Fate Weaver’s Legacy

#084 – All set and ready to dungeoneer!

I gasped heavily and my entire body ached from running around and literally putting out fires for quite literally the entire day and night. It was actually the next day in the afternoon now and I hadn’t even slept.

I looked at my crystal flask to see that I’d ended up drinking almost half of it just to keep going. The shower head I’d gotten from the water park dungeon truly was MVP.

I groaned and collapsed on the ground before rubbing my forehead and then glaring at the culprit of this whole incident.

The damn plasma pool I’d made when I’d first experiment with my fused gun.

Okay, fine. It had been entirely my fault this had happened. I really should have done more to prevent it from spreading, but dammit, I’d thought this stuff would eventually dissipate! Why was it still here even after days?!

I was lucky that I’d caught the forest fire before it could spread too far, honestly. I shuddered thinking about the mess I would have to deal with if I’d left it for much longer.

Anywho, I had to thank the Immolator title and the added fire resistance it gave me, because although I’d put it all out already, I still felt hot even with all my stacked fire resistance. This would have been so much harder without it.

I sighed and let myself fall into a lying position, ignoring the charred landscape surrounding me.

I’d taken care of the emergency, but the root cause of the problem was still here and it didn’t seem to be going anywhere. The fire had only spread from one side of the plasma pool somehow, so if I left it alone again, it could still spread to the other side…

I groaned again and dragged a hand down my face.

What the hell was I supposed to do with this?

Could I negate it by shooting water at it? Hell no, that would probably just splatter it in all directions and ignite more trees. I could gently hose it down with my glove instead of using my water gun, but if being out in the open for so long hadn’t cooled it down, I doubted a bit of water would. Stupid nonsensical magic physics.

If only I had my bucket, so I could maybe scoop it all…

GonguuH: fusion?

I paused, blinked, opened my mouth, and then closed it.

“Huh. You know… why not? If it worked on the sapphire, it should work on this too…”

And since I had such crazy fire resistance, I should be fine touching it for a little bit…

Probably.

Hopefully.

Even if not, I could heal myself with fire afterwards.

“Okay, let’s fuse the plasma then. The only question is… into what?”

I pondered on it for a while and quickly rejected some suggestions from chat such as ‘add it to the pizza to make it spicy’ and ‘towel for extra dryness’ because those sounded like the ideas of Darwin award winners.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have a lot of clearly good options, so in the end, I decided to put it into the emerald bow I’d gotten from my last… altercation with the archer. I wasn’t sure whether it would work, but I was hoping it would make it so the bow would ignite any arrow I nocked on it or maybe even magically create its own arrows out of plasma.

That was the idea I was trying to push into the creation, anyway. If I could make door hinges out of razors when I wished for it hard enough, then why not this?

So with that, I clutched the bow in my hand and reached out toward the plasma pool with my jaw clenched… before remembering that I didn’t have Armsmaster equipped.

“...Right, hold on. Uhh… Hmm. What do I swap out…? I need to either replace Soulbind Item or one of the phoenix skills…”

I really didn’t want to replace Soulbind Item. Having it temporarily disabled during ads was already quite uncomfortable, but benching the phoenix skills would also mean that I couldn’t get them back easily…

I didn’t have anything quite like Heat Vision and I had no idea whether it would come in handy at some point, so I didn’t want to swap it out just yet. Flameguard, on the other hand… Well, I had a lot of ways to produce fire nowadays, what with my gun and the pan. Flameguard was incredibly useful and had saved my butt so so many times, but I had more options now, so…

Replace [Flameguard] with [Armsmaster]?
Note: [Flameguard] will not be re-equippable for 24 hours.
Warning: As [Flameguard] is no longer available in your skill list, it will not be re-equippable until you unlock it again.
Y/N

I blinked at the warning.

“Huh… Wait, why does it even say that it won’t be equipable for twenty-four hours if it’s just gonna say it won’t be equipable at all?”

GeorgeDoshington: shitty programming lol
PrestoFive55: cooldown persists probably?
PrestoFive55: even if you swap back to fire bless

“Oh yeah, I guess that’s true… Well, alright.” Despite my exhaustion I decided to still make a bit of a show out of it and quickly summoned John, had him look at me from the most dramatic angle, and then saluted. “Goodbye, Flameguard! You served me well! Let’s meet again one day!”

I pressed yes.

Just to triple confirm, I looked one more time into the skills menu to see only human skills. Then I looked at my status and saw that I still only had five skill points. No refund for Flameguard.

“...Well, that’s a bunch of skill points down the drain, I guess,” I murmured with a frown.

I sighed.

“Ah, well. I’ll just have to get more skill points, I guess. Don’t worry about it, chat,” I said more to myself than chat.

FInally, with Armsmaster now available, I reached out toward the plasma pool once more. I flinched when the pool let off a little zap near my hand, but kept going.

