Chapter 100 – To Grind [Wednesday]

John’s life was a typical story. Boy meets Girl, Girl helps defeat deadly biker gang with a centipede monster in tow, Boy and Girl fall in love after murdering ghosts, Stuff happens, an evil organization steps on the field and throws their lives into turmoil, tragedy, sadness, drama, an enemy that tries to pull them to their side but the Boy outwits him. John’s life was not at all a typical story.

Which is why he was happy to finally do something he knew how to do again. “Grinding! Grinding! Grinding!” he chanted as they went to the bus stop.

“You look sooooo stupid right now.” Rave giggled at his side.

“Well, it is great to find something normal to do that doesn’t involve someone trying to kill or convert me.” John said as they arrived at the stop. “Okay, monsters will try to kill me, but that’s different.”

The bus pulled up in the distance and with it the impending time of what was essentially the loading screen for his Instant Dungeon. Man, this PC was slow. The bus rolled down the street. Going to the forest all the time surely was annoying. If they wanted to stay hidden they needed to do that. The bus started to slow down.

Wait, hide from whom? The Golden Rose had long found out about them. The only other reason to go to the forest was because John had no idea how Treants would spawn. The bus came to a halt and Rave was waiting with a confused look for John to walk towards the opening door. Why exactly should they take the bus to the forest if they were about to farm Skaven?

He asked Rave exactly that and her eyebrows jolted upwards then shifted downwards quickly as she asked herself the same question. “We have absolutely no reason, do we?” she asked as the door closed and the bus went on its way.

“Nope,” John finally came to that conclusion and extended his hand to the sky. “Absolutely none.” The Instant Dungeon was erected and the entrance to it quickly found. They went inside the underground complex. Materializing both Gnome and Salamander, he doubled their party size. Speaking of the latter, he had never used Observe on the fire spirit. Time to get a better understanding of his new familiar.

Was Krieg not just the German word for war? Either Gaia (or whoever else decided the names of gods) was lazy in the naming sense or the elemental had some unpronounceable name and his mind just translated to the next best thing. Whatever was the case, her Stats were pretty glass canon-y. Thankfully, he also had Gnome.

Who was a lot better at being a tank anyway. If only she were about as tall as him it would be perfect. Probably a goal for the future. Keeping both of them active was about 0,32 Mana per second, also subtracting Aclysia and two Possessions pushed him down to roughly 1,08 Mana per Second. Pretty good all things considered. Individually, he was easily overcome by Abyssals his level, but with all of his familiars he became a one-man army. With Mana Ray he could provide the necessary backline support. Provided his mana didn’t go to other tasks.

Which there were two new outlets for. He activated Mana Shield, not because he thought it necessary but because he needed to level it anyhow. Actually, he hoped he wouldn’t have to use it, the current cost for that thing was disgusting. Best to not get hit in the first place.

“Okay, let's figure out how to integrate you into the formation, Salamander.”

“Fuck formation!” Salamander cursed right at him, which surprised him twofold. She had been active the entire time (like Gnome he liked to keep her skill levelling through passive use) but she had never spoken a word. The other thing was her tone. “Just point me at something to burn!” Salamander demanded.

“I like her!” Rave said, “Speaks my language, just with fire.”

“Well, I don’t like her.” Copernicus chimed in, the sun cat suddenly appearing between the party, yawning. “Fire elementals are always dim-witted.” Salamander flew over and hovered in front of the sun cat for a moment. Then she made a single mocking laugh before leaving the cat on the floor again. “What was that supposed to mean?” Copernicus meowed.

John scratched the back of his head. As the party grew so did the number of oddballs apparently. He stopped the scratching. ‘I really can’t kick the habit.’ “Let’s just get this moving, I want to see what Salamander can do, afterwards we should hurry to the next floor or even the one below that. The enemies up here aren’t exactly great EXP providers.”

The verdin fluttered its wings and started scouting out the corridors. It didn’t take long for them to locate the first group of Minor Skaven. They didn’t mind or notice the bird. Exactly what John wanted to see.

“Okay, Jane, you do your thing at the frontlines. I will disrupt them with Possession. Gnome, you guard me. Salamander, you show us what you can do.”

The fire elemental grinned, an aggressive glint in her eyes. “Got it!” she exclaimed.

Rave stormed around the corner and the fight began. Of course, they were horribly over levelled. Lower Skaven had a Level ranging from 20 to 25. John and his elementals were currently level 31, Rave was at level 34. Every single member of his party could have cleared the dungeon on their own.

