Krete

“More?” I whispered.

More.

A shrill laugh echoed around me. Where had that come from. Had I made that sound?

I stepped over the bodies, heading deeper into the dungeon.

Just a little more, Krete. Do this for me, and you’ll have them back.

The voice was a whisper. It was my constant companion. My friend?

Yes. Yes. The voice was a friend. If it wasn’t a friend, it wouldn’t be trying so hard to help me. That made sense, didn’t it?

I scrunched my face in frustration. Lately, I had to keep asking myself that question. Everything seemed to make sense, but there was a deeper sensation of wrongness. Like some other voice in my mind. That voice was quieter, though. It felt like it was coming from behind a series of locked doors. It was fainter every hour.

You cannot trust him.

“I can’t?” I asked.

No. He wants them to stay gone. He wants you to shut me out. If you do that, you will never see them again. Ever.

I steeled myself. If the other voice wanted that, then he was an enemy. That made sense. I didn’t even need to ask myself about that one. No, Sir. I did not even need to ask.

I walked on. The voice had given me new powers. They squirmed inside me, coiling and moving around. All I had to do was let it out, and the power did the rest.

Sometimes, I wondered why the voice hadn’t given me this power to save them. Why had he waited until they were gone to give me the tools to save them?

But he didn’t like when I thought like that. I could feel it when he was angry, and he was getting angry with me now. He liked it when I focused on feeding him, though. He liked it very much.

“Which way?” I asked.

I felt a subtle tug that drew me to the left at a fork in the passageway.

“How many are there?” I asked.

Does it matter?

I heard that giggling sound again and continued walking.

The more I fed him, the easier it became. I didn’t feel it now. The first time, I paused when they asked me to stop. I didn’t pause the second time, but I still felt bad. I couldn’t remember how many more times I had fed it since then, but it wasn’t so bad now. All I had to do was find them and let the power loose. He took care of the rest.

He needed more, and I would keep feeding him until he gave me what was promised.

Yes. The promise. I will bring them back. I promise you. They are close. Keep going, Krete.

“Yes, yes,” I muttered, heading toward the growing sounds of low voices. Were they laughing, or was that me again?

The thing inside me stirred, moving to my fingertips as it did, ready to feast.

Vitus

I wiped the blood from my great-axe, then knelt to catch my breath.

“Vitus?” Marcia limped over to where I was. Her blue cloak was sodden with blood and dirt and her robe had a dark red stain by her hip. “What are we going to do?”

“You need to see a healer,” I said. I was only twenty-two but knew how to infuse my voice with command. I could thank my mother for that. She was one of Ithariel’s top field generals, and she had been grooming me for leadership ever since I could crawl.

Marcia snapped upright, eyes sharpening. “Yes, Sir.” She was the daughter of a top interrogator in the divine house of Azmeria. Today, Marcia Anukis was brown haired and soft eyed. Given a few years and more family guidance, I knew she would have to harden.

We all would.

If I made sure we didn’t die in this hellhole they were calling Beastden, that is.

“Julius,” I said, catching the young man’s attention. “Stop babying your weapons and help her.”

The black-haired youth looked up from his elaborate swords. They were likely priceless, but the boy acted as if he was preparing for a pageant instead of readying himself for real combat.

Julius Amun was supposedly a descendant of Thalion himself. His grandfather was a famous assassin for Ithariel and credited with almost single-handedly ending the Underwars between the cursed tomte and purefolk tomte. According to the legends, he snuck up on the swamp hag herself and crippled her, sending the cursed tomte into disarray just before a pivotal battle.

And now I’m his spawn’s babysitter.

Julius flashed a cocky smile, sheathed his glimmering swords, and moved to help Marcia, who had been afflicted with their strange poison.

I could feel my jaw clenching as I watched the pair head off toward the healer tents.

“Isarona,” I said, moving to a group working on dragging dead beasts away from our barricade. “There’s no need to be gentle with them. The fallen were our enemies, and they died with honor. But their bodies don’t need our coddling. Throw them if you must, but we need to hurry.” I set my axe down to help move corpses out of the way.

We had a growing pile of bodies forming in the entrance cavern. The creatures coming from the tunnel were rats the size of large children. Most were maybe four feet tall, cut through with muscles, and they walked on two legs. Instead of the small arms typical of rats, these had human-like arms with bulging muscles. They also carried poisoned weapons that were a true nightmare to deal with.

