Ivan and Marvin fought side by side. The towering Owl-kin watchman staggered back barely able to cling to its weapons after meeting with Ivan, and Marvin surged forward, the bone white blade of his new greatsword flashing in the dull light of the mist all about them. Marvin cut the creature down, the new blade taking limbs when it didn't meet with armor, and dealing devastating damage even when it met with the thick bronze armor these creatures wore.
They were in the Dungeon again, fighting, advancing, and doing well.
Ivan grinned, and got that excited feeling that came with leveling his rogue job as the last of the patrol fell. The attribute gains to his agility, dexterity, and endurance when that happened made him feel like new. He took a satisfied breath and summoned up his scroll, keeping it small so its light wouldn't draw the eyes of the maze's flying guardian boss.
“Inspect Person.”
Inspect Person, No Target Found. Inspecting Self.
Congratulations! You've advanced your Rogue Job to level 3 out of 10!
Level 3 Rogue Skill: Plunder. Your clear ambition to rob these poor dungeon monsters blind has opened the way to stealing from them while they are dead. This skill costs considerably more mana to use while in a Dungeon, but will likewise bring about greater rewards. Using Plunder outside the dungeon will only require Dungeon level mana on a person or mob with an internalized magic storage space.
Level 3 Rogue Perk: Dungeon Delver. Your mind and goals are bent around gaining power from this dungeon and you've learned some of its secrets. You will now find more gold on Dungeon Monsters you steal from and any dungeon chest you open will have better loot. More money=more good!
Ivan let out a satisfied sigh and before he closed the scroll he looked to each of his companions. Myrn was holding the back line of their formation with Davian, both right behind Andy now. Each was showing signs of fatigue after quickly coming as deep within the maze as they had come before. It had been two days since their little shopping trip and Marvin's Ember awakening. They had done little but spar and practice until Marvin was ready and able again.
Ivan would have liked to have gone hunting on his own outside the Dungeon, but Myrn had seen the time as a well earned chance to engage in courting activities. He had felt annoyed at first, but being out on the town with her had quickly turned to fun. It gave him a little normalcy. It calmed his mind and feelings. There was a dangerous little hope buried somewhere in his mind that things would really be okay and that he didn't have to just pretend.
Ivan concentrated and drew his focus upon the new Stamina Tonics he had been able to brew with Myrn's help. The new seeds were growing in Lalya's secure little back garden and already Myrn had allowed them a large harvest using her magic. Ivan had spent a good deal of time not thinking of the hunt, learning new recipes and concoctions with the magic herbs.
“Administer Medicine, Low Dose Stamina Tonic.” Ivan chanted, raising his hand toward Andy.
The big fighter smacked his lips, twitched, and then gave a thumbs up as he rose. Ivan repeated the chant, raising a hand toward Davian and Myrn both too. Myrn puckered her lips and wiggled her hips at the taste. Davian's eyes opened wide and he seemed to shiver and shake a little. Both returned to attention with renewed vigor after that.
“It's like you've injected me with a Red Bull.” Davian commented with a laugh.
“Red Bull? Injected?” Myrn asked.
Davian made a pained expression as Andy too looked at him curiously.
Having no desire to deal with Davian's entropy curse in the Dungeon, Ivan carefully shushed the lot of them and cast his eyes upward. Luckily enough the dungeon guardian passed by just close enough to reinforce his point.
They moved ahead once they were back in formation. Myrn downed the few Spotting Owls hidden in the hedges and the group stopped before the turn into the courtyard they had last left. Andy shifted in his new armor, making very soft clinking sounds as he checked his shield straps and readied his halberd.
“Here again huh?” Andy asked, keeping his voice very soft.
Myrn nodded, crouched within the magic sound eating mist.
“It's the safest path. Not the fastest, but it has the fewest overlapping patrols and while this courtyard is a dead end it always has a chest on the far side.” She answered, speaking more normally, but with the knowledge that the mist made her sound as if she were whispering any more than a yard away from her.
