jogged down the dark and dingy alleyways between the run-down and mostly abandoned warehouses, his feet making no sound on the rough stone pavement. His powerful vision picked out every detail, even in the darkness of the cloudy, moonless night. Wrinkling his the stench of the rotting trash heaped against the walls and spilling out across the pavement, he thought, Myrin’s Keep, how I’ve missed your delicate sts, his inner voice dripping sarcasm like syrup. Ciradyl had spoiled him. He sped up, eager to be doh this job, his smooth, effortless stride carrying him faster than an ordinary man sprinting – far faster than he had been capable of less than a month ago.

  The dires Seth had shared were clear. He had no trouble log the dipidated warehouse with a door half-hanging on broken hinges. Across the way, he noticed a steel grate set into the stone leading down into the sewers below. There were a few scrapes where it hadn’t been put back precisely as before, revealing that he had found the spot where Seth had finally fled his captors down into the Myrin’s Keep sewer system.

  slowed, ing to a halt before he ehe alleyway, and surveyed the darkened doorway, as always, not wholly relying on his stealth or silent movement just in case someone had an advanced perception skill. When Vivian had personally asked him to take this job, he had learhat the kidnapping ring was a surprisingly well-funded and equipped operation. It wouldn’t be surprising to find magical wards or people with advanced skills in this operation. But the fact that Seth had escaped with only a level one css implied that none of them could have been all that powerful.

  Doesn’t hurt to be cautious.

  He crept up to the dooreered in, finding a long passage with several doors oher side, ending at what looked like a stairwell. Not a sihing moved, but there were several discarded papers and track marks on the ground where something heavy must have been dragged away.

  crept through the doorway, careful to keep his stealth and silent movement magining, stalking down the halleering into each of the rooms o a time. All were dark ay – all hastily vacated, by the signs he read with his trag skills, with only discarded trash remaining littered about to indicate that anyone had been using this pce retly.

  Finally, he desded the stairs, remaining vigint for any traps or people that might notice him. But nothing disturbed the silence.

  If Seth was right, it should be about here, he thought. He had talked with the quiet boy, finding him to be rather smart and observant. Sure enough, as he exited the stairs into the basement level, he found it. There were several barred doors indig that each of the rooms here had been used as cells to imprison people, all of them now sitting ajar.

  In the middle of the hallway, he found a corpse. Well, what was left of it – it looked like the body of a person whose skeleton had been forcibly ripped out of it whole, and it stank of rot and putresce. At least, what he knew of Seth’s skills indicated that this was clearly the work of his css.

  Eclipse has reached level 23.

  Dismissing the notification irritably, he picked his way through the prison slowly, cheg each of the cells until he arrived at the final room. Here, he found the sed body, lying in a pool of dried blood. The tracks that led bato the hallway were old, bed blood in the shape of a human footprint, but without the normal flesh around the bones. Skeleton. He had seen enough skeletons to know their tracks.

  His eyes surveyed the room, taking iails. The door was covered with knife marks, f the rough outline of a person, and, along with the sptters of dried blood soaked into the wood, told a story of torture. He grimaced, but then his eyes fell on a small shape, stig out from behind a scratched and scuffed chest of drawers.

  Reag over, he recovered a small notebook, along with several Kel’darran s. The s reminded him of his own incarceration at the hands of the merary sve traders, audied them specutively before st them in his ring. If they had Kel’darran currency, ces were that they had strong ties with the crime syndicate and had an easy, profitable market for selling sves.

  There were no tracks out front of the warehouse – at least none he had been able to dis, but as he paged through the notebook, he realized he had records of several deals that had taken pce over the past few months.

  Clearly aablished operation. Vivian will want to see this. He stored the notebook too. His skills were limited at this point, without clear tracks or any obvious targets, but with her skills, he was certain Mieriel would be able to turn up some leads from the notebook he had recovered.

  Explorer has reached level 27.

  Well, at least I got something useful out of this. I wonder if Ali and Mato are having more fun than me?

  Aliandra Ali sat quietly beside the shrine, experimenting. As was normal, she felt shaken and scared after the run-in with the Disrupte, especially given just how close she had e to being killed.

