by Atlas Kane
Havasham shouted to be heard above the hubbub of the crowd. “I’m sure you all have much to discuss, and congratulations to all of those who succeeded on today’s dungeon dive! But we have some business to handle first. Tomorrow morning, we are sending down another team to clear the next level. Anyone who didn’t go today that wants to give it a try?”
The hunters being gone, only a few of the remaining Casmeer villagers raised their hands. Ketzal and Satemi chose to remain behind this time as Cade was planning on joining, and though the healers and tanks remained the same, a few others signed up to make the run.
Summarizing the choices, Havasham declared, “Then another sixteen shall enter the dungeon shortly after first light. Cade will be in charge of the expedition and his team of eight, and Polde will be the leader of the second team. If anyone has any further comments or issues, please meet me out near the cook stoves. I’m starving and want to try out the new ale the brewer has been bragging about.”
His final words caused an uproar of applause, and the villagers emptied out of the Town Hall in moments.
Cade stayed to chat a little while longer with Satemi, Ketzal and Minda, then joined the feast.
Among the common spoils was a trove of fish and an item called Squid Cube, a block of solid jellyfish meat that was apparently quite delicious when roasted. From the smell of everyone who’d entered the third level of the dungeon, the elementals had been filled with various sea life.
The girls are going to need to take some extensive showers tonight, or I won’t be liable for the jokes I have to make, Cade thought ruefully, knowing it wise not to even mention the thought.
They all ate together, and Cade was pleasantly surprised at how delicious the new source of meat was. As a group, they’d collected over three hundred steaks and nearly as many large fish. Being stored in the Warehouse, the food would supplement their supplies for weeks to come.
The ale was as good as everyone claimed as well, though Cade and the others who’d signed up kept it to a two beer limit. There was slaying to do in the morning, and though he knew it would be hard work, and dangerous, Cade was excited.
He rose at first light and prepared himself with an ice-cold dip in the waterfall. His senses were thrumming with life, and he spent fifteen minutes making sure that all relevant supplies were being brought with them. Medicinal herbs, a stronger Moderate Health Tincture he’d finally perfected, and a Stability Tablet that a fellow Apothecary had made, were all packed away.
This last, the Stability Tablet, didn’t heal the body, but instead acted to nullify shock, bleeding, and other ongoing physical damage. If someone was burned, for instance, they could take the tablet, and the continual damage the burns caused would either slow or stop completely depending on severity.
Finally, Cade made sure that everyone brought a Delver’s Kit, as Satemi had called it. A length of rope, bundle of torches and fire building tools, extra water and dried rations, and fur-lined parka that Tessra had labored on with a handful of assistants through the night.
They trudged toward the dungeon together, and Cade found an opportunity to share a sweet and private moment with Minda.
He reached out and held her hand as they walked.
Instantly, her face brightened, and her steps became chipper and full of life. They chatted briefly, but fell silent along with the others. This early in the morning, talking always felt wrong somehow, and he sensed she thought so too.
But clutching her tiny hand, the velvet fur smooth to touch, he reflected on how much he’d grown to love and respect this woman.
That first night in the old village, before Vormer had it destroyed by a pack of abyss cats, she’d “claimed” the rights to sleep with him. He chuckled to himself at the thought, thinking the moment absurd and absolutely sweet. As if a woman like her had to claim me? I’d take a roll in the sheets with her even if she was covered in fleas.
She glanced up at him, a question on her brow. He answered with a slight shrug. If he even mentioned fleas to her, Minda would no doubt skin him alive.
Again, Cade led them through the cave, and called out to Micah to open the next floor of the dungeon. Each time he activated the stairwell, 5 Mana Shards were consumed, but considering how much the dungeon was giving them in return, it seemed a good trade off.
Cade jogged down the steps ahead of the rest of the party, and when they emerged on the fourth floor, they found a single slab of granite at the end of the usual hallway. It was crude, as if pulled from the earth and not cut. Gesturing to Ronden, Cade stepped back and prepared to enter as the big man used his might to open the door.