One scratch was enough to leave people paralyzed and unable to fight until they were dragged to a healer.

Weapons like that would have been a worthwhile salvage, but they were tethered to the beasts and flaked away if we tried to retrieve them. Honor, accomplishments, and dungeon diver tokens were all we could really hope to gain here.

I knew what people said about our organization. They said the Azure Guard was nothing but a daycare for pampered nobility. Some within the organization may even agree with them. I saw to it that nobody in my squad did.

On the one hand, my mother ensured I was trusted with the highest-born of the highest-born descendants. The legends who sent their children to be hardened on these missions knew death was a risk, but that didn’t mean they would be happy to learn their sons and daughters had met an early end.

My job was to minimize casualties and maximize exposure to combat and experience.

On the other hand, I didn’t believe in doing things halfway. Maybe people thought this was just about pampering important people’s children, but we served a real function. The Azure Guard protected the entrance of dungeons. As long as we stood, none of the beasts from within would reach the surface and hurt innocents.

That was our charge, and I was fully prepared to sacrifice my life for it.

Normally, I could admit the job was boring. Once adventurers arrived, there wasn’t often much left alive to wander back to the entrance. But that was no excuse for laziness.

Beastden, though… Beastden was different.

I sensed it as soon as we arrived.

“Vitus, Sir,” Thalor jogged up to my side.

I gave the rat thing I was holding a heave, slinging it with Iron-fueled strength. It arced through the air excessively high and thumped down on the pile.

One of my body evolutions when ascending to Iron had been strength. The other evolution was more rare, and I had my mother to thank for it.

One of the rats I killed in the last wave had begged for its life in broken Erosian.

I felt a coldness at the memory. It was disturbing, to say the least. I could slay mindless beasts and even enemies of the human order and Ithariel’s Will, but this… I knew dark mana was at play, granting intelligence to beasts who didn’t know what to do with it—making them aware of their cruel ends in a way they shouldn’t be.

But there was nothing to be done about it. This, too, was just another trick of the dungeon to eat away at our resolve. I wouldn’t let it work on me.

“I counted,” Thalor said. “The waves are slowing down but getting larger each time.”

I nodded grimly. I had already noticed the same thing. “It’s getting worse. If we don’t find a way to get to the spawning room and shut it down, the whole godsdamned dungeon will be overrun.”

“Are we going to make another push down the passage, Sir?” Thalor asked the question and I didn’t miss the faces perking up, watching me expectantly. An easy, privileged life waited for all of them out there, but I knew if I gave the order, they would march with me down into that hellhole and try their best.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

I respected the hells out of them for it, and I wouldn’t throw their lives away without cause. The threat was growing, but we hadn’t been able to weather the waves once we were bottled up single-file in the narrow passageway. We’d lost Nolanar and Mithran to some kind of bomb one of the rats threw. We were too damn cramped up to move away, and I could still feel the memory of the warm splatter I had felt on my back when they exploded.

Wood enemies using weapons like that… It wasn’t normal, but none of this was. The whole of Eros was acting strangely lately. Mother said the higher-ups were constantly talking of it.

Larger rifts in places that shouldn’t be possible.

Dreadbeasts breaking through inner-ring strongholds.

Restlessness among the outer races and battles that threaten to push empires to war.

Behind it all, the kiergard seemed to be maneuvering to use the situations to their advantage. But there was nothing new about that. The pale-skinned bastards were always searching for some angle to power. Still, this time felt different.

Everything was happening at once. Chaos and disorder on too many fronts to face head-on.

How long before something slipped through the cracks that were constantly widening?

Privately, I knew Mother worried about a coup. With so many kiergard in positions of high power, it wasn’t a suspicion to raise lightly.

I dragged my thoughts to the here and now. The politics of the world at large could wait. The only politics that mattered here were the parents I would have to face if we lost more of our squad—not that I cared about that part.

I cared that my decision to push in had been wrong, and they paid the price with their lives.

I pursed my lips. “We won’t make another push,” I said. “We’ll hold here. When new adventurers enter the dungeon, we will explain the situation and tell them the Azure Guard needs assistance. If our force grows large enough, maybe we could risk it. Or if the gods are good and send us a Silver, we could move through the tunnel with them at the head of our spear.”

Thalor nodded.

