It didn’t surprise me, but this was one I wished I could throw back.
Lesser Devour
By consuming a creature recently deceased, you are able to leech some of the power they had in life. As its level increases, Devour will increase in the amount of power it can leech.
The very thought of devouring the monsters that I killed was disgusting, but it was likely that the spell would work like Vampire’s Might and I didn’t really have to eat what I defeated. I guessed this was what made succubi so powerful. It gave me an idea.
“Heads up everyone!” I said, raising my voice. “I’m going to try casting Blood Drain even though there doesn’t seem to be anything left.”
Walking to the middle of the bridge, I held up my hand and offered the spell an excessive 5,000 MP. I cast it just overhead.
Dark Magic tentacles burst from the heart of the spell and intruded on everyone standing there and everything in the room, drinking up even the smallest droplets of blood. Before it was done the spell had gathered gallons of what was left of the Succubus in a liquid orb. The blood poured into me through my hand. My power surged.
+10,475 MP
+145 Int
+225 Wis
Closing my eyes, I smiled to myself. Lady Contessa had been just the kind of monster I had hoped for. I didn’t receive unnecessary stats, only the kind that would help me with my character build. My MP jumped to over 226k and my Mana Per Minute was close to 6,000!
Now to try Devour.
With my hand still raised in the air, I cast it with the same amount of mana. I expected it to not be as powerful as Blood Drain because it was the first time I was using it.
Almost immediately I was left scrambling in my confusion. Had I cast Blood Drain a second time? The way the spell reached out with dark threads of energy was identical, but when the sphere started to fill above my head, it was made up of a dark substance, not blood. As it filled me, the power I felt was just as real.
+2,000 MP
+7 Str
+8 Dex
Even though it had seemed to gather just as much substance from the walls of the Bridge, it seemed either its low level or the fact I had already cast Blood Drain had lessened the stats I could leech with it. It was also interesting that I had received Strength and Dexterity with Lesser Devour when I hadn’t with Blood Drain. I would have to test it later. Now it was time to celebrate!
***
The dwarf happily let us lock him between two lesser doors in the Inner Chamber. We spent 2,000 DP on two of the stone variety. When we offered him something to eat he thanked us, but said he had his own.
The group started to gather about an hour later and filtered into the Master Chamber. Everyone spread out so that they had a good view of the pedestal and the new image on the mural above us. Lady Contessa’s defeat was depicted with a bone spear piercing her gut under our images encircling the dome.
Murmurs echoed through the group.
I took out the Dark Orb, and Khun’s ghostly red face appeared above the pedestal.
“Welcome back, Master. It is a pleasure to see that you’re still alive,” he said, sounding genuine while all the time not taking his eyes off the orb I held in my hand.
“Thank you, Khun. We have something for you,” I said, approaching the pedestal.
“That looks like a fine upgrade.” He nodded as he spoke.
“Do I need to place the new orb first, or can I remove the current one and put this in its place?”
“It is better to place it upon the podium first, so I have access to both, but if you remove the Fire Orb, it will be a few days before I will lose the ability to function.”
I looked to Zorik, who I had spoken with beforehand, and offered him a grin of thanks. He had told me that Dungeons were jealous by nature and even though they couldn’t act against your orders, he had seen Khun arguing with Xenos in the past. I had at least been able to confirm that Khun wasn’t lying to us.
Taking the Fire Orb from the middle socket, I replaced it with the larger Dark Orb. Dark energy shot down the veins of lightning at the podium’s base. Seconds later, the wall to the right of the arched doorway thundered.
Now inscribed in the otherwise smooth segment of wall was the name of our Dungeon followed by 50,000/50,000 Dungeon Points.
Cheers rose up as we saw the big jump up from 20,000.
“Russ,” I called, offering him the Fire Orb as he approached.
He looked at me, confused.
“I bet there is a forge around here somewhere that needs to be powered,” I said with a wink.
“Yes!” he replied, pounding his fist into his chest. He stomped off with a big grin on his face.
“What now?” Aeris asked from her perch.
Before I could answer, Skyler’s voice blared. “I’m hungry!”
A chorus of laughs sounded in response.
“Master,” Zorik said, leaning toward me to get his voice to rise above the mirth.
“Yes, Zorik?” I replied.
“We only have three, maybe four weeks of food if we ration what we have.”
Heaving a deep sigh, I thanked him again.
“It seems our first form of business is going to be finding a consistent food supply,” I said to Aeris. Perhaps there’s a way to make our own ranch dressing? It was the number one thing missing from the magic bag the Head Mistress’s Imp had supplied us.
Khun took my words as if I was speaking to him and replied, “That, I could help you with, sir.”
Holding my hand up, I stopped him from going further and said, “Thank you, but first I must take your first piece of advice and explore the Living District. We will discuss it soon.”
Everyone left in their own time to enjoy the first proper meal they had had in a few days. I stayed, taking the first watch of the dungeon map as everyone else ate. Aeris wouldn’t leave my side until I asked her to find someone that had finished eating to take our place. We snacked on bacon jerky. Later, I would set a constant watch, where everyone would take their turn keeping an eye on the map. For now, I would let everyone relax and recover. They had earned a much-needed break.
***
The dwarf snored as he leaned back against the wall in the corner of the room we had locked him in. There was a stone partition running parallel to the wall, so he was boxed in except for the direction we approached from. His head was back, his mouth drooped open and he sounded like a humpback whale trying to blow its nose. The dwarf still wore his blue plate mail, but he had no weapons visible and his hands were folded together, resting comfortably on his stomach.
