The Dungeon Fairy: Three Lives: A Dungeon Core Escapade (The Hapless Dungeon Fairy Book 3)

by Jonathan Brooks

  “Boss, we should get out of here,” Squab said suddenly, which just annoyed Marvus even more. “I think that you might be wrong about what we might find here.”

  Without even thinking about it, he backhanded the worthless Level 12 Thief, sending Squab sprawling after he slammed into the nearest wall. “Strip him of anything of value; we don’t condone cowardice in the Cohort.” The organization was a hard bunch, having done some more-than-questionable things in the past, but the few things they couldn’t handle were cowards or those that couldn’t follow orders. As for Marvus, he couldn’t abide by others disparaging his abilities.

  The others leapt to obey, stripping the protesting Thief of everything but his clothes. “Get out of here, you fool. You had better disappear, too, because if I see your face again, you’ll only live long enough to regret crossing me.” Marvus kicked him hard in the side, before turning his back on the disgraced Cohort member. He heard Squab get up painfully and retreat, going back the way they came.

  “Alright, lead on.”

  Now knowing that there were Assassins in the maze, they took their time and watched out for any more threats. They were quickly joined by the other team, who had run into a dead end a little earlier, and they made their way through the rest of the maze without taking any other casualties. Of all the Raider Classes out there, they were the most prepared to counter an enemy Assassin-type, especially as the Gnolls were particularly weak when they didn’t get a surprise cheap-shot in.

  The next room was a complete change from the last couple, as it was full of trees. Since Squab wasn’t there anymore, Marvus couldn’t ask if this was how the other dungeon looked, but he had to assume that it was. There didn’t seem to be any dangerous monsters inside the room, however, or at least none that they could see. They did find some traps that were so obvious in their placement and easy to bypass that they barely even needed to Detect them, but they Disarmed them anyway.

  “Hey, that is one fine-looking woma—ahh!” Marvus suddenly heard next to him, only to see Derf looking up into the trees, an arrow embedded in his shoulder. A second one slammed into his other shoulder as he tried to avoid it, and then chaos figuratively rained down on the entire group.

  “Take cover! Counterattack!” His words were unneeded, as everyone scattered and hid behind trees, blocking them from the line of fire from above. Marvus caught a sight of their attackers, which seemed to be women with fiery red hair holding bows, which didn’t make sense to him; when he saw the bushy tail behind one of them, he knew what they were: Kitsune.

  The Cohort leader dragged Derf away under a hail of arrows, taking one in his upper left arm as a reward. He wasn’t giving up their trap specialist without a fight, however. When he was back behind the safety of the nearest tree, Marvus pulled out some of his throwing knives and took aim around the trunk of the tree, tossing his projectile weapon straight for the throat of the Kitsune across from him. His knife flew true, only to have the humanoid-fox creature dodge it at the last moment, barely nicking its cheek as it pulled away.

  How? It turned out that the archers in the trees were fast and quite agile, bounding from tree branch to tree branch in an effort to avoid more projectiles, as well as moving into a better position in which to fire onto those below. They weren’t the only ones that were agile and at home upon the branches of a tree, however.

  Half of the Cohort started to climb the trees, nimbly pulling themselves up, and started to chase the Kitsune around. While they were occupied, the others of the Cohort continued to throw knives above themselves, hoping to strike the fleeing archers while they were distracted. Just as Marvus managed to hit one in the knee, he felt a pain in his own knee, which nearly caused him to collapse.

  Looking down, he stared right into the eyes of a brown fox, which blended into the roots of the tree he was hiding behind so well that he could barely distinguish between the two. The dungeon monster was currently trying to bite through his leather pants, and he could feel a trickle of blood coming from where it had managed to penetrate the tough material.

  “Get off!” he shouted, slamming his knee – fox and all – against the tree, where he heard the crunching and hollow *pop* of bones. Fortunately, it wasn’t his own bones, but the body of the fox, which crumpled to the ground, disappearing moments later.

