“Are you sure it says ‘Drunador’?” Gratia interrupted me.
“Yeah. Why?”
“Hmmm. Nothing. Please continue.”
“They planned for half a century; waiting for the ripe opportunity. Finally, it came. Rwunidar had found a bride. The wondrous Lelinah, who was descended of the Low Lord, and the Ice Hammer Clan hero planned a massive celebration during the month of their unity. They invited all the dwarven clans to their stronghold as guests, and the Drunador disguised their hateful eyes and muddy skin with low hats and bulky clothing.”
“Then, on the night of the wedding ceremony they attacked.”
“Rwunidar and the clans were caught unaware, but the hero was too powerful to die from a hundred axe cuts. He killed the attackers, but his new bride had died during the combat. ”
“Rwunidar took an oath of silence, and never spoke or sang to his people again.
“Until the day he slayed the last Drunador.”
There were more symbols at the bottom of the scroll, and they seemed to dance as my eyes focused on them. Suddenly they seemed to twist into a stylized drawing of a stout dwarven warrior, and my UI started to flash. I felt as if someone had just pumped a gallon of adrenaline in my heart and my muscles all started to tense.
“Leo, are you okay?” Artus asked.
“Yeah. I think so,” I said through a shiver. It wasn’t an unpleasant feeling, if anything, I felt powerful.
“I have never heard of Rwunidar, but I have heard of the Drunador. They are supposed to be dark versions of our kind. Bent on destruction instead of crafting. May I take this scroll? I think our loremaster will want to look at it.”
"Of course," I said as I handed her the rolled paper.
"Can you all hold on for a second? I need to look at something," I asked my three friends.
"Where are you going to go?" Artus asked.
"Nowhere. I'll be right here." I motioned up to my body outline on my UI and then gestured over to the Abilities tab.
Rwunidar's Might- Body 25. Stance. Take on the fortitude of Rwunidar. Attacks that hit you do 50% damage. Stance is broken if you speak, or use another ability. If the stance is broken, you cannot use the ability for another eight hours.
"Wow! This is badass!"
"What is wrong, Leo?" Allurie asked.
"Oh, nothing is wrong. I just learned a new ability."
"You learned something from reading the scroll?" Artus asked.
"Yeah. I ummm. I'll explain a bit later. Let's keep exploring."
"There is another structure over there. I'm thinking it might be a training hall," Gratia said as she pointed opposite of the gate where we had entered.
"Shit. I don't really see anything. You all have sharper eyes than I do."
I followed the dwarf past the blocky dwellings and saw the corner of the structure rise out of the darkness. The building did look massive, and I guessed that it was about the size of a football field inside.
"Allurie, do you still hear that singing?" I asked the elf woman after we reached the corner of the building.
"Yes. It is coming from that way," she pointed deeper into the darkness of the forgotten city.
"Okay. Tell me if the singing stops." I didn't really know which direction was which down here, but if I called the gate we entered the south side of the city, we were still in the southeast corner of the place. Allurie had pointed toward the far north end of the city, and part of me wasn't looking forward to finding out what could possibly scare the happy-go-lucky elf woman.
But then again, I'd never been able to turn down fat loot in a game. This shit was super fun, and it was bringing me back to my early days of playing Astafar Unlimited. The thought of getting new gear, and the gold to buy more new gear, was really exciting. I had kind of lost that feeling with Astafar Unlimited over the last five years. They had often come out with new content, but I quickly beat it, and then acquired all the best gear in the game. It felt kind of refreshing to know that I had to rebuild myself from nothing. Hell, I didn't even have starter clothes anymore.
"There is the entrance. There is still a door on it," Gratia whispered as she pointed at the south side of the massive structure. The walls to this place were not decorated, but the door was etched with designs that made me think of Celtic knots, only more square in shape.
"It might be locked," I said as I tried the door handle. The wood looked incredibly thick, and it seemed to have fossilized.
