The Dungeon Fairy: Two Choices: A Dungeon Core Escapade (The Hapless Dungeon Fairy Book 2)

by Jonathan Brooks

  Shale, the brave Dungeon Fairy, was fluttering just in front of the closest tree to the six-armed people; his first actual sight of them must have been a shock to the Assistant, because he barely moved in time to avoid being skewered by an expertly thrown sword by the invader out front. The 5-foot-long blade was thrown with such strength that it impaled itself up to the hilt in the tree behind where Shale had been hovering; normally, Tacca could sense her Environmental Object regrowing to replace any of themselves that was cut down or damaged – but now the tree was basically inert. Just as she wasn’t regenerating any Dungeon Force, nothing else seemed to be operating as usual, either.

  “Those are *huff* more frightening *huff* than you described,” Shale mentally communicated as he flew further into the trees, making sure to keep a tree trunk in between him and those that just tried to kill him. He wasn’t necessarily exerting a lot of energy doing so, but Tacca could tell that his fear had ramped up so high that he was nearly hyperventilating.

  Remember, you don’t have to do this.

  “No, *huff* I’ve got this. It was just unexpected.” He was visibly trying to calm himself down behind a tree in the middle of the forest valley, taking deep breaths to pull himself together.

  Ok, just be careful. And you might want to move.

  At her words, her Dungeon Assistant twitched once in surprise and abruptly shot upwards. Another sword blade emerged from the back of the tree where he had just been, missing him by only a few inches. Tacca watched as the other invaders tracked his movements, after having followed him inside the small forest.

  It seems as though I’m not their only target. Stay out of range, Shale.

  Instead of continuing on, it appeared as though they weren’t going to leave until they killed the elusive Fairy. They tracked him unerringly as he zipped through the trees, ahead and above them, avoiding a few other thrown weapons by the thickness of one of his wings. Thinking that they might actually follow him outside, she urged Shale to fly through the tunnel they just entered from – which elicited another argument as they paused in the middle of the trees.

  The purplish-skinned monster person was the loudest, as it pointed further down the forest valley and identified the exact location of the tunnel leading on without fail. They others pointed back towards where Shale had flown, but were obviously overruled. Before they finished their argument, however, their raised voices camouflaged the approach of Tacca’s two creatures.

  One was a Level 5 Forest Wolf which had been frozen into immobility to camouflage its presence, located only a dozen feet away from the group of six-armed invaders. Her creature suddenly raced forward as if by some unknown signal and lunged at the back of the nearest blue-skinned leg, using its bite strength to try to rip the flesh from its target. Unfortunately, the same glow flared up and prevented more than a few indentations on the skin – not even enough to break through; the Wolf backed off almost immediately after discovering that it couldn’t do any damage, looking for something a bit more vulnerable – but it was too late. A warhammer swung down from the side as another six-armed person helped its comrade, shattering the spine of the creature and nearly cutting it in half from the sheer force.

  The Forest Wolf wasn’t alone in its attack, however, as a Mountain Cougar leapt down from the left-side hill, having been lying still along a small shelf Tacca had created for the express purpose of camouflaging it upon the brown rock. The Cougar was about the same size as the Wolf, but instead of mottled green-and-brown fur, the large Feline was different shades of brown – which blended in perfectly with the rocky hillside.

  It landed on the back of a different blue-skinned invader, staggering the larger figure with its weight. The large cat immediately bit down on the back of the monstrous person’s neck, but it was so thick that the Cougar couldn’t find any purchase. It then attempted to tear into the skin underneath its hind legs with claws that were normally super sharp, but the familiar – and highly annoying, by that point – glow sprung up and prevented any damage from being done.

  Before it could spring away as it realized its futility, her creature was impaled by a trident and torn off the back of its six-armed “victim”. The nearby invader that had stabbed the large cat raised the feebly struggling Cougar high up into the air, before slamming it down onto the ground with force. Bones audibly cracked as her creature hit the ground hard and it quickly disappeared, leaving behind 2 silver pieces lying in the dirt, joining the 2 dropped by the now-deceased Wolf.

  The best I can say is that there is certainly a decent proof-of-concept to my placement of my creatures so far – but they are useless against these…whatever-they-are. Where they came from, who they were, what that annoying glow was, why they were after her Dungeon Fairy and her Core: These were all questions she had no answers to, and she doubted they could be answered before they arrived at her Core Room.

  At least Shale was doing his best to delay what appeared to be the inevitable.

  Chapter 26

  Sterge and Gwenda rushed out of the “Town Hall” behind Jesper and one of his assistants, alarmed at what he had just heard. A group had come back from the mountains, screaming about how they found over 30 bodies outside of the dungeon – bodies of the Raiders waiting for their chance to delve through again.

  “What’s going on?” he heard yelled at him from his right side, and Sterge looked over to see Evy, Mordecai, and William rushing over from the nearest Inn. While they weren’t “allowed” to stay inside the Town Hall (as per Gwenda’s rules, to keep it strictly for Village or Raider Clan business), they lodged close enough to Sterge and Gwenda that it helped them to all stay in touch and feel like a complete group.

