Dual and even tri affinities are unique in that they are a different magical alignment but built off a primary magical affinity. If you had darkness and shadow on Hortus, you would have the cold fire affinity, which would create an endothermic reaction, resulting in a freezing action instead of burning. The unique aspect is that your affinity to cold fire cannot be greater than your affinity to fire or shadow. Affinity is one of the building blocks of a large genealogy of magical systems, so growing your affinity is incredibly important.

  So how do you increase this affinity? Some try to surround themselves with the element in question, while others try to study it in libraries. Both are valid ways that yield results.

  What we have found is most important is that the soul must understand. Knowledge of reality helps the soul grasp its conceptual components, while exposing oneself to an element will allow the body to learn the element. It is similar to how some learn better by reading, some by watching, and others through diagrams. They all teach the same thing, but learning how you internalize it is the most important.

  -Lecture on affinity magic systems and how to increase affinity

  Peering into the dark depths of the tunnels, I realize it's different from when the floor fell below me.

  “You never did mention what kind of dungeon creatures we might find below,” Frank probes.

  I shrug, “I‘m not sure. The last time the floor broke, the boss just appeared. There is nothing between.”

  I feel knowledge trickling in the back of my brain from the stolen memories. The dungeons are like living pocket dimensions that slowly spread deeper. The bosses act as anchor points for new growth. Sometimes, there will be very few mobs between bosses when a particular development is new.

  The fact that it broke, revealing the new boss instead of a walkway or tunnel, reveals just how new the growth is. Over the next couple of years, the dungeon would create winding tunnels and mobs between the boss areas. It meant we likely would not face many mobs, but it did make me nervous fighting underground.

  “I will go first,” Knight Johnson stated. He moves to the tunnel entrance. The tunnel looks big enough for a car to enter. I follow closely behind him. Behind me, the Ashmores create flames that cast our flickering shadows on the walls as they light up the tunnel. It curls around into the familiar cavern entrance with an underground pool. I look at the surface, which looks almost like a mirror; it’s so still.

  “Wait!” I call ahead, but I’m a few moments too late. I wanted to prepare more, but the Ashmores enter the boss’s zone. I feel the cave shake with its arrival. In the middle of the lake, ripples form as a flower emerges from the water. Fortunately, this time my mana is topped off. I begin to run through the water as I create Ice shards. I swirl the shards under the surface, building momentum.

  In the center of the cave, the petals unfurl to the familiar humanoid wooden figure of the boss. It roars and roots from the ceiling start to whip at us.

  “Burn the roots, I will take care of the boss.” As soon as the words leave my mouth, plumes of flame travel across the surface of the cave, scouring the living roots. Unfortunately, they also blind me. I trip, running into a wall, and fall into the water.

  By the time I get back up, I see the boss with a spear in its hand, aiming at the rest of the team. I cry out and let forth a burst of telekinetic power without thinking. The spear sails wide of its target, and the boss turns to me as more root spears come up from the water.

  I curse as I move out of the way and summon my shadow armor. The boss aims three spears at me as I push the ice shards to start cutting into its trunk. The first attack misses, but the next two projectiles are stopped by my armor. They still nick me, but it is a light scratch that I’m happy to let my natural regeneration take care of, and not a hole in my chest.

  The fight is much tougher without a large column of ice prepared to sneak attack the boss. When the shards of ice start to cut into its root like a grinder, the boss tries to summon its shield to block or bash them. It succeeds at mitigating my attack. Unfortunately for it, summoning more is a trivial task. With my healing and blood spell forms, I’m confident I can win any contest of endurance. Eventually, the boss loses patience and goes into its second stage.

  It grows from the ground and slams down around itself to destroy the ice shards in the water. Once it accomplishes its goal, it rushes forward, striking out at me like a snake. I move to the side to dodge the attack. With my magical sandals and my power over water, I’m propelled forward. I’m able to dodge the attack with ease.

