, using the same strategy as before to light them on fire so that Ignition would begin to chip away at their health. The next brazier was poking out of the edge of a lava pool, dangerously overhanging the superheated rock.

Chilly Flame Dashed to the other side. He grabbed the iron rod and used it as support with one hand while the other extinguished the flame. Both his hands sizzled, but ignored them, barely even registering the slight discomfort due to his high regeneration and the fact that everything burned.

Another wave of birds approached, as everything went white from another set of fireballs. Chilly crouched down channeling Incinerate wildly around himself towards the last known positions of the little birds. When the light faded, and his vision returned, there weren't any birds immediately around him.

He grinned, charging at the next brazier, and extinguishing it quickly.

He paused, taking a moment to look at his progress...

That’s not right.

He looked back. Some of the braziers that he had worked to extinguish were still lit. As he stared, a Living Ember flew into an unlit brazier, sacrificing its body to ignite the flame. As it vanished, another replaced it as the now lit brazier began spewing out fire birds.