  But she was no longer defenseless, and the heavy thumps of her giant forest guardian boss patrolling nearby felt somewhat reassuring, and, if that wasn’t enough, Mato reparing a meal nearby – his brand of self-care, but one she had e to appreciate more and more, and ohat his mother clearly regarded as being an essential skill for his future marriage prospects. It was no myth that Beastkin loved their food. Poor Mato, his Mom won’t let the subject drop, will she? He gets all twitchy whenever she mentions it, which is often…

  She examined her skill descriptio again, trying to figure out what exactly her domain mastery meant by ‘anything you have made’. It literally said she could use anything, not just monsters. It was curious, but more than that, it helped keep her mind busy and not so focused on her fears.

  It’s just the Domain Magihahat is specifionsters, she thought. So, what happens when I attaething else to the domain?

  She gnced about, deg to try it out on a few mushrooms that grew nearby. They were her golden glowing are mushrooms, and even now she marveled at how pretty they were. It took nothing more than a few points of mana aouch to bind the mushrooms to her domain. She watched curiously as the domain mana adjusted around them, but apart from that, very little that she could see actually ged. However, they noeared in her list of things that her domain mastery would respawn after an hour.

  Nice, she thought. It would not be an effective defense against having her entire domain buro the ground, because it required the mana of the duo fun. But if Basil came by and harvested the mushrooms, she wouldn’t o manually repnt them. Idly, she wondered if the young herbalist would be ing down into the forest cavern now that he and his team had defeated the Kobold warrior. She hadn’t seen much of the now bronze adventurers, because Vivian Ross had approved them for taking jobs on the jobs board, and there were plenty of jobs hunting zombies out in the nearby forest.

  Ali paged through her Grimoire and decided to try something else. She made a k of nature affinity magicite about the size of Mato’s fist and embedded it iohe shrine.

  This stuff should work much like a mana battery. Just as she had attached her mushrooms to the domain, she did the same thing with the magicite. As soon as her magic was pleted, she saw the swirling of her domain mana p into the stone as it glowed brighter and brighter until it finally settled on an intense green light, like a glowing crisp apple from one of the trees Sigurd had brought her. Nibsp;She studied it for a while, deg it wasn’t going to oversaturate, thankfully.

  For the part of her idea, she decided to try inscribing some power transfer runes into the ground around it. She carefully spliced in some of the runic structure she remembered from the library entment and some pieces she borrowed from her Orb of Mana – specifically the elements reted to drawing mana from the magicite crystal sliver embedded within the gss orb. She tinkered with it for a while, absently accepting a bowl of food from Mato while she worked.

  “Thanks,” she told him, briefly distracted when the delicious fvor exploded in her mouth, but she quickly returo her work.

  “What are you doing?” Mato asked, dropping himself to the mossy ground nearby.

  “I’m trying to see if I make a battery for the shrine. If I’m right, I should be able to recharge it faster with this.” She tinued scribing her runes and chatting with Mato, the work not quite difficult enough to demand her entire focus.

  Suddenly, the runes pulsed as she pleted the final se, and a powerful cascade of green nature-affinity mana surged from the magicite and poured into the shri was already at full capacity, so she didn’t know if the recharge rate had improved, but before she could sider ways to use some of its mana safely, her chime sounded.

  Runic Script has reached level 25.

  Requirements met for shrine adva.

  Shrine overcharged.Magicite imprint known.Suffitly dense domain mana achieved.

  Shrine of the A Grove gains Mana Battery.+1,000,000 to Mana Reserve

  Shrine of the A Grove gains Living Mana.Mana Reserve grows with the total size of the domain.

  Choose one adva.

  “Oh, my shrine advanced!” Ali had no idea that had even been a possibility. She bli the zeroes. Holy… how much mana?

  “Nice, what did you get?” Mato asked.

  She quickly shared the options with him. One million mana to her reservation seemed like a lot, but she was almost certain the Living Mana option would be the better long-term choice – provided the proportion was reasonable.

  “Living Mana,” Mato suggested, agreeing immediately with her assessment, so she chose that option.

  The shrine fred with the light of plex mana formations growing and twisting. Her Grimoire immediately responded with a sympathetic glow and the shrine’s mana poured into her book while the pages flipped back to the magicite variant. And then she felt her Domain Mastery activate without her own iion.

