The Quizard Mountains: A Dungeon Core Epic (Station Cores Book 2)

by Jonathan Brooks

  Either he had gotten used to the smell or it had faded over time. The same couldn’t be said for the room’s appearance.

  With the enhanced light the Sensor Orbs produced, Brint was starkly reminded of the scene he encountered when he found Whisp’s body back at her house. Blood had pooled in various indentations in the floor and spots of the viscous, sticky substance appeared to have splashed against the columns, creating what Brint could only imagine was a scene out of a nightmare. When he looked closer, he saw that most of his Combat Units had been almost drenched in the stuff as well, adding to the nightmarish visage the entire room conveyed.

  Well, at least there is something I can do about that. One-by-one, he sent a different Unit to wash in the small stream outside. He made sure their position was covered while this was done, to ensure nothing could take advantage of the temporary guard rotation. After 30 minutes, they were all as clean as they could get from literally rolling around in less than foot-deep water – but at least they weren’t as terrifying as before. Well, no more terrifying than the deadly creatures normally were.

  He had instructed the drones to avoid the section where they had previously broken through, in fear that if the opening was widened they would have a harder time stopping any possible attacking force. After a few hours of being awake, however, nothing else had bothered them and most of the other walls had been mined down to bare, normal-appearing generic stone.

  Knowing that his mission wasn’t quite complete – although they had eliminated the attacking force and mined a lot of metal – Brint was sure The Milton would want him to press on and make sure this location was fully stripped of its available resources and it was clear of potential hazards. He was reasonably confident that the danger had passed – as they hadn’t heard or seen anything attack them in over half a day – so he figured that if they were to explore the passage they inadvertently opened it would be safe. Of course, the other caves that he saw outside were a different matter; before he tackled those, however, he would need to get some reinforcements.

  Another hour ticked by, where Brint made sure that everyone (including himself, even if he still didn’t feel hungry) was fed. The damaged members of his Raid Group had healed most of their wounds overnight, though a few still-healing gashes could still be seen here and there. Even the Quanks were back in shape; despite their hard shell, they still took small amounts of damage to their insides from the forceful attacks the Quizards delivered.

  At first, this confused Brint; then he remembered being battered and bruised after playing Guardians and Beasts with some other boys in the village when he was younger. Each of them would wear padded “armor” – more like stuffed shirts and pants – and would hit each other with sticks. Although they didn’t break any bones or cause any cuts, the sheer force of the impacts would leave them all bruised and achy for the next couple of days. When he considered it that way, it made more sense.

  When everything was as ready as it was going to get, the drones finished up their mining around the stone portal they had created, where it widened marginally. Soon enough, their job was complete and Brint had them load up all their supplies onto the Quartermaster. Once that was done, he sent his Quanks ahead – followed by a flock of Birdalopes – to scout out the unknown corridor. It was similar to the rest of the cave they had just been in except that it was wider and taller than even The Milton’s dungeon tunnels.

  Cautiously creeping down the stone passageway, Brint began to worry that there weren’t any more viable deposits to mine as everything they passed looked like boring old stone. It wasn’t until more than fifteen minutes of traveling down the winding tunnel that he saw a glow coming from up ahead.

  He immediately shut the sensor orbs off and noticed that the glow was stronger than he had realized. It was a different glow than the previous cavern, but it also seemed brighter somehow. As he got closer to the source of the illumination, he began to see why.

  Green-glowing rocks still dotted the walls of the new cave; however, they were accompanied by numerous conical-shaped protrusions along the floor that pulsed a light-red color. Most of them were as tall as Brint, though a few topped at least ten feet. They appeared natural, were bumpy and misshapen, and they also looked to have grown straight out of the floor. He had no idea what they were made of – though, truthfully, he didn’t know a lot about rocks in general – but he figured they would probably be useful for their dungeon.

  Before he set up shop, he explored the large cavern with his crew ranging far ahead, ready for any more surprises. At over 200 feet long and almost as wide, this room alone was packed with enough resources that Brint thought that it could take weeks with his current supply of drones to finish collecting everything. Fortunately, other than the plethora of interesting glowing rock formations, the room was empty. Another tunnel on the opposite end of the room led further into the cave, but he ignored it other than to acknowledge its presence and post a few Quanks in the large entranceway.

  Instead, he got his drones moving to set up a new mining station. He wasn’t going to stay too long, but he reasoned they might as well collect what they could before he left to get his reinforcements. He still felt uneasy being under full-strength, so having extra help would go far to alleviate his worries.

  Once the drones were steadily stripping everything they came across, Brint looked at the tunnel that led deeper into the mountain. He knew he should just stay here for a little while before heading back, but his curiosity was killing him. Maybe I’ll just explore a little bit down the tunnel. You know, just to make sure there isn’t an army of Quizards waiting to pounce on us from behind when we leave. He justified his need to explore by rationalizing it, besides, I want to make sure there isn’t anything to worry about when we come back.

