Underground Jungle
Fuse
Romeo ended up following me to see what I could do to the poor monsters hiding in the underground jungle.
Since this Terraria world was on hardmode though, I knew that there's still a chance that I'd get my ass kicked. The underground jungle was absolutely brutal from what I remember.
Descending down the cave, Romeo made some small talk as he spoke, "You must be quite confident in your capabilities in order to so boldly walk into the underground jungle like this."
I shrugged, agreeing with his assessment, "I am pretty confident in myself, yeah. Have you ever been down here?"
Romeo nodded, "Of course, a traveling merchant such as myself goes wherever there is treasure to be taken!"
Romeo then stared at the walls for a bit, "However… I do believe things have gotten much more dangerous since I've last been here."
I tilted my head, "Oh? How come?"
"I believe the spirits released by the Wall of Flesh upon its defeat by Garbanag has triggered something in this jungle," Romeo stated, "Even now, I feel as if we are in danger…"
I hummed, "How long ago was the Wall of Flesh defeated?"
"Oh, no more than perhaps a few hours ago."
…oh.
I thought it would've been longer ago, but… Huh, when did that happen? During my fight with the Desert Scourge?
Huh, so if Garbanag just entered hardmode, and this is a calamity world… He must be pretty powerful.
At least, for British standards, anyway. I can still win against him if I just get to him fast enough.
The ground rumbled a bit.
"So, those are my enemies?" I rhetorically asked as a massive angry trapper burst through the ground in front of us, along with some skeleton warriors and archers entered the fray from the darkness ahead of us.
A quick observation says that these guys are all around mid C to low B tier enemies, so something just about at my power level.
I took out Roosevelt & Eisenhower, my two swords.
I wanted to try some swordplay, since my mana could use a rest and I don't feel like wasting bullets on trash mobs.
"Well, go on," Romeo encouraged, "Show me a bit of your power."
The angry trapper leaped towards me as I sidestepped the obvious attack and went for the vines.
The angry trapper died after the vines were cut, which was fun to discover because you couldn't do that in the game.
Dodging the 3 flaming arrows, I parried an attack from a warrior and sliced its arms off as I kicked it towards another skeleton warrior.
I tried to slice through its armor, but the armor was a bit too tough for me so I had to back off before the skeleton warrior hit me.
Blegh, I wish I had a bit more strength.
Dodging more arrows, I leapt towards the archers in the back and began cutting them down before they could get enough luck to actually hit me.
Then the sting of a moss hornet hits my back as I turn around to see a cluster of hornets coming my way.
Well, I guess my swords can't really do AoE attacks, I guess I'll have to use my magic after all.
Raising my hands towards them, I tried to create a new soul spell that would hopefully just cut through the mass.
Then, a blade made of souls erupted out of my hand and cut through many of my attackers.
Spell Created.
[Soul Blade - Creates a magical blade that flies through the air to slice your opponents. Costs 5 souls and a bit of mana to use.]
5 souls? Well, I guess since I'm getting weak souls from all of my kills here, that's a fine trade off…
Dodging the ranged attacks of the remaining hornets, I curiously tried to do some sort of laser beam attack to see if I could do it.
Your Control Rank is not high enough to create that spell.
But alas, C tier was not good enough for a big laser beam.
Fighting through the remaining enemies, I finally finished the final hornet as Romeo applauded my performance, "Bravo! Bravo! Yes, you are quite the skilled fighter! Not quite up to Garbanag's level, but still possibly stronger than many of his citizens!"
"Huh?" I confusedly spoke as I asked for elaboration, "What do you mean I'm not up to Garbanag's level?"
There's no way that Garbanag is somehow better than I am right now.
Romeo nodded as he explained, "Well, you see, Garbanag titles himself the 'Harbinger of Destruction,' which is quite the apt title for him. You see, Garbanag brings unfathomable destruction wherever he fights. If we go further down, you'll find the arena where he fought the Queen Bee to be… A mess, to say the least. And though you are strong… You can't really fight the force of nature that is Garbanag."
