The Systemic Lands

Chapter 415: 14th Floor (2) – Furious Fighting

Chapter 415: 14th Floor (2) – Furious Fighting

I rushed forward. The metal poles and the bullets came in a barrage, forcing me to dodge to the side since the golems were bad at tracking my movements, even the level 5 boss golems. There! I reversed directions as I crossed over a brief lull in their firing patterns.

The gap was small, but allowed me to approach closer as the monsters continued to attack me from range. Two of the smaller golems unleashed blades at waist height. I dodged under them and used my right hand to force me back up and keep dodging as I closed the distance.

Acid Shot. Acid Shot. Just as the attacks got unbearable, I took out one of the golems, dodging the ejected portion it ejected towards me. It quickly began to melt and was disabled, but I had aimed my second attack higher up. I didn’t want it to die complete, just disable it long enough.

I raced up to the disabled golem as the rest of the golems tried to spread out to get angles on me. I was now too close for them to attack me for the next couple of seconds. That was one thing I had noticed, the monsters didn’t attack each other. I slammed my right hand into the half melted monster and focused half my Body stat into my right hand.

It dug into the metal and tried to lift the monster up. It was too heavy and I suddenly felt an intense amount of pressure on my hand. I yanked it out of the monster. Air Burst. Air Burst. Acid Shot. Acid Shot. I melted off two of a lesser golems’ legs instead of killing it as a I retreated.

I couldn’t kill the monsters, but I could disable them. My initial plan had been to use one as a shield to get close without getting attacked at range, but that appeared to be impossible. They were just too heavy to lift even half melted.

That left disabling the lesser cubic golems. While they regenerated, I just targeted their stubby, pointy legs. My energy came back faster than their legs and that left them trapped on the floor, or moving very slowly if they were only left with two legs.

“Really making me work for this,” I muttered, as I took out another lesser golem. With each one disabled, it became easier to take out the next one. Once I had disabled all 16 of them, I spent a short time to get back half my energy before moving on one of the boss golems.

The other one was behind it along with the disabled level 4 golems. I didn’t need to use Air Burst to approach it, which was critical. I could really commit to this attack.

Acid Shot x9. Panels were ejected on one side of the level 5 Cubic Golem to intercept my attacks. There were a total of 9 panel sections per side. I dodged the panels. Acid Shot. The boss golem leapt into the air to avoid the attack, and I did the same. Acid Shot x5.

The entire side of the boss monster was covered in acid and began to slowly melt. I kicked off the ceiling to retreat. After getting a lot of distance, the boss monster was struggling quite a bit, but still alive, even half melted.

I waited a short period of time and rushed in again. Acid Shot. Acid Shot. I disabled another one of the level 4 monsters that had recovered. I got near the boss monster again. It had been trying to turn, but the golems were omnidirectional, and not fast turners.

I had been easily able to keep up with the turn, even if that meant the other boss monster tried to take me out. Acid Shot x3. The boss monster finally collapsed to dust and I let out a sigh of relief. While that hadn’t been easy, it was still doable.

The last boss monster went down after another two hours or so. I estimated the time by the amount of energy I needed to recover and the skills I had used. When the elevator room opened, I retrieved my packs from the other side of the floor and slowly made my way to the elevator, heading up to the fifteenth floor.

That had been far too difficult and long. I collapsed in the saferoom. I needed a lot of sleep. That fight had taken forever. The worst part was that, most of it had been spent regenerating energy and keeping the low level monsters disabled until I could take out the boss monsters.

It was not an experience I cared to repeat in the slightest. But I had no doubt that the 21st, 28th, 35th, 42nd, and 49th floors would all prove to be just as troublesome. It honestly was a tossup now between bad puzzles and a grueling fight that had turned into a bit of a puzzle, forcing me think on what I needed to do in order to win.

It would be all too easy to get locked into a single mindset during the fight. Kill or be killed. I was glad I had avoided that. One nice thing about the larger floor had been the space to maneuver and the time to think. If the space had only been that of a regular size boss room, there was no way I would have been able to pull something like this off, with how close everything would be.

The small monsters could provide support even if disabled in such an enclosed space. Still, the lack of ability to land an alpha strike was incredibly annoying. I would have to commit more to such an attack if the situation came up again. Get a running start out of the safe room door and just spam Air Burst.