Here, at least, we had a chokepoint. Here, we could form a concave, focusing our fire easily on the narrow place where the passage joined the main entrance.

It was exactly the sort of thing my mother always told me to think about in battle.

When the terrain hands you an advantage, you take it.

I knew we had a distinct advantage fighting like this, but how long could we hold against these waves if they kept growing? We were already strained for sleep and time to heal between battles as it was.

“Any word on the tunneling?” I asked.

Thalor grimaced. “No, Sir. It's just more of the same. People are reporting they can hear something digging and tunneling behind the walls. Whatever it is, it’s moving fast. It collapses when we try to dig into one of their shafts before we can explore it. Marcia said she thought she saw small holes, like windows, carved into the dungeon walls, though. I think whatever it is has been watching us.”

I gave him a grim nod and dismissed him. We had to repair the barricades destroyed in the last attack, and Thalor was good with his hands. They needed his help if we were going to have them ready for the next wave.

This place was a real mess. Dungeons were always unpredictable, but sometimes the dice landed on shit twice. Growing waves of enemies spawning from a room we couldn’t reach, suspicious tunneling creatures who were likely waiting to ambush us, reports of a squad of Irons murdering, an Eclipsed gone mad deeper in the dungeon, and even rumors of a Forsaken lurking and feeding on the fallen.

I hefted a body and threw it hard toward the pile. Too hard, maybe.

A few of my squadron gave me looks from the corners of their eyes. They knew better than to question me, even if I was obviously bothered.

My eyes fell to the patch of the blood where it had died. The dark blood seeped into the soil, draining between the pores of dirt, sand, and rock until there was no sign of it.

This place is hungry for blood. Unnaturally so.

I feared the feast was only just beginning.

Brynn

I couldn’t help but glance at my new ability, even though I wasn’t sure I could figure it out in time for the coming fight.

[Rare] Active Skill: Elemental Spike. [Tier 1] Summon an elementally charged spike of energy to your hands. Striking an enemy with the spike will immediately apply a [moderate] portion of the elemental effect. Note: The effect must be applicable to the target.

Holy shit. That was a game-changer.

I checked my map. They were getting closer.

“New ability,” I whispered. “Give me a second.”

Lyria swung her head to face me. She gave a curt nod, then rushed in front of me and raised her arm.

Shlick.

The Basilisk Shield unfolded, shimmering torchlight catching on its scales.

This was my fifth active ability, I realized. Elemental Projection, Forge Echo, Devour Mana, Mana Shield, and now Elemental Spike. Because of my prestige path, I could equip this, but the next ability I earned would mean choosing between my equipped actives. Damn. That wasn’t going to be a fun decision. But I supposed I was still lucky for having five active slots instead of four because of my prestige path. I assumed I could swap abilities out of my equipped slots as needed. I wondered if that meant some abilities would waste away, never strong enough to earn a spot in my roster of slotted skills. They wouldn’t grow if I wasn’t using them, which bothered me.

How was I supposed to know if they were worth using if I hadn’t grown them to their full potential?

Maybe as I grew stronger, I could power-level old abilities to help them keep pace. For example, using a tier 1 ability against a Silver-ranked enemy would probably push it to grow faster than casting it against empty air.

Thoughts for another time.

Right now, I needed to hope I could figure this Elemental Spike ability out in just a couple minutes.

Every time I learned a new ability, it became easier. There was a chance I still had time.

I spent about half a second thinking about which element to use for Elemental Spike before settling on Viperlilly Potion. I needed to do some tests before I risked the Dragon’s Tail or Bombroot with a close-range weapon. I did wonder if this meant I could stab people with healing spikes. I would probably need to make sure they trusted me for that one, but it would be awesome all the same.

My mana was dangerously low, but I didn’t have time to recover. I knew Lyria’s was low, too.

I didn’t give myself time to second-guess the decision. I pulled out my last Siphon and sucked it dry. I could have offered it to Lyria, but refilling my mana would give me more tools to heal everybody by projecting Healing Potions with my Soul skills, and the people coming our way might need it.

Assuming we survive.

Focus, Brynn.

I drove my mind into the mana stream. I had Viperlilly in one hand and pushed a thread of mana out from the vial. I reached out for more ambient mana, drawing it in and forcing it through the thread of mana from the Viperlilly.

