Random Portals

“Yes, mimics, and by the way, I no longer have any control over the mimics, not that I ever had much control over them. All I could do was put them back into stasis for a short time.”

Taking a deep breath, Steven did his best to forget about the mimics for the moment. “What do you mean by the original parts of the dungeon?” Steven walked over to the pit and began dropping skeletons. He had wasted enough time with chitchat. He needed to be leveling up.

“Well, before Sorin came along, this was just a normal dungeon that the half Naga and Spider-kin used to sharpen their young into warriors. Then Sorin took over the dungeon with his domain. This room here and all the others are from the original part of the Dungeon and his domain has little to no effect within these rooms.”

“But why? What does he get out of claiming this dungeon?” Steven asked, moving to one of the larger pit traps next to the narrow path.

“There are few undead Dungeons and Sorin is a young and a relatively weak Domain holder, taking control of the undead Dungeon is a safe way to hide till he could grow in power,” Silvia’s light pulsated a couple times, “Ive been meaning to ask how are you doing that? Ive never seen anything like that before.”

“What this?” Steven asked while dropping another skeleton in the pit.

“Yes, that is one of the craziest abilities I’ve ever seen! It also has Sorin frighted to death.” Silvia said that last part with a bit of a chuckle.

“You really don’t like Sorin, do you?”

“Absolutely not! He was horrible to me, always calling me names and demanding things while making me call him master or lord. He is an evil blood-sucking vampire and I hate him.”

Steven paused from dropping skeletons. “Did you say vampire?”

“Yep! A greedy, no good vampire!”

Steven pulled out the water pipe.

“You realize that affects your judgment, right?” Silvia said.

After taking a couple of hits, he offered some to the Wisp, who politely declined. He didn’t even know if the Wisp could smoke, but he thought it would be absolutely hilarious if she could.

“It helps calm me down, and make better decisions.” Steven said off handily.

“Oh! Well, in that case, I would recommend using it more often!” Silvia said in a completely serious tone.

Steven chuckled to himself. He was starting to like this floating ball of light. With that thought, he opened up the prompt and selected yes, without giving it much more thought.

Suddenly, a bright pink light shot from the Wisp and formed into what Steven could only describe as a pink rope. It then shot directly into his chest. Then a dark green rope of light came from Steven. The two ropes of light came entangled. Then it was over and Steven fell to the ground, panting. He stared wide eyed at the Wisp for a moment before he finally found words to speak. “Uh, was that supposed to happen? It lifted me off the ground!”

“I-I think so. I’ve never been Soul-bonded before, so I’m unsure.”

Now that Steven looked at the Wisp, he noticed some dark green swirls in the normally pink ball of light. Instantly, he looked down to make sure he wasn’t glowing pink. If he was glowing pink, it would be tremendously harder to use his stealth ability!

Luckily, he didn’t see any pink glowing lights coming from his skin.

“Your eyes! They are so beautiful!” Silvia said.

“Don’t tell me they are glowing pink!”

“I wouldn’t say glowing.”

“Are you kidding? I have pink eyes now!” Suddenly everything went pitch black other than the Wisp in front of him and Steven went still. “What’s happening?”

“I’m not sure, but the color looks amazing on you. I think it really brings out your cheekbones, but don't worry it's probably only temporary.”

“No! I mean, everything went dark!”

It took Steven a moment to realize he no longer had a dark vision counter. He quickly pulled out a potion and drank half. “Never mind, my dark vision just expired is all.”

“Oh. Well, next time we can just use shared vision instead.”

“I didn’t realize that was a thing?”

“Me either! But I now have words that hover in front of me and they are telling me all sorts of things!”

“Oh yeah, that’s a stat page. Did you not have one before?”

“No, I’m unsure if any Wisps in the history of Wisps has had one!” Silvia’s light began pulsating and Steven got the sense that she was excited.

Steven let the Wisp do her own thing, and he got back to skeleton killing.

+83

Steven paused. That skeleton had been worth a good bit more than the others. He wasn’t sure why, but he wasn’t about to complain.

+79

+86

+83

Steven stopped and opened his inventory. Nothing seemed to be any different about the skeletons and he still had seventy-three left. His eyes widened in surprise. Did he just get a boost in how much essence he gained from Dungeon monsters by bonding with that Wisp? He turned to Silvia, who was muttering to herself while looking over stats. He would ask later. Besides, he had some leveling to do. A smile crept onto his face as he began dropping skeletons. This was no small increase. He went from gaining fifty something to eighty something!

