The Destroying Plague Read online

  Experience: +900.

  Experience at current level (26): 34550/36400.

  The body started to twinkle, and I hurried to check the loot.

  You got 1000 gold.

  Not exactly what I wanted, though generous. That was a lot of experience, but no wonder — the location was obviously unusual.

  I rose, the hedgehog’s corpse disintegrated, and two new vertical lines emerged in the air in the hall’s center, auguring the opening of two new portals. But I had no time to swear at the strange treasury and even stranger mechanics of handing out rewards for Threats. Two new hedgehogs, their sinister spines bristling, had begun to rise.

  * * *

  Maybe this was a feature of my chosen Path of Courage, or a new idea from Snowstorm, but I’d spent over an hour in the treasury without getting kicked out.

  After two level twenty-eight Experienced Hedgehog Warriors, which gave me two thousand gold each, three naturally appeared at an even higher level. With them, the Mother Hedgehog Warriors, I struggled. My health bar after the previous battle was a little under ninety percent. It wasn’t regenerating, which forced me to be careful. Thankfully the mobs only attacked in melee range, so I kept my distance and kept using Stunning Kick, Paralyzing Shot, Iggy’s similar Binding Toxin and his Deadly Chirp. At the same time, I kept my Vindication. It (the resource) was available — the Infection debuff had ticked up to twenty thousand while the guys were taking me to Behemoth. But I could only add to it by getting hit. That wouldn’t be a wise move in this situation.

  I sent the well-beaten trio of hedgehogs running with a Ghastly Howl, finished off the first one while the others ran around in Fear, and when the effect ended and the mobs returned, I knocked one out with a Stunning Kick and the second alongside Iggy. I didn’t have any problems dealing with the last hedgehog.

  The trio did manage to hurt me, though. It was a good thing I’d leveled up and my health had recovered. Ten thousand gold clinked into my backpack to join the other coins. I hurriedly invested my stat point into Perception, increasing the range of Sleeping Vindication.

  Immediately after that, without a moment to catch my breath, another portal opened. Only one, but wider and larger. A level thirty Hedgehog Guardian noisily bounced out, a boss around the size of a small mech tank, with a hundred thousand health.

  The guard made me sweat. He only dealt physical damage, but unlike the previous fighters, but he was twice as large, heavier and a couple of his attacks forced me to move quicker.

  Spinning in place, he chaotically shot out metal spines in all directions and there was no way I could dodge them. All I could do was cover myself with Stoneskin and turn around, hiding my head to protect my eyes. I should have forgotten about my days of total invulnerability and gotten myself some good equipment! I was used to strolling through instances naked…

  The guard’s other special attack could have one-shotted me if I hadn’t leveled my Resilience so high: the boss rolled up into a ball and rolled toward me as fast as lightning. I couldn’t just dodge — he easily changed direction and hit me with his spines, a glancing blow, but it still tore my armor and flesh. Elites might be twice as strong as ordinary mobs, but bosses were bosses; they dealt insane damage.

  All my experience of fighting mobs depended on the invulnerability of my undead curse, and old habits die hard — like my habit of attacking bare-handed. After releasing a combo on the boss, I couldn’t stop when he gathered himself into a ball bristling with needles. It was bad enough that I lost more health than I gained with Lifesteal; I also felt such terrible pain that I swore not to attack enemies like this again with my fists. It was one thing to hit the smooth surface of a shield or breastplate, and another entirely to slam your fist into a sharp and bony needle. I badly needed some plate gloves!

  All this led me to a moment in which I panicked. I had less than a third of my health left, my Destroying Plague debuff hadn’t gone anywhere, and I was far from willing to die and risk my character for the sake of gear, even super-legendaries. But I had no way out. My retreat was cut off, and even Depths Teleportation wasn’t working.

  Things looked dire, but Iggy and I beat away at the Hedgehog Guardian — in the end I couldn’t resist, and fired an arrow charged with Vindication. Like Tissa guessed, the damage from the energy of the Sleeping Gods went right through his defenses; the boss died, generously dropping three thousand experience. Now the only problem was that my Vindication was at an extreme low — not enough to kill even a single mob.

  Local achievement unlocked — Treasury of the First Mage: Path of Courage!

  Achievement progress: 1/99.

  Only heroes may enter the Treasury of the First Mage, and only the strongest in spirit among them choose the Path of Courage. The first guard is defeated, and you have opened your heart to the spirit of the treasury. From now on, each subsequent Step on the Path of Courage will be rewarded generously.

  Reward: +1% to damage against the guardians of the treasury and their minions.

  This was the first time I’d encountered a multi-stage achievement like this. I understood the mechanics, but I still wondered; would all the rewards be local, and the damage increase linear, just adding a percentage for each Step, or would I get something more serious as I went along?

  After looting the boss, I realized that something more interesting had dropped from it than from the previous mobs:

  You got a Basic Magic Transformation Tome.

  At first, I was overjoyed, but then realized I was still thinking in terms of the sandbox. In Darant, anyone could buy magic tomes if they had the money. Magic was the same as skills in Dis: theoretically you could learn everything… Practically… There was no point in it, especially if your class wasn’t predisposed to the corresponding stats.

