[Beastborne: Tower of Blight] Chapter 32

Hal could scarcely believe what the [Citadel Quest Tablet] contained. A Quest unlike any other that offered the chance to change Brightsong forever.

New Quest: Dawn Citadel

You have discovered the plans to the once-lost Dawn Citadel in the form of a schematic not seen for centuries. Citadels are built in stages, each stage requires a great deal of unique and rare materials in order to complete it. Experience is awarded to all who contribute, with the majority going to the Questgiver. With this Quest, you may extend it to any you wish. Only those who have this Quest may submit items for construction.

Unlike normal constructions, the Dawn Citadel cannot be constructed by hand. Items must be submitted to the construction grounds, and then fueled with an assortment of materials and vital resources. A Dawn Citadel is so named because their completion often is considered the “Dawn of an Empire” and thus, the center and source of a new Empire’s strength is derived from its construction.

Objectives:

●       Complete Stage 1 Construction (Dawn Citadel Foundation).

●       Complete Stage 2 Construction (Dawn Citadel Central Keep).

●       Complete Stage 3 Construction (Dawn Citadel Curtain Wall).

●       Complete Stage 4 Construction (Dawn Citadel Battlements).

●       Complete Stage 5 Construction (Dawn Citadel Bastions).

●       Complete Stage 6 Construction (Dawn Citadel Barracks).

●       Complete Stage 7 Construction (Dawn Citadel Inner City).

●       Complete Stage 8 Construction (Dawn Citadel Courtyard).

●       Additional Objectives Available.

Rewards:

●       Experience and construction progress based upon materials and given stage of construction.

●       Completion of all stages awards the Dawn Citadel building and the Empire Founding Skill.

●       Additional Rewards Available.

Hal nearly choked at the words. He immediately shared it with all those in his present company to avoid having to explain anything. If they chose not to help, that was their call, but he wasn’t going to keep this to himself.

It was almost as if the Shard had read his mind.

Unlike other Quests, Hal was able to focus on any of the objectives except for the last, and get a more detailed view of what was required.

Okay, so maybe not as good as I thought. I don’t even know what half of these materials are!

“This… is quite amazing, Hal,” Val told him. “I’m not a builder by any means, but these ingredients look expensive.”

“They are rare,” Elaise said. “However, I know of where to get some of these for the first stage. They are only difficult for those who do not know the ways of the Shiverglades. These items will be simple to obtain, but the metals… you will be on your own.”

“If only the dwarves were here,” Hal thought aloud. He focused, trying with all of his might to send the Quest to the entire Bravers Guild.

I should have tried that first, Hal thought. Now I won’t know if it works because everybody here already has it.

Even if it didn’t, he would just make sure to repeat it again once he was out of the Tower.

The platform before them, ringed in the same bone-like material, conjured a stretched oval vision of Brightsong during the middle of yet another blizzard.

Val groaned. “Do we have to?”

Hal focused on going to the next floor and was rewarded with a shift in the portal’s scenery.

Instead of the snowy Shiverglades, they saw a dark purple room full of shifting platforms that slowly made their way across a pit of glowing purple goo.

“Maybe this will be easy,” Hal said, trying to keep everybody’s spirits up.

Nobody looked particularly thrilled at what the Tower offered them, but there was no other choice. Not a soul wanted to leave just yet.

Once through the portal, Hal staggered to the side, just like everybody else. For one nauseating moment, everything had reversed. Up became down, down became up, and inside had become outside.

“Is my skin on right?” Val asked, patting herself down.

“Urk–!” Elaise managed to squeak out before she doubled over and lost her recent meal.

She wasn’t alone.

Traveling up to the third floor was deeply unsettling.

After everybody had time to adjust, they noticed that the third floor was unlike the previous two.

Instead of monsters waiting for them or a large room that branched off, they were in a small, cramped room with five sides and two doors angled off in different directions.

One was engraved with a symbol that reminded Hal of a flame, and the other looked like a series of three squiggly lines over a triangle. Oddly enough, this wasn’t the room the portal had shown. Where was the pit of glowing goo?

Flames seemed bad, so Hal picked the door with the squiggles.

That turned out to be a colossal mistake.

No sooner had Hal touched the door than every person in the room was shoved through the doorway and into a room filled with caustic fumes.

Hal immediately started coughing, cycling his various essences to find something that might cancel it out, but nothing worked. His eyes watered, and he realized belatedly that this was the room they had seen in the portal image.

Platforms glided back and forth over a bubbling, frothing purple mixture that lit up the entire room and filled it with noxious fumes.

Only Val and Giel seemed completely unbothered.

The Beastborne looked over at him. “Don’t you have monoceros essence?” she asked, incredulously.

“You know I don’t!” Hal said, barely holding back a rib-cracking cough.

“Sorry, sorry,” Val said.

All around them, the Ebon Star tribesmen were coughing and gagging, rubbing at their watering eyes. Even Vorax was coughing from mouths that opened and closed all over the cloak.

Hal had no choice but to use a Kol’thil Sigil. He raised a hand, made a motion with his fingers, and pulled the Sigil’s energies through the magicite bracelet he wore.

He hoped it would have been possible to filter it through his [Fell Sorcery Chain] as well, but it didn’t work. His first attempt caused his amulet to buzz with so much force Hal was certain it would shatter if he kept it up a second longer.

