The Rats would die today! And I would get to see what's next!
"Alchemist/2!"
Discovery! Bonus Forsaken Discovery! Poison use, +2 Poison Saves! 6 Skill points! An Advance!
Discovery, Blood Healing! Normally this would require some customized alchemical extracts put into my blood, but this was a dreamscape, so basically it meant making adjustments to my dream body. Maybe it would be reflected in reality, maybe not. If rendered unconscious, activates automatically.
5 Health worth of fast healing/round, rounds/day = half Alchemist level.
Blood and Soul: Increase Alchemical Spontaneous Healing by 1 hp/rd and 1 rd per Essence invested. Gain +1 Essence… and +1 Soak…
Invest two Essence! 7 hp/rd for 3 rounds per day! From 5 to 21 points of healing...
This was more powerful then it looked, because Vigor turned Health damage to temporary damage. Every point of a healing effect healed a point of temporary damage with every point of real damage. So, this was potentially 42 points of healing per day, not 21, and it could be staggered as I needed it!
More endurance!
Resistance/1 Mastery, +1 to all Saves! Null +1, Soak +1… a Power Mastery, once per three Levels…
Soak to 84, Null to 16, Ess to 11. Finally using my Essence for something…
Skill Points: Biology 3, Whitesmithing +1 to 3, Gemcrafter +2 to 3. Poison use also meant I could now freely concoct potions and use them with ease. Hey, look, giant spiders…
Two Alchemy recipes for potions and whatnot. I picked Cure Light Wounds and Mutagen, because why not? Not like I could use them.
Now, we were gonna see what that room could cough up again…
---
The effects of Swarmbane were impressive.
The magic preyed upon the same linkages that rendered a swarm a single mass instead of disparate individual parts. Any individual hit in the mass spilled over excess damage to all other members of the swarm close by. The effect was like having a bloody broom attached to Tremble as it cut through the air, slaying whole swathes of rats at one time.
There were at least six swarms of rats, maybe more. Fido always managed to basically torch one of them, I chewed through another one before leading the rest that were not sampling hell poodle on a chase as the big white two-headed bastard came through. I whipped through a tight curve like I was skating, racing towards the fat bastard as it readied its psychic Mickey, red eyes glowing and… found out that a glowing Sword in the neck really sucked, again.
I was on it with both hands before it could recover, ripping open the throat of the left head, pulling out Tremble and cutting off the other one as its enraged rat minions caught up to me.
This time, I was smiling as I turned to face them.
Rats came apart in the hundreds, splattering blood and bits of gore everywhere as Tremble seemed to be laughing in glee in my hands. They streamed towards me, and as fast as they could run and jump, I reaped them like wheat.
Seeing beagle-sized rats coming apart was never so much fun!
When they were done charging me, I raced over to Fido, and killed the ones munching on the hell poodle. He was already dead, but that was fine. I belatedly realized they must be some kind of hellrat if they could tolerate his burning blood…
So, what was coming next?
Marginally astute, I scooted over under the crib, waiting for whatever was next.
The sun had never stopped streaming into the room, illuminating the center of it while throwing the rest into start shadow. As I'd largely fought in the shadows, I hadn't paid a lot of attention to it… except now it was shrinking rapidly, even as it crawled across the floor, up the doorway, and vanished at supernatural speed, like someone shifting a spotlight, not the sun.
Which naturally enough left this room in the dimmest of lights, basically only lit by the soulfire glowing around Tremble's blade.
Yeah, this wasn't going to be bad, no, no…
There was movement in the shadows, of the shadows. I walked out into the very faint starlight of the room, looked out at the blurry night barely formed out there, and then glanced around at the humanoid forms condensing out of the shadows at the corner of my eye.
Shadows. Incorporeal undead. Straight up 50% miss chance, and half damage if you had magical weapons, none if you didn't. Flying, pass through objects, etc.
Daydreams and corrupted things seen were now heading firmly into nightmare. Things that went bump in the night were coming.
They were going to suck away my strength because my Null wasn't strong enough, encircle me from all sides while I whiffed away trying to land a good hit on them, and then kill me with soulchill.
I didn't have Ghost Strike, and Ghost Touch would take four days to add on Tremble.