  Simply put, even a warrior that joined a guild of mages, Nergal followers or another school, could study a tome of basic light magic. That would let him heal himself in battle, but at a certain point the effect of that healing would be tiny relative to his total health. He wouldn’t be able to level up the skill enough because his stats wouldn’t allow it.

  As for the cost of basic magic tomes, they varied from ten to fifteen thousand gold — I’d gotten as much from the Hedgehog Warriors. So, my first item reward from the treasury didn’t exactly impress me. I wouldn’t have even called it a reward.

  And here’s why. The tome ended up not in my backpack, with its unhappy three free slots that I’d carefully freed up for my loot. No, it went to the Treasure Hunter’s Bag that had apparently appeared out of nothing. It had no material incarnation; it was just an icon in my interface.

  Treasure Hunter’s Bag

  Divine

  Soulbound to Scyth.

  Capacity: 99 cells.

  In the days when the One Ocean washed all the world and struck the first created continent, the First Mage of Disgardium created this created this spaceless immaterial bag specially for his treasury. Every treasure hunter that has ever broken in and dared to steal anything at all has received such a bag, and once they died, they were doomed to become its guardian.

  Effects: disappears along with its contents after death in the treasury or will be permanently soulbound to the player if they get out alive.

  I couldn’t believe my eyes. What? The bag’s name was showing up red! Divine gear! Considering my class penalty, it was just a stunningly essential gift! Epic chests of similar capacity cost upwards of a hundred thousand gold, and this was divine quality too! Holy… All I had to do now was get out.

  An invisible bell tolled once. The ringing echoed endlessly throughout the hall, bouncing off the walls. No new portals appeared, but the gates behind me opened. The far wall of the corridor was back to where it should be. The veil of a portal glittered next to it.

  Nothing else was happening except that my life had started to recover, and a lot quicker than it should have done. A minute or two later it reached the max, only now the upper limit was at ninety nine percent!
The last little sliver of it was red, and I saw an explanation in a row of debuffs I’d gotten:

  Curse of the Treasury

  The stuffy air of the Treasury of the First Mage is affecting you.

  —1% total health.

  It looked like I had the option of leaving with what I’d gotten or staying to try my luck and let the games continue until I either left or died. The main thing that bothered me was — what would happen if I died? Would Infection activate?

  This version of the treasury relied on the player’s greed, giving them a choice after each Step: take something and leave, happy with what you got, or risk everything you already got to try and get more?

  The second option was the obvious choice for me. The divine bag was a great reward on its own, of course, but from what I understood, it wasn’t the main reward, but just the packaging. And the basic magic tome and sixty thousand gold… If I was honest, I’d hoped for more.

  “Walker on the Path of Courage! Second Step!” I heard from beneath the hall’s dome.

  The gates slammed shut. The squares on the floor changed — instead of one line in the corner of each, two lines were now etched. An angular point of travel magic appeared again in the center of the hall.

  The portal it turned into was darkened with mist and spat ash and sparks out from the other side, after which came a cloven-hoofed and horned mob:

  Satyr Tormentor, level 28

  Elite

  Covered in matted fur, unarmed and unarmored, it seemed this creature needed none of it. My first arrow clattered harmlessly off his chest. The damage logs didn’t even update. The cloven-hoofed creature ignored Binding Toxin, fired in a fine sticky stream from Iggy’s stinger.

  Stamping his hooves, he emitted a staccato bleat, pierced me with his gaze and waved his arms. It was obvious why he was unarmed: his horns, tail and talons extended and filled with mist. The tip of his tail shined with a dull metallic gleam. The satyr bowed its head, stamped a hoof and, bleating something threatening, began his charge.

  And this was just step two of ninety-nine? At that moment, preparing to apply Stoneskin and to counter the hoofed creature with a charged Combo, I sorely regretted that I hadn’t entered the treasury before Infection.

  At least then I wouldn’t be afraid to die.

  Chapter 7. Path of Courage

  THE DRAWN-OUT BATTLE with the hoofed satyr minions was tough. I didn’t have enough Vindication, and the miserly drops of Health I was getting with Lifesteal from my Combo weren’t helping. My arrows didn’t harm the demons, and my hand-to-hand damage was badly reduced. If it weren’t for Iggy, I might not have lasted the three rounds. The needler fired from his machine-gun stinger, not forgetting to periodically implant larvae in the satyrs and give them a debuff to cut down their total health.

  A quarter of an hour of constant mayhem, constant walking on the edge and a bunch of burnt-out nerve cells — but I survived. In no small part thanks to my speed advantage, moving twice as fast as the mobs.

  The finale of the second Step was the appearance of the guardian:

  Satyr Guardian, level 31

  Boss

  It seemed the mob’s levels were changing to match mine. The second guard was level thirty, then I leveled up and the enemy’s level also changed. But there was another option: the guard at each next stage would be one level higher. I didn’t like that option at all, because it would turn advancement into an unachievable mission. Although, it fit perfectly with the reward limitation that Infect and Tissa encountered — they dangle all the stuff you could get, but in the end…

  This boss didn’t start the battle right away. After emerging from the portal, the satyr carefully looked around, then studied me with his gaze. Bowing his head, he chuckled — his upper lip peeled back and bared large horse teeth.