Ivan was on the far side of her and barely heard. Tingles were running up and down his arms where the fog touched. He felt at home in the dark shade of the hedge and the Shroud was about him making him blend in as much as it could manage. Though the item was leather it had an uncanny effect of making him harder to notice. Ivan could feel it's tiny mana draw for that secondary effect now, but that only meant he was getting better at managing his own mana and mystical senses. That was all to the good.
“There aren't any exits to this courtyard then?” Marvin asked.
“No.” Myrn answered. “Isaac can summon the map if you want to double check, but this is a known static route.”
“And the big guy will spot us here if we try to cross?” Marvin asked, carrying on the line of questioning he apparently had in mind.
“Almost certainly. He's begun his search pattern instead of his regular patrol pattern and he will spot us now that he's actively using his perception skills if we spend any time out in the open.” Myrn clarified.
Marvin looked over Andy and Ivan. All three of them had been tearing up the fights so far, with Davian making an effort not to be left behind. Myrn was good as always, but then pressing the initiative this time it only gave her more room to deal damage as she liked.
“How many Spotting Owls are in the courtyard? Can you take them from here?” Marvin asked.
Myrn nodded and pointed each of the resting little birds out. They were hard to spot even with her pointing to them, but they trusted her. Andy nodded to Ivan and Marvin. Marvin grinned back at Ivan before shifting his gaze to Davian.
“Hey Dav.” He said casually.
Davian raised his eyebrows, but waved a hand in greeting back to Marvin.
“How are you feeling about things this time? Confident?” Marvin asked.
Davian shrugged, but nodded agreeably.
“We're doing fine by my estimation. You three hardly leave me room to strike, but that's fine since like Myrn I can do so from range. What are you on about?” Davian asked, picking up on Marvin's fierce smile.
Myrn took a breath and nodded slowly.
“You want to take down the patrol boss here?” Myrn asked calmly.
Marvin glanced at Andy and Ivan, but nodded.
“He has a Horn of Alarm just warning you. You'll have to trust me to shoot it out of his hands or use one of us as bait to see if he'll come down on his own.” Myrn advised.
Marvin considered that, and then eyed the Dungeon chest across the way. Ivan's Steal ability was providing them with some nice funds with what he stole, but none of it was equipment any of them would readily use. Even the great bronze scimitar blade Ivan had stolen this time was of no use to Andy or Marvin because of its ungainly balance and weight.
The Chest across the way would contain loot more or less made for them, generated by the spells and magic work the Gods had put upon the Dungeon thousands of years before. The chest itself fit readily enough into its surroundings, but instead of whatever burial means might have once been inside it was now a device that fed upon the dungeon to produce magic items. All they had to do was come in and get them, a fitting reward for their efforts in fighting down the Dungeon's magic pollution to the world around it.
Ivan had been reading up on it in those books he had bought, the first of which focused on the known history of Dungeons, and the knowledge the Gods had shared about the nature of the sealing magic they had used to seal so many of them. It was an act to make the world safer, but it was not without a maintenance cost. The magic of the Dungeons could never be fully sealed, even by all of the Gods, but they could be managed. Dentennek and its Old Oak was one of the weakest, sealed the tightest of almost all Dungeons, and meant for beginners.
Ivan would plunder it with his friends and grow stronger. The loot was a boon, but what he was after was the quick and efficient leveling that came with battling inside any Dungeon. Always these places would advance one more quickly than outside. Though many had guessed as to why that was, nothing was for certain as the Gods themselves refused to answer such questions even when posed by their own scholars. It was a puzzle many struggled with, and Ivan was enjoying reading the independent works of both a man and woman who had sought to figure it out in the past.
“I'll be bait. I bet I can run to the chest before he even lands on that side.” Ivan put forward.
Myrn gave him a worried look, but turned her gaze to the thirty meter wide circular courtyard. The chest was there, waiting, a stone shadow beckoning them to come out into the open.
“If he gets the Alarm off we'll have the exit sealed against us.” Myrn warned. “The patrols will come one after another and block the way out.”
“We'll have them at a bottleneck.” Andy put in.
