Return to Jorgaldur Volume I: the battle mage

Leveling party

He took off his clothes and dried himself with a towel that Lidia had bought him, remembering for a moment her and Líodon, and deciding that it was better not to tell them that he had ended up soaked. When he put his clothes back on, they were already dry, as they had gone through the inventory.

He took out the lamp, and walked after it carefully, for the stone floor was also wet and slippery. He wouldn't tell them about his spectacular fall to the floor either.

He remembered that, in the game, that tunnel led to a huge plain crossed by multiple water channels. From these, monsters similar to a meter high turtles were continually emerging, and that these monsters which were resistant to physical and magical attacks, except fire. Being very slow, anyone with fire attacks on their hands could easily kill them. And, if they didn't have them, they could use flammable potions, which used to not be excessively expensive in the game.

It was a leveling paradise, although only for a few levels, because that strange turtles were all level 50. The only danger was to be over-confident and let them get too close, because their jaws could even break weapons at the same level.

And it was as he remembered, so the tunnel ended where the plain began, a plain whose extent couldn't be seen with only the light from the lamp. He had to leap about two meters to go down, which was enough to prevent the monsters from leaving.

"This has to be a joke!" exclaimed Eldi.

In all the extension illuminated by the lamp, the floor was covered with those turtles, totally motionless. Wherever he looked, there were only turtles. Apparently, the years without anyone entering there had led to that absurd situation.

It took him a few seconds to recover from the shock, and the first thing he did was to take out two mana stones, as one of them was already half full. Then, he spent a couple of minutes deciding the best course of action, regretting not having the mage's power to calcine large areas.

Unfortunately, he couldn't cast Burning Walls and incinerate them, since it is necessary that the space to place them is empty, So, he decided to try Burning Blast from his elevated position.

The turtles didn't move, but he could see how the closest ones had been damaged. So, from the security of his position, he cast ten Blasts, ending with the nearest three, which disappeared. It wasn't much, but he had got a little hole between them, although he decided not to attack anymore. He sat down, watching the turtles and recovering mana, since Blasts need a lot of it, having spent more than half from his reserve. And he had raised the spell level to 5.

Once he recovered his mana, he used Ambient Light and put away the lamp, waiting again to recover what he had just spent. Now, he could see farther, but he only managed to discover more turtles

None of those monsters even flinched until Eldi jumped down. Before doing so, he had put two Burning Walls, one on his back and one on his side. He wielded the hammer as soon as he reached the ground, and immediately a kind of murmur spread throughout the area, the sound of the turtles' awakening. They took the head out of their shell, showing their black eyes and dangerous jaws.

The ones that were closest began to move towards Eldi, while those at the back immediately occupied the unoccupied space, advancing just behind their predecessors. They were indifferent to the Burning Walls, they just followed their instinct to move towards a being that was alive.

With Propel, Eldi sent the turtles in front of him several meters away, leaving them on top of their peers, and barely hurting them. His goal was to gain space while watching those who were slowly crossing the Burning Walls. When he got a margin of a few meters, he created new Burning Walls, and kept watching the ones that were approaching.

The first ones didn't take long to die from the effect of the Burning Walls through which they were going little by little, burning continuously. He used Burning Blast a couple of times, as he intended to level it up, casting it when his mana was high. And he checked with his other weapons that, as in the game, they hardly hurt the turtles.

He made some unsuccessful experiments with his spells and skills, since he couldn't scare the turtles, they received little physical, ice or electrical damage, and a hole only could accomplish to make some fall in, and others walk over them.

When the first Burning Walls exhausted their power and disappeared, Eldi again used Propel with the hammer to create more space, and placed others a little further. Little by little, the area that he dominated was increasing, which meant that he needed more Burning Walls, and that more of those monsters were incinerated at the same time, gaining more experience and greater stress.

In the end, he decided to limit his area of ​​influence, because he also wanted to take advantage to level up as many spells and skills as he could. When he went to rest and jumped the slope, the turtles stopped and hid their bodies. In fact, when he returned the next day, they had advanced barely a few centimeters, something he was unable to appreciate.

He had leveled up to 50, unlocking the Fast Steps and Knee skill. The first is the last of the unarmed fighting skills, and allows you to quickly dodge your opponent's attacks, and, like the others, he had it at 10. The second reinforces the knee to attack with it, and can be used while carrying weapons. It confuses the opponent for a few seconds, causing him not to be able to use spells or skills. It was at 4, as it isn't easy to hit the opponent with it, and, therefore, to level it up.

Regarding spells, he now had Magnetize and Cure Poison available. The first was Goldmi's favorite spell. You need to have physical contact with the objective to apply it, after which the projectiles will go towards it even when it moves. They can hit even when it is hidden behind a wall, as long as the curve in their trajectory wouldn't be too pronounced. Of course, he had it at 10.

The effect of the second is exactly what the name indicates, and it was one of the spell that he wanted to unblock the most, because it could save his life without needing to depend on potions. It was at 7, since he hadn't been poisoned enough times, and hadn't bothered to force its leveling.