  I dodge as I feel more than hear it crash into the wall behind me and get a brief smell of the toxic spores it releases before I’m out of its range. The fight is harder this time as I need a critical mass of ice shards to form the blender that is so effective. Each ice shard does an almost negligible amount of damage as it shatters easily on the wooden thorns.

  As we continue our game of cat and mouse, I try to think of what else I can do. I grasp on one of my training stones to create two blades, one of shadow and one of ice. I want to try these weapons out. The next time the boss charges at me, I turn back around and slice at the stalk with my swords. I find the ice sword slices much cleaner and deeper into the stalk, but it is brittle and shatters as soon as I’m a few inches in. The shadow sword has a much duller edge but is more flexible, and because of its slightly intangible nature, it doesn’t become stuck.

  I feel like there’s something there I can use. If I could create a combination of my powers into a weapon, maybe I could bring in the benefits of the elements. The flexibility of the shadow element with the sharp edge of the ice element. I haven’t tried force out either. I’m a little apprehensive about creating a telekinetic sword. The amount of mana to do any telekinesis is considerable. Pushing that into a weapon form and keeping it stable could outpace even my mana regeneration.

  I try to put some concentrated mind affinity mana into the spell form and notice a hole in the blade where I add the magic. I will need to do more experimentation and figure out which parts of the spell forms create which parts of the sword.

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  As I’m about to form a second blade and start swinging, the stalk lunges forward towards me. The force of the blow knocks me back. The boss is in an awkward position to strike at me, but punching out with the side of the stalk, it hits me. With the large thorns, it would’ve been devastating, but the shadow armor negates most of the attack. I still have a cut on my shoulder, but it is shallow.

  Interestingly, the attack meant that it took longer for the boss to recover from the lunge and prepare for a new one. It has to stretch back out before pulling itself up. That gave me another idea. As it rises to its full height, it looks down imperiously at me before lunging forward in a falling charger. I smile, moving aside. At the last moment, thin shards breach the surface. The boss cries out in pain as it slams down on the sharp points of ice. I had laid a trap, creating ice shards facing up and channeling to grow them.

  Up to this point, I have created smaller ones since they were fast and easy. Larger ice shards will normally do almost no more damage, and their brittle nature means they probably won’t survive any longer, but the boss is putting considerable power and weight into its charge. Far more power and speed than I could build up. So now deep groves are carved in the boss.

  I cry out in pain as I am nicked by one of the thorns as I slice down with two ice swords that immediately shatter.

  The boss tries its trick again, where it would slam into me, but I’m already gone. I move around to another area and begin to channel more ice blades under the surface of the water. The boss tries one more time to charge at me, and I repeat the trap, sword slash combo. When it lifts, I see deep wounds leaking sap-like blood, and its humanoid body appears haggard. Not willing to close to me again, it pulls back, coiling like a snake and creates more of its javelin-style root spears.

  Instead of closing, it decides to attack from a distance. This is a mixed bag for me for a couple of reasons. One is that most of the damage I have done has been with my blades or buried under other parts of the stalk. I have more room to form ice shards and slip them through the after. So, I can build up a large attack or would have more space to build up a swarm of ice attacks.

  The downside is that I could see a thick green mist billowing off its flower. It’s trying to fill the room with spores. I’m sure it won’t take a long time for the spores to make it to me. With my natural resistance the spores will be little more than a nuisance, but I’m not so sure about the rest of the team.

  I decide on a different tactic. I channel a considerable amount of water up in the air, high above the boss, then begin freezing it. A pillar of ice forms in the air, fifty feet or so above the humanoid part of the boss. The pillar is at least two feet wide and ten feet tall. The pillar is not sharp, and it’s not a very well-crafted attack, but it is heavy and blunt. A hard thwack echoes across the wall as it crushes down on the boss. One of its arms is crushed and a few thorns break as the block of ice bounces down the rest of the body.