  An impact from behind threw him forward and he slammed his head hard against the trunk of the tree. When he recovered a moment later, he looked over his shoulder to see an arrow sticking out of the flesh of his upper back, though it didn’t penetrate far because of his natural resistance. Yanking it out, he looked around him to see that those that had stayed on the ground were nursing wounds by even more foxes that had attacked, and a few fighting on with arrows stuck in them in various places.

  Fortunately, all of those foxes appeared to have been slain, and the Kitsune in the trees were quickly being corralled together, where they couldn’t withstand the speed and deadliness of Raiders on a mission. In less than a minute after he slammed the fox on his knee into the tree trunk, the last of the attackers were dead, allowing them to recover and move on. Half of those that had accompanied Marvus needed to be healed using Potions, but there was a silver lining: 4 Minor Healing Potions dropped as loot from the Kitsune up in the trees.

  If I had more of a legal bent to my life, I might consider this place good for farming these Potions and selling them. As it is, I’ll think I’ll have to pass.

  When everyone had recovered, he was pleased to see that no one else had died, though a few had been severely hurt. It was a shame that they didn’t have any Healers with them, but the Cohort was a bit of an exclusive club; besides, they had more than enough Potions to keep them alive.

  “On to the next! We’ve got to be getting close now!”

  Chapter 9

  She’d learned about it at DAPS, had some higher-Level Raiders test her dungeon, and heard about how powerful Scouts could be when they gained some experience, but this was her first time really seeing it in action. At least, seeing it in multiple, because most groups that had come through her dungeon thus far had been much smaller – as in 5 or less. Now, though, she was witnessing 18 Thieves, Brigands, and Assassins make their way through her second section without too much danger to themselves.

  After one of her Gnoll Assassins managed to slit the throat of one of her guests, it was like a switch had been flipped. All of the luck had been against her again, even when they unknowingly stepped into her defenses.

  For instance, take the room with her Kitsune Archers, whose number she had added to before they arrived. The traps in the room had been Disarmed, but none of them had been expecting an attack from above – and yet her creature had only wounded the initial target! All because of a leaf, too; she had been watching the Kitsune release the first arrow, and a leaf – which shouldn’t fall from her trees, yet inexplicably did somehow – fell into her face, causing her to miss her first shot.

  Surprise was the only thing on their side, unfortunately, and once that was wasted, the fight went poorly. The thieving Raiders were just too quick, too agile, and too strong to fall to creatures 10 Levels or more below their own. Even when her Root Foxes managed to surprise the heck out of every attacker, they just couldn’t do enough damage to really bother them; their Physical and Ranged Defense was just too great.

  Tacca couldn’t really blame her creatures, either, because that was how she had designed them. They really shouldn’t be able to harm such powerful Raiders, because then that would mean her defenses were overpowered for what she had planned; if a “normal” group had tackled them, then the lower-Level Raiders would’ve been wiped out without a chance.

  Marvus and the other Raiders didn’t appear to be dissuaded from their objective, as they continued to push on. The room after the Kitsune saw the introduction of Scrub Lions, along with Frond Coyotes and Bush Jackals, in a room with densely packed foliage, including ferns, bushes, and other plant life that allowed them to hide extremely well. Unfortun
ately, Thieves and their ilk tended to hide quite well themselves, so the Raiders were either able to spot them beforehand, sneak by without alerting Tacca’s creatures, or attack from range with a seemingly endless supply of throwing knives.

  The same “luck” went in the next room, which was an uphill climb up a mountain, though it was flatter than the cliff had been with the Cliff Lynxes earlier. Instead, large boulders were stationed along the hillside, where Gnoll Scouts were able to utilize the bows she provided for them, firing from cover. When the Raiders advanced too far, they were able to push and tip over the large stones, which were perched precariously and only required a firm shove to topple over. The boulders would then roll down the hill, crushing anyone that got in their way.

