Two Regrets cracked in bursts of white light and flowed over and into Chilly’s armor. His connection with Flame Dash waned as both Primal Familiarity and Incendiary Resurgence became unallocated. He would not need to spam Flame Dash as much as he had been for what was to come. The two skill points flowed into Ember Proliferation and Adaptable Embers, both augments that were absolutely required when fighting in water. As the skill points settled, the far circle of his domain began to expand just a little farther while also spreading up in a great dome above his head.

Another Regret burst and a skill point shifted from Jailer’s Patience to Thermal Accumulator. In the distance, his domain shrank, but nearby he felt and saw the green mist of Irradiated Earth and the golden crucifixes of Consecrated Ground intensify.

Chilly closed his eyes and breathed in deep as he felt the rush of power. The 24% increased effect of Consecrated ground had given him over one hundred points of life regeneration; a not insignificant boost in his survivability.

In the distance, two perfect spheres of ground effects encapsulated him, though the green mist was slightly smaller than the glowing crucifixes. He frowned, and pulled another Regret out of his small pack.

Getting Volatile Transmission would make Irradiated Earth spread further to match the Consecrated Ground, but it would require another skill point. Fire Forged was the most likely option but, losing 24% fire damage seemed silly just to satisfy his OCD. While a couple of meters at the edge of his range was a fairly significant boost in volume, Leviathans would rush into melee range regardless so the extra area was unneeded.

With a shrug, he packed the Regret back into his pack, then jammed the entire assembly in a nook in the cold ground on top of the cliff face.

No sense in getting his food soggy.

“Hey you, finally awake.”

Chilly turned to the penguin with a smile. “Yup, good morning to you too my feathered friend.”

“You were trying to cross the Wastes, right?” the penguin chirped with a flutter.

“No?” Chilly frowned pointing at the Spires “I was going to go down there and...you know. Why? Is there something on the other side of the Wastes that I’ve missed?”

Mr. Pyrus shrugged with a cheeky grin and plopped down at the cliff edge, as Realm Walker transformed into a bag of popcorn.

“Righty, ho,” Chilly said, giving the penguin a long look, then he stepped up to the edge. The craggy edge rose sharply from the chaotic surf, leaving many crevices and platforms that could theoretically be stood upon. Without further ado, Chilly vanished in a flare of bright fire—

—and reappeared on a narrow ledge on the side of the cliff.

His armored boots slipped slightly on the damp stone. A small pebble dislodged under his weight and tumbled down into the agitated waters far below. Chilly gulped and shifted his feet a little closer to the wall as he placed both palms on the cool, damp stone to help stabilize himself on the narrow ledge.

Water would probably feel like concrete from this distance, but he was pretty tanky, right? It probably wouldn’t kill him if he fell.

Probably...

“...for the chapter!” a distant chirp sounded from above. Chilly turned his head up, his helmet digging into his neck in the process. From above, a penguin leaped off the cliff face with a desperate look on its cute face. Realm Walker transformed into a wooden wingsuit that fused with the penguin's flightless wings into majestic meter-long extensions.

The penguin shot off over the surf, then twirled and turned to glide towards where Chilly was standing.

“Finally caught...” The penguin shouted, its words getting lost in the wind.

“What?” Chilly shouted back, shuffling on the cliff face.

“Time...explosions!” Mr. Crowbe shouted as a gust buffeted the small bird and launched it into the distance.

“Explosions? What?” Chilly called after the penguin. “What expl—”

A faint buzz followed by a detonation shattered the small ledge and perforated Chilly’s back and arms with red hot fragments of stone.

Spoiler :

“Son of a...” Chilly grunted, scrambling against the cliff face as gravity sunk its merciless teeth into him. A quick glance at his life revealed that not much damage had been done, so he quickly pushed his will into Flame Dash to get to the next ledge that he had planned on using. Second Wind activated and before the thought was even completed he had bypassed the cooldown and vanished.

He reappeared in a burst of purple fire and barely managed to stabilize on the damp stone before another detonation ripped apart the cliff face.

