The Last Experience Point

Pausing to make sure there were no stragglers, Zach rounded the corner at the end of a hall that was significantly narrower than the one before it had been. There was an opening ahead, though it was clear of any enemies, as Rian had already unintentionally pulled the mobs here with his fear. Looking over his shoulder, Zach watched as Tyson, awkwardly holding his new sword, came hobbling into the room, misery on his face.

"Sir Calador, it appears we're at another dead end," he said as he turned his body around full circle.

From all appearances, he looked to be correct. They were now in a room that was perfectly square in shape, not entirely large, and lacked any unique characteristics aside from an open section of the wall above them and to their left that was letting in a blinding ray of light and another opening beside it that provided a view of the dome-shaped structure they were inside of. There were also four glass-like crystal columns positioned at each corner of the room.

"Ugh," Jimmy said as though annoyed. "It's one of these."

"These?" Zach asked.

He pointed at the patch of light on the floor. "Yeah, it's one of those puzzles where you have to move glass crystals so that they reflect the light off the floor, out of the other opening, and into some target we have to figure out, and then the door or hatch or whatever will open."

By the time Zach felt his jaw dropping, it had already fully dropped. Even Rian was gawking in amazement. But how could they not be surprised? Despite everything Jimmy had already shown them with regards to his knowledge of the adventuring world, the fact that he could just spout out some overly complex bullshit and turn out to be correct—it was never going to feel completely normal, was it? Like, that was such a detailed thing he'd just said. Who in their right mind would see a streak of light and naturally just think that they needed to manipulate the direction of that light?

Someone who views the entire world as a deliberate game, he realized.

"It's amazing," Rian said, no mockery at all in his voice. "Jimmy really did receive some kind of special, elite training. I mean, if he's right and that's actually what we have to do, then wow. Just wow."

"It is," Jimmy said. He rubbed his forehead as though annoyed or stressed. "Ya'll need to stop acting like this every time I say something basic. Again, where I'm from, this kinda' puzzle is common as hell. Anybody would just know it. It's actually cliché."

"What's klee-shay?" Zach asked.

Jimmy mumbled something to himself. "It doesn't matter. Let's just get this over with so we can—"

"Wait!" Lienne called out, raising her hand up high like she was in school.

"What's up?"

"I wanna do it."

"I want to do it too!" Seiley said, now raising her hand as well. Then the two looked at each other and smiled. "Me and Lienne want to do it. Let us solve the puzzle."

Jimmy looked at Zach, who shrugged back to him. "I mean, you're the one who's always calling this a game," he said to Jimmy. "Might as well let the girls do one of the 'puzzles' as you call them."

"That's right," Lienne said.

"Actually, that is right," Rian added. "We should be taking turns solving the puzzles. It's bullshit Jimmy gets to just strut around and do everything all the time."

Jimmy chuckled. "Be my guest. But none of you would even know that there is a puzzle if I didn't say so."

"Yeah, so? You can tell us which thing is a puzzle and how it works and we can figure it out once we know the rules."

Unexpectedly, Tyson voiced his agreement, as it seemed that, even he, the total coward, found the idea of "solving dungeon puzzles" to be entertaining. Though, Zach suspected that was only because he wasn't aware that sometimes mobs could come out of these puzzle contraptions. But at least he was showing some degree of initiative. In fact, the only person here who wasn't was Trelvor.

"I don't think we should fall into the misguided trap of treating this as 'fun' or a 'game,'" he said sternly. "We are here to advance the will of the Great Goddess. It may be sinful for us to be overly hedonistic in what should be a more noble pursuit."

"Hedonism is what I live for," Tyson said with a merry laugh. Then a chirp came from somewhere inside his silk robe, and he removed his phone and looked down upon it. Suddenly, his facial expression changed—dramatically. For the first time since meeting him, he looked and behaved like someone his age. His expression turned serious, then dire, then exhausted before settling on subdued. Slowly, he put his phone away and then made a very insincere, very forced smile. "Shall we proceed?"

"Uh, okay," Rian said. Walking over to Zach, he whispered, "What was that about?"