Marvin nodded, but grimly.
“Yet they will quickly outnumber us if that happens and overwhelm us. If he gets the alarm off we don't wait. Isaac is likely the quickest of us, and the best duelist besides. He'll turn the boss about while we run. We overwhelm the first patrol we run into and then make it double time to the exit—even if we have to form up a fighting retreat. We've practiced that, even while carrying wounded.” Marvin answered.
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
“With Isaac acting as bait and Myrn to shoot the horn from his lips..or beak or whatever I'm not too worried.” Andy replied.
Ivan listened, feeling uncertain of what to do. He wanted the loot and to grow stronger, but were they ready for this? Tingles ran up and down his arms and legs. He wanted to move, to keep fighting. Quixla's dagger was heavy with the Dungeon Monster's essence, but it wanted more. Ivan could feel Quixla's demonic hunger, her corruption specifically, spreading and twisting together with Penelope's own mellifluous corruption. Tingles of excitement shot through him again.
“We can do it. I know we can.” Marvin asserted.
Ivan's eyes fluttered closed and he took a deep breath through his nose. Quixla's hunger... Penelope's ambition... Ivan shuddered within the Shroud as something more rolled over him. He tried to focus on it with his mystic senses, but he could only call it something of his own. He shivered as memories played at the back of his mind, new to his thoughts, but long sealed away in the depths of his memory.
“It's a risk.” Myrn maintained.
Snow crunching beside him. Growling breath, and an aura that reached out to him even when he was just a baby. It came through his memory to today, to where he was crouched alongside the others in the Dungeon.
“I think we can do it, Myrn. Marvin's new weapon and his Warrior-Smith Ability have really increased his damage. Beside Isaac's already devastating damage and your own we'll do just fine. That or we'll get a good sprint out of here.” Davian reassured her.
In Ivan's mind where so often he felt he clung to sanity like the branches of a tree he now felt like he had slipped down from those limbs to gently land upon the ground. There was something there. Something in the dark of his mind. Something he barely had the time to know, but was his all the same.
The sound of claws breaking through ice came again. Ivan shuddered. Memory played in his mind, and overlapped with his thoughts. It was there in the dark of his mind. He could reach if he just... if he just... In the end he couldn't find what he needed, but when he opened his eyes the world around him looked new.
It was as if the colors had been made fresh and more vibrant. The smells were more intense and there was something more to everything about him. Myrn rose from her crouch, bow in hand, and an arrow nocked.
One Spotting Owl fell. Then the next. The final Owl fell.
Ivan had heard them agree, but had been too lost in his own thoughts to really pay attention to words. He slipped forward like a black cloud in the night. He stuck low along the sides of the courtyard, smelling, and sensing the flying guardian much more so than he turned his eyes up to watch for him like a dumb struck human lamb.
He used Nimble Feet, a Thief Skill to its utmost practically flying around the edge of the courtyard in perfect silence. He stole away under the moon shadows and in a few moments he was already leaping behind the chest seeking cover.
His heart beat hard in his chest from the sprint, but he couldn't feel anything more than pure exhilaration..
He glanced back toward the courtyard entrance, his team nothing more than half seen wraiths hiding the fog. He waited for a few moments until he heard the guardian creature take off nearby. For a moment he thought he was going to get away with the contents of the chest without a fight, but that possibility faded as he tried to move its lid.
It was heavy, even for him. He could move it, but the stone slab would inevitably make noise as it struck the ground. There were two approaches to dealing with that to his mind, and he quickly decided on the second.
He backed away from the chest, and toward the hedge and its thick bank of Whisper Fog. He slowly cast out his Shroud into the mist and then surged forward using the Shroud like a sail to cast the fog forward about the chest hoping to dampen the sound. In a quick movement he kicked the heavy stone lid off the chest and to the ground. It came with a dull clatter of heavy stone and everything went silent.
Ivan peered about smelling and sensing the boss creature nearby, but he couldn't see it or hear its wings any longer. He stood enough to reach into the chest with one arm still hidden in his cloak. The goods inside screamed to be gazed upon, but he kept his eyes from them and focused on his other senses besides as he reached within.
