Sixth Realm

by Michael Chatfield

  “Fire!” Storbon said.

  Gilly fired out a stream of water that cut through the air. The ground underneath shot up in the attack’s path like jagged teeth. The water cut through several orcs as the ‘teeth’ stabbed into the orcs from below and created a natural barrier.

  Erik fired his rifle from his place on her back, he only stopped shooting when the target went down and he changed targets to the next orc.

  At the same time everyone but Erik fired their repeaters. Each of them controlled an area of the tunnel. Their bolts pierced through the orc’s armor and into their bodies. A red glow covered the orcs as they seemed to ignore their wounds and try to push forward even as more arrows pierced them. George stomped on the ground and blue flames shot through the ground, cracking it as it created a line toward the orcs. The ground split underneath them and blue flames vented up into the middle of their group.

  Some of the orcs caught fire as others were killed directly, tombstones appeared in the tunnels.

  The orc group, numbering around fifteen, was reduced to nothing in a few short minutes.

  Erik paid attention to Gilly even as he heard the sweet arrival of notifications.

  “There are more bands coming towards us.”

  “Alright, Yao Meng, Tian Cui in the rear, Lucinda, Yuli up front with me.”

  They quickly stored the loot.

  Storbon lead the way as they charged forward. It seemed that the warbands in the entire catacomb were chasing after them.

  Erik looked back as he heard the bark of a rifle.

  Yao Meng and Tian Cui were firing their rifles as Lucinda’s eyes glowed. Rats and other small creatures that were hiding in the area poured out and leaped to attack the charging orcs.

  There had to be about twenty orcs charging from behind. They were able to thin their numbers, but they were charging through the tunnels and actually picking up speed.

  “We need to get stuck in or else they’ll tear through us,” Erik said.

  “Take a left at the next intersection, there is a cavern in that direction, looks like it has a water source running through it.”

  Storbon lead them forward and turned at the intersection.

  The group all followed him. Yao Meng fired his under barrel grenade launcher, killing a group of orcs and making the tunnel shake violently, dislodging rocks and dust from the ceiling. A spike of stone dropped towards Erik. He threw out his fist, crushing the stone before it reached him.

  They charged through, streaming dust, groups of orcs gathering together behind them and moving across the rough ground that slowed them.

  Storbon entered the cavern first, scanning and looking for opponents. There were five entrances into the cavern, three of which were behind them, and a waterfall to their right that made it hard to speak. Mist was thrown up, filling the room as the water travelled through a fast-moving stream across the room from their right to the left.

  On the other side there were two tunnels, one straight ahead and the other to the left, between the tunnel and the waterfall.

  “We need to cross,” Storbon had to yell to be heard over the water.

  Gilly seemed to understand and stepped forwards as Yuli looked to be starting a spell. Gilly tapped the ground and let out a deep roar that Erik felt in his chest, a bridge of stone appeared and arched over the water.

  Rugrat grabbed Erik’s armor, “I’m going up high!” The communicators cut through the background noise of the waterfall. He pointed to an overhang in the cavern with vines hanging off of it.

  Erik nodded and gave him the ‘Okay’ symbol.

  George jumped into the air with Rugrat. The ceiling was nearly two hundred meters high, giving Rugrat a great vantage over the battlefield.

  Everyone crosses the bridge as Erik jumps down from Gilly and pulls out his grenade launcher.

  Gilly stomps her leg. A low wall of stone appears back from the shore of the river but running parallel with it.

  The others store their mounts away and grab their weapon systems, getting behind the short wall.

  Gilly let out a cry to Erik getting him to focus on her.

  He nodded and ran over to Storbon, grabbing him and yelling in his ear.

  “We need to hit them and keep running. There are more orcs coming from those tunnels and looking to loop around to our rear,” Erik said.

  Storbon had a thoughtful expression as he looked at Erik’s grenade launcher.

  “Grenades then?”