  The mana rushed through her as the shrine usurped her skills for its own purposes, eling magicite and ref it with her domain mastery. The shrine began to grow, glowing intensely as it summoned more and more magicite, folding it into itself in an intricately plex structure. Finally, the mana rush slowed and the glowing subsided to the normal luminance of the runiscriptions on the surface of the once again bck stone obelisk. But it was several meters taller now, and noticeably wider at the base.

  Shrine of the A GroveAn a mystical shrine of unknown in. Offers advanced css features and attu of tent mana affinity.Owner: Aliandra AmarielMana Siphon (Active)Mana: Unlock css experiena: Unlock or enhaent magical affinitiesMana: Unlock alternate cssesOwner’s Mana: Recharge the shrine’s mana reserve. 1,250,003/1,896,250Shrine – Artifact

  “It gained almost six hundred and fifty thousand mana,” Ali said in surprise. It wasn’t quite as much as the one million mana option, but if she grew her domain, it should tinue increasiually surpassing the ft increase option.

  Ali g the k of magicite she had made for her experiment, now looking pitifully small pared to the sheer amount of nature affinity magicite the shrine had ed in its restru endeavor. Probably irrelevant now, she thought but decided to leave it anyway. If the adventurers grew strong enough to take on her Forest Guardian boss, it would be a nice reward for them, and her domain was already set to respawn the magicite if they took it.

  It hadn’t escaped her notice that the shrine had only used the nature-affinity magicite, which got her thinking. I get anrade if I find are-affinity magicite? There had been an are denser, but she retty certain it was one of the missing ones, presumably buried deep uhe rubble or entirely destroyed by whatever explosion had been strong enough to destroy half the city and level the mountain above.

  Ali’s guardiaed her to a presence, and she quickly flickered her awarehrough her monsters just as Malika called out to them.

  “Ali, Mato, what are you guys doing, I saw some bright lights.”

  “Malika!” she squealed, springing to her feet and sprinting off to greet her, sending a quiand to her Forest Guardian to stand down.

  Their happy reunion took some time, and Ali was overjoyed to have her friend back healthy and looking well. Mato, of course, greeted Malika with a bear hug swiftly followed by a bowl of savory stew, which was gratefully accepted, and they all sat down to catch up on their various activities.

  “So, I poured a whole lot of mana into the shrine and then it advanced,” Ali expined, answering Malika’s questions about the brightness of the light.

  “Oh, Vivian asked me to talk to you about using the shrine for css adva again,” Malika said.

  “I told her I’d think about it,” she answered. In truth, she hadn’t thought about it much, but she was still hesitant given her experie time.

  “Ali, I know you seem hesitant, but I think it’s a great idea. I told Rezan t one of the girls from Kezda to you for a css because Vertias is charging thirty gold to use their shrine. I know Myrin’s Keep only charges twe silver, but still, that excludes almost the entire popution simply because they ot afford it. I told Vivian I would help her train the applits if she finds them from the poorer ses of town just so we give them better opportunities. I’m excited about the idea, and I think it’s a way we make a big difference.”

  “I’m certain that the st time was how people learned I’m a dungeon, and that’s why they came to hunt me.” But she knew her fear wasn’t quite rational. After the trial where she had proudly annouhe fact, it had bee on knowledge iown.

  “I won’t make an issue of it if you don’t want to,” Malika said, but she was uo hide her disappoi.

  Ali bit her lip. So, what am I still afraid of?

  Lira had told her that her father had done something simir for the whole city of Dal’mohra and had firmed Malika’s thought that it would make a difference. In fact, Ali was certain Malika might be underselling the value for a messed-up town like Myrin’s Keep, provided most of the didates had good role models and guidance – regardless of her personal s around Vivian’s occasional use of questiohods, she was undoubtedly a fantastic resource for any newly cssed adventurer.

  “Maybe we do one more and see how it goes?” Ali suggested. It was hard to bloething that Malika was so clearly passionate about on something as nebulous as a fearful memory.

  “Thank you, Ali,” Malika said. “Is there anything I do?”

