They reappeared in a small, wood-walled chamber the size of a small bedroom. Rick and Sasha both scanned their surroundings, looking for any immediate threats. When they found none, and Sasha saw the small podium with glowing writing set against the far wall, she let out a breath.
“You can relax, Rick. This is what I was talking about. Some Dungeons will warn you of what the trial inside contains before you enter. Rooms like this will allow you to leave without participating in the challenge.”
Hearing that, he immediately slumped to the floor, cradling his broken arm. Taking a closer look, Sasha could obviously see the unnatural bend in his upper arm almost dead center, halfway down the bone. It hadn’t broken his skin, but that was the only real positive.
Rick looked at it before hissing out a strained breath. “Mother Mary and Joseph, that stings somethin’ fierce.”
“You have to Revive. We can’t treat a broken arm. Stacked with your bruising, we can’t challenge this Dungeon. We have to leave.” Sasha insisted.
Rick shook his head, clenching his teeth and leaning back into the wall. “Need some spare leather and two planks of wood ‘bout as long as my arm. The good one, not the bent one. And the sharpest shovel we’ve got. Please and thank you.”
Sasha sighed before producing what he’d asked for from her stomach storage.
“RIght, now I need you to realign the bones. Actually, get me the smallest bit of wood you’ve got, somethin’ that’ll fit in my mouth, and tiny bit of scrap leather.”
Taking the offered item, Rick used his good hand to wrap the leather around the bit of wood before sticking it between his teeth. Standing with obvious difficulty, he took the sharpened shovel in his good hand, and slammed it as hard as he could into the wooden floor. It buried in several inches, standing perfectly upright. Then, he gestured toward the bent arm.
Reluctantly, Sasha slithered up his body before wrapping gingerly around the broken bone. Then, Rick gripped the shovel with his injured arm, and pulled. Screaming into the makeshift bit, Sasha could feel the broken segments underneath her pull away from where they had slipped past each other. With her body, she gripped the two sections, realigning the bone through feel.
That done, Rick dropping into a knee while still holding the shovel to keep the realigned bones from slipping back out of place. With him that low, Sasha was able to finagle the two pieces of wood and, with Rick’s help, tightly wrap the leather around it all, making a makeshift full-arm splint.
“Ok, now could you tell me why you won’t just Revive?” Sasha asked. She’d gone along with Rick’s request, but she wanted an explanation.
“That tall bastard was a Sinner too, right?” he asked, leaning back against the wall, wincing all the while.
“Yes, absolutely. No mistaking it. What he hit you with was his Sin Totem. This is why I told you that I’m not exactly the best Sin Totem out there. Combat Totems offer a massive advantage on the First Floor, where access to magic is limited and magical weapons are basically nonexistent.” Sasha grumbled.
“Nothin’ doin’ about that. And not what I’m worried about. He’s got a Sin Totem too, so he’d know the same stuff you’ve told me about how the Higg works.”
“...Yes. His Sin Totem won’t be able to communicate with him nearly as efficiently as we can, but the Heavenly Spirit within his hammer would do its best to inform him.” Sasha nodded. Then she thought about it. “Oh, dang it.”
Rick nodded, “If he knows what I know, and he’d bloodthirsty enough to attack on sight and go for a killin’ blow, then he’d probably wait outside the entrance for me to Revive so he could kill me again. You said the gods want us Sinners to duke it out, right?”
“Yes, yes they do. And if he’s any level of devout, or just greedy, he’d do his best to fulfill that mission. And if he managed to give you a final death, he’d be rewarded if he ever made it off the First Floor. Just killing you once would get him some minor benefits.” Sasha sighed. “So, what do we do?”
“I’m thinkin’ I’ll be needin’ some of that magic now.” Rick laughed.
Sasha shook her head. “Can’t. Or at least, it’d be unlikely to help. We currently only have one Essence, and it’s deeply unlikely to produce a combat-oriented Stat. Sin Totems are generally considered to be equivalent to a Second Step ability in power. Without a Second Step Ambrosia and another Essence, we can’t even hope to match him. At least, not from any traditional perspective.”
“Figured as much. With that in mind…” Rick nodded toward the podium with glowing writing.
Sasha looked at it, then back to him. Then back to the podium. “...You can’t be serious.”
“I try my best not to be.” He smirked wanly.
“You have a broken arm! Not to mention the bruisssed messsss that isss your torssso. We can’t complete a Dungeon Delve.” Sasha hissed.
“Well, how ‘bout you go check out that glowin’ stuff and see whether or not we got a shot. ‘Cuz I don’t know what to do otherwise.” He leaned his head against the wall. “Say, that bruiser can’t follow us in here, can he?”
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“No. Some Dungeons allow parties of Delvers to form, but they have to enter within a certain time frame and there has be equal intent from all Delvers to work together. The System determines intent, so people can’t cheat. At least, not on the First Floor. There are some Step abilities that allow for workarounds, but you wouldn’t find them here.” Sasha dismissed his concern, slithering over to the podium and winding her way up.
There were a few lines written down in glowing yellow lettering.
Delver, this is a Survival Dungeon
Enter at your leisure, but you may only Delve once, leaving forfeits this opportunity
Survive the environment within until the tree blossoms, only then shall you claim Rewards
Enter?
Yes. No.