Salamander demonstrated how useful she was, turning into a large ember that danced through the air. Her attacks could broadly be described in two different ways: either she tackled the enemy with her flame body, showering them in rapid melee attacks, or she used her small size to fly around the enemy and bombard them with fire attacks. The former was more devastating, covering the Skaven in trails of burned fur, while the latter was disruptive and provided little chance for counter attacks.

Salamander returned to John’s side for a moment, her form of flying fire consolidating back into the red-skinned woman. “Ya like what ya see?” she asked and wiggled her hips, winking with one of her coal-black eyes.

“Yes.” John didn’t get further into the sexual advance, she was sexy but way too small. Hopefully that would change over time. Not that he was sure he would take her advances even then. It was all a bit complicated. “Let me test something. Jane, can you make way?”

His girlfriend jumped backwards and now John extended his hand. Time to try using fire himself. He offered Mana up to Salamander and she started laughing. “Aw yisss!” She exclaimed and covered the remaining three enemies in a wave of fire that filled the hall in front of him.

John felt very stupid as he looked at his own hand, doing nothing, as the Fire Elemental laughed at the destruction she brought. It made sense, when he gave Gnome his mana he wasn’t the one doing the actual casting either. Nonetheless, he was disappointed. Leaving Salamander to her pyromania, he checked his mana to effective destruction ratio, which was more an educated guess than actual math.

Well, three Skaven were dead and the whole ordeal had cost him a mere 60 Mana, meaning he could easily kill one every 20 seconds with his current mana regeneration. Theoretically, reality had the mean tendency to defy expectations from time to time.

“I am a tool of destruction!” Salamander laughed with hands stemmed on her hips as the cooked bodies of the Skaven vanished. “This is fun, let's do more of that, can we? OF COURSE WE CAN! Let’s go John, gogogogogogogogogogogogogogo.” When did he land in the Looking for Group-Group? Whatever, the avian extension of him had already found the boss room. He read the Observe information on the boss while they went and fought their way through the Dungeon, towards him.

An explosion, caused by Salamander, announced the party’s entrance into the boss room. Skaven were catapulted through the air and crash landed on the dirty stone floor, vanishing moments later. They left behind small amounts of money and other small items.

The Warlord was sitting on a small throne, two Rat Wolves chained to it. They were smaller than the one that had guarded the treasure room last time around. Nonetheless, their teeth and claws looked like they could inflict quite a bit of pain and disease. Behind the Warlord was a wooden door, probably the way to the next floor.

“Let’s make this fast.” John decided, “Jane, you take the boss. Salamander, you help her. Gnome, we take on the wolves.” The strategy was made just in time as the Lesser Skaven Warlord shattered the chains with a blow with its mighty axe. The Rat Wolves sprinted at them but Rave didn’t even mind. With her far superior speed she charged and met them halfway. Nimbly, she dodged their vile maws by sliding underneath them and then jumping right at the Warlord.

This little manoeuvre confused the wolves enough that it allowed John to get his first Mana Ray off without interruption. The attack seared one of the Rat Wolves’ front legs, crippling it with one blow that made it impossible for it to resume its charge. The other Rat Wolf, now aware of the danger the Gamer posed, went on the offensive again. It didn’t manage to get past Gnome, who stood in its path and grabbed it by the snout.

The Earth Elemental’s strength was shattering, figuratively. Although she wasn’t able to break the attacker’s head in her palms, she was able to completely immobilize him for the moment. Which was all that John needed to get a second Mana Ray off on the already wounded Rat Wolf at the back. ‘This is really just bullying.’ John thought, the hit killing the beast.

At the same time, he heard the howling of a wounded animal from the Warlord. The boss collapsed right as John directed his eyes to it. Burn marks from Salamander and Rave, interestingly different in their patterns, covered the dying Skaven. Then it turned to ash. The last Rat Wolf was finished up in mere moments as well.

“Buh!” Rave complained, “Way too easy. Is the Loot good?”

“Nope.” John looked over it. Just some rusted equipment, money and that was it. Well, for some reason people paid a lot for the metal the weapons were made from so he wouldn’t complain. He put the vendor trash away and prayed for some of that Warpstone next time around.“Let’s go down.” He decided and opened the door.

Behind was a staircase that wound deeper into the earth. The bird took the lead and he found the first enemies before they were even done descending the staircase.

“Gaia is officially a lazy game designer.” John stated with a disbelieving, disapproving voice. “She just took the enemies from the last floor and slapped 5 levels on top.”

“Booooooring!!” Rave complained even more. He sighed, “Yep…oh well, let’s keep grinding.”

They beat the boss of that floor too, causing both of them to level up, before calling it a day and going somewhere else.