  “Actually, there is,” Ali answered. “I promised Thuli that I would search for the mines under Dal’mohra. Maybe when gets back from his job, we go clear some more of the juo get to the entrance?”

  “Yes!” Mato excimed. “I’m tired of fighting stupid zombies.”

  Ali wi Malika and said, “Clearly he’s rly bored with beating up zombies. What about you?”

  Folding his arms across his chest, Mato growled, “You got that right. Filthy work!”

  “Of course I’m in,” Malika said meeting Ali’s smile with one of her own. “It’s good to be back.”

  ***

  “What about here?” Ali asked, gng at as she tried to wipe the sweat from her fad neck with an already-soaked sleeve.

  “I’m not sure,” he answered, “but this spot seems most likely. We already checked the other possibilities.” If he was affected by the humid jungle, he didn’t show it, studying the gigantic pile of rod rubble as if he might stare right through it to glean insights as to what might lie beyond.

  “Ok, I’ll try,” she answered. “I just need a few minutes for my domain tate.” They had been hunting for the entrao the mines for several days now and she was beginning to worry that they would never find it. It didn’t help that the entire area was vastly ged by the passage of time, jungle, and the fallen rubble and rock, and she had poor memories of a pce she had rarely visited anyway. The entrance was undoubtedly buried somewhere underh this wreckage, but the a rown rubble of half a city was vast, and they had to fight through the denizens of the jungle for every meter.

  Oher hand, she plowed through the jungle like a ravenous devourer, ing all manner of trees aation, and leaving in its wake a jungle reborn from the hundreds of imprint variants she acquired, now glittering with are and nature mana instead.

  “How is it?” Malika asked.

  “Much calmer,” Ali said, gng back at the expanse of her new domain. Obviously, she didn’t have the time to repce everything, but once she had established enough trees – particurly her t Lirasian Oaks, her domailed over the region. In her wake, her industrious minions filled in the gaps with mushrooms, moss, and wildflowers.

  It all had a sed purpose, though. To pee the rubble and find the entrance, she o rely on her powerful Domain Mastery skill and its ability to affect rge areas within her domain. Tunneling through the rock with Destru had been far too slow.

  “It’s still as sweaty as a Troll’s armpit around here,” Mato grumbled.

  “I don’t remember Trolls being that sweaty,” Ali answered absently as she checked her domain mana carefully, pig at her unfortably sticky, damp clothing. “I met a few from Telim Gor ohey had an ice-affinity bloodline.” One advantage of pnting all the rees and expanding her domaihrough the jungle was that her shrine’s mana reserve had been slowly growing. It was not an immediately useful improvement, but Ali was happy that she had picked the Living Mana adva now that she could see how effective it was.

  “Hmph!” was all Mato said.

  “I think I’m ready,” Ali said, deg that the domain maed by the nearby enormous oak had grown suffitly strong that it would support her skill, and she reached toward the rubble and rock lyih the dense cover of moss and pnts. Her domain mana immediately respoo her will, infusing the rod it began to bend away from her, flowing like a thick viscous treacle. She stepped toward the mountain, pushing the rock up and around to reinforce the walls and the roof of her slowly growing cave. With a thought she added her Destru, wielding both skills simultaneously to dissolve tons of rock while simultaneously growing a tunnel into the heart of the broken remains of the city. She took a step forward, trying to ighe tons of rock bearing down oiny tunnel causing the primitive part of her brain to cmor with arm.

  She stepped fain, abs mana from the rock with her Destru and redireg it back out through her domain mastery to slowly shift the rock to the sides and open up the way forward. As she did so, she summoned a slowly growing carpet of moss at her feet.

  Variant: Ivold Granite added to Imprint: Stone.

  She ighe notification as she tio bore her way through the tons of stone and rock, focused on the mana that she could see peing several meters deep into the walls, searg for any hints that might help direct her.

  Variant: Tura Limestone added to Imprint: Stone.

  She shifted unfortably, p her mana into her skills stantly, and beginning to srofusely.

  “Is it getting hotter in here?” Ali asked.

  “I think so,” said from a little way back.

