Healer Arc 2 -- Chapter 14

Chapter 14

It took Thaden a few seconds to shift his mindset away from his Competency Advancements to the larger world around him, but once he was able to comprehend what he was looking at, he immediately understood why Sadia needed his attention.

“Where did this come from?” he asked, confused, while he climbed down from the back of the large wolf.  As soon as he was one the ground, Sadia shifted back to her normal squirrel form with a simple thought from Thaden.  He was used to communicating with her in that form; for some reason, it felt more “normal” talking to a giant squirrel than a wolf.

“Going through the perusal of those maps you glanced at in Felith, I think this was marked on one of the maps, but this is much bigger than what was depicted,” she responded.

Thaden nodded in agreement as he surveyed the scene.  The trees they had been passing through came all the way up to the banks of a river that abruptly cut through the forest, preventing them from continuing on their way.  It wasn’t a stream or even a small river, however, but one that he estimated was approximately 300 feet wide, with a water that was amazingly pure, allowing them to somewhat see that it was at least 50 feet deep toward the center, if not deeper.  That meant they couldn’t necessarily ford the river with any ease, as they would be swept downriver; he wasn’t the best swimmer, but with the speed of which the current was flowing, he was worried about being pulled underneath the water if he wasn’t careful.  Even if he managed to stay afloat, crashing into rocks that he could see sticking up here and there, along with forest debris, was a real concern, as well.  He wasn’t as durable as he used to be on Tarth, so such things could greatly harm, if not kill him.

“Can you take a form that could fly us across?” he asked after a moment of contemplation.

She shook her squirrely head.  “No; it’s already stretch to carry you on my back, but I’d have to be the size of bi-plane to carry something of your weight, which I’m not capable of doing.”

“How about something like a dolphin, then?  You could swim me across.”

Sadia shrugged.  “That’s possible, I guess, but there’s a problem with doing that.”

“What’s the problem—oh.”

It only took a second to see the issue.  With the water being remarkably clear, he was able to see deeper into the river than he would normally be able to.  As such, he noticed a number of monsters swimming around, just waiting for prey to enter the water, or even to move up to the river’s shore to get a drink.

River Gator – Minimal

Level 10

Mutant Piranha – Minimal

Level 11

Cruel Swordfish – Minimal

Level 15

Each of the monsters looked like they would be a challenge, especially the pair of Cruel Swordfish that had long, serrated noses that appeared capable of slicing entirely through his body without much issue.  Still, he thought that he could probably get past them with Sadia’s help, as she could likely swim pretty fast.  Unfortunately, given his low Level, Weak Enthrall wouldn’t work against any of them, as even with his Spiritual spellcasting bonuses, it couldn’t target anything Level 10 or above.  It was possible that something like Dominate Spirit might work, but the casting time for that meant that he’d likely only have once chance of it working – and it wasn’t guaranteed if he didn’t have them already Enthralled.  In addition, he’d have to get closer to them for his wide-area bonus trait to be in range, meaning that he’d be in the water before he started casting, given that most of them appeared to be just outside the range even if he was right next to the water.

But it wasn’t even these monsters that concerned him.  Instead, near the edge of what he could perceive in the water was a large mass sitting on the riverbed, and while he couldn’t see it clearly, he was still able to see its nametag.

Tentacled Strangler from the Depths – Medial

Level 50

Even as he stared at the mass, he saw something dark extend from it in a flash before it enveloped one of the River Gators leisurely swimming around beneath the surface.  In less than a second, the Gator had been ripped away from where it had been and pulled back toward the large mass of the Tentacled Strangler, before the meal disappeared completely from his sight. 

Ooh, that’s not good.

Thaden had just run into his main concern when he considered delving through dungeons by himself.  He’d already proven that he was able to handle almost any number of lower-Level monsters through the use of his Spiritual spells to enthrall or dominate them, but the problem came when he was forced to face something outside of the range that Weak Enthrall could affect.  Instead, the only way to win against something like that was to amass a large enough army of weaker minions to take down the stronger monsters.