When my hand touched the surface, it felt like touching pudding, except warm… At least at first. Warm quickly turned to pretty dang hot, but not searing like I’d expected.

Before it got any worse, I activated Fusion and watched as the lake of plasma crawled toward my hand and turned into the familiar ball of orange… which actually didn’t look all that different from the plasma pool itself, funnily enough.

I hummed and shrugged at that thought, and then carefully fused the stuff into the bow.

Once the light show was over, I was left with a fancy green bow with bright orange markings along its limbs.

“Hmm, fancy…” I murmured and briefly looked around just to make sure I’d gotten all the plasma.

Once assured that no more forest fires would break out again, I prodded the bow with my Ether and found out that, yes, it did have some magical functionality now. Namely, I could channel my Ether through its limbs and into the arrow rest to do… something.

Since I didn’t want to burn down the forest right after I’d prevented that from happening, I didn’t test it right away and instead walked back to the river.

That was when I noted that the sun was actually setting again already… and boy, was I tired after that all-nighter – and all-dayer? – of trying to stop a forest fire had completely exhausted me.

Regardless, I managed to force myself to at least test the bow before going to sleep for the night.

I got to the river, channeled my Ether to the arrow notch and sure enough, a glowing blob of plasma materialized and gradually turned into the shape of an arrow.

And then it fell off because I wasn’t holding it.

“Gah!” I jumped back to prevent it from landing on my feet.

The vaguely arrow-shaped blob of plasma splattered on the ground, but thankfully didn’t ignite anything since there wasn’t any grass this close to the river.

I frowned.

“Right. I need to actually grab it. Makes sense.”

Unlike the plasma pool from before, the puddle of plasma from the arrow quickly dissipated, making me sigh in relief. No more danger of accidental forest fires.

Anywho, I tried again.

I sent Ether to the arrow notch and as soon as the thing began forming, I reached out with my right hand and tried grabbing it.

It was warm… then it was hot… and then–

“Okay, apparently, this thing doesn’t have innate heat protection! I can’t hold the arrow for too long!”

Before my fingers could start burning, I pulled the blob of plasma into the string like an arrow – Why wasn’t the string burning? – and the thing obliged and shaped itself appropriately. And just as the heat turned into hot stinging on my fingers, I launched the thing straight into the river.

The thing swished through the air and splashed into the river with a loud sizzle as a cloud of steam burst out of it.

GeorgeDoshington: noice
GeorgeDoshington: I like it

I hummed.

“It’s… cool. But a lot weaker than my gun, much bulkier, and can hurt my fingers in return,” I summarized after discussing it with a few people in chat in parallel.

I shook my head.

GeorgeDoshington: but the coolness factor

I rolled my eyes. “It’s not really that useful, actually. Too impractical. Not strong enough. No reason to ever use it over the gun. But yeah, it’s cool, I guess…”

Funny how something like a bow that shot plasma arrows wasn’t that impressive by my standards nowadays. What would I have given for this when I’d first arrived in this world.

Irid123: why not use both?
Irid123: fusion

“Fuse it to the gun…? Huh. What would even happen if I did that? Would it just get a plasma arrow mode…?”

PrestoFive55: crossbow?
GeorgeDoshington: its gonna shoot bows lol

My eyes lit up.

“Ooo, I like it! Not shooting bows, that’s dumb. But I probably could turn my gun into a crossbow hybrid!”

Whether that would even be useful or not was still up to debate, though. And since the Ether cost got higher with every subsequent Fusion, I should be careful about what I fused, so…

“Maybe later. I’m just gonna keep it as a backup weapon, I guess.”

With that, I returned to my camp and began preparing to go to sleep when chat reminded me about my beautiful axe and the fact that I hadn’t appraised it.

“Oh, right. Uh, but I don’t wanna swap out Armsmaster since it has such a long cooldown… Ehhh…”

I could either swap out Heat Vision – which I might regret if I suddenly needed it, like with Rend and the crater boss – or Soulbound Item, which… would be uncomfortable. And I would need to wait a day to swap it back if I wanted to use the Soul Pocket.

Which… wasn’t that big of a deal, actually.

Really, the main reason why I didn’t want to swap it out was because it felt so uncomfortable to suddenly lose a part of myself, even if only temporarily. It was like… having an arm anaesthetized or something.

“...Okay, chat. New plan. I’m resting all day tomorrow. No dungeoneering,” I eventually declared, before gritting my teeth and swapping Soulbind Item out for Appraisal.

Ughhh…

Yeah, this felt incredibly weird now that I’d gotten used to it.

But maybe this was a good thing? Wasn’t me getting used to Soulbinding the reason why Ebiko got mad? Or at least part of it?

Speaking of her… she hadn’t shown up in chat in quite some time…

I shook my head to shove away all the distracting thoughts. God, my tired mind just kept wandering off. I better wrap this up soon.

