"There're the floor guardians, but we're going to have to make a little bit of a plan to get through, looks like. Five of them."
"Yes, Benedict," Astrid sighed. "This is something we've talked about every night since we came into the Trials. Every tenth floor, there's a stronger guardian to get to the next floor, and then things spike in difficulty on the following floor, being the eleventh, twenty first, thirty first, and so on. It didn't matter on the tenth floor because we were all Iron against Bronzes, but we'll be more on our guard for this fight."
Benedict started to open his mouth to snark back, but Felix leveled a fierce glare at the Bard and made him go silent. The party had pushed hard through the twentieth floor, focusing more on moving quickly than what Astrid would call clean progress. Felix himself had been the most driven member of the party, following behind Muti as she led the way to the next fight. There, he threw himself into the thick of things and was seeing small steps of progress already. Now that the exit from the floor was here, it was obvious that the Guardian wasn't going to deal with Benedict's hijinks, whether they were teasing or genuine.
"It's probably a bit of a stretch to continue planning on getting through the twenty first floor before we break for the day." As Astrid said it, she watched Felix specifically. As she expected, he stiffened at the mention of possibly slowing their pace.
"We haven't even seen the next floor, and we know it isn't going to be particularly difficult," he countered. "I'm not tired. The only person who might need to recover is Benedict. Skandr, you haven't been using much mana, you're probably pretty close to full, right? And you and Muti are doing fine."
"You're not wrong," Astrid held up a hand, "but maybe if we rest early today, we can push through two floors tomorrow instead and keep ourselves grounded."
"We can push through two tomorrow, even if we do three today." Felix's answer was immediate, obstinate, and made Astrid roll her eyes.
"I'm not just going to make a decision for the party at large, but I think that there's no problem in just having a shorter day today." Astrid fought to keep her tone reasonable as she continued speaking, "We're going to have the same amount of time to get as deep as we can no matter what, and if we end up sleeping as if there had been thirty three days instead of thirty, there's no problem so long as we're pushing fast and hard while we're up. I leave it to the party as a whole to decide through votes, but I don't see the need to push ourselves that hard right now when we're about to get into the floors where we can push to gain levels faster without it being empty experience. Consider me a vote for not pushing."
"I'll be the deciding vote if you need me to be," Skandr spoke first, "but I'm really fine either way. I am enjoying having opportunities to experiment with my spells and enchantments. I can do that while resting or while delving."
"We should go further." Muti's response wasn't a surprise to anybody. "I do not know if it is merely what I desire to feel or if it comes from Dread Master, but I feel that pushing ourselves further right now will result in greater gains towards our Skill acquisitions. After all, based on our plans, we will pass the first watershed of Iron before we cross into the thirty first floor and are confronted with genuine difficulties throughout the entirety of every floor. We should push and prove ourselves now, delaying nothing. Additionally, I do not need rest as much as I did before, I can happily push further and longer."
After making her point, Muti looked to the others for their opinions. Felix was the next to speak, "You all already know what my opinion is. I'm for it."
"That makes two for, one against, and one abstaining. Benedict," Astrid said, as she turned to the only other person who hadn't made their position officially, "it's up to you if we're going to bring this to Skandr's tiebreaker."
"I was going to agree with you, Astrid," Benedict said, "but Muti makes too much sense. If I can get an Iron skill or push Silvertongue to Iron at this next watershed, then I'm willing to forgo sleep or whatever else it is that we need to do. And as an aside, I think that the choice to push faster on these last two floors was probably for the best, fighting against so many monsters under our tier isn't going to be great for us in the long run."
"While I'm glad that you're on board with the decision that we made as a group last night," Astrid said, "that last part wasn't especially necessary, I don't think. Anyways, we'll take care of this fight, then get onto the twenty first floor and push. We'll talk about more specifics for that floor when we're on the path down. For now, these ghoul delver wannabes are our target."
"Correct me if I'm wrong," Skandr said, "but, for all intents and purposes, this is a delving party of ghouls. There's a frontliner with a shield and attention Skill, a finisher with a spear and magical piercing potential, the supporter with vampiric effects it can grant in an aura, a ranger with a bow and an arrowstorm Skill, capped off with a bone mage that focuses on control effects. They're all level 27, and with attribute boosts due to their position as Bosses, that'll make them basically our equals in attributes."
