Healer Arc 2 -- Chapter 23

Chapter 23

Walking through the dungeon entrance was as strange as it always was, though he certainly wasn’t expecting what ended up being on the other side.  Based on the underground location, he had figured that the dungeon would be based around caves or dark spaces, but he was almost immediately blinded by the bright sunlight as he emerged into a vast sea of calf-length grass and thousands of flowers in a riot of colors for as far as the eye could see.  When he was able to see clearly again, the first thing he checked out was his notifications to find out exactly where he was.

You have entered the Wild Flower Dungeon!

Wild Flower Dungeon

Assessed Difficulty: Medial (Strained)

Recommended Party Size: 5

Recommended Party Levels: 38 – 41

Thaden had only been inside 2 dungeons since he’d been on Plangea, and both of them had turned out to have something special about them.  The first, the Blasted Caves Dungeon, had been a Minimal difficulty “Swarm” dungeon full of relatively weak monsters, but in large groups; it had been relatively simple to clear once he fully took advantage of his new spells, as well as with some help from his Party of Netherines to kill the Boss.

The Wild Flower Dungeon, on the other hand, was assessed as a Medial dungeon, which he had been told was a rarity except for some of the deeper dungeons – and they hadn’t been anywhere near those locations.  He figured it had to be the special modifier attached to it, though, which was “Strained” instead of the “Swarm” he’d seen on the other dungeon.

“Uh, Thaden?” Blinky said only seconds after entering after him.  “I know you made a deal, but I think even Flarenia would be willing to switch dungeons.”

Thaden was confused.  “What?  Why?”

“Are you so ignorant that you don’t know what’s happening to this dungeon?”

He sighed, before gesturing with his hand for Flarenia to get on with it.  “Obviously, I have no idea what you’re talking about.  Why don’t you explain it to me?”

The armored Aelveen answered first.  “When a dungeon has been ignored for too long, it becomes what you see here, which is what is referred to as ‘Strained’.  In short, the Adversary is pumping more of its energy into the dungeon, attempting to forcibly increase its strength by enhancing its monsters; that’s why the Recommended Level listed is higher than what was posted outside.  This process strains the dungeon as a whole, however, making things inside it… unpredictable.”

“What do you mean by unpredictable?”

Rel’ba’shet turned to Lovinia next to him, clearly out of his depth already with his knowledge.  She took up the explanation, even as she eyed the entrance.  “Odd changes to the dungeon’s layout, multiplied or mutated monsters, and/or shutting down access to the entrance we’ve just passed through.  I would recommend we leave as soon as possible and then you can perform your little stunt in a different—NO!.”

Of course, as if it was waiting for her to say something about it, the wavy haze of the entrance portal floating in the middle of the field of flowers suddenly flared with a reddish light before disappearing entirely. 

Everyone stared in disbelief at where their only retreat from the Strained dungeon had just disappeared.  After a few seconds, Flarenia turned and looked at Thaden with an expression on her face that looked like a mixture between sheer terror and anger.  “You had better be able to back up that claim you made earlier, because if you kill us all, I’m going to come back as a phantasm and haunt you, your family, and every single descendent for the next 10,000 years.”

Thaden chuckled darkly, shaking his head.  “Too bad for you that I have no living family, and therefore no living descendants.  But you won’t have to worry about haunting anyone, because I can handle this.”  At least, I hope I can.

“You had better, or I’ll—”

“Or you’ll what?  Kill me?  I think that if I end up failing, then I’ll already be dead.”  He took a deep breath as he glanced around him, glad that, at least for the moment, they weren’t immediately under attack.  “Seriously, calm down so that I can do my thing here.  We still have a deal, remember.”

“I think we’re far past worrying about our deal, Thaden,” Blinky said softly as he, too, looked around at the innocent-looking environment.

“No, I think it’s still valid,” Flarenia said with anger tinting her voice.  “He’s the one that picked this dungeon, after all, so he has to deal with what is in here – whatever it turns out to be.  It’s only fair, don’t you think, Thaden?”

For his part, he shrugged, as if it didn’t really matter one way or another to him.  “Sure, sounds fair to me.”  He began to take a step forward, but Blinky caught his arm.