Unfortunately, he didn’t believe that, even if he managed to control all 30 or so low-Level monsters he saw within this particular part of the river, it wouldn’t be enough to significantly harm the Tentacled Strangler of the Depths; he’d already seen it basically consume an entire River Gator in a few seconds with one of its tentacles, and he didn’t know how many of those appendages the stronger monster had at its disposal.  The difference in Level was just too great to think that a weak army 30+ Levels beneath the horrific monster would actually succeed in killing it.

“Can we move up or down the river and then cross there?” he asked, wondering if they could simply go around the problem.

She shook her head.  “Before I called for your attention, I looked to see if it was clear; unfortunately, I saw even more of these Tentacled Stranglers another 500 feet in each direction.  I don’t believe that’s enough space to squeeze through them, as they seem to be able to move quite quickly.”

“So, we can’t fly above them, we can’t swim around them, and we can’t swim through them.  Where does that leave us?  Do we turn around and go back?  Move upstream or downstream and hope to find a bridge or another way across?”

Sadia thought about it for a second.  “I would advise that we don’t turn around.  I don’t know when those people from the Local Legion will learn about us leaving, but if they’re determined to find us, going back will only bring us closer to them.  We might be able to find a way across if we go up or downstream, but if I remember the maps correctly from your memories, I don’t believe we’ll find anything upstream for about 100 miles when we arrive at Fanebridge.  Downstream is a gamble, as I don’t remember there being anything marked on the map, but it’s possible that there is a bridge or a ford somewhere.”

Neither of those were good options as far as he was concerned.  The first would simply bring them back to where the road they had been following before eventually led, while the second could have them moving along the riverbank for hundreds of miles without any way over it.  As he looked around, he remembered his Beaver minions, wondering if they could somehow use their skills to build some sort of dam or makeshift bridge, but he doubted they could do something like that – or at least not easily or swiftly.  Could I build a raft?  And then float downstream while trying to paddle my way across?  Would a few logs camouflage me enough from the monsters inside the river to succeed?

He doubted a raft would work; plus, he’d never made one before, and even if he did so, he doubted he could create it in less than a few hours.  He really didn’t want to waste that much time while time was at a premium.

Thaden shook his head at the problem before him, wondering what solution would be the most likely to work.  He was wracking his mind, considering multiple scenarios, before Sadia interrupted him again.  “I believe you’re overthinking this.”

“What do you mean?”

She spread her hands in a gesture of helplessness.  “What is it that you usually do when the odds are against you and you’re faced with the impossible?  Think about it and then just do that.”

“Really?  What kind of advice is that?  Just do that?  What am I supposed to do, control every monster in the entire river—?”  Thaden cut himself off, as he realized what he’d just said.  Huh.  I wonder if that might just work?

“What is it?  Did you think of something?”

He nodded, as he started contemplating what he was about to do. 

“This is probably really stupid, but when am I doing anything different, right?” he chuckled, as he began to describe what he was planning to Sadia.  She smiled while she shook her head, but she didn’t say anything to stop him.  “Let’s do this, then.”

With a deep breath, Thaden stepped one foot into the river.  Almost instantly, he could feel a change come over the water, or at least the monsters within the river, as one of his bonus traits came into effect.  Previously, while traveling over the land, any hostile monsters within 3 miles would immediately be attracted to his location and would attack – but they were spread out far enough that it wasn’t that big of a problem.  The monsters within the river hadn’t acted the same, however, as he was located outside of their domain; since he wasn’t in the water and accessible, he wasn’t necessarily invisible to them, but they weren’t immediately forced to head toward his direction. 

It was something he had thought about when he considered Sadia swimming him across to the other side, but once he put his foot in the water, he realized how naïve he had been.  All of the monsters that had been nearby immediately swarmed toward him, and he sent his Beavers into the water to act as a blunting force while he waited for the newcomers to approach – which didn’t take long at all.  As the first bunch arrived near enough to be within his range, he dropped both controlling Reserved spells he had on the Beavers and replaced them with Celestial Spiritual Enhancement Aura – which, at a cost of 45% of his Mana pool, increased his spiritual spell effectiveness.  Originally, the bonus increase in effectiveness was only 25%, but with his other spell effectiveness bonuses of 100%, that 25% doubled to 50% -- which was just enough of a bonus that it would push the threshold for Weak Enthrall from being able to affect targets at Level 9 to Level 10.5 – which he hoped would round up to Level 11.