Zach shrugged. Then, speaking conversationally, he said, "Wait, our phones work in here? How am I only realizing that now?"

"Oh, you're right," Seiley said, removing her own, which like Jimmy, she'd only recently purchased. Though she was born on Galterra like the rest of the green-cloaks, she'd spent most of her life on Archian Prime and was still catching up on all the things she'd missed out on since leaving here as a little girl, including getting older and buying her first phone. "It does work."

Trelvor, like all the white cloaks, still had no device of his own and did not seem interested in buying one. He also didn't appear to realize the significance of the fact that phones were working here, so Zach explained it to him. "Our phones working means we're still on Galterra," he said to Trelvor. "As far as where we are, I'm not sure."

"I am," Rian said, laughing. He turned his screen to Zach. "We're in Giant's Fall according to GPS. We must be really deep underground."

"It's nice to be on our own planet for once," Zach said. "I'm glad we didn't go that far."

"And we're still not going far," Jimmy grumbled. "Can ya'll get a move on this shit, please?"

Seiley and Lienne looked at one another again, and then both laughed as they ran over and began moving one of the glass-like crystal columns, each of them grabbing one side of it and rolling it across the brick surface with a deep scratching sound towards the pool of light on the floor. The moment they began sliding it in place, the light struck the bluish-green crystal and reflected strongly off it in a way that seemed to defy the laws of physics. It then reversed directions completely, blasting out to the right, stretching across the room and coming to an end on the opposite wall about halfway to the ceiling.

"Nice," Jimmy said. "So uh, what you need to do now is—"

"Don't tell us!" Lienne shouted at him.

"Sheesh, okay."

The two girls turned towards one another and began whispering as if in some kind of deliberation. "This is really easy once you know what you're actually supposed to do," Lienne said.

"Yeah," Seiley whispered back.

The two of them grabbed another crystal and moved it as they had the first. Zach watched, amused, as it made more scraping sounds along the brick flooring as they used the crystal to intercept the beam of light and redirect it once more to the opposite corner of the room. Then they whispered to each other some more and undid what they'd only just done, causing the light to yet again hit the wall to everyone's right.

Now, they repositioned the crystal so that it was just in front of the second opening they were apparently supposed to be shining light through. The moment they had it where they seemed to want it, the two girls separated, with Lienne grabbing the third crystal on her own and Seiley grabbing the fourth. Lienne made a happy squeak as she moved the crystal against the wall to the right, intercepting the beam of light and shooting it towards Seiley, who had moved the fourth crystal against the back wall, causing it to redirect the light yet again.

This is wild, Zach thought, stepping back and realizing that there was now a bending, turning beam of light that was moving all the way around the room. And it continued to move while Seiley made slight rotational adjustments with her crystal until the light connected with the second crystal near the second opening, causing a final beam of light to at last shoot out of the second opening.

Finally, the two girls once more rejoined, and together, they carefully adjusted the second crystal as if aiming for something. "It has to be that blue crystal all the way across the dome," Seiley said.

"Yeah, definitely."

They made a few more slight rotations, and then several seconds transpired before, finally, the entire room began to shake and rumble, this time even more forcefully than it had the last time, and most of it was concentrated on the right side of the wall, which began to crumble. Bricks were falling out of it one by one, and then the entire wall simply turned to dust, revealing the entrance to another area—one that was obscured by something.

Something huge.

"MRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" cried a large, hairy, ape-like creature more than ten feet in height with massive, orange, and fur-covered arms that ended in freakishly huge clenched fists. The creature had two sharp tusks protruding from a mouth filled with razor-sharp teeth, and its eyes were green in color. The creature began pounding its huge fists against its chest.

"Boss fight!" Jimmy shouted out just a bit too happily.

Zach quickly drew his sword. "It's only T1, but we should still take this seriously."

"Treat it like it's level 65," Rian said, raising his axe and shield. Seiley and Trelvor readied their staff and flute respectively, and Lienne was already casting her defense buff on everyone in their group, including Tyson, who was reacting to this situation in a way slightly different from how Zach had assumed he would.