“Right, let’s see what this awesome baby is about now!”

I dropped my backpack on the ground, reached inside, and carefully pulled out the axe before shooting Appraisal at it.

Demon-dragon war axe
A war axe once wielded by the demonic mother of an ancient crystal dragon. Has Ether-reactive circuitry etched inside it, allowing the user to channel Ether through it and turn it either into demon fire or concentrated crystal dragon’s breath.

I blinked.

“Huh… This thing has lore, chat! A demonic mother of a crystal dragon? Damn. I guess that explains a lot about that dungeon… So, the final boss was that mother and the first boss was her dragon son, right…?”

Irid123: looooooree
GeorgeDoshington: thats edgy as shit
GeorgeDoshington: i like it
PrestoFive55: how did they make the dungeon though?

I hummed and looked the axe over.

“I mean, we still have no idea how dungeons are created, so… Who knows?” I shrugged. 

Irid123: maybe they fought something together
Irid123: flamethrower is key item
Irid123: so secret third floor has their enemy as the boss
GeorgeDoshington: they sneezed and made the hole lol
PrestoFive55: maybe they just lived in that hole

I tilted my head.

Irid had a point that if there was some kind of secret area in that dungeon that you needed the flamethrower to access, it likely contained more clues as to what had happened and maybe even how the dungeon had been created.

For now though, if an area like that really existed, I had no idea how to get there. And the only way to figure it out would be to get my map back.

“Well, you can keep theorizing for now, I guess. No way to know for sure until I go to that secret room… if there even is one… Anyway! Next!”

I put the axe on the ground and pulled out the ring and a few of the scales I’d gotten from the dungeon alongside the axe.

First, the ring. I hadn’t gotten a good look at it before back in the darkness, but with better visibility now – although still not great since the sun had set already – the ring looked like a proper magical artifact. It was shiny gray and had strange silvery patterns etched into it. The patterns were oddly familiar…

I shot Appraisal at it.

Sealed ring of the larcenous demon queen
An ancient ring once worn by a demon queen.
[INNATE] skill: Skill Snatch – Use a large amount of Intra and Tempor on a person, an animal, or a dungeon monster to steal and seal one of their skills inside this item. This item will gain that skill as another [INNATE] skill. The skill can then be released at any time for no additional cost, deleting the extra [INNATE] skill and returning it to the original owner.
This item is a relic.

My eyes almost bulged out as I read that.

“Holy shhh–shopping spree! A skill-stealing ring?! And what the heck, a demon queen’s ring?! Why was something like that in a D-rank dungeon?! Is this rare loot?! And what does relic mean?!”

GeorgeDoshington: omfggg
Irid123: oh wow
PrestoFive55: you should try stealing skills from every monster
GeorgeDoshington: wait so monsters have system?
GeorgeDoshington: and animals?
Irid123: oooh I guess that dragon mom was the demon queen?

Oh. It could steal dungeon monsters’ skills! Oh my god. Could I steal the shark’s space-warping nonsense? Or the octopus’ portal thing? Or the sapphirication roar from the dragon?! This opened up so many options!

PrestoFive55: wait can you steal your own skill?
PrestoFive55: to have another skill slot?

I stopped for a moment.

Could I steal one of my own skills to have the ring act as another skill slot? Would that be safe? The description said that it could be released at any point to return it so… it should be safe to try, right…?

I wanted to try it really badly, but I was also wary of somehow accidentally deleting one of my skills forever. I had to first test it on someone else… Meaning a dungeon monster, since I had nobody else available.

But it said it used a large amount of both Intra and Tempor. Expensive… and dangerous. And also, if stealing a skill cost too much Intra and made me into a drooling idiot again, I might just immediately release the skill again in my dumbed down state. Not to mention, running out of Intra inside a dungeon was incredibly dangerous already…

Ugh, how the hell was I supposed to safely test this thing…?

“...Okay, let’s leave this thing for later. Maybe I could try risking using that ring on the cooking demon or something,” I mused as I moved to slide on the ring, but then stopped when I remembered that I wore gloves. “Uhh… Do you wear gloves over rings or rings over gloves…?”

Because for all the games I’d played where my character would wear both gloves and rings at the same time, I had no idea how you were supposed to wear them in reality. It was the sort of thing you just… didn’t really think about in video games.

PrestoFive55: depends
PrestoFive55: how tight is the glove
Blouterest: whatevers more comfortable I think
GeorgeDoshington: fuse them lol

I blinked and then slapped my forehead.

“Duh! Of course! Let’s see, then…”

I took off my demon glove and held the ring in my hand before focusing and–

I ran into a block. The ring resisted me trying to turn it into a magical blob.

“What the…” I frowned. “I can’t… I can’t? I can’t use fusion on it! Why?”

