Pit's Cry is level 24!
Pit's Rake is level 21!
Pit's Bite is level 20!
Companion Pact is level 23!
Frustratingly, Felix wasn't able to get Acid Stream, Shadow Whip, or Stone Shaping to level 25 despite how often he used them. Simple repetition wasn't cutting it anymore, the final jump taking far more effort than others. Felix didn't really understand why, and Magda's advice was to "think about how the Skill works and how it affects you." Which was...not exactly unhelpful, but Felix didn't make headway, not with those spells.
Exploration, on the other hand, had jumped to level 24 fairly quickly. This place was a treasure trove of important, unexplored crannies. That Skill seemed to apply toward places of significance, and Felix couldn't claim that this two thousand year old death maze wasn't significant. They had encountered a wide variety of fascinating structures within the Labyrinth, ranging from the omnipresent carved standing stones to delicately detailed frescos painted on the walls and mostly hidden beneath thick moss. They depicted white-furred, robe wearing creatures standing among a gaggle of elementals. Most were simply ordering the elementals around or using them to build something. A few, however, swarmed around strangely amorphous...blobs. They had no clear size or shape, only a dark discoloration that seemed to seep into whatever pigments were used on the paintings. The white-furred folk (Geist, clearly) were fighting against the blobs with spears and spells but seemed to be in a stalemate.
Magda thought it curious, but likely irrelevant. "I've seen thousands a these sorts a things. All of em have their heroes fighting off monsters or demons, or whatever nonsense you wanna imagine. It's usually just braggin'."
"Then why aren't they winning?" Felix asked. Magda shrugged and kept moving.
Another twenty minutes later, they found the statue chamber. At least, that's what Felix called it.
It was massive, easily the largest space they had found within the Labyrinth. The dense fog and smothering darkness blocked their senses beyond fifty feet in any direction, but brief flashes of his Manasight convinced Felix the room was easily a mile in all dimensions.
Manasight is level 35!
The tiled and mossy floor extended about thirty feet from the entry before it tilted down into a lake. That was the only way to describe it, as it filled most of the space, dark water that slowly surged and receded with tiny waves yet was absolutely silent. Still in the corridor just outside the chamber, Felix and Magda shared a look before stepping in. Now beyond the threshold, the sound of the water roared up from nothing, a constant susseration that filled the immense chamber.
"Some sorta seal or something on the door," Magda muttered, briefly looking back at the entryway. "Why bother, though?"
Felix shrugged and knelt down, pushing aside the omnipresent moss. A strip of carved rock was at the base of the archway, the markings in it etched in a familiar script. Felix went over his memories of the script he'd seen up to that point, a relatively short list. The script consisted of four characters, repeated over and over until they formed a dense banner of sigils. Felix considered them each in turn and while his understanding of sigils was shaky at best, he was able to tease something from them. Uncertain as to why, Felix felt that the largest of the four characters meant "quietude" and that the rest modified that declaration for an unknown purpose.
Sigils of the Primordial Dawn is level 5!
"No clue why, but yeah, some sort of silence sigil is inscribed here." Felix stood up and brushed off his hands. "At least that means any monsters behind us won't hear us?"
Magda snorted before sitting down on a large rock. "That's something. I'm taking thirty seconds. Then we move. We're close, I know it."
Felix nodded, silently agreeing. They were close. The song was louder, more strident, more...insistent...though he still blocked it out with Bastion of Will. His Skill formed a metaphysical castle wall around his mind, dark stone repelling the sinuous notes like ransacking invaders. If he focused on it, Felix could easily picture those soaring walls of stone, each block the size of two men and growing larger and more ornate as the Skill leveled. Was it real?
As real as anything else in this bonkers place, he decided.
Felix walked to the water's edge, careful of his movements and scanning everything around him with a combination of Analyze and an intermittent Manasight. With no obvious traps underfoot, he gazed out into the water and his eyes widened. Closer now, the fog had parted to reveal massive statues partially submerged in the dark water, each of them depicting a wild beast that combined a handful of opposing features.
Chimeras.
There were dozens of them, perhaps hundreds placed in the water in a regular pattern. The water sloshed against them, the sunken statuary varying in height from enormous fifty foot tall constructions to barely peeking above the surface. They appeared to be all made in the same fashion, a fluted pillar supporting a chimeric beast in some sort of action pose. From his position Felix could make out Wyverns, Harnoqs, Wendigos, and yes, even a few Tenku. But there were more, beyond the range of his Analyze, things he hadn't encountered before and were startlingly graceful meshes of monstrous creatures.
"What is all this?"
A chill wind blew across the water, the fog swirling in its passage, raising goosebumps on Felix's skin even as he ignored the temperature. His Cold Resistance made it inconsequential. What wasn't to be dismissed was that when the fog parted, his peripherals caught the shape of something fluttering near the water line.
"Is that..?" Felix's attention pivoted and his mouth widened into a grin. "My stuff!"
There, sitting on the mossy stone was a slew of pages and the splayed open form of his ragged notebook. Felix rushed over, keeping his eyes open for any more traps, and scooped them up. The notebook was more or less intact, though a number of pages in the back were coming loose from the binding. It even still had the few pages he stole from the Archon. Felix only briefly glanced at their fell designs before snapping them shut again. Of the actual satchel there was no sign, nor of his grease pen or the locked box Pit had stolen. It appeared as if the bag had fallen from a great height and scattered, which unfortunately made sense.