He glanced over at his essence counter. He now had twenty-one hundred and five essence. Glancing at his stat page, he saw he needed just over a thousand essence to level, meaning he had enough for two levels already and climbing!

As time passed and he continued dropping skeletons, his excitement slowly waned. Even with his extra roughly thirty percent increases to his essence gathering, it was still going to be slow going. Eventually, he stopped even paying attention to his essence and began thinking about home.

He wondered if he would ever get back there. And did he even want to go back? He would like to see other humans and explore this world. He had even made a friend. She wasn’t human and part snake, but he didn’t care. It wasn’t long before he didn’t have anymore skeletons to pull out of inventory.

Steven was finally done. He had dropped every skeleton he had into the pits and every single one had died without issue. He wondered if the zombies cushioned each others fall with their bodies. Shaking his head, he tried not to think about rotten flesh being a cushion. Opening his stat page, he looked over his gains.

{Stats*} {Equipment} {Shards} {Inventory}

Level -6

Available Attribute~1

Essence- 8329

Essence required for next level 1003.

HP ~ 72

Stamina ~ 40

Mana ~ 173

Poise ~ 0

Vitality ~ 7

Endurance ~ 4

Strength ~ 4

Dexterity ~ 5

Resistance ~ 7

Spirit ~ 13

Talent-

Basic Stealth -

15% less likely to be noticed while in stealth.

15% noise reduction while in stealth.

20% more damage when attacking in stealth.

A huge grin fell over Steven’s face. This was exciting. That was a lot of essence and was by far the biggest haul he had yet! Steven immediately began leveling. He even had enough essence to gauge how much the essence requirement went up for each new level.

Leveling up to seven, he slightly paled. The required essence to level went up from one thousand three to one thousand one hundred and eighty-nine. At this rate, he wouldn’t get as many levels as he was hoping. It was nearly a two hundred essence increase. But there was nothing that could be done about it and he just continued to level as many times as he could.

When Steven hit level ten, he stopped and took a good look over his stats.

{Stats*} {Equipment} {Shards} {Inventory}

Level -10

Available Attribute ~5

Essence- 3140

Essence required for next level 1840

HP ~ 72

Stamina ~ 40

Mana ~ 173

Poise ~ 0

Vitality ~ 7

Endurance ~ 4

Strength ~ 4

Dexterity ~ 5

Resistance ~ 7

Spirit ~ 13

Talent-

Basic Stealth -

15% less likely to be noticed while in stealth.

15% noise reduction while in stealth.

20% more damage when attacking in stealth.

The last level he gained had cost him two hundred and twenty-nine more essence than his previous level. There didn’t seem to be a set number that increased, but with each level, it did increase. It was going to be slow leveling if he ever expected to get seven shard abilities. Looking over his weapons and then his stats, he realized he was still a good ways off from using the spear. From the looks of it, he would need to be level seventeen. He had enough essence for one more level, so he spent the essence bringing him to six free attribute points, though he wasn’t even sure where to place his stats. He probably shouldn’t hoard so many attribute points. After all, he already had a plan, and it was to use the lightning spear.

Looking through his weapons, he noticed the short bow required eleven in dexterity. He could really use some range, besides bows and stealth, went hand in hand together. He needed eleven in dexterity for the spear, anyway. Steven then placed all six of his stats into dexterity and hit confirm. Suddenly, his body started twitching. It was just a slight twitch in his muscles at first, then it became more pronounced and his whole body began jerking around. His muscles began to burn and felt like they were ripping apart. Even his eyes felt like they were being stretched, causing everything to go blurry. At one point he even felt the sensation of falling, but the pain was so intense he barely gave it any thought.

He just lay on his back, waiting for the pain to quit. He thought he heard a distant voice, but he ignored it. It hurt to listen, and no way in hell was he going to even move a muscle, it even hurt to think, and all he wanted to do was sleep.

Steven’s eyes shot open to someone screaming at him. The first thing that came to mind was his aunt telling him to turn down the tv, but he quickly realized where he was.

“What happen to you! You just started screaming and jerking around. You even fell into the pit trap! I thought you were a done for, but then you just appeared on your back unmoving.”

“Oh! Just. Please, stop screaming. My head is pounding. Give me a minute, okay?” Steven said while holding his head.

“Why don’t you just use a healing potion? Do you not have any?”

