The Dungeon Traveler

by Alston Sleet

  I wasn’t sure why his reaction had been so overwhelming, but he did win. I felt he deserved a little extra so I ensured he would gain a banded reinforced spear with a long metal blade and a cross guard, the end had a protective metal cap. It wasn’t a spear like they had been using. This prize was arguably the best spear in the tribe, despite its unfamiliar style. This sign of his prowess would probably fuel the fire of the lizard love triangle.

  I still had a few more days here to watch my favorite lizard drama show.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Uh, Love Triangle?

  I would guess that in Romeo’s head, his plan would see him leaving my dungeon triumphant and proud. He would swagger away with his new wealth and power, a magical weapon of awesomeness held high as he marched back into the celebration and demanded his rightful place.

  If that was the case, then the reality had to be a bit of a letdown. Romeo staggered, not marched, away from my dungeon. His body was bruised, and bleeding from the shallow wounds his scales failed to stop when fighting the wild kobold. His tail had a bald patch where his scales had been eaten away down to the meat. His head must have been ringing given the way he kept blinking at every fire pit he passed. That was probably a side effect of having so many concepts stuffed into his head in such a short time. All of this, and he couldn’t even show off since most of the partygoers had turned in for the night. I noticed that while Shortstop and Lady Lizard split up to their own huts at the end of the night, he was guarding her awfully close.

  Romeo’s greatest prize from my dungeon wasn’t the spear, it wouldn’t have been even if the spear had been magical in some way. His greatest reward was the language. With that, he might be able to lead trade deals, diplomatic missions, or even just be able to talk to prisoners or a jailer if his people are captured. Information like that is literally world-changing. A spear at the end of the day is just a pretty bit of metal which may or may not be useful for long.

  Given Romeo’s straightforwardness and more physical than intellectual nature, I wasn’t sure if he understood that.

  The next morning was more subdued than the previous wake up. The lizard tribe slowly crawled out of tents and homes, more disheveled than they had been the night before. A few had indulged far too heavily in alcohol, and the hissing and pinched eyes said they were now paying for it. I had a laugh when watching this display, I could remember the exact same feeling, and it looked the same, human or kobold.

  After the day started and the different troops gathered to eat their food, Romeo marched out of his hut in full regalia. His leather armor had new markings applied, he had a leather band applied to his arm, and his new spear was nicely polished. He was moving a bit slowly, still a bit sore, but he stood upright and proud. Trooping up to the gathered lizards, most of whom had watched with a dull gaze while eating rations, he drew himself up into a rigid stance, spear held out while the butt rested at his feet.

  The last chief just watched. I liked to think that after all my snooping - I mean careful assessment - that I had developed an understanding of lizard expressions. This lady’s face seemed to show bemused watchfulness. Maybe a bit of, “at least I don’t have to deal with this shit anymore,” bled through. As Lady Lizard left her hut the crowd seemed to perk up; I could personally smell the drama coming. Pausing when she noticed Romeo’s stance, she gathered herself then regally walked up to the gathering and sat down to eat her own jerky.

  Shortstop’s entrance was lackluster compared to Romeo’s, he was lacking weapons, leather armor, and if he had hair it would definitely be in the style of ‘bed head.’ His drowsy inattention dropped away once he noticed Romeo’s appearance. With Shortstop joining the crowd, Romeo started to give a speech. This seemed to be a common occurrence with the lizards. Pompous speech, then action, then more pompous speech. The other lizards appeared to be into it at least.

  The exciting bit is when Romeo switched back and forth with halting Common. The old lizard nearly hopped in surprise, then huddled next to Lady Lizard and whispered into her ear. The speech Romeo was giving was how he was strong of arm, swift of the tail, had completed many challenges and earned many achievements within the dungeon. Oh, and let’s not forget how he was blessed by the great spirit as her champion since she chose to give him this language and his grand weapon.

  Say what?

  I felt like I was watching a train wreck in slow motion. Looking up I waited for Romeo to be hit by a lightning bolt from the sky. Was their some lizard goddess they worshipped and was I going to be blasted from the world for this misrepresentation? Having met an actual factual goddess, and blessed by more than one god to boot, this wasn’t a far-off concern.

  Most of the tribe didn’t seem to be buying it, but they all seemed mildly impressed by his weapon and the ability to give a speech in another language. Speech-making in this culture appeared to be an essential trait. He finished his statement demanding the Right of Combat. Whatever that was. I figured he was dueling, but what he was winning or who he was fighting I didn’t know.

  Lady Lizard listened carefully, letting the old chieftain, now an adviser, whisper in her ear the whole time. When Romeo came to the end of his speech, she stood and held her claws wide. She gave her own statement, all the time eyeing Romeo up and down. Romeo practically preened under her gaze while Shortstop became more and more agitated.

  Some of the fun I had from watching this triangle came from the personalities of the three protagonists of this soap opera.

  Lizard Lady was a strong woman and had made a decisive plan to gain strength. Being a failure in life, I could respect that, though the fact she stopped everyone else from gaining power made her and Shortstop seem very selfish. That I disliked.

