570 monsters slain, 246388 gold, 24376 ore, 17556 aether, 500 souls
This would be the final venture through the dungeon for the Chef class, tackling the additional burdens of NG+2 difficulty. I picked up with a new heir following the successful completion of the previous difficulty with lots of gold and additional souls to spend. I started by paying 250 souls to unlock the +2 equipment via Embroidered Investments while holding off on the tier 3 runes for the moment since I was still missing lots of the tier 2 ones. I only had enough souls to take one additional rank in something and chose Infinite Knowledge for more damage via extra Intelligence. There was surprisingly little that I wanted at the Blacksmith and Enchanter on this trip, as I limited myself to the second Reinforced Rune for some extra Armor. In a change from previous characters, because I would be getting so much additional income from running extra Burdens in this latest patch, I opted not to pursue any additional Gold Gain levels. Instead, I dumped some 220k worth of gold into actual stats to beef up this upcoming Chef for NG+2 difficulty. I stacked up significantly better numbers in each category in the hopes that this would help me survive longer.
Once again I cranked up the burdens for NG+2 difficulty. Following the same pattern as my Knight Legacy earlier, I chose to take 14 burdens (instead of the required 4) to make things harder. I was taking max ranks in Burden of Evolution (50% chance for monsters to upgrade to the next tier) and Burden of Adaptation (15% chance for monsters to gain a commander buff) along with all three points in Burden of Scale to make the dungeon 30% larger. For my last burden, I also took the NG+2 option to face the prime version of the Axis Mundi Void Beasts. I knew from my previous experience that having tier 3 monsters everywhere would made things noticeably harder as far as clearing the dungeon. And with this latest patch, I'd also be getting 25% additional gold for my troubles!
Chef #8: 86 Vitality, 80 Intelligence, 102 Armor, 7 Focus, 24 Strength
This Chef had one of the new traits added in the recent patch: Inter-Dimensional which causes all enemy projectiles to pass through walls. I had also opted not to take the rightmost Chef on the heir select screen because I wanted to try out this new trait (which came with 55% higher gold generation) and therefore this Chef had the Poison Bomb instead of the Searing Shot spell. This was a bit of a test of the Inter-Dimensional trait and I found that it wasn't too bad for the Chef class. I think that other classes might have struggled with walls no longer blocking enemy projectiles but the frying pan was up to the task of knocking incoming shots away. Interestingly, the Inter-Dimentional trait worked both ways and my own spells and reflected projectiles also went through walls which I hadn't been expecting. It was definitely worth taking the trait in exchange for 55% more gold.
As far as the actual dungeon, it proved to be a bit of a rollercoaster ride in terms of making progress. I would have long stretches where my Chef was doing just fine only to take a couple of hits in rapid succession and suddenly find herself on death's door. Tier 3 monsters were doing more than 200 damage per hit and that didn't leave much room for error even with the awesome sustain on the Chef class. I was able to full clear the Study but it was dicey at times and not at all a foregone conclusion. I made use of the resources available to me for extra health gain, using Murmur's miniboss chamber to heal up off the meat/flask drops inside and then fighting Lamech (with a flawless victory against the non-prime version) to refill 40% HP and regain my expended Stew charges. I was also able to exchange out the Poison Bomb spell for the more useful Fungal Spread ability which actually let me target things at range. The Fungal shots would even go through walls (which they don't normally do) thanks to the Inter-Dimensional trait, neat. Finding the Cornucopia relic early in the dungeon (meat items restore an additional 8% of your max HP) was a big deal as well, with the meats replenishing about 200 HP to start and then gaining in power as my Chef's lifebar increased.
