by S. A. Devane
After I assigned my points I decided to go into my settings. The experience gains and level ups were distracting just as the combat log had been. I set them to silent mode and closed my interface, watching it shatter and diffuse.
Chapter 9
Going through the only other door in the jailer’s room, we carefully went down a creaky wood spiraling staircase that ended in a large smooth stone room, at the end of the room was a transparent swirl of fog that covered the entire wall. “What the hell’s that? Some kind of portal or something?” Kraznick asked.
“Looks like a dungeon entrance.” Roy picked up a pebble and threw it at the whirling mist. It bounced off like a wall. Charlotte began walking to the ghostly wall, and I grabbed her arm. “What are you doing?” I asked. “Let go of me!” she peeled my hand off her. “I have to go, you three can stay and cower, but I need to check all the cells.” “Why?” Kraznick asked in his deepest voice. “That’s not your concern.” He strode around to block her path, his hammer over his shoulder. “I thought we were becoming a pretty good team. Are you not going to trust us even after we have all fought together and seen each other’s attributes?” He glared at her, more upset than angry. “I’m a lottery winner.” Roy’s face was motionless, unsurprised. “I figured you and Joe were, what of it?”
“What’s a lottery winner?” I interjected. They all looked at me astonished. “You mean the big scary looking troll chose to be a big scary looking troll?” Kraznick burst out laughing, “you chose to be that monster. You must have some serious issues buddy.”
“What is a lottery winner?” I asked again annoyed.
Charlotte's voice softened, “Immortality held a lottery across the U.S. as a promotion. Giving people who had terminal diseases another chance at life. They came to the hospital my brother and I were in and let us enter for the Pacific/Northwest drawing. We both won.” We were able to convince some of the managers of the contest to let us start on the same continent, and they let us look at a map of Alleria before we entered. We chose this area, Burnshire Village as a meeting point. He might not even be here yet, he might be dead. But I need to check every cell to be sure. I don’t even know what race he got, I got lucky, at least I look human.”
“Lottery winners get random races? That's not so bad, he could be human, or an elf.” I said hopefully.
“No.” Roy said. “They use lottery winners to spread players more evenly throughout the races. Only people that bought in get to choose. Odds are he is a monster race. While you’re pretty scary looking Joe, some are disgustingly deformed. Araches are these half human, half spider creatures. They have Gorgons or you could end up being a zombie, flesh falling away day by day, but the rest of you is held together by magic.” Charlotte's eyes began to well up. “Shut up Roy. You don’t know what he is. He could be a Dark Elf or something practically normal.” He saw Charlotte's face and changed his tune, “yeah, he’s probably a normal humanoid. Don’t worry Charlotte we’ll find him. Now let's go put your awesome wand to use.” She swallowed hard and forced a smiled as her eyes still gleamed wet.
With that we all walked through the misty vortex together. “Let me scout it out.” Then Roy disappeared into black smoke. He returned a minute later. “Okay, so it’s another stone room, two guards in the back with crossbows and one near the entrance in full plate. He has a sword and shield. Charlotte hit the crossbowman on the right and Joe throw all your daggers at the guy on the left. Kraznick you fight the guard and I’ll stab him in the back until, well until he dies. You guys ready?”
We all sounded off, “ready.”
