Chapter 4 - "You have all passed"

Many Months Ago, in Maltetious' Realm...

“Are you ladies ready?! It’s go time!” Shouted Chris in excitement. “Party up!”

Chris willed party invitations to the other two as he blessed all of their weapons with holy magic, and their status bars and names appeared in his top left area of vision. It was the same scenario as when they first arrived two years prior, they could hear the territh’s screech from across the ruins… the same one that had once struck them with fear.

This time... they were delighted. Two years of torture were about to come to an end, and they couldn’t get to that end fast enough.

Taen was dressed in green and brown leather boots, a vest, and pants. Michael and Chris both wore heavy variants of steel plate armor excluding helmets and having modified gauntlets that exposed their fingertips. They had learned for themselves the hard way why many battlemages or other variants of mixed physical and magical combat wore little to no metal over these spots. The head and fingertips were primary pathways that mana took when unleashing spells, so covering them up with helmets and full on gauntlets would slightly delay casting time.

Aside from their armor, the equipment provided weren’t their usual sets or choices. They were only given the basics: two daggers, a bow, arrows and a sheathed longsword each. Long dark cloaks with hoods adorned their backs to finish their outfits off.

But now was not the time to complain, they were finally getting their chance… so Taen brushed off his woes. “We can either make for and find the brood mother near the river to kill her, or we can kill all the territh in the city. I say we make for the brood mother, agreed? It should be easier to kill one than hunt down randomly placed territh, even if she is guarded.”

“Agreed.”

“Agreed.”

“Then let’s move. Keep a triangular formation for spotting until we engage, I’ll take front. Michael you take rear left and Chris you take rear right. The west entrance to the ruins has closest access to the river, we can have someone scale the wall for vision and spotting when we get there.”

They made off through the city with a sense of purpose and excitement, really not wanting to mess up their opportunity at salvation. Taen was certainly quieter than his two heavy-armor wearing friends, but even they didn’t make a ton of noise. Two years of practice sneaking around with heavy plate armor had taught Chris and Michael how to move around in it with a moderate amount of grace. So it only took a single minute to spot their first set of unaware targets.

As they started to make their way down an alley of rubble, they came across two terriths caught off guard while exiting one of the buildings to their right. Taen whipped up his bow - notched an arrow - and let it fly straight into the eye socket of the first.

It dropped as deadweight to the ground.

Chris took out the front left leg of the second one with a large black arrow, and as the beast had started to dash- it sprawled head over heels towards them where it ended up with another arrow through its throat from Michael’s backup position.

Quickly they moved through a series of arches and up a slope where they came across another territh lying in ambush. It sprang upon Taen with a roar before he could raise his hand, but he did see it coming.

“Gravewalk” He muttered, and as the large brute with outstretched claws was within an inch of him: Taen - for just a moment - became ethereal. Taen’s body stepped into the void, becoming semi visible and passing through the territh as it lunged. He re-materialized drawing his sword and splitting the animal open in one motion, it took less than a second for him to do this and re-sheath his sword, continuing on with the other two.

“You have gained XP.” stated a familiar mechanical voice.

Michael frowned and gave his friend a tsk tsk. “Be careful about using that spell for too long, man. Remember your soul can become lost in the void if you don’t rematerialize fast enough. Maltetious would be pissed and rip off a limb or two if she had to come get you again.”

“Don’t worry about me, I got this brah.”

“I don’t think she’d rip off his limbs just for that Michael.”

“Maybe you’re right, because it’s Taen. He’s her favorite ya know! But if it was me, sir Michael the brave we’re talking about... it’d be different. You know how well I get along with that hag!”

Smiling at the memory of the last time Michael had a verbal confrontation with Maltetious, Taen couldn’t help but chuckle. Michael had called her some pretty interesting names... and in turn she’d actually beaten Michael quite violently with his own arms while they were still attached. It was very similar to what he used to do with his younger siblings when they misbehaved. ‘Stop hitting yourself!’ is what Taen would say as he’d take his little brothers’ hands and jokingly force them to slap themselves. Michael hadn’t found it so amusing when Maltetious had done it to him though.

