EdgeCases

Chapter 34 - A Mother's Intuition

As it turned out, the decision to not cry for a third time was a stupid one. Misa decided to give herself a pass. Her mother was holding her again, sobbing into her shoulder, and as much as she hated seeing her cry, she was alive.

She never thought she'd be able to hold her mother again. Of course, she'd never imagined her mother being the one to cry, either.

"Mom," she said softly. "It's good to see you." Again, she wanted to say, but then she'd never seen this ...

Chapter 33 - Past Pains

Misa hadn't actually spawned very far away, and it took only a minute or so of walking for her to reach the walls of her village. She felt her heart tightening as she approached — there were guards stationed near the gates of the village. Those guards had been the first ones to...

"Name and purpose, miss?" A guard asked as she approached. Misa recognized him immediately; it was V'karro. How strange was it that she'd remembered him not too long ago, and now she was seeing him again? Th...

Chapter 32 - Aberrant

Derivan would have frowned, if he could have. The eyelights in his armor dimmed to show his worry.

Helping Misa was, of course, easier said than done. None of them had any idea how they could get to where she was, and Kestel was frantic through the telepathic connection, telling them to find the delve team.

That telepathy faded into a horrified silence as the flames faded and revealed a corridor full of blackened skeletons in front of them.

Sev, Derivan, and Vex all tensed. ...

Chapter 31 - Trigger

The Aberrant seemed to regain any confidence it had lost. It swept itself in a dancing circle, creating a blast of arcane energy that knocked back every one of the delvers that were lunging at it; while they staggered, off-kilter, it lunged itself at one of them and slammed him into the ground. There was a shout, half panicked and half determined, trying to fend off the blow — but arcane energy plunged into his chest and he screamed.

React, you idiot! Misa roared the...

Chapter 30 - Unstoppable Force, Immovable Misa

As a general rule, almost all skills had some sort of range limit, even if that range limit wasn't stated. A fireball's range depended on its strength; the further it traveled, the more the fire or the magic that maintained it would dissipate, and the weaker the spell was. A melee skill's range depended on the size of the weapon you were using, and how much you could physically extend yourself.

More esoteric skills from rarer classes tended to bend the rules; they tried to obey the rule...

Chapter 29 - It's just floating there. Menacingly.

Misa frowned as she looked at the screen. There was something bothering her, and it wasn't the strangely menacing orb, floating in the middle of the room — which in and of itself was rather concerning, considering it should really have garnered all of her attention.

There was something else. She couldn't quite place her finger on what it was, though. Everything seemed fine, and none of the others seemed to have noticed anything...

Misa kept her mind sharp, and her eyes ...

Chapter 28 - Researchers

It was technically Vex that noticed it.

The scrying screens displayed the delve team going through and mapping out the dungeon. Each screen showed them from a slightly different angle, keeping track of both the team themselves and what they were surrounded by. A [Mass Telepathy] spell kept the team hooked up with the researchers, allowing them to be alerted to any dangers that the researchers spotted.

The problem was that the scrying screens were wrong. 2022-04-20 06:43:54 +0000 UTC View Post

Chapter 27 - Dungeons

It was decided that Jerome would be sent back to the Guild, along with the sleeping members of his party. The Guildmaster would personally debrief them later, once the paladin and his team had a little more time to absorb what had happened to them. Sev understood this to mean that the Guildmaster would stand in the corner of the room and stare at them under the full effects of her anti-perception Skills for a solid few hours, making sure that no one was reapplying any geases.

But she wo...

Chapter 26 - Fear

Histre hung in the air, vibrating with fear and paranoia and anger.

Derivan wasn't sure how he knew. Physical Empathy, likely, though he couldn't begin to guess at how he could read the body language of a creature that was more windchime than person. Histre floated in the air in front of them, wings spread in a way that was unnaturally still — almost like they were hung from invisible strings in the air. Golden cylinders rotated agitatedly around one another, swinging back and forth a...

Chapter 25 - Plans, Plans

Sev was surprised the plan was going as well as it was.

Always plan for things to go wrong — that was his motto, though he couldn't remember when he'd decided on it, or why. He preferred his plans to have backups on backups, and for the longest time his final backup had simply been [Divine Communion]. That wasn't an option for him anymore, and so he'd called for them to be very, very sure the plan would work. They hadn't faced a team of intelligent opponents this powe...

Chapter 24 - Interlude - Jerome

To think they had the gall to tell him they wanted to meet him alone.