We must be closer to our landing point then, right? How would the bag have fallen here if it was really four hours away from where we landed? Felix frowned. We did double back on many of the pathways...this Labyrinth is too strange though. How big is it, exactly?
Ten feet away, further from the water, he spied a dented and crumpled potions case. Cursing, Felix strode over and picked it up with gentle hands. It was his alright, and the case had been half crushed by the fall, leaving several of the vials leaking a thick silver liquid. Remnants of liquid, at least, most of the essence draughts having leeched into the ground. Damn it, I need some of these. Vessilia's draughts only contained enough for two Mind, two Body, and two Spirits. The ducal heiress already had partially tempered her Body, Mind, and Spirit and only needed enough to finish the job. As Felix went through the case's remains, he found only a single Iron Body Essence Draught and the Wandering Spirit Essence Draught. The Body draught was useless to him, since he couldn't Temper his Body again at Apprentice Tier, but the Wandering Spirit Essence was lucky. It was his only uncommon ranked draught and it meant he could fully Temper his Spirit with the Essences on hand.
Now I just have to worry about my Mind Skills. Both Exploration and Analyze are close to Tier.
The soft sound of something rubbing against stone caught his attention. Felix's Perception zeroed in on it without hesitation. It sounded high pitched in a way he couldn't place, but it definitely was something dragging against stone. Almost at the water line Felix spied a glittering bronze shape, crooked and sharp.
My sword!
As he watched a wave crashed over the blade and it began to slip into the dark water. This time he didn't even check for traps, pushing himself quickly to the edge in an attempt to snatch the Crescian blade away from a watery grave. The moment his hand wrapped around the hilt, however, was when they struck.
The water thrashed and suddenly a line of blood appeared on Felix's forearm, following by a sharp burning pain. He fell backward on his ass, looking for whatever attacked him and at first he saw nothing. Then his high Perception picked out a slight distortion in the air before him, a distortion that was now lunging at him. With an undignified squawk, Felix rolled to the side as three somethings sparked against the stone ground, their path so fast and form so transparent that he couldn't follow the attack. Pushing up with his free hand, Felix shoved himself into the air, cracking the stone beneath him with a sharp retort. Even before he landed back on his feet, the invisible creature struck again. The blow hit him square in the chest, sending the Nym sliding backward a few feet, stopping once he fetched up against a standing stone.
Invisible monsters? No...fair, he managed groggily before flaring Bastion of Will. His mind snapped back together. Felix leaned forward, surprised to find his hooked sword still in his grip; then he tucked it into his belt and raised both of his hands.
Acid Stream!
Twin jets of acid exploded outward, extra Mana increasing their flow and speed. Felix sprayed down the area before him, panning to the side to ensure he got the invisible bastard. The viscous green liquid spat and sizzled against the stone, eating through the moss and rock at a steady rate, and a good portion of it coated a collection of spindly limbs that began to charge towards him. Felix couldn't quite make out what it was, or how many of them there were, but he did notice that the acid only sloughed off their form, doing no damage.
Shit.
Then the water exploded.
What seemed like a hundred dark blurs launched out of the water all along the coastline, shooting up before buzzing forward toward them. They were fast, fast enough that he couldn't make out details, but they weren't faster than thought.
Reign of Vellus!
Felix released the spell in an arc, and azure lightning exploded up from the earth as a wall of force shimmered and slammed everything backward. The near-invisible creature toppled back as the flying monsters bashed into midair as if hitting a massive window, their momentum stopped dead cold though not reversed. He could see that they were like giant aquatic insects, sectioned carapaces, faceted eyes and all covered in glistening scales. Within moments a few had recovered and buzzed their awful wings toward him again.
"Clarion Call!"
That high pitched siren song belted out into the area, and nearly all of the fly-fish swerved toward her. Felix spared a glance toward her and saw Pit at her side, launching Wingblades and Frost Spears at the approaching monsters.
Good job, Pit. Watch out, they seem fast. Pit chirruped at him mentally, acquiescence that became a warning screech. Barely registering the warning, Felix turned in time to catch a blurring limb to the face.
CRASH!
The stones shattered beneath him as his body was driven to the ground, but when the second limb hit his gut, Felix grappled with it. Refusing to let go, Felix dragged the invisible bastard down with him, using his leverage to yank on their glass-like limb until a loud thud echoed from beside him. Felix rolled on top of it, swinging out with Corrosive Strike; he could feel something grab at his fist, but not hard enough to stop his blow.
CRACK!
Splintering cracks formed on the surface of nothing, revealing the shape of several thrashing limbs beneath his fist.
Blind Fighting is level 21!
Strike after strike, Felix didn't let up. Not even as the glass monster beneath him lashed at him with razor sharp claws and fangs, slashing into his legs, thighs and back. Felix pushed through the pain, focusing on pushing each Corrosive Strike harder and further through this beast's remarkable defense. The cracks spread, making it more and more visible as it's form clouded with fractures, and Felix could make out a snarling wolf-like head atop an emaciated body with far too many limbs.