  Ten mier she was certain – a scorg heat radiated from the ro unfortable waves, leaving her sweltering and short of breath. It was getting hotter than standing in front of Thuli’s fe – almost like she imagined bread must feel baking in the oven. She pressed on, taking the unusual heat as a good sign – something that was notably different about this location pared to all the other attempts they had made.

  Domain Mastery has reached level 22.

  She ighe various notifications of additional variants of decorative or structural stone, presumably remnants of the city’s stru, tent to explore them ter. If nothing else, she would have plenty of new options for artistic sculpture.

  “If this doesn’t work, perhaps we should hire ah Mage?” suggested.

  “Oh, yes,” Malika answered. “Some of them have Earth Sight or perception skills that work through rock. Basir, Rezan’s disciple, do that.”

  “That’s a pretty good idea,” Ali said. Anything to avoid the unfortable heatwave. “Or we could find ah affinity monster and I could just take a look myself.”

  “Not sure where to find one of those,” Mato said. “But that’s a good idea.”

  Suddenly, up ahead in the rock, something shifted in her mana sight. Instead of her structured domain of nature and are magiething else fred and flickered, like tiny fmes of red.

  “I see some fire-affinity mana,” Ali said, reizing it from long familiarity with the magic of her favorite Kobold mages. With mountiement, she pressed forward.

  “Be careful,” Malika murmured.

  added, “Have a barrier ready, alright, Ali.”

  “Ok, here it goes,” she said, warning her friends to be prepared, and then broke through. Rock walls gave way to a sudden inte of dry heated air that banished her sweat in an instant, searing her skin and burning her face. She reacted with an instant barrier, but even the ambient air burned, blistering and reddening her skin.

  “Yeowch! That’s hot!” Mato hissed.

  As the soothing holy magi her attentive Acolyte settled into her body, repairing the damage, she studied the effect. “It’s the mana, not the air,” she said. While the air itself was scorg hot, most of the damage seemed to be ing directly from the ambient fire-affinity mana that out from the rge open space she had ected to with her tunnel.

  From the darkness beyond, a strange glow shifted, throwing shadows that flickered and danced, and suddenly a sizzle broke the silence as a bolt of fme shot toward her, crashing into the golden barrier with a loud bang and a shower of fming blobs.

  “Ining,” shouted, and from the dark cavern beyond their position came a being born of pure fme a.

  It was the intense fiery e-red of her Kobolds’ fireballs, but rger, flickering and shifting like a bowo intense white fmes he ter gave the impression of eyes, and two protrusions of fme evoked the idea of arms, creating a vaguely humanoid squat, broad shape. It was impossible to tell if the monster had any substao it, or if it was entirely posed of fme, but the white-hot core was dense enough to be entirely opaque.

  Shard of Fme – Elemental – level 39 (Fire)

  “Fire elemental!” Ali and yelled simultaneously.

  It unched another bolt of fme, this time crashing into Mato as he charged forward to e, his fur instantly igniting as he ehe intense aura of fire emanating from the monster. It swung an ‘arm’ and struck Mato with a resounding thump that sizzled as its touch burnt deep into his hide.

  “Heal him,” Ali said, but her Acolytes were already casting their holy spells.

  The Shard of Fme struck again, driving Mato backward. As it approached, the aura of its fme touched her domain, and an immense pain smmed into Ali’s mind, drivio her knees in agony. Uo see, she barely registered shouting and screaming, and the roars of her minions. Someone grabbed her roughly and she felt herself being carried. She struggled with the searing pain that raged uered through her mind.

  “Ali! Are you ok?” She heard the shout frht beside her, a from so far away.

  “Malika,” she gasped, not even knowing if she spoke aloud.

  It was Malika carrying her as they sprihrough the tunnel and out into the jungle, pumping her healing magito her. Her mind slowly began to adjust to the pain as she realized her minions were still in there, unleashing everything they had.

  “e back,” she managed. But only her Kobolds mao make it out alive, her Forest Guardian succumbing somewhere deep iunnel, its mana reservatiourning to her with a stinging snap.

  “It’s a dungeon,” cried in sudden realization.

  Ali slowly struggled to her feet, trying tain trol of her faculties, her minions, everything – merely trying to process what was happening.

  Dungee.