  Whatever excuse he wanted to make, he was determined to follow the tunnel until he decided it was time to head back. He left a Quank and a Qwizard near the drones for guards while he took the rest of his group down the massively-sized tunnel. He didn’t think he’d be gone that long, so he figured they’d be safe for the time being.

  The passageway was almost identical to the previous one they had explored – with one difference. This one was sloped downwards, as if it led toward the bowels of the mountain. It quickly grew too dark to see, so Brint turned the sensor orbs’ light, this time remembering to bring it up gradually. He left it at a low level, both to hopefully avoid alerting anything that might be down there and so that his Units could utilize their night vision without being blinded.

  The tunnel was primarily straight, the ground was as flat as he’d seen so far, and it was only after ten minutes had passed that he noticed that the walls started to become smooth. When they encountered a switchback – a turn in the passageway that lead further down into the mountain – Brint started to become worried that they’d gone too far.

  Just as he was about to turn around, intending to pick up the drones and get out of there, one of his Birdalopes heard a sound coming from down the tunnel. Fortuitously, he wouldn’t have even known about it if he didn’t perpetually keep a feather-light link to each of his aerial scouts. Once he concentrated on the one that heard it, he was able to hear it through its exceptional perception.

  It sounded like a heavy pounding, followed by cracks that indicated something was breaking apart. It was too far to tell exactly what it was, but now he was curious. And everyone knows what happened to the curious cat.

  Unfortunately, Brint had never heard that particular expression.

  Chapter 25 – The hunt continues

  The morning so far had been uneventful. Rosewyn woke up early as usual and spent five minutes trying to get Moxwell out of bed. The first few times she experienced how much of a not-morning person he was, she thought it was cute. Now, however, it only delayed their start.

  She had tried a variety of methods in the past to wake him up: some nice, some very nice, and others not so nice. She usually went with a gentle approach at first, which was fun an
d took about 30 minutes to an hour, but today she wanted to get out and about early. After trying to shake him awake and tickling his feet – which occasionally worked – with no result, she went for her foolproof method that never failed.

  Spluttering obscenities as he wiped the icy water off his face, Mox stared daggers at her after he shot bolt upright in bed. She placed the cup of water on the nightstand and told him, “C’mon lazybones, no fooling around today. Let’s get a move on – I want to be done with this job sooner rather than later.” As she left the room, she could hear him mutter something indecent.

  “I heard that!” she yelled backwards into the guestroom, a smile on her face.

  I think I love him more and more every day.

  Once her husband was awake, he was up and ready to go rather quickly. Less than a minute later he came out of their temporary room, wiping the remainder of the cold glass of water she threw at his face. He was smiling too – he knew he was difficult in the morning and didn’t let anything she did to wake him up bother him for long. Especially since it swung both ways; an icy bath one day was usually balanced out by a very pleasant wake-up call the next day.

  “So, where we off to? Hold that thought, let’s get some breakfast first,” he asked, before his bottomless stomach got in the way.

  Knowing better than to deny him stuffing his face when he got the chance, she found that the Mayor’s wife was already up and finishing up breakfast for the family. She had made an enormous spread of food – which made sense because anyone who frequently used their ability became ravenous if they didn’t get enough to eat. To those who expended great amounts of power – like Moxwell and herself – they needed to consume even more. Mox could put down three to four times the amount someone like the mayor would need, whereas she herself could make do with only about twice the amount. Although she was actually more powerful – though he would disagree as he flexed his muscles at her – when she reached a certain power level her body was able to process the food more efficiently.

  Once they had eaten their fill, which – despite eating what looked like half his bodyweight in food – didn’t take Mox long (he had gotten more efficient himself at shoveling in his meals). After grabbing some extra food, they prepared to leave and with a big “thank you” to the Mayor’s wife, they headed out to the village proper.

  Although Moxwell hadn’t explored and investigated the place like Rosewyn did the day before, it was set up like almost every other village they had ever visited. A large wooden fence encircled it in its entirety, leaving only the outer farms where they grew their food unprotected. Well, basic protection at least – wooden walls wouldn’t stop any large beasts determined to get in.

  Which is why the Guardian Guild stationed representatives in every village, hamlet, town, and city where more than a dozen people lived together. There were a couple of small places that refused their help, but they were few and far between – and usually didn’t last that long. Most common village folk couldn’t defend against a serious invasion; while there were usually competent people around who could kill stray beasts that ventured near, if they were attacked by groups or packs of wild beasts they would be in real trouble. The higher the threat of an attack that was assessed by the Guild, the more protection they were afforded. The fact that there were only two reps present meant that they didn’t worry about an attack there anytime soon.

  As they passed the small Guild Outpost next to the fields outside the walls, they waved to one of the sleepy-looking reps she interrogat—met yesterday. He casually waved back as he surveyed the field. Their usual job in these boring villages was to protect the ones who produced and harvested the food – which was the lifeblood of a community like this. If they lost the ability to grow food so quickly, they would be in some grave trouble.