Irid123: because relic?
Irid123: probably?

I groaned.

“Right, relic. So relic just means you can’t fuse it? Well, that’s annoying. Oh, well…”

I ended up wearing the ring over the glove. It fit much better that way for some reason.

Now, I wasn’t sure whether I would be using it anytime soon because of the hefty cost and the need for a dungeon monster, but it didn’t hurt to have it on hand – or on finger, hah – in case I needed it.

Finally, I took a look at the last item I’d gotten in the crystal slash sapphire hole dungeon. The crystalline scales.

Crystal dragon scales
Scales from a crystal dragon.

And… yup. That was just about what I’d expected. Not everything could be amazing like the ring or the axe, after all.

Although even if I said that, those were still dragon scales. And if video games taught me anything, materials from a dragon were usually top quality. Could I use this to craft something? Or maybe I could just fuse it into my clothes? Hmm, but I didn’t want to fuse too much random crap into it…

…Not to mention, the warnings from Jane and the fight I’d had with Ebiko about Soulbinding random things, ugh.

Speaking of which, Ebi hasn’t been in chat since we had that fight… I really hoped she would come around at some point again.

I could also just call her, but… I didn’t want to seem like I was forcing her to deal with me.

Gah! Why were friendships so difficult?! No wonder I barely talked to people outside of the Internet before this whole isekai bullshit…

I shook my head and refocused as my forks delivered some theories and suggestions to me. There seemed to be a heated discussion about the axe and the benefits of fusing it into the key sword, just to make it less unwieldy.

“Hmm… But I like having a giant war axe to smash my enemies with!” I whined.

Secretly though, I agreed with them. Especially in the city dungeon, having a smaller and lighter weapon would be better, as demonstrated by my naginata getting stuck on things in small rooms and being too slow and heavy to ever touch the archer.

I huffed.

“I guess I could unfuse it later if I don’t like it… I can’t soulbind it just yet, anyway… Okay, you know what? Fine! Key sword!” I summoned the key sword into my hand and frowned at it. “I’m promoting you from a crappy semi-ranged weapon to my main melee weapon! Be proud! And no, you won’t be getting a raise.”

GeorgeDoshington: fuckin typical manager
PrestoFive55: the office dungeon affected you?

I snorted.

“Yes. Setting my foot near that office dungeon made me into a cruel and abusive boss. Sounds about right.” I shook my head. “Anyway! Let’s do this, then I’ll go to sleep, and tomorrow, we get our revenge on the damn city dungeon!”

With one more cheer, I reached out toward the axe and used Fusion.

The mass of orange smoke it then turned into seemed larger and more energetic than anything I’d ever tried fusing before.

Well, I already knew that the axe was a cut above – heh, puns – all the other weapons I’d ever used in this life, but this basically confirmed it.

After admiring it for a moment, I finally brought it closer to the key sword and pushed it inside.

…But for some reason, the key sword was resisting me.

The heck? Why? What was–

As I tried pushing more, it suddenly gave in and the blob of orange slid into the key sword while at the same time a small mass of liquid squirted out of it all over me.

“Wha–?!”

I froze and blinked a couple of times, but I soon had a bunch of people inform me of what had just happened via my forks.

GeorgeDoshington: kinky

I sighed.

“Right… I totally forgot I fused the bit of spilled drink with the key sword back then… Great. And George, shut up.”

Well, it wasn’t a big deal. There was apparently enough water in the liquid that I could still dry myself by moving it off of my person with the hydrokinesis, although it felt ‘heavier’ than normal water.

Now that I was cleaned up, I finally took a look at the key sword.

The golden sheen of most of it was replaced by the familiar crystalline cyan, while the teeth had been dyed black.

I hummed, gripped the thing in my hand, and tried to channel Ether through it.

Two sets of Ether channels, just like the axe. Perfect.

I tested both of them and they worked exactly like the axe. Although the crystal setting was a bit more awkward to use, since the crystals would explode from all of the teeth, and unlike the axe’s blade, they were a lot closer to my hand, so I would get partially caught in the blast more often than not.

The black fire setting worked really well, though. Having the weapon be lighter fit the slashing nature of it a lot better than the bulky axe.

Lastly, I tested throwing the key sword and then resummoning it to my hand using Quick Fetch. It worked without a problem.

I smiled.

“There we go, chat. Finally a good weapon! Don’t need to use scraps anymore.”

And the best part was that even without soulbinding it, I could still quickly summon it to my hand at the drop of a hat.

With this, my super gun, and my reinforced clothes, I felt ready to take on the city dungeon.

Then I let out a huge yawn, which interrupted my determined thoughts.

…

…Tomorrow. I would take on the city dungeon tomorrow.

…No, wait. Tomorrow was a rest day.

The day after tomorrow was dungeon day, dammit!