Soul of the Warrior

Reivyn and his Party stood outside the portal, checking their gear and going over the information from the dossier. They had consulted with some of the other Adventurers in the tent city so as not to step on anyone’s toes, and a proper time rotation had been set up. There weren’t so many groups as to fill every time slot, but to keep things working smoothly, entry times were agreed upon. They just had to wait a few more minutes before the clock struck the right time.

Reivyn finished double checking all of his gear and set his mind to going over the information from the guide.

This particular Dungeon is interesting for a couple of reasons. First, it starts on the outside of the cave, so there’s actually some space to move around the outside. There have been instances where Burning Echinacea have been found inside the instance, but it’s not guaranteed. That might cut down on our time to look for the ingredient.

Another interesting aspect of this Dungeon is the fact that it goes up. The level of difficulty of the monsters and bosses actually goes from bottom to top, with the most difficult floor being the top one.

There are only four accessible floors in this Dungeon with the bottom floor filled with slimes and a boss ooze. According to the dossier, the difference between slimes and oozes are their ability to use magic. Slimes are just corrosive, mindless puddles with a particular Affinity they absorb, but oozes can actually cast low and intermediate level Spells despite also being mindless. The spells are pure instinct, though it’s a rather interesting phenomenon all things considered.

In the real world, the cave system and mines go well below this floor, but in the Dungeon, the path is inaccessible due to being filled with a corrosive underground lake. I don’t know if that existed when the Dungeon formed or if it’s System shenanigans to act as a barrier. What I do know is that the corrosive nature metals anything up to just below Tier 6, including people. If one thinks about it by percentages, anything at 5.99 and below can’t safely explore the lake. The dossier mentions there once was a Tier 6 party who delved into the waters, but they didn’t find anything worthwhile, at least not publicly.

The second-to-bottom floor was a nest of basilisks. They had evolved to petrify and then consume the slimes as their main food source. It kind of makes sense on paper, though it doesn’t make a lot of sense when you think about it. It just has to be the way the Dungeon works, but I doubt we’d ever run into a similar situation in the real world. I mean, turning corrosive slime into stone then eating it? What? Dungeons do Dungeon things, though, I guess.

The basilisks’ petrifying ability, according to the dossier, isn’t anything for a Tier 5 individual to worry about. I’m not Tier 5, and neither are most of the Party, but we have Tier 5 Stats and Skills. Hopefully it’s the Stats - probably Vitality - that matter and not the Tier. As far as I know, one’s Tier doesn’t have any tangible benefit besides the Class. I guess we’ll find out.

The second-to-bottom floor, the second easiest, was actually the only floor that gave the Party any pause. Luckily it was completely optional with the way the cave system was set up. The entrance to each floor was from the main stairwell located right at the front of the cave. The plan was for Reivyn to expose himself to the petrification with Refix standing by to interfere and rescue him, and his mother and fiance would likely be able to resolve any problems with their Magic if things didn’t go well. It was a calculated risk.