“Hold on.  I don’t know if you can see it, but I believe there is a small safe area around where the entrance used to be.”  The Grome pointed about 20 feet ahead of them both, but Thaden couldn’t see anything; once it was pointed out to him, though, he thought he could feel it.  And if he wasn’t mistaken, it was slowly shrinking.  “As soon as you take a step outside of this area, whatever is in the dungeon will know you’re here.”  Blinky left unspoken the fact that all the monsters in range would likely attack Thaden immediately.

Nodding to show that he understood, Thaden turned to his Party and warned them, “Don’t attack my friend that is about to appear; she’s on our side, and I’m probably going to need her help.”  The next moment, without any other prompting from him, Sadia materialized next to him in her giant squirrel form.

Every member of his Party took an involuntary step back when she appeared.  “What the—” Flarenia began to ask in a shocked voice, but Thaden cut her off.

“I’ll explain later.  For now, stay back and let us work.”  In a softer voice, he addressed his companion.  “You ready for this?”

“As ready as I’m going to be, I guess.  And they’re right, dungeons in a ‘Strained’ state can be unpredictable, so be prepared.”

Another quick nod had Thaden preparing, as he cast Lesser Subjugation Aura, which – at its base – increased his spiritual will battle success rate by 20%; with his spell effectiveness bonuses, from Advancements and Class traits (including the 300% increase in effectiveness for existing wide-area spells granted by Fortunate Catastrophe), his success rate was essentially increased by 100%.  It required 35% of his Mana pool to be reserved while it was active, but it would be worth it to boost his chances of taking control of whatever monsters were inside the dungeon.  To further help with what he had planned, he also cast Celestial Spiritual Enhancement Aura, reserving an additional 15% of his Mana pool.

Celestial Spiritual Enhancement Aura (Reserved): A persistent aura surrounds the caster that enhances the effectiveness of the spiritual and psychic abilities of every target within range; effectiveness of the enhancement is dependent upon Level differential between the caster and targets, with higher-Level targets receiving a greater enhancement; can aid in partially piercing through spiritual or psychic resistances or immunities.

Range: 120-foot 30-foot radius of caster

Magnitude (Base): 70% 30% increase in effectiveness

Casting Time: Instant

Mana Cost (Reserved): 20% of Mana pool 15% of Mana pool

When the spell had first synergized with his new Class, it had required 85% of his Mana pool and only increased the effectiveness of his spiritual spells by 25%; after acquiring a larger Mana pool, it now only required 15% of his Mana pool and the increase in spell effectiveness had been bumped up to 30%.  With his existing spell effectiveness bonuses, as it was an existing wide-area spell which received a bonus 300% in spell effectiveness, he essentially bumped his spiritual spell effectiveness up by 150%. 

All of that meant that something like Lesser Enthrall, which would allow him to control targets up to 4 Levels higher than his own Level – meaning Level 19 – was now increased by 350%; if he was doing his calculations correctly, that meant he could theoretically control monsters up to Level 85 or so.  Of course, successfully winning a battle of spiritual wills depended on resistances, as well as his Mentality and Personality stats in comparison to the target.  Thankfully, with his 80% increase in success granted by an Advancement, the 100% increase in success boosted by Lesser Subjugation Aura, and the 39% increase he’d received from the Why Aren’t You A Control Class? V Achievement, he thought that he had a fairly good chance of pushing through most psychic or spiritual defenses he might encounter. 

As prepared as he was going to get, Thaden took a few steps forward, halting right on the edge of where he felt the safe area shrinking.  With a deep breath, as he wasn’t sure what exactly to expect, he took that last step.

Before his foot even touched down, he sensed a multitude of hostile sources of Adversarial energy popping up from the wildflowers all around.  It only took a few seconds to see what they were – and he wasn’t sure why he expected anything different given the environment.

Beezard Drone – Medial

Level 38

Mutated Beezard Drone – Medial

Level 41

Beezard Spitter – Medial

Level 40

Bees.  More specifically, Beezards, which were giant yellow and black bees that had a wicked-looking beak like a buzzard, as well as talons tipping each of its 6 legs that had no business being on a bee.  Even the smallest of them was the size of a horse, and while he didn’t have a chance to count how many there were, he estimated that there were dozens of them surrounding the entire party.