Steven’s eyes widened. “Of course.” He then pulled out a health potion and downed it.

Instantly, he felt the pain and tension start to leave and his head slowly stopped pounding. He quickly checked to see how many healing potions he had left. He would definitely need to ask Sirus for more.

“Only two left.” Steven mumbled. He probably didn’t need a full potion, but he had no regrets.

“Are you even listing to me?”

“Sorry, sorry. I’m felling much better now. What did you say?”

“I was asking what happen to you?”

“Well, I kinda messed up is what happen. I didn’t think using multiple attribute points at one time would have such an effect. I have definitely learned my lesson!”

“Yeah, that will cause some pain, I hear. I forget you are so new to this world. Next time just ask me, okay, we are bonded now, and if you die, I am sent to Nembulia and I don’t want to go there!”

“What is the Nembulia?”

“Basically, just a void. A terrible place. I don’t want to talk about it right now. Anyway, I was looking over your equipment while you were out and I was wondering why you didn’t use your ring of summons against the skeletal knight? It could have bought you enough time to run away, I’m sure.”

Steven looked down at the ring on his hand, “uh. Well, I just didn’t think it was a good time to use it.”

“But you nearly died! I just don’t understand your reasoning.”

“Okay, look. I had just forgot about it okay. This is all new to me. I haven’t even used the ring before.”

“It’s a powerful ring. I’m surprised you got something like that in the dungeon. Also, that spear in your inventory is a rarity I have never seen before.”

“Wait, you can see in my inventory?”

“Yes!” Silvia said excitedly. “Look, I can even go inside it.” She said as she vanished by flying into his chest.

Steven opened his inventory and found a new tab labeled familiar. The wisp popped back out and began talking. “Its quite convenient as Sorin will definitely be looking for me in his dungeon and he won’t be able to track me while I’m in your inventory.”

“Wait! What? He can track you? And didn’t think this was something you should have told me before.”

“Well, I didn’t want you to refuse. And he can’t find me while I’m in your inventory.”

Steven took a deep breath. “Well, I suppose there is nothing to be done about it now. Can you talk to me while in my inventory?”

“I’m unsure. Let’s give it a try!” Silvia vanished. “hello. Can you hear me?”

The voice was distant and quiet, but he could hear it with effort.

“I can hear you, but you sound distant. Can you hear me?”

There was a brief pause before he heard Silvia’s voice echo in. “Yes, it’s echoing, but I can make out what you are saying.” Silvia popped back out of inventory.

“Can you pull things out of my inventory?”

After a few moments, Silvia sighed. “It doesn’t seem like I can. I’m sorry!”

“It’s fine. I was just checking. Okay, we need to get back to it. I need to gain essence. Oh, and speaking of essence, do I get some sort of boost to essence from our bond?”

“Yes, of course you do. I’m a Wisp and we are bound. That’s the main reason Sorin is so pissed, he lost his only chance at getting a boost to his essence.”

“Well, that will be useful. And good, he doesn’t need to gain any more levels, anyway back to business.”

Steven moved his arms around and hopped up and down a bit. He felt limber and got the sense he would be good at parkour now. He wanted to test his new found dexterity out, but the small island he was on wasn’t the ideal place for experimentation.

Pulling out the short bow, he decided now was as good of a time as any to get some practice in.

Walking as close as he could to the narrow path without stepping on it, he nocked an arrow, waited for the axes to swing open, and released. The arrow slammed right into the second axe, causing an echoing ting sound. The skeleton Steven had been shooting at turned its head from side to side but made no indication that it had spotted him. Steven tried to hit the skeleton several more times, but he missed each time. His arm was starting to get tired now, and he noticed his stamina bar getting low, so he stopped to take a break. “Well, so much for being an awesome archer,” Steven muttered. “I need more strength and stamina.”

“It just takes practice,” Silvia said. “It’s not like you are strapped for time, are you?”

“I guess you’re right!” Steven said, “something you said had me curious. You said getting messages from the system was rare, but how do others level and place their attribute points?”

“Only domain holders can place attribute points. Everyone else just gets attribute points placed by what you call the system. They don’t get to choose where they go. it’s one of the perks of being a domain holder. As for how they level, I imagine it’s the same as you. Although most use leveling stones to level up.”

“Oh wow, having a domain gives a huge edge!” Steven paused, “Wait what about the half Naga they didn’t seem surprised at all that I could choose where I placed my points, just that I could do it without the stone?”