  “Might as well, blunt impact.”

  Storbon signalled he had heard and went to the others, holding out his grenade launcher and pointing at them and then the tunnels they were supposed to cover.

  As special team members they had the best gear that Alva could produce and all of them had grenade launchers on them.

  They adjusted their aim and readied themselves, it had only been a few minutes since they had reached the cavern.

  The orcs charged out of the dust filled tunnel and then more started to appear from other tunnels.

  A spell formation snapped into existence around Gilly as a pillar of water shot out from her and slammed into the orcs charging down the tunnel they had been running through. It tore up the ground, blasted through the tunnel’s rock and reformed it. The pillar of water and tunnel debris cut through the orcs and forced them back.

  Rugrat fired his rifle, his round hit an orc, killing them. A black spell formation appeared on the ground and chains shot out, holding the orcs that were hit from behind by their charging compatriots before grenades landed among the group; the pause was enough to group them all together nicely.

  George swooped down, leaving Rugrat on his perch as he released blue flames down the remaining tunnel andGilly’s attack ended. Erik and Lucinda fired on the tunnel, using their grenades to kill the recovering orcs and bring down the tunnel.

  “Reloading!” Erik snapped the grenade launcher open and dropped the smoking shells before lowering it. He looked over the short wall, saw the right tunnel was closed off, and that the central tunnel he had fired on was broken as well. George headed back to his perch, the tunnel had been turned into magma in places. The last group fired their grenades, the molten stone hitting any unlucky remaining orcs.

  Erik had dragged his hand around the cylinder of the grenade launcher, dropping rounds out of his storage ring and directly into the weapon. He snapped it together and looked to Storbon who was sending them all signals. They quickly mounted back up, Rugrat, riding George dropped to the ground and took the lead. They rushed out of the cavern, and kept going. If they got bogged down in fighting then more orcs could flank around them and kill them. In unknown territory they needed to keep going.

  They got away from the cavern and they could hear once again.

  “We’re about a ten minute ride from the outpost, we just need to break out of this orc area. I wanted to take the other tunnel, but that wasn’t an option, this one leads to an orc camp. We’ll need to rush past it and then we’ll be out of the orc-controlled territory, I think,” Rugrat said, getting everyone else up to speed.

  “Anyone injured?” Yao Meng called out, checking on everyone as Storbon spoke.

  “If Gilly can cover them with water and then Yuli casts lightning magic that should have a greater effect.”

  “George can instant boil some of it, give us cover,” Rugrat said.

  Erik communicated with Gilly before she looked back, looking him in the eye before she let out a proud screech.

  Water mist covered the cavern. Yuli’s lightning spell turned it into a lightning prison, jumping from water droplet to water droplet.

  Orcs dropped to the ground, stunned by the lightning.

  George breathed in and exhaled flames.

  The mist turned into a fog in seconds, orcs yelled because of the superheated steam.

  “Move it!” Storbon yelled getting everyone into action.

  The steam was starting to condense, covering the cavern in a wet sheen.

  They r
eloaded their different weapons as they rode through the tunnels, all of them had mastered riding on their mounts at this point.

  “Camp is just ahead!” Rugrat said.

  Gilly let out a keen of agreement while George let out a challenging growl, the other Panthers joining in.

  The thrill of the hunt, the fight was on.

  We just need to get past this camp.

  Around Gilly a faint haze could be seen as she gathered her power, ready to carry out the water spell.

  The tunnel opened up ahead faint flickering lights from fires inside the camp played on the rough rock roof and surroundings.

  Erik took in the camp at a glance, walls made of stones piles atop one another. Crude design, sentries wandering around.

  Spikes with heads on the wall, mostly orc, others beast, some human.

  High pitched yips and yaps from inside and outside the camp revealed scrawny, diseased and crazed-looking dogs that scavenged the area around the camp all looked over at the pack of people that were rushing out of the tunnel, trying to stay away from the camp as much as possible and get around it to the open areas beyond.

