The Infinity Dungeon [LitRPG]

Michael jumped to the side, avoiding a projectile and then weaving out of the way of the vicious whipstrike that followed. He spun into the air, jumping several feet high thanks to his stats granting him monstrous power. He created a Hycean Ice bullet that he shot towards the boss monster, then retreated and prepared another attack in a never-ending barrage.

The boss was a gigantic mountain of muscle, sinew, bone and mortar. There were entire bricks embedded in its strange, grotesque structure, and its flesh pulsed and shifted in response to all the attacks that hit it.

A chunk of Blackstone impacted one such brick while Michael prepared his next attack. He condensed Forgefire into a tight sphere, added a core of Ice and lobbed it at the boss. It exploded in a loud bang of displaced air and steam, Ice and Fire being ordered to express their more violent interactions.

The boss staggered, then righted itself. Its flesh morphed, not for the first time in a fight that was already approaching several minutes of length, and more bricks were now visible. It seemed taller, and its roar shook the whole room.

"Behind!" yelled David from where he was dodging and deflecting hits of his own.

Michael ducked. Something hit his shield from where he could not see, faster than his perception for a fraction of a second, turning his defensive skill yellow and then red. He stopped moving, and the shield was green again. When it was over, he turned around to see yet another whip, moved by a brand new set of arms the boss had grown.

It was the third set of limbs that had appeared since the fight began.

Michael prepared to change strategy. At the beginning of the fight, he had chosen to be close and personal with the boss, intending to practice his Okinawan Mastery skill of Chi and Jing. It had been a mistake: instead of an opportunity to polish a skill that was gathering dust in his Sanctum despite its enormous potential, Michael had been forced to expend resources and mana to defend himself from an enemy he had clearly underestimated.

Even now, he had been trying to keep his distance, so that David could have a chance at fighting. The monster had only shrugged off his attacks, while growing more powerful by the second. A veritable flow of magic was empowering its body. Michael could see it with his naked eye, and while the mana empowered his regeneration as well, what it did to the boss was on a whole other level. The boss was the intended recipient of the mana, after all, while Michael was just a leecher.

A backhand strike sent David flying past him. Michael caught him in his aura and slowed him down, then healed his injuries. Turning towards the boss, Michael took a step forward.

"Sorry David, it's time to finish it."

The man groaned, holding his chest. Even after the heal, the wind had been knocked out of him. "Go ahead man, no need to ask me."

Michael took another step forward, readying his elements and expanding his shield. The room was soon a hellish landscape of fire and ice, Intent and Aura, Mana and Qi. When the energies died down, however, the monster was still there.

Its flesh was singed, still burning in many places. The fires produced a black smoke that pooled in a layer of air above their heads, but which was drawing nearer every second. The bricks and stone in the boss' flesh had melted, but they still moved animated by the same magic that was animating them before they were bathed in Michael's Elements.

Always moving, dodging, avoiding attacks and deflecting others, Michael called upon more and more of his arsenal. Candle Light empowered his flame attacks, Telekinesis transformed the arena's walls into projectiles, Spirit Guardians harassed the boss.

David was forced to take a back seat, and then sit out the fight entirely when it became clear that even getting close to the boss would mean death by being caught in the crossfire. The fight was out of his league, but he was not out of the fight. The boss monster was watching him; it didn't want him slacking or thinking that he was safe.

Even though Michael commanded most of the monster's attention, some attacks slipped past and tried to target David. He was forced to dodge, just like Michael–always in motion, always watching his back. Whips came at him at all angles.

Michael could spare his attention at first, and moved to intercept the attacks with his shield. Then some of the weaker ones started to get through, intentionally because he knew that David could deal with them.

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Then one of those attacks managed to shatter his Blackstone Wall. He looked at Michael. The young man was sweating, muttering things under his breath, gritting his teeth. David was seeing some of the less-used parts of Michael's arsenal, and he realized that the man had reinstated all his sundered skills for the fight.

He saw Presence try to push the monster down, with ever-smaller effect. He saw Marksman-empowered Foul Water bullets fail to even pierce the flesh of the creature. They bounced off the stone bricks as well, the element of rot failing to find any purchase.

Michael's body was Enhanced and his reflexes quickened to impossible speed by his passive skill.