  In the meantime, I was trying to figure out what his special abilities were. If he was a melee fighter, like the previous satyrs, then I had a chance… If not…

  No. The guard struck his palm with his fist, beginning to enshroud himself in armor. His already impenetrable fur was covered in black scales, forming into full-fledged armor. The clawed hands of the hoofed creature flashed with fire, finally dashing all my hopes.

  A mage after all. The satyr attacked, starting with a bunch of fireballs. Several small, walnut-sized balls of plasma shot at a speed that gave me no time to even think of dodging. Protecting me, Iggy threw himself in front of them. His pre-death squeal ravaged the ears with a Deadly Chirp. The satyr froze, and I used this to close the distance. I released a few arrows as I ran, aiming for the boss’s bare head. One hit, landing in his face. The needler’s stun still hadn’t worn off when I extended the effect with a Stunning Kick and desperately loosed my entire arsenal on the boss.

  The satyr recovered from the stun, pulled the arrow out of his cheek along with a good part of the cheek, leapt up and kicked me full force in the chest with his hooves. All the air went out of my lungs. I was thrown thirty feet, not to mention the damage — my health bar turned yellow. Rising up, I waited for another fireball to hit me and turn me into a human torch, or for something else to happen — any kind of trickery. But after hundreds of deaths in the sandbox, I had no fear of pain. Especially since I still had some surprises for the satyr.

  Clenching internally, I somersaulted to the side away from a path of fire, took some exploding fireballs to the chest, paying no attention to the burning and flames, tied the guard’s legs with a Slowing Shot and fought fire with fire with an Explosive Shot. The shot hit the satyr in the stomach and knocked him off his feet, but didn’t even damage his armor.

  Working my bow as I ran, I dodged a clawed arm cutting through the air, jumped to avoid a hoof, and struck with Hammer. The satyr’s elongated face twisted, he took a step back to maintain his balance and I struck his turned-back leg with a Combo.

  The satyr’s limb flexed and he fell to one knee. The mob blocked my next strike and suddenly grabbed hold of my arm, turning my wrist to himself.

  “Wait…” he bleated, panting and swearing fiercely. “Azmodan’s cock take you! I swear on the Faun, this is Behemoth’s seal! How did you get it? This is the mark of the Sleeping One! How? Who are you?

  He released my arm and rose, showing no aggression. He ran a finger along his torn cheek and the edges of the wound merged. His large nostrils flared in greed. The satyr was waiting for an answer.

  “I am Scyth, initial of the Sleeping Gods…” I answered, surprised by the mob’s behavior. “And you are?”

  “Flaygray is my name,” he said. “What do you seek in this hole forsaken by all the gods, Scyth?”

  “This is the Treasury of the First Mage, right?”

  “The First Mage?” the satyr asked in surprise.

  “Um… I don’t know his name. I don’t even know who he is.”

  “No wonder. I was possessed centuries ago… Or rather, a couple of sinister and frivolous fiends dragged me here, pulling me from my long frolics. ‘We’ll clear out the treasury and be rich until the end of our days,’ they said. Heh. We got stuck here forever. Even in those days, none remembered the name of this ‘First Mage,’ except that he was called by another name — Rascal. They said he was a good-for-nothing. Haughty, greedy, boastful. The gods punished the cretin and sent him to the Nether.

  I noticed that I was out of combat, which hadn’t happened since the very beginning of the second Step. And not only had the satyr’s name appeared in his profile, but the color had changed too: the enemy red had turned to neutral yellow!

  “As you say, Flaygray. What surprises you about Behemoth’s mark?”

  “What surprises me?” The satyr laughed. “I do not know your times, but in my days, that name inspired respect even in the most superior of demons! I never saw it myself, but I heard that Diablo and Belial turned the whole underworld upside down in joy when the Sleeping God disappeared!”

  “He couldn’t have disappeared. You know that, right?”

  “Pfft…
Of course not. But the new gods did such a number on the mortals that they forgot all about praying to the Sleeping Gods. And without faith, there is no god, any, um… god would tell you that. Well, thank you for sating my curiosity, Scyth. Shall we continue the battle? Who knows, perhaps one day I will get out of here and perceive Behemoth with my own eyes? By the way, you are nimble for a human! But that will not help you, I fear…”

  Flaygray began to retreat, putting distance between us and starting to cast his fireballs.

  “Wait…” an idea was forming in my head. “You said ‘get out’? How? You’re bound to this place…”

  “Nobody has the right to bind a free satyr to anything!” the hoofed creature stated proudly. “But my spouse… To the Nether with that witch! I have a contract, Scyth. When the guards grabbed me and my stinking demon drinking companions, they gave us a choice: die or serve as guards. As soon as I send ninety nine treasure hunters to the Nether, the contract will be complete. I will be free.”