He found out pretty quickly that the round-up to Level 11 wasn’t a guarantee, as it seemed likely to go either way on a whim; fortunately, his Fortuity was playing a role in his success, and all but one of the Piranhas were caught within his Weak Enthrall when he cast it upon everything within range.  As soon as he took control of the majority of the monsters heading toward him, he used his Beavers, as well as his new Gators and Piranhas, to target the Swordfish that he was unable to affect with Enthrall.  He didn’t need to kill them, only delay them long enough so that he could cast Celestial Dominate Spirit; they did just that by throwing themselves in the Swordfishes’ paths, swarming around them until they couldn’t move.  His minions took a ton of damage as they were sliced up by the nose of the Swordfish, but he multi-cast Weak Minion Regeneration on them and healed them with Weak Health Siphon to keep them all alive. 

While all of this was happening, he kept an eye on the Tentacled Strangler of the Depths, but all the monster did was extend approximately 20 tentacles in his direction, as if straining to reach him; it didn’t move closer from where it was on the riverbed, only moving up and down stream, as if it didn’t care to move into the shallower water.  The tentacles were long enough that he nearly left the water, but they stopped approximately 20 feet away, to his relief; based on how far they extended, he realized that if he had gone into the water with Sadia swimming him across, he would’ve been snatched before he was even halfway to the other side of the river.

When his Superior Dominate Spirit casting completed, successfully dominating everything within range – including the Swordfish – he cancelled his Enthrall spell just in time for another batch of aquatic monsters to arrive from both directions in the river.  Because every hostile monster within 3 miles was now heading toward him, he was planning on taking control of most of them for the next stage of his plan. 

What he hadn’t exactly planned for, however, was for the other Tentacled Stranglers further up and down the river move toward him, as well.  He saw them moving along the riverbed, staying in the lowest depts in the center, but he didn’t have any time to focus on them – because he had his hands full with casting Weak Enthrall and then Celestial Dominate Spirit on the Gators, Piranha, and Swordfish that were constantly arriving by the minute.

Thaden started feeling a little bit of strain on his mind once he had a little over 100 monsters under his control, but he had increased his Mentality since the last time he had tried to control so many of the Gremklins in the dungeon; as a result, he found that he could handle quite a few more.  A few minutes later, as he continued the process over and over as more of the aquatic monsters arrived, the strain began to seriously affect him once he reached a little over 300 of them, and he nearly fell to his knees as it began to overwhelm him.

“That should be enough, Thaden,” Sadia said from next to him, and it required all of his concentration to focus on her words.  “I think you’ve hit your limit.”  He simply nodded and looked down into the water, barely able to see past the veritable army of aquatic beasts that were now filling that portion of the river.  With a herculean effort, he began the next stage of his plan as he ordered all of his new minions to attack the assembled Tentacled Stranglers down below. 

Almost immediately he felt a reduction in the strain on him as, once he actually directed his controlled monsters to attack the Level 50 Stranglers, the tentacles started to fight back by snatching up his minions.  A few of them died immediately, but he’d cast Weak Minion Regeneration on all of them, and the ongoing effect managed to heal most of them that didn’t die upon the first attack. 

He wasn’t actually trying to kill them, however – because that would be asking too much.  Instead, he something else in mind.

With a nod toward Sadia, she jumped into the water ahead of him; at the same time, he mentally changed her form into the same dolphin he was thinking about before.  She hit the water and began swimming around, and Thaden leapt forward into the deeper part of the river; Sadia swam underneath him and he grabbed ahold of her upper dorsal fin, and she began pulling him even further into the swiftly flowing water.

Theoretically, Thaden’s army of controlled monsters might be enough to distract the Tentacled Stranglers long enough to make it to the other side – but he had a much stupider idea.

