The Wolves Ch. 021

"Alright, let's check it out."

We grouped back up and walked over to the door. I was the first one there, so I tried turning the handle, only to find that it was locked.

"Huh, it's locked," I told everyone. "First locked door we've come across."

"I'll get it open," Mason declared as we watched him put away his halberd and take out another large handle that was in a holster around his waist. He activated it and a huge hammer appeared. "Back up."

I started backing off when I heard Ben shout.

"Wait!"

It was too late, however. Mason was already swinging the hammer, and with the head of the hammer weighing so much, he couldn't stop his swing. His hammer collided with the door with a heavy thud, but nothing happened. Suddenly, some sort of blue energy flared up, and Mason was sent flying across the room, and through the door they had come in from. He smashed into the wall of the hallway and then fell down onto the floor.

We all ran over to see if he was alright, but we needn't have worried. By the time we got to the door leading to the hallway, he was already in the process of standing up. He shook his head when he was standing, but didn't seem worse for wear.

"What the hell was that?" he asked.

"I said to wait. Locked doors usually have some sort of safeguard to prevent people from forcing their way past them. Since we don't have anyone with Lockpicking, we'll need to find the key if we want to get past that door," Ben explained.

"Lockpicking is a perk similar to Identification, right? Why don't we go up and buy one so one of us has it?" I asked.

"It's much more expensive than a minor Identification perk," Ben replied. "A minor Lockpicking perk would cost around one thousand credits, I think."

"Really? Why is it so expensive?" Anja asked.

"They're much rarer than other minor perks, and they're highly sought after. The demand is much higher than the supply."

"Ah, let's continue then. I think we can make due without Lockpicking."

The next twenty minutes or so flew by quickly. We went through nine different rooms, each with between five and seven Skeletal Warriors in each, allowing us to rack up the experience pretty quickly. I leveled up once more, while my friends each leveled twice, up to level seven. Unfortunately, we didn't find any more locked doors, nor any keys, either.

As we continued down the hall after clearing the tenth room, we came across a set of wooden double doors. They weren't as ornate as the doors leading to Jihm on the fifth floor, but they were different from the rest. Everyone took the time to allocate their attribute points and then we opened the door.

The room lit up and we could see that it was bigger than any of the others. In the middle stood a Skeletal Warrior on a raised platform. It had glowing blue eyes and was wearing an immaculate set of shiny steel armor. Its hands were in front of it, gripping a large axe, that was resting head-first on the floor. In front of it, standing on the same floor we were, were three groups of nine skeletons.

The groups to the left and right were just Skeletal Warriors, while the one in the middle was a mixture. There was a frontline of six Skeletal Warriors, and then a backline of two Skeletal Archers, and one Skeleton holding a staff. Without seeing it cast something, we couldn't be sure what kind it was, though.

Having noticed us, the Armored Skeletal Warrior raised his axe slightly off the ground, and then rammed it down, producing a thud. That signaled the group on the right to start running towards us, which was new. The skeletons we had come across had been slow moving, which made it very easy to deal with them. I didn't think these ones would be any harder, but it was still interesting.

We all braced, readying ourselves for when they reached us, but they never got the chance. When they were about ten feet away, Mason stepped in front of me and punched the ground. The stone dungeon floor broke apart, and a wave of stone crashed into the Skeletal Warriors. It didn't seem to do much damage, but it did send them flying backward various degrees. Where before they were moving as a group, now they were coming one or two at a time.

My spear wasn't that great against Skeletons, so I put it away earlier and taken out one of my swords instead. Mason was using his mace instead of his halberd as well. We hacked and smashed the Skeletal Warriors as they reached us, with Ben using his auras to increase our damage, and the twins shooting projectiles past us. For Anja that was her Ice Shards, while Sonja was taking them out left right and center with her recurve bow.

It didn't take long to deal with the first group, and soon there was another thud. We looked over to the group of skeletons on the right, and just as they started moving, a series of fireballs started smashing into them. After a few seconds, they were all dead, and all that remained were a series of craters and splintered bones. We looked back, and saw Ben leaning on his staff with a big smile on his face. Before we could say anything, there was a final thud and the central group of skeletons began moving.

We immediately had to pay attention, particularly to the archers and the caster.

"I've got the backline, you guys deal with the rest!" Mason shouted, activating Whirling Leap to get past the warriors.

Anja and I rushed the group of six Skeletal Warriors, with her firing off Ice Shards while we ran. As we were closing, I heard two arrows fly past my head, each of them finding their mark and taking down two of them just like that. Anja took down two of them with her Ice Shards. When we closed the distance, two Skeletal Warriors remained. I took one, while she drew her katana and quickly took out the other, using Shadowstep to get behind it, neatly decapitating it. It took me a little more effort, but mine was soon dealt with as well.

We looked over to Mason to see that he had taken care of the two Archers, but was actually having trouble with the Mage. It was teleporting short distances and throwing fireballs at him, which collided with his Mana Shield. I didn't think he had much mana left, and knew he would probably run out shortly. I began running towards him, but before I could even get close, there was a streak of lightning that went right through the Skeletal Mage before finally forming into a person; Sonja. Instead of her bow, she instead had her katana in her hands. With a quick slash, a blade of wind was sent forward, easily slicing through its skull. It collapsed to the ground, and almost immediately there was another thud.

We looked over to the Armored Skeletal Warrior to see that he was making his way down the steps off his raised platform, and as he did, he was dragging his axe behind him. The grating noise sounded horrible, but we got ready. Something about it made me think I would need Precognition, so I activated it. After a few seconds, I was able to see it sort of reverberate as he walked forward, and then it reached down and grabbed the end of the axe it carried. It suddenly disappeared.

"Ben, move!" I shouted, turning and running towards where I knew it would appear.

Mason seemed to have the same idea I did, and as soon as he heard me shout, I could see him activating Whirling Leap. Ben wasted no time, Blinking away. About a second after he Blinked away, the Armored Skeletal Warrior appeared behind where Ben was standing, and cleaved where he would have been standing. Right after that, Mason landed beside the Skeletal Warrior and sent it flying when his hammer collided with it.

The twins weren't sitting idle all this time, either. Anja was firing off Ice Shards as quickly as she could, and Sonja was doing the same thing with arrows. With me having Precognition as well, it left Anja free to do some damage.

The Armored Skeletal Warrior didn't even get a single hit on any of us, with all of us being able to move around so well, or block his attacks using our shield spells. After about two minutes of hacking, smashing and shooting it, we finally took it down.

Along with the usual Mana Gem that floor bosses drop, this one also dropped a few surprised for us. The first was a key that looked like it would match the door we had passed earlier on this floor, but the others were more interesting. In addition to a Skill Gem, it actually dropped a piece of loot.