by Ivan Kal
Morgan let her do it; she wasn’t having much impact on the fight, but he knew that practice was a way for the ascended to advance, and they needed every bit of help they could get.
A strange sound brought Morgan’s attention to the end of the room, and the four magic users. The ward-like glowing symbols in the circle between them was glowing—and then it disappeared, getting swallowed into some kind of red-and-black pool. A moment later, an arm reached out of it. Morgan’s eyes widened as more of the creature started appearing, with long horns being next. Goddamn it! A fucking demon? Morgan turned around immediately. “Lucius!” he yelled, pointing at the mages.
The Roman turned his eyes on them, and Morgan could see the horror and realization on his face.
“We need to stop them!” Morgan yelled, preparing to fire arrows at them even though it probably wouldn’t make a difference with that shield around them.
Lucius cursed, and then ran up to the balcony and jumped off. A sudden burst of wind hit him in the back, sending him forward over the few lizard-men still remaining below them. Morgan watched in disbelief as Lucius landed on the ground a bit more roughly and then fell into a roll. As soon as he came out of it he started running at the mages.
Morgan glanced at Ves and Vall, seeing them keeping the lizard-men back. Ves had a cut on her arm, and Vall was favoring his left leg. Most of the lizard-men were now on the stairs, and Morgan knew that he wasn’t going to be of much use there. His friends were too close to the lizard-men for him to shoot from here.
He turned toward the running form of Lucius and cursed loudly. He turned to Clara. “Stay here, help them!” He nodded toward Ves and Vall, then took the few steps to the balcony and jumped off. He pulled out and fired a binding arrow at the ground as he fell. Roots expanded out of the arrow catching him and softening his fall. As soon as the roots started entwining around him, he reached out to them and ripped the life energy back into himself. He had never really done that, and he felt a sudden surge of power that slowly dissipated as the roots crumbled to dust.
He shook his head at the sensation, and then turned to look at the base of the stairs, seeing a few lizard-men notice him and run back in his direction. He shot them with a Scatter Shot of three exploding arrows, and seeing them fall, he took off running after Lucius.
The Roman was standing just outside of the shield, hammering at it with his swords, but the shield was still there—and the demon’s shoulders just left the pool. It had a bull’s head with long horns and dark brown skin, with short fur over its arms and long claws which were bracing the ground as it raised itself up. Already, its upper half was as tall as Morgan. FUCK ME!
Morgan noticed that the mages were all looking tired, and with each of Lucius’s strikes, they were wincing. Morgan ran up and drew his short sword, adding his strikes to the Roman’s.
The demon was looking at them hungrily, but then the shield cracked under their blows, and one of the mages staggered. Both Lucius and Morgan rushed forward, putting their blades in the backs of the two mages closest to them. The other two abandoned their chanting and pointed their staffs at them, firing bolts of red fire. Morgan ducked and rolled, coming close enough to the circle that the demon lunged after him, catching one of his legs as he came out of the roll. Morgan screamed like a little girl, which seemed to surprise the demon. It was a moment of hesitation, enough that Lucius could take care of the other two mages, with the combination of his air blades and sword through the neck. The demon’s inhuman eyes widened and it let go of him, trying to get back in the circle. But it was too late—the circle snapped and disappeared, cutting the demon in half.
“Holy, fucking, shit,” Morgan said as he looked at one half of a demon lying on the floor and dripping blood everywhere.
Lucius agreed with a nod. “That could’ve been dangerous. If I am not mistaken, that was a class-three demon; they are usually between level 20 and 30. We wouldn’t have stood a chance.”
Morgan shook his head, and turned to look at the balcony, where their friends were still fighting. Wordlessly, the two of them started running back. They reached the stairs and climbed up, hitting the lizard-men from behind. It was a tough battle; Morgan let Lucius take the lead and stayed mostly back. His bow was useless in such close quarters, but he did use his short sword whenever he saw an opportunity. In the end, they prevailed.
Once they had finished, Morgan looked at his friends, each of them tired, exhausted. Vall and Ves were bleeding from several wounds. Morgan found the tired-looking Clara and approached her. “You okay?”
Clara nodded. “Yes, I just…need a moment.”
Morgan nodded. He knew that the closer one got to depleting your energy, the more one felt the effects of that depletion. “Can you heal our friends once you recover enough?”
Clara gave him a resolute nod, but didn’t otherwise answer. He studied the orc woman; she looked fierce, and yet she was a healer. He didn’t think he was someone who would be into orc women, but he couldn’t deny that she was striking. Hell, I fantasy-married an elf. Looks like I’m into weird stuff.
This was her first dungeon, and she was holding up pretty good.
He turned to find his friends, who had all found spots on the ground, leaning against the walls. “So, what the hell was that? I thought that the dungeons respawned with the same monsters?”
They exchanged glances, and he could see that neither Ves nor Vall had an answer. It was Lucius who answered him. “That is usually the case. I have heard of only a few dungeons which changed their compositions after a clear.”