Spoiler :

Chilly sighed as he was once again slammed into the wall. The projectiles were more annoying than damaging. He angled his body away from the cliff, as he fell further, and saw distant movement at the top of the nearest spire.

Figured I’d have a little longer, Chilly thought, scrambling at the cliff face in an attempt to slow his fall as he waited the one second for Flame Dash to cast.

He vanished again, reappearing on a far larger ledge only to have all his breath shoved out of him as his momentum was abruptly halted by the hard ground.

Chilly coughed, willing his diaphragm to reassert itself as he rolled to his feet just as another shell smashed him right in the face. He rocked back, his helmet cracking sharply against the stone but managed to stay standing as his knockback resistance stabilized him.

“Ow...” he complained, pulling bits of shattered seashell out of his helmet’s eye sockets. It didn’t really hurt, with all of his life regeneration the hit had felt more like getting walloped with a pillow.

A dense pillow.

A flash of light flared in the distance, and this time Chilly heard a subsonic buzz just before another shell hit him right in the nuts.

He went a little cross-eyed as he rocked back against the far wall and slipped down to his knees.

“Not...cool,” Chilly wheezed, as another subsonic buzz drew his gaze outwards.

This time the projectile missed him but hit an arguably more fragile target. The stone ledge he kneeled on absorbed the projectile with a strained groan as sharp detonations of cracking stone spread out from beneath him.

Chilly barely had time to utter a curse before the entire side of the cliff face sheared off and he was once more sent into freefall.

He shot a glance to the next ledge, but then shrugged and leaped as far from the falling rocks as he could. The current strategy wasn’t working. Time to try something new.

With a flare of bright fire, he traveled as far forwards as he could. Air rushed past the grills of his helmet and he let out a whoop as salty spray cooled his skin. He vanished in another burst of fire, then smoothly oriented himself into a dive.

Rocks battered the surf, creating a tidal wave of displaced water behind him as he slid into the stormy water.

Salt burned his eyes, as he was almost immediately blinded by dirty, turbulent water. Bubbles cascaded up around him, and he was tossed aside as a powerful current shoved him deeper. Up became down, and all sense of orientation shattered as he struggled to find light in the chaos. Another current of water grabbed him, and he fought with all his power to regain control with smooth, powerful strokes.

What amounted to a water jet flipped him, with dizzying intensity, and almost made him hurl, but he clamped his jaw tightly to keep both his breakfast and his air trapped inside. With such chaotic waves, he couldn’t tell if he was sinking, but considering his heavy armor, it was likely. In a flash of inspiration, he channeled Incinerate and watched as the purple and black flames struggled through the water, leaving behind a plume of steam-filled bubbles that floated...sideways.

Chilly grinned and immediately vanished in a flare of bright fire, aiming in the direction the bubbles had traveled and reappeared a foot above the waves.

He let out a whoop, just before he was once more swallowed by the surf with a splash that was lost in the din. This time, without the huge momentum of his fall throwing him deeper under the waves, he managed to resurface with several powerful kicks.

A shell crashed into his skull and shoved him under the waves again. Disoriented, Chilly struggled to resurface as he saw his life bar recover to full in a second.

Another shell crashed into the water above him, detonating right under the surface and guiding Chilly to the sweet air. He resurfaced, gasped for air, then blinked as a little penguin in a tiny wooden dinghy floated by.

“Topple th—”

A weight settled around his ankle and dragged him under. Chilly gulped water, as a heavy blubbery weight crashed into his chest.

Spoiler :

Starfire Aegis flared at each melee hit, illuminating a shadowed Leviathan thrashing below the water level.

In a second, his life smashed to full and Star Fuel ripped out, practically dismembering the tentacles restraining him with burning lashes of superheated plasma. He instantly summoned the Chains of Subjugation which whipped out and wrapped themselves around the creature.

A subsonic screech caused the tips of his fingers to tingle as the Leviathan roared. More tentacles grabbed him and pulled him deeper. Not wanting to descend further below the surface, Chilly left behind a trail of Burning Ground as he reappeared once more on the surface, snapping the Chains in the process.