When he felt he was in range, approximately a third of the way across the river, he dipped his head under the water and recoiled at the absolute chaos that was occurring below the surface.  His eyes widened as he witnessed an entire dozen of the Tentacled Stranglers, more than he expected, tearing into his forces, with each of them holding and strangling the aquatic monsters with their tentacles – and his sizeable army was shrinking by the moment. 

Without a second to waste, he began casting a second Celestial Dominate Spirit spell, his eye on the original Strangler that had been there from the beginning – but he made sure that the spell would target every target within 180 feet.  Thankfully, it appeared as if the larger masses of tentacles had their “hands” full with killing Thaden’s minions, and while they didn’t exactly ignore him, they had a single-minded focus on eliminating the victims already in their grasp.  Even with Minion Regeneration keeping them alive longer than they normally would be, his forces were diminishing by the second, and when one died, the next one would be snatched up in no time at all.  His previous 300+ minions had been reduced to half of that number in a matter of 20 seconds, and the rest were on the way out. 

Come on!  Hurry up!

His spell didn’t listen to him, but whether or not his Fortuity had a hand in the outcome, but the last 100 or so monsters under his control managed to just barely hang on by the time his spell went off as he canceled the previous Dominate Spirit spell.

Thaden immediately felt the strain come back as he successfully connected to 4 of the Tentacled Stranglers down below – as well as each of the surviving lower-Level monsters still swimming around.  Fortunately, Sadia could feel the strain and began directing the remaining Gators, Piranhas, and Swordfish to attack the other 8 Stranglers to distract them, while Thaden directed his newest acquisitions to do the same.  While his new, terrifying minions were outnumbered, they had an advantage that the other Stranglers did not.

They had a dedicated healer keeping them alive.  With an immediate cast of Weak Minion Regeneration and then multiple casts of Weak Siphon Health to keep those that were being injured alive, he began to see some results.  It was frankly a chaotic mess of tangled tentacles attacking each other down below, with snake-like appendages being ripped out of their main bodies – which appeared to be enormous blobs of dark blubber with a tooth-filled maw right out a nightmare – and his smaller forces were ripped to pieces in the melee. 

At that point, the hostile Stranglers surrounded his controlled minions, thinking to overwhelm them, but for every tentacle that was ripped apart or out of their bodies, they were regenerated within seconds as they shot out of the body again as if nothing had happened.  His healing was powerful, especially when all of his bonuses were added up, but it was going to be a lengthy battle if he didn’t do something about it; Dominate Spirit only allowed them to leach Health, after all, and that was limited to a portion of Thaden’s own max Health.

Fortunately, after Sadia had directed all of the smaller minions to start attacking, she took over the healing while Thaden began casting Dominate Spirit once again to target all of the Stranglers, dropping the Spiritual Enhancement Aura to regain some of his Mana pool back.  Normally, after failing to dominate a monster with Dominate Spirit, there was a backlash that would drain his stats; thanks to his Haunted Nemesis Advancement, however, that backlash was transferred to the targets of his spells.  In addition, there was normally a cooldown after failing, or even succeeding, before he could try again, but his Karmic Balance Advancement – the same one that tripled his casting time – negated any cooldowns; therefore, there was nothing preventing him from casting it again.

This time, when the spell finally completed, he caught an additional 4 Stranglers in his controlling net, which was pretty much the limit to what he could handle because of their high Level – and that was even with all of the smaller monsters having been destroyed during the conflict.  With the advantage of numbers, as well as the reduction in stats that 2 failed backlashes had upon the remaining Stranglers, his own tentacled minions began leaching Health from the monsters, using their appendages to tie up the hostile monsters, not doing any damage by that means, but essentially just making sure that the enemy couldn’t fight back.  With their tentacles essentially wrapped in knots, they were helpless as their Health eventually wore down after nearly 10 minutes of Health leaching.

As the last hostile one died, Thaden couldn’t help but smile as he resurfaced from watching and breathed out in relief.

He’d done it, even if it had been stupidly close – but that was the way he seemed to operate most successfully.  Against the odds, he had a way of coming out on top, one way or another.