Pathbreakers: Multiclassing For Fun And Profit

4:24 PM

Odysseus is 40 feet from the entrance to the Hollywood Sign dungeon. He has already healed three of the injured from the last wave.

Ivy is 5 feet from the entrance, talking to Mercy.

Mercy is 5 feet inside the dungeon.

Jun and Quins are 15 feet from the entrance, inside the dungeon.

The bomb was created by a dungeon. As a Dracosys item, its briefcase size does not relate to its actual destructive potential. The bomb is equivalent to a 5 megaton warhead.

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0.01 seconds after detonation.

A bright light flashes, centered on Lynnwood, California. It is one of the many former small towns that have been absorbed into the Los Angeles metroplex.

Everything within 1.25 miles of 11175 Long Beach Blvd is instantly vaporized.

Mercy, looking south in the direction of the blast, is temporarily blinded.

8,906 people are dead.

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0.1 seconds after detonation.

A shockwave of sheer force. Everything within 3.75 miles of 11175 Long Beach Blvd is instantly flattened.

Jun's incredible Reflexes and Agility allow him to react and run towards Mercy.

55,418 people are dead.

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0.3 seconds after detonation.

Ivy turns and looks at the explosion.

Odysseus's soldier instincts kick in, and he runs towards Ivy.

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1.0 seconds after detonation.

Everything within 7.5 miles of 11175 Long Beach Blvd is now flattened. Fires in this area are rampant. Many humans in this area are crushed or burned.

Jun grabs Mercy and pulls her away from the dungeon entrance.

Odysseus is 29 feet from the dungeon entrance.

114,077 people are dead.

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2.0 seconds after detonation.

A wave of thermal radiation extends to 10 miles from 11175 Long Beach Blvd. Humans in this area and not in shelter immediately receive 3rd degree burns.

Odysseus is 17 feet from the dungeon entrance. He is 12 feet from Ivy. He intends to get himself and Ivy into the dungeon, and possible safety.

195,490 people are dead.

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2.99 seconds after detonation.

The Dracosys dungeon self preservation protocol activates. A solid grey door appears, sealing the dungeon entrance.

309,731 people are dead.

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3.0 seconds after detonation.

The wave of thermal radiation extends to 15 miles from 11175 Long Beach Blvd. Humans in this area and not in shelter begin to burn.

Odysseus reaches Ivy. He knows there is no escape for them. He presses her against the exterior dungeon wall. He uses his large body to cover hers, shielding her from the blast.

313,407 people are dead.

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10.5 seconds after detonation.

The Dracosys dungeon self preservation protocol deactivates. The grey door disappears.

608,331 people are dead.

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11 seconds after detonation.

Ivy falls forward into the dungeon. Odysseus remains standing where he was 8 seconds ago, unmoving.

663,409 people are dead.

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I see Ivy fall forward into the dungeon. Odysseus is just standing there. Ivy's face looks severely burned. I race over and hold my hands out, using Restoration Palm twice on each of them.

Ivy's face goes from red to pink. She begins to cough. She rolls over onto her back. Odysseus is still standing there. He's not dead, his inventory hasn't dropped. His arms fall to his sides and he lets out a guttural gurgle of pain, his lips unmoving. The phone he plays his invocations with is melted to his left arm. I see my healing take hold, and the red in his face lessens for a few seconds. And then it comes back. His lips crack and blood drips down his face. His eyes are searching about. There are small bubbles in his eyes. I think his eyes are beginning to boil.

I push another Restoration Palm into him. He gets better. Then, a second later, he gets worse.

"It's like he's on fire!" I hear Mercy cry from behind me.

I won't let him die.

I hold my hand up in the air and a ball of flame erupts, only to puff away and reveal Biscuits J. Cannonball Jr, my healing cat familiar.

Quins fires four pale blue arrows into the wall next to Odysseus. They immediately begin to exhale freezing cold air. That may alleviate his burning or may do nothing. But it's worth a shot.

I place Biscuits in front of Odysseus. "Heal," is all I can manage to say.