“Ujurak!” I said with a raised voice, standing a foot away from where he sat. My advisers stood behind me, ready to start the interrogation.
With a snort, the dwarf’s head rocked back and forth before settling to one side. He took a deep breath, that turned into a yawn.
“Ey,” he said, groggily. His eyes stretched open. “Have you decided where you are going to flee to next?”
Looking to Aeris who stood at my side, I raised a brow. This was not how I thought this would begin.
“Why would we run?” I asked.
“Ha! Look.” He sighed, leaning forward. “Lady Contessa was scary, I’ll give you that, but Mistress Nava is going to send her Captain after you next if we don’t return in a few days. Waldemar is far more powerful. You don’t want to have to deal with a Minotaur of a war-bull clan. A war-bull is a paid mercenary, not a slave.”
“How long do we have?”
He looked me in the eye and shook his head in contempt.
“Maybe a week or two. Maybe more. It might be difficult for them to find us if none of the wargs escaped.”
“Does Waldemar have an army?”
“Yes. About eighty strong.”
“Do they use magic?”
“No, boy.” He chuckled. “Minotaurs throw things.”
“We’ll be ready,” I swore, trying to seem more confident than I felt. “Are there any other dan
gers we can expect?”
He nodded. His eyes never left my own before he said, “Yaatiesh was the son of a noble family. Don’t ask me how dark elf politics work or why he would swear himself to that crazy succubus. But he was here on his own accord. If Mistress Nava doesn’t get to you first, then the dark elves will. If they ever find out what happened to him that is.”
I heard a murmur rise up from behind me. Someone leaned forward and whispered in my ear. It was Russ.
“Maybe we can ally with the dwarves,” was all that he said.
Ujurak suddenly hocked up a big loogy and spat. It landed an inch from my foot.
“Dwarves don’t ally or go friending no spoiled humans!” he insisted.
Note to self. Dwarves have good hearing. His reaction surprised me. Especially after we had saved him from slavery, whether it was our intention or not. The only other dwarf I had met was the merchant, so I didn’t know what way to approach this problem. Remembering the other dwarf gave me an idea.
“What about trade?” I asked.
As quickly as he had turned on us, his scowl turned to a grin.
“Well. If you aren’t looking for no handouts, then perhaps we can do business,” he replied.
“That was easy,” Olivia huffed.
He inclined his head to the side to see past me and said, “Gold talks, missy. Dwarves always respond well to turning a profit.”
“I also hear they like soft sheets,” I replied, remembering the merchant dwarf.
His eyes lit up and he turned back to me. “That they do, my boy!” With a throaty chuckle, he continued, “So what kind of trade are we talking about here?”
“One moment,” I said, before turning around and facing the others.
They all looked at me full of concern, which was appropriate given that we had just learned there was another enemy that would soon be hunting for us. A stronger one.
“Olivia. Can you give the others the news please?” I said.
She gave me a nod.
I continued, “It looks like our break ends here. We need to start to prepare. Meet in the Master’s Chamber in one hour. Those who are interested can stay as we finish with Ujurak.”
“I’ll stay,” Russ said immediately. No doubt wanting to talk to the dwarf about forging. He had talked to many of the dwarves who had still been building our forge when we had fled from the Head Mistress’s Dungeon. Perhaps I should let him lead the conversation.
Besides Aeris and Russ, the others left us here, hurrying off to inform the others and begin planning. Today, we had had a great victory, but with the new revelation about Mistress Nava’s Captain and the Dark Elves, I got the feeling our fighting had only begun.
“Um. One last thing.”
Turning, I saw Mel had stopped at the door.
“Yeah?” I asked.
He replied in all seriousness. “Can I have the dark elf’s skull?”
Chapter 29 – Curiosity
Later that night, I found myself restless and sleep would not come. There was no doubt that I was still wound up from almost dying numerous times in the last couple of days. I had possibly healed myself too recently to be exhausted enough as well, but that was not all. There was another thing that kept nagging at me in the back of my mind. I was trying to put the others first, but this was an itch that just would not go away. Finally, I had given up.
Mel was on watch when I entered the Master’s Chamber. He didn’t seem surprised to see me. At the mention that there was something I had to test and that I was heading to the rooms of the Outer Perimeter, he confirmed there weren’t any creatures in the Dungeon, so I shouldn’t be interrupted. I nodded my thanks.
I made my way through the Inner Perimeter and into the Bridge. Exiting into the Outer Perimeter, I kept going for a number of rooms until I was a good distance away, so hopefully, no one would feel what I was about to do.
I brought up my Shapeshifting menu and found the form that just wouldn’t leave my mind: Primordial Cat. It took an extreme amount of mana and would drain me in approximately 10 seconds. Still, if I could find a way to level up this form to a more manageable mana cost, it might be the kind of thing that could give us a chance against Mistress Nava’s Captain. Maybe even Mistress Nava herself.
With full mana, and without any immediate danger, now was the perfect time to test it. If things didn’t get too out of hand, I could cast it, let it drain my mana, meditate, then do it all over again.
Closing my eyes, I took deep breaths as I tried to calm my nerves. Not exactly sure where to direct my mana, I gave up trying to anticipate how the spell would work and cast Shapeshifting, Primordial Cat Form.
I felt the mana inside me start to push against the shell of my skin. Then the power inside me began to churn faster and faster until I started to heat up. It didn’t burn, but I could feel the temperature of my skin skyrocketing.
Looking down at my empty hands, the pink of my skin hardened into a crust-like substance until it was black as coal. I clenched them into fists and felt strength welling up inside me. Then, I started to grow.
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Underworld - Through the Belly of the Beast: A LitRPG Series Page 31