18 Hastur's Cloak
--- (General POV) ---
Two weeks had passed since Niall arrived in Orario and settled inside an abandoned church in the ruined part of the city. Days flew by as he delved deep into the dungeon without pause, only returning home to sleep occasionally.
His growth was visible; he had completed one of the three quests given to him by the God who brought him to this world.
And that quest was eating monster cores.
Shwooosh
Suddenly, a green light enveloped Niall's hands, and a book appeared right in front of him, levitating in space.
"Congratulations on completing your first quest, Niall. As part of your requested power, we have decided to give you a bonus reward for your obedience."
The voices spoke from the book, while Niall stared without any emotion on his face. He was currently on the fifteenth floor of the dungeon, surrounded by walls made of bedrock.
"Your evolution also managed to go a bit further than the last time, you should notice drastic changes to your body already," the voices spoke in unison, leaving Niall wondering what kind of drastic changes were about to happen.
Then suddenly, Niall felt a sharp pain in his stomach, a pain like a burning sword piercing right through his gut. He screamed in agony as blood poured from both his eyes and mouth, like a red fountain.
But his red blood quickly started changing color to green, eventually becoming a fully greenish color that resembled dark forest leaves.
"What... what is this?" He could only mutter those words before the process of evolution fully finished and the pain subsided.
"You fully entered the evolution process, which meant that the first experience would be painful since your mortal body experienced a major trauma. After this, you shouldn't experience such pain upon evolving, but that only depends on how fast you will progress."
Niall brushed off the blood from his face before tilting his head up, looking at the book with doubt in his mind.
"Until next time, farewell." The book closed and fell into Niall's hand. He immediately opened it and searched for his status page.
--- --- ---
Name: Niall
Race: Human? (1/100) ???
Level: 1
PWR: 145 I --> 644 C
SRV: 102 I --> 476 E
DUR: 94 I --> 524 D
POWERS
(Azathoth's Blessing)
● Gives a user a different state of mind, removing emotions and offering protection against charms and any attack on a user's mind.
● Granting the user his own self-efficient Falna connected to the Necronomicon. In exchange for needing an achievement to level up, the user must max out all its stats to 1500 to level up.
(Chaos Sultan)
Sends a spatial energy wave that nullifies any armor, once the wave hits its opponent, the receiving side will experience fatigue and stamina loss.
(Hastur's Cloak)
It grants the user the ability to summon a golden transparent cloak around their body, completely protecting them from any harm that is level below or above their own.
QUESTS
● Unseal the Dungeon in Melen
- Progress: Uncompleted
● Kill 100 People using Chaos Sultan Ability
- Progress: 54/100
--- --- ---
"This ability seems nice. It's an alternative to armor... I guess I don't need to carry these armor pieces on me anymore." Niall dropped a small piece of armor he had stolen from bandits, feeling lighter without it.
"So, how do I summon it? Do I just imagine it appearing around me, or do I say the skill's name? Hmm, let me try using my wonderful imagination."
Niall imagined a golden, transparent cloak appearing around him. At first, nothing happened besides Niall's fart. But after a few seconds, the golden-like transparent cloak appeared around him, giving him a divine-like look.
"This looks similar to when Hestia used her Arcanum inside a dungeon, just a golden color instead of her white. Someone may mistake me for a god using his Arcanum when in this state. It looks hella cool, not gonna lie."
Niall nodded to himself and decided to go back home to sleep since it was late at night, but he noticed his sleepiness was gone.
"Could I be tripping or is my sleep deprivation gone? Wait, my body evolved drastically, so that could only mean that some of the basic human needs are gone... but that would be too OP this early..."
He thought for a moment until a group of monsters spawned behind him, a pack of hellhounds growling ferociously at the boy now surrounded by a glowing golden light.
Hellhounds were known as pretty dangerous beasts that could fire fireballs from their mouths at unfortunate adventurers. Most newbies used to underestimate them, leading to their deaths.
"It's recommended to wear Salamander Wool when facing these things, but I'm going to risk it and see how my new ability reacts to their attacks," Niall thought, and instead of casting his power, he approached the group with his arms open wide.
"Come on, you ugly beasts, let me see what you got!" Niall yelled at the angry hellhounds, who fired flames from their mouths and charged at him.
BOOM BOOM*
Flames hit Niall, but the golden light protected him. Not even a scratch was left on his body, proving the effectiveness of this new ability.
The group of six hellhounds charged at Niall in a desperate attempt to eat him alive and tear him apart. They got close and tried biting him, but each attack was nullified by a strange cloak around him.
They tried and tried, but no damage could be dealt to him. Seeing that they were unable to harm him, the beasts growled in frustration.
"This ability is indeed useful. It cannot be bypassed, of course, if the attacker isn't two levels above me or higher. But if he's not, then I'm in creative mode for that unfortunate bastard!"
Niall sent multiple waves at the beasts, turning them into a pile of bloody mush before they disappeared into a black mist.
"My powers are even stronger now that I've managed to grind my abilities, but I have to level up quickly if I want to complete that one quest."
Niall decided not to think until reaching a safe point, so he moved to the eighteenth floor, also known as the Safe Zone, also known as the City of Rivira.
