Rune Seeker

Chapter 90: This Doesn’t Feel Like An Achievement

Wild Dungeon – The Lost Palace of Creeping Death: Complete

New Record

Time: 49:56

Congratulations. Achievement unlocked – The End of the Line

With the Lich gone, the dead may finally rest.

Please access a Dungeon Interface to unlock class-specific reward.

Time until Wild Dungeon – The Lost Palace of Creeping Death instance closure: 59:56

Odi’s body dissolved to dust as Nivian stood. The tank turned without another word and went back to gathering energy from the corpses.

Everybody watched him leave, Odi’s words echoing in Hiral’s mind. Death energy. Two ranks. There was hope for him, but it wasn’t within easy reach. That first part, especially… Did it mean…?

“The dungeon interface is here,” Yanily said, pointing at the interface crystal on one of the throne’s arms. “Should we?”

Nobody answered. The usual rush of getting achievements and loot seemed muted by the whole situation. They’d won… so why did it kind of feel like they’d lost something too?

“Yeah,” Seena finally said. “Yeah, we should. Yan, could you?”

Hiral looked back at Nivian at the same time Yanily waved his hand over the crystal, and the whole room went dark except for the small sphere of blue light as the tank consumed more flames. There, kneeling alone in the darkness, it didn’t look so much like Nivian was eating the energy as it did like he was holding a candle of vigil while paying respects to the fallen.

The image only lasted a second, light crawling through the roots along the floor again and racing to the throne, where it revealed the familiar chests now arranged in a circle around the party.

“Let’s get to it, then,” Seena said, and Hiral turned away from Nivian.

The man obviously didn’t want to discuss the situation right now, so Hiral would give him some space. There’d be time to figure things out at the Asylum and then back in Fallen Reach after they saved it. His chest was easy enough to find, and he went over to it while Yanily, Seena, and Seeyela each stepped up to their chests at the same time.

Wule, however, picked two of the chests up—his own and Nivian’s—then shrugged at the group and went over to join his brother.

“I’m worried about them,” Seena said, just loud enough for the three around her to hear. “Both of them.”

“Is he really undead?” Yanily asked.

“That’s what it says,” Hiral said.

“You know Nivian,” Seeyela said. “He’ll talk about it when he’s ready. Give it time until then.”

“I know,” Seena said. “I know. Okay, what’ve we got?”

All four of their chests were similarly ornate, but quite small. More items like the ring that gave them bonus attributes? Definitely not something Hiral would say no to. But when he opened the chest, what he found looked more like the broken piece of a mirror.

What could it…?

He lifted it up to look at the glass, and a pair of blue-flame eyes stared back at him so suddenly he almost dropped the shard. It wasn’t his reflection, though. No matter how he angled the strange mirror, he couldn’t see himself. Instead, there was something inside the shard. Something he’d seen before, and he stopped trying to look at it until his View ability kicked in.

Reflection of the Dracolich – Unknown Rank

A reflection of a great beast which can be used as a mount to traverse difficult terrain—or even the sky itself.

Note: The Reflection cannot be summoned while the user is in combat.

Note (2): Any damage to the Reflection will cancel its summons.

Note (3): Due to the size of the Reflection, it can carry up to three passengers.

Note (4): The Reflection can be summoned directly from an Interspatial device.

Note (5): If the Reflection’s mirror is destroyed, the Reflection is lost forever.

Hiral looked again inside the mirror shard, and, yes, that was definitely a Dracolich prowling around in there. Unlike the one they’d fought—and killed—earlier, this one had all its limbs and wings. Without the gruesome injuries, the thing looked far more intimidating.

Is this really something I should summon and then try to… ride?

SCREEEEEEECH! A tremendous cry shattered the silence, and a gust of wind sent Hiral stumbling to the side. His RHC came out on reflex, and he spun to aim it at the new threat—some kind of half-eagle, half-lion monstrosity with pristine white feathers in the front and a golden coat in the back.

This looks familiar…

Then he saw Yanily—with a huge smile on his face—right beside the creature.

“I have a gryphon!” Yanily said, obvious excitement in his voice, though he added, “Whatever a gryphon is.”

“Pretty sure that’s a gryphon, Yan,” Seena said. “And warn us before you whip something like that out!”

