“And one for the Font,” Princess Kristie bowed to Ancient Schotiel. The great Fire Monolith Tortoise, his head bigger than either of us, nodded agreement as Kristie plucked up her third globe of Radiance and stowed it away.
“Knights of the Lost Light, one by one!” Kris called out to them, and I headed off to bring each one down on a Disk over the burning lava of the caldera to the altar, there to salute the Fire Monolith Tortoise standing guard there, and gain their own Radiance.
-----
I gave my respects to Ancient Schotiel, being the last to gather up the Radiance for myself. I towed Lord Mick and Kris out of there as the Monolith bade us go, his attention turning back to the Court he was building there on the Dark Isle.
We went back up to the rim of the Caldera, and then retreated with the Wagon back to the Wall we’d put up.
There we set the Wagon down, blocked off the Wall again just in case, and then Teleported off to the Halls of the Lost Light.
The Pyramid I’d raised near Candeth Keep during my time off active hunting was only a twenty-stepper, but the Halls were still inside its Interdiction zone, something only bypassed if you were attuned to it properly. That was basically restricted to those Candeth Martine Marked, his fellow Prodigals, or those bearing Weapons of the Lost Light.
It had done wonders for controlling the flow of traffic and threat level from undead, who couldn’t Recall anywhere within twenty miles to harass us. That was enough to cover what was now The Deep’s Island and the Withered Zone, coming up just shy of the shores of the smoldering Singularity Caul.
It also meant the concealed scrying sensors thoughtfully installed about the Halls could see such forces coming from some distance away, allowing a sufficient force to be assembled to meet any would-be raiders.
Only one such force of undead had dared follow up on the disastrous earlier attempt from the ancient company of undead that had ambushed and slaughtered the Knights in the past, and they had gotten nowhere near the Hall itself. They were threading their way through a valley nearby when the Chained Shards blew through them in layer after layer of killing fire, and were completely unprepared when the Knights of the Lost Light threw off concealing illusions, smashed into them, and mowed the survivors down.
Anything magical was taken away and soon Burned, the rest was buried, and the white smear that remained after vivus was done with them was gone with the dawn.
There hadn’t been any other raids since, only the occasional scout creeping in to see if anything interesting had been done to the Halls.
We had debated putting a thirty-foot wall around the Halls, but decided against it. It had lasted a great deal of time without such a defense, and there was always a force of acolytes based there, working the Spawn Points nearby in a rotating duty.
As the Font returned to life, the influence of the Lost Light was clearly more pervasive in the place. It was clearly anathemic to anything unliving or of Shadow. Just coming inside now they’d start to Burn, and the Vivic Lights and Fires spread through the Halls only helped spread the Lost Light’s influence more.
The Font itself had been fed with the Infusions from three volcanoes, fires crimson, white, and azure, and now we added the Radiance to it to complete the quadfecta.
The fountain of Lost Light pouring forth now was aglitter with waters of Gold, Silver, and Rainbow, joyous and effervescent in its power and illumination, lighting up the whole of the Fountain Hall brighter than a sunny day. Mana swirled around the place as thickly as any ley-line-tapping menhir Henge, making the room an ideal place to rest and regain mana, and it strengthened the whole of the Wards covering the Halls at the same time.
The Lost Light had returned to full strength, and was clearly a tool of the Heavens the undead so clearly spurned.
We’d just have to see what that was going to do to them.
----
“Well, there it is. Harlune is going to laugh when he sees the effect.”
It turned out the new polychromatic rainbow edge to the Motes of Lost Light was a Protection from Void spell at VII, granting any wielder of such a Weapon considerable protection against all Void Magic attacks. Combined with the Cantrip from his Rose of Celdon Rings, and the defense against such normally inviolate attacks was over -75%!
Our Weapons had received a minor damage upgrade, equal to that of an increase in Profound damage rating, but that iridescent razor on the edge of the Soulfire was actually a Radiant damage effect occurring parallel to any other damage the Weapon inflicted. In other words, any damage would be of the normal nature of the blow, or Radiant damage, whatever was more effective.
That was similar to Void Magic, which never struck at less than average damage against almost anything. It also meant we never had to worry about striking against a creature with something it was very resistant to, as we’d do at least average damage with the Radiance from the Weapon strike.
The boost to spells was more minor, and actually guided by the Blackfire Stones. The Blackfire Stones on my Staff did Implement Kicker Force damage of +1d6 per Stone instead of Legendary Blood Thirst’s +10, and the Radiant Infusion added another +2d6 of Radiant damage on top of that. That was an extremely impressive +5d6 Kicker damage, although minor in regards to the amount of Health that creatures in Dereth often had. Still, it was basically typeless and bypassed immunities and armor, so useful against almost everything… and if you used Damage over Time effects, it stacked right on top, along with vivus, Banefire, Holy damage, and everything like that.
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My Shards, for instance, now had tiny Motes of Radiant Blackfire Lost Light circling around them when launched, quite eye-catching if you were looking closely at them.
Despite all that, the undead and Shadowed creatures didn’t actually take extra damage from the Radiant Lost Light, which was a bit of a shame. But since everything did normal damage, everyone got over it.
The Mick’s Bunita’s Kiss was fairly typical of the Weapons of the Lost Light now.
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Bunita’s Kiss
Radiant Infused Heavy Adamantine Warfang Claymore of the Lost Light
Base damage: 2-16/4-24 → 10-27/15-38 (24-56/30-70 wielded, Profound Weapon)
Jadework Bonus: +4/+4 non-magical (Radiant Infusion), does not stack with normal Enhancement bonuses.
Radiant Blackfire Motes of Lost Light: Wielder gains Deflection bonus on AC and Sacred bonus to saves against Evil magic equal to magical Enhancement bonus, Void Protection VII (65% Void Damage Reduction).