  As her mind slowly recovered, getting used to the pain – for it was not abating in the slightest – she began to uand. It was a familiar pain; one she had experiewice before. The first time when she had iently overpped her mana with the Ruins of Dal’mohra in the forest cavern, and once again wheried to save Lira by merging their domains. Somehow, she instinctively khat merging domains with a hostile dungeon would be disastrous. The Shard of Fme surged out of the tunnel, still trading blows with Mato, while Ali’s Kobolds unleashed all their energy and might at it, ung for the damage.

  “Firebolts,” Ali arying to force her will through their rage. “Firebolts!” They were killing Mato with Fireballs in their ardor to protect her from the monster.

  Relutly, her Kobolds obeyed, switg from Fireballs to Firebolts and the pressure on Mato eased a little.

  “Ali?” Malika’s pierced through the haze of pain.

  “Dungee,” she managed. “I’ll be ok in a minute.” Of course, she had no idea if she would really be ok – the pain showed no signs of fading.

  “Still?” said, raising an eyebrow as he tio unleash his arrows.

  “It’s the Elemental,” Ali said. The Shard of Fme was emitting a potent aura of fire-affinity mana, and she finally reized what was familiar about it. It reminded her of Naia’s slimes, and how they propagated Naia’s domain wherever they went. Just like her trees, only mobile. The domain of the fire dungeon was being id down by the elemental’s aura, extending bato the tunnel she had bored through the rock. And it was burning her domain wherever the two came into tact.

  “Go,” she said, slowly standing up on her own, freeing Malika from having to hold her. “Mato needs you.” She sent out her will, forcibly bringing her minions under trol. Her melee forces – three rogues and a shaman – were all literally on fire, being burned by the mere presence of the Fire Elemental. As she struggled to keep her bance, one of her rogues colpsed in a sm heap, filling the forest with the stench of charred meat.

  She moved her Kobold Fire Mages and Acolytes back out e of the aura ahem to some vague sembnce of strategy. At her side, one of her Acolytes fred with the pilr of holy light as she triggered her devotion skill to cope with the excessive damage.

  Ali quickly merged her perceptions with the Acolyte, with its Healer’s Sight, shocked to find just how low oh her melee minions were. The Kobolds seemed to be doing a bit better than the shaman, but her Forest Guardian was long gone, presumably uo keep up, given its vulnerability to fire. With her potent temporary boost in healing power, her Acolyte was bringing her minions back from the brink, but it was a close call.

  All around her, she could feel her domain fighting with the expanding fire domain, but it was hers that was being pushed back. More than just the fire domain being more powerful – the mere presence of the Elemental set her grass on fire, destroying the pnts that created her domain in the first pce. And the agony in her mind reventing her from even thinking straight.

  She reached out and pced her hand on the giant oak she had pnted so that she could make the tunnel and destructed it. As it evaporated in a giant explosion of mana motes, her domain recoiled, reg rapidly, and suddenly her mind cleared as the pain subsided.

  Ok, now I think. She breathed a sigh of relief. Malika was ihick of it, fighting hard beside Mato, and by the frequent flickers of her magic, Ali could tell she was rapidly burning her energy to heal him and herself. Her Acolytes were healing stantly, and her melee forces were barely holding onto life.

  Ali quickly threw up a couple of barriers to protect her Acolytes from the tinuous barrage of Firebolts bsting in all dires from the Shard of Fme.

  “It’s not dying,” said through ched teeth.

  “It isn’t?” Ali’s eyes so the elemental in surprise – it was a single monster, by itself, and even though it was formidable, they were aire group. She slipped her mind bato the Acolyte’s Healer’s Sight and studied the elemental.

  “It’s at full health…” Ali could easily see Mato’s powerful strikes, Malika’s rapid ones, and the damage from her shamahe Lightning Bolt smmed through the elemental, but then the elemental suddenly recovered its health.

  “What the… it’s healing!” she yelled. “Go all out!” she anded, elig a chorus of yips and chirps from her remaining Kobolds. She ighe sed rogue colpsing behind the elemental.

  “How is it out-healing all of us?” asked.