After he’d begun moving it, the door slid sideways into the wall easily, and he unsheathed his own hammer in a flash. Ronden nodded and walked into the chamber beyond. Cade moved behind him with Sholl and Fenian to either side.
The group was better equipped than the last he’d gone down with, and his own leather vest had been augmented with steel plating. No more getting stabbed through the chest, at least he hoped. It was impossible to cover every part of the body and still be light enough to move around with grace.
Besides the additional armor, four of the delvers had been given the Soul Weapon Enhancers. Ronden’s hammer had grown by 10% and all of his skills were increased by the same degree. The best part was that the giant could move the huge weapon around without any additional effort.
Most of the villagers had figured Cade would claim the treasure for himself, but he felt it wise to avoid the obvious self-privileging. Instead, he suggested they give it to Minda. Others agreed happily, and now as she walked behind him, her staff glittered with more light and power than ever. Her skills had more punch, their Cooldowns reduced and active durations increased, all by 10%.
Polde’s daggers had been given the same treatment as well as Dan’s claws. Polde was a natural choice for the upgrade as she was such a high level, nearly Level 12 at this point, that she often did as much damage as two others combined. Dan had originally tried to refuse, but as the backup tank, Cade and Havasham both agreed it would be a smart decision. After the success of the fourth floor, everyone was happy he’d been given the Soul Weapon Enhancer.
The final one fell to Fenian, whose healing abilities were increased, benefiting all.
“If we find more,” Havasham had insisted, “they must go to you, Cade, as well as the other healer.”
That comment had earned him a sharp look from Cha, but the councilman kept a cool balance between his loyalties to the lycan woman and to the tribe itself.
The first chamber was a mess. A roughly hewn pocket of earth stretched wide around them, flickering lights falling down from a high ceiling. Dust motes hung in the air everywhere, and one of the delvers coughed. Everywhere on the floor, rubble lay in piles. Cade imagined that once columns of stone had stood here, but it looked as if Ronden had gotten drunk by himself and hammered the rock to bits.
“Anything over there,” Cade called to Polde, her team having moved to the opposite side of the chamber.
She shook her head tersely.
Cade looked around to the others as well, and nobody looked to have found anything of note. “Okay. Then let’s keep moving. The way seems obvious from here.”
He gestured for Ronden to continue down the tunnel beyond, a gaping hole like something a worm had burrowed through, roots dangling down. The giant made it to the beginning of the tunnel when his huge foot sunk into the ground a few inches.
A mechanism clicked into place, and bright lines of etheric energy lit up the room.
Each was leading to a pile of rubble.
“Surround the stones!” Cade screamed, rebounding away from the nearest heap of rock, already shifting and clacking together to create some as of yet unknown form.
He didn’t have to wait long to find out.
Each pile of shattered stone had assembled itself into humanoid monsters that ranged from five to seven feet tall in a matter of seconds. They were golems, good, old-fashion
ed golems. And there were twenty of them.
Thankfully, the groups were spread out, and they were only slightly outnumbered. The issue remained that each golem was a match for Ronden. Even the shorter ones swung their stone fists with such force that attempting to block the attack would result only in shattering your arm. A shield would do little but diffuse the force. Already blunt instruments that relied on incredible force, the golems were forces to be reckoned with.
Polde was shouting orders to her team, attempting to get her fighters to pair off with the nearest of the magically powered creatures.
“Minda, see what your root spell can do, but hold off on the Mycelium for now!” Cade shouted. “Who knows if we’ll need it later!”
As Cade squared off with a six-foot pile of dense stone, its eyes glowing eerily from amid a shifting mass of fist-sized stones, he activated two aspects of Mr. McGregor. First, he used Ratcheting Reach, a skill that extended the overall length of his weapon significantly. He wanted to be able to land a hit while not getting so close. It was the perfect opportunity to do so. Then he used his most recent acquisition, Impact Rod.