The mana was washed in the element and emerged on the other side coated in poison energy. I took the elementally infused mana and drew it to my hand, weaving threads together into a shape like a dagger.

I found myself leaning on the example I had seen of Lyria forming her Wind Wall. Had watching her use her ability fundamentally changed my own ability’s functionality?

It reminded me of Circa’s warning that her advice could shape my abilities and that it might be better to discover things on my own instead of relying on her instructions.

But in this case, I was probably learning from a Soulbound’s example and suspected there was likely no better example.

Either way, it opened a very interesting realm of possibilities. I felt like I was on the verge of grasping a fundamental understanding of corestones, classes, and abilities, but it was barely out of reach.

I thought about how the stone bound itself to our nature and how it seemed as though I had more or less interpreted all of my abilities so far. Had I simply used my prestige-fueled intuitions about mana to guess how they would work correctly, or had I decided how they would work by my methods?

Again, it was a tantalizing question. It could mean there was far more freedom to use my abilities in ways that might stretch the “rules” or implications of their descriptions. Unless, of course, I somehow locked them into a form the first time I used them.

I wished I had more time to think it through, but right now, I drove my focus back into the weaves of colorful mana I could actually see stitching themselves together like shimmering threads in the air.

The strands of mana wove together, twisting and tightening as I continued to draw more inward. My intuitions told me the way I was forming this weapon would increase its potency—that the more efficiently and tightly I could weave the threads together, the more powerful the result would be.

It was an aha moment for which I could thank Lyria’s Wind Wall.

Could I do this same thing with my other abilities?

A bright green light flashed above my hand.

The magic dagger solidified, rotating slightly before gravity took hold, and it landed with a satisfying weight in my palm.

The weapon was a green knife that glowed from within, radiating green light in the dark tunnel. Green, smoky energy flowed around it, drifting upward and moving as if alive.

The knife was rough and rock-like in form, but it was two or three hand-spans long and looked deadly.

Learning to keep my Forge Echo active was good practice for this, I realized. I carefully tucked my Elemental Spike into a loop on my belt pouch and pulled out my Silver Scream quiver.

“Seriously?” Lyria asked, watching the magical dagger I had just formed.

“I took some pointers from your Wind Wall,” I said. “The dots on my map are close,” I added, keeping my concentration on what I was doing. “Get ready.”

I fed mana to the quiver, summoned an arrow, and fed Viperlilly into it.

I could Echo the bow or my Elemental Spike, but could I keep all of that in my head at once?

I decided not to test it right now.

I gripped my bow, nocked my arrow, and drew. I sidestepped so I could aim past Lyria, and give myself a clear shot at whatever was coming our way.

With the help of the four Wood dots coming our way, we should be able to handle whatever those two red dots were, so long as they weren’t Iron-level threats.

Shit. What would we do if they were Iron?

Maybe I could let them all get behind me and try to create another cave-in. It wasn’t a perfect solution, but it would have to do if the enemies were too strong.

I heard the sound of footsteps on dirt and heavy breathing. Someone shouted.

“Faster, Min!” a woman yelled.

“I’m trying,” a girl shouted with irritation and fear in her voice.

“They’re close!” A deep voice roared.

Lyria shifted on her feet and looked back at me. She gave the slightest nod, face serious.

She was ready to help them. Good. This was the side of her I had seen back in the infested ruins. I saw a woman then who was ready to risk her life to protect others. I felt a fresh swell of respect for her and tightened my grip on the bow. I ignored the dull burn between my shoulder blades and kept the arrow fully drawn.

A roar echoed from deeper in the tunnel.

The footsteps grew louder, and a group finally stumbled into view. Two nightmaws were right behind them.

One of the women wore a dark, tattered robe. She half spun, throwing black web-like magic over her shoulders. It spread in the air, attaching to the tunnel walls and creating a barrier that slowed the nightmaws.

One nightmaw stumbled and fell, ripping the shadowy webs from itself.

A man in elaborate but torn clothing whistled in a hauntingly beautiful note. A second later, the ground rippled with blue light, as if a drop of water had landed at his feet and spread outward in a fast-moving pulse.

The four Woods were bathed in blue light from their feet to their thighs, and their pace increased.

Music magic?

I held my bow, muscles screaming in protest, and waited for a shot to open up. But there was no clear path around the running adventurers.

This fight is about to get messy.