"Our Skills will be incomparable to these forgettable creatures. Astrid and I shall destroy the supporter and mage while Skandr focuses the Ranger. As for the finisher and frontliner—Benedict and Felix should be able to take their attention and dispatch them without issue, correct?" Muti's words came as an instruction to the party, and Astrid couldn't help but smile at her eagerness.
"That's fine with me," Benedict answered, looking at Felix. "Maybe I'll focus more on the damaging halves of my Skills instead of just buffing our side. After all, we'll have some time to recover our mana after this while we get ourselves onto the next floor."
There wasn't much more to solidify after that, and the party stepped forward. Unlike the entrance to the twentieth floor, which was a clearing among the graves, the arena to access the stairs to the twenty first floor was found underground. A massive crypt stood in the center of the graveyard, large arched doorways on each of the four sides of the edifice. Upon entry, a faint purple light filled the air and beckoned with a faint pulsing for the party to descend into its depths. With their hurried pace, the party hadn't seen any other delvers, though when they walked to the nearest doorway, the passage halfway down the stairs was blocked with a pearlescent, shimmering wall.
The paths curved in a strange way under the ground, tunneling maybe 20 meters before the path the party was on merged with another staircase that then coiled into a long circle of stairs that coiled down further into the earth. Another ten meters after the first juncture came another merging with a staircase, this path giving the impression that it was made of the other two staircases to enter the crypt. As soon as the party stepped down into the final arena to prove their worthiness, the pearlescent wall appeared behind them and they looked at the monster "delvers".
In the front stood a ghoul taller than the rest, nearly as tall as Astrid herself. It carried just a massive shield with no weapon, though it wore tattered armor made of a dark metal. Behind it and to the side stood what was the finisher ghoul, a long spear seemingly made of blood soaked bone in its right hand. Behind them stood the other three, the ranger with an ivory bow in hand, the bone mage wearing a cowled cloak, and the supporter wearing light leather armor.
As soon as they were seen, the ghouls leapt into action, the frontliner stepping forward as a dark cloud billowed out in every direction from it. Astrid could see through the smoky mist, but she knew that if she walked into the cloud, its Skill would begin to take effect and draw her towards the bulky frontliner instead of her targets. An arrow and bone lance both shot towards Skandr, pulling the party's attention back to the fight as he ducked behind Astrid. She raised her shield and smashed them both away, the movement easy and the protection complete. The finisher lunged to the side and sought to infiltrate the back ranks as well, but Felix hustled forward and, with Guardian's Wrath, forced the skeletons to focus on him. The supporter and mage didn't seem to be affected at all, while the Ranger sent two arrows towards Felix. He caught one in his left fist while swiping the same arm's forearm through the next.
The ranger drew back heavily at that, loosing an arrow that split into dozens more. Astrid retained her position in front of Skandr and pushed mana into her shield to ensure nothing managed to pierce through. Like rainfall, the arrows thundered against the Dungeon silver shield, and Astrid grinned as she protected her ally. The Skill had a brief cooldown, and as soon as she could see that Benedict had evaded the arrows as well with a timely assist from a gust of wind from Skandr, Astrid focused on her next task.
Astrid stopped paying attention to the melee on the frontlines, trusting in her allies as she went to cut down the supporter to make sure that the ghouls would go down faster. With Hasty Rebuke and Dread Master buffing her, she skirted around the edge of the frontliner's attention grabbing Skill, rushing towards the supporter in the back. Seeing her approach, the supporter and mage both stepped into the smoke of their protector's Skill. It wasn't a surprise, but it did complicate matters as Astrid gritted her teeth and pushed mana into her helmet to keep her mind clear as she stepped into the Skill in hot pursuit.
There were plenty of Skills in the world, in effect, a limitless amount, and Astrid had experienced precious few mental Skills being used against her. Whatever that frontliner in the prig Caelum's party's name was had tried to force her attention to him, but this was a different feeling. It was more insidious, more like whatever Anders had done when he nearly forced her to sign his ledger. The feeling here was similar, even through her resistance amplified by her helmet. Surely that was due to the Skill's origin being an Iron tier boss monster, but with her helmet's clarity, Astrid could feel her mind struggling to pull her towards the frontliner instead of the supporter. With a force of will, she focused on her priority.
