The Demonic Games (Disgardium Book #7): LitRPG Series, Dan Sugralinov [the read aloud family TXT] 📗

floor is approximately twenty yards in height. You can go down a spiral staircase all the way to the bottom of the Pitfall if you so desire — there are no mobs on the stairs. The entryway to each floor is blocked by gates protected by a boss sealed within them. As a rule, the boss is of the same kind as the mobs that inhabit that level, but is far stronger than they. Bear in mind that the boss always aggros on the one who removes the seal.”

“Let’s mob them all together!” someone shouted.

Octius shook his head.

“Not so fast. Don’t forget, the boss scales depending on number of opponents. With diminishing returns, however.”

“What does that mean in human speak?” someone shouted.

Octius smirked. “One on one with the boss — its strength is equal to X. If two attack the same boss, his strength will be X times two. But if four attack, that number won’t be doubled, but will be somewhere around X times three point nine. And so on.”

“Now I get it, thanks,” the same man mumbled. “I need a calculator and a shot of dwarven whiskey for this!”

“Just keep in mind that reasonable teamplay will make the bosses easier.”

“What do you mean ‘reasonable’?” Anna asked.

“The passageway into the dungeon narrows beyond the gates. And the deeper you go, the narrower it gets. For level one, for example, I would recommend no more than a hundred people. And for level three hundred — a maximum of forty. And only in a balanced group.”

“Hey!” a dark-skinned orc next to me suddenly growled. “I like these new rules! Now we don’t have to complete every level, right? We can go straight to level 10, say?”

“That I don’t recommend, unless you’re wanting to get out of here soon,” the gamesmaster replied. “Remember, the mobs don’t respawn. If you don’t get experience from mobs at your own level, you’ll be sorry; you need to equip yourself from nothing, and it’s easier to beat gear out of opponents your own size. In addition, the demons’ strength leaps up every ten levels…”

Octius spent more time talking about the bosses, then reminded us of the grand prize: not only Concentrated Life Essence, but also the lifelong Demon Fighter perk. The losers would be afflicted with the Hell’s Curse debuff — 1% of the health of each is given to the champion. In addition, he mentioned two ways to win the Games: as part of a raid group that defeats the final boss, or as the sole survivor by the end of the Games. Nobody had yet accomplished the former.

“And one last surprise for the newcomers. In the Cursed Chasm, the pain is real! There are no pain filters at all, so keep that in mind.”

An unhappy murmur spread through the onlookers, but Octius ignored it and raised his voice:

“On that note, the briefing is ended. Let the Demonic Games begin!”

And we were taken to an area out of time. We all found ourselves in a forest glade surrounded by burnt tree trunks. The interface didn’t show up in this strange place. I quickly looked myself over and swore under my breath — the Cursed Cripple debuff was active.

A tall and stately elf stood before us — Eynyon, king of the elves.

“The stars shine on the hour of our meeting, brave ones! You have the hearts of lions! With pain in my heart and hope in my soul, I open the way to the Cursed Chasm!”

He spread his arms wide, clapped and pointed to a portal burning amid the trees.

“I wish you fair wind and good hunting! And may the leaves of your trees of life never yellow!”

The contestants exchanged glances and started running through the portal one after another.

Chapter 5. A Herald Summoned

I WAS THE LAST to pass through the burning portal despite my best efforts. The curse of worst player began its work in the elvish glade: my knees bent, my legs failed beneath me, my arms weakened.

Things looked bleak; prizes were given to the worst player every day, and even Trixie could have figured out that the ‘lucky’ recipient of all those rewards would be Scyth. I had to somehow fundamentally change the strategies I’d worked out, although a lot would depend on which abilities I was left with.

Dragging myself through the reddish-black veil, I fell into a space between worlds, hung suspended in the great nothing. Fiery text appeared out of thin air:

Summoned one!

 

You have been incarnated in the Cursed Chasm with the following characteristics:

 

Scyth, level 1 Summoned Herald

 

Main characteristics:

 

Strength: 3.

 

Perception: 6.

 

Endurance: 5.

 

Charisma: 4.

 

Intellect: 6.

 

Agility: 7.

 

Luck: 51.

 

Not counting the heavy skew toward luck, the situation was awful. My training with Hairo and Roj hadn’t helped — you can’t become an athlete in just a few days. What about the rest?

Secondary characteristics:

 

Health: 65.

 

Mana: 78.

 

Spirit: 100.

 

Defense: 1.5.

 

Health restoration rate: 5 per minute.

 

Mana restoration rate: 6 per minute.

 

Spirit restoration rate: 1 per second.

 

Base damage: 6.

 

Spell strength bonus: 6%.

 

Movement speed bonus: 7%.

 

Dodge bonus: 3.5%.

 

Carrying capacity: 70 pounds.

 

Merchant discount: 4%.

 

Critical hit chance: 7%.

 

Skills and abilities:

 

You have forgotten all your skills and abilities. Use a Memory Scroll to recall them. Your character’s death will also return the memories of your lost skills.

 

Judging by my pathetic spirit restoration rate, my beast protector the owl was cut off from the Cursed Chasm. Shame.

A mechanical voice spoke in my head, explaining the numbers:

“These values have been calculated based on the average metrics of all contestants, where the number ‘5’ indicates the average. The stats