The Beezard Drone was the smallest version of the monsters that suddenly appeared, and it looked like it was the “standard” size of these monsters, as there was nothing unique about it.  The Mutated Beezard Drones, on the other hand, ranged from about 50% bigger than the normal version, to nearly the size of an elephant.  They also had extra legs sticking out at awkward angles, an extra set of wings, or even a second head that he saw on one of them.  In short, they looked extremely dangerous.

But they weren’t nearly as dangerous as the few Beezard Spitters he saw, which had a sticky-looking yellowish substance that might have been honey dripping from their beaks, but when he saw some of this substance splash onto one of the flowers beneath the Spitter, the petals almost instantly dissolved from its touch.

Thaden didn’t speak, as there was no reason to; both he and Sadia knew what needed to be done, and they both cast Lesser Enthrall simultaneously thanks to his Double Team Advancement, and the channeled spells were converted to a wide-area effect.  Immediately, he could feel his influence pass through the majority of the Beezards swarming toward him.

A total of 43 monsters were suddenly under his control, and while there was a little bit of strain on his mind, his Mentality was high enough to handle it easily enough.  They came to a stop in the air, hovering in place and awaiting his commands, but there were still another 5 that had slipped through his leash.  “Alternate,” he said, and Sadia knew exactly what he wanted to do.  Thaden canceled his Enthrall spell and immediately cast it again, recontroling those that were still affected by Sadia’s spell, and spreading his influence through the rest – managing to snag 2 more of the ones that he hadn’t managed to grab before. 

Then Sadia did the same the next second, managing to control 1 more of those that were being stubborn, leaving only 2 that weren’t under his control.  Unfortunately, one of those happened to be a Beezard Spitter, and his heart sped up a bit when he saw a glob of yellowish nastiness the size of a basketball heading right toward him.  Thankfully, Sadia was on top of it, and he saw the closest Drone suddenly swoop over and bodily block the projectile – which was horrible to see.  The acidic yellow goop practically exploded upon contact with the controlled Drone, spreading all over its body, legs, and wings, eating through them with a speed that was frightening. 

He began casting Lesser Health Siphon and Lesser Minion Regeneration to save it, but he thought it might be too late; fortunately, the Drone was robust enough to survive until the 3-second Delay from his Delayed Satisfaction Advancement finished, and he immediately felt its Health surge back up to full – though it was still covered in the goop, which continued to eat away at his controlled minion.  Now that it had some lasting healing spells on it, though, he could tell that it would outlast the acidic goop as it quickly dripped off his minion and began dissolve the flowers beneath it.

Of course, while this was going on, he and Sadia hadn’t been idle, as they alternated casting Lesser Enthrall a few more times before enthralling the last couple of Beezards that had escaped his control.  Once that was done, and there didn’t seem to be any more threats, Thaden finally let out the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding since the conflict began, and grinned.

“See, that wasn’t too bad, was it—?” he asked, even as he turned back to his Party – who were all slack-jawed and staring at him as if in a daze. 

Eventually, after about 10 seconds, Flarenia snapped her mouth shut, before asking in a strained voice, “What did you do?!”

“I enthralled them,” Thaden said matter-of-factly, as if it was obvious.  “I’m a Novice Enthraller, after all.”

“I can… see that, but what you did should be impossible!”

He shrugged, as he didn’t want to explain everything right then and there.  “Yet, it happened.  Now, there’s a few other things I need to do, and then we can really get started.”

He turned away from his flabbergasted Party, before focusing on his new flying minions.  The one that had blocked the yellow goop was slowly recovering, as its Health kept seesawing up and down as the last of the nasty projectile either lost potency or fell off, but otherwise all of the others were perfectly fine.  In total, he’d acquired control of 48 monsters, and he certainly felt the strain on his mind; even though they weren’t as high of a Level as the Tentacled Stranglers he’d controlled in the river, they were still all a much higher Level than him – and his Mentality couldn’t handle too much more than what he had currently.  He thought he might be able to add another dozen or so, but that would be pushing his limits; at the moment, it was manageable without being distracting. 