Several shells slammed into him, but he ignored them the best he could as he struggled to fight against the heavy weight of his armor.

“Topple the c—” Mr. Gzxytos called from the side, as a huge tentacle broke the surface—

—and slammed down on top of him.

Spoiler :

Chilly grunted, willing his mouth shut so that he would start taking even more damage from Asphyxiation. More tentacles immediately sped towards his position and began to bludgeon him with heavy blows. He quickly blasted the area around him with Incinerate as multiple sets of the Chains lashed out. All of his fire skills struggled to function so deep under the waves. Still, both of his ground effects extended deep into the water and spawned dull embers that ate at the Leviathan’s blubbery, barnacle-covered skin faster than it could regenerate.

Realizing this, the Leviathan recoiled deeper under the waves, leaving Chilly momentarily free, before another Leviathan—

—rushed from deep underwater and latched its tentacles around him. This time, however, the tentacles shoved him hard above the surf.

His head crested the surface and he took a deep breath as he saw the jaw-dropping sight of several dozen meter-wide tentacles writhing from deep underwater. Notifications whizzed by as he identified his foes. Mostly level sixteens had gathered beneath him, but there were some level seventeens mixed in. Before he could truly appreciate his foe, the bus-sized tentacles closed in on his position. Just before they slammed down he teleported up and out of his restraints, only for a subsonic shell to crash into his back and cause him to spin. Tentacles rose to greet him, some latching onto him, as others pummeled him with jaw-cracking blows.

“Toppl—”

Chilly teleported to the side to escape his encirclement as his life shot back up. He fell back to the water as more tentacles rose from below to prevent his re-entry. Another two shells crashed into his back, causing him to spin in his fall, as he saw the severely burned tentacles around his initial position retreat beneath the waves.

I gotta take them out. Chilly thought. He slipped a hand into his breastplate and cracked one of the few Regrets he had slipped into the pocket. Fire Forged unallocated and his flames grew even weaker in the wet conditions. With frantic scrolling, Chilly slammed his now freed skill point into the only augment that he could think would help him here.

Quantum Connection.

The world opened up. The confusing blur of waves and tentacles thrashing to the backdrop of red crystal spires faded as he closed his eyes, but still, Chilly wasn’t hindered. In the huge more than twenty-meter sphere of his influence, he could sense every barnacle covering the blubbery skin of the Leviathans. In the wake behind him, the trail of ground effects revealed panicked Leviathans fleeing deeper to heal.

The flood of information didn’t overwhelm him. It came as naturally as breathing. Every bump and pore of the ghastly monstrosities was revealed to him, familiar to him in the same way he knew where his fingers were.

A wide grin spread on his face, as he sensed more than felt a fast-moving blur enter his domain. A moment later, a shell crashed into him and caused him to tumble off the slimy tentacles holding him up like a sacrifice to a deity.

Chilly waited impatiently for Flame Dash to come off cooldown as his life regeneration struggled against the ceaseless assault. More tentacles battered him, as a dozen damaged limbs retreated to the periphery and vanished beneath the waves only to be replaced by freshly healed appendages. His life dipped further, as shells crashed into him from above and Flame Dash finally activated.

This time, instead of dodging to the side, he went straight down. The weight of his armor settled around him and he dropped like a stone. Slithering tentacles raged around him, but even with his eyes closed against the salty water, he knew them all. Careful kicks and strategic rushes had him sliding past the forest of tentacles and deeper into the ocean.

A fresh wave of his domain spread out, eliciting a subsonic groan from the fleeing Leviathans as Smoldering Embers caught up with their retreating forms. Blubbery flesh blackened and sloughed off, as plumes of sickly, green mist suffused the tentacles and sapped their resistances. Chilly grinned as he saw them flag, then teleported out of the way of an incoming tentacle as he went even deeper.

>

Chilly winced at the chaos degen, but smiled as another notification blipped in his vision.

