Chapter 173: Figuring Out Secrets

Cordellia still had an arrow ready even though Tanila had told her to stop attacking. Her mouth was open as she watched the human warrior dissecting the plant as if it were nothing more than a common flower in a garden.

A minute passed, and every vine from the creature was gone.

“He’s going to kill this almost by himself,” Cordellia said in awe. “How?”

“I can’t answer that,” Tanila replied as they both watched Max start to chop the petals off the boss's face. “He’s not like us, yet he’ll do whatever he must to protect you.”

Fowl made it to the group of three, standing about thirty yards from the carnage Max was creating.

“I like a good hug, but that thing was a bit too much,” Fowl joked, grunting when no one laughed as he hoped. “How long till that thing is dead?”

“I have no idea,” Batrire replied, “but he is harvesting the heck out of that thing. I’m not sure we’ll have enough space to bring all that back.”

“Sure we will,” Fowl declared. “These new storage devices have three times the space and weight. Everett might have a heart attack when he sees everything, though.”

A loud wail came and then stopped, experience flooding the four of them.

“Holy ogre nuts,” Cordellia cursed. “That was more than a pack of plants we killed in the other clearing.”

“Aye, level fifty-one now,” Fowl said happily. “It's time to decide how I want to present my points.”

“Stop yacking and come collect this stuff!” Max yelled at the group of three, grabbing a handful of petals and stacking them on each other.

The boss was gone before the three of them reached the corpse, replaced with a standard-sized green chest where the bottom half of the stem had been.

“That was impressive,” Cordellia stated as she started to pick up some of the vines and store them. “Tanila said you always wanted to be a gardener.”

Laughing, Max nodded and stuffed the pile of petals into a backpack he had brought out. “If a life of adventuring doesn’t work out, perhaps I can get a job taking care of overgrown plants.”

“You used everything?” Batrire asked as she grabbed a vine and dragged it over toward Fowl.

“As did Fowl,” Max replied. “Provided there aren’t any more bosses, we should be fine, but if so, we’ll have to leave and try again in a few days.”

Max saw Tanila opening the chest and watched her as she studied inside of it.

“Anything good?” Fowl asked as he stored the vine Batrire had brought him.

Tapping her lips with her finger, Tanila nodded. “I believe so. This chest is interesting, though, to say the least.”

Everyone groaned, and Tanila moved to join them in cleaning up the rest of the items Max had cut off the boss.

“One fricking item! You have got to be kidding me!”

Everyone ignored Fowl and his complaining, each staring at the item that was changing appearance. Occasionally, a green belt or a necklace, a bracer, and even a ring a few times.

“Two crystals and one random item. That does seem a bit unfair,” Max admitted. “Still, the two yellow gems should mean someone gets an upgraded skill sooner.”

“The best way to do this is everyone rolls,” Batrire stated. “No point trying to do it any other way for now.”

“You sure I should roll on this?”

“Everyone means everyone,” Max replied, nodding at Cordellia. “Get over the part where you don’t feel like one of us.”

She smiled and held her hand over the dimensional area.

Everyone touched the section, and each person’s face appeared on a die. It looked to have four of each person on it and started to twist and turn in the dimensional area, slowing down after a moment.

Max watched as everyone’s eyes were fixated on the results, knowing inside all of them was a desire to win and see what might come from it.

“Ockrim loves me!” Fowl shouted, dancing a small jig when the dice stopped spinning, and his bearded face appeared.

“Congrats, now take your prize and tell us what it is,” Max said as he retrieved the two massive yellow crystals.

Fowl reached in, took out the ring, and started to examine it. Green metal with what looked to be crafted as a twisted vine fashioned all around sat in the dwarf’s palm as he stared at it.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

His eyes went wide, and he quickly slipped it onto his finger, smiling as he did.

“Well, you ogre nut, going to share?” Batrire asked, frowning at him.

“Yeah… I just wanted to see if I could tell a difference. It only offers five constitution points but grants a Rooted ability. It seems that I can use it and not be moved. It’s like my Armored Warrior, but different. I only get a two hundred percent bonus to defense, no extra bonus hit points, either. There is only an hour cooldown, too, which is a blessing compared to the cooldown on the Armored Warrior.”

Nodding, Max reached out and grabbed Tanila’s hand, leading her a little bit away from the others.

“Everything ok?”

He nodded and smiled. “I got six strength and constitution again. I have no other stats, but I won’t complain. I also have no skills, but part of me can see why that might not have happened.”

“Being a plant and all?”

“Yup,” Max replied, giving her a small kiss on her cheek. “Besides, I wanted to ask how Cordellia responded to that fight. I don’t like going all out like that, but this thing was far stronger than I imagined it would be. Even my best attack only cut halfway through it. I’m not certain how these things will measure up, but at some point, we will hit a roadblock. I’m certain of it.”