“Well, it’s a good thing that someone warned me about that!” Morgan said sarcastically. They conversed a bit, and after a short discussion decided to keep moving deeper into the dungeon. Clara recovered enough to heal the others, and did so. After a few moments, they made their way toward the stairs. The others went ahead, but he stayed with Clara, who was catching her breath after the healings.
“I didn’t think that it would be like this,” Clara said as they were climbing down.
“Like what?”
“There were so many of them. I can’t imagine what it was like doing this when you were my level.”
“Well, we are all pretty badass.” And we were fighting tiny kobolds.
Clara glanced at him with a small shy smile around her tusks. “That you are.”
They rejoined the others, who were peering into a few chests in the kobold—now lizard-men—workshops. There was a lot of ore here that they could transport back to the Hold, thankfully.
After accounting for everything, Morgan and the rest of the group moved to the end of the room and then down to the next floor.
They cleared the mines fairly fast; there were still kobold miners here, but also a few of the lizard-men, though not as many as there had been upstairs. They weren’t really a challenge, and Lucius and Morgan moved stealthily and took them unprepared. Finally, they reached the gate. Morgan considered turning back then, but he really wanted more ingredients from the manticore boss, if there was still a manticore boss, and he wondered what kind of loot would be in the chest this time. The addition of the lizard-men might’ve given them even more loot. The problem was that he was having really bad flashbacks to the last time, so once they raised the gate, he had Lucius cut off the lever to prevent the gate from being lowered. He was being paranoid, but he couldn’t help it.
Then, as they moved past the gate, Morgan froze. He looked at the wall with disbelief in his eyes, and the others did the same. Up one the right side wall was writing, in softly glowing letters. Morgan blinked as he read through it. Hidden lever here, it said, followed by an arrow pointing down.
“That hadn’t been there before? Right?” Morgan asked.
“No,” Vall answered. “It hadn’t.”
Morgan moved closer to the wall, and looked around the stone block that the arrow was pointing at. He reached out slowly and tried to push the block. Nothing happened, it didn’t even budge. But he did notice so
mething: the rock was chipped at two corners, one down, one up. From the distance it looked like it was nothing but the rigors of time, but up close Morgan could tell that the two corners looked identical. He put his fingers into the holes, and then caught the edges. Acting on instinct, he pulled instead of pushed. The entire block came out, grinding against the others, revealing that it was hollow, and inside the indent in the wall was a lever.
“Motherfucker,” Morgan whispered. “That hadn’t been there the whole time? Tell me that it hadn’t been there. We checked this wall, right?”
Morgan was looking at his group, each of whom was looking at the wall in disbelief.
“I hadn’t noticed anything,” Vall said slowly. “But, I…I didn’t try to pull the stone out. I just pushed.”
“Well, fuck me sideways. We could’ve left here without fighting the final boss?”
No one answered him.
“Great, just great!” Morgan threw his hands in the air.
“Morgan?” Ves said as she peered into the indent.
“What?” He turned to look at her, and saw her pointing at something beneath the lever.
He narrowed his eyes as he noticed a small silver plaque. There was more writing on it. He frowned as he read through it.
For M, L, V & V: Next time, look closer—or try not to get trapped in the first place.
It was signed G.F.
“The hell does that mean?” Morgan turned to look at the others, who all wore looks of open astonishment on their faces.
“A message from the Guiding Force herself…” Vestella whispered.
“I…I have never heard of anything like that,” Vall said.
“Right, just what I needed, another god taking interest in me,” Morgan murmured. Stupid-ass gods-not-gods.
He left them there to gaze at the stupid plaque, as he walked toward the boss chamber. The hell did I do to deserve the gods-not-gods of this place to mock me? He took a peek inside, and saw the manticore, sitting on the rock, the same as before. Great, at least the boss hasn’t been changed.
A few minutes later the others joined him. The boss had been level 14 last time, but this one was only level 11. Still, it was a powerful creature, and they proceeded carefully. Morgan had Vall stay back this time to protect Clara, with the plan being Ves grabbing its attention and then Lucius and Morgan to keep attacking until it died.
As soon as they got down in its area, the manticore roared and began its attack, charging at them. Clara attached her Drain and Morgan fired off two Arrows of Decay with wards, each hitting it and making it falter and shake its head. Ves charged forward and bashed her sword on its head, stunning it. Lucius was at its side almost immediately and stabbed his swords in its stomach. Its tail lashed out, but he was fast enough to jump away.
Morgan fired an explosive arrow, which struck near its shoulder and damaged half its face and an eye. The manticore roared and attacked around itself blindly, catching Ves on the arm and tearing a deep gash. Ves slashed at it in return, taking out its other eye before jumping back and holding her arm. The blind manticore raged all around as Morgan put arrows in it and Lucius sent blades of air in its sides, cutting deep gashes there.
Then an energy arrow to the face ended the fight, and the manticore fell down on the floor, dead.
“Never been easier!” Morgan said, pumping his fist into the air in triumph.
That’s when the second manticore crashed into his back.