They marked three more territh for death with their arrows as they rounded another corner leading up to an overhanging bridge that sat between two larger structures - and below was a steep drop into an earthen crevice. Chris signaled that he was spotting from the viewpoint up top, and took a couple seconds to scale the walls leading to the overhang - grabbing onto rocks and rubble that jutted out from the structure, and hoisting or throwing himself up a yard or two at a time. He spent another 15 seconds on the overwatch, then dropped to the ground with a clatter of his armor and signaled them to move on.

They encountered no more territh for the next couple hundred yards. They then came up to the gated entrance of the ruins.

The gate was enormous, with many thousands of enchanted iron bars protruding from various angles and overlapping the thick wood of the door. Sigils none of them recognized were also portrayed there with paint from ages past peeling off in thick layers.

Taen frowned and scratched his head. Having been here numerous times before, he found this out of place. “This gate is usually open. She must have closed it for the trial... Guess we’re all scaling the wall.”

Taen looked up and gestured towards the stone barrier. It was a couple hundred feet to the first window. “Considering that the Statue of Liberty is 305 feet tall, this wall is probably about 800 feet. But we only need to make it to one of the windows and climb through to the other side. Let’s find a way up.”

Chris let out a low groan of disapproval and his shoulders slumped forward.

Michael shook his head and motioned them to follow, pointing towards a tunnel into the wall. “Stairs over here...”

The others acknowledge his find with grins his way. The entrance was a gaping hole that’d been torn down by the sands of time, with rubble piled around the makeshift entrance and an uneven surface of rock before entering - but stairs were definitely seen a couple yards in.

Taen raised a question before they started in. “Do you really think this’ll lead out?”

“Got any better ideas?” asked Michael with a shrug.

Taen shook his head no, but really didn’t like the idea. This was too easy… Maltetious wouldn’t leave an entrance like this for them to find.

However they didn’t debate it, and they didn’t waste anymore time. Silently they began to climb the steps, ascending into the darkness above.

“Night vision boys...” muttered Chris as their eyes all started to glow a faint blue. The otherwise pitch-black stairway became a shade of light blue as well, though the objects were not as clear cut as they were with regular vision - it was much better than going in blind.

The air became musty, and a thin layer of dust kicked up with every step they took. Cracks in the wall closest to them also rang out with the howling of wind, but eventually even that went away when they made their trek further into the deeper parts of the enormous barrier.

Eventually they made their way to a room that had two corridors branching off in opposite directions to the right and left. Pausing to consider which to choose, they began to feel tremors through the stone floor. Screeching then abruptly started from far down both ends, and it began to quickly get louder.

Chris facepalmed. “Ohp. Here they come.”

Taen only smirked. “This reminds me of a riddle. You boys want to hear it? Here goes. You have two supercomputers in a room next to two doors. One door leads to certain death, the other door leads to salvation. One computer always lies, one computer always tells the truth. Both computers know which door is the door leading to salvation, and which door is the one that leads to imminent death. You may only ask one question to one computer. Tell me: what is the one question that will, regardless of which computer you ask, allow you to know with absolute certainty which door is the safe door to go through?”

The screeching was not only growing in how loud it was becoming but in the number of simultaneous screeches as well. There were many of them coming now, from all three directions. The way they had come, and along the two opposite corridor paths echoed with hair curling screams of enraged terriths headed their way.

“We were set up, this is an ambush.” Stated Chris. “They’re intelligent.”

“Do you really think this is a good time for riddles Taen?” Inquired Michael. “I feel like it's not, I don’t feel like being eaten again. I still remember what it feels like and it certainly isn’t good.”

“Yeah and I have no idea aside from that.” stated Chris.