"I've got a pick," the dwarf said as she reached into one of the pouches I hadn't noticed she had been wearing on her belt.
I held my sword and her emberbrand over her head while she went to work on the lock. First, she poured a little oil into the crack of the keyhole, and then she took something that looked like a metal straw and blew air into the hole. I guessed that she did that to get the oil up into the pins of the lock. Then Gratia took out a pick and an L-shaped tension rod. She worked for a few minutes in silence, and then finally the lock made a clicking sound when the handle turned.
"There have to be some weapons or something in here," she whispered eagerly as she slid her tools back into her pouch.
"Want me to go in first?" I asked as I handed her back the emberbrand.
"Aye. You are bigger, and you'll shield me from all the traps that are probably lying in wait."
"Traps?"
"Ha. Scared you didn't I? Dwarfs don't use traps in our cities. That would be all sorts of foolishness, but go ahead of me."
I pulled out my broadsword and walked through the door. The ground here felt a little different on my bare feet, and I realized that it was a rougher kind of stone inside. It almost felt like a porous lava rock, but my soles didn't feel any sort of sharp edges between the set tiles.
"Aye. I was right. This was a battle hall. Empty now, though."
"How can you tell?" I asked
"That it is empty? Just look around. No one is here. I swear, humans."
"No. I mean, how can you tell it is a battle hall?" I asked
See the dents in the stone over here?" She walked across the expanse of empty floor and pointed to the ground. "It has been smoothed by hundreds of years of training; you can see that the tiles have been dyed with dwarven blood. This place smells of their honor, and their struggles."
"I see something on the far side of the hall," Artus gestured over to the corner on the southeast side farthest away from us.
My companions and I walked across the empty hall toward where the fenia had pointed. As we reached the corner, I saw that most of the space was taken up by standing racks of dwarven plate, chain, and scale armor. I counted six total, and each suit looked in surprisingly good condition.
"By grandfather's beard," Gratia whispered with amazement. "These are thousands of years old, and I don't recognize any of these techniques. Do you see how the gauntlets are joined to the vambrace? They are welded together! Ha! How did they do that with such a thin lay?"
I put my hand on one of the suits, and my orange UI window popped up in my display.
Dwarven Plate Mail of Shadow Strength
Armor Rating- 20
Durability- Magical
Br +5
Qu--
In--
Wi--
Pe--
Ch--
Co +5
Lu +5
The lettering was in blue, and I kind of stared for a few seconds at the hue of the glowing name. This was a bad ass suit, and I bet that the rest of the stuff was probably blue as well. Then I saw the text at the bottom of the description and sighed.
Maximum height - four and a half feet
The suits were all on the small side, and I was a big dude, even a human. It probably would have been too drastic of a power increase for me to find blue gear on my first series of quests.
I moved to a few of the other suits and examined them. They were all magical with blue text, and I felt the pleasure radiate from Gratia when she silently examined the craftwork of the armor with me.
"So?" I asked after I had looked at the last suit.
"So what?"
"These are all magical. How much do you think each suit is worth?"
"Ha! Well, let me put it to you this way." She took a step back to the first set of armor and grabbed onto the gauntlet again. "This single piece will probably pay off my marriage."
"So we are rich then?" I asked with a laugh.
"Maybe." She shook her head and gave me a thoughtful look.
"What do you mean?"
"We aren't going to be able to sell everything to her clan," Artus spoke from behind me.
"Aye, the fenia is correct. My clan might be able to buy one of these suits off of me, but they probably won't. In fact, I'd be a bit worried that our haul might be too good for them. They could tell me that they will just take all of it."
"Wait, they would just steal it from you?" I felt my stomach knot.
"It isn't really stealing. You don't understand how dwarves work. Each clan is made of hundreds of close-knit families. We have all sworn that we are stronger together than apart. The clans all support the Low King, and I'm one of his descendants. It is going to be one thing to trade a suit for my freedom, but it will be something else if I tell them they have to buy the rest. It borders on treason, and I will be exiled."
