“Don’t be foolish, you did well” Bruce comforted Lucas, who was still annoyed at himself for running away. Truth of the matter was that he was completely and utterly outmatched by the Duchess without even putting a bit of pressure on her. And worse yet, she was a bad match for him as the pressure spell she casted was took away his biggest advantage. Taking all that into consideration, he was sulking. It was a long time since he done anything solo and it showed.

“I will not be able to match her in a very long time” Lucas spoke. “I’m not even sure we have the time”

“Time? You have anywhere else to be?” Bruce retorted.

“Are you not interested in retaking Camp Hearth?” Lucas asked.

“And how will I do that if you don’t get strong enough?”

“I’m still not doing anything about that? I’m only interested in Michael”

“And for that you still need to beat everything in there?” Bruce sharply said, pointing in the direction of the wreckage. “And you are not doing that by feeling sorry for yourself. Pick it up and let us see is there a way for you to overcome the Duchess”

Still feeling like crap, Lucas started recounting once again how the trek to the Naga and subsequent fight went. Bruce was listening intently, nodding alongside and after Lucas finished his tale, he got deep into his thoughts. Lucas was moderately recovered after speaking it again but that feeling of hopelessness still permeated around him. He still didn’t see the way for beating the Duchess and by the looks of it Bruce also was drawing blanks.

“You said that she had some sort of guarding duty by her thralls?” Bruce asked. Lucas nodded and the old Loremaster smiled.

“Then, Lucas, we have a solution. What do you think will happen if we attack her with an explosion?” Bruce asked.

Lucas mind could see the potential in that line of thinking, but he was in the dark about how to make something like that happened. Luckily for him, Bruce wasn’t unprepared. He waved for Lucas to follow him and they soon found themselves on the path that sprawled away from the shore.

“From here, if you follow that narrow path, you will find a hut. In that hut lives an old friend. Tell him about our trouble and generally describe him the dungeon. I’m fairly certain he will have a solution.” Bruce told him. He added that with his speed, he should find the hut in less than two hours.

Lucas paced himself into the light jog and soon he was lighting trough the forest, navigating around trees and other obstacles, testing the limits of his new skill. To his delight, the limit was non – existent, or to put it better, it was predicated on how much he could go before he lost the ability to react. He learned that the harder way when he hit one of the lower branches from one particularly old looking tree. Now he was pacing himself a little bit more, a fresh bump on his head a reminder of what will happen if he didn’t control himself. Soon, he found what he was looking for, a small hut completely camouflaged within the plant life that grew in this thick forest. Lucas carefully approached while keeping the eye out for traps. He knocked on the door and was put on high alert when he heard a lot of rumbling from inside. He prepared himself for anything and went for the handle, but then the door opened and in front of him stood tall man completely covered in dark green robe. On his bearded face a deep frown was observed by Lucas and his black eyes carried distrust and alarm in equal measure.

“What do you want?” he asked Lucas.

“Bruce sent me here” Lucas responded and started explaining what problems they were facing. Bearded man listened to Lucas and then simply waved him to enter the hut. Once inside, Lucas saw a large amount of herbs that were drying on the simple wooden wall. Other than that, there was a bed and a desk with equipment dedicated to processing those herbs that were drying. It gave the same vibes alchemist from Scenario dungeon had and Lucas was pretty certain he knew what will be their problem solver. As expected, old man sat down and started brewing something, without a word said to Lucas. On his end, Lucas was already making a list of what else should he take, seeing this as a unique chance to replenish his stash. He guessed he is probably getting explosives at the moment and he would like very much if he was able to replace his used – up flashbang potions. What else he would like to have was something toxic or similar, a potion he could use to incapacitate single target while he was two on one as was the case with the dryad king during the Scenario dungeon. He remembered he was so swept up by events that he forgot to check his credit balance which was probably going to play a part now. He called his status and navigated to the credits.

Current balance: 10540 credits

Lucas for sure wasn’t an economy buffs and he wasn’t about to deeply think about such issues. For what he knew until now, he was filthy rich. Too bad he was currently in the wilds, because the number of taverns in which he could empty the larder was numbering in hundreds. And there were only ten or so taverns back at Camp Hearth. He didn’t even stop to think from where he got all that money, only focused at how best to spend it. Compiling the list of potions he would like to have, he approached the completely focused bearded man and gently placed his hand on his shoulders. He startled and turned his gaze from his work on to Lucas.

“What?” he asked a little bit on the aggressive side.

“Care to make some more after this?” Lucas carefully asked.

“No” the man simply responded and went back to his work.

That wasn’t the answer Lucas expected, nor was the one he was willing to accept. He rasped his knuckle on the shoulder of the man in a bid to get his attention again. Visibly annoyed, man once again looked at him.

“And why wouldn’t you?” Lucas continued the conversation from before.

“Because I’m not a merchant, nor do I want to craft cheap parlor trick. I’m a researcher trying to push boundaries of Earth alchemy, chemistry and in a more broad sense, science. I do this because I owe Bruce a favor and I will certainly not make anything for the errand boy” the man was almost shouting at the end of his tirade.

Lucas was stunned at the ramblings he just heard and after that came the anger.

“Did you really just call me an errand boy?”

“Yes, and now you make a strong case for being a simpleton also. Now please, let us return to silence so I can focus on finishing these potions and send you on your way” bearded man ended any notion of the further conversation.

Lucas went back to sulking, which seemed to be the default mood for him today and retreated to the farthest corner from the man he could find. After half an hour passed potions were finished and Lucas simply took them and stormed without even saying goodbye. The night was almost fully descended when he found his way back to the wreckage where Bruce had already set up camp. They shared a meal and once again reiterated the plan they made during the day. Also, Bruce had a hearty laugh at events that transpired between his friend and Lucas, telling him not to worry about that and that he will handle it when the time came. They wished good night one to other and went to sleep.

In the morning, Lucas once again ate the delightful food, enjoying the prompt informing him his stats were once again boosted.

“Good luck” was all Bruce had to say, and Lucas was quickly back at the entrance of the dungeon. He dived right in and there was a moment of pure darkness before emerging in the familiar corridors of the ship. This time, however, he didn’t bother to open every door and check out every room, instead making a beeline straight to the massive room in which Duchess resided. On the way he was intercepted by the number of Naga, but they posed no threat to him and he didn’t even break a sweat during the numbers of battle. When he approached the familiar room, he repeated the same action as the last time, sneaking into it. The difference this time was that he didn’t even think about attacking, instead preparing the bottles which held his trump cards. One of the bottles had a black sludge, a mana – infused tar that was prepared to explode from the bottle when it was broken. The other one hold a highly volatile substance that inflamed itself from just a bit of pressure. The pressure that was poised the came from breaking the bottle. From there, the idea was that the tar – soaked enemies should be put on fire and hopefully negate the guard duty thralls did for their Duchess as they were all set on fire and die.

“Here goes nothing” Lucas exclaimed and threw the first bottle.