We followed Kraznick through the passageway and as soon as we were in sight the guard in plate shouted, “Intruders!” We charged after Kraznick, his warhammer overhead and it crashed down onto the guards shield with an echoing pang. The crossbowmen were taking aim and before they could fire Charlotte's glowing orb flew through the air leaving a trail of green miasma and exploded onto his face, removing a large chunk of his head. I threw a dagger at the crossbowman and it stuck in the dirt near his feet. I heard a thwack and felt burning in the left side of my chest. I looked down and saw a crossbow bolt deep, inches from my shoulder. I took a glaive off my belt and threw it side armed at him, it was dead on, but he spun and it pinged off the wall. The crossbowman was reloading when a bolt of lightning zapped him, his body vibrated and he fell to his knees. I took the other glaive and threw it, aiming at his chest and missed, but the result was good enough. The glaive fell short and to the left, slicing his unarmored arm causing him to drop his weapon. I looked to the center of the room where Kraznick was in a stalemate with the guard, holding his sword up against the handle of his hammer, while Roy stabbed him in the back repeatedly with the daggers from his boots. His hands were a flurry of motion and blood, but the guard didn’t yield. Another bolt of lightning shot through the air hitting the kneeling crossbowman and smoke rose from his eyes and mouth. I took out my scimitar and rushed the plated guard, swinging down onto his sword arm. He gave me a look of mild annoyance and bashed his shield into Kraznick, toppling him over. He reached onto his back, grabbed Roy by his vest and tossed him onto Kraznick with a thud. I swung again and he parried my attack and followed it up with a slash to my arm, cutting deep.
*Status effect*
*You have been afflicted with bleed, -10 health points per second*
I heard another arc of lightning and a violet glow reflected off the walls. I turned to see the guard crumpled to the floor, his metal chest plate glowing orange and red. “Drink your potion Joe, don’t bleed out.” Charlotte shouted. I ripped the cork off with my teeth and did as she said. The pain from the slash and the bolt disappeared, the cut on my arm began to fuse together. I tried to pull the bolt out, but every time I moved it, tears streamed down my face.
Kraznick pushed Roy off him and Roy sat up dazed. “Did we win?” He looked around the room. “It looks like we won. I’m going to rest a moment.” and he laid back onto the stone floor. I was still tugging at the bolt hoping it would magically come out. Then a thick hairy hand grabbed it and pulled. I exhaled all my breath stopping a scream, as the dwarf ripped it out. “Drink the potion Joe.” Kraznick said as he threw the bolt on the ground with a tink.
“Roy, get up. Can we put the guard’s weapons in your bag?” Charlotte asked. He got up grumbling, “no, I can only carry a hundred and twenty-five pounds. When I get my strength higher than 10 I’ll be able to carry more. If I go over the weight limit now, I’ll move like a turtle”
“Where’d you get that bag?” I asked.
“I bought it, they cost ten mystic coins. There's an enchanter that sells them, he won’t even let you in the door unless you have 5 mystic coins. Has the doorway enchanted or something. Keeps the looky loos out.”
“Right…” I looked at my money seeing I could get in, but I was down to 9 mystic coins. If we pooled our money, we could get Kraz a bag since he could carry the most. Assuming we could convince him to be the loot mule.
“Let’s get going you layabouts, we gotta find Charlotte's brother and kill this scumbag politician. I’d like to get my money back. See how he likes us camping outside the graveyard for his ass. We should kill his scribe too. For good measure.” Kraznick said walking towards the exit.
“Has anyone else leveled up?”
“Ayy, I put it all into strength. I won’t be trapped behind bars ever again. Now let's get a move on, we can’t be nappin in a dungeon, you don’t know if these guards respawn or not. I’ve never been in one before, but in games they always come back in dungeons.”
“Before you rush us all to our deaths, look at the walls.” Charlotte said pointing.
“What about them?” Kraznick moaned.
“Well if you had 5 perception like I told you to get, you’d be able to see the wards.”
“I can see them now. The little shiny markings?” I said staring intently at them.
“Yes Joe, I don’t know what these ones do, but if we go into a room and
they have a finger over lips I won’t be able to cast my death bolts. The wand should still work though.”
“I’ve seen these,” Roy said smugly, “they’re wall reinforcement runes. They’re in almost every building in Telonora.”
We all stared at him blankly.
“The city. About twenty miles from here...Well, those are earth magic runes to fortify the walls. Any low level earth mage can make them.”
Roy lead the way stealthed until we reached the next room. The room was filled with a pool of mud, except for the separated stone steps that formed two pathways, creating a loose oval from this side to the exit on the other.
Kraznick looked nervous, “ya think it's a trap?”
“Of course it’s a trap. We’re in a dungeon.” Charlotte replied mildly annoyed. His hands began to squeeze and twist on his hammer. Kraznick was as strong as a rhino, but just as agile.