“Sorry,” Yanily said, but he didn’t look it at all, reaching up to run his hand down the feathers on the side of the gryphon’s head. “You’re so pretty.”

The large gryphon nuzzled its head up against Yanily’s hand, and the two seemed to hit it off right away.

“That something you can ride, Yan?” Seeyela asked.

“Yes,” Yanily said, pointing at the saddle on the monster’s back.

“I got something similar,” Seeyela said. “Though mine isn’t a gryphon; it’s a Nightmare.”

“The fiery horse thing?” Seena asked.

“Yup,” Seeyela said.

“Which means Seena got a phoenix Reflection,” Hiral reasoned.

“I did,” she said. “How did you know?”

“Because I got a Dracolich

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“Do you think they can really fly?” Yanily asked, looking at the saddle. “Can we try it out? We should try it out.”

“Not now, Yan,” Seena said. “Put the gryphon away. We still need to get our achievements and get out of here.”

“Just one…” the spearman started to say.

“No,” Seena said with finality. “Left, Right, what’s in the communal box?”

“More of the currency we got before, all fully charged already,” Left said.

“Oh, I totally forgot about that stuff,” Hiral said, pulling the Reflection of the Dracolich into his Interspatial Ring where it’d be safe, then letting his mind drift to the coins already in there. “Feels like the ones we have are full, too, or close to it. We should be able to exchange them for more stuff once we get back to the Asylum.”

“Good to know,” Seena said.

They split up the six bags, each of the party members taking one into their rings. The other two were set aside for when Wule and Nivian eventually rejoined them. For the moment, they seemed to be deep in quiet conversation.

“Should we wait for them?” Hiral asked.

Seena shook her head and went over to the interface crystal, swiping her hand above it. “Achievement Rewards," she said, and a stream of notification windows appeared in front of Hiral’s eyes.

Achievement: Glutton for Punishment

Reward: Class Modification: (Lost) That all you got?

(Lost) That all you got?: If you take a lethal hit that inflicts more than 25% of your total health in one blow, you will instead be left at 1% remaining health.

Note: This skill offers no protection from follow-up hits, damage-over-time effects, attacks that inflict less than 25% of your total health, or your own recklessness.

Note (2): Cooldown—20 hours

Don’t know if the part about my own recklessness was really necessary, but this is… kind of amazing. I mean, it’s not like I’ve died, so this wouldn’t have activated anyway, but it could really save me. Cooldown isn’t bad, and if we run into more things like that Hulking Behemoth, it could come in handy. Not bad. Next.

Hiral closed the window, and the next one popped up immediately.

Achievement: Undead SMASH!

Reward: Class Ability (Passive): (Lost) Regeneration

(Lost) Regeneration: Passively regenerate 1% health per 30 seconds as long as you have solar energy to power the ability.

Note: Passive healing can be supercharged for a burst of active health restoration (Cooldown: 10 minutes).

Note (2): After using active health restoration, passive Regeneration ceases until cooldown expires.

Two percent per minute isn’t super fast, but definitely better than what I have now. Theoretically, I can go from no health to full in less than an hour. Then again, I’d just rather never be at no health. Another good safety net. Next.

As soon as the notification window vanished, another took its place.

Achievement: The Flametastic Four (Three?)

Reward: Class Ability (Active): (Lost) Shared Strength

(Lost) Shared Strength: You may temporarily transfer the use of one active or passive ability to another party member.

Note: Only abilities earned through achievements may be shared.

Note (2): Only one ability may be shared at a time.

Note (3): Duration of shared ability is 2 minutes per Rank (currently 4 minutes).

Note (4): Only people linked via the Party Interface are eligible recipients of Shared Strength.

Another party ability. Nothing wrong with that. And sharing abilities? Seena is going to love training with that to see what we can do. Hrm, if the others got the same ability, I wonder how many abilities can be shared with one person. This says I can only share one at a time, but could I get five? Okay, I’m going to have fun testing this too.

What else do we have?

The notification window blinked out, and the next blinked open.

Achievement: Scratch that Lich

Reward: Class Modification Upgrade: (Lost) Cycling+ Technique

(Lost) Cycling+ Technique: By focusing on drawing energy into your body in a specific way, benefit from greatly increased solar energy absorption rate, quality of absorbed energy, and efficiency and power of energy-aligned abilities.

