THE FOUNDER

• BOSS
• THE RIFT

THE FOUNDER is a boss on THE RIFT, a place of entities.

The same coward, cornered a second time in a place with no security to call and no regulator to charm. He tears open the far door rather than answer a straight question, and leaves the golden parachute behind him.

Where you meet it

THE RIFT

It is placed by hand on THE RIFT and waits at its post until you come close.

What to know

• COWARDBeaten to nothing it escapes rather than dying, tearing a way out a few strides off and running for it.
• HOW IT ENDSHe does not stay to be finished. He tears his way out, runs for it with his back turned, and is drawn through spinning. The hero: "STILL RUNNING. IT'S THE ONLY THING YOU EVER BUILT YOURSELF."
• LEASHEDNever strays further than 460 from where it stands.
• WHAT IT WAS CARRYINGA fortune. Its corpse sheds 6× the gold an ordinary body of its rank does, which is the plainest thing anyone has ever said about it.
• WHEN STRUCKIt bleeds. A blow that overwhelms it bursts it, and there is a face among what lands.

Mechanics

Every dangerous move is telegraphed — it roots, it winds up, and you get the beat you need to be somewhere else.

• SUMMONEvery 12s it calls 3 more out of the ground, up to 6 of its own summons alive at once. They arrive outside the level's wave budget, so they are extra rather than borrowed. It calls VOIDLING.
• ORBITAL DELIVERYIt roots for 0.9s first, then calls 4 pods down onto marks scattered across 140 around YOU. Each falls for 1.4s behind the same firming ground shadow a meteor drops behind — so you already know how to read it — and bursts for 85% of its contact damage across 60, then pops open and lets 2 more out of the crater. The marks bracket you rather than chase you, so the question is which way to move, not whether. Once every 10s. It calls VOIDLING.

Below 35% health it switches to:

• ENRAGEBelow 35% health it fights like a cornered animal for the rest of the fight — 1.35× speed and 1.25× damage, permanently.
• SUMMONEvery 10s it calls 4 more out of the ground, up to 8 of its own summons alive at once. They arrive outside the level's wave budget, so they are extra rather than borrowed. It calls VOIDLING.

What it drops

Every kill pays one piece of gear, 2 medkits, one repair kit and one XP scroll.

Its drops roll 35% better on the rarity ladder than the level's ordinary loot.

Guaranteed pieces by rarity: 2 magic and 1 rare. A rarity the monster's own level has not unlocked yet is skipped, so the same fight pays better on a harder rung.

Always drops

• GOLDEN PARACHUTE

Story items

• RIFT CREATOR

Named relics it can roll

Gated to the rung you beat it on, and rolled against the monster's own level, so the deeper rungs open names the shallow ones never see.

EASY

• EXILE'S STRIDE
• ESCAPIST'S TREAD
• RIFTMAW

MEDIUM

• EXILE'S STRIDE
• ESCAPIST'S TREAD
• RIFTMAW

HARD

• EXILE'S STRIDE
• ESCAPIST'S TREAD
• RIFTMAW

NIGHTMARE

• EXILE'S STRIDE
• ESCAPIST'S TREAD
• THE REDACTED
• AEGIS OF EXILE
• RIFTMAW

JESUS CHRIST!

• EXILE'S STRIDE
• ESCAPIST'S TREAD
• THE REDACTED
• AEGIS OF EXILE
• RIFTMAW

What it says

Spoilers for this fight, covered until you ask for them.

What this scene is part of — everything said and found around it — is its chapter of the story.