“Ready?” Logan called, knocking on Amelia’s door.
They were going upstairs to hunt some rats today. The goal was to collect more food and, if they were lucky, maybe find some kind of unique monster that would raise Logan’s privilege level. That was more of an afterthought since he only had a vague idea of how to do that.
James and Tom stood behind him. James wielded the crystal dagger he had found in the cells while Tom used a short sword from the skeletons, but the differences ended there. They had both opted to use the same type of shield. It was called a buckler and was so small that it could barely defend the upper body, the disc no larger than a dinner plate.
It would help deflect some attacks but wouldn’t do much if a rat pounced on him with its full body weight.
“Coming!” Stephanie said in a singsong tone, her voice muffled through the stone door.
The door opened, and both girls stepped out. They wore the same white robes as everyone else. They were all the same size as well, but Amelia and Stephanie had tweaked their outfits to set themselves apart. Logan couldn’t blame them. There wasn’t much to do the last few days, leaving them both with more hours than they knew what to do with.
Stephanie came out first. Her hair was tied into a pigtail, and ribbons of white fabric were weaved into the dual braids. They ended in bows that matched the one her sash was tied in. She waved at Logan and gave him a bright smile. Unlike the rest of them, she carried her weapon in her left hand since she was the only left-handed person in the group.
Logan smiled back. He appreciated her positive attitude a lot, and so did many of the others.
Amelia stepped out next, a big crystal shield in her left hand and one of the few short spears in her right. It was small enough to be used in one hand, allowing her to carry the shield for a solid amount of protection. It covered half of her body and weighed a fair bit since it was pretty thick. Logan suspected she was also why Tom had decided to use a shield. He often made an excuse to train with her since they could pool their knowledge.
“How do I look, guys?” Stephanie said, doing a little pose. She glanced at all of the boys before staring intently at Tom.
“Like a Goddess of war and beauty,” Logan said.
James gave a thumbs up and a forced smile, both nervous about fighting monsters and depressed.
“Looking good,” Tom replied, glancing at her before focusing on Amelia. “You look like a real Valkyrie with that shield.”
“Hmm?” Amelia said, not really paying attention as she fiddled with the shield strap around her arm. “Oh, thanks.”
Amelia also had her sash in a bow and her hair in a braid. The white ribbons were the same as Stephanie’s, only her hair was in a single braid that trailed down her back and didn’t end in a bow. They both looked great despite their horrible situation.
Still, it was obvious that Tom only had eyes for Amelia.
“Now, shall we sort out who is responsible for what?” Logan said, trying to move the situation along. “This might be very dangerous, so I’m more than happy to scout ahead while you all stay grouped together.”
Stephanie pouted at Tom since she had been ignored, but she returned to her cheerful self when Logan spoke. “Make sure to scream if you get mauled!”
***
Around half an hour later, Logan stood at the end of the stairwell. Amelia and Tom were on either side of him, leaving James in the middle and Stephanie at the back due to her greater reach and weaker defence.
They all wore spotty patches of armour. Mostly gauntlets, pauldrons on the shoulders, and chain mail skirts that went down to the top of the knee. Not the best or most protective, but it was all that they could scavenge.
“Ready?” Logan said, earning a chorus of nods in return.
The rest of the group stayed behind in the cavern. Deon had volunteered to stay back and protect them in case something crawled up from underground, but Logan believed the man was just scared. He couldn’t blame the guy, and neither would he force him to fight, both because he wasn’t needed and that he would only cause more problems than help fix.
Logan thought back on the elderly in their group. None were fit or young enough to run, which didn’t help in a life-or-death situation. A few of them also refused to learn how to fight. Some had legitimate excuses, one of them being a combination of arthritis and osteoporosis that made it all but impossible to grip a spear without significant pain. The other was just an entitled hag who thought that those younger than her should risk their lives while she relaxed.
That left just the five of them to collect food and hopefully raise Logan’s privilege level. There were medicines and resources for sale that could help revitalise the group’s older members before they made the journey up. Until then, it was on the younger generation to pull their weight.
Logan walked up the staircase first. A few minutes later, he came out at the top and found himself in a familiar hallway. It was the same as the one downstairs, only much longer and over twice as wide.