Copper Kol’thil: Gust, created a swirl of clean air all around Hal. He moved next to the others and immediately the coughing and gagging ceased.

“I can’t keep this up forever,” he told them. “We need to move.”

With their eyes no longer watering, and the fumes only a mild irritant whenever they managed to pierce the swirling veil of clean air Hal summoned, the group made it through the room with relative ease.

The platforms moved awkwardly, and the fumes became much worse once they were over the pit, but it wasn’t anything Hal’s Kol’thil couldn’t manage.

They arrived at the other side, another pair of choices ahead of them.

Another fire and triangle-with-squiggles.

“Not that one!” Elaise wheezed, pointing at the triangular symbol.

Hal agreed and put his hand on the flame.

Like before, they were shoved out of the room and into the new one. Hal braced himself for flames and traps, but there was nothing.

Instead, they were met with a hulking, blighted bruiser covered head-to-toe in plates of bronze that seemed riveted to its bones and flesh.

Oozing fluids dripped to the ground from its various rivets. After using his Kol’thil for so long, Hal was drained, but Val wasn’t.

She launched herself forward, her skin glittering like diamonds as she cast Diamondhide on herself and drew her halberd, the weapon she gained from the last floor’s chest.

Bringing it down with all the force she could muster didn’t so much as dent the thick armor plating of the blighted creature. Her halberd rebounded so badly that it flew out of her hands.

She cursed, dropped to the ground on all fours, and then leaped to the side as she cast another beast magic spell that filled the white-paneled room with raging flames.

Giel joined the fray, swinging his massive greatsword. The pair gave the others enough time to recover from the previous room and join in.

Hal lashed out with an Anvil Lightning, guessing that the metallic armor would be an excellent conductor.

He was right.

Rivets holding the plates popped and crackled like popcorn in the microwave as the electricity sizzled and charred the creature through the plates.

It roared with rage and cast a spell that Hal had never seen before. A thin green-gray bubble of light appeared around it, then vanished.

Hal cast another Anvil Lightning. This time, the powerful spell had a muted effect. The creature still howled with pain, but its armor didn’t blast apart like it had before. The conductivity seemed… blunted somehow.

Without his [Fell Sorcery Chain], Hal doubted the creature would have felt anything.

Val slipped behind it as Elaise speared her greatsword into the ground and began moving her hands around in a blur. She curled her hand to her mouth and a dragon of flame rushed out, snaking through the air and curling around the blighted bruiser.

This time, Hal was watching. He saw the bubble of gray-green energy reappear like a ward and the dragon’s heat dropped from white-hot to a scalding red.

The bruiser swept its massive, armored hands at Giel, knocking him into the wall and with another motion, the creature grabbed Robas. The man let out a gasp of pain, hardly audible above the roaring spells that Hal and Val sent at the creature.

Elaise snarled, pulled free her sword, and leaped for all she was worth at the creature. She snapped all her muscles in concert–a considerable effort considering how muscular she was–and her new greatsword came down in a silver blur.

Whatever barrier the creature had managed to summon was ineffective against her attack, and her sword went straight through its armored wrist and the bone beneath.

The bruiser’s hand fell to the ground in a gout of foul blood. Robas was freed. He managed to crawl away from the battle until he could fish out a health potion and down it.

Hal lunged forward, using Convergence and splicing disara essence to move as fast as possible while the monster was still howling in pain.

He lashed out with [Founder’s Folly] extending the sword to its limit and hooking it around a jut in the monster’s pauldron.

With another thought, Hal contracted the sword, and he flew into the air, landing atop the monster’s shoulder with ease. He struck at the gap between its neck and shoulder, where the creature was least armored.

A spray of black blood fountained out, but Hal wasn’t done. He cast Sinker Drill. A black swirling liquid rolled around Hal’s empty fist until it resembled a blurring dark drill.

Hal didn’t have as much Strain as he was used to, but it didn’t matter. The effect of Beastblade coupled with the defense ignoring properties of Sinker Drill caused Hal to plunge his arm up to the elbow into the creature’s neck.

The faint bubble of warding magic made Hal’s attack consume more MP, but it was not able to stop him.

There was a faint snap as Hal’s spell burrowed through something vital and the blighted bruiser’s legs went limp as if somebody had cut its strings.

Hal had just enough time to pull his hand free and leap away as the creature crashed to the ground in all its twenty-foot-tall horror.

Breathing hard, keeping an eye on the unsettling MP drain that Sinker Drill caused, Hal’s focus snapped to the Shardscript in front of him.

You defeat the [Blighted Bruiser | Lv. 50].

You gain 5,000 Experience Points.

You gain 5,000 Sparks.

You obtain:

(2) [Vials of Blighted Blood]

(1) [Blighted Hide]

(5) [Blighted Bones]

You learn Spoil Shield.

Spoil Shield

Conjure a shield of blighted essence that reduces the effects of the last element and school of magic that was cast on you. The more the same element and school of magic are used against you while Spoil Shield is active, the higher the mitigation of Spoil Shield. MP is drained based on the current mitigation rate.

School: Beast Magic

Type: Magical (Unaspected)

Family: Elemental (Blighted)

MP: Variable

BP: 3

Strain: 12

Hal looked over at Val, who gave him a weary thumbs up with a grinning face that Hal mirrored.

They had both gotten the new spell.