Biscuits puts his front paws on Odysseus's right boot. She says, "it's a status effect, called Radiation Burn." She shakes, then falls over. "Papa, he's gonna keep burning. I got it down to five minutes." Her eyes close. She's really tired. She must have used all her healing at once.

I push another Restoration Palm into Odysseus and see his face heal up. His lip sews itself back together. Then his flesh turns red again.

I'm already in negative KP from using Restoration Palm six times. If I use it more I'll pass out, and I don't know how long I'll be out. If I pass out I can't kill monsters. If I can't kill monsters I will die of Scourge.

Ivy's scratchy, burned throat begins to rasp out the opening line of "Dustland Fairytale" by The Killers. It's Odysseus's favorite song. Her Regen Refrain kicks in, granting everyone a small amount of constant healing.

She sings about a romanticized past.

Something falls off the back of Odysseus's head and I realize it's a blackened chunk of skin. The damage he's taking is more than the healing he's receiving.

I won't let him die. I won't let him die.

I drop to the floor and close my eyes, flipping through my menus. I grab Ivy by the arm and use Upcycle to maximize her Regen Refrain.

The left side of Odysseus's face begins to darken and crack, blood gushing out.

Ivy sings about a young man charming a young woman.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

The cracks in Odysseus seal up. Odysseus still hasn't moved. His eyes are wild and panicked. His mouth lets out a pained gasp. His lips barely move as they crack and heal again.

Five minutes of this. No, he won't make it. Mercy is at my side now. She's pulled the few healing potions we still have out of her inventory. She pulls the cork out of one of the glass vials and tips the red liquid into Odysseus's barely open mouth. It does almost nothing. I see a blackened part of his face recover just a bit before darkening again. The left side of his face looks like burnt wood on top of red glue.

Ivy sings the refrain with her hoarse, burned throat. She sings of the song's heroine, dubbed Cinderella, and sings of the inevitable devil that will come to claim her.

I can feel the fatigue of Ki Point loss kicking in. "If I cure myself of Scourge I can go deep into negative KP." Mercy finishes draining the last potion into Odysseus. "Without worrying about dying while unconscious." I catch Quins's eyes. "But the assassin-"

Quins's eyes are scared for Odysseus. Then he blinks, looks at me and says, "got it." His eyes are set with determination. He's already got an acid arrow strung.

I turn to Mercy and she forms her beam trident and psychic shield.

Ivy starts the second verse. She sings about change, revelation and a soul being set aflame.

I flip back into my menus.

Experimentalist subclass: Diseased - You can create poisons from diseases, including any you're currently afflicted with.

This lets me use Scourge as a poison. Once I choose Scourge it permanently becomes a poison, and will remain in my arsenal after I'm cured. It'll only disappear if I choose another disease.

I use the creation ability, and an eye dropper appears in my hand, containing a single dose of the Scourge poison. It kills in 24 minutes instead of 24 hours.

Envenomer subclass: Over Poison - You can alter how proficiency affects your toxic abilities. If your version of a toxic effect is stronger than an existing one on a target, yours takes priority. You can stack any toxic effect, treating its proficiency as 100% higher for each stack.

This lets me replace the Scourge disease with a Scourge poison, since the poison acts faster and is therefore "stronger" than the disease.

I release my helmet and it falls apart, each part turning translucent and then becoming small motes of light. I place the toxic eye dropper against my neck and poison myself. I feel the poison take hold.

I take the third level in Biologist and choose my subclass.

Biologist subclass: Antitoxin - You can cure any poison with a touch.

This lets me cure the Scourge poison at the low, low cost of putting one of my creation abilities on cooldown. I have a bunch of other useless poison creations, so this isn't an issue.

I touch my neck, my gauntlet covering the spot where I'd just poisoned myself. I wipe away the poison while using the Antitoxin touch to heal myself. Still with eyes closed, I watch in my menu as the Scourge status effect disappears.

I open my eyes to see what nightmare the Dracosys Admins are going to use to kill me for breaking their damn system.

Ivy sings about the dreams of youth being abandoned.