  Romeo was a musclehead and was proud and confident in himself. He reminded me of the self-important jocks who always seemed to succeed no matter how poorly they did. But his willingness to force himself through my challenges, even at grave risk to himself, was admirable.

  Shortstop was weaker and shorter, both things I had experienced, he was smart and willing to work. He viewed his lady love from afar hoping with every breath to capture her eye…while suffering in silence as she passed him by. Tragic and romantic.

  I could see part of myself, or at least my past self, in each of them. I could see people I had admired in them. Not to mention the drama and romance of the theater was enticing. Given my current form, it was doubtful I would ever experience anything but this kind of abstract and indirect type of romance ever again. I didn’t even feel the urge for sexual expression any longer. This drama wasn’t the same, but it hinted at ways to fill that emotional void.

  So I watched, and I was enticed by the interplay of these people and these three in particular.

  After Lady Lizard’s speech, the crowd stomped their feet while some used their tails to thump the ground. It seemed that whatever she said had met a lot of support. Romeo looked slightly uncomfortable but willing. Shortstop just looked pissed. The glance Lady Lizard passed between the two threw me into flashbacks to high school. The smile of the popular girls as they got two alpha males all riled up and butting heads. My respect for Lady Lizard as a person was dropping even as my respect for her cunning grew.

  One of the younger males ran off, his return with Shortstop’s spear saying precisely who was involved with this ‘right of combat.’ Romeo stared at Shortstop’s spearhead even as he angled his weapon towards his rival.

  Was that concern for his opponent? Was the combat not supposed to be with weapons, but the brandishing of his new weaponry pushed things further than he wanted? Was I reading too much into a simple glance at a spearhead?

  Shortstop was smaller and weaker than Romeo, but he had the advantage of having trained after earning his achievements. I don’t know how many connected skills he had acquired from those achievements, but he had to have gained something. Romeo, on the other hand, is bigger, stronger, and well prepared with his armor. Shortstop had just woken up, but he was wel
l rested, Romeo was sore and tired from his dungeon run.

  Which of the two had the advantage here was hard to predict.

  Stepping into the center dirt fighting area, both combatants held their spears up and said a phrase one after the other. They then turned towards each other and said another phrase. Once they had finished their words, the fight was on! Shortstop tried to end the battle right from the beginning with a charge and thrust of his spear. Romeo had predicted this and turned to the side as he slapped his opponents spear away, his spin continued to use his tail as a club battering away at Shortstop’s charge.

  The battle started pretty evenly, but Romeo’s strength and extra reach were telling. Shortstop did throw out a few surprises, at one point he managed to dodge a series of five jabs of Romeo’s, each of them seeming to be too quick to avoid. He had definitely learned some skill from his achievements, if Romeo had that ability he would be a genuinely frightening opponent, only his recklessness had left Shortstop a chance.

  After landing a swipe with the bladed edge of his spear, a move the tribe's traditional spears wouldn’t allow, Romeo swung the back end of his spear forward slamming the steel cap against Shortstop's head. Woozy from the blow Shortstop almost failed to dodge a thrust to his trailing leg. His off-balance hopping dodge had an almost perfunctory stab included. Romeo moved in a practiced follow-up, the move so practiced as to seem calm even in its violence. This was the final move of the fight, his arm brushing away the half-hearted stab and continuing on to thrust into Shortstop's side. The cheering of the crowd was suddenly dropped into silence when a foot of the spear disappeared into the shorter guard’s body.

  Romeo, jolted from the sudden stop of his weapon, staggered as he breathed deeply. The fight had been an intense short battle putting his already strained body to the test. When he realized that his spear had so injured his rival, he halted before rushing forward to apply pressure around the weapons head. Lady Lizard commanded a young female, and she ran off, I assumed for healing supplies. The elder chief calmly approached and placed her hand on Shortstop’s pained form, a gentle glow appearing around her hand. The spell she was casting didn’t seem to be doing much, but Shortstop’s pained grimace and hissing were reduced.

  Romeo stood before the tribe, though his eyes lingered on Shortstop, raising his arms he then spoke a ritualistic phrase. Lady Lizard glanced to him before answering. They then both turned back to Shortstop. The young runner quickly returned with a potion and bandages. The next few minutes had more than one lizard cringing as the weapon was removed, the potion sloshed the wound clean, and Shortstop was forced to drink the rest. After being bandaged, four of the hunters were selected to carry his relaxing form to his hut.

  A few days later Shortstop was up and moving around again, if slowly and with a bit of hobbling. Romeo took his place next to Lady Lizard while Shortstop took second place in her guard. This left me befuddled trying to figure out if the entire love triangle was just in my head, something I had just read too deeply into, or if this was the entirety of their duel. Was it all only to determine who got to be in charge of being the watcher for the head lady?

  Since no god or goddess came to berate me (or Romeo), and since Denda had asked me to head south, I started to search for a new location.