Logan silently opened the closest door and was shocked to find a tunnel on the other side. It looked completely natural, with a few stalactites hanging off the roof here and there. He even saw glowing mushrooms and fungus lining the floor and walls.
Logan signalled that it was safe and checked a few more doors before the others arrived.
“Well, what did you find?” James said, his eyes flicking to the open doors.
“Caves and no more stairs. I think this is some kind of central hallway that connects a series of passages together. It looks like the tunnels keep going, which makes me wonder if they all lead to different places or have some other purpose. Hell, it might even be a natural farm for all I know.”
“Have you tried to eat any of those mushrooms yet?” Stephanie said, almost drooling at the sight of food. “Are they edible?”
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“No, I haven’t. They shouldn’t kill me if I only have a nibble of one, but I can’t be sure I won’t get violently ill.”
Amelia nodded. “Smart. The egg should keep you alive no matter how many mushrooms you eat. The issue is that we have no idea if it can stop you from getting food poisoning.”
“That would be really convenient,” Tom said, barely suppressing a grin. “No need to leave markers when we can just follow the trail of whatever he leaves behind.”
James made a face, Amelia gagged at the idea, and Stephanie shuddered and closed her eyes.
When she opened them, she smacked Tom on the arm and scolded him for saying something so disgusting.
“I’ll try a mushroom on our way back. As long as we can hunt a few rats first, I’m happy to risk feeling sick for a few days if it means we can get more food.”
Tom chuckled while the others nodded.
“Anyway,” Amelia said, changing the subject, “you didn’t find more stairs?”
“No, there are none. I think we’re at the top of this temple and can’t go any higher. There might be a way through a tunnel, but we’ll have to find it ourselves.”
They began their search by going through the door closest to the stairwell. None of the doors were close to each other, and neither were they equally spaced apart. Some were over ten metres away from each other while others were so close they were almost touching. The nearest two were on the left while the third was on the right side of the hallway, making it so that none of the tunnels appeared to be connected at first glance.
Logan started walking ahead of everyone. He broke off a glowing blue mushroom and dropped it in the middle of the tunnel as he went along, his idea being that they could use it to keep track of where they had already explored. The rest of the group followed about ten or so metres behind. They rarely lost sight of him so it was entirely to leave a trail for them to follow back once they were done.
Things were peaceful for the first half hour until Logan heard digging. Slowly walking around a bend in the tunnel, he spotted a crystal rat scratching at a mound of glowing fungus. It was bright green and looked like a giant head of cauliflower growing out of a stone wall.
Logan couldn’t see what the rat was doing until it stopped digging. It stuck its head into the fungus and sniffed. After lunging deeper into the folds, it came out of the cauliflower fungus with a slug in its claws. Now that it stopped moving, he could see that the rat was smaller than the one he had killed a few days ago.
Hopefully he wouldn’t need the egg this time. Logan needed at least one vial for when he got back home. Shaking his head, ideas and strategies began to appear in his mind. The rat was smaller than the other one, but it was still around that of a medium-sized dog with crystalline claws and a thick protective hide.
He would have to come up with something good.
The slug glowed the same colour as the fungus. It writhed in the rat’s claws, but it didn’t give the slimy creature a chance to escape. Holding it against the ground, the rat bit into the slug and began to rip out chunks of flesh while it was still alive, luminescent green blood spilling out of its wounds.
Logan turned around and saw the rest of his group standing a ways behind. He waved them over before turning back to watch the rat feed on its prey. When his friends crawled over, he pointed at the rat and made a few hand gestures that he hoped they would understand.
Not giving them any time to mess up, Logan signalled them to wait as he approached the monster from behind. He was lucky that it was facing the other way. If not, he would’ve had to run out like an idiot and face it head-on. That wasn’t the case here. With its guard lowered and its back facing him, Logan could sneak up on it and land the first blow.
With his time limited, he decided to attack one of its hind legs to keep it from running away as easily. Not only was it the closest limb, but it was also relatively unprotected by its crystal hide.
Once he was close enough, Logan thrust his spear at the rat. He tried his best to use Piercing Thrust but failed to combine the pieces into a full technique. That didn’t mean he dropped the spear or failed to do any damage. Instead, his unsuccessful attempt was a noticeably stronger attack than what he could do without a technique.
