Regicide

by Dakota Krout

  “Understood.” They moved on, and Joe couldn’t realistically understand why there were so many injured every day. He got the fact that he was somehow a hard counter for the creatures in here, but this was clearly a dungeon for novices. Especially with the weakness of these Shades now shown, it was likely that this could easily be a training ground for rapid skill development. Joe refused to believe that everyone had trouble in here. It was more likely that the prisoners were given zero information or ways to deal with the monsters, while the Kingdom used them to distract the monsters away from whatever they actually did in here.

  “Ugh, that one dropped goop. Alright, someone’s gonna need to grab it.” Bill called to the others as he pointed to where a Shade had recently popped.

  “Goop?” Joe got closer, trying to inspect the drop. “That’s ectoplasm, a… rare, I think, alchemy compound. Probably goes for a few silver.” Just like that, Joe knew at least one thing that the Kingdom was likely after.

  “Eh. We can’t keep it, but we get extra rations for turning it in. We get searched every other day. Magically, so there’s no reason to put it somewhere unfortunate because they will still find it,” Bill warned him with a downward glance.

  “Unfor…? Gross.” Joe pulled a face and looked at his map again. “This is actually a small floor, at least if you go directly for the exit to the next floor. Otherwise, it is just a bunch of curved tunnels that circle back to each other over and over.”

  “Wait, you mean… this floor is supposed to be massive! People get lost in here for days at a time!” one of the touchy-feely guys complained. “I got stuck here overnight once!”

  “Look.” Joe showed him the map. “Eight main tunnels that circle back to the start point, each with eight tunnels that do the same but also branch to go into each other. Looks like a drawing of a flower that I did when I was twelve and taking art class. We take a left, a right, then go straight. Boom. There’s the exit.”

  “I don’t know how long you are going to be here, but please make me a copy of that map.” Bill was looking over the details and shaking his head.

  They followed the route plotted by the divine gift, killing off a few Shades and what appeared to be walking anthills, but when they got to the location the map had been directing them to, there was no room like it promised. They set about looking for ways to get into what they assumed was a hidden room, but there were no levers, buttons, or secret latches. Joe’s instincts were screaming that the room was there, so he looked at the map again and saw that there were tiny numbered locations scattered around the entirety of the second floor.

  “It’s a puzzle.” Joe shook his head in negation of the facts. “Nope. I have no time for this garbage. Stand back.” With the others out of the way, he dual cast Acid Spray and channeled both spells until he ran out of mana. In front of them was a smoking tunnel that they could probably all squeeze through, and the fresh hole opened up into a small room. Joe went through first, looking around the empty room for any indication of an exit. The floor seemed patterned and interesting, so he crouched down to inspect it.

  There was a quickly muffled shout of surprise from the others as they watched Joe vanish with a small clap of thunder.

  ~ Chapter Thirty-nine ~

  “What odd patterns. Is this an enchantment? What do you guys think?” Joe looked up and around but quickly realized that the others had vanished. Or… he was somewhere else. That was more likely, as the wall wasn’t melted away but instead opened into a hallway. “Oh. Um. Hmm.”

  Joe tried to read over the mosaic on the ground, but it was all formulas and magical symbolism. While it was similar to ritual magic, it was different enough that he wasn’t going to be understanding this any time soon. How had he activated it? Joe stomped on the patterns, poked them, and then jumped on them.

  “He’s back!” Joe heard, almost making him fall over in shock.

  “Joe, thank goodness. Shades are starting to group up and get close. Someone decided to shout in surprise, and you vanishing makes a sound like thunder.” Bill got close and grabbed Joe, shaking him a bit when Joe didn’t respond right away.

  “Uh… I’m not sure how I got this to work,” Joe finally spit out. “All I did was crouch to read this, and-” Bill instantly crouched, vanishing with a *bang* that made Joe yelp.