Purple flame bloomed deep in the water, as the entire corpse of a Leviathan erupted in consuming balefire. A second later, a second notification dinged, and another Leviathan was defeated.

He sensed a fast-moving tentacle approaching, but couldn’t activate Flame Dash before it wrapped around him and yanked. The tough blubber distended as it struggled to pull him through the water, but despite its best effort, it could barely budge him.

Rock Solid coming in clutch, Chilly’s grin broadened. He flared Incinerate as suddenly a rough vibration shook the waters.

The unearthly call of the Leviathans trembled up his toes and settled into the base of his spine in a pleasant tingle. He shuddered, feeling slightly violated, as the rest of the Leviathans reacted to the noise. The tentacle around his waist slid off and darted away as every Leviathan in his domain retreated. Chilly frowned, and instantly chased after the most injured of the Leviathans. Even with Flame Dash, he wasn’t able to keep up with the overgrown squid in their natural territory. Still, before they had completely vanished, another huge body erupted in balefire and vanished.

>

His lungs ached, and he roughly kicked upwards to the surface. His lungs filled with sweat air, and his status ailment was purged.

>

Chilly kicked hard to keep his head above the water. The surf was still rough, and his armor weighed on him. A shell appeared in his domain, crashing a fraction of a second later into the water in front of him, and splashing water up his nose.

He sputtered and threw the Hyperion Walker an annoyed glare before using a combination of exhausted kicks and Flame Dash to make his way to the base of the crystal Spire.

An irritable penguin stood on a small ledge at the base, tapping its foot impatiently.

“Hi again,” Chilly waved wearily, treading water.

“Topple the crabs.” The penguin huffed, pointing up, then down.

Chilly teleported onto the ledge, just as a pair of shells crashed into the red crystal, this time from two distant pillars deeper into the Spires. On the plus side, the Walker directly above them couldn’t hit them now that they were directly beneath it.

“Oh that’s brilliant,” Chilly remarked, sitting down and catching an errant shell on the edge of his shield. “Are they weaker down below?”

The penguin nodded, pointing down again before it vanished in a burst of rapidly dissipating smoke. Chilly caught another shell with a grunt, as a wave washed over him. Thankfully, Starfire Aegis was more than capable of keeping him warm and dry, even if it left a salty crust over his armor in the process.

As he rested he searched through his menu as he recalled the anomalous behavior of one of his skills during the fight.

Chains of Subjugation

You have challenged an untenable foe in a battle of attrition, where your only desire was to subjugate the beast. You may now crystallize your frustration to better tackle such battles.

Summon an ethereal chain to subdue an enemy

Chained enemies take 8.1% increased fire damage per 10 seconds affected by the chain

6.6m maximum range

2 Maximum chain

0.87s cast time

When had that happened? Sometime in the last couple of levels Chains had gained an extra maximum chain, and he hadn’t received some grand notification or even bothered to check. The only reason he had noticed it was because he was spamming the skill during the fight.

With a sigh, Chilly leaned back and continued to catch the errant Walker shells on his shields. Not much he could do about it, except endeavor to check each of his skills after every level up. He quickly scanned his skills and their augments but nothing stood out to him. There was an argument for switching to skill points to reduce the cooldown and cast time of Flame Dash, but at least for now, the Leviathans had disappeared from the immediate area. It was worrying, seeing monsters retreat, but there was not much he could do about it, and worrying about it would only stress him out.

Another shell crashed into his shield, this time clipping the edge and causing the shield to rotate in his grip and clang loudly into his helmet. Chilly grumbled quietly and repositioned. Despite there being two Hyperion Walkers, they still weren’t able to surpass his regeneration. Especially since they seemed to miss one of every three shots.

After he had recuperated he jumped back into the waves full of confidence. There was something epic about knowing for a fact that there weren’t any enemies beneath him. At least in a twenty-something meter sphere. He sank like a stone along the side of the red crystal, using it and his rapidly expanding domain to orient himself.

After sinking for almost a minute and his lungs began to ache, he noticed an enemy enter his domain on the seafloor.

