What kind of plan was this? Moreover, why didn’t Lucid feel the need to keep Owyn in the loop?
“This is so stupid.” Owyn drew his bow again, loosing the arrow. It struck a urik, killing it instantly.
That seemed to trigger the horde. Owyn couldn’t see very far in this darkness, but he could see enough to know where his targets were. That was the whole point in his headlamp. Bright enough that he could see his target plus a little bit to the sides, and dim enough that it didn’t steal his concentration away when casting.
Unfortunately, he’d been casting the damn thing for the better part of a day now, and he was beginning to feel the onset of a headache coming on. Owyn grit his teeth, vowing to himself that he was going to sleep after this, rocky ground or not.
He loosed arrow after arrow, taking down the incoming enemies one by one. Dweller and Silver stood strongly between him and the enemy, with the two fish monster things on either side of him. Rab took up the rear, planting himself firmly in the only entrance to the fort. But Owyn couldn’t worry about that right now. Right now, he was far more concerned with the sheer number of monsters crawling, running, or slithering in his direction. Owyn was not used to dealing with more than three monsters at a time, especially without Abby standing guard, and now he was expected to hold off against fifty!?
At the very least, Owyn could pick off the bigger threats.
He switched targets, abandoning the closer humanoids like ratkin and other two-legged creatures. He would hit the snake based monsters first, since Dweller would have a harder time against them. True to his assumptions, when the first ratkin crashed into the little party of defenders, Dweller swept three of them up in a single strike of his mace, obliterating the skull of the first while knocking the other two away. Silver roared, biting and clawing his way into the largest opponent he could find.
Owyn kept at it, now surrounded by the horde. The larger monsters joined the fight, bringing the fish monsters away from the group to fight one on one. Owyn spun, placing his back against Dweller’s for protection. He shot his arrows after the monsters that tried to join the larger monsters, trying his best to keep the fight as even as possible. The fur armor he made the fish creatures seemed to help them shrug off attacks from smaller creatures, but then a giant lizard joined the fight, clamping its teeth around the fish's throat. Armor or not, nothing could protect it from that.
The fish died, and Owyn quickly dispatched the threat soon after. He clenched his teeth, kicking away a small ratkin that had snuck through. Dweller laughed.
“Come at me you ugly motherfuckers! Your dungeon is a whore, to accept so many species!”
The enemy monsters roared at the provocation, doubling their efforts to kill him. Dweller just laughed again, smashing through. “I see my master! This is the reason you gave me a voice! Yes! Fuck all of you! I bet you all fuck each other! Ahahaha!”
A rat with snake arms ran beside Owyn, whipping its arms up at him. Owyn tried to shoot it, but the snake arms knocked into his bow, deflecting his aim. Owyn cursed internally, bringing up his armored knee to protect his body from the second snake head. A body slammed into the back of his head, knocking him off balance. Owyn instinctively grabbed for the creature, just as dozens of tiny teeth bit into his neck. He ripped the creature away, a lizard, pulling his own blood out with the effort. Owyn shouted in rage, throwing the lizard at the rat-snake hybrid. It did nothing but distract the monster, and it reared its arms back for another strike.
Silver flashed before Owyn, bounding around him and between the enemy. The horse sized dragon bit into the rat-snake, killing it instantly. Silver didn’t stick around to make sure Owyn was alright though, and it bound away, joining the scrap with his fishy brethren. Owyn recovered quickly too, pulling out another arrow. This fight needed to end soon, otherwise he might really die.
A screech echoed up from deep within the cavern. Several more monstrous cries soon followed. Owyn had to ignore them in favor of the fight before him. As much as he hated to admit it, he was relying on Lucid for some semblance of protection. If Lucid fell, Owyn stood no chance of making it back to Abby. So he would fight as hard as he could to hold the damn line!
A small detachment of larger monsters broke away from the fight. The five largest monsters in fact. Owyn noticed their departure, but didn’t stop them. Why would he!? He turned his focus to Silver, sniping a ratkin that had latched itself on to his back. Satisfied that he repaid his debt, Owyn turned his attention back to the monsters around him. The gap Silver had created was closing, and Owyn could no longer rely on his bow.
Owyn held his bow above his head to protect it and drew his knife from his back. He blocked an incoming body with his elbow before striking down on a snake monster at his feet. Bodies piled in, scratching at his armor. Owyn fell away, flailing his knife in the direction of the closest monsters. His foot caught on a crack in the floor, and he stumbled, falling to his knees. More monsters piled on, biting and clawing at his clothes and armor. Owyn couldn’t see straight. His breathing was becoming labored. Not like he was tired, this was different.