  “See! It’s not just me!” The other three ran over to the enchantment and crouched, vanishing from sight. After taking a screenshot of the enchantment, Joe took the hint and did the same, popping down to join the others. While they were all in the new room on the third floor he got a screenshot of this enchantment and pulled out his map to look at where they needed to go. The map had updated again, showing the third floor in much greater detail.

  “Looks like we go through here, and then it is a long hallway with rooms on either side. Huh, kinda feels like a hallway in a hotel,” Joe looked out into the long hallway, revising his statement right away, “or it is the solitary confinement area for a long-forgotten prison. At the end of the hall is a room marked with a skull and crossbones, so let’s avoid that for now.”

  “Joe, don’t you get it? We are on the third floor of a dungeon that no one has found in decades!” Bill was extra excited about this. “There might actually be great loot here. The longer a dungeon exists without being looted the better the rewards will be! As far as I know, this dungeon has never been finished.”

  They walked down the hallway, looking through the slots of each of the doors. Most of them were empty, fully empty, but were opened anyway just to check for anything hidden. The doors were secured with complex bolts on the exterior, impossible to open from the inside but fairly simple from the outside. Then one of the others looked through a slot and stiffened, body going rigid and falling to the ground. Joe ran over, glancing into the cell only to be caught by two eyes full of blazing green flames that seemed to dig into his mind.

  Joe stiffened as well but only for a moment as he forced the invading tendrils of thought out of his head. The eyes shifted away from the hole, showing instead a wide smile made of the same burning flames. The mouth moved, and a terrible voice echoed into the hallway, “Ahh. A fellow practitioner of Psycomancy. A Novice! Did you come all this way to study at the feet of greatness? I had thought I had been forgotten by the world, but you even brought me tribute in the form of snacks. Release me, and we shall commence your training after I consume their memories and sanity.”

  You have found a class trainer that is willing to teach you the skills of Psycomancy! Would you like to release him and learn the true depths of your mental capabilities? Accept / Reject.

  “Not a chance.” Joe slammed the viewing hole closed, and the being on the other side began to smash against the metal, howling in rage. Joe could only hope that the creature was a typical Mage-type, strong in power but weak physically. He shuddered as his fallen teammate blinked and stood.

  “What happened just now?”

  “Powerful mind-twisting creature. Really don’t look in there guys.” Joe gestured at the door and shook his head. He pulled a small chunk of chalk out of his pocket and took a moment to write a warning on the door. They kept moving, much more cautious when they opened the viewing holes. None of them noticed the man who had fallen prey to the Psychomancer was looking back the way they had come… with a spark of green fire growing in his eyes. By the time they had reached the end of the hall and explored all rooms on the map, they had realized that they had been foolish for thinking there may be valuables in these cells. Who would give inmates powerful items?

  “Great. Three hundred and fifty-one experience; we’ve gone through three levels of the dungeon, and there’s nothing to fight that we can beat. At least we should get some decent experience from whatever is waiting in there,” one of the men complained bitterly.

  So there they stood, eyeing the door that loomed in their path. It was not overly fancy, but it was obvious that behind this door was not more of the same. Most likely, it held the dungeon boss, which was
sure to be a powerful enemy. They were about to reach for the rewards they had been seeking since they arrived. The only issue… this door was keeping them from their goals. As a group they agreed: this dungeon boss was going down.

  They opened the doors and stepped through, and only the fact that the door slammed shut behind them and began to shimmer with a shield kept them from turning and sprinting away as fast as their legs could carry them. It was unlikely that this boss was going down.

  The room was large and circular, and the center of it was filled with an inky pool of darkness that Joe couldn’t see through, indicating that it was made of Shades. Standing in the center was what Joe could only assume was an elemental. It stood only a bit taller than him but was fully coated in black metal armor that constantly released a billowing darkness. It didn’t move or make noise but simply stared at them. Joe stared at it in return, activating Intrusive Scan as he did so.

  Name: Warden of Souls. Class: Elemental Specter. Title: Undying.

  Highest stat: Luck.