Its maw closed down over his shoulder and it threw him to the side. Morgan flew through the air and crashed against a rock, hard. He could barely think from the pain, but he managed to sit up and lean against the rock. He couldn’t see his bow anywhere, but he still had his sword. He hissed as he moved his other arm and pulled it out. The others were fighting the other manticore. Morgan wanted to help, but he was out of the fight. He could do nothing but watch.
Ves was keeping it occupied, as Lucius tried to get around it and stab at it. He got a few good hits, before the manticore managed to catch him with one of its paws and pummel him into the ground. Vall charged it before it could finish the job and kill the Roman. His two-handed sword burned with red fire as he stabbed it in the shoulder. The manticore roared and tried to dislodge both the sword and Vall, who was holding it.
That’s when Vall released a power-wrought bellow right in its face. The manticore was stunned, disoriented, and that’s when Ves stepped forward and stabbed her sword through the bottom of its jaw up into its brain.
“Great…job, guys…” Morgan murmured, trying to lift his sword up in the air. It toppled from his grasp and everything went black.
When he woke up again, he looked right into the concentrating face of an orc. Clara was leaned over him with her eyes closed. Morgan felt energy from Clara push into him and the life within him being encouraged, increasing his regeneration, and he could feel as his wounds slowly closed themselves shut. Once done, Clara sighed deeply and nearly collapsed, but Ves was there to catch her.
“I’m okay, I just need a moment,” Clara murmured.
Ves kept holding her until she was sure that she could stand on her own. Ves put a hand on the orc woman’s shoulder and smiled at her. “Thank you.”
Morgan groaned on the ground. “That was not fun. Not fun at all.”
“At least you aren’t dead,” Vall said. “Which you would’ve been, had we not had her with us.” Vall gave Clara a respectful bow of his head. The orc woman was too exhausted to react to it.
“Good thing I had her come with us then,” Morgan said with a grin on his face. Vall rolled his eyes and walked away, murmuring something that Morgan couldn’t catch.
Morgan slowly got back to his feet, aided by Lucius, as his Ves was too busy holding up the orc woman. After a few minutes Morgan felt well enough to walk, and they all moved to the chest behind the rock and looked inside.
There was not as much loot as the last time, but they still got three high-quality ascension crystals, two small pouches filled with gold, and a horned helmet that gave a bonus to strength, which Vall took.
After that Morgan returned to the manticore corpses and started harvesting the ingredients. This time he even took some bone and fur, while the others left back into the other parts of the dungeon to begin collecting the rest of the loot. After he finished with them, he went back to the second floor, and found the half of the demon’s body still there, so he harvested its heart and horns as well. When he finished, he put it all in his Bag of Holding and then made his way to the spawning point’s doors. He looked at them for a moment. They still couldn’t remember how they got out, how they ended up on Reach, but they remembered the spawning door opening and them stepping inside and the next thing they knew they had been somewhere else.
Morgan couldn’t help but think that it had something to do with Oxylus or the Guiding Force. The image of a young woman was featured prominently on the doors, and something about her appearance nagged at Morgan; he just couldn’t figure out what it was. And she had left a message directed at them specifically—he didn’t know what that meant.
He reached out slowly to the doors and placed his palm on them. Nothing happened. For a moment he considered punching the door like last time, but he thought better of it. Right, better not provoke godlike beings.
Morgan headed back to the rejoin the others.
It took them two hours to gather as much loot as they could pack onto the wagon. They took some weapons that were of good quality for the Sky Guard, some armor which Artos could hopefully refit for humans, and as much ore as they could manage to pack.
After they finished with that they all checked their notifications to see how much exp they had all gotten.
DUNGEON GROUP EXP GAINED! (DUNGEON GROUP CHANGED TO GROUP)
24 Kobold Warriors killed = 480 exp
37 Kobold Miners killed = 370 exp
10 Kobold Scouts killed = 150 exp
34 Lizard-men killed = 1700 exp
4 Lizard-men mages killed =
240 exp
2 Manticores killed = 280 exp
Morgan Newton LVL 12 — EXP 5351/4000 (ascension possible)
Morgan whistled at that and, seeing that he could ascend, he immediately entered his soul space.
“Master,” the floating implant/ghost thingy greeted.
“Sabila,” Morgan greeted back.
The dungeon had given him less exp than what they had received the first time, but it looked like they hadn’t out leveled it yet—especially with the new monsters now occupying it, they could still get some use from it. He pressed the button for ascension and leveled up.
Morgan Newton LVL 13 — EXP 1351/5000
He got two attribute points from that, so he put one in Agility and the other in Will. He also got two skill and ability points, but he still didn’t want to spend those, and that left him with 6 skill and 5 ability points. He glanced at his tables and saw that he had upgraded a few of his abilities; some he had upgraded during the run, and a few others before, when he had been practicing.
STRENGTH
13
AGILITY
(23+1) 24
CONSTITUTION
15
INTELLECT
20
WILL
(21+1) 22
WISDOM
13
CHARISMA
10
LUCK
10
SKILLS
Hand-to-Hand Combat II
Weapons I
Language-Basic
Elemental Alignment-Nature V(+one rank Guild buff)
Archery VII
Hunting II
Monster Lore III