  “I have no idea.” Ali fired several barrier shards at it, finding them only able to strike at the dense core of the monster. She anxiously tracked its health as her minions hit it. A massive strike from Mato and the health dropped noticeably. Malika’s flurry of punches hit, and it dropped a little more. Several arrows from and the health dropped noticeably again. Her mages fired a volley of firebolts and…

  What? The Shard of Fme was suddenly back at full health.

  “Oh fuck!” she excimed. She was not one for careless profanity, like Morwynne, but this time she had been rather stupid. In her defehe dungee had done a number on her tration and focus.

  “What?” asked, staring at her in surprise.

  “It’s a Fire Elemental. I’m shooting it with fire…” Ali expined. I need ice. Water. Lakes of water!

  “Oh. Fire damage absorption?” asked.

  “That’s the only expnation,” Ali grimaced. She was uo study the aptitudes of any of the Elementals she had acquired, save for the Forest Guardian. But her Guardians would heal from any nature or poison damage due to the absorption of its affinity. There was no reason to believe the Fire Elemental didn’t have a simir aptitude – and the evidence she had just observed firmed it.

  “Stop shooting fire,” she growled in draic, telling her Kobold mages to simply stand by. It was clear they were upset about her orders, but they obeyed, heless. She studied the health of the monster carefully, watg it slowly decrease as they fought, but it was no longer healing itself. It was a stressful few minutes, particurly when the fires killed her shaman, but her Acolytes were able to keep up with the intense damage – at least for Mato ihick of the fmes – and, with their bined efforts whittling it down, the chime finally sounded.

  Yroup has defeated Shard of Fme – Elemental – level 39 (Fire)

  “Thank goodness,” Malika said, wiping soot off her face.

  “Suys,” Ali said, mortified that she had missed the crucial ability in the chaos and pain and had put them all in danger.

  “No problem, we got it,” Mato answered, sauntering over to join her. “Hey, what are they doing?” he asked, pointing to the two Acolytes who were standing with heads bowed over csped hands.

  “It’s a skill called Prayer,” Ali answered. She had studied her Acolytes’ abilities extensively – they were one of her most essential minions, after all. The Prayer ability was simir to Malika’s meditation, they could greatly improve their regeion, but they could take no other as while using the skill.

  “What do Kobolds pray to?” Mato asked.

  “I… don’t know,” Ali answered.

  “Some a dragon, I think,” answered.

  “You guys aren’t worried about me healing the monster?” Ali was surprised at their casual attitude toward her mistake.

  “It happens,” Malika shrugged.

  “You figured it out, and we won,” Mato answered, as if that was the only thing that mattered.

  “He’s right, Ali,” said when she frowned. “We learned something. Here, take a look at this read on the dungeon, I think it firms that we’re in the right pce.”

  [Explorer]Emberfe Mines – level ??Affinity: Fire, Lava.Age: A.Knowures: Fire Elemental.Known Bosses: --Dungeon

  “Another dungeon?” Malika asked.

  “And it’s a,” Ali added. It seemed like the dungeon was almost as old as she was, but the name firmed they had found it. Unfortunately, the mines were inhabited by a dungeon, which meant that getting Thuli his information would take a lot lohan she had anticipated.

  “Won’t this help you level up ahat mana you needed?” Mato asked, grinning.

  “It seems unreasonably hard,” Ali muttered, g her lips together as she realized how sulky she had just sounded. Oher hand, leveling up would definitely be the most effective way for her to solve her mana issues.

  They all trooped back to the tunnel and Ali noticed that the rock itself was glowing. Several fissures had opened, spilling va out of the entrand into the jungle. Lava that was brimming with mana that emerged to mih the remnants of the fire aura the elemental had left, pinning it in pd expanding the domain of the hostile dungeon.

  “Wait, that was a dual-affinity dungeon again?” Ali asked, finding the description had shared.

  “Yes, fire and va,” he firmed.

  “I think this va is propagating its domain, too,” Ali said, pointing it out to the others.

  “Hey, this is cool,” Malika said, calling attention to the corpse of the Shard of Fme. She stood over it with an intense e-red thiing in the palm of her right hand, a flickering dang fme that refused to go out. Periodically, she pulsed her mana to heal her hand against the burning of the fme.

  Lesser Essene

  “I think Thuli might like this,” Malika grinned.