  Ongoing effects: Bored. Dark Renewal. Bored. Jailor. Enhanced Darkness. Bored.

  The Specter shifted slightly, and an echoing voice came from it, “Ah, prisoners. I have been so distraught over having nothing new to do for the last few decades. It is like the crown forgot about me and simply stopped giving me new detainees to reform! Well, come on over, and we shall begin.”

  A fireball raced from one of Joe’s companions, slamming into the chest of the Specter. It didn’t flinch at all, merely looking a bit annoyed by the interruption. A tendril of shadow launched out of the darkness pooled at his feet and impacted the offending party member, driving him into the wall before turning into chains and spikes. Fully pinned to the wall, but apparently not hurt, the man could only struggle.

  “You can make darkness take physical form?” Joe gasped in wonder. This was something that he would eventually need to test. His apparent lack of concern for his team’s well-being made a few of them glare at him.

  “Oh, a Shadow Mage? How lucky.” The Specter looked more closely at Joe. “I had wondered how even the paltry amount of Shades I let wander this place were defeated so easily. So my talents intrigue you, hmm? Is skill in shadow manipulation something you would be willing to bargain for?”

  “Perhaps, but… you don’t plan to kill us?” Joe spoke before the others could think that he was betraying them.

  “Why would I let you leave this place so easily?” The Specter seemed genuinely confused. “You are here to be reformed. You will not be slain until you have repaid your debt to society. The others will all die within a few days or so, but with you… I find a loophole for companionship. You have no limit on your sentence, and you can’t unless you appear for trial.”

  “You want me to get you out of here?” Joe timidly questioned him.

  “Oh, quite the opposite. You will be staying with me for a very long time.” The Specter showed a disturbing smile, the interior of his mouth seeming to show star systems. “I was just hoping you would make it easy on yourself and consider it a once in a lifetime opportunity chance to learn from the Sage Nocturnal. Not too many with our capabilities out there.”

  ~ Chapter Forty ~

  “You know, I keep getting told that Sages are supposed to be rare, but they seem to be dang-nab everywhere.” Joe looked over the Specter, trying to create a Shadow Spike to impact him. It did, but the tip of the spike broke against the film of darkness that coated the being.

  In retaliation, all of Joe’s companions ended up netted to the wall. Manacles formed around Joe and dragged him down to the floor. The Specter spoke again, “I won’t hold that against you; I’m sure you felt that you needed to try. You all will be held here until your time is up, why not make this a happy occasion? I am sure there are even a few things that I could learn from you. For instance, what year is it out there?”

  “Look, uh, Warden?” Joe looked at the writhing darkness keeping his new acquaintances pinned to the wall. They had been there for upwards of thirty seconds without the bonds appearing to weaken at all, so Joe had no reason to believe they would vanish unless the Warden wanted them to. “Is it alright if I call you that? Warden? Great. Look, I’d be happy to learn from you. More than happy, really; this is an aspect of myself that I feel has been fully ignored for far too long.”

  “Excellent. It is always best to start these relationships off in a positive light, especially as we might spend an eon down here together as these fools wither into dust.” The Warden chuckled dryly. “Ironic, isn’t it, that I wanted a positive light when we are going to be spending all of our time in darkness? Shall we begin?”

  To his credit, the Warden was an excellent teacher. Joe had no doubt that it was due to his self-proclaimed Sage status. Joe started with only the ability to see in the dark and create a few Shadow Spikes, but he was fully entranced with what he was learning. The Warden directed him through a multitude of forms and techniques, from creating chains and binding agents to dancing with his eyes closed and using darkness to guide his movements. Any time Joe would have collapsed from exhaustion, the Specter infused him with a dark energy that fully revitalized him.

  “I must say… for only a few days’ worth of training, you are becoming quite adept at using the basic abilities of a Specter. I think that with only a few more years of training, you will be able to take my place here. I’d love to roam the world once more, see what has changed over the last few hundred years,” the Warden’s voice penetrated the fog around Joe’s mind, jostling him to action.