To be sure, the man definitely released a fearful croak, and he was certainly trembling along with showing other signs of uneasiness. But all of it came across as a bit more subdued now. It was as though something was on his mind: something so significant that it lessened his reaction to seeing what, normally, would have him crying out as though he'd already been murdered.

What's gotten into him?

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

Zach didn't have time now to figure it out. Right now, he needed to concentrate on the boss. At the instruction of Jimmy, he began spreading out so that the seven of them formed a loosely separated link from one side of the room to the other. Then Rian threw his axe at the monster, clipping it in the jaw and doing a paltry 558 damage. It wasn't even enough to draw blood.

"We got a tough boy," Rian said with a chuckle as his axe began returning to him.

It never made it.

The boss, moving even faster than the axe, let out a mighty roar and then jumped forward into the air while raising both its huge fists. Zach, Lienne, Jimmy, Trelvor, Seiley, and even Tyson all shouted his name in warning as the huge creature dropped straight down on top of him as Rian raised his shield directly upwards and reinforced it with his second, free hand. What followed was a terrifying clunk as both the creature's fists bashed down on the shield, and then a secondary thud as Rian was smashed down onto the floor on his back.

"Rian!" Zach yelled. "Are you okay? Rian!"

"Y-yeah," he said. Then he began groaning as, while lying flat on his back, he was forced to raise his shield as the creature began punching down at him, alternating between its left fist and its right fist; this, as a clack emanated from behind them as Rian's axe became lodged in the brick wall.

"MRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" the creature roared as it slammed down its left fist, then right fist, then left, each one making a thunk against Rian's shield. But Rian was struggling. Zach doubted he would be able to hold on for much longer. He was being badly overwhelmed.

Zach, flooding with urgency, activated Halting Strike. Since he wasn't in Unleashed Phase, he paid for the ability immediately, but being that it was only a Low-Medium Exertion Cost, it didn't tax him all that heavily.

Disturbed by the sight of the beast's fists slamming down over and over against Rian's shield, Zach leapt into the air and raised his blade high above his head as it began to light up with reddish sparks, which covered the blade from the hilt to the edge. Then he slashed directly downwards, cutting the beast from its forehead to its right cheek, hitting for 6,511 damage and leaving a bloodied red streak in its flesh that perfectly traced the trajectory of his blade.

It also caused the T1 boss's body to become covered in reddish tendrils of electricity, and for just a moment, all activity halted.

"Good stun!" Jimmy called out. "Rian, move!"

At its best, Zach's stun could only last for 1.2 seconds. And in this case, that was simply not long enough, as that wasn't even enough time for Rian to realize he needed to move let alone for him to be able to pull himself together and do so. For this reason, Zach followed up his stun with yet another ability.

"Rooting!" he called out as he activated Frostbind, the ability on his Robes of Dark Awakening that had a fifteen-minute cooldown and could root a target for up to thirty seconds. Now, as the stun broke on the boss, it was replaced by a number of frozen shackles made of pure ice that burst through the brick flooring, destroying several bricks in the process as they clamped tightly around its feet, securing it to the floor. At the same time, Trelvor ran over, grabbed Rian's shoulders, and slid him away from the boss just as it slammed both its fists down at once, blasting a small hole in the floor and causing more bricks to go scattering.

"MRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

On wobbly feet, Rian got back up, now looking more winded and disoriented than he did in pain. "Thanks, Zach—and Trelvor." To Jimmy, he said, "I don't think I can tank this thing."

"You've gotta!" Jimmy snapped. "Otherwise we need to retreat."

"Okay, so we'll retreat."

Jimmy gave Rian a look of such outrage one would have thought Rian had just insulted Jimmy's mother. "Hell no."

Rian returned the look with one that rivaled Jimmy's outrage. "You're not listening to me, buddy. I can't tank that thing!"

Zach sighed. "I can."

Now, the six of them looked his way. "No way you can tank that," Jimmy said, shaking his head. "Unless you're planning on using your ability."

"No, I don't need to use Unleashed Phase on this. I can tank it without that."

"How?" Jimmy demanded. "If Rian can't take a hit from it, what makes you think you can?"

"Oh, I definitely can't."

"Uh, okay, so then how the fuck are you gonna tank it?"