  Jumping my viewpoint south and east from my dungeon’s actual location, I found the castle I had initially escaped from. The partially destroyed tower having drawn my interest, I used my [Far Viewing] spell to scope out the now abandoned tower. I wasn’t going to place my entrance inside the castle, and the small shanty town outside the castle was not of interest either. Both seemed like just another chance to cause me trouble.

  I continued south until I found a much larger city. This city was similar to the size of the dwarven castle that was embedded in the mountainside. It was far more extensive than the kobold’s tribal town. Denda was right, I needed to visit more humans. Not because I missed them that much, but because I missed understanding what people were saying. While my instincts were against interacting and I didn’t find myself lonely, I still wanted to have some connection to people. I could imagine myself becoming a horrible monster if I drifted too far from people.

  I would pop my view back to watch the Lizard Love Triangle Trio in the future, but for now, I wanted to see how humans lived in this world.

  Closing the kobold’s entrance, I relaxed my hold on the door’s warped space. With a strange pop, my gateway appeared above my dungeon. Grabbing hold of the now relaxed space, I repeated my efforts of shrinking, pulling and stretching the area around the doorway. When it finally pushed through in that odd way that wasn’t in the three dimensions I usually understood, I locked the door into space in the central square.

  My gateway was arranged directly in the center of an area that seemed to be organized around a grim stand. The purpose of this stand I had initially been confused by, perhaps music or announcements? But the sizeable sturdy beam along the top and the trap doors along the floor made it clear it was for public hangings. This alone said dark things about these people, but it wasn’t beyond what one would expect from humans in a world of monsters and magic.

  My appearance didn’t garner much attention, only a young man in a set of wooden stocks seemed to notice at first. Others eventually noticed and then pandemonium broke loose.

  The king snapped his head to the north, his action drawing silence from his assembled council. His actions of late had been erratic and often angry, but everyone knew what that look meant. This was the king's legendary skill at work.

  He had sensed a rebellion.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Enter Humans, Stage Left

  I had once been a human. I should have understood what my gateway appearing would cause. The monkey brain has a pronounced reaction to the sudden appearance of something new in its environment. It’s either something to eat or something to run from. It’s good and should be taken, or it’s dangerous, and you should run!

  In a world, with magic and monsters, this reaction was only reinforced. Once people realized that an obviously magical doorway had suddenly appeared, well…it was like the running of the bulls. The only one not running was the young man in the stocks, but then, he didn’t have much of a choice in the matter. After a little while, some armored men with large curved blades showed up and surrounded my doorway.

  While the soldiers formed up around my gateway, the one who looked to be in charge marched over to the man in the stocks. It was interesting that he was able to unlock the stocks and pull the man out to interrogate him. If only the bigwigs had keys to that kind of public punishment, then it was rarely used. If some low-level functionary like some soldier was able to open the locks though, that implied it was used often. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that, or even if I should feel anything about that. I built challenges that killed people, did I have much of a moral high ground to stand on?

  The soldier promised the young man his freedom if he answered his questions. I was surprised he actually let the man go once he found out what little he knew. He didn’t really know much. Namely: My gate wasn’t here, now it was! It looked like it was up to the soldiers to do some cop work now.

  The captain left two of the soldiers to guard the entrance while sending a third off to report to some kind of Lord. I was a little confused why his instructions to the guards included holding anyone who showed too much interest. Did he think someone had done this? He had to know this was a dungeon entrance right? The nuclear blast of mana exiting my entrance was clear.

  I watched as the six soldiers and the captain formed up and marched carefully through my entrance. I had been getting better at watching from multiple simultaneously viewpoints inside my dungeon. One of my favorite moments was coming up, and I got to see the look on seven faces when they entered my vestibule. That look of wonder as they noticed the ceiling that arched high above them, where the sky should have been but wasn’t, the massive stone dome held up by columns of marble, the beauti
ful architecture, and finally the portrait to my goddess.

  Two of the soldiers looked at her and looks of lust flashed across their faces, three of the others, including the captain, managed to remain neutral, but the last soldier…the look of disgust was blatant. Once the captain finished reading the plaque, his look of disgust morphed into one of rage. The soldiers who had been full of lust quickly hid their looks, but I watched their eyes flicking to points of interest on the goddess.

  The angry soldier broke ranks and stood close to his captain as he practically demanded, “Sir, we need to report this to Lady Josephine. This is a trap. This place is evil. The Church will cleanse it.”

  Oh. Shit. I was not planning to deal with a [Crusade] today.

  Apparently, neither was the captain. He maintained order with an elbow to the unruly soldier's throat. The angry man dropped the sword he had been clutching as he choked and held his neck.

  “Shut it you ass. You’re in the guard, and you will act like it. The Lord Mayor gives the orders, not you. You get in my face again, and I’ll gut you in this dungeon, you understand me boy?”

  OK, note to self. This guy is more than just a captain and getting on his bad side is a piss poor idea.

  None of the other soldiers did more than glance at the stupid shit as he tried to choke on his bruised vocal box. They maintained their guard even while their leader was shit kicking the religious idiot behind them. The angry man eventually nodded his agreement and joined the rest of the troop, but I noticed the scary neck puncher kept him in front of him and in his view at all times.