Chapter Three Hundred and Eighty-Nine - Antipathy

Puffles walked with a slow, stalking gait through the narrow corridor leading into the dungeon. His magic light, little more than a lightball with a bit more oomph, was enough to illuminate everything fairly well, but I still summoned a light of my own and noticed Amaryllis and Caprica doing the same.

I was about to ask if the dungeon was going to be dark the entire time when we happened across an end to the corridor.

This led to an open space, a rocky outcrop with steps leading down to one side.

Towering above us, massive to the point of being almost incomprehensible, was a tree. Its trunk was as wide around as the Storm Tower, and it climbed far higher into the sky. Enourmous branches reached out and up, the ends holding onto a starry canvas high above while little flickering lights painted a night sky that didn’t match the mid-morning sky we’d just left.

“Whoa,” I said.

I loved this world. Every time I thought I’d seen something new and impressive, I’d stumble across something else that just amazed me. Like a huge tree hidden away in a cave where it absolutely wouldn’t fit.

“That’s the dungeon core there,” Puffles said. He pointed to something, and I followed his directions with a squint. There was a shorter branch sticking out of the tree, almost like a hand, and at its end was a faintly glowing... something. The core, I supposed.

It was covered in roots. In fact, the entire branch was, with more wrapped around the tree’s trunk. Some had pierced into the bark, finding cracks and nooks where questing tendrils could reach in.

“A core visible from the first floor,” Amaryllis breathed. “I’d never heard the like.”

“That is very unusual,” Caprica agreed. “Can’t we just... fly to it?”

“Just the way it is. Usually it provides all the light you could need on this floor, but now that it’s covered,” Puffles said. He shook his head, clearly disappointed. “And no, you can’t just fly to it. It’s too far away.”

“I can fly that distance,” Caprica said.

“You’d think that. But the more you fly, the further it gets. You could fly all day and you’d still only be a few minutes from the ground,” Puffles said.

I think I understood. This place would have been a little more magical with a great big dungeon core just hanging overhead the entire time. I tore my eyes away from the tree and the root-covered core. There was a path from the little outcropping we were on down into a zig-zaggy route between large roots that led all the way to the base of the tree.

“Is that how we get to the next floor?” I asked with a gesture ahead.

Puffles nodded. “Yup. Used to be that a bit of sugar water would have all the ants let you pass without trouble. You’d need a bit more to convince them to let you take their quilts.”

“Quilts?” Calamity asked. “Like, blankets?”

“That’s what we call them. The ants make these big nets out of their spit. Now, if you annoy them, they’ll spit those nets at you. It’s not hard to cut through, but it is a pain. I’ve seen folk trip and fall, and it’s hard to fly when your wings are all tangled up.”

Caprica nodded, and I wondered if she had any experience with that.

“So, what’s the trick now, then?” Amaryllis asked.

“Mostly, we follow the path and kill any ants in our way. The vines make them weaker than they used to be, but more aggressive too. Can’t make it too far though, eventually the vines block out the path, and even my Weedkiller skill can’t get rid of enough of them to make it through.”

I’d never heard of that skill before, but it seemed like something a farmer would want to have. I could wipe Evil Roots out with Cleaning magic, but that didn’t mean it was the only option. “If you don’t mind me asking, how strong is your Weedkiler skill?” I asked.

“Hmm,” Puffles said. “Got it to the first magical rank, never pushed it past that.”

“Ah, okay, thank you.” so rank C, which was pretty good, but it took until rank S for my Cleaning magic to really start working on the roots. Still, another possible option. I glanced to Amaryllis and she nodded a bit. If we ever made it to another Exploration Guild or something, we’d have to let people know about that trick.

We formed up a bit before climbing down the side of the outcropping. Caprica took the lead, with Awen on one side and Puffles on the other with his pitchfork. Amaryllis and Calamity made up our rear-guard, and I ended up in the middle where I could dive in to help wherever it was needed.

It was strange to see blades of grass towering above us, and there was even a dandelion that hung heavy nearby where each seed was as big around as my head.

Our descent was noticed, unfortunately, and by the time we were halfway down the stairs over a dozen ants were skittering their way up to us. “Looks like they’re eager for a fight,” Caprica said. Her shield thunked down and she unsheathed her sword. “Stay behind me if you can.”

Calamity hummed to himself, a little ditty that sounded all too casual as he nocked an arrow then let it loose.

It thumped into the head of the lead ant, and it crashed down, the ants behind it scurrying over its body without even slowing down.

Then Amaryllis got involved, and long arcs of lightning flashed out into the ants with a powerful crackling discharge. The ants convulsed, steam rising off of them, and little electric jolts flew from one to the other, spreading the damage around.

Not to be undone, Awen fired her crossbow into the mass, and Puffles moved his pitchfork around so that the new lead ant rammed right into it.

And then it was pretty much done.

I felt kinda useless. I hadn’t even tossed out a fireball to help.

“Are there any more?” Caprica asked.