Radiant Weapon: Weapon does either Radiant or normal damage, whichever is better.
Crit Range: Base 19-20 (13-20/x5 with Improved Threat/Improved Critical)
Warfang Runes: Biting Strike (x3 Crit Range), Crushing Blow (x4 Critical Hit Damage)
Blackfire Stone Sockets (Set of 3): Armor Cleaving (?, max 1/2 MAB), Legendary Blood Thirst (+10 damage), Epic Heart Thirst (+2 To Hit)
Guard of the Minor Stones: Elemental Protection VII (Opposite Element), Elemental Dominance (+2d6 damage and secondary effect vs. opposite Element), Elemental Slayer (Opposite Element)
Pommel of the Major Stones: Elemental Phasing (Stone type), Elemental Strike (+d6 Stone Type), Protection from Element VII (Stone type)
Major and Minor Elemental Stone Set Bonus: Elemental Burst (+3-30 Major Stone Elemental damage on crit)
OR Prismatic Stone: Elemental Slayer (all), Greater Armor Cleaving/Elementals (full MAB)
Slotted Effects (Zehn Slotted): Greater Soulbound (2), Vivic (1), Blooding (1), Sharding (2), Bane of Legends (1), Healing Edge (3)
Supplemental/Slotless: Impervious/Indestructible, Morphing
Attachment: Greater Baneskull vs Undead: +2 To-hit/Damage, +2-12 damage (Banefire)
Attachment: Greater Token vs Undead: +d6 damage, Ignore Damage Reduction of Undead, Treat as better of Fire or Force damage against Undead.
Base Weapon: 38-70/44-84 +1d8 Positive +d6 Vivus (13-20/x5), +6 to Hit, Armor-Cleaving, +Banes, +Elemental Damage/Burst, +Slayers, Heal 1-8 Health on Hit; Inflicted Wounds do not magically heal, Regenerate, or Fast Heal; Sharding attack as ranged attack (15’ increments/75 feet).
+4+Bane Deflection bonus to AC and Saves against Evil Magic.
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Yeah, Bunita’s Kiss was an incredibly brutal Weapon, and the Mick hadn’t even gone for intelligence on it, yet. He had several Baneskulls he could use, although he rarely changed out, and of course he could Infuse different effects into Bunita’s Kiss as he saw fit if it was appropriate, usually replacing Sharding. Add on the acceleration of extra attacks, the extra damage from Feats and Weapon Mastery, and yeah, the Mick was putting up a lot of damage on the things we were fighting, as was everyone else after a year and more of relentless Naming Karma upgrades to their Weapons.
The Lost Light was now broader but somewhat less potentially powerful than it once had been. Magic modifying itself slowly and subtly...
It was still all good to see, good to see…
--------
Kris was serious about seeing if the Purified Blood of Avoren Palacost, the son of Bael’Zharon, could be upgraded to form the way to a final upgrade to the Swords of Lost Hope, which meant visiting that Dungeon.
Originally access to the Dungeon involved traveling all over the landscape and finding various components in various Dungeons, then assembling them with magic into an access jewel. The materialization of all the hidden Dungeons happily rendered that moot, and there was only to go to the coordinates at the center of Dereth, north and west of Qalabar, close to the shores of the Inner Sea, where once people had exited from the bottom of the sepulcher Dungeon where the body of the child had still laid exposed after all these millennia.
We were not too surprised when a dark and gloomy tomb was revealed there, heading into the ground. The atmosphere about it was not much different from the Quiddity Dungeon on Ithaenc Island, and Kris could even smell grievvers from the top of the place.
The doors to the place were thick metal, locked and shut with powerful magic. One Null Strike later, Kris kicked them open as the severed magic collapsed, and led us all inside.
There were grievvers within, Shadow-tainted as normal, and powerful shades, much like other shadow Dungeons, although thankfully no mukkir. Why there were grievvers in an ancient tomb from long before the olthoi came to Dereth was another question entirely, probably having something to do with the line ‘we thought it would be cool’, and that was that.
After Ithaenc’s challenge, this Dungeon was not much of a threat, and we slaughtered our way through it fairly quickly, the shades probably a little astonished at how readily they died and their Spawn Points were Sealed. I had no wish to keep a place as Tainted as this intact, and everybody concurred, the Roaches tracing Vivic Weapons over the blackened rock and setting everything on mistfire around us as Kris, the Mick, and I did likewise, with Bursting Darts flitting about and blowing little spheres of whiteness into being as they hit the walls and ceilings and feasted on Taint.
The end of the Dungeon was another of those nonsensical leaps down to the outside of the burial chamber, an idiot’s ploy if there weren’t Recall spells or a Portal there to bring you out of the place. But why not rely on magic being around for everyone, right?
The shade guardians in the place were half-dead before the archers floated down with me and shafted them in the back as they tried to whale on Kris and the Mick, Fire Vulns making sure their efforts were muchly short-lived and they died Burning en vivus.
The boy’s body was still laid out on the altar, sickeningly enough. He was remarkably well-preserved for something dead for all these thousands of years, the necromancy thick around the corpse… and yes, his Blood had regenerated.
I drained it all into a vial of some size, extracting a good gallon of the sickening, corrupted stuff. It was red, tallow yellow, green, and black, swimming with necroic energies of the foulest sort.
When I was done, I nodded at Kris and the Mick, and they plunged their Blades into the corpse, setting it instantly and brightly alight, the necroic regeneration meant to preserve the corpse actually feeding the vivus faster than it could restore it.
Really fast and really brightly, actually.
Kris looked at me, I threw up the Dimension Door, and everyone bailed.
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