  “I haven’t a clue quite yet, but if it’s true we might have a major problem.” His answer to Evy was admittedly incomplete, but his knowledge of the situation was likewise incomplete. None of them protested when their groupmates nodded at his words and joined them in their run towards The Village’s center, where a huge group of Raiders – and Merchants – were already gathering.

  “—don’t know! All I saw was that they were hacked apart—”

  “—said that, didn’t I. I told you I had no part in—”

  “—must have been these filthy—"

  “—they’re all dead! Whatever it was, might be coming for us next—”

  “—be the dungeon, itself. It must have released all of its monsters to kill—”

  “—anyone seen Bernlet’s group? They were supposed to be next on the list—”

  They arrived to pure bedlam, as conversations, arguments, and accusations were traded back and forth by those already assembled, with the small group in the middle being bombarded by questions. Sterge figured that the middle group were the ones who had discovered the bodies and were being interrogated – though it didn’t seem very effective, as they seemed not to know much more than they had already said; he kept hearing the same things repeated over and over by the time they reached the edge of the crowd.

  Unsurprisingly, the Merchant Minister arrived around the same time, looking like he was prepared to rip the answers out of the brains of the middle group with his bare hands. He saw them along the edge and immediately came over, flanked by some intimidating guards that he suspected were quite a high Raider Level. He was tempted to Analyze them, as he had acquired the Ability when he achieved Level 5 himself, but held back because it was considered rude to do it to another person without their permission. The last thing they needed at this moment was an excuse for those powerful individuals to be mad at him.

  “Was this your doing?!” the Minister fumed. “This had better not be another Arcundia attempt—”

  “What happened in Arcundia?” Gwenda suddenly asked, her curiosity obviously getting the better of her. Or she had some other reason for asking, which Sterge couldn’t fathom.

  “Go on, tell her, Jesper.”

  As the crowd continued to swell and become louder – and possibly violent soon, if Sterge was any judge �
�� Jesper shook his head quickly. “Of course not, Minister. We don’t have time for this—”

  “They killed 20 of our own and then shattered our dungeon’s Core, that’s what they did!” the important Merchant yelled, spittle starting to foam at his lips as he got worked up.

  “Look, I had no part in that. Besides, it was only in retaliation for your own attack and destruction of the Core in Greenville—”

  “Lies! Just because you can’t look after your own, you shouldn’t be blaming—”

  “ENOUGH!” Sterge heard someone yell…and then he realized it came from his own throat. The yell shocked him and the others enough that they paused in their argument, but the Hill Dwarf recovered quickly and continued before they could resume. “None of that is important right now; from what I heard, there were Raiders from both of our people up there, so this has to be from a different source. And if I’m understanding your argument correctly, none of us would benefit from this attack – since the dungeon and its Core do not belong to either of you.”

  Sterge was gambling on whether or not that would make sense, but it obviously did enough that there weren’t any other arguments. Gwenda cleared her throat loud enough to be heard over the crowd, and said, “Now, let’s see if we can get everyone under control and find out some answers if we can.”

  It took longer than anyone would’ve liked, but within a couple of minutes Jesper and the Minister managed to corral everyone into some semblance of order, and they both took turns questioning the wide-eyed group that brought the news in the first place. After no more than a minute, it was clear that they really didn’t know more than what was known to everyone already: That they had found the slaughtered remains of everyone waiting up at the dungeon; they had only gone up because they were on the list to delve within the next 4 or 5 hours, and they were eager to get up there in case the wait was shorter; even the Clan rep organizing all of the people was among all of the dead – though it was apparently hard to tell, given the description of her remains.

  “Myra was powerful, Minister,” Jesper explained after the questioning was done. “She was only here helping out because she was taking an extended leave from her group; they had just lost one of their group members to an unfortunate accident within a dungeon, and she felt this was the best way to deal with it. When you’re at Raider Level 72 and have been with the same group not only for years, but decades, such a loss is difficult to get over. If someone or something killed her, this could be bigger than it sounds.”

  Sterge wasn’t aware that Myra, a relatively quiet Elven Raider that he had met as part of Jesper’s helpers, was Raider Level 72. Being that high of a Level was nearly inconceivable to the Hill Dwarf, and if she really was dead, then he shuddered at the realization that something even more powerful must have killed her. Looking around the entire Village, he could see the wave of information pass over the scared and angry crowd, creating an immediate murmur as they just heard that such a high-Level member of the Clan had been killed. Sterge hadn’t known her that well, but she had always been kind to him and to others when she actually deigned to speak; he felt like the world had lost a good one with her death, and it would behoove them to find out what happened to her. And possibly even exact justice, not only for her death, but for the deaths of everyone up at the dungeon.

  Yes, even the Merchants. If they perished within the dungeon, that was one thing; the outside of the dungeon was supposed to be relatively safe. Sterge just hoped that it hadn’t been the actual dungeon that had done it, though from what he’d learned over the last few months, he thought that would be quite impossible.