I poked my head into the Dry Lake and made some modest progress there but kept having to retreat back to the Citadel and then Axis Mundi because the enemies just dealt so much damage. I kept plugging away though for lack of other options: back and forth, over to the easier areas and then returning to the basement when health was in a safe zone. I was able to make more progress than I expected and even continue taking the Blessings of Life as they popped up along the way. The Gnawed Bone relic appeared as an option for my last 25 resolve and I was able to use the Chef's Stews to stack it up quickly, another 76 * 3 = 228 max HP to play around with. In fact, this Chef was starting to get somewhat beefy as her health climbed well above 1000 HP thanks to a couple of additional red portals with their Blessings of Life at the end. It took about an hour of real world time but to my own surprise I did manage to full clear the whole Dry Lake with this character. I opened up both of the Onyx/Pearl miniboss portals and then returned to Axis Mundi to start the process of healing back up again for the fifteenth time.
Once I had a little bit over half health, I portaled back to the Study to face estuary Enoch. I was using the 40% heal on the boss doors as another form of recovery and on this third try at the boss fight I was finally able to get it done right. I kept my distance from Enoch when he was shooting out fireballs and reflected them back at the estuary's huge character model. This time I was able to avoid the sloppy mistakes from before while working in additional castings of the Fungal Spread for more damage. I only took one hit against the mage form and then a second hit against the mimic chest, that was it. My Chef was able to emerge from the battle with more health than when she'd entered, then head over to the Sun Tower and start clearing it out as well.
From here the dungeon started to become routine again. I'd already done the hardest biomes and I could fall back on Axis Mundi and then the Kerguelen Plateau whenever I ran into trouble climbing up the Sun Tower. I had managed to find the second Soulsteal and Quenching Runes earlier in the dungeon and now I finally came across the item that I most wanted: the Leviathan Cape worth 24 Intelligence after this run concluded. I was also starting to accumulate a massive gold haul with the 130% bonus on this Chef, now up to 400k money and still climbing. Once I made it to the top of the Sun Tower and recovered enough health to be close to full, I crossed my fingers and went after estuary Irad. I was nervous that I might flub this boss encounter but I needn't have worried as I proceeded to kick his butt with a masterful display of aerial dodging. The eyeballs were completely unable to touch this Chef as she bobbed and weaved her way around almost every single projectile. I think that I took two total hits in the encounter and emerged with more than 1500 HP remaining on the lifebar. That was a relief to get this enemy out of the way.
Once again I tore through estuary Naamah at the end of the Plateau without much effort; the Chef's ticking Burn damage seems to work well against her and allows time to dodge her various rose projectiles. I waited until virtually the whole dungeon was finished before taking on the much more difficult task of the Void Monster boss refight at the end of Axis Mundi. As I've written before, the two big skeleton pirates gain an additional cannonball attack and produce heat-seeking Cursed ghosts whenever they jump, plus they summon more skeleton minions as they take damage throughout the fight. The Chef is well equipped to handle these opponents since the frying pan can knock the ghosts away although the lack of any innate evasion skills isn't great. I had also traded out my spell again elsewhere in the dungeon, exchanging the Fungal Spread for the Shockwave, which was more useful than I expected because it will pop large projectiles like the cannonballs when it detonates. Mostly though I used it for additional damage when my Chef's mana bar was full. Despite my best efforts at working down the skeletons one at a time, this was another difficult fight where health dropped down to about 600 HP at one point. I was glad that there are always two meat items in the two lanterns at the ends of the boat, which acted as double recovery items thanks to the renewed Stew charges. Fortunately I was able to get the job done without ever dropping down into the extreme danger zone.
Now I was down to the final few bosses and I was starting to think that I had a real shot to finish off the whole difficulty in one go. Tubal has been one of the biggest stumbling blocks for my past characters and I feared that he would put an end to this Chef's journey as well. Instead it was exactly the opposite case: I had one of my best Tubal fights that I can remember and calmly avoided his various attacks while taking minimal damage. It helped that the Chef could use the frying pan against both his Cursed projectiles as well as the swords that fall down from the ceiling. The flying minions were also relatively easy to defeat thanks to the ticking Burn effect of the frying pan causing them to die instantly once their invulnerability period wore off. The trickiest part of the fight was when the Inter-dimensional trait caused Tubal's Cursed ghosts to pass right through the ceiling or floor and loop back around again against my Chef. They had to be knocked away with the frying pan and this threw me off a couple of times. Still, this was never even remotely close as I easily defeated the final remaining estuary to unlock the Golden Doors.
