Dungeon Lord- Ancient Traditions

by Hugo Huesca

  Klek shrugged. “The Haunt is that third kingdom. Or will be. Once we unite my country.”

  The lizardman stiffened. “As long as we strive for power and glory, we shall further the cause of the Dark. That’s Murmur’s doctrine. So third kingdom or not, I shall always serve the Dark.” A few of the other researchers rolled their eyes, and others nodded enthusiastically. It reminded Alder of Father Zachary, who for the longest time had refused to admit he had switched sides. The cranky old man still insisted he was converting Ed to the Light and celebrated every time the Dungeon Lord showed up to Oynnes’ chapel.

  “So, we have general improvement, that’s nice,” Alder said, to switch topics away from religion. “That doesn’t really tell me much. Can you give me something more specific? We’re on a tight timetable here. Ed—I mean, Lord Wraith—mentioned that your research might create better enchanted armor. Tell me about that.”

  “Always the same with Dungeon Lords and their minions,” Churla said. “They want better killing spells, swords with more edge, armors that never dent. But when you cannot find the right book on enchanting because the Library is a mess, their eyes go all blazy and the yelling starts.” He sighed. “Fine. It’s your gold. Come with me, Master Chronicler. I’ll show you the new armor.”

  He brought them past the main area, through a small corridor full with invisible, deadly traps, and into a room guarded by five animated skeletons wearing pristine iron armor and purple-and-pink Lasershark tabards. The room was where the research team stored any prototypes, and was directly connected by a short railway system to Heorghe’s forgeries, where the parts of those prototypes were built and assembled.

  Alder saw piles of scrolls, crystal balls with rows of magical brilliance swirling inside, a group of dented lead balls engraved with magical glyphs, undead parts from Lavy’s failed experiments, and trap contraptions based on new cursed designs. Klek took one look at the traps, which sparked with magical feedback at their proximity, and stayed a safe distance away.

  “Here,” said Researcher Churla, pointing at a pile of iron scrap easily bigger than Alder. “The new armor prototype.”

  Klek and Alder studied the pile. At first glance, it was merely rusty trash. On second glance, however, it was a gigantic set of armor, engraved with advanced enchantments and glyphs. As a Bard, Alder was a spellcaster, although his illusion magic relied more on talent and performance than raw knowledge. At a mere glance, he could tell that the raw magical consumption of that many enchantments on the same armor set vastly outpaced any mortal user’s natural emanation.

  In other words, “This thing won’t work,” Alder said. “It needs too much magical juice.”

  Churla nodded. “Our research is highly theoretical. It may be years before we come up with anything useful in the battlefield. But the potential…” He placed a proud hand atop the armor pile. “This prototype doesn’t feed on the natural energy of the user’s body. Take a look here, Master Chronicler. Perhaps you recognize this spiral pattern.”

  Alder squinted. The part that the lizardman pointed at indeed looked familiar. It was a sort of long spiral, like a tail sprouting from the back of the breastplate, that went down to leg’s length and opened up into eight long claws covered by a sheet of spidersilk. “It looks like an umbrella?” the Bard guessed.

  Klek took a few steps back, ignoring the disappointed sigh of the researcher. He placed a finger on the iron tail. “It reminds me of the smoke spiral that appears when Lord Ed finishes building a new dungeon room,” the batblin said.

  “Ah, you’re quite perceptive, Master Adventurer Slayer,” Churla said, clapping with delight. “Yes, indeed. You shall find the same pattern on all traps across every single dungeon in existence. This engraving pattern is a connector. It allows for the ley line of a dungeon to power traps, rooms, and most drones. It is Dark magic, though, and it only works as long as there is a Mantle connected to the Dungeon Seat.” He lifted the armor’s helmet with much difficulty—it was big enough to fit half of Klek, and placed his finger on a glyph under the visor while intoning an activation phrase. There was a buzz in the air and Alder’s nostrils filled with the smell of burnt ozone as the enchantments in the armor flared to life… and after a second, fizzled out. Churla looked slightly embarrassed.

