The sonic blast shot out for us. I raised my hand, palm out, generating a shield from my own Sonic Essence. The two collided. The Dark Sky Bat Queen’s attack was much, much stronger than my measly Level 60 Sonic Essence, but when reinforced with some Force, it was able to hold long enough to dampen the overall power of the Queen’s blast.
The waves of sound washed over me, knocking me from my feet as I hadn’t Kinetically attached myself to the ground. I figured it was safer that way. If my feet had been locked and the blast still sent me reeling, snapped ankles were never fun.
I’d had that happen once. Long time ago. I’d learned my lesson.
Just because my feet wouldn’t move, the rest of my body could.
Sound energy was something that my Kinetic field couldn’t stop. It was a different kind of energy, nothing really kinetic about it. It could dampen it, so the effect wasn’t as great, but couldn’t stop it completely. It was similar to fire.
There was a kinetic energy to how the fire moved, but fire itself wasn’t kinetic.
As I fell, I turned it into a roll. Hitting the ground, arms around my head to protect it, baseball hat staying on, I shifted so my back impacted first. My leather jacket, which was enchanted, took a lot of the blow, as did my kinetic field. I barely felt the impact. Popping back up, I turned to face the Queen.
Who was now dealing with Sunie.
We’d killed the Dark Sky Bat King about an hour earlier, also getting the last of the bats needed for the Tower’s quest. Turned out there was a Queen, which we should have known. It was fairly common to have a matched pair. Or sometimes more Kings than the Queen. But it wasn’t always that way. Sometimes there was just one.
After killing the King and nothing immediately appearing, we figured this was one of the times there was only the one. The King, in this case, just being an Alpha version of the bat. Nope, there was a Queen and she was not happy that we’d killed her King.
And she was much stronger than the King.
After looting the King, we’d headed deeper into the plains, looking for the last of the creatures we needed for the quests. We’d hit the Endless Plains Biome pretty hard the last couple of days wanting to bang it out and finish with that one. We were so close too.
Somehow the Queen had tracked us across the Biome, we were a couple miles from where we’d killed the King and there were a couple dozen Adventurers in the Biome at that time, but the Queen knew where we were and that we killed her baby daddy.
Sunie moved his staff through the air, one side to the other, a thick wall of ice appearing before him. The Queen’s wing slammed into the ice, breaking shards of it off. Those shards flew through the air, some striking the Queen but doing no damage. His other hand pointed at the Queen, a thick spear of ice shooting out. It pierced the membrane of the Queen’s wing.
She shrieked, waves of sonics slamming into the ice and breaking it apart.
I sent a Force Lance at her head. She sensed it coming, twisting her head out of the way.
The Queen was a huge bat. Twenty foot wingspan, twelve feet high. Claws on the wings and her feet. Large ears that constantly moved as she picked up sonar signals. Some people found bats cute, but there was nothing cute about the Queen.
I ran past Sunie, who fired another ice spear, cutting another hole in her wing. The other wing swung down, I sent my Kinetic Field at it, sapping the momentum. The wing slowed, allowing me to grab onto it. I kept running past, pulling her wing with me. She twisted her body, exposing her side to Sunie, who shot another ice spear at her. This one pierced her side.
The Queen shrieked, sending out an area of effect sonic attack. This one struck our minds, disrupting our connections to our Essences, making it hard to Activate an Ability. The wing was yanked from my grasp as I skidded to a stop. I heard a grunt from Sunie as he was struck by an attack. I wanted to turn but couldn’t.
The sonic attack was that strong.
I wondered if that was something I could end up learning to do.
A wing slammed into my back, sending me forward. I landed hard, not even able to Activate my Kinetic Field to absorb the impact. My mind started to clear, allowing me to focus and move again. I rolled to the side and away, not sure if the Queen would go after me or Sunie first. Probably Sunie. So far in this fight, he’d done the most damage to it.
Nothing attacked me, so it was after Sunie.
That kind of made me mad. How dare it ignore me.
The Queen had her back to me. I could see flashes of a blue-white light as Sunie used his Abilities. Shards of ice shot out, falling to the ground. A thick spear pierced the Queen’s wing, the other wing this time. It just made her angrier. She screeched at Sunie. I saw his body go rolling to the ground, coming to a stop. He groaned, sitting up, staff not in hand any longer.
Not that he needed it, but he was a little dazed.
I rushed at the Queen, fists glowing with power as I pushed off the ground with a bit of Kinetic Energy. I fell toward her back, punching down as I landed. She screeched in surprise and pain as I slammed a Force and Kinetic empowered fist into her spine. Bone snapped, making her thrash to try to dislodge me. I held on tight and kept punching.
The Queen kept thrashing.
Her furry hide as thick, good protection against blunt weapons like my fists. I thought about taking one of the bladed weapons from my Inventory, but instead just kept punching. Sunie got back into the action, firing an Ice Spear at her. It slammed into her stomach, making her body spasm. That almost dislodged me, but I managed to hang on.
And I managed to keep punching.
“Head shot,” Sunie yelled out.
Which didn’t mean he was making a headshot, not yet. It meant he wanted to make a headshot.
“Working on it,” I yelled out, not sure if he heard me over the Queen’s shrieking.
She was launching attacks all over the place, not aiming or paying attention if Sunie was even in the vicinity. She was pissed and just wanted to kill whatever was hurting her. Which was me, which was on her back, and she couldn’t get at me. She was trying though.