  Unfortunately, the Raiders were too quick to stay in line of the rolling boulders, and the few times they were actually shot, the wounds were superficial. They slaughtered the Scouts with ease, while other Raiders Disarmed the Obscured Vision Enchantment traps she had placed over the hillside. The traps were designed to blur the sight of anyone affected by them, which would theoretically let them fall victim to a rolling boulder, but she never got the chance to see their effect.

  She had high hopes after that in her next room, which she had designed as a long bridge over deep pits on either side. Tacca had broken up the bridge so that there were 2 large gaps of 10 feet between the sections, and then placed Life-based traps that were similar to the ones in the Kitsune Archer room – which would enhance their jumping ability. She figured the Raiders would Disarm them automatically, thereby not allowing them to continue on.

  Of course, she forgot how acrobatic these Scout Classes could be. Each of them were easily able to clear the gap with just a simple leap, looking as if they did that all of the time.

  With the gaps cleared, her creatures didn’t do much better. Originally, she had placed 2 Crag Harpies in the room – part woman and part bird-like creatures – but she had upped it to 6 when these Raiders invaded. Ultimately, it didn’t matter, because throwing knives took them out easily from a distance before they could swoop down and attack, thus failing to knock any of the Raiders off of the bridge. Tacca had to admit that she took some satisfaction that half of the impaled Harpies fell down into the spiked pits, where their Reward was lost along with their knives.

  Also placed on the bridge were 8 Mastiffs, the massive dogs from her Boss Room in her original section. This time, though, they were Level 10, which made them quite a bit bigger and stronger. Tacca’s thought on their purpose was to literally slam into the Raiders, hitting them so hard that they knocked the attackers off of the stone bridge. Naturally, that didn’t happen, as these Raiders were swift enough to avoid being hit, and sometimes even jumping over the Mastiffs as they charged. The dogs either ended up running off the side of the bridge themselves, or succumbed to the knifework of multiple Raiders, leaving their true potential largely untested.

  Subsequent rooms fared no better against the infiltrators, no matter what stood in their way. Since most of her traps were Enchantment-based, with clear access to Disarm them, they basically did her no good; her creatures were then forced to take on the role of the sole defense, which they weren’t capable of doing against such adept opponents. As they got closer to the Boss Room, however, the Level difference between the two groups started to shrink, which meant that her creatures were finally able to do significant damage.

  * * *

  This is one of the strangest dungeons I’ve ever seen.

  Marvus nimbly dodged a vicious swipe from what appeared to be a green-striped tiger as it emerged from behind a fern, hoping to catch him unawares. Unfortunately for the monster, the Plunderer had seen it crouched behind the plant, so he wasn’t surprised when it attacked; it took a lot more than that to surprise him, and the monsters within this dungeon were comparatively weak. As he slashed with his knife at the large cat, which came up to his chest in terms of height, scoring a direct hit on its jugular, he quickly found out that things weren’t quite so one-sided anymore.

  His attack only injured the beast; he didn’t kill it like he expected. It was severely wounded, yes, but far from dead.

  It was unexpected, to say the least, which was probably why he failed to avoid another swipe by a huge tiger paw. Marvus was hit so hard that he was flung sideways, landing in a sprawl of limbs; he was in such shock that it took him a second to gather his wits – which was when an abrupt shot of pain careened into him. Looking down, he saw that his leather chestpiece had been shredded, and there were deep furrows raked across his side, bleeding profusely.

  Luckily, before the tiger could take advantage of his fallen state, two of the Cohort jumped in and finished off the beast. Taking a Minor Healing Potion from his bottomless bag, he popped the cork and took a swig, thankful that his injury didn’t seem too serious, mainly just a flesh wound. A deep flesh wound, but he didn’t think there were any broken bones or internal damage.

  “You alright, boss?” Gerthin asked, extending his hand to help Marvus back up. The Cohort leader ignored it, instead getting to his feet on his own – he didn’t need anyone thinking he needed help, after all.

  “Perfectly fine. We all clear?”