---
Moving forward, Niall faced more and much larger monster parties ahead of him. He was currently on the sixteenth floor, already soloing these Middle Floors for what other adventurers were forming large parties to even reach the fifteenth floor.
The structure of these floors consisted of walls made of bedrock, a much more complex layout than the upper floors of the dungeon. Between the fifteenth and seventeenth floors of a dungeon, monsters that are considered to be level two begin to appear.
Minotaurs were the most noticeable of all other monsters, alongside them were Hellhounds, Dungeon Worms, Ligerfangs, and Crystal Mantises, though those were rare.
Niall's luck had been quite good; by now, he had managed to defeat dozens of Minotaurs and Hellhounds. Ligerfangs spawned less frequently, but he still managed to take down a couple of them.
"Now it's just too easy to grind since I'm practically untouchable if the monster isn't two levels above me..." Niall commented as he purged out any monsters in his way with his Chaos Sultan ability.
Suddenly, from one of the corners, a crystal praying mantis appeared. It shined in the dungeon light as its long, sharp claws were ready to butcher any human in its path.
"If this one drops an item, then I'm gonna get money that's a month's worth of expenses if I don't buy any weapons, armor, or expensive places like the Hostess of Fertility," Niall thought and cast multiple waves at the shining monster.
WOOSH BOOM
The monster was hit multiple times with the ability. Niall spammed it like crazy until the monster was unable to move completely.
"This one is quite sturdy, eh? No problem! Just gonna hit it until it either gives up or dies from impact." A couple more waves struck the creature, making it finally crack and disappear into dust.
After the dust cleared, a monster core lay down, but not the special drop item that Niall so much wished for. "Ah, for fuck's sake, I guess I gotta grind the dungeon daily to live from day to day. But since I gained this amazing ability, I may just go deeper to earn better monster cores."
But what Niall lacked was a space to store his monster cores. If he had spatial storage, he would be earning tons of money. Usually, he would grind until his backpack became full enough, but it was becoming a nuisance.
"Hiring support is a big no-no since you cannot trust anybody in this town, especially those little Pallum supporters like Lili," Niall cringed at the thought of that annoying little midget.
He picked up a monster core and continued forward. The furthest point where Niall had been was just at the popular Wall of Grief. It's a transparent wall that separates the boss room from the rest of the dungeon.
Niall didn't want to test his luck against the level 4 monster rex, so he avoided going any lower. No familia had taken on the boss in the past two weeks.
"Guess I'll just go see the wall and go back home. The wall became some sort of a checkpoint for me before I returned home," Niall murmured as he continued toward the Wall of Grief. But as he got closer to it, he heard sounds of yelling and weapon clanking.
"TAKE THAT, YOU GIANT BASTARD!"
"THIS IS SO FUN!"
Niall recognized the two voices that echoed the most. It was Loki Familia, or more precisely, Bete and Tiona, fighting Goliath.
"Fuck, man, should I go back or wait for them to take it out?" Niall thought about going back home. He knew that meeting Loki Familia would be kind of dangerous, since Finn is a very smart individual with a sixth sense, also known as his thumb that hurts in the face of danger or a great change.
But the other side of him wanted to meet them in person, especially Tiona since he has a thing for tomboys.
Avoiding Loki Familia was pointless since sooner or later they would cross paths somewhere. Even so, Niall remembered that he didn't feel hungry or thirsty anymore. That alone would cut his expenses greatly, allowing him to live in the dungeon.
'I don't have any stuff back home to come to, all the stuff I have is inside my backpack so I can move right now,' he thought, looking at the distance. The sounds of weapons clanking stopped so that only meant that Goliath was defeated.
Taking a deep breath, Niall approached the Wall of Grief with caution in his mind. Passing through the transparent wall, he was greeted by Loki Familia's executives standing and doing their usual stuff.
'Why the fuck haven't I been informed about current expeditions undergoing in the dungeon?' Niall slapped himself on his head for his own foolish mistake; information is the most powerful weapon that one can have.
Standing further away, a relatively large group of Loki's children were chatting. Some noticed Niall and looked at him cautiously. Ignoring these stares, Niall walked calmly over to the tunnel that leads down to the eighteenth floor.
Of course, no one cared about one adventurer passing by, but caution must always be present in the dungeon or in general. What Niall didn't think about, however, was that if someone saw him alone in the middle floors, they would consider him a powerful adventurer.
It wasn't much of a rarity, but at least adventurers who were level 3 or 4 were easygoing enough to solo the middle floors.
"Who is that? Also, why is he glowing??" Tiona, the older sister of Tione, asked with genuine interest on her face.
"Don't know, never seen him before... WELP, let's ask him and find out!" Tiona cheered, escaping Tione's hand that was about to hold her back.
Finn, Riveria, and Gareth sighed at the foolishness of their familia member. Approaching people in the dungeon could be considered a threat. But they couldn't deny their interest in that person's odd growth around them.
Niall heard her and immediately cursed himself for not going back home. Turning around, he saw both Tiona and her sister approaching in a rush.
'Ah, shit, here we go again.'