>

He ignored the notification and continued to sink until the enemy was close enough that the light from his cape illuminated it.

It was a deformed crab with a vastly enlarged shell and itty bitty little feet that were crushed helplessly against the seafloor. Two house-sized claws extended off the central body and held up the enormous pillar of red crystal. Chilly approached, idly noting how his Smoldering Embers spread around the creature but didn’t seem to do any damage. A second later, he got into range of Star Fuel and a streamer of plasma joined the embers.

That seemed to get the beast’s attention and it placidly turned two little eye stalks towards him before turning away. As if he was nothing more than a gnat that was buzzing around.

He tensed as a pulse of distorted purple water spread from the creature and washed over him.

>

Chilly turned to observe the pale green wave extend far into the distance. Too far and too fast to run from. He frowned, then dismissed the notifications, and kicked closer. Despite the curse and the stacking Asphyxiation, he would try to kill it.

A dual pair of Chains of Subjugation rushed out and encircled the crustacean. They pulsed with grim red light in stark contrast to the blues and greens of the underwater crustacean. A ray of purple and black flame joined the plasma and embers as Chilly unleashed every one of his damaging skills at the large crab.

The chains pulsed once.

>

Twice.

>

Ten times.

>

Chilly turned away and swam to the surface. The chain snapped behind him and still, the Atlassian Crab barely looked singed.

He crested the surface and climbed onto the red crystal ledge. Shells crashed into him periodically as he reached into his breastplate. Rooting around he only found two Regrets and pulled them out with a frown. Sometime during his fight with the Leviathans, he must have lost the rest of his Regrets.

He couldn’t wait until he helped Sooty and got his accessory slot back.

He hunkered down beneath his dual shields as he considered how to take down the Atlassian Crab. With Asphyxiation providing a soft cap on how long he could stay under, he wouldn’t be able to stack Chains of Subjugation to the moon. With about ten ticks of the Chains, he would have 120% increased fire damage by the end, perhaps more if he stuck around longer. Still, it wasn’t enough. Trying to understand the situation better, Chilly brought up the description for Incinerate.

Incinerate

Unleash a beam of fire that burns enemies that it touches. The beam dissipates after 6.6m

Deals 534.1 Fire damage per second

Deals 53.4 Chaos damage per second

Channeling

It was his most basic skill and would be the easiest to do math with. All his other skills scaled off of life, but since they all dealt fire damage, the math should extrapolate to them quite easily.

If he accounted for the curse, the skill would do around 350 fire damage per second, but then taking into account the 120% increased damage from the Chains, then it would deal...350 times 2.2...around 770 fire damage. The chains basically undid the effect of the curse and then added a good chunk on top of that.

The Atlassian was a purely defensive monster. Obviously, considering it tanked his entire skillset while remaining stationary under the pillar. It was unclear how much the water was reducing the effect of his flames, but it was unavoidable considering he couldn’t lure the monster out of the water.

So how would he fight it? If he looked at his list of augments, there was one that might help. Righteous Providence. An augment for Pious Path. It was one that he had skipped over since the beginning, as it hadn’t been relevant until now. It provided 100 curse resistance which, if the math worked out like all other resistances, meant that he would reduce the effectiveness of the ‘Enfeeble’ curse by 50%. So instead of dealing 33% less damage, he would deal 16.5% less damage.

That would mean that instead of 350 fire damage initially, Incinerate would deal around 450 fire damage. Taking into account the Chains, it would deal about 1000 fire damage after one hundred seconds under the water. So a net gain of about 230 damage over time, or 1000 over 770 which was about 4 over 3 or about 33% more damage by taking Righteous Providence.

On the other hand, if he took Willbreaker it would double the effectiveness of every Chain pulse. So instead of 120% more damage, it would be 240% by the tenth tick.

That meant that starting from the 350 damage basepoint of the full-powered curse, he would multiple by 3.4, and he would get...about 1200 fire damage per second, or 200 additional fire damage per second. 1200 over 770 was about 12 over 8 or about 50% more damage compared to no augment whatsoever.