A ratkin scratched at his head, knocking his helmet off. The world went dark. Owyn curled into a ball, unable to think straight. He knew he should protect his head and neck, so he did that. But what else could he do? His legs were armored. Could he kick the monsters? He tried, thrusting both legs out at once. Although they impacted bodies solidly, they struggled to return. Bodies weighed them down. Owyn thrashed, struggling on the floor to bring his legs back into his protective ball. It was no use, more monsters just swarmed him. Either by luck or something else, they seemed to notice the gaps in his armor. More and more bites and scratches attack his elbows, his waist, his knees, everywhere. Owyn tastes blood and cries out in pain.
A sudden mass was lifted off his chest, and the attacks on his head lessened. Dweller gurgled a roar, swiping his mace horizontally, clearing away most of the attackers on Owyn. Owyn relaxed slightly, listening with labored breath as he scared away the monsters. He heard as dozens of bodies ran away from him, heading back in the direction they had come from. Silver bounded over, standing next to Dweller over Owyn, probably watching the fleeing monsters.
“Cowards!” Dweller shouted after them. “Your dungeon is weak, and you should feel shame!”
Owyn coughed, spitting up what tasted like blood.
Oh. That wasn’t normally a good sign.
Owyn reached out his will, trying to find his light spell. He shivered, somehow cold now, and quickly gave up. He felt thick digits roll him over.
“Boss says you’re sick.” Dweller gargled. “He thinks it's poison. Doesn’t know how to treat it though, so you’re kinda shit outta luck. C’mon, I’ll take you back to the cave so you can sleep it off.”
Poison? Yeah, that made sense. When? Was it that ambush lizard? It could have been dozens of different attacks. Who knew.
“...N… do…” Owyn managed to mutter. Dweller rocked a bit as he carried him.
“Speak up human.” Dweller growled.
“Nti..dote…” Owyn waved in the air vaguely.
“Antidote?” Dweller asked. “Where?”
“Bag.” Owyn could say that much. Goddess, this was hard.
Owyn was set down. He could feel cool, damp moss below him. Nice.
He heard his bag rustling and rattling nearby. Where was Owyn? This must be crossroads cave. Cool, that meant he was safe.
A hand roughly shoved Owyn to his side. Owyn moaned, coughing. He didn’t want to be on his side. That was uncomfortable. He wanted to lay on his back! He fought against the hand.
“Easy.” Dweller muttered. The sound of a cork being released. “Smell. Is this the antidote?”
Owyn sniffed. All he could smell was blood. It didn’t matter, the antidote didn’t really have a smell. “Yeh…”
Glass touched his lips. A liquid poured in. Bleh, it didn’t taste nice! Owyn dribbled it out the corner of his mouth. The glass was taken away, so he let his jaw go slack. Suddenly, the glass was solved against his tongue, and he was forced to swallow some of the gross tasting liquid!
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Owyn coughed, trying to get it out, but it was no use. The taste was there to stay.
“Go to sleep stupid.” Dweller growled. His presence faded behind him. Owyn was alone.
To be fair, sleep sounded nice right about now. Maybe the taste would go away when he woke up? Why not…
----------------------------------------
Owyn woke up with a headache. And a clearer head. He moaned, sitting up.
A bright light greeted him.
“Morning.” Mr. Vernant greeted.
“I imagined heaven to hurt less.” Owyn joked, shying away from the light. It hurt his eyes.
Mr. Vernant lowered the light, hiding it under his knees. “That fish thing said you were poisoned. You good? Still feeling poisoned?”
“Don’t think so.” Owyn sat against the stone wall. “Just a headache.”
“Like a hangover?”
Owyn smirked. “Dunno. Never had one before.”
“Well that’s just wrong.” Mr. Vernant tutted. “We’ll have to fix that when we get out. Meantime, why don’t you come with me.”
Mr. Vernant got to his feet and helped Owyn do the same. He led him through a crack in the wall and down a sloped tunnel. Owyn felt the dungeon's influence leave him behind. A few steps later, and they were in a new room that smelled like literal shit.
“Oh god…” Owyn pinched his nose.
Mr. Vernant shrugged. “Sorry, but it’s not like we have a choice. There’s others, but this one smells the least.”
Owyn pieced some things together. “I’ve got mana deficiency?”
Mr. Vernant nodded. “Yup, and that means you’ve got to spend at least eight hours outside a dungeon without using magic! I’ve already done my time in this shit hole, and now it’s yours!”
“Wait, hold on!” Owyn stopped Mr. Vernant before he could leave. “What happened?! After the fight! Actually, during the fight!”
