Chapter 203

Rosalie furrowed her brow as she looked down at the hollow cube item. Zoey found herself similarly perplexed. “Reduce divine influence? Does that mean it’d make our shards ... normal?”

Because there was only a single divine influence changing how these dungeons worked, to Zoey’s knowledge. Ephy’s. Her patron’s.

“That seems to be the reasonable assumption,” Rosalie said. “But how does one ‘fill it with energy’?”

“And why would we want to make shards more normal?” Delta asked. “It’s a good thing that they’re this way.”

Rosalie gave an exasperated look to the foxgirl.

“No, seriously,” Delta said. “I’m not just saying that. If we ‘stabilized the shard’, then we won’t get any of the crazy loot, either. And Zoey’s class wouldn’t work with it. Right?”

“Most of it would,” Zoey disagreed. There’s nothing making any of my skills ineffective inside a normal shard.” She shrugged. “It’s just that I can help more with add-ons like, uh, the ones in this fight, than a typical boss.” As it stood, Zoey was better at fucking than fighting, at least for now.

“I guess that’s true,” Delta said. “But still. The loot wouldn’t be as good.”

“We don’t know that for certain. Just that it wouldn’t be as weird,” Rosalie said. “And only probably. Besides, I wouldn’t mind some functional loot. Real weapons and armor.”

“We get those sometimes.”

“Sometimes.” Rosalie frowned. “Then again, at a minimum, Zoey’s runes won’t progress as fast without those types of encounters.”

“I don’t think it’d be a bad thing to do some regular shards, here and there,” Zoey said, taking a stance that surprised Rosalie and Delta. “This one was more normal than most, but I’d still like to try a real shard. One where we could bring in a full set of armor, a weapon, and potions.” Since the shard usually stripped them naked. “You know, try to complete it the old-fashioned way.” With no body-suits, fuckable add-ons, wall-pussies, molesting vines, or other shenanigans going on. Not that Zoey had any major problems with any of that, necessarily. “Just, I don’t think it’s a bad idea to focus more on actual combat skills, here and there.” Especially with the looming threat of ‘the end of the world’. Zoey wanted to be as well-rounded of a wayfarer as possible. She didn’t have the greatest idea of what those threats entailed, but seeing how the class Ephy had granted her had plenty of combat functionality, Zoey could infer she would need a diverse skill set.

“It’s never a bad thing to have options,” Maddy chimed in. “We get to pick when we use it.”

“True,” Delta said. “Still. I’m surprised we got something like that.” She frowned. “And I figured Zoey’s influence is mostly a good thing, not bad.”

“We’ll look more into how it works,” Rosalie said. “Something this strange, we’ll want thoroughly investigated by an inspector, anyway. It might have hidden effects.”

“I’d bet my ass it does,” Delta said, snorting.

“Maybe it can act as a de-stabilizer too,” Zoey suggested. “If we wanted things to get even less normal.”

Delta blinked, then perked up, her ears twitching in excitement. “Now that would be something.”

“Hm,” was all Rosalie had to say on the subject. She tucked the item away into her inventory, then reached into the sarcophagus to draw their next reward out.

Emerging from the inky black portal came...

A pot?

A small black cauldron with two sturdy handles on either side. It was surprisingly mundane-looking. Zoey knew not to trust that impression outright. With interest, she inspected the item.

Item Smelter: Melt magical items down into their most fundamental form, producing a potent reagent for permanent stat boosting potions.

“Permanent?” Zoey said, her attention latching to that word instantly. “As in, lasts forever?”

“That is what permanent means,” Delta said, though she studied the small cauldron with a curious look, obviously understanding Zoey’s point—she was surprised by the immense potential. “I bet there’s a trick to it. Or some downside. Because that’s way too strong for a third-advancement item.”

“Plenty of Zoey’s class is ‘way too strong’,” Rosalie pointed out.

“Mostly the sex items. Not something like this. As in, normal.”

Rosalie grunted in agreement.

“Though, if if it is one of her items,” Delta said, “maybe only lewd artifacts will have a strong effect, when melted? The ones that come from her class? Because there’s no way we can go buy a bunch of junk and turn it into infinite stats.”

Rosalie considered that theory. “It’s a plausible interpretation.”

“And we are collecting a bit too many of those to make use of,” Delta said. “All the rings, piercings, body-writing ink, cat ears, buttplugs—it’d be ridiculous to try to use it all, even if the shard didn’t pick and choose what we can bring in.”

“So we can melt down everything but our best,” Zoey said in realization. “And still benefit from them.”

“It specifically says it turns items into a ‘potion reagent’, too,” Rosalie said. “Who wants to bet catalyzing a permanent stat potion will be absurdly difficult?”