"Ahh, shit," I said. "But we are splitting the treasure four ways. You can give them your suits, and we can sell the others to them. Won't that work?"
"Nope," she sighed. "These are dwarven works. They won't flat out take them from you, but they won't offer you any assistance. If anything, they will completely forget that you saved me from the gnolbolds, and tell you to get out of the stronghold. You won't have any supplies, and you'll be stuck in the mountains. Trackers will follow you and hope that you freeze to death so that they can take the armor."
"That's fucking brutal," I sighed, and then I held my finger up to Allurie so that she wouldn't comment.
"It would be different if it was weapons. Even if they were of dwarven make, you could use them and could claim that you've had them in your family. They will want the armor."
"So if we give them the armor, would they help us out with a wagon, and some supplies so that we can get to Arnicoal?"
"Yes, but they would do that anyway. If you give them all this armor, you will have their eternal gratitude, and I'm sure that the loremaster will go out of his way to find more about the Pieces of Heliotrope."
"I guess that is something I can use," I sighed. "Also, there is much more to explore in this city. Let's carry these suits back to the cart, and then search the rest of these ruins."
"Aye, that is a good plan. Thank you human-- I mean, Leo. You are a real friend, and I won't forget what you have done for me. You've saved my life twice today."
"No worries, Gratia. That is what we do on quests." I raised my hand in the air, and the short woman bumped her fist with mine in the dwarven manner.
"Allurie, can you get all these suits of armor off of the racks and find some way to bundle them up so we can carry them?"
"Almost done!" Allurie shouted gleefully.
"How in the hell did you do that?" I asked as I turned from Gratia.
I had only been looking away from the armor for a few seconds while I talked to Gratia, yet Allurie had somehow taken all but the last suit of armor off of their racks, unpacked them, stacked them within each other like those crazy Russian dolls, and was now in the process of taking the one off of the rack next to me.
"Did I do something wrong?" she asked with a wide-eyed expression on her pretty face.
"No. I just-- One of these days I'm going to see how you do that so quickly. Like show me now," I said as I pointed at the last suit of armor.
"Oh, it is easy. All you do is untie the buckles here, and then you can release the straps that hold the plates together. Taadaa!" she said as the armor fell apart in her hands like some sort of magic trick.
"I must have blinked or something. I still didn't see what you did," I said as I rubbed my eyes with my hands. Her fingers had been a complete blur when she spoke. She was like some sort of super cleaning magician. A horny, super-cleaning magician.
"I'll grab all this," I said as I squatted to pick up the nest of armor. It was a real shame that I couldn't wear any of it, or sell it, but I needed leads on these relics. If Gratia's loremaster really did know about them, getting his help would save me a ton of time.
Time was much more important right now. I needed a plan of attack for getting these relics, and I had no idea where to begin besides Gratia's people. My other plan had involved returning with Artus to Arnicoal and trying to search for information in the bigger city. I would still follow that plan, but this seemed like a better lead.
We walked out of the training hall with our loot, around the side road, and down the steps to the small square houses. As we passed through the alleyways between them, Artus let out a warning hiss, and we jumped back behind one of the walls near the end of the cluster.
"What?" I whispered softly to my friend.
"I see light. Up there," he said with a head nod around the corner toward the bridge that would take us back to the gate.
"Cover our emberbrands," I said. "Allurie, do you still hear the singing?" I whispered to the elf girl.
"Yes!"
"Shhhhh!" we whispered at her angrily.
"Oh. Sorry. Yes," she whispered.
"Does it sound different at all?" I asked.
"No, but I'm trying not to pay attention. It is not a nice song." She frowned.
"What isn't nice about it?"
"Leo, look!" Artus pointed before Allurie answered me, and I followed his finger.