“Well, that’s not ideal, but it could be worse.” Sasha rolled her eyes. “It’s not a combat Dungeon. That would have been an instant loss. Nor is it a trap or maze type Dungeon. Those wouldn’t have offered any worthwhile Rewards for our purposes.”
“What are we lookin’ at?” Rick huffed. Sasha noted the sweat accumulating on his face. He was pushing through, but he was in terrible condition.
“Survival Dungeon. It says we’ll complete the Delve if we survive until ‘the tree’ blossoms. It doesn’t specify which tree, and that may be part of the challenge. But the tree part does indicate some kind of forested environment, rather than an ocean or desert. More than that, the rewards offered by a Dungeon like this have a high chance of enhancing your survivability, for obvious reasons. That could be useful.” She explained.
“Shoo, sounds good. Sign me up.” Rick chuckled.
“Not so fast. We only get one shot, so we need to be as ready as possible. I’m not even sure attempting this is a good idea.” Sasha cautioned.
Rick waved her off with his good arm. “Failin’ the Delve puts us right back where we are now. Goin’ in gives me more time to heal up and might save my butt if we finish the Delve.”
Sasha reluctantly nodded, having come to the same conclusion. Theoretically they could stay in this antechamber indefinitely, but the System tended to frown on abuses like that. It was far more likely that the moment they truly intended to stay for any meaningful period of time, they’d be kicked out and automatically forfeit the Dungeon. The System was no one’s fool.
“Could I get some water before we head on in? I’m parched.” Rick gratefully gulped down two whole jars of water once Sasha pulled them from storage. Rick had gone through a few days of a pottery craze during their leather making months and produced dozens of vessels for holding water, all designed with Sasha’s storage in mind. She could even pull from her sizable water stores and refill them before putting the jars back in storage as well.
If she was being honest, Sasha knew that the Delve they were facing was partially trivialized by her Sin Totem ability. She had ample stores of food and water, enough to last months. Especially jerky. Rick had made a lot of jerky. But she was much more concerned with the other dangers they might face in the Dungeon. Ones that she and her charge were ill-equipped to handle at the moment.
Rick took a short nap before they did anything else. He was exhausted, simply laying down on a leather sack stuffed with grasses that Sasha had stored in parts. The sack could roll up small enough to fit in her mouth, and she had plenty of grass. It wasn’t the most comfortable bed, but it was better than the floor.
When he woke up, Rick winced before getting to his feet much slower than normal. The fact that he could manage it at all was a miracle, but he wasn’t exactly fit for a Delve. Despite that, he pulled the sharpened shovel from the floor as Sasha packed up the bed.
“Aright, time to get a move on.”
She slithered up his leg and onto Rick’s shoulders, nodding silently.
“I hate to admit it, but you know I’m gonna be relyin’ on you a lot in here Miss Sasha.” Rick did indeed sound unhappy with what he was saying.
“I’ll do my best.” She nodded sharply. It was clear he wasn’t fully comfortable admitting how limited he was right now, so his trust in her meant all the more.
Walking up to the podium, Rick rapped his knuckles on the Yes.
One moment, they were standing in a small wooden room. The next, they were in a forest. Rick’s hand was still in the air, shovel gripped tightly.
It was a coniferous forest, by the looks of it. Tall pine trees were the prevalent vegetation, with sparse underbrush. Instead, the forest floor was covered with a wide array of mosses, mushrooms, and lichen. Birdsong could be heard easily coming from several directions.
The only thing that stood out as unusual was a black-green vine that was nearly ubiquitous. It was easy to spot both climbing the trees and winding along the forest floor. Sasha hadn’t seen anything similar before. The vines themselves were pencil thin.
“I’m not seein’ anythin’. Would you mind climbin’ a tree, check for any landmarks we should look out for?” Rick muttered softly. He was so quiet that even the birds didn’t take notice.
Rather than respond verbally, Sasha simply wound her way down her charge’s good arm and onto his shovel, which he then raised up to the branch of a nearby tree, giving her a small boost on her way to the top. It was a long journey. Snakes were good climbers, but not necessarily fast. The canopy was dense, blocking her view pretty much the whole way up.
Sasha wondered if she’d find the edge of the Dungeon if she looked for it. Technically, there didn’t need to be one. Dungeons were pocket dimensions in their own right. She and Rick could very well be in a forest covering an entire planet. It all depended on how much effort the designing deity had put into what they submitted to the System. Some were lazy, while others added an incredible level of detail.
Finally, she reached the very top of the tree, winding through the needles to see across the Dungeon.
“Oh. I supposed that is ‘The Tree.”
It was impossible to miss, even far off in the distance. The Dungeon was huge, Sasha couldn’t see any obvious signs of an edge. Only a forested horizon. But her attention was captivated by the behemoth tree looming over it all.
It was a deep, rusty red with tones of gold and black present where bark had chipped off the wood underneath.The foliage was high and tight, with most of the tree being trunk. But that wasn’t all. Wrapping around that massive sentinel was another tree, growing with it. This one seemed to grow as it pleased, spanning out far wider than its taller counterpart.
The second tree was a chocolate kind of brown, with obvious veins of white and grey shooting through it, giving the bark an almost marble appearance in some places. Its wild growth was a stark counterpoint to the upright and strictly regimented behemoth it surrounded.
“Only in a Dungeon.” Sasha shook her head, recognizing the pair. “A Radiant Purgation Redwood and a Synergist Spirit Root. They should be extinct.”