Dungeons and Dalliances

4.04 – Juggernaut

Skill progression wrapped up, with Natalie not having enough points to funnel into another advancement. Following that, Natalie set out for the armory with Jordan to test out her new abilities. First and foremost, she needed to find a new weapon. [Bigger Is Better] was clearly urging her toward a style that utilized oversized weapons, and Natalie was happy to follow down that path. Her shield and hammer had been reliable, but nothing inspiring, either.

“So what are you thinking?” Jordan asked. “Warhammer? Great axe? Two-handed sword?”

“With the strength bonuses, I’m honestly thinking warhammer.” Her thoughts flicked to Otto, wearing his heavy platemail. “It’ll be good against armor. Plus we have that hammer drop from earlier, so I’ll be able to equip myself right away.”

“Figured,” Jordan said.

The two of them looked around the armory. As expected of an institution like Tenet, all weapons were accounted for, every shape, size, and type a person could imagine. Even she couldn’t name some of them, and Natalie was a person who’d grown up learning the ins and outs of combat.

Finding the appropriate section where ridiculously sized weapons were stored, she perused her options. Giant polearms, swords, axes, and every other sort lined the racks in rows, or hung on display.

Some were ridiculously oversized. Bigger by a significant margin to the unwieldy warhammer they’d found down in the dungeon. Natalie saw how Jordan’s attention fell to those, and she turned to Natalie and quirked an eyebrow.

“Well,” she said. “Let’s start big?” She gestured to the largest warhammer of the set—one that was easily twice her height and had a hammer head the size of half her body.

“There’s a point where it becomes physically unreasonable,” Natalie said, amused. She approached the weapon nonetheless. “This thing would not work well in hallways.”

She gripped the weapon’s haft, then grunted as she dislodged it from its resting place. Even with her recently boosted stats, easily doubling her strength when combining [Juggernaut] and her passive level boosts, the weapon was a nightmare. With a block of metal the size of her chest for its head, that was completely understandable. Jordan whistled, impressed that Natalie could hold the thing at all.

“Yeah,” Natalie said, muscles straining to hold the thing. “This’s probably meant for some of the upperclassmen.”

“You don’t say,” Jordan replied dryly. She eyed the bulky thing with an appreciative look. “Probably where you’re headed, though, long term. Imagine swinging that thing around. Pretty sure you’d pulverize even bosses.”

With some difficulty, she placed the weapon back. She picked a more level-appropriate warhammer. Still as tall as she was, and with an impressive block of metal for its head too, the weapon would be devastating in its own right. This one had a pointed end, intended to further help dig into metal.

No longer handling something ridiculously oversized, the giant warhammer felt much more comfortable in her hands. She gave it a few test swings, then rested it on her shoulder.

“Yeah,” Natalie said. “I could work with this.”

Just the day before, that certainly wouldn’t have been true. But her strength boost with [Juggernaut], and explicit bonus with [Bigger Is Better], made the weapon more than maneuverable—if admittedly less so than her previous shield-and-hammer set up. But when accounting for her level up, new weapon, and offense-oriented skills, her offensive capabilities had probably tripled at a minimum, and without her defenses taking too massive of a hit either. A solid smack with this thing would crack a good portion of her opponent’s HP, if not outright break it. The problem, of course, would be actually getting a good smack in; maneuverability would be difficult. Even glancing blows would be devastating, though.

But against other heavily armored opponents, that wouldn’t be as much of an issue. Natalie might have become a tank killer. She suspected her fight against Otto would go a vastly different route, this time.

Or, maybe. Natalie begrudgingly would admit he was one of the top freshmen tanks of Tenet, which meant he was one of the top talents in the world. Natalie had a competitive streak, but she recognized from a practical standpoint that losing to him said nothing about her personal skill—besides that she wasn’t one of the best in the world herself. And only as it stood. Plus, he probably had a level on her during their fight. Regardless, there was no shame in losing to world-class talent. Or so she told herself; rationality and emotions didn’t always play nice with each other.

“Let’s give it a test run,” Jordan said. “Your biggest problem will be with slippery targets, so I’m the ideal person to practice with. We’ll see if you need something lighter.”

Natalie nodded. All classes and fighting styles came with upsides and downsides, and where this weapon would excel against a heavily armored tank, or any other class not skilled at getting out of the way, someone like Jordan or Sofia would fare much better.

That said, if Natalie even caught a glancing blow on a rogue or lightweight fighter, she might win the fight outright. All it would take was a smart piece of misdirection, or somehow handling the fight to force an undodgable attack. Not easy, but not impossible.

And misdirection? Tricking an opponent for one devastating, fight-winning strike? Well, [Illusion] sounded quite useful there. There might be more coherence behind her class than she’d first thought.

She and Jordan headed for a practice room. They had a short amount of time to get a few spars in and for Natalie to familiarize herself to her new weapon before real combat classes began.

For the next while, she and Jordan sparred. As Natalie expected, the encounter was a clear demonstration of her biggest weakness—an inability to land clean strikes on a slippery target. That said, Natalie quickly picked up how to handle the warhammer, using her momentum to always be in motion and advancing on Jordan. Jordan’s strength wasn’t in a one-on-one either; she did best attacking from flanks, with her opponent focused on someone else.

She tested her illusions, trying exactly what she’d figured would be effective earlier—tricking her opponent into dodging one way, then landing a devastating blow. But Jordan knew to watch for her illusions, and so fared better than a dungeon monster or even another sparring opponent would.

The fight didn’t end with a clear winner or loser, since that wasn’t what the spars had been intended to be—they were just testing out Natalie’s new style.

That said, for these upcoming fights in today’s combat classes, she intended to be a lot more competitive. Her empowered stats were immediately noticeable, and she felt the improved power, speed, and constitution surging underneath her skin.

“And that’s before [Juggernaut] boosts your gear,” Jordan said. “You’ll be even more of a monster in the dungeon. Especially as we get stronger items.”

Natalie nodded in agreement. “It’s a shame we can’t use gear in spars.” For some other competitions and situations they could, but not everyday spars. The reasoning as far as Natalie understood it was to test their ‘base strength’, but certain abilities, like this recent strength boosting one of hers, did get overlooked in that case. But there were no perfect solutions, so Natalie understood.

With early morning self-training wrapping up, she and Jordan headed to class. Natalie found herself more excited than she had been in some time. She wanted to test herself in earnest against whoever their opponents were today.