“Charlotte and Kraz should go first. They have the lowest agility and if the steps begin to sink, Roy and I will have the best chance of catching up.”
“Yes, but what if something attacks us from the mud, then Roy and Kraznick should go because they have the highest Constitution.” Kraznick set his hammer on the first stone, nudging it. “It didn’t sink, looks like its Roy and Kraznick.” I said.
Roy pulled out both short swords and Kraznick tossed his hammer in his hands, hefting it. “Okay guys, at the same time. On three. One, two,” With two Kraznick ran for it. “You damn cheating dwarf,” Roy called after him as he sprinted skipping every other stone. As Roy bounded to his fifth stone a hand shot out from the mud towards his leg, using his speed he pulled away and sliced the arm in two. The hand fell to the stone in a splatter of mud and slowly crawled back into the pool. Quickly dashing to the exit, he shouted, “guess it was a sneak attack. Good call Charlotte.” Then we looked to Kraznick in horror. A mud armed gripped his ankle. As he went down to punch it a longer one latched onto the top of his head, grabbing his hair. Trying to pull him off the stone. Kraznick forced himself to a standing position and another arm grabbed his wrist. “Well you gonna help me or what?” I threw a glaive that cut through the arm, Kraznick lifted his head and separated the mud arm. He kicked his right leg ripping the other arm apart, then did the same with the other, ripping it again. Four more arms shot up at him and he shrugged them off. And on each stone an arm grabbed him and he ripped it off. He finally made it to the other side, “Is that all you got you weak mud pool thing! Don’t mess with a dwarf with 42 strength!”
“Okay are you ready?” I asked Charlotte. She summoned an orb and nodded. She dashed to the left, where the stones were covered in mud. With every stone, she shot a blast of lightning into the mud pool and when she got halfway she dropped the orb into the pool. Detonating. Mud splattered everywhere and she safely made it across. I could see in the top right of my vision her mana was almost completely gone. I ran across, skipping every other stone like Roy, none of the arms got close and I cleared it without issue. “Well if things go bad, at least we have a way back out of here.” And with Charlotte's words all the stones collectively sank into the mud. “You just had to say somethin, didn’t you girly.”
“You ugly dwarf, if you call me that one more time I’ll blast you into a mud bath.” As she whipped her wand out and pointed it at him. “I was just jokin lass. No need to get all fiery on me.”
The next room was empty. Larger than the rest, it had wall strengthening runes like the others, the floor was a brown pact dirt, desert like and two large piles of boulders sat near the center. “So, what do ya think this time girl.” She glanced at Kraznick with burning eyes. Correcting himself, “what do ya think lass? You think the rocks are gonna start floating and launch at our heads and we have to swat them away like baseballs?”
“More likely their rock golems. The runes are earth magic, those mud arms were earth magic, so the boss here is some kind of earth mage.” She summoned a death orb and launched it at the mound of rock on the left. Rubble exploded into the air. The boulders unfurled creating large stone creatures. The one Charlotte hit was missing an arm. “They have 285 constitution, that means their strength is 57. If any of us gets hit we’re dead.” I threw a throwing knife at the injured golem and it wedged into the creature’s chest. “How much damage?” I called out. “10 damage,” Charlotte shot back. Great another fight I was going to be useless in. Roy and Kraznick were distracting them by running around in circles, they were strong, but slow, by the time Roy ran to the creatures back it began to turn. He sliced at where the creatures achilles tendon might have been and continued to run, staying behind it. Kraznick wasn’t much faster than the golem, but his only had one arm, so staying to its side was effective enough. Charlotte sent a bolt of lightning at the creature. “What?” She said. She fired again. “Great, its grounded, lightning doesn't work on earth magic. Thanks a lot laws of nature. 45 seconds till my next spell. Your on your own for now.” Kraznicks one armed golem spun its back to me and I copied Roys maneuver from earlier. I took out two daggers and ran. Leaping on the hard monsters back, stabbing down into its craggy crevices. I hung on while it twisted its torso trying to shake me off, then it tumbled forward onto its stomach. While I was on its back, Kraznick crushed its knees with his warhammer. I took my daggers and rolled off and away. Kraznick jumped on its back and started crushing stone. “I’m Kraznick The Rockbreaking Gemcutter, you can’t BEAT ME!” and he went into a frenzy. I kept rolling as the shrapnel from Kraznicks fury pelted me. I stopped at Charlottes feet as she launched an orb hitting the other golem in the head. It exploded into chunks of rubble, sending the golem toppling backwards. Roy walked away sipping a flask of his green stamina potion. I looked up to see Kraznick still bashing away. Lying on the floor, I looked up to Charlotte, “should we stop him?” She shook her head, “no, he’ll run out of stamina soon.” I nodded and set my head back onto the packed dirt.