Taen sighed. They were always poor sports about his riddles. “The answer is ‘What would the other computer say is the door leading to salvation?’, the computer that always lies would lie and say that the computer that always tells the truth would tell you that the door leading to imminent death is the door that would be chosen for salvation. If you asked that same question to the computer that always told the truth, it would answer you and say that the computer that always lies would lie and tell you that the door leading to imminent death would be the door that leads to salvation. This way you know to always choose the door opposite of whatever door the computer tells you is the door that the other computer would choose!”

“Shut the fuck up Taen.”

The screeching and howling was very close now and the noise had risen into a tempest. Vibrations from the charging beasts vibrated the stones of the room beneath their feet.

Name: Territh

Race: Territh - Greater Beast

Class: N/A

Level: ???

HP: ???

MP: 20/20

SP: 302/302

DP: 1/1

“But y’all are no fun, you didn’t even guess! You need to live a little more!” Taen shouted as the first territh to spring into the room was lit up with pale-blue death energy emanating from Taen’s left hand. Firing off in a stream of magic - it shredded the beast into various pieces that scattered across the walls.

“You have gained XP.”

“Taen, take the way we came! I’ll take the left and Chris you take the right side! Go now or we’ll be overwhelmed! If we can force them into tight corridors they won’t be able to surround us and attack from all sides!”

The three split and rushed into their designated corridors. Chris quickly encountered the first two terriths, crushing one’s skull with a downward blow from the hilt of his sword as he unsheathed it, flipped over its body and used it as a shield against the charge of the next. He then shoved his longsword through the body of the first and through to the second’s heart. As he heard yet a third come from behind him he let go of his sword, drew two of his daggers and ran up the wall despite his heavy plate armor - with his absurdly enhanced body struggling but still overcoming the feat. Flipping backwards to land on the brute, he jammed both daggers into the eyes of the roaring animal and jumped off.

He barely had time to notice another two terriths incoming from further down the hall and whirled. Using his ‘Shield of Righteousness’ spell - he momentarily blocked off the corridor with a holy barrier and then sent a torrent of celestial flames surging down the hall to decimate anything left alive.

“You have gained XP.”

Running back, Chris saw Michael’s corridor explode into a barrage of stone that was ripped from the walls to crush a series of oncoming enemies. As Michael let up on the attack he whirled and notched an arrow. It whizzed about an inch past Chris’ face to land directly into the open mouth of yet a fourth territh coming from behind Chris, dropping it to the ground.

“You need to be more careful man!” Taen scolded from across the room as he dropped the bow, dodged an incoming attack by etherealizing, and then rematerializing a split second later a few feet away from his original location; cutting open the neck of the last of his terriths with his longsword and finishing it off with a downward execution.

“Not everyone can be as accomplished as you bro.” Chris said as he rolled up one of the gray leaves he had been smoking the past couple days.

“Now is not the time to get high!”

“There is never a time to not get high!” scowled Chris as he conjured a white celestial flame and starting puffing on his makeshift blunt.

A moment later Michael walked into the room completely smug, his clothes still had dirt all over them and he had a very disgruntled look upon his face as he patted off his hair. Seeing Chris he chuckled and exclaimed: “This guy!”

Chris yawned and swatted his friends away. “Well guys, I’m exhausted. I think I need a nap.”

Michael nodded. “Yeah me too, I just blew up an entire corridor. The place collapsed after I set off my spell, we can’t even go through that way anymore. Easy answer to the riddle you had, Taen. We take Chris’ corridor now.”

“Indeed...” replied Taen dryly. “All those smooth moves will make you tired Chris. I saw you pull off those flips! Think you’re fancy, dontchya? And running up the wall like this is some sort of parkour?”

The blonde hippie man shrugged. “After 2 years of intense and brutal training from that witch, I would expect no less.”

“Alright let’s get a move on things and finish this up, we can take a break afterwards.”

They started down the corridor Chris had cleared out, and were suddenly stopped by Taen.