  “Wetlands,” Alder muttered. During that brief instant, the armor’s defensive enchantments had reached Heroic rank.

  A Heroic set of armor was the sort of thing the gods gifted to their champions during the most difficult part of their quests—and they would take it back once the quest was over. A Heroic item was often created by legendary blacksmiths, forgotten elven artisans, and dwarfs as old as their mountains. The wearer of such a thing could withstand being launched through a marble pillar and merely feel a slight discomfort… if Bardic reports hadn’t exaggerated such events.

  “How did you do that?” Klek asked.

  Churla smiled. “The Light showed us. The center of a Hero’s chest is full of such patterns. They connect the piece of the Mantle at their core with the rest of the construct. These patterns also allow the Hero to connect with the ley line of a destroyed dungeon and transform it into energy. Thousands of experience points their reanimated Mantle can use to empower them.” He grunted and set the helmet down. “Master Lavina believes this is the secret of Heroic item creation.”

  Alder’s heart burned with desire. He wanted to name that armor right now and make up a history for it more interesting than “Heorghe probably put it together from spare parts.”

  “It is useless outside a dungeon, though,” Klek pointed out. “And the Standard Factory has no ley lines. Even then, this thing is too heavy. Lord Ed cannot wear it.”

  Alder winced, and forced himself back to reality, and away from his Bardic daydreams. “Is there a way to fix that?”

  “Yes and no,” said the lizardman. “The Heroes are Necromantic golems controlled remotely by long-distance magical signals. If Archmage Goviferus’ postulate is right, and every type of magical emanation is actually raw energy highly refined, we could learn to send those signals to an adequate receptor, using raw ley line energy instead. So we could feed energy at a distance for our artificial Heroic armor. But that may be decades away. We need to watch our step with every minor discovery, lest we incur Objectivity’s wrath. This would be a spellcraft revolution bigger than the invention of the rune. It would reshape dungeons everywhere.”

  “But it won’t help Lord Ed during the Endeavor,” Klek finished sadly.

  “Not even after that,” Alder said. “Unless the fight against the Militant Church lasts a couple decades.”

  The two of them exchanged disappointed glances.

  “I’m sorry to dash your hopes,” Churla said stiffly. “Anyone with higher spellcraft ranks would appreciate the sheer brilliance of what we have already accomplished. In any case, perhaps we could shave off a couple years of research time if our team had three times its budget. Make it ten times and we can hire Archmage-level researchers.”

  “The Haunt is using every cent,” Alder explained dejectedly. “Every extra Vyfara a team gets has to be taken away from some other, just as vital team. Even if your research could turn the Haunt into a powerhouse in about ten years, we need our Scrambling Towers right now or we won’t live so long.” He shook his head and frowned. “We have seen enough, Researcher Churla. You’ve done a great job so far, and I’m sure Lord Wright shall be pleased. But in the future, focus as well in our short-term survival, because otherwise we won’t make it into that future.”

  The lizardman stiffened. “I assure you, Master Chronicler, we’re going as fast as we possibly can.”

  As Alder turned to leave, he saw the succubus researcher standing timidly by the entrance, her leathery wings carefully folded behind her white coat. She held with both hands a wooden box with a red silken pillow over which stood a rough metallic device Alder had seen during the couple times Lavy had shown him around the Facility. It was the second Artifact of Ear
th that Ed had returned with during the Battle of Undercity. The Laptop. From such Artifacts, the Inquisition directed the Players whose Heroes scoured the countryside.

  “I may have something,” the succubus whispered. “That our Lord may find of use.”

  There were creatures lurking in the depths of Hoia Forest that even the bravest adventurer would think twice about challenging. Tonight, on Spriveska’s eve, with the twin moons shining pale and distant on the clouded sky, even those creatures remained far away from the clearing that Nightshade Jarlen of the Haunt oversaw, sitting calmly on a rotting log and waiting for the night’s entertainment. The ground in front of her log had been recently dug and reset.

  A grimy fog of necromantic pollution spread around the clearing, and the stench of rot was such that Jarlen could almost taste it.

