Travis Gardin
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Chapter 19: Punching Jefferson
🕑 Added 2024-10-14 18:00:03 +0000 UTC6/22
Washington D.C.
2:40 AM
“The dungeon reset happens at 10:42 AM,” I say to the team. “We have eight hours to clear five floors.”
“Jun,” Jose whispers to me. “Your watch is on Central time, not Eastern.”
6/21
Washington D.C.
3:40 AM
“The dungeon reset happens at 10:42 AM,” I say to the team. “We have seven hours to clear five floors.”
Mercy yawns and stretches, reaching her arms up, and when she does there's a slight jiggle-
Madeline asks, “the remaining monsters are supposed to be demons, right?”
I go over the notes from the guy in charge of the Capitol's defense. They'd encountered two monsters from lower floors that we haven't seen yet.
Demons
Imps. Small tan demons that spit balls of fire. They attack in swarms.
Stone Stag. A centaur-like demon. Extremely fast and its horns are deadly.
Man, even though we got those notes earlier today, it feels like three weeks ago.
I use all of my Wisdom and Intelligence to give the team advice. “Okay, so demons. Expect spells and physical brutes. Don't get hit.”
“That's it?” asks Quins. “Just don't die? Grand strategy, boss.”
I shrug. “We all know the drill by now. We go ninja until we have to go SWAT. If you, Jose or Rutger get rushed me, Madeline or Mercy will come in and melee the monster. Watch each other's backs and focus on imminent threats.”
Biscuits's little voice rings out from my shoulder, where she's perched. “If you get hurt I'll heal you but only once.”
“Why just once?” asks Mercy, with the patience of a saint.
“To keep you from being reckless,” is Biscuits's way too clever response. Maybe upping her mental stats was a mistake.
We head to the big wooden door on the far side of the boar's field and I push it open. It's heavy enough that you'd ordinarily need multiple people to budge it. I am no longer ordinarily. Inside is a long, red brick hallway lit by gas lamps. Cozy.
We walk for about 20 minutes. Most of us walk. Biscuits rides my shoulder. She refused to go back home so she's with us for now. We get to the end of the hallway and find ourselves under a (fake) starry sky. In front of us is a round, temple-like building with pillars surrounding an open air upper area.
“The Jefferson memorial?” Mercy asks, currently in her Angle Frame mecha armor. Each of her three costumes shows off her thick thighs. I have 250 Intelligence unless I'm looking at those thighs, then I have an Intelligence of about 3.
To the right is a path lit by gas street lights. It's flanked by cherry blossom trees in full bloom. In the distance I can make out the Lincoln Memorial, and over the tops of trees I can see the Washington Monument.
“It's the whole national mall,” Madeline says.
From behind us Rutger asks “think this is like that giant swamp? Multiple floors in one big zone?”
“If the monsters are diverse enough, I'd say so,” Mercy answers.
I tear myself away from dreaming about Mercy's soft, plump legs long enough to point at some winged brown humanoid monsters seeming to guard the temple to Jefferson. A man who pissed away money on art and furniture while complaining about the poor. A pro-slavery man who had a slave mistress. A guy who cared a lot about rights, unless you were a woman or anything except white.
“Can I fuck up the temple?” I find myself asking the group. I turn and look at the team. “Because fuck Jefferson.” I get shrugs.
Quins gives me a nod and a wink. “Okay mate, but only if I get to thrash any statues of Thatcher we find.”
I switch over to Void Mind, charge up two Vortex Grenades and toss them at the memorial to an ass hat. The small balls of void hit the base and the roof, then each expands to a translucent, 20 foot sphere of purple energy. Black lines of pure void shoot out from the center, spiking and annihilating everything inside the sphere. Debris and a couple of nearby imps are sucked towards the spheres.
There's a chorus of screams as dozens of imps fly out of and off of the monument, and look in our direction.
Tourist Imp. Tier 4. Flies around without thinking about the significance of what they're seeing. Also, they want to eat you. These are only a little smaller than you are, making them pretty strong for imps.
Possible loot: camera, souvenir keychain, chained soul.
Our ranged fighters open up and a dozen of the imps die to explosive arrows, lightning bolt rifle shots and emerald chain lightning.
In unison the remaining imps open their mouths and small balls of fire spit out, flying towards us. My Intelligence, Wisdom and Reflexes work in concert to tell me that those are too small and slow to be the attacks of Tier 4 demons. These are, in fact, probably explosive fireball spells. And that's bad.
I switch my left sub-mind to Solar Mind and create a dozen Solar shields, two in front of each of my team. “Take cover!” I shout, and just in time as the first fireball hits the shield in front of me and explodes in a 10 foot radius blast. I had this spell! In my right hand I charge another Vortex Grenade, this time giving it the extra few seconds to be empowered when I toss it. I see my team duck behind the shields I set up for each of them, and watch as flames burst around them but get stopped by the Solar element shields.
I pop out and throw my charged grenade like a fastball, beaning an imp in the center of the pack. The charged grenade explodes into a 30 foot radius sphere (that's 60 feet across) and all the imps within twice that distance get pulled into the range of the black void stabbing lasers. Lasers? They just look like black lines. Whatever the void energy is, it spears each imp inside the sphere with dozens of thin beams, ripping each apart. The grenade lingers for 10 seconds, during which time only a few imps escape the pull of the Vortex. And those few imps just get shot to death.
I check my radar and see one more enemy, this one at the center of the Memorial. I spring ahead, leaping up the stairs leading up to the dais. I get to the top area and find, to my utter delight, that the Jefferson statue has come to life and is now a bronze golem.
“I... Get to punch Thomas Jefferson?” I ask nobody in particular.
I switch to Atmos Mind and create 15 storm fists. The statue turns to me and its eyes glow red.
I beat the shit out of Thomas Jefferson. And it feels great.
-----
Jun's Void (Dark/Poison/Psychic) spells
Void Blades
Exotic
Conjure blades of void energy in your hands, or stab from any surface at range. Targets who survive your strike are afflicted with Entropy. You also may create Void garb.
Range: 61 ft
Duration: 10 minutes
Cost: 2.5 Arcana Points
Proficiency: 309% (Range)
Dark Mote Grenade
Exotic
Throw a ball of void that explodes into smaller motes of void, that then home in on nearby targets.
Range: As far as you can throw a grenade
Area: 10 ft radius
Cost: 10 Arcana Points
Proficiency: 110%
Void Rift
Exotic
Create a line on a surface that emits void energy. You can refresh the duration for 1/2 the cost of the spell.
Range: 30 feet
Area: 10 feet long
Duration: 1 minute
Cost: 5 Arcana Points
Proficiency: 41%
Vortex Grenade
Exotic
Throw a ball of void that creates a void well on impact, sucking in nearby foes and damaging them with tendrils of void.
Range: As far as you can throw a grenade
Area: 10 ft radius
Duration: 10 seconds
Cost: 25 Arcana Points
Proficiency: 41%
Entropy Dart
Exotic
Fire a homing dart that inflicts severe Entropy on its target.
Range: 200 ft
Cost: 12.5 Arcana Points
Proficiency: 37%
Mind Scraper
Exotic
Damage an enemy's psyche while also reading their thoughts.
Range: 50 ft
Cost: 10 Arcana Points
Proficiency: 7%