“Wait a moment,” he whispered, kneeling down next to two of the corpses that had been left along the side of the hall. He then examined them both, and with a swift motion of his hand - ripped out the jugular of one of the corpses... along with some other bits and pieces of flesh. Then, kneeling down next to the second corpse, he placed the flesh of the first corpse on the open wounds. He muttered a few incantations and the flesh molded to the corpse as if alive. It opened its eyes again, and then stood up.

“You have created a Zombie Territh. Zombie Territh is now registered as your minion.”

Control Limit Slots: 1 of 16 used.

Taen’s Minions:

Territh, Zombie, Level 31 (1 slot)(Braindead)

Michael blinked in surprise. “You’re zombifying one of the territh? Here? One alone won’t do much and you won’t be able to keep them until we’re out of her realm.”

Taen gave a thumbs up, happy with his new creation. Maltetious didn’t ever let him keep these pets of his, but he was told that as soon as they’d finished the first trial - he’d be able to do so. She just didn’t like him using her pets as undead slaves. It’s also the reason why Taen didn’t have a small possy yet. He could even create a flesh golem if he had the patience and time, but it would take longer than he had patience. No, he’d wait for that until he got out of this hellhole. He was confident in his ability to succeed without the unnecessary waste of time.

“I’m going to use it to find the broodmother. Zombies might be slower, weaker, and vegetables, but as long as their brains are still intact they can still confirm very basic questions such as yes or no, left or right, and things of the like... Even though the soul is no longer present.” He turned towards them, wiping the blood and flesh off onto his clothes. “We know she’s along the riverbed, but now we can find her even faster. Let's go.”

Taen uttered a few commands and it began to walk down the corridor, so they began to follow.

The large zombie territh ended up taking them a roundabout way beneath the city walls instead of over, into a lengthy catacombs and out the other side with no incident. As they emerged out onto a hill, they saw the slightly dried up riverbed down below. Across from them about 400 yards to the south they saw the exterior of the ruins they had recently been fighting in.

Michael grinned at their success, folding his arms with the rattle of his heavy metal armor. “Good call on the zombie territh. Any idea on how much further?”

“Dunno, the territh’s thoughts are cloudy and hard to make out. I know the general direction but can’t tell you how far. This would be so much easier if I could access it’s previous memories, unfortunately that would require the soul though. A full scale resurrection would require more energy than I want to use at the moment.”

Taen paused, frowned, and considered his explanation. “And I’d have to fight its soul for control in order to gain access to the memories, which might fail.”

“Not to mention going back into the void is scary shit, you have the possibility of being possessed every time you do it if you stay in there too long. Longer you perform the ceremony, the more likely your soul is to be lost or displaced by another,” Chris chimed in. “Remind me, if something dies then you have a certain amount of time before the body and soul detach from one another, correct? It then becomes incredibly hard to perform a resurrection and requires that you fully enter the void? As opposed to when you just phase into the void and become ethereal for a moment or two, or when you do an early resurrection while the soul is still attached to the body. Right?”

“Right, you usually have less than a week, but it varies case by case according to Maltetious. Though I wouldn’t call a full scale resurrection easy even if the soul is still attached. I’ve only done it once, it was on a beatle. You have to rebuild the body making sure that it doesn’t have anything wrong - otherwise it will just die again - and then reattach the soul which is hard work. I had to enter the void for a good few minutes even while the soul was still attached. Rituals were set up to prevent possession of my body, and it requires a great deal of energy to undergo the spell.” Taen looked at the ground thoughtfully, rubbing his chin as he did so. “Maltetious was there to make sure everything went smoothly... but even so, it was not an easy job. Though coming back to your comments on phasing into the void for brief moments, I wouldn’t worry about that too much Chris. I mean I’m sure that if I did it over and over again about 20 or 30 times in a row, you might attract some unwanted attention and risk possession, but otherwise it’s incredibly unlikely that anything will happen if I phase just a few times in a row to avoid harm. There’s more risk in phasing into a wall or into the ground than there is possession that way.”