  Every vampire that had lived enough years had an instinctual awareness of the time left before dawn. At a glance, tonight still had five or six more hours left, which were about enough to finish her business here and return to the tunnels, away from the hated sunlight.

  Her first guest arrived soon enough. The ground of the mass grave broke as a dirty fist reached for the sky, followed by an arm as its owner clawed its way to the surface from among a pile of waking corpses.

  The man wore the leather-and-mail armor set of an adventurer working for the Militant Church. In life, he had been a tanned Starevosi with rough and handsome features. In undeath, those features were erased, turned by the trauma of death into taut, gray skin strung along his skull like a hollow mask.

  Jarlen smiled pleasantly as her new offspring gasped for air, then immediately realized his lungs neither worked nor his body needed them to. The vampire—an adventurer no longer—studied his grimy hands, and the nails that curved like black spurs. The hands of a predator.

  “I was dead,” the man said, his voice like a distant grasp from underground.

  “No longer,” Jarlen answered gravely.

  The newborn lifted his milky eyes in surprise and recoiled at her sight. “You are Wraith’s vampire.” He instinctively reached for his waist, looking for a weapon that wasn’t there. Then he slowly passed a hand around his face and pricked his finger on the two sharp fangs protruding out of his open mouth. “I see. You turned me. I am as you are.”

  “You could be, if you live long enough,” she said, amused. The man had retained his quick wits after turning, which pleased her. Not all were so lucky. Not all were worthy. Then again, that was tonight’s point. “Right now, you’re but a baby with one point of Essence. Now be quiet. Your brothers are coming.”

  Another hand broke the ground, making the new vampire jump away and hiss like a common barn animal. More hands followed after, and arms, and heads and torsos. The confused moaning of the damned broke the silence of the forest. A flock of birds flew away from the nearby trees, and a dozen pairs of milky eyes shone silver under Camcanna’s light.

  Jarlen had gathered the fallen with the help of the ever helpful animated skeletons of the Haunt. Most had come from a bloody dungeon battle the day before, and a few came from Undercity’s mass graves, the usual rabble that ended on the wrong side of a knife one unlucky night.

  Despite Lord Wraith’s claims that Jarlen would reign over the new “Haunted vampire” strain that Lavina would develop someday, that was in the distant future, and despite having all the time in the world, Jarlen hated wasting time. Mortals had the annoying tendency to die with unfulfilled promises as reminders of their failure. Jarlen’s two former Dungeon Lord masters, Jiraz the Old and Jiraz the Young, were prime examples of that. Even the undead could learn, and she had learned to hedge her bets.

  Wraith had given her permission to create a team of five Nightshade warriors to help fight Heiliges griffins. As a minion of the Haunt, Jarlen’s best interest lay in serving a powerful Dungeon Lord with powerful minions and unassailable dungeons. However, first above all was ensuring her continued existence. Creating more vampires to serve and protect her was the way of her ancestors—the reason they thrived despite the incessant hunting by mortals. It was a risk as well, though, because those servants often betrayed their master, just like she had done an eternity ago.

  However, with the minionship pact to force them into compliance, Jarlen had the best of both worlds. There were only two things left to do: make sure the new vampires were worthy of entering the bloodline and following Lord Wraith’s order to the letter: only five new Nightshades.

  She could accomplish both by the end of the night.

  “What’s happening?” one newborn asked weakly. He was naked from the waist up, and someone had stolen his boots. The badly sewn cut along his throat revealed him as unlucky Undercity scum. Maybe his luck would change in death, although Jarlen doubted it. To her, blood was everything, and this rabble’s blood had been thin. “Am I dead? I cannot feel my heartbeat.”

  Jarlen jumped down her log. “You are creatures of the eternal night. Stop moaning. Unlife is a blessing from the Dark god Murmur himself. But this gift must be earned, little ones.” She looked like a shadow, dressed in all-black leather, up to the featureless mask that covered her face. She drew the sword at her side, and her cutlass’ silver edge—deathly to the undead—glinted in the moonlight. Every newborn vampire recoiled instinctively. “The Haunt is your new home. You answer to Lord Wraith… and to me. But we have only space for five of you. So either you choose which are worthy or I do.”