If it came to a Greater Shadow, the drain might last even after I woke up, and would take days to recover from.
Shit, fifty percent miss chance plus half damage was one-quarter damage. I took a deep breath, and began to move. Shadows weren't the fastest creatures, and my only chance was to attack as many times as possible. Whiffing half the time, and barely hurting them the rest… this was going to suck bad.
Damn the Swarms. I could've had Final Rest, Vivic, or Ghost Touch for my first, but nooooo, had to kill all the damn rats…
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Ahg.
I could not move.
The creepy chill was still thrumming through my bones. I literally had the strength to raise a finger, and that was it.
Reborn with Strength 1. Ha ha ha, Curse, that's really funny. The cold horror of that necrotic damage, assaulting my ki and life. The Str drain from their mass hits as they finally managed to get around me… I was only alive because they couldn't kill me and turn me into a shadow, or the Curse would die.
Shadows couldn't fight very good, and if they ignored armor, so what? Most of my AC was dodge bonuses. They'd found it hard to hit me given how slowly they moved, so we had both been doing a lot of whiffing at one another.
I'd need to have a Diamond Vajra to stave off necroic energy like that, plain DR just didn't work, nor normal energy resistance.
But I had killed a bunch of them. Between their uncaring movement, missed attacks, and attempts to grab me, I got more AoO's then I could shake a stick at. Even at ¼ effective damage, I had still managed to disperse a bunch of them. The continuous Wardancing had helped, until I no longer had the strength to hold my Sword or stand up, and literally fell over from muscle numbness.
Hadn't lasted too long after that. Strength damage killed me way before my Soak or Health was gone. They'd reached right into my chest and drained my heart of strength.
Three points a day, with bed rest and a Heal check. It looked like I was going to find out what my Strength score was.
Ugh, three days of just sitting around doing nothing. If my Resolve was at II, I could blow Vigors to recover in no time. But that would mean being a Six.
Well, no time like the present.
"Vizard/2!" I yelled out in a ten decibel whisper.
Bonus General Feat. Forsaken Bonus. Advance. 4 skill points.
"Null Interdiction. Soulwarding. Null Mastery/2. Knowledge Arcane +2 to 3, Knowledge (Underworld) +2."
Null Interdiction was a semi-active effect that strengthened the Veil around a Null, reinforcing Reality's natural laws. It made dimension-skipping, both time and space, very hard to do, stopped phasing and incorporeality, ethereal-shifting, plane-hopping, and Summoning in new shit.
Powered, and especially Casters, loathed it like nobody's business. If you weren't prepared to lose your escape buttons and sudden attack stuff, Interdiction was a fast way to die. Not being able to Summon in your enslaved creatures was pretty crippling to Summoners, too. Shattering an Interdiction from a Null was nigh-impossible, unlike the one from a fellow Caster, too…
For me, it would force the shadows to bug out entirely or come into full corporeality, which meant I could kill them, which meant no more miss chance, and with a magic weapon, I'd do full damage.
The effect existed naturally in my Null Field, which wouldn't extend out past me until I reached 20 Null. However, with a burst of effort and a standard action, I could expand this effect out for five feet per point of Null, creating an area of reinforced dimensional stability for a minute per point of Null. Within that area, the Caster Level of dimensional effects was reduced by the level of the Null, effectively making most of them impossible.
I was going to fuck them up so badly. C'mon, throw a Greater Shadow at me. All it was going to do was get me more pissed. Multi-dimensional existences? Up yours! These incorps, weren't.
Soulwarding was a Soul Feat, +1 Essence. It gave +1 to Fort Save per Essence invested. Naturally, +1 Soak, too. And when I threw two Essence into it, Fort Save +2, meant 2 more Soak, and Null +2.
Null to 19! Total Essence to 12! Soak to 87!
Strength, still at 1…
If I had a lab, I could have concocted a Potion to speed things along. Nope, nothing like that. I had what I had. All I could do was glower, and sit there, and try to burn the Strength damage out of my system faster. If I had five Heal Ranks, I'd know how to double the speed of my recovery.
With a Null of 19, they had a one in five chance of being able to do Strength damage to me. At 23, they would have none, if they weren't a Greater Shadow.