First, he cast one of his newest spells that he’d gained from his recent Level-ups, Lesser Health Reinforcement. 

Lesser Health Reinforcement (Single Cast): Boost the maximum Health of a single target based on the number of minions under your control

Maximum Health Increase: 9% per controlled minion

Range: 60 feet

Duration: 20 minutes

Casting Time: 5 seconds

Mana Cost: 50

Lesser Health Reinforcement was incredible for someone like him, who could control quite a few monsters at one time.  At a base of a 9% increase in maximum Health per controlled minion, of which he now had 48, that meant that once he used the spell with a wide-range effect – which would include even himself and his Party – that would mean a 432% increase in maximum Health.

But then there were bonuses to factor in, as well.  As this was a Support spell, it automatically would gain a 150% increase in spell effectiveness from his Class, but then his Delayed Satisfaction would kick in to add another 900% increase.  Therefore, with a 1,050% boost to the 432% from the original spell, he was looking at a 4,968% increase in maximum Health.

As he bent over in pain as his body was suddenly flooded with extra Health, he could hear the screams of his Party members as it hit them at the same time.  I probably should’ve thought about this before I did it.  Previously, when he was on Tarth, his Physicality had already been at incredible heights when he began messing with his maximum Health, so any changes hadn’t really affected him all that much – because he could handle it.  Now, though, jacking his Health from 1,680 to a little over 83,000 made a huge difference, and it took him nearly 30 seconds before he became used to the changes.

“What the hell did you just do?!” Lovinia screamed once she could speak again, as Flarenia was apparently still recovering.  Thaden got to his feet after collapsing in pain, thankful that he was able to maintain his channeled Enthrall spells, and panted out the last of the growing pains.  “I just boosted our Health a little bit.  No big deal.”

“No big deal?!  It felt like my entire body was going to explode from the inside!” the Netherine complained, before she seemed to freeze in place as her face went slack and her eyes looked distant.  Thaden smirked as he turned away, knowing that she was looking at her new maximum Health.  Unfortunately, her Health pool probably wasn’t full, as even though she had a higher max Health, it didn’t bring her up to that maximum Health right away.  Thaden took the time to use Lesser Health Siphon on each of his Party members as they recovered, and while the original heal was relatively small compared to their much larger pool, they also all had Afterglow affecting them, which was replenishing 1% of their max Health every 5 seconds for the next 60 seconds.

“How… I have over 90,000 Health now!” Rel’ba’shet exclaimed as the Aelveen stood up, looking at his Character Report. 

“Should keep you alive for a little bit in case something goes wrong – which it hopefully won’t,” Thaden said, again without any specific explanation.  He’d rather get the dungeon cleared first before he went into anything with his Party.

But Thaden wasn’t done; he cast another spell on his controlled Beezards – as a further safeguard against anyone dying.

Lesser Explosive Recuperation (Single Cast): When the controlled target of Lesser Explosive Recuperation is killed, they will explode in a non-damaging manner, and their fleeing lifeforce is rerouted into the member of your Party with the lowest current Health to maximum Health percentage, healing them instantly.

Health Amount: 30% of maximum Health

Range: 90 feet

Duration: 60 minutes

Casting Time: 7 seconds

Mana Cost: 45

The new spell, Lesser Explosive Recuperation wasn’t as effective as something such as Death Ward (which he couldn’t quite cast yet), but it was a way of healing himself and his Party whenever one of his minions was killed.  Theoretically, that might not happen at all, now that he’d boosted their maximum Health, as well, but in case it did, it was basically an automatic heal that he wouldn’t have to worry about.

Before venturing further into the dungeon, Thaden cast one more spell: Celestial Dominate Spirit.  He was tempted to add Celestial Befriend Spirit, but he figured that they would likely encounter more Beezards, and that would prevent them from attacking; Spiritual Domination would at least let them leech Health away from other monsters – which amount was now based on 10% of his maximum Health, which had just been boosted incredibly high.

I’m suddenly feeling much better about this.

With a wave for his Party to follow him, he started walking toward the only landmark anywhere in the vast field of flowers.  A stand of trees in the distance practically beckoned him forth, and without any other destination in sight, he planned to oblige.