  There is a moment where the boss cradles its arm, staring at me. I heave a breath, staring back at it. We both move.

  I form another block of ice above the boss as it tries to start uncoiling itself. Unfortunately, moving its mass with the thorns is not fast or easy. I get another ice pillar to form above it, but it only smashes into the flower around its torso. Damaging it must have been painful because the boss cries out, and I see a part of the sap leaking from that wound turn green with the spores. I must have damaged a part of it that is releasing the spores. I think to myself.

  As it continues to rally for another strike at me, it grabs a spear with its only remaining working hand. I form a large ice pillar under the water. As it rushes forward towards me, I move and try to strike it, but it adjusts just a little too far to the side, so instead of hitting it dead center, it slices a groove on its side.

  The boss is looking haggard with sizable cuts all over its stalk. I wait a bit too long to form the ice swords. In the end, it doesn’t matter because instead of pulling back, the boss does a sweeping maneuver where it curves in on itself. It tries to charge at me from the side, but the movement is just out of reach of where I am. It’s terrifying to see, and while I’m sure I could’ve survived the hit, I’m certain I would’ve had far more than a simple scratch.

  It pulls back in on itself before trying to rise. Then something unexpected happened. This whole time, I had a passing awareness of where everyone else is. I knew no one was as close to the boss. I had glances to the side to confirm where they were, but most of my concentration was split between dodging, casting the mana/health combo of spell forms, and creating different ice weapons.

  So, when Morgana appears behind the haggard form and bites down on its neck with her fang mouth, I stare in awe. The boss cries out in pain as her bite takes out about a third of its neck. Right as it is about to counterattack with a spear strike, she swipes with her claw, severing its head.

  It topples down, and she hops down off its body nonchalantly as could be. I see her spit out the sappy part of the boss before I turn back to see its stalk shake in anger, pain, or both.

  The humanoid part goes limp and drops its spear. The stalk part of the boss went into the attack I’m used to from before. All variations go out of the boss as it stands straight up and slams down where I was a few moments ago.

  I start creating the traps again, but it takes two attacks to get the timing of the trap right. The boss is far more accurate with its attacks when the humanoid part was active, but now that it’s dead, the attacks consist of blunt, poorly aimed strikes. Without the humanoid part to guide it, I’m able to do considerable damage, and two attacks later, the spore parts of the flower are too damaged to function.

  I prioritized attacking the flower since I don’t want my teammates to get hurt unintentionally. Once it’s done, I try creating ice shard traps by the root of the stalk to hurry things along. I’m a little concerned that attacking it at the top will only shorten it instead of finishing it off. I notice it growing noticeably slower as sap covers every surface and begins mixing with the water. Interestingly, it’s Morgana again who moves in to deal the death blow.

  I see her dash in and sink her claws. Her sharp claws cut into the wood several inches with each swipe, and in only a few seconds, she cuts away half a foot. Seeing her attack from up close brings up memories of the bear. It was the only other creature to have nearly as much vitality as this boss. I pull up the water on either side of the boss into thick pillars of ice.

  I see the boss try to swipe left and then right as it attempts to curl in on itself. The ice pillars don’t hold long, and I start to see them crack as it puts tremendous force on them. Right as I’m sure I’m going to lose the battle, I see an explosion of wood in the distance. It took me a moment to realize the boss had strained too hard and the pressure had caused the remaining wood to crack explosively. It is not severe completely, but the way the stack is slowly being pulled into the center, and the water is draining told me we had kill it.

  ‘Thank you, Morgana.’ I project my thought to her.

  ‘I wish it had a heart to eat; the sap tastes nasty.’ She responds. Despite her lackluster response, I feel her preen at the praise.

  I see three chests appear at the center of the room. The rest of the dungeon team slowly walks to the center. Killing the boss gets me a level. Then I see another window that made me smile, and it is a greater reward than even the Ashmores received.