"Activating Immortal Warrior's Aura!" As Astrid gave the warning, she caught up to the supporter. It seemed to expect her to rush past it, but as she pushed mana through her glove and into her hammer, she swung it at the monster's center mass. The strike was perfect, and caused the supporter to activate a life saving skill. It flashed back one meter out of her range, and Astrid growled as she felt a hit manage to pierce through Felix's defenses. The point of the finisher's spear yanked out of his side, letting Astrid feel a trail of blood trickling down her left hip. The weapon's head may be pierced a couple of centimeters into Felix's abdomen, and the Guardian roared as he activated Whirling Blades.
Astrid's head was pounded by the shrieking of metal as the Skill bounced off of the enemy front liner's shield, wasting much of itself on the reinforced shield. She could see as the bone mage and ranger both turned their attention to her, sending missiles her way in the opening. Having not truly spent any mana other than that in her helmet and shield, Astrid pushed nearly a third of her total mana into her armor to make sure that the attacks coming her way couldn't pierce through to her body as she neglected to block them with her shield. With these approaching attacks and part of her mana spent, she activated Immortal Warrior's Body as she closed in on the supporter. The Power-aligned mana remained in her hammer, but the supporter remained surprisingly evasive.
With two swings, Astrid was unable to dispatch the monster, or even catch a solid hit. However, she decided to stop focusing on securing the kill and instead lunged forward with her shield towards it. Again, the supporter used its Skill to almost teleport a meter further away.
Muti's seax decapitated the monster in one strong swing. It tumbled to the ground, the fell magic that maintained its life slipping away. There was a kill notification, but Astrid paid it no mind. Instead, she grinned as she planted hard with her right leg and twisted 180 degrees to throw herself at the bone mage. It was only two meters away, and though it struggled, there was only a single strike needed, Power-aligned mana and Immortal Warrior's Body boosting the strike as they did. The mage was slain without difficulty.
Astrid looked at the rest of the battlefield. Despite the single hit that he'd taken, Felix was otherwise fine, the frontliner completely tied up with him while the finisher was unable to land any more solid hits. The ranger was on its last legs as one lightning bolt after the next smashed into its chest. Before Astrid or Muti could go to finish off the creature, it took one final, concentrated flash of lightning to the head that shattered its skull and gave another kill notification. Astrid hurried forward and, while it was still occupied with Felix, smashed her hammer into the frontliner's spine just above its hips. The weapon's head shredded through the rotten flesh and broke the bone holding the monster together. With that opening, Felix set both his feet squarely and twisted with his hips to first smash the shield away and then decapitate the frontliner.
Benedict waved for the rest of the party to step back as he leaned forward and used Doublespeak to use Song of Vindication on the remaining finisher. It swayed, trying to step towards him, but he pressed several buttons on his flute, and the song became so shrill that Astrid couldn't hear it. The monster fell, its face still twisted towards Benedict as he blew until his face went red.
He pulled his flute away from his lips, a scowl on his face as his face regained its usual pale color. "Curses. I was hoping to deal the final blow with that, but it isn't worth it to spend more of my mana trying."
"Here you go." Astrid said, holding out her hammer. She held it casualty, having a particular turn of events that she hoped would happen. She was slightly disappointed when Benedict braced himself and held the hammer with both hands.
"Even though I was ready for it…" He grunted as the hammer dipped. He still carried the hammer, and, with it held close his body, he stepped up beside the prostrate body and basically dropped the hammer on its head.
Ghoul spearman slain. 2280 experience gained, split among party.
As the final monster collapsed dead, Astrid actually looked at the kill notifications. She sucked in a breath between her teeth as she nodded appreciatively.
"Muti, how close are you to level 23?"
"Exceedingly close." She grinned widely as she said it, dismissing her helmet, just long enough to scratch her left ear.
"Then let's get to that next floor and kill us some hobgoblins!" Astrid laughed as Muti's eyes widened, her helmet reappeared on her head, and she roughly cut the pinky off of the supporter corpse on the ground. The rest of the party did the same, taking one finger off as they looked at the equipment and parts of the monsters.
"Should we take the shield, spear, and so on? Might be worth something," Benedict asked as he picked up the spear from the finisher.
"We can take them for now," Astrid answered with a shrug, "then replace anything we want to when our bags end up full."
The rest of the party seemed to agree with that idea, and they stripped the bodies of everything they thought might be worth anything. Mere seconds passed before all five were prepared to begin their journey to the next floor. From here on, there were only Iron tier enemies, and the party would finally at a greatly accelerated pace until they could confront what was beyond even the forty first floor, much less the twenty first.
Astrid couldn't wait.