"Because I won't let it hit me!"

Jimmy again shook his head. "That's dumb as hell. Not a great idea." He swore. "If we only had more room, I could solo this thing."

"I told you," Zach said, becoming irritated. "I got this one." He stepped forward even as Rian and Lienne began to warn him to come back. "Just make sure nobody attacks it until I get firm aggro. I don't have any taunts, so I have to bust it up a bit before it's locked onto me."

They all began shouting at him, but Zach ignored each and every word and instead put his focus on the massive, hairy creature, who with a grunt and a lurch, managed to snap free of its bindings. It was still locked on to Rian, however. With another roar, it began stomping its huge feet onto the brick flooring, causing the room to shake as it dashed to where Rian was backing away towards the previous room where they'd fought the initial three Spike-Head Critter mobs.

"Where do you think you're going?" Zach growled at it.

As the creature darted by, he turned his body to the right and extended both of his arms, holding his sword directly out in front of him and letting the creature slice its own self on his blade. Now, a second bloodied streak joined the first, this one running from its belly to the back of its right hip as it shot past Zach, taking 5,555 damage. But this, it seemed, was just enough to cause the boss to switch aggro, as despite Rian's initial taunt, Zach was now responsible for having dealt every point of damage it had taken thus far aside from the 558 Rian had done initially.

The boss continued to run towards Rian for several seconds. Then it planted its feet, coming to a rough halt. It spun around, its lips peeled back, and now, at Zach, it released another roar. But something was different about this roar. Something very strange; namely, the fact that Zach could actually see it. He could see the roar in the form of a dark, reddish-orange aura that came out of its mouth in a cone shape and extended all the way across the room, covering Zach in its cold, dark energy.

"MRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

"Z-Zach!" Lienne cried out in warning. "What did it just do to you?"

"Nothing," Zach said as he rotated his shoulders and assumed a fighting stance as the boss approached. "Just some armor debuff."

Jimmy looked uncertain and worried, which was unlike him. "See if you can get around it and come over to us. If we need to back out of here, I can—"

"I told you!" Zach interrupted, cutting him off. "This thing's not so bad. Just stay back and don't attack it until I say so!"

Jimmy's uneasiness seemed to grow as he nodded, slowly. "All right. It's just I'm not sure…I haven't figured out what kind of boss this is yet. And I don't like the terrain we're fighting on."

Can't believe he's acting like this, Zach thought. It was only in this moment he realized that Jimmy's courage came with certain restrictions. Typically, he seemed willing to take any risk, no matter how great, as long as he felt secure in his knowledge of the situation or the way that events were unfolding. But as soon as he found himself in a situation where something was happening that he didn't quite know or he found himself in a place that was a bit too enclosed for him to do his crazy boss-kiting bullshit, all of that went out the window.

Jimmy needs to get better at adapting on the fly, Zach thought. He's the most confident person in the world until he doesn't know something.

Zach, having heard enough from the others, decided to take the lead for the time being. He once more tuned them out and trained his eyes on the boss, who having debuffed his armor, began pounding its chest before crossing the distance to Zach in just two quick strides. And yet, before it even managed to move its left fist, Zach had already noticed the twitch of its left shoulder muscle—and thus he already knew exactly what was coming his way.

"Tell me you can do better than that," Zach taunted as the boss attacked.

With incredible force, the suitably named Mighty Kongex of Karnzon slammed its clenched fist down on top of Zach like a hammer. But Zach, seeing it coming, made a short, concise hop to his left, then followed up with one to his right as the boss brought down its opposite fist. Then it tried to bludgeon him with both fists at the same time, and for this, Zach jumped much higher up into the air while quickly raising his wrists, slicing the boss vertically up its throat, over its lips, nose, and finally its forehead for 8,211 damage.

As the boss's fists crushed down onto the brick floor, Zach spun himself around midair and slashed the boss from the very top of its scalp all the way down its shoulders, its hairy back, its right knee, and then down to its very foot, leaving his longest and bloodiest gash yet and dealing 11,211 damage as he landed deftly onto his feet. From there, Zach swung his blade twice more in just the time it took the boss to turn around, but these were fast, opportune strikes that sliced at its oversized ass, adding another two bloody streaks for 4,011 and 5,211 damage, one on each hairy butt cheek.

"MRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

The T1 boss, once again facing in Zach's direction, tried again to slam both of its fists down on top of Zach. But its stance was wider now than it had been before, so rather than jump over its head, Zach darted forward, threw himself onto his back, and slid beneath its legs an instant before he was turned to mush. Then he spun his body around completely and unleashed a spinning slice of his sword that cut from hip to hip for 7,899 and also activated the light ability on his weapon, causing dozens of white, glowing, star-shaped emblems to appear all around the boss before converging upon it and exploding in a blast of light, dealing another 72,592 and causing blood to begin pouring out of its nose, eyes, and chest.

The boss, banging its chest, jumped straight up into the air and then slammed down onto the ground where Zach was standing, using both of its big, bare feet. Zach threw himself forward and came into a roll, moving in the direction of the others and avoiding the attack completely. Then he jumped up to his feet and began furiously whipping his arms from left to right as the mob entered into an awkward crouch and began to stand back up. Utilizing each and every second it took the mob to reposition and reorient its body and posture, Zach struck the boss five times in the back and three times on its belly by the time it had turned around.

6,441

5,211

7,666

7,664

4,295

8,081

8,000

5,272

Zach laughed at the boss, which now had so many bloodied streaks across its body that it looked like it was being carved up for dinner. To that end, Zach's blade now had gross orange hair all over the edge, which he began to shake off. Then he held it at the ready and nodded at the boss. "That all you got?"

"MRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

The boss launched into a frenzied series of fist strikes, alternating between its left and right fist with absolutely no variation or change in timing. This must have been the attack that almost killed Rian. It was relentless, and it went on for several-dozen punches, the mob striking over and over with its hammer-fist attacks. But with such a steady, constant rhythm, Zach was able to simply shuffle from side to side while slashing out with his blade between fist strikes, dealing out another 31,476 total damage before the mob's attack ended, at which time Zach took a lunging step forward and plunged his blade through the beast's heart, hitting for 7,221 and causing his stamina buff to proc.

Whew, I needed that, he thought, realizing he'd begun to sweat. At once, his breathing, which hadn't quite been heavy but was approaching it, softened, and his heart rate went back to near resting.

"MRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" the creature roared. The floor was now absolutely covered in the creature's blood, and it continued to leak more and more of it as it pursued Zach. It slammed just its left fist down, so Zach moved quickly to the opposite side. Then, twisting his body to the right, he quickly spun in the opposite direction while launching himself upwards and extending his arms, performing his strongest strike yet: a jumping, spinning slash that slit the boss's entire neck open, dealing 14,112 while a jet of dark red blood sprayed out of the wound; but most importantly, the attack actually caused the boss to moan as it stumbled several steps backwards and then fell over like toppled giant, landing hard onto its back.

Zach, who was still midair, turned his sword downwards and landed directly on its chest, plunging his sword into its heart a second time for 10,001 before pulling out and piercing it a third time for another 11,200. The boss, writhing, shot back up, causing Zach to fling off his belly, flip backwards in the air—purposefully, just to taunt Rian—and then land softly onto his feet. He then rushed forward and whipped his blade back and forth, dealing yet another 6,255 and 7,877 damage respectively, and it was on the second of these two strikes that his light ability proc'd once more.

Seeing the dozens of star-shaped emblems of pure light surrounding the critically wounded, near-death boss, Zach decided to be a showoff. He immediately halted his third attack, and instead, he fully turned his back to this dangerous boss, stared the others in the eyes, and actually sheathed his blade as he heard the explosion and saw just the afterglow of the emblems of light exploding.

"You guys can help now."

+110,000xp

Zach chuckled. He'd completely forgotten they were there at all and thus had likewise forgotten to order them to attack. And now, they were speechless. For a time, they stared at Zach as though he were some kind of strange, mysterious being. Even Jimmy was at a loss for words. But why were they so surprised? It was only a T1.

"Okay then," Rian whispered. "Let's loot and move on."