  A yowl went up and some of the starved dogs started to move forward.

  “Looks like we have company,” Rugrat said, raising his voice as he fired the repeater on George’s back.

  The magically enhanced arrows from the special team’s repeaters acted as tracers as they reached out to meet the growing horde of scavenger dogs.

  “Ready!” Yuli yelled.

  “Do it girl,” Erik said to Gilly, his legs were clamped around her midriff allowing him the freedom to fire his grenades into the large groups of dogs that were turning and chasing after their rear.

  Gilly turned her head towards the camp, her body started to glow with power, runes appearing on her skin as the air around her became heavy and cold. A rumble could be heard through the area as a blue line appeared above the camp. From the line, runes and other parts of a magical circle appeared almost organically like they were being written in the sky with someone not taking their pen off of the sky’s page.

  The spell formation was completed as it drew in the surrounding mana.

  Is this using the external mana stage of spell casting?

  Erik watched as mana surged out of Gilly and the spell formation grew in strength, clouds formed above the camp and rain started to fall. It quickly turned from a shower into a tropical downpour so strong that it created a visual barrier.

  Yuli’s eyes were glowing as another spell formation appeared among the clouds.

  The clouds rumbled as orc guards reached the walls and started to fire their bows at the group. With the rain falling on them and the changing directions of the group, the arrows missed their targets. orcs were used to using their blunt weapons instead of the short and simple bows.

  “Shaman!” Lucinda yelled.

  Erik looked over, seeing an orc a full head higher than its already tall brethren. It was wearing a headdress, seemingly stumped over by its weight as it rested on a staff of black and cracked wood. Within the wood one could see a green glow, a rope of small heads attached to the staff.

  The Shaman was wearing robes that were made from different hides.

  It started to chant, gathering a massive amount of mana.

  Erik was inwardly alarmed.

  Is this the power of the Sixth Realm dungeon mobs?

  “Not today,” Yuli said, her voice infused with mana, her lightning fell upon Gilly’s conjured rain, thick blinding arcs of lightning descended weaving through the rain. The noise rolled through the camp and the tunnels, shaking the ceiling and the foundations.

  They looked away from the camp that was now a series of light impressions as lightning bolts fell one after another. Gilly’s spell drew in external mana, having a much greater effect than her spell would have had by itself. The high mana concentration fueled the spell that Yuli had cast, the two of them working in synergy.

  The dogs lost interest in the hunt and fled in fear, allowing the group to speed up, using all of their speed to escape.

  The shaman changed his spells and a mana barrier appeared over the top of the camp as they got around the camp, riding down the small rise that reached up to the camp. There was a well-worn trail in the ground that Rugrat led them down.

  Erik scanned the area and looked back at the camp. He saw as the lightning hit the side of the mana barrier and then struck the ground, earth exploded outward from the impact and then like someone pulling string out of dirt, it tore up the ground, scattering rocks and clumps of dirt and mud.

  Erik felt a chill, thinking of those attacks landing in the middle of the camp.

  He glanced up. In the top right of his vision a notification symbol flashing there.

  The group reloaded once again as they left the stone and dirt lands of the orc’s behind. Slowly trees, bushes and other plants could be seen. Everything had a sickly look to it, there was little light down here, but there was water falling from the ceiling in different places, making ponds that were covered in plants and where different creatures gathered to drink.

  A beast hiding in the trees jumped out at them, it had the body of a lizard, with long limbs with barbed suckers on the end of them. Itss maw opened, revealing three jaws all lined with teeth with a mouth big enough to fit a human.

  Lucinda fired her repeater into the beast, she had blunt and increased speed sockets on the repeater and the creature was tossed back and away from the group. The impacts rocked it, but its scaled body took the damage well.

  Rugrat’s chains rose up from the ground and clamped onto the creature as Storbon fired his rifle. He had a piercing formation in the socket and the round went right through the creature’s head and deep into its body.