Even if I used up more than half my energy getting close, an alpha strike was just too valuable to pass up. Taking one boss monster out of the equation was just too useful a tactic. The level 5 golems weren’t that bad. Even with their massive bullet sprays and leaping up if they were about to take damage.

Once their patterns had been worked out, they were no different than any other level 5 monster. The real danger was the unknown when facing something of that level. What would level 50 be like? That was the big worry on my mind at the moment.

I wanted the meta-point at the top of the tower no matter what. The pain in my gut was a constant reminder that I needed to keep moving up the tower as quickly as possible to get the issue resolved. However, I was thinking that I might just use a meta-point to save myself instead if I could get one.

The Astrologer was completely untrustworthy, but if he was in the safe room on the 49th or 50th floor, then it would be an issue. Would there be a safe room on the 50th floor? I had been thinking it was the roof of the tower, but that might not be the case.

Since people couldn’t cheese a tower with an airship, that meant the top floor or the prize had to be contained within the tower itself. So, there was probably one final safe room, maybe. Better rest on the floor below after killing the boss just to be on the safe side.

Still, I had completed 28% of the tower so far and that made me feel quite happy. I tried to work out the days, but I had lost all sense of time in this place. It was very annoying to be honest. I wanted to be able to gauge my climbing speed up the tower. Well, that would be something I would figure out once I got out.

Also, if I cleared this tower and got a meta-point, then I had another way to beat the Divine Empress. I would just go clear another tower and get a second meta-point. While it would be hard and grueling, if I could make it to the top of this one, there was no reason I couldn’t climb a second tower.

Heck, it would be more efficient for me to climb towers rather than grind. It doubled as combat training as well with all these battles I was having to fight. The variation wasn’t that great and the enclosed spaces made it different than fighting in a zone, but the concept was still there. Fighting higher level monsters to get stronger in terms of combat ability and understanding.

That was key. The improvement was hard to quantify, but I felt a lot more comfortable dealing with level 5 monsters now compared to previously. I had no doubt that some would still pull out crazy skills and be very hard to deal with, I wasn’t concerned.

The attacks were incredibly quick, and I was often dodging at very small distances, but I was still able to dodge and not take damage. That had been one of my biggest fears. There was no way to heal in the tower.

If I went to another tower, I would be stocking up on healing potions and actual supplies, not just food and lantern oil. I kept considering to leave the lantern oil behind, but I had carried it up this far it felt like it might be useful. With no way to buy anything, I didn’t want to give it up anything.

My food was also a bit tighter than I had expected. I had purchased a full pack of food and water so I could last over a month without resupply. But I had been consuming more than usual lately. Perhaps it was the loss of my hand, which still throbbed and hurt, or perhaps all the running I had been doing.

The traps and the level 5 monsters were pushing me to my limits. That brough up my other concern. A level 6 monster at the top of the tower. It would be a nightmare to fight. Well, the hope was that it would be alone, I could alpha strike it, and then use my hit and run tactics.

If there were minions added into the fight, then it would be a lot harder. A level 6 monster was not something I was looking forward too. At least it wasn’t a level 7. I suspected there would be another jump in intelligence and ability from level 6 to level 7, just like there had been a massive jump from level 3 to level 4.

The monsters at level 5 were just bigger, faster, and more dangerous, but they weren’t smarter. The lack of ability to track while doing ranged attacks was the best example of a key limitation. While they could work as groups, they were also lacking in very obvious ways that could be exploited.

Honestly I was still a bit surprised at how easy some of the fights were. The key thing was just realizing the right way to win and committing. Like this last fight. I had to disable, not kill the lower level monsters in order to stop them from respawning.

I would probably do that as well on the future floors. If I ran into a monster, take out its legs so that way it didn’t have the ability to chase me. The biggest headache were the cat monsters with the fireballs, but I could just skip over parts of the pit traps to leave them stranded and bypass them.

It was better to fight smarter not harder. The fights were puzzles in a way. So, would there only be one puzzle floor? I had been hoping the Astrologer wasn’t stuck in a puzzle, that would have been a nightmare. At least with a fight, it made sense.

Still, I couldn’t help but wonder what was the purpose of the tower and the rest of the Systemic Lands, especially the puzzle.