I stopped punching and started climbing. Reaching up with one hand, I grabbed another tuft of the hard fur, then let go with the other and pulled my body up until I could reach with the free hand and grab more fur. I climbed up the back, which as she was twelve feet tall, didn’t take much. Reaching the neck, I powered up a fist and slammed it into the base of the neck. Her head snapped back and Sunie took advantage.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
I let go, falling to the ground, seconds before a spear of ice shot through her chin and out the back of the head. I didn’t want to think about the blood and guts that were falling around me, thankful my Kinetic Field stopped it from covering me in goo.
I landed, running out of the way as the shadow of the body fell over me, not wanting her to land on me. The Queen crashed to the ground, the body spasming and falling still.
YOU HAVE SLAIN DARK SKY BAT QUEEN. YOU HAVE GAINED +30 TOWER POINTS AND +30 MULTIVERSAL CREDITS
“Sucks there isn’t a Quest or Hunting Permit for her,” I muttered.
“She gave Dungeon Level points though,” Sunie said.
“Yeah, I guess that works out.”
I touched the corpse and got the loot.
YOU HAVE GAINED +2 DARK SKY BAT HIDES, +4 DARK SKY BAT CLAWS, +1 SOUND ESSENCE, +1 LEVEL UP CRYSTAL
Now that Sunie was Level 105, we had decided to hold off on anymore Leveling until we’d done more of the Infinite Tower’s first floor biomes. We had enough to bring both of us to Level 107, which we figured would be good enough for the second floor. But we wanted to hit the rest of the first floor at our current Levels.
Make it a bit more of a Challenge and get more rewards.
I used the Sound Essence, bringing me up to Level 61. Which was still way short of the rest, so I’d have to get forty-five or so Essences before we left for the second floor.
“Let’s go turn the quests in and finish this floor,” I said.
“Lead on.”
***
I read over my First Floor of the Infinite Tower Status.
Multiversal Credits: 101, 235
Tower Points (First Floor): 130,347/200,000
QUESTS:
FIND 120 CLUMPS OF WHITEMOSS 101/120
FIND 300 OAKEN ACORNS 0/300
GATHER 100 BUSHELS OF PONDTAILS 0/100
GATHER 120 STACKS OF BIRCHEN LOGS 0/120
GATHER 75 WHITEMOSS WOLF HIDE 65/75
GATHER 100 HORRISLEAF ELK ANTLERS 84/100
PERMITS:
HUNT ALPHA WHITEMOSS WOLF 0/1
HUNT ALPHA URSASPINE 0/1
HUNT ALPHA WHITEHILLS WYVERN 0/1
SLAY 50 WHITEMOSS WOLVES 0/50
SLAY 50 URSASPINES 43/50
SLAY 30 WHITEHILLS WYVERN 4/30
THE WHITEMOSS FOREST BIOME
DUNGEONS: 11
SOLO: 4 (Completed 4/4, 1 Repeatable)
DUO: 3 (Completed 3/3, 1 Repeatable)
PARTY: 3
RAID: 1
QUESTS: 10
SOLO: 6 (Completed 6/6, 3 Repeatable)
PARTY: 3
RAID 1:
HUNTING PERMITS: 7
MULTIPLE ARCANEBEASTS: 3 (Completed 3/3, 1 Repeatable)
ELITE ARCANEBEASTS: 4 (Completed 4/4, 0 Repeatable)
QUESTS:
FIND 300 CLUMPS OF CRYSTAL GRASS STALKS 300/300
FIND 150 PLAINS BIRCH LEAVES 150/150
FIND 200 RAVINE SIDE MUSHROOMS 200/200
GATHER 500 BLUE PLAINS OXEN HIDES 500/500
GATHER 100 SCREECHER RAPTORS HIDES 100/100
GATHER 150 HORNED BOUNDERS ANTLERS 150/150
PERMITS:
HUNT ALPHA BLUE PLAINS OXEN 1/1
HUNT ALPHA SCREECHER RAPTOR 1/1
HUNT HORNED BOUNDER QUEEN 1/1
HUNT DARK SKY BAT KING 1/1
SLAY 500 BLUE PLAINS OXEN HIDES 500/500
SLAY 100 SCREECHER RAPTORS 100/100
SLAY 300 HORNED BOUNDERS 300/300
SLAY 250 DARK SKY BATS 250/250
SLAY 100 PLAINS CHARGERS 100100
SLAY 200 SHADOW FOXES 200/200
THE ENDLESS PLAINS BIOME
ADVENTURERS: 68
DUNGEONS: 9
SOLO: 2
DUO: 4 (Completed 4/4, 1 Repeatable)
PARTY: 2 (Completed 2/2, 1 Repeatable)
RAID: 1
QUESTS: 16
SOLO: 6
DUO: 5
PARTY: 4
RAID 1
HUNTING PERMITS: 10
MULTIPLE ARCANEBEASTS: 6
ELITE ARCANEBEASTS: 4
REQUIREMENTS TO CLEAR INFINITE TOWER FLOOR ONE:
200,000 TOWER POINTS
“Are we going to claim any of the repeatable Dungeons and Permits for the Endless Plains right now?” Sunie asked.
“Naw,” I said, removing my hand from the Obelisk. “Let’s do all the Biomes and then if we need more points, which we probably won’t, or just want to, we can run the favorite.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Sunie said.
He’d already turned in his quests and had stepped away from the Tower Obelisk, looking around the Hub. Probably wondering if any of the Multiverse’s many Factions were going to bother us today. Didn’t look like anyone was.
“Come on,” I said, clapping him on the shoulder and waving up at the viewing windows. “Let’s go get a beer.”