He had only a moment to react as the Guardian came crashing down out of the hazy sky. Its massive bronze halberd nearly took off Ivan's head at the neck as he tumbled away in a desperate dive. Only the barest instinct saved him, that and his thief's perception skill, Window of Opportunity, alerting him to being noticed. The creature gave no chase, instead drawing something from within the heavy folds of its armored robes.
Myrn's bow snapped with the dullness of being fired from within the fog and her arrow struck home sending the item flying from the creature's hands and into the deep mist near the hedge.
Ivan was in the courtyard now facing the Guardian after completing his roll and dodging out of the way. His heart was beating a joyous hammering drumbeat in his chest as he faced the first Dungeon Boss of his life.
It stepped forward with clam grace, its huge bronze halberd held regally in both its hands, a strange and graceful port arms. It stood more than two and a half meters tall. It was a giant bipedal thing with great heavily feathered wings sprouting from its back unlike the wing arms of the lesser patrol Owl-kin. That made up an important difference from the ones they had seen before. This thing could wield its weapon in two hands and fly.
Its robes were some kind of heavy plated leather article like a massive armored robe. Its arms were covered by separate bronze vambraces, bracers, and gauntlets on its hands. Those massive hands consisted of three feathered fingers and a thumb. Each was tipped with cruel hooked talons. Its face was hidden behind a massive ornate bronze mask settled upon its massive beak. Ivan was certain now he was facing this species quintessential Avian Knight.
It needed no mount with those massive wings on its back and Ivan had a sudden dreadful image in his mind of facing a company of ten or twelve of these monsters in battle, and being out flanked by them. What must it have been like to face their raiding parties? How did a commander keep their armored fliers from landing in the archers?
It stepped forward, its talon-ed feet clicking on the stone walk of the courtyard as it took up a battle stance with its weapon in hand before Ivan. It began to speak in a tongue Ivan could not understand, but it was clear by the way it held itself and its weapon it was announcing the beginning of battle.
The others spilled out in the courtyard, the knight looked at them all, taking them in with simple glances, before facing back toward Ivan. It began to speak again.
Inside the Shroud Penelope finished arranging some manner of spell upon a scroll and cast her magic. Immediately the hissing, chirping bird tongue changed to words he could understand.
“You humans defile this place with your presence. You and all of your foul blooded kin. The best of you should be nothing more than slaves, and the rest of your tainted kind killed off. I will show you your place on my own if I must.”
Something in Ivan suddenly gave him insight beyond this creature's bronze mask. Like any species of intelligent life its unique features would be different, but Ivan suddenly knew what this greater species of Owl-Kin looked like. It rose in him from an instinctual understanding like a child first staring at a snake. The being frightened him, or should have, but he was grown. He was a hunter. It was his place to put these threatening things down. Fear was replaced with hatred and the need to destroy the thing in front of him.
Ivan rushed forward blades in hand without another moment's hesitation. The thing’s great halberd came crashing down, too heavy and powerful to parry or attempt to deflect, but Ivan didn't care. He thrust Quixla's blade into line with the parry as he dodged the blow. Sparks exploded from the contact of the two magically potent items and Ivan vanished using the moment of blindness.
The Owl Knight screamed as Ivan's Shadow Step attack carved into its heavy muscled back. Quixla's dagger drank greedily of its magically potent essence. It's great wings flared immediately knocking Ivan away with powerful wind magic, but in the end Ivan had landed the blow and taken little damage in trade.
Marvin came in next, and not to be left very far behind Andy closed on the creature's other side. Ivan recovered and watched as Marvin deflected the great Halberd away with some Mercenary Combat Skill only to be assaulted by another Martial Skill in reply. Marvin deftly replied with one of his own, sword whirling through the air and igniting showers of sparks with each contact of the enchanted weapons. Andy charged in, slashing with his own smaller halberd and tearing at the wings of the unarmored wings of the creature as it tried and failed to beat Marvin into the ground with one Martial Skill after another.