  “Ining,” shouted, snapping everyone’s attention back to the tunnel as a sed Shard of Fme emerged.

  I need pletely different minions for this, Ali thought as she scrambled for battle. Maybe I o divert a few rivers down here?

  ***

  Race: Kobold

  Active Buffs: Azryet's Blessing, Faith

  Css: Acolyte of Azryet – level 23- Heal – level 17Mana: Heal your target. Range: 45.3 meters.Holy, Healing, Ranged, Wisdom- Restoration – level 15Mana: Heal your target over time. Range: 43.5 meters. Duration: 30 seds.Holy, Healing, Buff, Ranged, Wisdom- Healing Mastery – level 12You are profit with healing magic. All healing spells gain +64% [40 + skill + intelligence / 10] spell power. Holy, Healing, Mastery, Intelligence- Azryet's Blessing – level 13Mana: Your Wisdom, Intelligence, and Perception are increased by +60.3% [40 + skill + base intelligence / 10]. Reserve: 20%Holy, Buff, Intelligence- Healer's Sight – level 11Mana: You see the health of creatures and people around you. You see their wounds and injuries and uand how difficult they are to heal. Range: 39.9 meters.Holy, Healing, Perception- Prayer – level 14Focus: Seek the guidance of your patron. Mana regeion is increased by +270% [60 + skill x 15]. Movement or using an active skill cels your focus. Your Patron may choose to double your bonus at their discretion.Holy, Wisdom- Devotion – level 9Mana: All your healing spells gain Spell Echo, targeting up to 1 [1 + skill / 20] additional nearby targets. Your healing spells gain +18% [skill x 2] spell haste and the effects of all Healing Mastery skills are doubled. Duration: 30 seds. Recharge: 15 minutes.Holy, Healing, Area, Intelligence- Faith – level 4Stamina: Your will is strong, and your faith is pure. Resistance is increased by +177 [skill x 7 + wisdom]. Reserve: 10%Holy, Defense, Wisdom

  - [Locked] - [Locked]

  General Skills- Identify – level 4

  Aptitudes- Language: Draic- Draic Blood (Racial): Resistao Fire is increased by +161- Darkvision (Racial): You see in the dark.

  - Kobold Trickery (Racial): +5 to Dexterity and Intelligence

  Attributes- Vitality: 45- Strength: 5- Endurance: 18- Dexterity: 14- Perception: 80 (+28) - Intelligence: 120 (+42) - Wisdom: 149 (+52)

  Equipment- Body: Tailored Cotton Clothing – level 20

  Resistance: 465Magical Damage Redu: 41.92%+9% Spell power to Healing skills.

  Health: 450/450Stamina: 162/180 (18 Reserved)Mana: 1192/1490 (298 Reserved)

  Ta

  This was turning into aremely annoying and frustrating job. Expeoo. Ta darted along the rooftops, lettiealth skills keep the curious prying eyes from finding her as she made her way to the bar. Her prospective tractors had deed to meet at the Crooked and instead proposed the Pig ‘n Poke, and while she appreciated their caution, it not only meant a trip to the other side of town, but it also meant she would have to deal with the patrons that frequehe pce. Hopefully, it was te enough that most of them would be too drunk or too dead to cause trouble.

  Fug Disruptor. If only that arrogant mage had done his job properly, she wouldn’t still be stuck hiring meraries. How could someoh his ridiculous skills aation fail to kill a lower-level mage mark? His body – and those of his eeam – had never been recovered, which she supposed was what he got for dying in a dungeon, but she had reized some of his group’s gear showing up on the market a few days ter.

  A dead giveaway. She grinned wryly at her own pun.

  This time, though, there was much more at stake than simply killing Aliandra and wiping out the dungeon. With the ihat the Adventurers Guild was running a private css adva, and had been drawing in people from the poor and rundown slum areas in town, Jax Hawkhurst himself had gotten involved. He had been furious, calling it a decration of war against his business is – aion which had to mean Bastian Asterford was leaning hard on him. It wasn’t about the silver; it was about trol. trol and leverage led to results.

  Ta smiled grimly as she spied the meraries through an open window. You guys had better be worth my time, or I’ll be selling year myself.

  ----------

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