I'd need to be a Four for that to happen. Bunch of things were going to happen at Melee/4. I grit my teeth feebly, concentrating my Vajra in my heart and laying there helpless in this little clearing in the mists. The Curse might be laughing at me now, but it wouldn't for long.
Tremble wouldn't be getting any Naming Karma while I was flat on my back, either. Aaagh, another reason to hate the Curse. It was a good thing it couldn't send stuff to attack me here, or I'd basically be stunlocked and killed.
One point of Strength every six hours, here I go…
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Twelve hours later, I'd eroded enough of the necrotic energy away to barely manage to sit myself up, Strength at 3. Having little else to do here, I dragged myself into the lotus position, and Meditated to pass the time, setting future ground for alchemical changes as I swirled my Essence and Ki through myself.
Was not going to put up with this shit in the future, that was sure…
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Another twelve hours passed, as I slowly regained my Strength. I felt Renewal pass. Strength to 5. I could stand up uneasily, but that interfered with my resting and erosion duties. I satisfied myself with doing a lot of stretches and slowly working on flexibility, breathing, and mental exercises.
Archer/2. Technique, bonus Technique, Advance, 4 skill points.
Ghost Strike, Anathema, Dexterity Mastery/1, +2 to Bowyer/Fletcher (3), +2 to Animal Empathy.
Ghost Strike: As long as you have at least one point of ki, all your magical weapon attacks were Ghost Touch, able to play the chop-chop game against incorporeals. Since it applied to bows, worked as an Archer Feat. I didn't get Ki Strike to make my IUS magical until Monk/3, but that was fine. I had Penetrate Damage Reduction to make up for it.
Anathema; a Null Feat, worked particularly well with bows. As long as you satisfied the ability to punch the DR of something vulnerable to an energy or substance twice, the second time was considered an allergy enhanced by your Null.
So, if I had a magic weapon, and my ki strike also counted as a magic weapon, then instead of merely neutralizing DR 5/magic, I'd be doing +5 damage. A +III Weapon and Silverstrike would mean +10 damage against lycanthropes, instead of merely bypassing it. Penetrate Damage Reduction also worked just fine with this, although based on Level… silver arrows on a +III Bow (+III also bypassed silver and cold iron DR) was classic.
I'd need another level of Monk for Ki Strike, so this wouldn't kick in right away. But combined with Penetrate Damage Reduction, I was going to go to town on those Shadows. Oh, fuck them very much…
Dexterity Mastery/1, because Dexterity Mastery/3 actually granted a full point of Dexterity, and I had to get there before I hit Five. So, Advances for the Stat Masteries were definitely something I had to take, no reason not to get started on them. +1 to all Dex Skill Checks was minor, the second advance had literally no effect, and the third was the full point. Four was half a Stat, and the fifth Advance was the full second point of the Stat.
Costly, but Stat points were precious, and I had no magic items to make up the differences.
I put all my Craft Reserve from Artificer into Tremble.
----
Twenty-four more hours passed, another Renewal went by. My Strength was now 9, and I could tell based on relative amounts left I had twelve hours to go.
Artificer/2. I maxed out my Craft Reserve into Tremble because I could, making up time lost. Not like I could Invest anything else, and I could just directly put the excess power in with my bond to my Sword.
Extra Metamagic, Artisan, or Item Creation Feat to choose. Bonus Forsaken Feat for having no Infusions. Two extra formulas for spell effects. Four Skill points.
Item Familiar. This is where all of my Craft Reserve was going. Hah! You think I can't make any friends here? I'm going to grow Tremble out of my own soul, eff you!
Iron Will. This keyed off Melee Levels, representing a muleheadedness that wasn't out of place with Artificers. As a Melee, this was increased by Resolve; it increased Bravery by the amount of Iron Will; the +2 bonus was increased to +4 at Ten; +2 Class Skills (Spellcraft, Bowyer), and one more Vigor a day, bringing me to four.
This should bring my Will save to a minimum of +7, +10 against Fear, add Wisdom bonus, if any. I could at least TRY to fight against a psychic Mickey...
