Chapter 31 The Gate

That same thrill I used to feel when facing raid bosses or those super tough optional ones. Bigger the foe, greater the prize. Greater the loot.

Kaleo had sunk to his knees, his eyes closed. He was incanting under his breath, getting ready as I looked over the spear fragment entry in my log.

[Midnight Spear Fragment – Defeat the sub-boss Janus to unlock the Midnight Spear fragment. Note: you must defeat Janus during the Gate encounter. Note: you do not need to complete the Gate encounter for this mission to count as completed.]

So there were sub-bosses, sub-objectives. I wondered at the wildness of the power of the Midnight Spear if just a single fragment required fighting the end-boss. Hopefully, it wasn’t locked to this epoch, and I’d get the chance to take it to the next one.

‘Ready?’ he said as he got to his feet. ‘Remember, you must keep fighting to destroy those weak points. The system has to register you as a combatant in this instance, or it collapses.’

‘Ready.’

‘Good. I’m sorry I can’t fight alongside you, but I can offer you a boon.’ His eyes went fuzzy for a moment. I recognised him as going through his own HUD, before an item appeared in his hand. It looked like obsidian, a small, round stone. I took it, and examined it.

[Talisman of the Great Warriors – Legendary item. Can only be used during the Gate encounter. For three minutes will resurrect three avatars who have previously fallen during the Gate encounter to fight alongside you.]

I was speechless. Here was Kaleo handing me the single most powerful item I had ever clapped eyes upon like it was nothing. I wanted to say thank you, for believing in me, for helping me speed run this thing, for getting me through the Gate…

Shit. I…I’d never got the chance to say goodbye. Miggy, Larry. Even Ayla. Why was I thinking of them now, as Kaleo adopted a cross-legged position and began hovering in the air. The shimmer of his Sanctuary enveloping him. I told myself I barely knew those people. That I owed them nothing, but it didn’t stop the pang in my heart and mind.

I steeled myself. Attachments were weaknesses. I was here to become strong. No, the strongest. I hadn’t been Felix Glass in a long time. I was the Reaver. Hunter. Beastmaster. And I would be the one to complete the Doomsday Trials.

The Gate began to pour with light. The ground beneath began to shake, as though the land itself were tearing itself asunder. Kaleo channelling within his Sanctuary as the Gate boss towered, each colossal footstep shaking the ground.

Oh. My. God.

It was… a giant. It towered as large as the Gate itself, at least forty feet high, appearing like some colossus of stone. Its entire body was built from the same hewn rock of the Gate, the same moss covering its fat, round torso, its stubby arms and legs. I searched for a head, a face, and realised it was on the torso itself.

[Champion of the Gate – Level 10 – The Stone Guardian guards the Gate of the Stone Epoch. This colossal guardian was forged for one purpose: defeating avatars. The last test of the savage lands, it will take all your guile to defeat him. Can only be defeated by attacking weak points.]

[Warning – Each weak point is guarded by a sub-boss. The sub-boss must be defeated in order to break the weak point.]

At last the weak points were clear. In three separate areas, high up on the guardian’s body I saw glowing red areas. Two were high up on his shoulders, and one seemed to be atop where his head should be.

From my log, I could see that the left-most weak point would unlock Janus as the sub-boss. As the guardian pounded towards me, I activated the Talisman of the Great Warriors, watching as three of the skeletons nearby raised up as though lifted by gentle winds, getting to their feet.

I had thought the magic of the talisman would resurrect them completely, but instead they were simply skeletons, though with the weapons and arms that their avatar had fallen with.

‘Err, hello,’ I said, ‘so what I think we should do is-‘

Two of them ignored me completely, charging at the Guardian. Clearly they had unfinished business, or maybe they hadn’t even realised they had died. At least one of the skeletal avatars came close, ready for orders. The skeleton was holding a club in both hands, and banged them together.

No time for some extravagant plan. I pointed to the left-most weak point. The skeleton gave a bony nod, and we both began to run.

The Guardian dropped to his knees and produced a boulder that clearly was not there previously, hurling it at the two charging avatars. Good. At least we would split aggro. I had no idea what their plan was, but if they took the heat off me and my own skelly, it was enough.

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

The closer we got to the guardian, the more his scale became clear. His head almost scraped the top of the Gate itself. It was standing in place, as it knelt to swat the two skeletal avatars below. That gave us our opening, and I saw that there were grooves built into the side of the Guardian.

So begins the climb.

A few months ago I’d have tapped out at five feet up. I’d never been bouldering. I’d had the upper arm strength of a house cat. Now my strength allowed me to leap up, clearing several feet at once. My dexterity allowed my hands to be like an ape’s, finding purchase easily, and my improved stamina and endurance kept me moving.

I could feel skelly just behind as we ascended. There was something truly insane about scaling a colossal stone guardian who was in combat. Weak point, I thought feverishly, weak point.

We reached the shoulder of the guardian. He was still moving around, but I saw this area was intentionally flattened. Up close, the weak point looked like an ore vein. It was stone, but pulsing with that red glow, impossibly bright, almost blinding.