The axe whirred in his hand as the ability came alive. No other discernible changes were made though, and when he darted forward to strike, he wasn’t sure what might happen.
As the head of his hammer struck the side of the golem, he felt the weapon hitch a second time, and a burst of power shot out and into the creature’s body. Stone chips scattered in all directions, and a large section of its middle stone crumbled away.
Shit yeah, Cade cheered internally. Just need to land one of those on its head and it will be lights out.
The minion reacted quickly, spinning both its arms around its reduced trunk wildly. Cade back-pedaled quickly. Sholl leapt up, clearing the attacks, and thrusting the tip of his spear into the golem’s ether-filled eye.
A loud clink resounded, and the golem went stiff for a moment. It shuddered briefly before falling to the ground in pieces. “One down!” Sholl bellowed, giving Cade a confident grin.
“Three actually,” Polde responded. “Not all of us need to brag as they fight.”
“I have three more!” Ronden roared.
Cade pulled away to survey the situation. Polde had her group split into three. She and Dan were working like savages to take apart the golems, starting with the smallest and working their way up. The other two groups of three were fighting defensively, keeping the golems at bay but not going in to cause much damage. It was a cautious and effective strategy.
His own team had dissolved somewhat. Ronden was going berserk on anything that moved near him, Vrin had the others engaged with two of the largest golems, and of course Cade had Sholl at his side.
The healers were tucked against the cavern walls, waiting to step in should anyone get hurt. Even as he watched, one of Ronden’s reckless attacks brought him too close to a golem who repaid the man with a stone fist to the chest. Ronden fell back, looking stunned. The healer cast a spell, beginning to heal the man, but Cade moved to act. The giant was in trouble.
“Sholl, kite that golem, but keep your distance!” Cade ordered as he sprinted to intervene. “Vrin, shift your teams. One defensive, one offensive!”
As the fighters moved to follow his instructions, Cade hurled his hammer headlong at the head of the golem above Ronden. The big man was getting to his feet, but already the golem had its hand held up for a slamming attack. Cade’s hammer smacked it in the side of the head, and though it didn’t destroy it completely, the creature did seem dazed.
Ronden rolled away and retrieved his fallen hammer, then roared once more, his hammer igniting with ether. He spun, ducking under the attack aimed at his head, and slammed his weapon into the golem’s chest. The resulting force was so powerful Cade had to shield his face as rock exploded outward.
Finding his own weapon nearby, Cade decided to use his blast axe to good effect.
Turning the weapon around, Cade selected Explosive Shot and fired into the golem’s face. His shot was more accurate than he’d hoped for, and the huge bullet penetrated the creature’s eye and launched fragments of stone everywhere.
By then, Vrin’s offensive team had pulled down another of the large golems, and Polde’s two more.
“Okay, you’ve had your fun, Ronden. Now pull your shit together and go help out Sholl.” When the giant made to complain, Cade screamed, “Now!”
Reluctantly, Ronden ran to help out his fellow. Cade decided to join the defensive team, and he assumed control of it when he did so. Commanding them to back him up, Cade laid into another minion, cracking its body apart with his hammer, one blow at a time.
Within a few more minutes of ear-splitting battle, the last of the golems had fallen.
Cade looked around, dust making the air nearly unbreathable, and surveyed the group of delvers.
Bruises were common enough, and one of Polde’s team had broken an arm. After the healers had worked their magic on the woman, however, and Cade had followed the treatment up with a Moderate Health Tincture, they were back in order. The rest recovered with water and a few leaves of medicinal herbs.
“Loot!” Cade said, keeping his commands clipped. Everyone was coughing occasionally, and the less he opened his mouth the better.
Laying his hand on a nearby golem, Cade received the following items.
12 Slabs of Living Stone
6 Semi Precious Crystals
1 Golem Core
Who knew what the villagers could do with the materials. With as many Occupations as there were people, the prospects were high that these Slabs of Living Stone could work wonders. What tugged at Cade’s imagination, though, was the core.