As they discussed magic theory, they descended towards the riverbed from the tunnel’s entrance. Head-checking the area around them as they went, they were happy to find they hadn’t been discovered yet. They were out in a forested area now, putting distance between them and the huge looming wall behind them with every stride they took under the setting sun.

Chris grinned as he brushed some of the ashes still present from the earlier encounter in the walled corridors. His celestial fires had certainly made a mark on those monsters. “Yeah I’ve tried the celestial resurrection before just a couple times, I know the basics behind it. Not too good at it, sometimes I still fail. It’s hard to perform even though I have the spell registered on my page. Strange that different magic classes have different ways of doing it.”

Michael rudely interrupted as he bumped by the others. “So has this nest been here for two years, or did Maltetious just set it all up again?”

Taen scowled at the abrupt shove-by and seriously considered slamming his foot into Michael’s backside, but got over it just as quickly as he’d had the idea. “Honestly, your guess is as good as mine. I don’t even know why she wants these creatures dead, or if they’re her minions and she plans on bringing them back after the trial is over. What I DO know is that if we don’t end up doing this, we will never escape this hell hole and will deal with an eternity of torture.”

“True that. And then I’ll be stuck with you two ugly idiots for all of eternity and no sane girls to talk to.” Michael threw up his hands. “That’d be terrible!”

The three of them laughed and were in higher spirits than they had been in for quite some time. It seemed to them that freedom was so close, something they had been wanting for ages. The excitement was building.

***

As they rounded the next hill while following the riverbed, their smiles faded and they stood gaping at what they saw across the now dimly lit field. The sunset cast crimson waves of light softly downwards upon the largest monstrosity of an animal that any of them had ever seen before.

It was her.

The territh broodmother was surrounded by a good forty or more tightly-clustered regular territh. She was about the size of a two story house, with larva sacks upon her back and six enormous legs. Her head was not proportional to the rest of her body, though it was still larger than the body of a regular territh by itself. They could see the smaller territh collecting pieces of dead animals and dropping them into the broodmother’s mouth as it lay there, waiting for food and occasionally swallowing or looking lazily around.

Name: Territh Broodmother

Race: Territh - Greater Beast

Class: N/A

Level: 68

HP: 2150/2150

MP: ???

SP: ???

DP: ???

“... These swords and arrows aren’t going to be able to kill something this big guys.”

“Find the brain and it’ll die, though I’m questioning whether or not the skull will be able to be penetrated with our weapons here as well. Go through the eye socket maybe?”

“That might work.” Chris said as he pointed towards Taen’s zombified territh. “Use this as a distraction, make it attack one of the ones on the outskirts of the group. That should buy us at least a couple seconds of not being noticed by the pack. We can sneak around to a good spot and lock three arrows simultaneously into one of the eye sockets, puncturing the brain.”

Pausing a moment, Taen shrugged. “Sure, better than anything I’m coming up with right now... so let's do it.”

As they worked their way silently around the group and into the trees, the sun was lowered even further into the horizon. It was almost peaceful as the last glimpse of light left the sky... and everything turned to dark.

Chris looked upwards, his eyes glowing a faint blue. “The stars look very strange with this sight, wouldn’t you both agree?”

“Shhh, here comes Taen’s zombie, get ready.”

Poised for action behind the treeline, they prepared to sprint forward for a better range and accuracy upon their unsuspecting prey.

That’s when they heard a squeal of rage as Taen’s zombie bit into another one of the terriths on the far side of the camp, drawing an immediate response from the rest of the pack. The other terriths turned and ran towards the noise, leaving the broodmother wide open.

Chris gave a thumbs up. “Score!”

