Nathan took a stance just before the undead came within striking range. He held his spear securely, his feet positioned to allow free movement while maintaining balance. All conscious thoughts fled his mind as the unconscious calculations of an experienced fighter took over.
He quickly assessed the terrain: the slippery ground, the narrow walkway. He considered the range and speed of his opponent, and almost without input, his body began to move.
The undead rushed toward him, its arms protecting its head, and Nathan took small steps on the balls of his feet to stay mobile.
He narrowly ducked under its swinging arm as it rushed past him, its strike sending stone shards flying as it impacted the wall. Nathan kept his weapon close to his body; the reach it afforded him was barely an advantage in these confined quarters.
He chose not to strike as the undead passed him. Small wounds would do little to stop it; he needed to land singular, debilitating hits to take it down.
Both he and the undead turned simultaneously. It swiped at his chest, but he dodged by leaning backward. At the same time, he thrust his spear forward, hitting its shoulder, and immediately pulled the weapon back, using the resistance to right himself while retreating. The undead stumbled from the pull but managed to stay on its feet. With one arm slightly immobilized, Nathan calmly analysed the situation.
The undead let out a moan that reverberated through the sewers—a sound that had no place in the world of the living. A less experienced fighter might have reacted to the wretched noise, but Nathan remained fully focused on the fight.
The undead rushed at him again, this time shielding its head with its damaged arm and attempting to strike with the other. Before the strike even occurred, Nathan anticipated the move. He ran toward it, suddenly jumping and pushing off the wall with one foot. This sent him upward, allowing him to deliver a vicious kick while evading its one good arm.
He couldn’t have done this if it hadn’t already been wounded; otherwise, it would have reacted by catching him.
Both the undead and Nathan lost their balance, falling to the ground, though Nathan had expected this. His spear darted out, catching the undead in the hip and leaving a gruesome wound. Despite the fall rattling him, Nathan stood quickly, though he couldn’t launch another attack before the undead also rose to its feet.
Now dragging one leg behind the other, its speed had decreased significantly, and it could only shamble toward him. Nathan retreated slowly, turning around a corner without looking—the surrounding terrain firmly held in his mind. As soon as the creature could no longer see him, he took a stance again, waiting for it to appear.
As it did, he surged forward, his movements fluid, his spear landing one stab after another as the undead was forced back. Nathan seemed to flow around its attacks, none of its strikes even grazing him, while he landed a plethora of his own. Most of them barely seemed to faze the undead, but its body grew increasingly damaged until it fell to the ground once more, this time too weakened to stand.
The light barely illuminated the area where the fight ended, leaving Nathan’s figure draped in shadows, his spear dripping with ichor. An onlooker might have found it difficult to decide who was the more ghastly creature, the undead or Nathan himself, as even his expression was entirely cold, devoid of any emotion.
Carefully stepping towards his fallen foe, Nathan landed one final strike, piercing through its eye and shattering the core of resentment that kept the undead animated.
All at once, the strength faded from his limbs, and Nathan finally felt the exhaustion. He fell to the ground, his heart pounding, sweat streaming down his body. He tasted iron in his mouth, and his limbs trembled with the aftershocks of adrenaline.
Time passed until he was finally able to stand. He checked his timepiece—barely fifteen minutes left until his meeting with the mage, though he should still make it in time.
Heaving himself up, using the spear as a crutch, he steadied himself against a wall while checking his body for injuries. No wounds, but I got lucky in that fight, he thought.
The undead had been a young one, inexperienced and not particularly strong.
He might have been the first hunter it had ever come across, as its inexperience with actual weapons showed. A more experienced undead would have never let itself be hit by his spear like this one did.
Cutting open its head, Nathan reached inside and extracted a mass of black substance that seemed to suck the light out of its surroundings and chilled his hand as he held it.
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A clear hole marked where his spear had struck. This was the core of resentment, the very thing that allowed an undead to move without a soul controlling the body.
He turned to pick up his light when he received a welcome surprise.
Congratulations, Nathan Andrews
You have levelled up
“Damn, two levels in a day. I might actually hit level five before choosing my class. With the stat points and skills I’d get after that, I’d be pretty safe almost anywhere on the first floor. Better put that point into perception too.”
Now hurrying a bit, Nathan soon made it back to the ladder and climbed it, relieved to finally be leaving that wretched place. Arriving at the gate, he banged against it three times, and it soon began to open.
His lips curled into a smile, the lingering anxiety of being stuck in the sewers finally gone.
The guards at the gate had been replaced by new ones, though they seemed equally taciturn.
