Going Deep

"So, what's the plan? You open up one of your Barriers and then we clear it?" asked Brun as they left the pet store, looking at John from the corner of her eye.

John answered with a shrug, "Yeah, that was the plan. Except you have better ideas?"

The Valkyrie had to stifle a laugh, "Nah not really, nooothing comes to mind. Nothing at all. But I do want some good adventure, so we'll go with the original plan. I want to see if I can get a Zinogre like you did. Or maybe some other whacky creature or some loot at least. Seriously, your powers are so cool, it's like you're a walking talking RPG!" Yeah, John could imagine what Brun thought about. It also made him grin with all the praise he had gotten for his powers.

"Now then, where should we do this? I guess we should find a spot where no one would think it's suspicious to disappear into. I guess I don't need a lot of space for it," pondered John, not really sure where they would go.

"If that's the case then we can just go into the back alley behind the store. Noone ever goes there because the back door is busted and bolted shut anyway. So no one should notice us back there." Something about that didn't feel right to John but he decided to listen to the Valkyrie (was Astrid technically a Valkyrie as well?) and he lead the group back there.

It looked like Brun was right about it not being used, seeing as how nothing was back here. No trash cans, no old boxes, no hobo, nothing! It was a pretty optimal spot to go into a Barrier. Before they did that though, John had to do some housekeeping. Opening his sheet, John navigated to his recently discovered party screen and started to add both of the girls to his party. As he selected their names, respective pop-ups appeared in front of both of them. "Wh-what's this?" asked Astrid, confusion clear on her face.

"That's my party. If we go by usual logic in a video game it means that we will share experience, loot, and can work together better. I went into a Barrier with another girl in my free period today and she couldn't see any of the loot that dropped from the mobs. I want to see if you get your own loot now if we are in a party together," answered John as he went through his inventory.

"You're a living MMO, aren't you? But alright, this should make things easier, I guess," was Brun's response before she hit Accept on her prompt, adding her to John's interface. He could now permanently see her life bar and mana bar above her head. A second later the same bars appeared over Astrid as she too accepted the party invite.

"Can you guys see the bars as well?" asked John, to which both girls nodded. Brun had some things to get off her chest though,

"Seriously though, how the hell are you level 27? I think John was punking me when he said you were that powerful, but seeing as how I'm seeing it myself now I guess it's true... What happened to you?"

"I'm just as surprised about it as you are... I have no idea what happened, I don't even know why John's power deems me this powerful... I guess we'll find out in the Barrier?" was Astrid's meek answer.

Speaking of Barrier, John was already doing what he could to put up a Barrier, thinking about if he should use something to create a more specific Barrier or if he should leave that one to the roll of the dice. He was pretty sure he could use the Scrap Metal and Electronics to get something, but he was not sure about the Essences. Could he use them to create a Barrier? He didn't really want to try it though, seeing as how they were still rather valuable resources he could use... In the end, he decided to use one piece of Scrap Metal as an item to specify the scenery.

Keeping everything else at default settings except for the spatial dilation, he hit Finish as the world around them started to disappear. Both of the girls looked around them with awe on their faces as they were engulfed by the darkness. To John, this was now the third time he saw it and it wasn't that much of a thrill anymore. For him, the interesting part was what came next.

Like the last two times, they were engulfed in a blinding light, forcing them to close their eyes. As the light diminished, John was the first to open his eyes again, eager to see what his powers created this time.

What he saw both surprised him and didn't surprise him. They were standing in another back alley, looking pretty much like the one they were standing in before, but something was different. It looked a lot cleaner, the air was purer, and way above them spanned a deep blue darkness, held back by a gigantic sphere of glass and metal. Whereas the back alley looked way too clean, the dome was rusty, the glass was splintered in places and overall didn't look like it would hold long.

Type: Hostile
Level: 7
Mode: Annihilation
Special Modifier: Time Limit (Doom)
Enemy Type: Automatons
Scenery: Aquatic Biosphere
Difficulty: 75%
Objective: Inside the Barrier are 200 weak enemies. Kill them all to spawn the Boss. Total time limit until the Barrier will be deleted: 30 minutes. Minimap enabled.
Bonus Objectives:
Kill the Boss in 50% of the time
Reward: 2x Boss Drop
Have 60% of total kills
Reward: 2x EXP
Time will start once one party member leaves the threshold of the alley
Good Luck!

'Two hundred enemies?!?' was John's single thought. He looked into the faces of both Brun and Astrid as they looked over their own pop-ups. Brunhilde had a wide grin on her face as she read over the message, whereas Astrid had a look of pure terror on her face... This was certainly not the best Barrier to bring her along to... he had hoped this would be like the barrier he went into with Kim, where Astrid could properly support them... but this was more likely going to end up with them splitting up to get the enemies hunted down...

First things first, John had some things to prepare while they were in the Barrier! "Okay, give me some time to prepare some more stuff. I think you also need some kind of weapon, Astrid. If you want, I can make you something but I need to know what you want. Think about it while I'm busy with some other stuff."

While he looked at Astrid, John could see how a soft light enveloped Brunhilde, probably materializing her armor.

Giving the girl some privacy, John turned around and put down the remnants of Gary onto the floor while he casted Craft on it.

Additional Materials required!
1x Scrap Metal
1x Scrap Electronics

Continue? (Y/N)

Hitting yes, the pile seemed to grow and then reconstruct itself into a shape, specifically the shape of the dog-sized mecha-spider that was Gary. As soon as the reconstructing was done, the spider came to life and immediately jumped into the lap of the sitting John, happily pushing itself into the hand of his new re-creator, looking for some scratches. Chuckling, John gave the spider what it wanted and was rewarded with a low clicking of its metallic mandibles.

Picking up the little guy in his arms he turned around again and watched how both of them reacted. Astrid's eyes quickly grew as she walked closer to John to look at the 'pet' in his arms, "Oh my gosh, it's so cute!" Gary seemed to reply happily to the admiration of the girl as he wiggled himself out of John's arms and crawled onto the girl, tickling her in the process.

Brun meanwhile, in her battle armor by now, burst out laughing, "Dude, seriously? A spider the size of a dog? What is it supposed to do? Make its enemies squeal to ****?" As if to respond to the insult, Gary quickly shot a small blob of silk at the Valkyrie, hitting her in the face and covering her face in web.

This in turn made John and Astrid burst out laughing, seeing her struggle with the web in her face and spitting out small pieces of web.

"Oh ha ha ha, very funny. Okay, if you think that little guy is going to help you that much, let's see which one of us can kill more of the enemies around. How about it?"

Party Challenge issued!
Kill the most enemies!
Reward:
+200 XP
+50% of the Drops of the losers (Materials, Cash)