The territh were confused at first, but seconds later recognized the zombie for what it was and began to tear into their once upon a time comrade. As this happened, the three men sprinted forward at a speed far faster than normal humans could manage. The broodmother’s head began to slowly swivel towards them as they drew their arrows and fired their bolts of death towards its eye from about 15 yards out.

The three arrows all had direct hits upon the eye, and as the broodmother screeched out in pain and rage the rest of the pack turned again and dashed for the men - making a terrible amount of noise and commotion as they scrambled over one another to get at their enemies.

“That didn’t kill it!?” Chris exclaimed as they turned to run back the way they had came and into the woods. “Fuck! I wish we’d been closer!”

Taen managed to speak inbetween panting as they sprinted ahead. “Split into three and draw them away, we’re just as fast as they are and we can use the trees to double back for the brood mother.”

Michael shot him a dirty look as they turned heel. “EASY FOR YOU TO SAY! YOU’RE THE ONLY ONE NOT WEARING PLATE MAIL!”

Michael in the meantime drew up his hand for an ‘iron maiden’ spell, summoning two huge slabs of earth on either side of the front of the pack and crushing them between the long stone spikes jutting out from either slab. It got a couple of the territh, but not nearly enough of them. Taen shot off a soul bolt as he ran, death magic colliding to drop one of the territh in its tracks; and Chris let off a ‘purging light’ spell that illuminated their immediate area and burned the enemies that had gotten too close.

“Not my fault! Split now! Go!” Taen headed forward while Chris and Michael split off to the left and right, with a very angry mob of dozens of territh beasts on their heels.

For what seemed to be an eternity but was probably only a few minutes or less, Taen raced ahead of the portion of the pack that had followed him. About 12 or so had kept up with him, and they were gaining ground. If he didn’t do something soon, they would catch him. Swearing profusely, his anger turned into amusement while thinking of the other slower two who’d chosen protective armor over mobility.

With the territh hot on his heels and close enough to snap at him, he made a last ditch all-out sprint right into a large thick tree. He passed right through it, becoming ethereal with a gravewalk spell just as the territh on his tail slammed into the large trunk and began to pile up. Coming out the other side with a snicker he launched himself upwards and into the branches. Using one of these overhead branches of a tree to swing himself up and - using the force from flinging himself over the branch as well as an extra launch from his legs - he catapulted himself back towards the way he’d come. He flew over the mass of bodies that had piled up writhing below, and gave a little snicker at the small act of success.

He hit the ground running at a full sprint back towards the brood mother. Along the way, he saw one of the stragglers charge at him from behind a thicket a moment too late. It crashed into him, claws and teeth tearing at his chest and leg, leaving large bloody gashes behind where his flesh had once been. As fast as he could, Taen reached for one of his long daggers strapped to the other leg and jabbed it into the skull and neck of the beast repeatedly over the course of a few seconds. When it had released its grasp upon his body and fell lifelessly to the ground, Taen could begin to hear the other territh that he had duped coming back for him. He did a quick zombification of the creature he’d just killed and set it loose on his pursuers.

Meanwhile, the wounds he’d sustained and bleeding was pretty bad... but as he left the territh in the dust - he began to ‘soul siphon’ off the plants in the area to regain HP, MP, SP and DP. His wounds then slowly began to heal.

“You have gained XP.”

Though he was able to numb the pain with the soul siphon regenerating health, the territh that had attacked him had torn out pieces of muscle from his left leg. The healing wasn’t fast enough to get him better immediately. He was slower than before, and it was noticeable. He phased into the ground and then appeared twelve feet to the left. As the duped terriths approached, they noticed his change in direction and changed their own course to match it.

“Damn these things are smart.”

He approached the clearing and saw the broodmother, alone, screeching out in pain. It was a sad sight to see and Taen suddenly felt a sudden wave of guilt as he rushed towards the poor creature.

“I’m sorry...” he mumbled as he jumped the last 15 yards towards the creature’s head - driving his sword through its injured eye in mid air. Would this kill it? He knew he wouldn’t be able to if it didn’t reach the brain - the HP was too high… but if he managed to strike the frontal lobe he had a shot.