The fresh air and sunlight brought an even larger smile to his lips.
Perhaps it would be worth it to stay in the village a week or two longer to avoid going into the sewers again. He dismissed the thought. It’s nice to dream, but I can’t slack off until I get my Sanguinomancer class at least. After that, taking some downtime shouldn’t be too detrimental.
Just as discussed, the water mage was waiting at the exit, though his face was scrunched up.
“You stink like you took a swim in shit. Lost your balance, or what?” he asked.
“Undead,” Nathan said tiredly. “Had to get up close and personal with that sucker.”
The water mage raised his eyebrows. “Took it down by yourself? Maybe you won’t have to make sewer runs forever then.”
Nathan simply waved a hand in his direction, too tired for banter. “Just clean me up. I want my money, a warm meal, and a soft bed.”
The mage laughed, summoning his mana and weaving it into the required spellform that doused both Nathan and his clothes from head to toe. The water floated away from him and then simply evaporated. Now both clean and dry, Nathan already felt significantly better.
“Come on then, Brand. Let’s head to the guild, and you’ll get your share.”
The mage followed him, the walk back to the guild quiet, as Nathan didn’t have the energy for conversation. He felt Brand's eyes on him the entire way, finding the man's gaze too piercing for his liking.
When he took out his haul of slime cores and the resentment core, the man at the guild register—the same veteran Nathan had met last time—showed a hint of approval. For the first time, the man spoke, his voice low and scratchy, suggesting an old throat injury. “Nasty business, the undead. Glad to have one less running around under my feet.”
The total payout came to 38 credits, of which Brand received four—slightly more than the agreed-upon one in ten, but the man gave Nathan a feeling that kept him slightly on edge, and he had learned to trust his instincts.
“Same time tomorrow then?” the mage asked once they were outside the hunters' guild.
“Yes, same deal as today,” Nathan replied, though his face was scrunched up in distaste.
Brand chuckled at Nathan’s obvious reluctance to make another sewer run. “I truly don’t understand you folks who go down there. No amount of credits could get me to crawl around in that muck.”
Nathan waved him off without answering and walked the short distance to the inn.
He alerted down the innkeeper. “Bring me a hot meal—no, two—of whatever you have. And some water to drink.”
The innkeeper looked at him strangely. Water was only mildly sanitary with the technology on this floor, and most people drank weak alcohol, as it killed bacteria just as well as brain cells.
But Nathan had made that mistake before. Hard to quit drinking if you have a beer with every meal.
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The next day, Nathan once again found himself shopping for supplies, though this time for something more specific.
That water mage, Brand, gives me some sort of bad feeling. It might be nothing, but better to always have a plan.
Finally, he found what he needed in a small store that was still in the good part of town, but only barely. The owner was an artificer, and every product seemed to be a unique, handcrafted project.
His gaze settled on an bracelet inlaid with three red gemstones.
Making his way through the dusty aisles laden with mostly unusable gadgets, he found the owner.
He was a man somewhere in his twenties, hunched over the counter while fiddling with what Nathan was sure was an open wire brimming with magic. He was extremely thin, almost skeletal, and his clothing was stained with unidentifiable fluids.
Exactly the kind of man I’ve been looking for all morning.
Despite standing there for a while, Nathan failed to get the owner’s attention, so he simply asked his question. “What exactly does this bracelet do? The sign wasn’t quite clear.”
With a slightly annoyed look, the man glanced up at him before launching into an explanation.
“Oh, that one. I made it some years ago, though nobody seemed interested in buying it. Those three crystals are each loaded with a fire-aspected counterspell. Activating them will let you disrupt any spell. Of course, it’ll be most effective against water-element spells, it might even counter something beyond its usual capabilities. Doesn’t work on monsters, though—instinctive spell casting isn’t so easily disrupted.”
The monsters on the lower floors rarely had real spells. They merely shaped their mana instinctively, like the shadow-cat Nathan had come across in the forest, or even the slimes projecting their mana barriers.
Allowing himself a smile, Nathan confirmed that this would be perfect if the water mage planned to go against him. “I’ll take it.”
The artificer had already gone back to his work. Without looking up, he mumbled the price.
“Fifteen credits will do. Not like anyone else would buy it except for you.”
Nathan winced at the price, though he knew it was more than fair. If not for its specific use against water mages, the item might have been worth a fortune. Three uses of a counterspell could save his life in a fight.
Sliding over the money, Nathan put on the bracelet and prepared for his second run into the sewer. If he remembered correctly, he needed about 300 credits to make a deal with the brokers, and that was all he was aiming for.