…There's no way that a guy named Garbanag also calls himself the Harbinger of Destruction. That's literal comedy.
But also, now I'm a bit curious, what does the arena around here look like?
"Do you know where that arena is?" I asked, "I wanna see it for myself."
"Of course, here, follow me." Romeo said as he started to walk in front of me in order to lead me to his destination.
As we walked through the underground jungle, traversing through its broken landscape, I asked Romeo, "So, uh, I can just tell from the area around here that Garbanag has been here, yeah?"
Romeo nodded, "Yes, he plundered the jungle, killed the Queen Bee, and he hasn't come back in a while… Though I do expect him to return somewhat soon."
Hm, the 3 mech bosses, right? That should take a while for Garbanag to do, so it should give him plenty of wiggle room to grow strong enough to take him down before he becomes impossible for me to beat.
…Hm, now that I think of it, are Terrarians gods canonically? Or maybe it's not just the Calamity mod, but also some other mod that gives him godhood?
Because if that's the case… There might be some merit in allowing him to continue growing right now.
Because eventually, he'll cross a line and enter an arena where I excel at.
Though, it might be a bit bold to claim I can kill gods at the level where I'm at, considering I haven't even fought one yet.
But maybe I'll go back to Sumeru and ask to spar with Nahida. Or maybe go find that giant dragon Dori was talking about to see if that counts as a god.
"We're about to see the shattered arena," Romeo announced as we passed another corner, showing me the results of Garbanag's fight.
And what the hell am I looking at?
Is that… The surface?
Wait, there's not even a beehive here anymore, there are just craters!
Garbanag literally destroyed an entire section of the underground jungle to the point where the fucking sun can see what happened, and that was a pre-hardmode fight?!
Romeo hummed as he looked over Garbanag's work, "In a way, it's quite beautiful, isn't it? The way that the destruction panned out."
"I think…" I began as I tried to think of ways to fight against someone who did this, "...I'm going to need a longer training arc to fight him."
Romeo curiously looked at me, "Fight him?" He said, as if I were stupid.
I nodded, "Yeah, fight him."
He gestured to the destruction in front of us.
"Give me a week, and I can beat him." I confidently said.
Garbanag's British, and I'm pretty sure we settled who wins that one in 1776.
And besides, 1812 was basically an American victory anyways.
Then we heard mechanical sounds coming from behind us, as I turned around to see some… Plague chargers.
More calamity monsters, yay. Hopefully it'll just be calamity and not anything else too wild.
I brandished my swords as I prepared to fight some more.
"You're going to keep fighting?" Romeo asked, subtly drawing his own sword just in case, "You're skilled enough to just avoid the enemies."
"I'd like to become stronger in case I meet Garbanag," I answered as I jumped into battle.
Because there's no fucking way I'm going to let some uptight British bastard get the better of me!
Romeo
Watching Fuse tear apart the incoming enemies, he internally lists Fuse as someone that could prove to be a very useful business associate in the coming months.
Perhaps not as much as Garbanag, but still quite useful.
He'll be late in acquiring his materials, but watching this flower bloom was a nice detour.
He watches Fuse summon some sort of electricity monster, which blitzed through many of his opponents.
Additionally, Fuse was mixing in some earth and soul magic with his sword attacks. He's definitely from the same place where Garbanag came from.
In that case… Perhaps he should be ready to sell out either of them in the scenario that Fuse's fighting spirit leads to some other destination other than defeat.
After all, surely he needs some evidence that he's capable of standing up to Garbanag, given that they both saw the results of one of his earlier fights.
Though, he probably won't ask straight up for evidence, he's fine being patient.
It took half a year for Garbanag to kill the Wall of Flesh, so he wonders how fast Fuse could catch up to Garbanag?
Either way, it'll be fun to watch! And there's nothing more profitable than selling to 2 people fighting each other!
Dumpster
Garbanag
God DAMN this food is great! This is definitely the best part about defeating literally any boss!