Summoning the item in his hand, he took a closer look. The Golem Core was the size of a baseball, and though it weighed no more than any other stone its size, it shimmered and vibrated with power. I wonder if this thing powered the creatures. If so, this could be some kind of magical battery. Or maybe it acts to give the thing purpose or crude intelligence.
He didn’t have the capability of finding out more, so he stored it away in his Inventory and proceeded to loot several other minions.
When they’d finished, the group headed down the tunnel Ronden had originally tried for.
The passageway grew dim, the overhead lights less brilliant here and only coming once every few dozen paces.
Ronden stalked before them, his hammer held up, ready to attack anything that moved. The way was littered with broken stone, so Cade expected another mechanism to trigger and awaken a slew of golems at any time. Nothing happened though.
That is, until Ronden bumbled into a different kind of trap.
And he might have died if not for a stroke of luck.
Ronden was stepping over a particularly large boulder when his foot slipped on a handful of loose gravel. It shot out and kicked another stone that rolled forward a few feet. A hidden plate clicked down, and hundreds of pounds of stone fell from the ceiling.
The rubble crushed Ronden’s leg, but missed the rest of him. Before the dust settled, a golem twice the size of the ones they’d faced before rose above their fallen tank.
Poor Ronden screamed, in pain, no doubt, as much as in fear of the huge creature still standing on his shattered leg.
Cade aimed his blast axe at the thing’s face and was about to fire an Explosive Shot when Polde flew past him. “Hold on, Cade!” she shouted, and vaulted into the air.
Activating a skill he hadn’t seen used before, the rogue’s daggers lit up an icy blue. She slammed them into the golem’s chest, and spikes of ice burst out from the impact site. The golem froze solid, its chest crumbling apart as the ice spread through its body.
Dan had rushed forward, and to help his friend avoid further injury, hovered over Ronden as the golem collapsed. The showering stones bounced off the lycan’s back.
The group was forced to take another break to first free Ronden from the stones, and then to heal his injury. Thanks only to the magnitud
e of the giant’s bones was he able to continue. His leg was broken, but cleanly, and after ten minutes, had knit back together.
Polde took the lead afterward, and several times as they burrowed deeper and deeper into the mountainside, she would spot the minute mechanism.
By surrounding the Mega Golem, Level 12 minions as they turned out to be, they were able to destroy each one quite easily.
“Thank god you’re here,” Sholl said to his love. “Dan would have to keep saving Ronden otherwise, and I do believe the healers have a limit to what they can perform.”
The giant man grumbled but remained quiet. Cade spoke for him. “He’s right, Polde. If we didn’t have you to spot these traps, the going would be much more dangerous. You might have saved a life today.”
The bird woman bowed at the waist. She didn’t respond verbally, however, so Cade suggested they press on.
Eventually, the downward sloping tunnel leveled out, and slowly, the walls to either side stretched wider.
A huge chamber rested ahead, four pillars of light falling onto a gravel-strewn pit. In the center stood a small hill.
“And that, everyone, is the boss,” Minda said, pointing to the hill.
“I wish I thought you were wrong,” Cade responded, giving hand signals for the group to spread out.
The stones before them were each as tall and wide as small cars. A single blow would kill any two of them. Cade chewed his lip, trying to figure out how to solve the problem in his head before they triggered the beast to life.
“Ronden, you have to be careful, okay? I have some explosives, but I don’t think they are large enough to make a difference. Anyone have any suggestions?” Cade asked.
Polde just blinked in obvious confusion. A rogue like her couldn’t stand a chance against such raw power. Finally, she said simply, “I have no clue. But I used my skill. A trip mechanism is just over there a few feet from the side of the mound.”
Thankfully, Vrin added his own thoughts, forming an idea that seemed almost logical. “We figure out how to wake the damn thing up. Separate into four teams of four, and keep the creature moving. Nobody gets closer than they have to, and somehow, someone hits one of its eyes. Your explosives might be too small to blow it all up, but not an eye. Maybe that will take it down.”