Myrn's bow snapped out shots from the courtyard edge where she was just a shadow in the fog, her red hair, and blue gleams of her eyes the only thing making her position plain. The great Owl-kin knight deflected the first arrow and then slammed the haft of his halberd into Andy's shield knocking him back before rounding on Marvin again before he could land an attack with his great weapon.
“Steal! Administer Poison! Imbue Poison!” Ivan chanted in quick succession, cloak flaring about him as he ran back into the fight from where he had landed near the open chest of treasures.
He noticed for the first time the shadowy tendrils that shot from his hands as he cast out his spells at distance. They flew like dark ghostly ribbons through the air striking at the creature's back and armor. Each was made especially obvious by the white fog and were easy to watch. A few seemed to lance inside and others were blocked by its magical resistance, but the effect was sure to his mind when they struck. His Knight's Longsword gleamed with sickly green and brown resins as his imbue poison spell took effect on his weapon.
The Owl Knight had resisted the first poison, but Ivan was already tucking away the small coin purse his Steal had ripped away from the Owl Knight.
Ivan's attempt to flank was outdone as the great Owl Knight flared its wings again, blasting another shot from Myrn out of the air, and battering everyone with intense wind that threatened to blow away the fog.
A suddenly rippling silver song of notes cut through the air just then. Mist and fog met as if reaching up from the hedges into the sky as Davian circled the far side of the boss, a silver cast set of conjured reed pipes upon his lips. The sound echoed and swam through the air with an obvious dulling effect that was only bolstered by the Whisper Fog drowning the maze. The Fog quickly engulfed him as if he were its conjurer and the world around them seemed to grow close and even thicker with foggy haze.
“You're nothing more than a tin canned chicken that's brought its own over-sized can opener!” Davian snapped at the end of the tune before he cast out his hand before completely fading in the fog.
The insult fueled magic slammed into the Owl Knight, and seemed to enrage it, but it had little time to focus on Davian. The familiar cracking snap and rattle of Myrn's Longbow Pods rang out dully from the edges of the courtyard.
Poisoned darts slammed into the Owl Knight like crossbow bolts. Myrn's bow snapped again and again from its far side, her arrows becoming nothing more than deadly black streaks in the heavy fog. Andy and Marvin rushed the creature close enough to support one another, but far enough apart to drive apart its attention. Ivan rushed in eager to flank the creature.
Andy's shield caught the Knight's first blow, his shield defecting the attack with ease, the perfect tell that Andy had caught the blow with a counter skill. The halberd recoiled into the air hardly in control of the feathered Knight. The spike on Andy's halberd drove home under the creature's mask making it squeal and squawk in protest, but that was nothing to the great section of wing it lost to Marvin's blade when it left the two handed Mercenary unoccupied.
It turned furiously upon Marvin and brought its halberd down with hands to its long bronze shaft. Marvin's blade spun and the halberd was deflected by a Counter Skill once again. Ivan closed on this opening together with Andy and Marvin's own counter attacks.
“You're overwhelmed and out matched Chicken Knight! Die!” Davian called, voice muted coming from the whisper fog, and hammered more of his insult fueled magic into the Knight.
He was followed up again by Myrn's bow and the Longbow Pods firing and shell pods clattering to the pavers as mutely as any of the other sounds of battle. Andy's halberd found the Knight's other wing landing with a bone crunching smack. Marvin stepped in within the striking distance of his blade, pitting his own great weapon against the knight's and daring it to turn away from him once again.
Ivan closed with Quixla's dagger and freshly poisoned Knight's Longsword in hand. The Knight tried to batter him away with its wings and more wind magic, but Ivan stayed low, anticipating the action now that he knew it was coming. Marvin punished that action even then as he landed a thrust upon the beast knight and Andy caught the return blow on his shield.
They were giving Ivan the perfect chance to attack. Mryn's arrows slammed home in the meat of its wings this time as he closed, and Andy charged the massive Knight from the front, pressing it harder and harder side by side with Marvin. If it raised a foot to kick back at Ivan it might have caught him, but doing so would let Andy blow open its guard and let Marvin strike with its deadly blade.