  “It was this blasted dungeon that did this!” the Minister abruptly shouted, almost as if he could hear Sterge’s thoughts. The Village Chief looked at him and saw that the angry spittle and foam was back on the head Merchant’s mouth. “It’s more powerful than anyone suspects; we lost an entire group in there that shouldn’t have died—”

  “What are you talking about? I didn’t hear anything about a full-group wipe.” Jesper may not have heard about it, but Sterge and Gwenda certainly had – and it had been straight from the source, too. Common sense told him that he shouldn’t mention that right now, even though the Minister had essentially admitted it; revealing the origin of his information while all of this was going on probably wouldn’t be the smartest idea, especially as he heard more angry rumbling from the crowd as they reacted to the Merchant’s words.

  “Oh, uh, I just mean that we’ve lost a full group of our people over the last few months, that’s all,” the Minister tried to backtrack. Fortunately for him, everyone else was too worried about what had happened to those that just recently died outside of the dungeon to care too much about how insincere he sounded.

  “Yes, well, given how…well-funded…your people are, I’m surprised you lost anyone at all,” Jesper responded doubtfully, before continuing and addressing the entire crowd. “I’m heading up with my people to perform an investigation. If we are not back within…8 hours, I would urge everyone to evacuate. I’m going to send a messenger to Trevelyan in Heftington, asking for some help with reinforcements, but we need to discover whether there is a threat to everyone here.” The Clan representative turned to the head Merchant and said, “Minister. You’re welcome to come too or send some of your own, but obviously I can’t guarantee safety for anyone at this point.”

  The fear of going up where there might be danger appeared to shake off some of the anger in the Elven Merchant. “No, no – not necessary for me to go. I’ll send Anders and Francha.” Two of the Merchant Raiders stepped forward; one was a Hill Dwarf that Sterge felt a little envious of with his pristine plate armor and shield as large as his body; the other was the same Human woman along the perimeter of the Merchant camp that had been so rude to Sterge and Gwenda when they first arrived at The Village. The woman had been humbled in front of them by the Minister, and he could only hope that she wasn’t going to hold a grudge.

  Because there was no way that he and Gwenda weren’t going. It took a little convincing for the rest of their group to stay behind, but eventually the fear of the extremely dangerous unknown got to them and they agreed to stay back. They only seemed slightly disappointed.

  “It’s time to go – are you sure you two want to come?” Jesper asked, looking specifically at Sterge and Gwenda. They were the only two that weren’t veterans and under Raider Level 10 (and possibly even Level 30), so it was a fair question.

  “Yes.”

  “Yes.”

  Sterge and Gwenda spoke at the same time, and The Village Chief could tell that she felt the same need to investigate that he did. If it was indeed the dungeon itself that did this, then Sterge at least felt a little responsible for what it had done.

  “Let’s go, then.”

  He and his best friend followed the others as they led the way, running behind those that could handle themselves a bit better than they could. Sterge and Gwenda might feel responsible for the dungeon…but they weren’t suicidal.

  To Sterge, arriving at the dungeon entrance felt like it took forever and only seconds at the same time. In reality, he was told that it had only been about 20 minutes since the group that discovered the bodies had come back to the village – because everyone was running, and things were happening fast. Not knowing what to expect when they arrived felt a little like their first delve into the dungeon, where everything was unexpected; this time, however, they had an idea of what they would find – but the reality of it was much worse than he could’ve ever imagined.

  Bodies and body parts were scattered all over the well-used waiting area, and blood was staining the stone of the mountain red in such a wide swathe that it was hard to see bare, clean stone. Some of the corpses were bunched together, which Sterge assumed meant that they had died as a group, while more of them were spread apart. Whatever had attacked and killed them must have been so frightening that many of them had run, which was obvious from the wounds in their backs.

 
If that was the worst of the wounds, it wouldn’t have been so bad. What made Sterge retch and Gwenda throw up was the horrendous carnage on display. At least a half-dozen of the bodies were missing an entire head; others had their lower bodies separated from their upper with their insides spilling out; a few appeared to have been smashed to a goopy mess of blood and broken bones, their faces and bodies barely recognizable as a person in some cases.

  The worst by far was Myra, the Raider Level 72 Elementalist – or so he had been told on his way up by Jesper – who appeared to have been bisected from head to hips, and the two halves of her body appeared to have separated and fell in two different directions. What made that horrible scene even worse was having one of Jesper’s assistants point out the gouge in the stone in between her feet – as if whatever had split her in half had so much force behind it that it chipped out a few inches of stone after it was done.

  “What…happened here, Jesper?” Sterge finally asked, the only word he had spoken since they had arrived. He and the rest of the “investigation team” had walked downhill from the macabre display of carnage to try to center themselves again after only a couple of minutes. Gwenda hadn’t been the only one to vomit from the sight of so much senseless slaughter – including both Anders and Francha, the Merchant representatives.