I hadn't expected to do this well with the very first Chef of NG+2 difficulty and I was wishing that I'd put more points into Meditation Studies before beginning. I only had two points there for 40% recovery when entering boss doors which meant that I had to minimize damage taken against Jonah for the impending Cain battle afterwards. Jonah was his usual self and most of the duel went well as I gradually worked through his huge life total. Towards the end of the fight he started spamming his "pizza" attack which I've always found to be the most dangerous one. This resulted in my Chef taking a couple of additional hits and finishing the battle around 1000 HP. Fortunately I could eat a few Stew charges knowing that they would be completely refilled against Cain and everything would be back to full for the last opponent. If I failed against Cain, it wouldn't be for lack of resources going into the fight.
Cain was not an easy opponent at all. I discovered right away that the Inter-dimensional trait was a huge handicap for this battle as the blue projectiles fired by Cain would loop around through the floor and come back to hit my Chef a second time. They would actually bleed over into the next Cain attack and I'd be forced to try dodging two different things at once - not good! Even with the frying pan for knockback this made the boss significantly more challenging. I had some luck at throwing the Shockwave at the floor and using it to dispel some of the incoming fireballs which wasn't something that I had expected to be doing. The Shockwave could also be used to break apart the Naamah rose projectiles with the void ball inside which I've always had trouble avoiding. Otherwise it was another long and tough sequence of dodging Cain's attacks while slowly working through his healthbar. His blows dealt 194 damage apiece which didn't leave much room for error even with 1971 starting HP and the three Stew charges. I was knocked down to a single hit of remaining life while Cain still had about 15% of his health left to go, any more mistakes would mean replaying the entire dungeon again. Careful... steady... don't look at the healthbars, just focus on dodging! Cain helped me out by picking several of his less-dangerous attacks and I avoided the next seven of his moves in a row without taking damage. He was down to his last sliver when I saw him winding up for the blue fireball attack. I was never going to be able to dodge that so I hurled two Shockwaves and expelled all of my mana in the hopes of bursting through the final remaining boss health. And it worked as Cain collapsed just before getting off his own attack!
Wow, what an absolutely incredible ending sequence! 
I cannot stress enough that my Chef was maybe one second away from dying and forcing me to spend hours redoing the entire dungeon all over again. I scraped this out by the absolute skin of my teeth and needed every single advantage that I'd gained throughout the dungeon, all of those Blessings of Life and the extra health from the Gnawed Bone and the Blessings of Wisdom from changing spells. I started out with 752 HP and finished with 1971 HP and needed all of it to win with a single hit's worth of life remaining. I also would have perished here if my Chef hadn't eaten all three Stew charged which provided just enough health to survive. I was walking around the room in real life, pumping my fist in the air after pulling out this victory.
Thus I completed all of NG+2 difficulty with a single character, the first Chef surviving the entire dungeon from beginning to end while defeating all of the bosses. The 800 souls on that screenshot is the proof of that, it's only possible to get the full 800 by defeating all of the estuaries with a single character. This is the first character in the Class Legacy series who managed to pull that off (though I've done it a bunch of times in other non-variant savefiles, most frequently with the Duelist class). What was stunning to me was the fact that I accomplished this with the Chef class - the CHEF class! 
I expect this sort of thing from the Barbarian or the Duelist but certainly not this wacky class that hits people with a frying pan. It turns out that the Chef class is actually very, very strong though, one of the best in the game for my playstyle anyway. I was also helped immensely by the recent patch changes described on the previous page of this report, particularly the change to add a Blessing of Life to every completed red portal. This allows a dedicated player to stack up huge amounts of max HP through clearing the dungeon, and no class is better equipped to keep healing up while taking those Blessings of Life than the Chef class. It turns out that having really, really good sustain to keep you alive throughout the dungeon makes for an excellent class, go figure. If you can keep healing over and over again then it's hard for your character to die!
Moral of the story: beware the frying pan. This was an unexpected but highly enjoyable outcome and I hope it was entertaining to follow. Thanks as always for reading along.
