The Gene of the Ancients (Rogue Merchant Book #2): LitRPG Series by Roman Prokofiev (top books to read TXT) 📕

The Dome, idiots, turn on the Dome — they’re going to break into your fort, flashed in Borland’s mind. Or was the command room of the Magic Shield empty? How lax...

Inside, between the unprotected walls, the ground swelled up in a dozen bubbles. Strange creatures climbed out of them, hurling around lumps of dirt. They resembled dead trees, animated by magic and had thick warped wooden branches for arms and roots for legs. Those were elder treants, the advanced version of a common treant: apparently, PROJECT had a druid capable of casting a powerful summoning spell. Cries of horror came out of the fortress, and at last, a Dome shot up. Yet it was far too late, as fighting had already spilled inside, and elder treants flung the enemy players like balls, crushing them against walls and towers.

Keith grit his teeth. Carebears would be of no help to him; half of them were already dead, and the others were locked inside the fort by the summoning. The PROJECT raid engulfed the slowly rising astral ship, focusing their fire upon it. Colossal spectral swords started hitting the Dome one after another, removing at least five percent of its hit points each: Keith’s enemies had either good mages or powerful scrolls. Slowly but surely, the defenses gave way.

To turn on its spelljumper and escape via its own Astral Portal, a nave needed to gain the maximum altitude. Octopus increased the output of engine elementals to the max; roaring wind almost burst up the sails, but boosting the overtonnaged vessel quickly was all but impossible.

“Fire!” Borland growled. “Shoot them down!”

And the NPC gunners, bent down to the scopes of four ballistae installed on rotating platforms, opened fire. Some of them even managed to shoot someone down, but the actively maneuvering PROJECT raid, mounted atop birdies, was protected by Swirling Shields, and clung to the nave like a tail.

Resigned, Keith extracted a scroll of Great Web out of its case. The purple outline of an epic spell flashed before his eyes. He kept it as a last resort — the mage who had sold him the scroll had assured him that the Web could slow down anyone and anything.

The main thing was to have enough mana to cast it. With his teeth, Borland pulled out the plug of an ellurite potion and swallowed it down in one gulp. The magic elixir worked immediately, increasing maximum mana by 500, but it came at a cost. Addiction kicked in, triggering impaired coordination and a thirty-percent loss of resistances and physical defense. Well, nothing in life ever came free.

The Web hit the area of effect, ensnaring his opponents in a myriad of sticky threads. Stuck in a misty haze, they moved only at ten percent of their speed. The birdies flapped their wings, but could barely advance, trapped in the spectral tethers.

Yet in less than thirty seconds, they regained their speed. The spell was down, thanks to PROJECT’s savvy black healer, who had the perfect timing with their Great Cleansing. That hex was able to remove all buffs and debuffs from everyone around the caster, as Keith’s enemies had decided that losing their buffs was worth catching up to the vessel.

Still, he was hoping to get away. They didn’t have harpoon guns and their DPS wasn’t enough to quickly break through the nave’s solid shield. Slowly but steadily, the Crabstrocity ascended.

* * *

Hashem: The summons are about to take the fort!

Tao: Quiet. Ruth, how many scrolls of Swords do we have left?

Ruth: Five. We used up seven.

Tao: We can’t get to it. We need more DPS. Svoy, get down, summon Dorten!

Svoy: How?! We need a sacrifice!

Tao: Kill anyone around you.

Svoy: One of ours? A sacrifice drains a random attribute!

Tao: He’s escaping. We. Need. DPS.

Svoy: Got it.

Seeker: Why me?! Well thank you guys so much!

Seeker is banned from speaking on the channel.

Tao: Come on. Come on! Come on, you bitches!

* * *

Fly, you fools! His legs spread wide, his hands firm on the steering wheel, Keith was raising the Crabstrocity higher and higher. The spelljumper icon was going to light up any minute, and he had forty percent of the shield left. He will escape, just as he always has, goddammit, or he’s not Keith the Octopus!

A sudden blow shook down the nave’s hull, throwing it off its course. In an instant, the Dome’s hit points were down by a half and started to drop at an alarming speed. Borland looked back. A greenish thread of necrotic energy was tying the vessel to a giant figure in a ghastly jade aura that had just appeared on the ground. It was a deity or their projection, the captain realized. The tricks of true priests. A shiver ran down his spine. Seventeen percent of the Dome left, sixteen...

“Astr, heat up the shields! Heat up the engines! HEAT UP EVERYTHING!” Keith yelled to his engineer in the reactor room. The elementals were already halfway burned, but he had nothing to lose. They needed to save their souls.

The ugly figure below — it looked kinda like a gigantic warrior in spiked armor, green light emanating from its slits — swung its monstrous jagged axe, and another necrotic thread hit the nave’s stern, shaking it and knocking down everyone on the deck. Six percent of Dome...

Keith realized he had no chance of escaping. Summoning up his courage, he decided to use his last opportunity and contact the enemies. If they were true PvP lovers, they had to have a code of honor of some sort. And according to it...

* * *

Tentacle: Tao, are you reading what this carebear’s writing in the general chat? A ransom?

Tao: Stop DPS! I do. He wants to