About 30 feet away from us, flat, red triangles fade in and begin to spiral. Quins fires an arrow into the swirling geometry. The acid arrow explodes in the middle of them and several triangles flicker and disappear. The rest of the triangles avoid the acid spray and begin to snap together. I've got plenty of AP, so I fire Void Blades at the triangles as they begin to form a polygonal spider. My Void Blades are absorbed into the creature without doing any damage. Several final triangles flicker into existence. Mercy rushes forward, shield first. Several of the soldiers in the dungeon safe zone take notice and grab their weapons.

The creature finishes forming, looking like an early 90s 3D tech demo. Elongated triangular prisms form its eight legs. A rotating pyramid is its central body. It has no head. Dozens of small pyramids on top of the large pyramid body look like spikes. Nothing is connected to anything else, it's all just floating in place. Red light glows from inside each body part. The whole thing is 10 feet tall and twice as wide. Each leg segment is four feet in length.

Mercy's charge ends with her shield colliding with the spider. Its limbs detach, only to flip around and fly towards different targets. I throw Vortex Grenades in their paths but as they explode the energy is sucked into the enemy's parts. Three Navy personnel are almost ripped in half as spiked legs punch through them. Quins manages to deflect the one coming towards him using an arrow with a spherical head. A leg gets bashed away by Mercy's trident.

Ivy is at my feet at Odysseus at my back. I will protect them. Two spider legs fly at me and I just brace and let them hit me. There's a shockwave of air as they impact, one slamming into my chest, the other into my stomach. My boots grind against the ground as I'm pushed back 10 feet. I shift to my left and the red spider leg aimed at my gut flies right, away from Odysseus.

If I can't use my magic attacks on this bastard, I'll need another weapon. I grab the spear-like leg pushing against my chest and hold tight. The leg segment tries to pull back, and I throw my Upcycled Telekinesis onto the segment. I feel the enemy's grasp over its own body part snap like a fishing line, and now I have a glowing red javelin.

I can't use Telekinesis on creatures. That means this thing isn't a spider and this isn't a leg. The bastard is just a psychic pyramid with 24 low-poly telekinetic javelins.

Ivy is back to the refrain. Cinderella keeps looking for what she wants, and won't find.

Bullets rain onto the pyramid body as more soldiers join the battle. Mercy's trident catches a red javelin and she flips it to the ground, pinning it there. Quins fires an acid arrow high, then fires another arrow at the first. The first arrow explodes above the pyramid and rains several gallons of bright green acid down on the monster.

Does System Scan have any help for me today?

[ REDACTED ]. TIER 6. [ REDACTED ]

Possible Loot: Nothing useful to Jun Kyung Han.

Fine. I expect this thing is immune to my astral element magic and Star Swarm, being designed to specifically kill me. It's also designed to challenge my telekinetic combat style with its own telekinetic weapons. Unfortunately for it, Upcycled Telekinesis seems to be fucking awesome.

I push my new red javelin forward like a rocket. It collides with another javelin and they both explode into triangles. The triangles unfortunately act as shrapnel and several cut into a Navy guy on the other side of the pyramid from me. He drops his rifle and clutches his face, but he'll live. Just 22 javelins left. Fuck.

The fist sized pyramid spikes on the monster's back fly off and start blocking gunfire from the Navy. Bullets scratch and scrape the monster parts, not doing much, but doing something.

Mercy stabs down with her trident until the javelin she has pinned shatters into triangles. Three other javelins fire towards her but she shield bashes one, trident deflects the second and front flips over the third.

Quins looks like he's cooking up something.

Ivy sings about seeing the end coming and not wanting to face it. Her voice is stronger now. Her Regen Refrain is probably healing her, too.

I pull a tall, wooden wardrobe out of my inventory and slam the doors open. Twelve MK 16 SCAR L rifles are inside. I slide a hand over the grip of each one so I can draw them all at once with Telekinesis. The rifles float in the air around me and then blare to life, dumping steel-jacketed rounds into the big pyramid. As they fire I'm already swiping my hands across extra magazines so I can use Telekinesis on those too.

Mercy's mecha dragon wings glow and she darts up high. Quins throws a palm-sized brass ring in front of him, which expands to about 5 feet wide. I empty my rifles, each gun aiming at a different javelin. I don't have the Ki Points to spare to enhance my shots.