The battle, however, was one of attrition. The problem, David knew, was that Michael was giving his all while the monster was only growing stronger. They had underestimated the boss, assumed that this would just be another fight. They had ignored the dungeon's warning, and now Michael was on the back foot.

"Take this!" shouted Michael.

Something sailed through the air, and David caught it. It was a small stone, spherical if roughly cut. The Gnapticon Stone.

The Force element inside of it called to him. Gripping it tight, he let the Element flow through his body, into his Sanctum, suffusing his skills and magic. It was as if a great tide of energy was rising within him, and with a burst of speed he charged at the monster, punches and kicks flying at the thing.

The system that governed David's magic had diverged from Michael's own system. It was not textual, but something more akin to feelings rather than words. Those feelings told him that as he empowered each strike with the raw might of the element of Force, he was growing.

Each impact resounded in the open space of the arena, shockwaves of air and dust displacing debris and body parts. He kicked and kicked, his long legs giving him tremendous leverage. The feeling intensified, and with it his own efforts. Then it burst, and he felt stronger than he had ever felt, Force element mingling with his Aura, joining the element of Stone and becoming a part of who he was as a person, rather than just being a magical tool.

For several moments, time that seemed to stretch into infinity, David felt truly powerful. He felt like there were no limits to his might, like he was boundless and the universe just a fragile thing he could punch into submission.

Then the bubble shattered.

Then David failed to see one of the snaking vines whipping through the air. A shield appeared between him and the whip. He gasped, then smiled. Michael's skill had evolved, the young man never ceasing to amaze him with his growth. The new evolution was letting the man manifest shields that were detached from his body. The moment was short-lived, however, and surprise turned to horror when the whip shattered the shield like flimsy glass.

Michael spat blood, suffering backlash that pushed him to his knees. His own shield broke, and one of the monster's appendages pulverized his legs. They regrew in moments, but now Michael was forced to use his own body to defend.

David saw the wall a millisecond before his face slammed into it. Stars filled his vision, and he realized that he had been healed, and then hit again. Now he was on the ground, although he couldn't really tell up from down. He struggled to get up, but his vision was swimming, things moving too fast, colors and lights confusing and unreadable. A great pain was radiating from his chest; even though he was whole at a first glance, he knew.

David knew. The pain was gripping, a cold fist around his heart. He felt the muscle struggle to pump blood to his ponderous body, the tips of his fingers and his feet going numb. It pumped in great, syncopated bursts, struggling.

It pumped erratically, like a spasming great drum.

David closed his eyes.

Michael struggled to his knees right as another of the impossibly fast whips sailed past his guard and gouged a hole in his side. He was quickly healed, but there was a growing emptiness inside of him. The shield came back online and was broken again, as were his arms and body. He got up on shaky knees, turned around, and saw David.

The scream was rage and frustration and pain. He tried to run to his mentor, but the monster didn't let him. He hacked at the offending limbs, brute strength fueled by anger enough to rip them apart. His grip was so strong it pulverized the monster's whips, but more came. There were too many; he couldn't make it to David, who was out of his healing range.

"Fuck!" he screamed again, this time turning towards the monster.

There it stood, at the center of the arena, a mountain that pierced the ceiling and expanded for yards into a dark sky.

"No more playing games," Michael said.

There was a moment of calm. Michael felt at peace. Like the eye of a hurricane, it was as if the fight was all around him, but failed to reach him. He cut the magic flow to all of his skills. His Sanctum, which had been like a roaring engine, filled with skills consuming magic to bend the world to their will, grew silent. The last skill fractal sputtered and shut down.

In his mind's eye, Michael turned his attention to the Unity skill. He could see it, clearly like a spring sky. Truth was there, within Unity, calling to him.

"Icarus, let's let loose."

He sensed the system try to feed him its half-broken, half-missing information, but all that he could see was gibberish. He felt the other skills in his Sanctum quake and change and respond to something. Some stimulus. He felt something, like the rupture of a great well of potential flowing into him. Qi roared in the rocks of his Sanctum, flooding something–not the Mind dantian, but another core, a dormant core.

He didn't care. Michael set his eyes upon Truth, and Truth responded in kind.