NOVEL NEXT Chapter 22: Dungeon Rewards
As I made my way up the hill to the stronghold to rescue my 'parents' from the Daimyo, I thought about my actual parents. My mom died when I was twelve. Cancer. At least, that's what they told me. I didn't see her wither away or anything. Just one day she was there and the next she wasn't.
My dad died when I was fifteen. Multiple gun shot wounds. He worked for the local organized crime syndicate, or the mafia as he called it. No one told me how he died other than it was gun shot wounds, and I only knew that because the coroner had me identify the body.
Which is kind of crazy to have a fifteen year old identify his dad's body, but that's what happened. The mafia adopted me after that. Technically, Johnny "The Jon" Jaunderson adopted me, but it was more the whole mafia that did it rather than just him.
They trained me in how to pick locks, run scams, and shoot a gun. They even taught me basic self defense. Well they paid for me to take self defense classes in different disciplines. They said at least one of them should work.
They didn't personally know much self defense other than shoot the guy shooting you, but they didn't want me walking around with an unregistered fire arm as a teen, so they settled for the classes.
I sat in on deals with other crime syndicates. Johnny always told them I was his son and he was "teaching me the ropes." Honestly, I think he just liked having someone in those meetings who didn't want to kill him. Someone who would watch his back no matter what.
Eventually, I rebelled as all teens do. I joined a band and toured around, sleeping in a van or the back of bars. They caught up to me eventually. They didn't have any hard feelings.
They didn't want me sleeping in vans anymore though. So they put me up in an apartment until I could make my own money. Which basically meant, until I got tired of the measly allowance they gave me and finally turned back to crime so they could take me into the fold again.
I never did though. I had been playing a show the night that Victoria turned me. I was on drums. I left through the back of the bar into an alley. That was when she 'attacked' me.
She pushed me up against the wall and got down on her knees. She started to unzip my pants, but I stopped her. I said, "You're worth more than this. You don't need to do that to get my validation. You are valid." That was when she kissed me, and the rest is history.
I had assumed she was just a groupie debasing herself to get my attention as a musician she admired. It hadn't occurred to me at the time that she had been trying to suck the life essence out of my, uh, dick.
When I got to the top of the hill, two tall multi-story buildings loomed over me on my left and right sides. As I looked closer, there were archers positioned on several layers of balconies aiming right at me.
"Stop!" A man said. "I assume you're looking for me."
[Main Objective: Defeat the Daimyo and rescue your parents]
There was an elderly couple behind the man, who I assumed were my 'parents'. Which meant he was the Daimyo.
"I'm going to defeat you… guy," I said, trying to play the character in the story of this game.
"You don't even know my name? It's Nobuhiro," he said proudly.
"That won't be your name when I'm done with you," I said, trying to sound threatening.
"What will it be then?" He said, confused?
"Nothing. Because you'll be dead," I said.
"Oh. I guess that makes sense," he said. "But not so fast! Let's see you deal with my archers first. They'll put so many holes in you that you'll… have a lot of holes in you after they do it."
"Yeah, that made sense," I said sarcastically.
I looked up at the archers aiming at me and prepared to react the moment one of them shot at me. They all loosed a volley at me at the same time. I dove to the side, but by the time I got back up, they were already shooting more arrows at me.
I dove into the grass again and again but they didn't get tired or run out of arrows. So I did the first thing I could think of. I jumped up to the second floor balcony of one of the buildings to take out the archers in close combat.
Instead of that happening, I jumped so high that I sailed way above the second floor balcony. I landed on the fourth floor balcony out of view of most of the archers, except for the ones on the fourth floor balcony of the building I was on and the one across from it.
I spun to dodge an arrow just as the archer in front of me loosed it. Then I grabbed him by the collar and threw him over the balcony. He landed with a thud and didn't move.
Trying to measure out my jumping power better this time, I jumped to the fourth floor balcony of the building across from me. I turned my jump into a kick in the chest of the archer on that balcony and then picked him up and hurled him off too.
There was only one archer per balcony. I jumped from balcony to balcony tossing dudes onto the ground below. When I got to the second floor balcony, realizing I couldn't toss them off to kill them, I formed a blood sword and chopped their heads off.