  His side was still a little painful, but the wounds had closed up and stopped bleeding. He realized that he really should use another Potion, but he also figured he could wait until he wouldn’t seem weak to the others. Marvus had learned that half of the secret of leading a crew of the Cohort successfully was showing strength, never letting those you led see you struggle. Everyone got hurt every once in a while, but as long as you didn’t let it seem worse than it was, your subordinates would think you were unbeatable.

  The other half of the secret was understanding the motivations of the crew. In this case, it was fairly easy to understand what motivated the Cohort: Greed, plain and simple.

  “It’s clear, but we lost Yates. One of them tigers practically tore his head off his shoulders.”

  On the one hand, another death meant that there was more wealth for each of them when they found their payload; on the other, there were fewer hands to fight against the increasingly difficult rooms of the dungeon. That, and there would be fewer people to do any mining – a chore that always went better when there were more to do it.

  “Grab whatever valuables he had on him and then move on; I can feel that we are getting closer. It shouldn’t be long now.”

  It had already been a profitable trip to this dungeon, despite the Potions they were forced to consume. His Valuation Sense had sniffed out a hidden treasure chest, secreted behind a wall in the last room; it hadn’t been hard to find once he knew where to look, as it was simply behind an outcropping of stone on the eastern wall, but if he didn’t Sense that it was there, they would’ve missed it. It had contained a Minor Physical Resistance Enchantment Scroll, which usually sold for a gold or two, as well as a handful of silver coins; even split 18 ways – 17 now – each person had already made a small profit, especially with all of the loot from killing so many creatures.

  But they weren’t here for a small profit – they were here for a huge profit. A profit of which was suddenly on the horizon, Marvus realized, because his Valuation Sense suddenly went wild. Either they had progressed far enough to get a better read on what they were after, or…that’s it! Looking at his Raider Status, he saw that his ability had increased to Level 30, breaking through to the next threshold; from what he had learned from others in the Cohort, at this Level, his Sense could now detect valuable materials that weren’t finished products. He wasn’t sure what it was, quite yet, but he knew there was a lot of something down below – and it was relatively close.

  Excitement rushed through Marvus as he followed the others to the next room, which took him back a little. It was a large space, at least 100 feet wide and long, and it had a…castle?...along what he considered was the southern wall. It wasn’t really a castle, more of the front wall of a castle, with ramparts up above complete with merlons,
a portal leading inwards down below – and defenders. A stone pathway led up to the castle façade, with perfectly trimmed green grass to either side of it, along with a small tree in the precise middle of the lawns.

  The ceiling of the room had some familiar blue-colored stone, which he had seen in the very first room of the dungeon, along with streaks of white, giving it the appearance of a sky. The walls were another colored stone, this time dark green that lightened in hue the closer it got to the ceiling, ending with the same color blue, making it appear as if the boundaries of the space went off into the distance. It was remarkably done, in fact, and it was seamless in its construction – something that he hadn’t expected to see in a dungeon.

  Better still, his Valuation Sense was tingling when he looked at some of the lighter green stone; it wasn’t a sought-after gemstone, but he thought it could be a semi-precious stone worth something to someone. All he knew was that this wasn’t what he was searching for, because it didn’t scream out to him like whatever it was down below, but it could be a potential source of income. I’ll come back after I find the rest.

  He was so distracted by looking at the walls that he hadn’t even looked over the dangers of the room yet. When he finally focused on them, he also realized why the Cohort hadn’t moved from their position near the tunnel entrance.

  Marvus Detected no traps, which was unusual because there had been traps in all of the other rooms so far, but the obstacle in front of them was a bit more significant. Up on the ramparts of the “castle” wall, 8 Kitsune were poised with bows, and something told him that they were stronger than the ones they had faced before. Reaching them would be a bit of a problem, because the wall was fairly smooth and couldn’t be climbed easily, as well as being 20 feet high. That wasn’t to be said that it couldn’t be done, but it would take a bit longer to figure out a way up there without being shot off of the climb.