There was a greenish glow in the center open area by the bridge. The light was coming closer, and while it was still three or four hundred yards away, it looked like a floating eyeball.
And the eyeball had a bunch of eyeball stalks coming out of its head.
"It is a beholder," Gratia said softly. I had kind of already guessed the name, since it was a common monster in fantasy lore.
Beholders were pretty powerful in most games. They weren't invincible, but a level one player with non-magical weapons and no armor could not hope to defeat alone. I didn't know what my exact power level was, but none of my weapons were magical, and I didn't have any clothes on besides a dirty pair of pants looted from a corpse.
Looks like it was time to get out of here.
We were peeking out at the monster from behind one of the building corners. It was really far away from us, and our emberbrands were covered, but the thing was one giant fucking eye, and it seemed to twist all of its eye stalks toward our position.
Then the monster let out a scream that filled the dead city with a horrific echo of terror.
"Oh. The singing stopped. That's a relief," Allurie said as the beholder flew toward us.
Chapter 23
"Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit." I stood from my peeking spot and tried to get my scrambled brain to come up with a plan.
One popped into my head that was all sorts of stupid, then another one came in that was slightly less stupid, and finally, I came up with one that would probably get me killed, but ensure my friends would get out of here alive.
"Take this armor," I said as I handed the load to Gratia. "And you all hide in one of the far buildings."
"What about you?" Artus asked.
"I'm going to distract it and run around the city. As soon as you all see it follow me, make a mad run for the cart. Get the armor inside, and then give me a few minutes. If I don't come out, get back to Gratia's stronghold."
"Leo, this is suicide. You can't stand against a beholder." The dwarven woman shook her head.
"Neither can you three. Besides, I'm going to run, and so are you. Get going!" I stood from behind the wall of the square house and ran in the northwest direction so that the floating green glowing eyeball could see me.
"Hey, asshole! Over here!" I pulled one of my short swords out
and made it light up with Ember.
The beholder had more than a dozen eyestalks, and they twisted toward me a half second before the rest of the giant eyeball monster banked in the air to follow their lead.
"There you go, asshole. Now you just need to-- Shit!" I shouted as I threw myself onto the cold stone tile of the city road.
One of the smaller eyeballs on top of a stalk had shot some sort of crazy flame laser. It had cut through the air like magma from a fire hose, and I had barely managed to dodge the blast. I felt the heat of its fire wash over me, and I rolled to my side before I sprung up to my bare feet.
"Ahhh!" One of the other eye stalks shot out a spiraling swirl of ice looking cold, but I was already running north, and the blast hit the ground a few dozen yards behind me. My feet and legs felt the chill from the frost, and I guessed that I would have turned into an ice cube had the thing actually managed to hit me.
This was a terrible idea.
But at least the monster was following, and I made a quick check over my shoulder as I ran to make sure that all of its eyestalks were pointed at me. They were, and I actually saw the far glow of my friends’ emberbrands as they made their dash to the bridge. Okay. Maybe this wasn’t so bad, I just needed to--
Not stub my toe on a chunk of stone on the ground.
“Fucking shit fuck!” I screamed as my foot numbed with sudden pain. I tripped for a few seconds and then groaned with agony when my injured foot sprinted a few steps to keep me upright.
I felt the air change, and I threw myself to the side with as much urgency as I could force my legs to exert. The air split with the sound of thunder, and a spray of white colored electricity flew past me. I smelled something kind of like a burnt plastic, and the terror of my near death made me forget all about the pain of my toes.
I rolled across the hard stone street of the city and pushed off the ground with my free hand. There were a bunch of homes, or maybe shop building structures on my left, and I heard the pour of water to my right in the distance. I didn’t think that jumping in the water was going to be a good idea when the beholder could just boil or freeze the liquid, so I made a sharp left, dashed up some stairs, and then dove behind the closest building’s edge.
Lion's Quest: Undefeated: A LitRPG Saga Page 34