Since I had a height advantage, I leaped from the second floor balcony at the Daimyo and performed an overhand strike with my sword. He put his sword up to block but the combination of my downward strike and Vi infused blood sword caused my sword to cut right through his and through his body, bisecting him in half.
The left side of his body fell away from the right side and blood sprayed, covering me and my 'parents'. They hugged me and started crying. Especially my 'mom'.
[Congratulations! You have completed the level "One Night in Edo"]
[You have completed a secondary objective. You will receive an additional reward]
[Standby for mission rewards]
Everything turned gray and my 'parents' froze. I moved away from them and saw that behind them there were some lit torches around a couple boxes. The torches and the boxes were in color.
A portal opened nearby for me to exit. I didn't take it because I was far too enamored with and curious about the potential rewards that lay in store for me.
There was a big box and a small box next to it. I tried opening the big one first. It was locked. Hmm. I got out my lockpicks and tried to pick the lock but it didn't work. I got a system message.
[Error: Lockpicking skill not permitted for use on reward boxes]
Hmm. If lockpicking didn't work, then maybe smashing did? I took the blood sword I was still holding and reformed it into an axe. I started whacking at the large box with it, trying to smash it to bits. I got a system message again.
[Error: Reward box is indestructible]
I racked my brain for a solution. After a few seconds, the most obvious light bulb idea went off in my head that at first I thought it couldn't possibly be correct. What if the key that Elder Ravenkin gave me would unlock them?
It was entirely possible. He never said where or how he got it. And he clearly didn't know what it opened. What if he found it in a portal and just never figured out how to use it.
I pulled the red key out of my pocket. I slowly put it into the lock of the large box and turned it left. I heard the telltale click of a lock disengaging. I pulled the key out and put it in my pocket.
I opened the box. Held within it was a katana with a deep crimson blade that shimmered in the torchlight.
[You have obtained the sword "Muramasa's Blood Fiend"]
[Forged by Muramasa himself and rumored to be a cursed sword that requires blood to be shed whenever it is drawn]
[Muramasa's Blood Fiend possesses the following abilities:]
[Blood Honing: Every time the sword absorbs blood from a new source, it becomes slightly sharper and deals more damage than before]
[Blood Mastery: Increases the effectiveness of blood manipulation by 100%]
[Blood Sense: After absorbing blood, the wielder can sense the location and movement of that blood, whether within an opponent's body or in traces left behind. This provides an intuitive awareness of the target's position and movements in battle, and allows tracking of injured targets through blood trails or residue]
[Blood Draw: A concealed mechanism in the sword's hilt. When activated, it extends a needle that pierces the wielder's palm, allowing for quick access to their blood for manipulation techniques]
Holy sh*t! What an amazing reward! This sword sounded incredible and perfectly tailored to my needs as a vampire and as a cultivator. The curse could barely be considered a drawback. I would only ever draw it if I intended to use it and if I ended up not needing to in a moment, I could just draw my own blood with it.
Now I just needed to figure out how to activate the Blood Draw ability. I twisted and cranked the hilt with both hands until I found out how to use it. I just had to crank the bottom half of the hilt forward away from me and a sharp needle would puncture my palm.
It wasn't very deep or painful. The needle was so sharp, I barely felt it. I could see myself doing a lot of damage with this sword. I already had an idea for a blood manipulation technique I could use with it. That would have to wait for later though.
Now I needed to see what reward the small box held. I used the key again to open it and carefully put it back in my pocket. I needed to put that thing on a string along with my amulet so I couldn't lose it.
When I opened the box, I was greeted to a relatively small pile of gold coins. I say relatively small pile because even a small pile of gold coins is a lot of gold coins!
[You have obtained 100 Gold Giblets!]
I saw a piece of fabric and string sticking out of the side of the pile. I pulled it out and saw that it was a dark midnight blue felt coin purse with a bright yellow cinching string.
I gathered all the coins into the purse, cinched it, and put it in my pocket. If I were a betting man, and sometimes I am, I would guess that these coins were useable currency in the monster world. I knew the dragons would take them at the very least because they were gold and dragons loved gold.
I happened to look up above the boxes and noticed a strange tear in space. It looked like a pulsing red keyhole in the fabric of space. It obviously would use the key I had in my possession, but I had no idea what it would do. As I stared at it a system message popped up in front of me.
[Would you like to lock this dungeon instance?]