Before the rat even noticed him, Logan’s spear had torn a hole in its thigh and sent a few chips of crystalline hair flying off its hind legs. The beast immediately screeched in pain and spun around to face him. With its hackles raised, the rat was only a bit smaller than a large dog. While that was less bulky than the first rat they’d encountered, he didn’t like having a staring contest with a hissing beast, its mouth literally foaming up as it trembled with rage.
Thankfully, the others were charging over from the second he attacked.
Seeing four more people circle around it, the rat slowly backed up against the wall. With Amelia on his left and Tom on his right, Logan managed to keep the rat from breaking out of their encirclement. The goal was to exhaust the beast and finish it off once it was tired and vulnerable. That meant getting in a jab or two to make it bleed, which should weaken it by quite a bit.
The rat swiped at Logan and Amelia whenever they poked it with their spears. The two of them surrounded the rat along with Tom, but he wasn’t being very aggressive. His shield was only a third the size of Amelia’s, and his life was much more vulnerable than Logan’s.
The heightened risk had obviously made him hesitant to engage. Logan couldn’t blame the guy, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t causing problems. The rat was probing each of them, sometimes even trying to run through a gap in their legs or attempting to pounce on someone without a shield. Logan and Amelia stabbed the rat whenever they got the chance. Even Stephanie and James were stepping between them and getting a jab or two in.
On the other hand, Tom only reacted to the rat. He never took the initiative to step forward and attack, allowing the beast to come to him every time. That would be fine if Logan and Amelia were doing the same, but they weren’t standing back and remaining passive. That left the rat to attack Tom at will, giving it many more space and options in its attempts to escape.
Logan could see that it was an issue. Something would eventually go wrong, which pushed him to attack even more frequently so that the fight would be over before it did. He repeatedly tried to get a handle on Piercing Thrust, but the technique eluded him just as much as it had an hour ago.
The frustration made him more aggressive, helping Logan tear some holes into the rat with his ‘failures’, all of which were dripping blood. The only problem was that they were all shallow thanks to the rat’s crystal hide. They would stop bleeding within seconds, forcing him to keep attacking if he wanted to cause any real damage.
As the minutes passed, a few scratches and teeth marks appeared on Logan and Tom. Amelia only had a scratch on her left leg. It wasn’t bleeding so he didn’t include it as an injury. As for the rat, it was a mess of cuts and holes, its crystal fur broken in many places.
Despite the damage, it was a veritable tank. The blood on the floor would add up to less than a jug, and even though they had been forcing it to run around, the beast didn’t seem that much slower than at the start. It only looked injured and tired on the surface. In reality, it was doing much better than the rest of them.
Taking the chance to see how everyone was doing, Logan noticed a lot of heavy breathing. Someone was going to mess up soon, resulting in someone getting killed or an escaped monster with a vendetta against their group.
The rat suddenly lunged at Tom with its claws bared. He blocked the slash with his shield like usual, even scoring a line across the rat’s chest as it scurried back. The experience of a real fight was helping him improve with every engagement. However, his improved skills did nothing to help him stop the rat when it attempted to escape.
As Tom pulled his sword back, the rat tried to run around him. His sword flew out once more. It had no strength behind it, the blade leaving a shallow scratch across the rat’s side.
The beast ignored the attack and tried to break out of their encirclement, but James stepped forward with his dagger, thrusting it straight at the rat’s face. It cried out and scurried back as the weapon bounced off its skull. Reeling from the pain of having its nose cut open, the beast retreated back into the circle and licked the painful wound.
Logan smiled, stepping forward and trying to use Piercing Thrust while it was distracted. The rat dodged his spear by lunging at Tom. It went for his feet like it often did. Logan expected the man to step back and jab the beast with his sword, but his timing was off, forcing Tom to hop on one foot to avoid getting his ankle torn apart.
The next moment, Tom lost his footing on a patch of moss and slipped. That gave it the opportunity to scurry around Tom’s feet and pounce at James. He slashed his dagger at the flying rodent, but the weapon came a moment too late, giving it free rein to sink its claws into his neck.
Logan could see this all happening, his mind already reaching out to the egg.