  It slumped down with a tombstone appearing above it as they looked around for other threats.

  “Must be a lone hunter. Keep an eye out, Yao Meng loot it,” Storbon said.

  Yao Meng rode over to the tombstone, his rifle pointed at the beast, tucked under his arm as his mount started toward it, ready to attack.

  He accessed the tombstone and it disappeared the next second, the beast started to dissipate.

  “Let’s get going,” Storbon said.

  They headed off again and they didn’t encounter anything else for a while.

  “So what kind of loot did you get from that thing? What is it?” Yuli asked.

  “It’s called a Deep Snapper, I got acid poison sacks, a small dagger, poison barbs, monster core, Greater Earth Grade. Then a section of its hide, damaged though,” Yao Meng said.

  “Deep Snapper? What is it a lost football player? Maybe an engineer? Those bastards could drink, looks better than some of them did after a night out. Hey look, there’s light up ahead,” Rugrat said.

  “I’m surprised and scared by just how much useless information you store in there,” Erik said.

  “For a second there I forgot that we were using Night Vision spells.” Lucinda said.

  “Get used to being in the dark, that Night Vision spell makes it so easy to move around at night or in the dark,” Tian Cui said.

  “Night creeper,” Yao Meng said.

  “What I do best,” Tian Cui grinned.

  Erik moved up towards Rugrat.

  “What does it look like to you?”

  “That Tian Cui is a lot scarier than I thought, can you hold me tonight I’m scared. She could out-stealth a chameleon.”

  Erik held his face, talking into his palm.

  “Why did it have to be him that came to the ten realms with me. Couldn’t I have someone normal?”

  “Ah you love it,” Rugrat grabbed his shoulder and shook him. “Looks like more light, with my mana sense I can pick out a lot of people with magical capabilities moving around. Based on the mana, I would say that it is humans.” Rugrat checked the map.

  “And it lines up with the map I have.”

  He showed it to Erik who compared the area around them to the map.


  “Should be coming up on an outpost soon, stay alert,” Erik said.

  They continued forward as a group, each scanning the area.

  “These roads are more like a trail,” Storbon said.

  “The people in the camp must not go out and fight the orcs that much. Either they ignore them or don’t know about them. If they’re dungeon creatures then they will most likely keep to themselves unless someone enters their territory.

  “They do give a lot of experience because they’re intelligent creatures, albeit savages,” Lucinda said.

  “Look who is already trying to grind out experience,” Storbon laughed.

  “That is why people probably don’t them, you can learn how a beast will react. Sentient creatures? You can try to predict but they can do something completely unexpected and take everyone out.” Rugrat said.

  “You sound like you’ve done it before.”

  “I hunted and was hunted by humans for most of my life, it was our job.”

  Erik grunted as everyone else fell silent.

  They kept scanning the area but relaxed a bit as the outpost came into sight.

  “Well, I think that outpost doesn’t really cover that. Doesn’t look anything like the outposts that are in the Beast Mountain Range, more like a small city,” Rugrat said.

  “Just how much did the academies build, these outposts are all over the dungeon,” Yuli said.

  The outpost had reinforced walls made from formation-covered stone that reached fifty meters tall. Behind the wall there was a bustling town, but there were a few different clearly separated compounds with towers that were embossed with the crest of the different groups that commanded them.

  At the center there was a lone tower with a book and sword crossing one another.

  “Managing this all has to be a nightmare,” Rugrat said.

  “Yeah, imagine all the Zhen Fu’s, the competition and fighting between all of the people to get a better position,” Erik said.

  “All managed by a council. Like I know that we have a council for Alva, but it’s slimmed down and there is Egbert there to keep things moving ahead so they don’t get bogged down. Here...” Rugrat let out a whistle.

  “Councils for research, councils for the different groups and then councils to deal with the needs of citizens, one to negotiate between different groups, another to control it all.”