  She made a gesture and activated one of her new talents. Necromantic energy flowed from her hand, traveled down the open mass grave, and coalesced around a leftover pile of bones. The bones floated upward, dark glyphs burning on them, as the vampires spread away from the spell. The bones formed the skeleton of a huge warhorse, and two red pinpricks of light animated its eye cavities as the creature rushed to Jarlen’s side, smoke pouring out of its maw like a furnace.

  “This mass grave is one of the Nightshades’ ancient traditions,” Jarlen explained proudly. “Only the worthy shall survive. The weak shall be culled. I have hidden weapons and armor nearby. If an hour before dawn there aren’t five of you remaining, I’ll let sunlight take care of all of you. Anyone who tries to hide, I’ll find and destroy myself. You get one minute’s grace.”

  Adventurer, Militant soldier, minion, and cutthroat stood next to each other, their former rivalries washed away by the ultimate equalizer. In death, there was no emotion to cloud their judgment. Logic reigned supreme, and logic’s verdict was simple enough. Their old loyalties were over. The living would never accept them. If the newborns were to survive, they’d have to prey on mortals. In turn, those mortals would hunt them.

  All vampires’ main concern was to ensure their continued existence. Jarlen almost laughed as the newborns exchanged grim looks among each other. She could almost read their minds, but she didn’t need to. She knew what they were thinking because she had reached the same conclusion, so many moons ago.

  What course of action had the best chances of them making it to the end of the night? They could band together and try to overpower her, despite being much weaker. Even if they somehow managed it, most would be destroyed. Or they could get an early start on their brothers, which were only about as strong as they were. The first plan required most of them to cooperate, and everyone who chose to run would have a huge advantage on the others.

  Never in the history of vampire-kind had a mass grave ever chosen the first option.

  One newborn, the cutthroat from Undercity, turned tail and ran for the trees. The tension broke and every other vampire followed in a different direction, sprinting stiffly as their muscles accustomed to their new world.

  Jarlen laughed and mounted on her undead horse, her cutlass hungry and ready.

  The hunt was on.

  A bell chimed as the door to Clarence Coldren’s Trevil’s Runes and Relics (Summer Sale) opened and Lavy strolled in with the unmistakable swagger of someone who owns the place and everything in it, including the bell.

 
The place had changed much since Lavy had taken over. The mysterious piles of random objects had been replaced by neatly ordered rows with detailed signs explaining what each item did. A line of half a dozen people, mostly old Witches and twitchy apprentices, waited patiently with baskets and shopping bags in front of the counter where Clarence Coldren carefully counted a long pile of Vyfara pennies.

  Coldren had never looked better. He was dressed in a smooth black suit with no dandruff, had a gnomish pocket watch hanging from a silver chain, and his shoes were of polished red drake leather with steel tips. His bald, oversized head was almost transparent, as if he could disappear at any time. Three miserable-looking eyes looked down at the pile of pennies.

  Lavy walked past a fireproof candle, and while waiting for the line to clear up, she thumbed a small tin locket that was cursed to make its owner forget what he was about to do when he entered a room. She decided to keep it, break it down, and see if she could modify that curse to create defenses for the Haunt. At the very least, she could annoy Alder with it.

  “Nice scarf,” a Heiligian swamp-Witch told Lavy as she got behind her in line.

  “Thanks,” Lavy said, caressing proudly the marten spirit she kept shackled to the neck of her dress. The ghost napped peacefully, keeping her body fresh in the Xovian heat. “I summoned it myself. Spirit fashion is for sure the next big thing, you know?”

  The swamp-Witch paid eight Vyfaras and a penny for a Ring of Dwarven Liver.

  “Management policy requires that I inform you the Ring is cursed to appear in the finger of someone who really needs to get drunk, then makes them immune to alcohol intoxication. Unless you take measures to keep it from disappearing, it will leave your person as soon as you no longer need a drink. If you wish to remove it before that, you’ll need a curse-breaking ritual, or somehow be completely immune to Dark magic.”