The enemy's javelins fly off in various directions, aiming to spear us. Anytime they miss they fly around and target the same person again. I let a javelin hit me and grab it with Telekinesis. Another slams into my back and another punches into my right side. My armor doesn't crack but I can feel the intense pressure from the blows. Each javelin, when it's charging at someone, must be close to going 200 miles per hour. The sheer kinetic force can't be reduced. I'm only still standing because the monster's spears don't have much mass. I use Telekinesis to take hold of the other two javelins trying to disembowel me.

Ivy sings of the vast and ruthless desert. Her voice is strong now. She's sitting up, looking at Odysseus, tears in her eyes.

My guns empty. The magazine release buttons click and mags drop to the floor, only to be replaced by new ones. I leave the SCAR rifles to aim and fire and I personally charge the monster's core. Its own javelins, now my javelins, are in tow.

Quins throws another small gold ring, which expands into a 3 foot ring, past the first.

Mercy flies down, also charging the monster core. Her body is coated in purple barrier energy and as the monster fires its weapons at her the barrier absorbs the impacts and deflects the attacks.

I fire my three javelins at the cluster of small pyramids blocking Navy rifle fire. I manage to destroy only a few pyramids, but the blocking formation is disrupted. I pull the javelins back to me. Navy rifles clatter against the core.

Mercy drops onto the large, pyramid-shaped core like a meteor, slamming it into the ground and imbedding her trident's beams into one of the four sides. Sorry, it's not a pyramid, it's a triangular prism. Like a d4. Fuck d4s.

The Navy crew stops shooting the core now that Mercy is on it. They focus fire on the deadly javelins still harassing them.

Quins throws a third ring through the first two, this one expanding to just a foot wide. He draws an arrow with an arrowhead that looks like a small anti-tank bazooka round.

I grab another javelin as it jets past me. This one is stained with someone's blood. Mercy's wings glow and provide downward force, her trident continuing to lock the monster core beneath her feet. I dash to her and intercept two javelins firing at her, then flip them around and smash them into three more right behind those. Four javelins shatter and triangular shrapnel bounces off my armor as I shield Mercy.

Quins's arrow shines iridescent. He aims through all three rings and each one spins in the air.

Ivy is on her feet. She's got her arms up, supporting Odysseus. She sings of the desert where good girls die.

I grab Mercy and jump away from the red d4. I punch down into the monster with my remaining javelins. I feel the monster struggle to fly up, out of whatever Quins is about to do.

Quins's arrow fires. My Reflexes let me track the shot, my Intelligence lets me calculate its speed, mostly. The arrow initially fires at 700 feet per second. It travels through the first, 5-foot-wide ring and accelerates to 1,050 fps. It goes through the second, 3-foot-wide ring and accelerates to over 1,500 fps. It goes through the third, smallest ring and I lose sight of it. My math tells me that it must now be going faster than the speed of sound.

Mercy and I are thrown away from the monster as a shockwave erupts from the impact. A sonic boom crashes through the dungeon, deafening us and knocking the Navy guys and girl down. The red polygonal enemy is nearly cracked in half, broken into jagged pieces. Then the arrow inside the monster explodes, deleting it entirely.

Mercy grabs me in mid-air, then uses her wings to stop our momentum. She spins and hammer tosses me towards Odysseus.

Ivy sings of Cinderella's impending death. There's desperation in her voice. Odysseus's face has cracked and healed so much that he's covered in blood.

I won't let him die! I WON'T LET HIM DIE!

My Star Swarm activates. Dozens of stars explode out of my back, then glow with golden Ki light. I push my hands forward and the stars rush to Odysseus. Pure Palm reduces the duration of any status effect by 1 second per tick. I push it through 140 stars at once, for two seconds. That should remove the burn effect. I clumsily land next to Odysseus and Ivy. Then I immediately collapse from the massive exhaustion from having -322 KP. My vision begins to fade. Everything starts to go black. I can still feel my stars on Odysseus. I push Restoration Palm through all of them and my KP drops below -13,000.

I fade, spiraling into unconsciousness. I hear Ivy sing the final verse as she holds Odysseus. It's about-