“The half Naga, are not normal, they were experiments. I honestly don’t know a lot about them. As for the Domain, it does definitely have its perks, but it also has the downside of powerful beings wanting to take it from you. Which is why Sorin is hiding in this dungeon.”

“Well, that’s good to know! Hopefully, I can go unnoticed till I get stronger. Also, how do others know when it’s time to level if the system doesn’t tell them?”

“I’m guessing they just get a feeling. I’m not exactly sure.”

As soon as his stamina recovered, he got back to practicing. He did this over and over, taking smoke breaks and even eating a couple of times. When his dark vision ran out, he decided to take a nap, to Silvia’s annoyance. She didn’t sleep, and neither had Sorin.

Steven had to tell her to be quiet several times before he finally fell asleep. When he woke up, he drank the other half of his dark vision potion, then took a couple hits from the water pipe and began shooting at the skeleton again. He could probably hit the skeleton if he moved closer, but he needed to practice from a distance. He hoped he would gain a second talent or something, but he got nothing. After about an hour, he had finally hit the skeleton, which caused its health to drop to ninety-three percent. It Immediately charged at him only to get hit by one of the axes and fall into the spiked pit.

+84

“Oh cool! I got essence for that,” Steven said excitedly, “uh. I’ve got less than fourteen hundred and now need over two thousand to level again.”

Either way, Steven was happy that he now had some range, even though he was quite terrible at it. Maybe he would be better at a closer range. This was called a short bow, after all. Steven began walking out onto the narrow path. He was a bit worry, but he kept telling himself he had the amulet on. Despite the fact he was perfectly safe from getting skewered on the spikes below, he was still just a bit terrified as he looked down.

“So what’s the plan? Just run through the axes?”

Steven's eyes widened and he looked at the Wisp, “are you kidding me? Would anyone just run through that?“

“Yes, I imagine everyone does that, unless they have a way to glide, fly, slow time, manipulate metal, phase through objects or become…”

“Okay, okay! I get it.” When Steven was close enough, he activated his shard ability. The axe moved ten feet over, becoming unhinged, and fell. This time Steven used his new found dexterity and touched the axe as it fell, instantly sending it to inventory.

“Oh! That was amazing. I didn’t expect that. Your shard ability is an unusual one, for sure.”

Steven ignored the Wisp for the moment. He had to learn to stop the ability sooner so he could avoid the raging headache. He was starting to think he had made a bad choice. This Wisp was overly talkative. Once his mana refilled, he sent the other axe to inventory the same way and then just walked across the narrow path. He wasn’t sure what he would use the massive axes for, but pulling out a massive chunk of metal could be useful. He imagined dropping it on top of an enemy.

“Where did you get that shard?”

“Sorry, I just need to concentrate on the task at hand. We can talk later. It’s just when I’m in the middle of something. Could you please be silent unless it’s important? We will have plenty of time to talk later. Ive got lots of questions about shards and talents and what not I would like to talk to you about, but first I want to clear this passage.“

Silvia didn’t respond, and he wasn’t sure if she was angry or just doing as he asked.

Steven walked into the treasure room and seen three treasure chests.

“Do you know which ones are mimics?”

“No.” Silvia said.

Immediately, he realized she was upset with him. He hadn’t known the Wisp long, but this was the first one word response she had given him.

“Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t say that to be rude, I just didn’t want to die okay. I’m sure that’s something you can understand.”

Silvia’s light pulsated a few times. “Yes, I can understand that. It’s just, Sorin never let me speak to him either.”

“Let me deal with these mimics and then we can talk about it okay, I don’t want to be in the same room as them.”

“You’re not going to try to take them on, are you? You're only level eleven?”

“No, I’m just going to put the chest in my inventory and get the hell out of here.”

“Oh, okay, well, that works. But I recommend we talk in here where Sorin can’t hear us.”

Steven slowly placed his hand on the chest. When it didn’t go into inventory, he jerked his hand back, ready to run at a moment’s notice. But the mimic didn’t so much as move. The next chest went into his inventory without a problem. Glancing at the last chest, he just turned and made his way back to the other room. She had said two mimics, and he didn’t want to chance waking a mimic for no reason.

Back on the small island, he turned to the narrow path. He was more comfortable being close to the illusionary wall in case he needed to bolt back to the second floor. But he didn’t think a mimic could walk across that narrow path, so he should be safe, although it could possibly jump it.