  “That’s your goal? Wait a moment… we have been here for days?” Joe’s mouth clicked closed as the Warden glared at him.

  “What? You thought I was teaching you for your benefit, inmate? Nice inmate number, by the way. Someone must not have liked you at all.” A scoff passed through the liquid metal armor the Warden wore. “Another year or so of dark infusions and your body will be prepared for the racial change into a Specter. Then I can bind you to this location, freeing me from the constant need to keep these Shades and other prisoners in line.”

  At that moment, Joe knew that he couldn’t wait any longer. He needed to do something drastic or he was going to miss the war entirely and become a glorified prison guard on duty for eternity. He opened his menu and looked over the thick list of skills that he had gained while trapped down here for apparently days.

  Skill gained: Spellbinding (Beginner V). The creation of magical documents is arduous and difficult, oftentimes deadly. Mitigating the risks is the best you can hope for. Effect: Each rank of this skill increases magical quill durability by 3%, magical ink purity by 4%, infused paper durability by 3% when it is used or created by you and decreases time to create desired magical ink by 5%. +2% writing speed and accuracy. Increases possible written spell diagram complexity and stability by 2n% per skill level.

  Oh wait, that looked like the document-making skills he had combined. The other ones were what he really needed. Not even bothering to read over the skill descriptions, Joe began tossing all of his new skills into the combination menu. He tried to group them by what they did as he put them in but otherwise didn’t care. Darkvision, Dark Infusion, Shadow Dancing, Dark Perception, Shadow Manipulation, Cloak of Darkness, Dark Binding, Shadow Spike… the list went on. Twenty darkness or shadow related abilities went into the mix, and Joe didn’t even blink as he read over the cost associated with the combination.

  A bit over twenty-six million gold to combine, nine and a half days to complete. Nope. Joe tapped a small icon that had been grey each time he had done this before but was now showing a shining gem.

  Combine skills using combination gem? This will negate the cost and time needed to combine all skills but will consume the gem. Yes / No.

  “Oh, heck yes,” Joe breathed, smashing the ‘yes’ button with all the mental force he could muster. He felt like he had been kicked in the gut as the plethora of skills was torn out of his psyche and a wall of information flooded his mind.


  Skill gained: Solidified Shadows (Apprentice VI) (Mythical). The ability to shape shadows to a desired form has always been excellent yet fleeting. No more! This skill allows you to take your shapes and make them into a solid. Maximum damage possible dependent upon mana invested. One point of damage dealt per mana invested. Maximum mana allocation: 10n where ‘n’ is skill level.

  Class gained: Flawed Shadowmancer (Unique). A shadowmancer is an Elemental Mage who uses shadows in lieu of other powers such as fire. A Flawed Shadowmancer is one who didn’t understand the power they were trying to wield, rushing to forge themselves without the tutelage or mastery needed to bring their power to bear. This weakens their power over Shadows but removes a few of the restrictions the full class would impart.

  Skill gained: Almost Effortless Shaping (Darkness) (Apprentice VI) (Flawed Unique). Effortless shaping allows the user to use their powers to shape their element, in this case Darkness, into any shape that they can imagine. This can be used to form weapons, shapes, abstract thoughts… and so on. Darkness withholds no secrets from you, allowing your senses to be even better in the darkness. Attaining the Effortless Shaping skill is the goal of any elemental manipulator, even if they don’t know it. You came… somewhat close. Instead of being able to shape shadows for free, mana cost is 80-n per second, where ‘n’ equals skill level.

  “What did you just do? Something changed; the system poked its overgrown nose in here.” The Specter generated chains and pulled Joe close, looking him over with empty eye sockets. “Tell me!”

  “I got a new skill!” Joe told him breathlessly, his throat being squeezed just hard enough to allow him to answer. “It’s a new shadow skill; it somehow created excellent synergy and combined, giving me a class.”