Caught and out flanked, the Owl Knight screamed as Ivan hamstrung it with Quixla's dagger as it began to be overwhelmed by the team's assault. Quixla's dagger drank deeply of its blood, and left a horrible blackened wound in its leg. Andy closed with his shield, slamming into its other leg as Marvin batted its weapon aside yet again and Myrn's arrows found purchase in the eye slots of its helm and her Longbow pods fired yet again. The poison from Myrn's arrows and Ivan's own blades must have been like a fire in the creature's blood as it fought on still, but the Adventurers knew to press their advantage and give no creature of the Dungeon any respite.
Davian rushed in close by Ivan's side, doing so before he ran himself out of mana. Andy's shield slammed into the beast again and again, his halberd working with the efficiency of a short spear as he thrust again and again into its joints and up at its face. Ivan's Longsword and deadly conjured dagger tore into the things feathery hide leaving long blackening wounds that made the creature scream in pain. It jerked, swatting, and flapping what remained of its wings and limbs at them as it tried to fight its way back to its feet, but it was done. They just had a great deal of convincing it of that yet.
Davian lunged into the melee in a flash beside Ivan as he struggled to close again against the fury of the Knight's wings. The rapier tore deep holes into the muscles of its back and the wounds leaked bright viscera from vital organs as it pierced deep into the creature's chest cavity from behind.
Andy and Marvin's armor protected them from the knight's desperate attempts with its taloned claws as the group closed on the deadly First boss and overwhelmed it. Mryn's arrows pin cushioned the thing, her Longbow Pod Darts too littering its limbs and chest.
Finally Andy slammed away the wounded arms of the beast long enough for Marvin's sword to part the creature's head from its body. Ivan and Davian toppled forward into the beast as it finally heaved forward, suddenly dead, and in a pile the two of them nearly pitched the corpse atop Andy.
“Ivan get the loot!” Myrn shouted suddenly, her will flashing in his senses as the sounds of sudden footsteps rose from the other side of the courtyard. Vines shot from the entrance and over the limbs of chained warrior slave rat men, and pairs of similarly bound lizard men.
Andy groaned and charged to keep the hole plugged with blood soaked Marvin. The Mercenary lifted his helmet visor long enough to grin at Ivan and Davian where they were tangled about the limbs of the fallen giant knight.
Their fight appeared to have been a little too loud, but they had done it!
Ivan laughed as he pulled Davian to his feet and pushed him toward the courtyard entrance. Davian gave him a panicked glance, but then surged toward the fighting with a Dancer's grace. He closed the gap at Marvin's and Andy's side, his rapier flashing in to stab at frightened mouse men and tear into the scale of Lizard-men who thought themselves bold.
“Plunder!” Ivan shouted, casting a hand out toward the fallen First Boss of the Dungeon.
The Boss creature went up in smoke, and loot clattered to the ground all around it. There was a fat purse of coins, some kind of mail armor, a small flask, a large white jewel, and finally a large bronze shield. Ivan stuffed them all as fast as he could into the Shroud, falling upon them upon the loot with it spread like they were his own wings.
Next Ivan ran and actually jumped in the chest with its removed top and took up fat gold coins, trinkets, armor pieces, weapons, books, scrolls, food, and gems alike into the Shroud with almost childish glee. When he rose he stormed across the open ground, targeting occupied lizard-men and their smaller fellow slave warriors of the little mouse men with poisons administered in the same way he could use tonics and potions on his friends.
“Administer Medicine!” He chanted at his two friends in the fore of the fight, bolstering them with potent stamina tonics.
Then he used Shadow Step to appear unseen in the back line of the fight. His team tore apart the two patrols with ease as they flanked and overwhelmed them. The jubilant group of young adults laughed as they looted what they could and began running for the exit. This was all they had planned and more. They stormed out of the maze in good cheer, feeling fearless even as terror gave their feet wings, and each of them were ready for the next dive back inside.