Tanila smiled and looked at their archer, talking with the other three. “She did fine, but she is overwhelmed. It's a lot between me being a princess and you soloing this boss that she and a normal party would struggle with. How long till you think we can do more?”

“You say that like you didn’t help against that boss,” Max replied. “You both played a huge role in that fight. Your spells kept it off of me for a bit.”

“Just remember to let everyone else play. Even Fowl gets flustered by not doing much. Eventually, we’ll have to fight and be at the top of our game.”

Max frowned and nodded, knowing Tanila was right.

“Fine, we can finish this floor and rest until all our cooldowns are done. Then we can see how things go as a group in the coming floors.”

Max pulled one more large pack to the group, killing over half of the seventy plants, trees, and mushrooms. They cleared out the rest of that path to find the exit to the tower's second floor.

“One day… we cleared a floor in one day,” Cordellia said again. “It’s a good thing we are going to rest a few days, or people might wonder what is happening with our group.”

“How long would your normal group have required for this floor?” Batrire asked as they stood near the portal, putting yellow gems equally into pouches.

“Three days without that boss. Two would have been pushing it. I’m not certain how Seth can just run past everything, but you can’t imagine the fear a normal party would have.”

“We’ll take care of a few other things as well. I got a few errands to run over the next few days anyways,” Max said. “The next question is who wants to upgrade their skill. Fowl and Batrire, you’re up. One of you picks who goes next and let Everett know.”

“What about you?” Cordellia. “Don’t you need to upgrade yours?”

“I always go last,” Max lied. “I can survive until we are all able to upgrade.”

She frowned but nodded.

Everyone took their pouches and started crushing the gems in their hands. Sighs and moans came as the power of each gem flooded their bodies, and by the end of it all, each of them had risen another tower level.

“That one percent seems nice,” Fowl said. “It's going to be really hard giving up seven percent when we reset back to level zero.”

“Why is why most don’t,” Cordellia stated as she finished crushing her gems. “Imagine the rare ones who actually make it to level fifty. Could you see them trying to give up those kind of bonuses?”

A thought hit Max as Cordellia said those things.

“Can someone give up all fifty tower levels at once?”

Max’s question caught everyone off guard, and he couldn’t help but smirk as they stared at him.

“You’d give up fifty percent bonuses for twelve and a half?! That seems insane to even imagine. If someone had one hundred in their constitution they would be giving up a third of their life!”

Bobbing his head, Max kept the same smirk as Cordellia ranted about that decrease.

“But it would make farming the levels easier,” Tanila said. “If things went well, you’d be close to level seventy-five, beat all the hard stuff, have all the better gear, and then descend upon the tower's lower levels, way stronger than before.”

Their archer’s face went from confused and frustrated to in shock and awe in one moment.

“You’re right,” Max replied. “Imagine all the stats you gained through that point. I was doing some math, and maybe I’ll share those numbers later, but if the gear scales, the stats continue to go up, and the truth is experience isn’t the biggest problem but our stats, that would be the smartest way.”

“That’s how they bridge the gap!” Cordellia exclaimed loudly. “Those who fight in the fifties! Only a handful do that, but most can’t make that jump! They aren’t willing to give up that growth and regrind everything again.”

Nodding, Max took a stick and drew a few lines in the dirt where the stone path ended before the swirling black portal.

“This line is your possible stats, and the one on the bottom is your level. As you gain both, the line travels like this.”

Fowl watched momentarily and then shook his head before moving away from the others. “I don’t like math; just tell me what to do, and I’ll do it,” he muttered.

Ignoring their dwarf warrior, Max marked where the line dropped down but less than half before rising quickly upward again. “If I’m right, and Tanila says I am, the actual loss will be less if we wait till fifty. Imagine then what we’ll be able to do as a group.”

Their archer tugged on her braid for a moment, trying to handle the overwhelming knowledge that suddenly made sense.

“Do you think Everett and Tom know this?” she asked,

“I do. Odds are they don’t share it until someone actually reaches the fiftieth floor. It’s far easier to convince someone to take that path when they see the truth instead of having an impossible mountain to climb beforehand.”

Fowl's stomach growled, and everyone turned to see his face turning slightly red. “Sorry, a bit hungry.”

“Let’s go, and we can discuss things back at the faction house,” Max said. “Besides, we need to turn in everything we have and acquire these reports from Everett and Tom. I don’t want to miss out on knowing something about what we will face.”

Everyone nodded and turned, going out the portal first, leaving Max standing there for a moment by himself.

Glancing up at the sun-filled sky of the tower floor, he couldn’t help but wonder what the last floor would be like. No one seemed to know or was willing to share, and the thought of it sent chills down his spine.