He'd already been kind! He'd offered them a thousand gold in exchange for some information on a dungeon! Dungeon scouts didn't even get paid that much. He wouldn't have considered paying that much for it at all, but it was some very important information, according to Aurum. It would help them delve the dungeon.

Jerome didn't know why they needed to delve the dungeon,...

Chapter 23 - Planning with Max, Clerk Extraordinaire

"So!" Max clapped her hands together. "Let's get planning, shall we?"

"Wait, wait, wait," Sev said. "How long have you been — what? Why are you level 81? What kind of class is [Adventuring Clerk]? How did you even get — Okay, I know I shouldn't ask that question, but also I have so many questions."

Max cracked up. "Oh, I love revealing that to people. The reactions are priceless every time," she said, grinning wide. "It's a little complicated, but I g...

Chapter 22 - A Path Forward

The four of them tried to speak for a while, but it didn't take long for them to lapse into silence, each lost in their own thoughts. Vex was still trembling slightly, clearly upset, and so without a word Derivan went to do what Vex had done for him, not so long ago — he sat down next to the lizardkin, offering a quiet show of support.

He didn't say anything. There weren't any words for what had just happened; not really. The immediate worry was dealt with by sheer fluke, Derivan unde...

Chapter 21 - Confrontation

"Uh," Sev said. He glanced at the rest of the team, and they all seemed equally stumped. Except for Misa, but the expression she was wearing was her 'punch this problem until it goes away' expression, which more or less translated to being stumped. "I don't suppose I can convince you you have the wrong room?"

"With a mana surge like that?" Jerome chuckled. His tone was almost casual. "I doubt it."

The paladin wore an easy sort of smile — but it was a smile that carried ...

Chapter 20 - Conclusions

"Your truth spells were fooled," Derivan interrupted Tarilex. The lizardkin stopped mid-sentence, turning his gaze to the armor and staring for a long, uncomfortable moment.

"Explain," he said. His voice was hard.

"You have been running some sort of truth spell this entire time," Derivan said. "I wondered why you were acting strangely. You could not trust your spell or skill with the Guildmaster because she has perception-based skills that operate well enough to obscure her even i...

Chapter 19 - Negotiations

Vex had told them the next morning that it likely wouldn't take long for them to be summoned — Elyra, he said, tended to try to throw money at problems instead of actually resolving them. The negotiations would reach an impasse, and they would call on the adventurers to break that impasse.

It wasn't long before he was proven correct. Sev received the summons, asking them to the uppermost floor of the Guild.

"Moment of truth, I suppose," Sev muttered.

There were no stairs t...

Chapter 18 - Truths

The Guildmaster was only mildly surprised to hear of the abundant mana concentration, and the way the deviation had rapidly swung right towards the end; if anything, the most surprising part for her was the weakness of the monsters they had fought in the final waves. A Platinum-tier dungeon was expected to have Platinum-ranked monsters spawn during its formation — but then, this adventuring team had been in lower Bronze, and it was a miracle that they had survived a horde of upper Bronze to...

Chapter 17 - Trust

"...what do you mean?" Sev asked after a moment. He seemed wary.

"How are dungeons ranked, normally?" Derivan cocked his head to the side, helmet clanking against his shoulder plate. "I am afraid I am missing some context."

The Guildmaster gave Derivan a strange look, but Vex quickly took over before she could speak. "They're ranked based on a combination of factors, usually the difficulty of the dungeon's challenges along with the level of the monsters inside. Usually, the dungeo...

Chapter 16 - Dammit, Jerome

"Where the hell did everyone come from?" Misa said, looking around in slight bewilderment. "There weren't this many adventurers around when we left."

"Word got out, I'm guessing," Sev agreed, frowning slightly. "Means it's a big announcement."

Vex was mostly silent — the lizardkin didn't particularly enjoy crowds, instead using Derivan's presence to deter onlookers. Indeed, the other adventurers tended to give Derivan a bit of a berth. Something about his armor being intimidatin...

Chapter 15 - Ecosystem

Derivan finished off the last of the polishing with a bit of a flourish. The others were working through the massive array of food that Sev had purchased, with Misa absolutely demolishing everything that was set in front of her. They glanced over at him from time to time, making sure he felt included, and that had been... nice.

"Well? Did it feel like a massage?" Sev grinned at Derivan. The armor chuckled faintly, glancing over his now-shining armor with a small amount of burgeoning pri...