  They took care to avoid trampling the knee-high crops as they passed through a field on their way to the border. Once they reached the tall trees so common to this section of the forest, the light dimmed as the foliage above them blocked out a significant portion of the sunlight. This didn’t bother either of them, as they usually used their other senses to navigate their way through the world.

  Moxwell enhanced his sight to see in low-light conditions, clearly pick out things further away, and notice details most other would miss. His hearing was heightened to the point where he could detect a mouse scuttling through the underbrush a hundred feet away or more, while his sense of smell was on par with the fabled hunting dogs that were purported to be around before everything went crazy during The Beast War.

  Most of the time he kept his enhanced senses active, only turning them off when he was sleeping. This constant use of his power meant that his skill with those parts of his ability was so refined that it only used the barest trickle of the precious resource. The strain of keeping it constantly active was therefore negligible, which meant that it didn’t matter if he was using it or not. Therefore, he chose to use it.

  As for Rosewyn, she had an entirely different way to sense the world. Her skill with air was so refined – because, like Moxwell, she used it constantly – that she could feel how the air interacted with objects around her. She could close her eyes and “feel” everything: the short grass growing along the ground, the trees and their leaves, the small furry animal looking at them from a branch up above. At the edge of her active ability, she could even “feel” the small bald mouse scampering through the underbrush a hundred feet ahead of them. It was actually easier to sense living creatures, as almost every one of them had to breathe in some way – the movement of air was like a beacon to her.

  She used her other affinities in the same way. Her Fire affinity could feel body heat, as well as the scattered sunbeams shining through the leaves above. Her Earth affinity primarily focused downwards, where she could detect small insects and larger burrowing creatures making their way through the dirt, as well as pinpointing cavities and deposits of certain minerals. Her Water affinity was similar to fire in the fact that it could detect the water content inside living beings; most beasts – and even Proctans – she found were made up of a good deal of water. But that same affinity could also be used to “feel” around her if the moisture level in the air was high enough for a good reading – so she didn’t use it for detection unless she had no other option. And, of course, it was good for locating sources of water.

  Although she had learned quite a bit about her Light and Dark affinities, they still weren’t developed enough to maintain a constant field. Doing so would drain her power pool extensively, and there was never a real need to do so because everything she could think of was already covered by her other affinities.

  Usually, she kept her range of detection around a hundred feet or so, but she could extend that to over a thousand if she needed to. It would drain her pool quickly, but she could do it.

  Even though it had been a while since anyone had traveled through here (at least according to the subtle signs she could detect), it was obvious that more than just the three Cordpower representatives had passed this way. She would say the number was probably around the six to ten range, but no more than that. Moxwell, with his enhanced vision, concurred.

  Following the signs of passage was child’s play compared to hunting dangerous beasts. There was no attempt at camouflaging their tracks, whereas there were many smart beasts they had tracked down that would use tricks like jumping from tree to tree, creating false paths, and even deliberately using game trails to try to confuse them. Fortunately, their uniquely honed senses were able to track down each and every one – sometimes it took a while, but they always managed to find a way.

  So, instead of the difficult tracking session they anticipated, it was more like casual stroll through the peaceful forest. In fact…

  Moxwell looked back at her as she froze upon the trail, concern written all over his face at her abrupt stop. “What’s wrong?” he whispered so quietly she was barely able to hear it.

  “There are no beasts larger than
that small one up in the trees up there anywhere around. I even briefly extended my range to over 1000 feet away, and I couldn’t sense anything bigger than your boot. It’s very strange – I’ve never encountered anything like this before. Usually there is something out there, some sort of predator claiming this territory, but there is nothing. It’s almost as if something has hunted this portion of the forest so thoroughly that nothing wants to live here anymore. Highly unusual…,” she responded in a normal, yet thoughtful tone of voice.

  “Hmph. I’ve got a bad feeling about this. Let’s just say we discovered that everyone is dead and there is no threat to their business anymore. I don’t want to go up against anything that could clear this forest so close to retirement,” he pleaded, before muttering, “I’m too old for this shit…”

  “Language dear. And no, we can’t just lie and said we completed the job,” she admonished him, but with the far-off look still in her eyes, “it just means that this day will get a lot more interesting. C’mon, let’s go find out what’s causing this.”

  She passed him on the trail, as she extended her senses a little further than usual as she continued to look for anything larger than a rat.

  Behind her, she could hear Mox hurrying to catch up, “Interesting, she says. I could do without interesting – how about boring, routine, and straightforward. I like those better…,” he muttered under his breath, knowing she could hear every word.

  She smiled, her concentration momentarily broken at the thought of how this job would be more fulfilling than they had anticipated. She just hoped that it lived up to her expectations now – she was beginning to look forward to a “last hurrah” before they retired.