Note: (Lost) Cycling+ is further greatly improved by use of energy with a subtype matching your body’s preferred energy.

Note (2): (Lost) Cycling+ can be used to filter incompatible energy types into preferred energy types, though there will be a 30% loss of energy.

Thirty percent loss seems pretty steep. How useful is preferred energy over normal energy? I guess I’ll have to ask Yanily or Seena. Uh, definitely Seena. That part doesn’t do anything for me, but the “greatly” part looks nice.

Nothing flashy, but useful.

Hiral read over the notification one more time to make sure he didn’t miss anything, then closed it and went to the next.

Achievement: Evolution Party

Reward: Class Modification: (Lost) Evolutionary Inspiration

(Lost) Evolutionary Inspiration: When a nearby creature experiences an evolution, you gain a permanent bonus based on that evolution.

Note: Benefits are gained when allies or enemies evolve in your presence.

It doesn’t say exactly what the benefit is, or what it considers an evolution. Obviously, the class evolutions that Wule and Nivian got, but what else? Ah, too bad it isn’t retroactive. Oh, well. Will Rank evolutions count? We’ll find out soon enough once we see how much experience we got from this dungeon.

Looks like just two more achievements left: the one for clearing the dungeon and the one that should unlock the Asylum. We going to get another convenient exit?

With only one way to find out, Hiral closed one notification to bring up the second-to-last window.

Achievement: The End of the Line

Reward: Class Modification: Selected Skill Increase

Please choose one skill from the following list to have its rank increased.

Skill Choices: Terminal, Eloquent, Enraged, Intimidate, Infernal Conjuration, Gourmand, Walk on Water, Internal Injuries (D-Rank), I Bow to No One (slight), Elemental Resistances (10%), Beauty Sleep, Inspirational Growth, (Lost) That all you got?, (Lost) Regeneration, (Lost) Shared Strength

Nice! Another rank increase for my skills, and the three Lost skills I just got are on here too.

Last time, it’d come down to Internal Injuries, Inspirational Growth, and Life of the Party. Since he’d already taken Life of the Party and ruled out Inspirational Growth, that just left Internal Injuries. Except now he had three new Lost skills to choose from, and those seemed too good to ignore. Then again, That all you got? seemed too situational. Maybe an upgrade would raise it above something other than a fatal blow, but maybe not. And, honestly, he didn’t want to get hit that hard either way.

SharedStrength had potential, but they hadn’t even tested which abilities it worked on. Out of all the choices, Regeneration was the overall best pick. Useful in multiple situations, and if it could be shared, it would be even more powerful.

Taking one last look at the options didn’t change Hiral’s mind, and he made his choice.

Class Reward: Class Modification: (Lost) Regeneration+

(Lost) Regeneration+: Passively regenerate 2% health per 15 seconds as long as you have solar energy to power the ability.

While under the effects of passive Regeneration+, deal bonus damage proportional to the amount of health missing from maximum.

Note: Passive healing can be supercharged for a burst of active health restoration (Cooldown: 8 minutes).

Note (2): After using active health restoration, passive Regeneration is reduced to 1% per minute until cooldown expires.

Note (3): Bonus damage increases relative to health lost and Rank.

Hiral blinked as he read and reread the upgraded ability.

Oh, that was sooooo the right choice. Even the Blood Aura would have a tough time hurting me through that. I might even survive the Ghost-Web Venom, though I’d rather not test it. And the damage bonus!

“Somebody looks happy,” Seena said, and Hiral closed the notification window to nod at the party leader. Before he got a chance to say anything, though, the final window sprang to life.

Achievement: On to the next challenge (2)!

Zone Reward: The Asylum is unlocked for you, as is the path leading to it.

Asylum—You’ve earned a rest, enjoy it, but remember—more challenges await.

Hiral closed that without much thought, though it was reassuring to know they’d be able to go to the Asylum as planned.

“And it looks like everybody has their achievements sorted out,” Wule said, approaching with Nivian a few steps back. The tank didn’t seem willing to meet anybody’s eyes, and he stood quietly behind his brother. “Let’s go find the ride to the Asylum.”