In a flash of light the brood mother was gone, and so were all the other terriths. Taen was alone in the clearing, lying on his back looking up at the stars and not knowing what had just happened. Suddenly he heard someone clapping and giggling behind him. He turned to see Maltetious smiling her usual big smile while walking towards him, long blonde hair and white dress flowing silently in the night breeze.

“Congratulations Taen. You have all passed your first trial.”

***

Name: Taen Movorio

Level 39

Class: Necromancer

Name: Chris Ederson

Level 36

Class: Celestial Paladin

Name: Michael Noren

Level 41

Class: Juggernaut

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Name: Taen Movorio

HP 140/140

MP 184/184

SP 100/100

DP 1/1

Race: Human

Guild: None

Class: Necromancer

Level 39

Status Alerts:

Remaining Skill Points: 0 Remaining Stat Points: 0 Current Permanence cycle: OFF Current Bound Point: Maltetious’ Realm

Buffs:

Night Vision (Modified Vampiric Bloodlines) Improved Smell (Modified Vampiric Bloodlines) Improved Reflexes (Modified Vampiric Bloodlines) +200% modifier to original base level Strength and Speed (Supersoldier)

Debuffs:

None

Stat Amplifications:

20 Strength

20 Vitality

0 Endurance

20 Dexterity

20 Speed

40 Intelligence

42 Wisdom

0 Faith

0 Luck

63 Willpower

Magics (10 of 20 spells learned)

Create Lesser Undead^^ (Necromancy) - Level 24

Zombie (Not Sentient) Skeleton (Not Sentient) Upgrade 1> +9% HP to all created lesser undead Upgrade 2> +15 speed to all created lesser undead

Create Medium Undead (Necromancy) - Level 8

Ghoul Bone Stalker

Create Greater Undead (Necromancy) - Level 8

Flesh Golem Bone Golem

Reaping (Necromancy) - Level 7

Allows you to draw mana into yourself from people recently slain, harvesting the energy that the soul leaves behind when leaving its body. Does not require mana to cast this spell.

True Resurrection (Necromancy) - Level 3

Raise someone from the grave, restoring them to their original body without converting them to an undead. Extremely lengthy cooldown, long channel time, endangers user to the perils of the outer realms while channeling.

Soul Siphon (Necromancy) - Level 9

Extend your hand and siphon life force from your target, absorbing their HP, MP, SP and DP over time. Channeling ability. Short ranged, causes necrosis.

Soul Bolt^^ (Necromancy) - Level 21

Summon pale blue death energy to fling at your enemies Upgrade 1> strikes drain 1% of current health every second over 5 seconds Upgrade 2> drastically increase soul bolt’s velocity

Gravewalk^ (Necromancy) - Level 16

Become ethereal, shifting into the void for a time dependent on mana spent Upgrade 1> decrease mana cost by 20%

Necromancer’s Calling: Minion’s Call (Necromancy) - Level N/A

Summons a specific minion you already own, or dismisses them to your personal nether realm. Dismissing undead to their nether realm will heal it over time and allow it to revitalize. However, keep in mind it takes 30 seconds to channel this ability. You may only summon or dismiss 1 minion at a time.

Shapeshift (Alteration) - Level 5

Shapeshift into another form.

Miracles

None

Physical Combat

Shields - Level 2

Light armor - Level 12

Upgrade 1> increase speed by 2% for each piece of light armor equipped

Bows - Level 8

Assassination - Level 8

Blunt Weapons - Level 2

Blades^^ - Level 23

Upgrade 1> dexterity bonus of +3% when wielding blades Upgrade 1> increased chance to cause status bleeding with blades

Polearms - Level 4

Hand to Hand Combat - Level 6

Small Blades - Level 7

Miscellaneous

Sneak - Level 13

Upgrade 1> gain 2% chameleon when sneaking

Tracking - Level 6

First Aid - Level 9

Identification - Level 8

Traits:

Earthborn - You are earthborn and experience ‘ON’ and ‘OFF’ permanence cycles. You also gain a 20% increase to any type of XP acquired when compared to your fellow NPCs, and your mana regeneration rate is increased by 30%.