That was significantly higher than Righteous Providence, and he could theoretically take Redundant Bindings for a whopping 340% increased fire damage by the tenth tick. He didn’t want to do that though, because he would prefer to keep at least one Regret for emergencies, and even if he was willing to use it, he wouldn’t know which augments to shift around. It was such a shame the skill was so hard to actually use. In any proper engagement, there was so much movement that the chains easily broke before they could stack up to ridiculous heights.

Several other options would likely increase his damage. Stalwart Bulwark for example would grant him 3% of his maximum life as life regeneration, which would increase both Star Fuel and Smoldering Embers by some nebulous amount that he didn’t even know how to begin calculating without the system’s help. His gut said that it wouldn’t be that crazy, so he skimmed over the list, rapidly discarding augments until his gaze settled on one of the augments of his newest skill.

Entropic Reversal.

The Atlassian Crab likely had a massive health pool, which probably fed into a huge regenerative capacity. It was the latter that allowed the crustacean to tank his skills indefinitely but Entropic Reversal could prevent that by inflicting stacks of Irradiated, which directly reduced its regeneration.

At ten Irradiated stacks, the monster would have its regeneration cut by 25%. The math got a little wonky since he didn’t know how much the crab was regenerating, but if it reduced its recovery by more than 430 points then it would be worth it, compared to the other choices. Wait, it was actually better than that because the 430 additional points of fire damage would get reduced by the crab’s resistances.

How much exactly was a toss-up, but at least 50% and as high as 80% of the damage would get mitigated so anywhere from 100 to 200 fire damage actually made it through the beast’s resilience. That made Irradiated actually really good, and it would hopefully be enough to kill the monster.

Another shell crashed into his shield and rocked him backward.

Wait.

He was thinking about this all wrong. Irradiated Earth lasted for over a minute, and every ten seconds it would inflict Irradiated. That was more than enough time to swim up to the surface - with gratuitous use of Flame Dash - for another breath and come down before the Irradiated Earth dissipated. After a few iterations, and assuming the crab couldn’t dispel the stacks somehow, he would inflict 40 stacks and 100% less regeneration. At that point, even just his Smoldering Embers should be enough to eventually cull the beast.

Satisfied with his reasoning, Chilly cracked one of his remaining Regrets, and after a moment of consideration shifted a skill point from Arsonist to Entropic Reversal. The area and duration of his domain shrunk slightly, but in its place, the sickly, green mists began to glow with a sinister light.

Chilly watched the glowing mist, entranced and slightly scared of what the skill was implying when another sea shell crashed into him and rocked him out of his stupor. He grunted and brushed the bits of shell off of his shoulders in irritation, then dove back under the surf.

Once again, he sank like a stone, and before too long the edge of his domain spread around the Atlassian while he began to accrue stacks of Asphyxiation. Once again the pale green curse weakened him, as he watched the Crab from a distance. The green mist seeped into the crustacean, visibly producing cracks in its carapace that simply refused to heal.

The Atlassian Crab ignored him, and soon Chilly was forced to return to the surface. He rushed for air, cleared his debuff, and dashed back to the crab. He managed to journey before the Irradiated Earth faded and almost curiously he watched the green mist poison the large crab.

After almost a minute, the Crab’s eyestalks waved in distress as little shudders rippled down its raised claws. Smoldering Embers latched onto its shell and managed to catch for the first time. Burns spread slowly across its shell under the water, as it grew more and more frantic. Its claws struggled to hold up the immense weight of the crystal pillar, then as more and more green mist fused with its exoskeleton, they slowly descended, then flopped lifelessly to the seafloor.

Chilly dashed to the surface and took a deep breath, purging the Asphyxiation stacks. The giant crystal spire leaned drunkenly in the water. Heavy waves battered it, then almost in slow motion, the entire structure tilted over and crashed into the surf.

At the very top, a distant Hyperion Walker wiggled its cannons helplessly as its perch toppled and it splattered against the roiling waves.