After a few more minutes, Kraznick collapsed face first into the depression he created in the monsters back. “Ayyyyy.” Kraznick yelled, “I found something.” His stubby arm reached up holding a dark blood red shard.
“It’s Allerium, about a mystic coins worth.” Charlotte went over and took it from him.
“Here take my hammer, someone get the other one, out of the other one, other one.” and then he began snoring like a chainsaw. Nobody did take his hammer. Instead Charlotte fed him a stamina potion and he went to work again.
After retrieving the shard of Allerium we all took sips from our potions returning our health, stamina and mana to 100%. Even after that we all felt the need to relax for a moment. Those golems were the scariest creatures I had seen and I was only level four. I imagined the monstrosities that awaited a true adventurer. Undead hordes, giant desert worms, schools of razor tooth sharks. Worst of all, spiders, I knew there were going to be spiders, and now that Roy told me about Araches, I felt lucky to buy my way into Immortality. I couldn’t imagine being forced into becoming a half spider monster. I hoped to god that her brother wasn't such a creature.
Kraznick was still sipping his stamina potion, “So Roy, how’d did you get that stealth skill?” Roy looked up from twirling his daggers through his gloved fingers. “You get to choose a class at level ten. The way my trainer explained it was, it all depends on your stats and the weapons you have been using. All my stats are ten, except I can’t use magic, your intelligence has to be fifteen to cast spells. I unlocked rouge, archer, thief, assassin, duelist, and gambler. They are all basic classes, apparently they specialize after that. So I chose rogue and then it let me choose between three special abilities. Stealth was the obvious choice. Who could turn down the chance to become invisible.”
“What were the other two options?”
“One was smooth talker. It increased your persuasiveness and the other was artful dodger, increasing your ability to dodge.”
I asked Roy, “what’s the city like?”
“Oh it's great, women are everywhere, food and drink is cheap,
one silver will get you three full course meals and plenty of liquor.”
I decided to address my main concern, “are there other races there?”
He looked at me knowingly. “There are, but mostly non-monster races, like dwarves and gnomes. The only time I saw monster races was in the arena. Otherwise they’re rare.”
“Well I haven't been with a woman since I came to Arielle, I need a guide to show me around,” Kraznick said grinning. Roy smiled to him just as creepily. “Okay you perverts, let's get going.” Charlotte said jumping off her rock seat.
Chapter 10
We made our way down a long corridor into a massive cavern, the ceiling was covered in small and massive stalagmites and the floor was scattered with a few tall fused stalactites. Torches lined the smooth stone winding path illuminating the room faintly, casting long pointed shadows. At the end of the path were stairs leading up to a platform that had a stone pedestal on it, an altar. Atop the altar was a brown glow, so bright it almost blocked the view to the door behind it.
There was a shout from across the room. “One second, just give me a second!” I recognized the snide voice. We didn’t move down the path, afraid it would trigger a trap or more golems. A blurred figured stepped through the doorway and made its way around the brown glow. “Oh, it’s you guys.” He said pleasantly surprised. “I thought you ran away.” He took a long pause staring at our angry faces. “I’m glad you all returned. And you brought a new friend. You still have quite a bit of money for me to collect.”