Languages Learned - Human, Dwarvish, Elvish, Necropolis

Modified Vampiric Bloodlines - Your body has been modified with key aspects of an ancient vampiric bloodline. You now have night vision, an improved sense of smell, and improved reflexes.

Supersoldier - Your DNA has been altered to express the best traits of your human heritage. You now have a +200% modifier applied to your original base level Strength and Speed. This modifier does not apply to Stat increases.

Physical Attributes:

Modified Vampiric Bloodlines: Eyes - Your eyes turn light blue and glow in the dark when using night vision.

Magical Attributes:

Necromancy

Alteration

Skill Trees Unlocked:

Necromancer’s Calling

Control Limit Slots: 0 of 16 used.

Taen’s Minions:

None

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“Do not worry Taen! The terriths are my pets, I would not let any of them truly die. They knew what they had to do, though it pleases me that you were worried about it!” Maltetious winked as she said this, wrapping her slender arms around Taen’s neck and pulled him close to whisper to him. “You are quite cute sometimes, did you know that?”

“Thanks.”

Michael and Chris sat a few feet away eating various foods such as pastries, fruits, chocolates, and even a form of ice cream after a request was made from Chris.

Michael scoffed as he bit into an apple. “Can’t believe you were worried about those brutes. Vile creatures. Good riddance. I hope they choked on it after eating me that first time. Not to mention we’re sitting on a ton of amazing food here as a reward for completing that damn trial and you aren’t eating a thing. Something’s wrong with you man.”

Chris shoved a pastry into his mouth, swallowed, and belched. “Meh, Taen has always been too nice. I saw him give a homeless guy all the cash in his wallet once and he ended up not having any money for himself when it came to lunch time. He then told me, ‘It’s ok Chris, that guy probably needed it more than me anyways.’ Too nice for his own good. Him being worried about those things doesn’t surprise me one bit.”

Looking up into the night sky, the large orange moon gave off a pale light that illuminated the ground around them. Taen paused for a moment, holding his hand up to the tapestry of stars above them. “It’s pretty. All life is beautiful, it shouldn’t be thrown away so thoughtlessly.”

Michael stared, bewildered. “You truly are a hopeless romantic at heart aren’t you. You’re here training to be a certified killer badass necromancer and you’re talking about how life is beautiful. Ironic.”

“I originally wanted to be a doctor, you know.”

“Touche, Taen. Touche.”

Maltetious stared curiously at Taen for a moment, straightened out her white dress and came around to sit next to him. Her bare feet dug into the soft grass, and she glanced his way. “I’m very impressed with how you all did today. I think we might even cut down the number of trials you have to do. But ONLY if you keep up your performance.”

“Nice!” Exclaimed Chris as he began to smoke another makeshift blunt. “Now, Maltetious, since we’re doing great work... how about you hook me up with some more of this stuff?”

“Those grey leaves you’re smoking?”

“Yeah!”

“Fine. But they make your genitals swell and burst if you smoke or eat too much of it.”

Chris’ face paled.

She began to smirk and laugh, got up again and began skipping away into the forest.

“She’s messing with me right? Right guys?”

Taen sighed with drooping eyelids. “Probably, but you never know.”

“She’s gotten a lot better, you know, about lighting us on fire or blowing out our kneecaps and whatnot. At least in the past couple months.”

“I think it’s only because we’ve actually gotten better ourselves and mess up a lot less.” Michael stared into the forest into the direction she had gone. “She’s still a cold hearted and evil bitch. Mess up on this next trial and I guarantee you that wench will definitely light us all on fire again, laughing as she does it.”