Two Formulas, eh? Lesser Fast Healing and Protection from Alignment. Didn't affect anything until I got out of here.
Advance to Weaponsmithing/2.
Skill points: Knowledge/Geology +3, Miner +1. Let's go with knowing the raw materials…
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Twelve hours passed. I rose to my feet, hefted Tremble, and stepped out grimly into the mist.
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I plunged Tremble into Fido's dead heart. The burning heart of a Hell Hound was a power comp, and an Item Familiar could quickly and directly devour a power comp from something it had killed.
Tremble hummed happily as the magic in the heart channeled the hell poodle's magical energies into it. Its prowess as an intelligent Weapon was something completely separate from its prowess as a Weapon, and just as hefty a gold sink. The hell poodle visibly withered up as the magic was extracted from it, and I hoped the Curse was pissed that it couldn't just recycle it, and I was basically double-dipping Karma here.
Ditto, the brains of the rat kings could be rendered into Potions. Time to use them, and the blood of Slinky the hellcat.
Arsenal energized, but there were no supplementary effects to swap out yet. Two more days, and I'd be feeding these shadows that were coming their teeth.
Tremble was blazing with light and humming angrily in reaction to my anger, understanding that what was coming was going to be painful. As the shadows rose out nothing, I charged into them.
Oh, oh, yesss.
Way of Water was useless against their no-armor forms, but Way of Fire worked just fine. They kind of moaned as I cut them in two, and the barely substantial edges of their bodies burned away from the magic cutting them apart.
They triggered AoO's, and I Cleaved from one to the next as I saw them shifting through the edges of the zone of light around me. I was having nothing of them playing with me, moving too fast for them to dance and dodge around me. They clustered and flowed this way and that, trying to get around me, and I went straight ahead, killing as I went.
The Greater Shadow loomed out of the darkness, twice the size of the lesser shadows, and struck out at me with arms distended and longer then the reach of my Sword. I shifted to defensive mode, parrying it, and cut it in passing, Cleaving through to it as I dodged around it, cutting down two of its servants as I wove in and out and they missed and shifted around me, provoking AoO as they exposed themselves, and I ended the strikes that killed them on their boss.
And then I straight up advanced into its ink-pool face and Flurried it dead with a wild combination of attacks that sent barely corporeal limbs flying and ripped it from head to oozing waist… and took out two more of its kind as I kept moving right through it, seeking all of them.
After circling the whole room twice and disposing of everything attacking me, I walked back out into the shadowy moonlight from the window and waited for the next rush.
I'd been tagged successfully once, and without ki I could not have lifted my Sword. That was all it took.
I was so going to get my Null up…
The darkness swirled again, and the cold of the grave began to gather, sending mist across the floor.
What kind of kid dreamed this stuff up?
Out of the mist, more spectral forms began to rise. Blackish, with empty, sparkling eyes, all of which quickly turned on the girl holding the sword burning electrum defiance.
Wraiths. Unless I got lucky with a crit, no way to one-hit them. And if they had a Greater Wraith, well, this was going to be quick.
Energy Drain, went after Levels. I could take exactly three hits ripping through my spirit, and down I'd go.
Tougher, but not really any harder to hit. My Null had a two in three chance to neutralize the energy drain, and the necrotic chill I could take a lot of.
So there was only dodging them as long as I could while I skated around and cut them down.
My ki lifted my Sword, arms too weak, and I grinned despite myself, sliding left. They were faster then shadows, moving with great speed, converging on me even as I was in motion.
Tremble was everywhere to deflect those reaching tendril-hands, AoO's snaking past to burn through them, marking which ones were wounded for special attention and follow-ups, Cleaves opening them up for focus and fury.
They didn't seem to like the way my Null prevented them from reaching into my body to tear at my soul. Well, eff them. They were gathering around me too fast despite my movement.
First one, ahhhhhh! Cold claws ripping through my soul like gossamer, making me shudder as my ki and Essence convulsed at the shock. The one who did it ate an AoO and my next attack tore it apart, but that didn't mean the rest stopped.
Another wraith died, a hand thrust through my heart. I spun around and cut it, once, twice as half a dozen spectral hands lashed for me. Something ripped through my head, and took my thoughts with it.