"You need to stay alive, Gordon! Because you can cook so well!" He complimented, getting a smile in return.
Gordon gave him a thumbs up, "No problem, boss! This is my job, after all!"
He gave him a nod as he went back to eating.
Technically, this is supposed to be a party with all of his town NPCs, and yeah, that is technically happening right now.
But he can always talk to people after he finishes eating, right?
Though, he has to contend with his own thoughts while eating.
Speaking of thoughts…
What the heck was up with the Desert Scourge showing up on his map? During the middle of his Wall of Flesh fight? He did not call for that guy.
And apparently, the Desert Scourge died, which begged the question; who killed it?
Well, it's not like the Desert Scourge was strong or anything, but the simple fact that a boss was killed by anyone but him was kind of baffling.
Well, it could've just been the traveling merchant, that guy gets buffed to the moon whenever he's trying to sell something. Maybe he was just trying to get a good deal off of the worm?
Hm, no, that's stupid.
…Could it have been another gamer like him? That does sound like the most far-fetched but equally plausible outcome.
Still, why the heck would someone be beefing with the Desert Scourge for like 7 minutes? How does it take someone 7 minutes to beat the Desert Scourge?
Well, to be fair, he is an exception. Bosses are apparently a lot harder to fight whenever your arrows don't just delete the landscape.
Ah, well, it's not like whoever took 7 minutes to beat the Desert Scourge has any chance of beating him.
He raised his hand, "Gordon! Gordon! Some extra food over here if you don't mind!"
Underground Jungle
Fuse
Sitting crisscross-applesauce on the branch of a mahogany tree, I allocated my rank points I got from my massacre, and checked my status to see how much stronger I got from that session.
[C-Class Souls] x45
[B-Class Souls] x17
[Souls of light] 15x
Fuse
Status: Healthy
Stamina: Healthy
Mana: Full
Race: Human/Slime Hybrid
Title: Ambitious Regent, Devourer of Souls
Classes: Mercenary, Soul Mage, Geomancer
Professions: Stylist
Ranking Setting: Universal [Change]
Overall Ranking: C+
Power Rank: C+ [Expand]
Magic Rank: C+ [Expand]
Social Rank: C+ [Expand]
Rank Points: 0
Perks: [Expand]
Titles: [Expand]
Classes/Professions: [Expand]
x
Ranks Expanded: (Universal)
Overall Ranking: C+
Power:
Strength: C+
Dexterity: C
Vitality: C+
Endurance: B-
Magic:
Intelligence: B-
Wisdom: C+
Control: C+
Social:
Confidence: C+
Charm: C+
Luck: C+
…So, not much, basically.
I sighed.
At least the souls will help.
California chirped happily, much happier about the situation than I am.
California (Regieleki)
Status: Great
Level 32
Nature: Quirky
Ability: Transistor
Overall Rank: B
Yikes, how is he so strong and he's only at level 32?
I can only imagine the amount of destruction he can cause at level 100, considering he was already killing enemies in here with like, 3 hits max.
Very appreciated, but I can't let my guy surpass me like that.
"Hey, Romeo!" I called out, catching his attention which was fixated on taking some random artifact out of a chest nearby, "You mind taking me to wherever Dumpster is?"
Romeo nodded, "Ah, of course! But I do ask you to not fight Garbanag."
I shrugged as I moved over to him, "We'll see. Anyways, you know where the exit is?"
Romeo nodded, "Yes, I do know my way around here, follow me."
Alrighty, then, it's time to see what the British are capable of…
AN:
Yo it's the 24th, if I keep up this 2K words per chapter thing, I might eventually get those 3 chapters backlogged thing I said I'd try when I first started this fic.
It's also nice to just write without worrying about how I'm going to get even remotely close to 5k words.
Yeah, I think I just hit a new stride with this fic, even if it's going to be shorter in the long run.
Feeling pretty content right now.
(January 1st update: No, I did not write 3 chapters. Chapter 13 is 104 words right now. Luckily for me, I only need to update on the 13th and the 15th this month.)