Chapter 14 - Break

It took a while to get away, for the priests wanted to question them on what happened. A nervous Misa had to fend them off and explain that even trying to talk about it was dangerous, and explaining that had taken some doing. Eventually, the priests extracted a promise from them that they could be called on from the Adventurer's Guild if they were needed for anything, and with that promise secured they quickly fled back to the Guild.

To Sev's room, specifically, where they typi...

Chapter 13 - Tales of a Different God

"I need eight healing potions and five mana potions," Sev said. He hadn't even looked up at the vendor yet, his eyes too busy flicking over the wares they had available — surprisingly high-quality potions of all kinds, actually. The divine mana emanating from them was stable, rather than fluctuating like was common in lower-quality potions. Priests made good potions, but they weren't typically this good. "How much will it cost?"

Then he actually looked up. And... kept looking...

Chapter 12 - Of Dungeons and Priests

"It was a castle," Derivan began. He remembered that much. "A place of cold stone and dark skies. I did not know it at the time, but it is what I now know you call an open dungeon — the kind with unclear boundaries, that draws adventurers in without their realizing. The kind that never breaks, and only grows. The dungeon had secrets, I believe, and a fabricated tale involving an old lord of the castle. But I was not privy to many of those secrets. Before my upgrade to infiltrator, I was con...

Chapter 11 - Bonding

Derivan could, as it turned out, absorb spells from spell scrolls just as a wizard could. He'd made an attempt to study the actual contents of the scroll, but most of what it was describing flew quickly over his head; there was a lot of runic theory embedded in the scrolls that he'd need to study for months to really understand.

"There are thousands of these symbols," Derivan commented, staring at the scroll, then looking up at Vex. "You have all of them memorized?"

"Wel...

Chapter 10 - Magic and Understanding

Derivan and Vex had both retreated to Vex's room. It was a mess, still, but the lizard cleared out a space on the floor for the armor to sit. Comfort wasn't a strict necessity for him, Derivan assured his friend — though that didn't stop Vex from fretting about it.

"You're sure you don't need a chair?" Vex asked again.

Derivan, equal parts amused and exasperated, chuckled. "Comfort does nothing for me, Vex," he said. "It is the same reason I do not need my own tent and bedroll w...

Chapter 9 - Who Even Invented These Stats?

"A slime stat doesn't make any fucking sense!" Misa groaned, throwing up her hands with exasperation. It was, if Derivan was counting correctly, about the fourth time she had made the declaration. She was pacing about the training field, wearing grooves into the dirt with her boots. "What's it even supposed to do? A slime is a type of creature, not a stat!"

"You seem particularly distressed by this," Derivan noted, watching Misa with mild amusement. He supposed he should feel more conce...

Chapter 8 - Answers. Also, More Questions.

"A dungeon formed?" the clerk asked incredulously. "Dungeons don't just form without warning. Our scouts would've noticed!"

"Max," Sev said, rubbing his temples tiredly. "You're my favorite clerk but now isn't the time for this. That was exhausting. We need our pay, and like, five consecutive days of sleep."

"Maybe more," Misa chipped in. Vex nodded as seriously as he could, from his position half-hidden behind Derivan.

"Sorry," Max said, though she sounded...

Chapter 7 - A Complete Disregard for Fate

The party was quiet and downtrodden, even as they began their journey back towards the Guild. They had reported the formation of the dungeon, of course. That was a necessary procedure, and it helped them, too, to engage with something approaching normal. The dungeon meant better resources for everyone in the region, possibly better gear. It was entirely possible that the mana crystal shortage for all the nearby villages could be solved with this, depending on how the politics of dungeon owner...

Chapter 6 - Chains

Derivan caught and strangled the flare of panic as his Skill failed. What did that tell him?

There were only a few possibilities. One, somehow, the Overseer still had access to its skills, and one of them allowed it to mess with [Consume]. Two, it was at such a high level that it could simply ignore the Skill. But... no. That didn't make sense. Skills were generally fairly absolute, the rules of the system inviolable. Sheer levels were rarely enough to allow their effec...

Chapter 5 - Skill Abuse

Derivan knew what he needed to do.

The rest of the party had already expended everything they had. Sev had exhausted most of his mana trying to keep them all alive. Vex had similarly spent most of his mana on spells, and Misa was already barely keeping it together. She had 30% of her health left, and a direct hit from a three-digit leveled creature — something he had, until now, been certain was impossible — would kill her instantly even if she were still at full health. 2022-04-17 04:12:29 +0000 UTC View Post