“Oh, plenty,” Puffles said. He tugged a cloth out of his back pocket and wiped the end of his pitchfork clean. “We’ll be seeing them down below. Some can’t move much, on account of the vines.”

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Congratulations! Your party has exterminated 14 Quilted Ants (Level 4-5)! Due to combating as a team your reward is reduced!

Huh, I’d gotten experience for that? I hadn’t done anything! Well, maybe it counted moral support or something? I didn’t know exactly how mister and misses menu decided to doll out experience.

“Should we leapfrog forward?” Caprica asked.

“Leapfrog?” I asked. I was pretty good at jumping, so I imagined I’d be good at that.

“It’s when an army unit advances, stops, then allows another unit to advance past their position. Technically since we’re more like a singular unit, it would be more accurate to call it a bounding advance,” Caprica said.

“Well, we usually just keep on ploughing through till we can’t,” Puffles said.

I held back a laugh at the look Caprica got for a second there. “We’ll do what Caprica said, then,” I replied. “Maybe we can save up mana that way. Amaryllis doesn't have unlimited mana.”

“I regenerate mana fairly rapidly, and I have plenty to spare,” Amaryllis said. Her huff right after basically told me not to underestimate her.

“Ah, well, yeah, but there’s also three more floors after this,” I said.

We got to the bottom of the stairs, circumventing the dead ants as we went. I noted that all of them were wrapped in black vines, with some vines digging into the ant’s tough exoskeleton through big ugly cracks.

Were the ants in control of themselves anymore? It was hard to tell, I’d never spoken to one before, but according to Puffles they were acting strangely, so that had to be enough not to feel too guilty about smushing them all.

I still felt a little guilty though.

Once we were at the base of the outcrop where the entrance was, I could see why this floor was just one long corridor. The (non-evil) roots of the huge dungeon tree created walls on either side of our group, walls which twisted and turned so much that we couldn’t see all that far ahead.

“I’ll take point for now,” Caprica said. “We can switch around at every intersection?”

“We’ll see how we feel,” I said. “But for now, that sounds like a good idea. Amaryllis, want to hold back for the next one, then do your thing on the one after that?”

Amaryllis rolled her eyes. “Oh, very well. But if I think we’re in trouble I won’t be holding back.”

“Of course not,” I said with a thumbs up. “Anyone else have anything they need to let us know?”

“I’d like to try and retrieve what arrows I can salvage,” Calamity said.

“I can maybe make you new ones,” Awen said. “Kinda? My bolts are made of glass. I think arrows are a little more complicated.”

Calamity shrugged. “I can probably work out how to shoot glass arrows. I have a couple of archery skills that might come in handy for that. But I’d rather just use normal broadheads like I’m used to.”

Awen nodded. “Okay. Just ask if you need them.”

“We’ll pause to let you pick your arrows back up,” I said. I imagined the fact that these were dungeon monsters who faded to ash would help a lot since he didn’t need to tug the arrow out of a corpse or anything.

“Heads up!” Caprica said.

We turned ahead just as a trio of ants came around the corner. They were moving a bit sluggishly, their limbs partially tangled in vines, but when they sensed us, they picked up the pace. Then a few more came out from around the bend, and I got ready for a proper fight.

We didn’t run out to meet the ants, because that would have been silly when they were already moving towards us. Calamity and Awen fired their respective bows at the front of the pack (what was a group of ants called, anyway?) and I prepared, then lobbed a big brace of fireballs that spun through the air, then splattered onto a few of them with sticky, fiery gobs.

The ants also had ranged options though. One of them opened its mandibles wide, then with a yucky splorching sound, spat out a large gob of something sticky and wet.

Caprica moved ahead of it, and the stuff thumped against her shield and then onto the floor with a wet splat.

I opened Weedbane as the ants came closer. Calamity got off another quick shot, and Awen let out a frustrated grunt as she failed to cock her crossbow in time and just gave up in favour of grabbing her warhammer.

The ants were... not very strong. Not only were they uncoordinated, what with vines catching on their many legs and tripping them up, they also didn’t seem to know where we were attacking from very well. Most of them being between levels four and five also didn’t help them any. Not that their carapaces weren’t naturally tough, it was just that they didn’t seem to have many tricks up their sleeves except for spitting out the occasional glob of stringy cloth in bright colours and strange patterns.

I winced as a wet splat hit me in the calf. A glance down revealed a large clump of plaid cloth caught around my greaves. I shook it off, my Cleaning aura wicking away the spittle but doing nothing for the cloth itself.

Soon enough, however, we’d fought through another batch of ants. I got another message from Mister Menu about experience earned (this time I felt like it really was earned) and then we started looking for Calamity’s arrows before anyone could step on one by accident.

“These aren’t too difficult yet,” Caprica said.

“It won’t get much harder than this on the first floor,” Puffles said. “Most folk choose not to fight though. There’s a lot of ants and not as many of us. It’s bad business to get swarmed.”

“We’ll take our time then,” I said.

At least it was good experience! Something told me I was due for another level up soon. It would be nice to be a bit stronger before we reached the wedding!

***