“You just want me to stick around so I can give you a light.” Mr. Vernant smirked. “It stinks in here!”
Owyn looked around. Best as he could tell, it was all bat shit around here. This must be one of Depths’ old nurseries. He couldn’t blame Mr. Vernant for wanting to leave.
Mr. Vernant chuckled. “I’m joking. Find a spot to sit, if you can. I only got the report a few hours ago myself. You were out cold for a whole day it feels like. You can’t imagine how bored I’ve been! I need somebody to talk to!”
Owyn chose a rock that looked relatively clean to sit on. Mr. Vernant sat in the entrance. He leaned on his knees to speak casually.
“Well first of all, Grant’s fine, so that’s the most important thing. Second thing is, we didn’t really lose too many men during the scrap. Well, we actually lost quite a bit. Those lizard fuckers were tough, and they killed a fair amount of our undead, but since Mercy just kept resurrecting more, we came away net zero. Pair that with the guys Lucid’s men killed, and we might even be slightly better than before! Although, all the new recruits are gone to Mercy… I’m not sure I trust that dungeon.”
“I don’t either.” Owyn freely admitted. “But I trust Lucid to keep her in check, so…”
Mr. Vernant nodded, giving the point. “Grant seems to like his new role. Lucid’s been calling him a lich, which apparently is a creature that controls the undead. Fitting, I suppose, given the circumstances. Oh, and in case it wasn’t obvious, I wasn’t actually talking with Lucid himself. Lucid was talking through that demon character. Damian? I hope that’s his name, he only said it the once.”
“The battle, Mr. Vernant.” Owyn insisted. “What’s our situation like now? Are we safe?”
He shook his head. Thought about it for a second. He tilted his hand side to side. “Kind of. One of the major dungeons has been destroyed. Apparently, Lucid had planned to weaken the other dungeon while defending himself at the same time. Damian said something about showing strength, rather than weakness, but I don’t remember. He explained that Lucid figured that if an easier target showed itself, the other dungeons would target that one and leave us alone. And it worked, seeing as how those lizard fucks retreated.”
“So we’re not going to be attacked any more?” Owyn asked.
Mr. Vernant shrugged. “No clue. Lucid seems confident that we’re at a stalemate for now. He says the four remaining dungeons have resumed their ‘regular’ activities, which means hunting the weaker dungeons for sport it seems.”
“They’re farming.” Owyn said. “Lucid did it too, on the upper levels. He was harvesting the weaker dungeons in order to grow his own forces up.”
“Ah. Makes sense.”
“Is Lucid joining in?” Owyn couldn’t see why he wouldn’t want to get stronger.
And yet, Mr. Vernant shook his head negative. “‘S far as I can tell, he’s just been focusing on recovery. He doesn’t have too many living creatures, and he doesn’t want Mercy to leave his domain. And Mercy is keeping her undead close, especially since Lucid keeps giving her more skeletons to make undead.”
Owyn slouched. “Well that’s not good. The other dungeons are going to grow stronger while Lucid stagnates.”
Mr. Vernant didn’t have a lot to say about that.
Owyn sighed. “It’s almost like Lucid isn’t really a dungeon at all…”
“I dunno, he’s starting to grow on me.” Mr. Vernant said, stretching.
They both heard sounds of feet on stone. Damian appeared behind Mr. Vernant, greeting him with a nod. The demon wasn’t wearing the vest they made him, but seemed to like the loincloth that held his knives at his sides like a belt.
“Lucid wishes to fulfill his promise of giving you a feast. However, he is worried that you cannot eat raw meat. He claims to have a solution, but he requests some advice from you as to how to deal with it.”
Owyn rolled his hand. “What kind of advice?”
“Financial.” Damian stated. “He wishes to make a trade with the Grove dungeon for some wood to start a cooking fire. He’s wondering if you have a good idea as to what we could possibly trade.”
Owyn and Mr. Vernant shared a look, both unsure. “Couldn’t you ask the Baroness? Wouldn’t she be a better choice to ask for advice?”
Damian stood still for a second, probably relaying information to Lucid, since they weren’t in his dungeon for him to overhear. “Lucid says she’s out of range. The church is keeping her just outside the entrance to the Setterton caves apparently.”
“Why? And why doesn’t he just expand his territory to extend his range?”
Damian stood silently again. His black eyes flicked back and forth as he silently conversed with Lucid. A scowl grew on his face.
“Fine. You two, come.” Damian left the smelly cave behind.
Owyn shared another look with Mr. Vernant and shrugged. They both got to their feet and followed Damian back into Lucid’s dungeon. Owyn’s headache returned, but after the short break, at least it was a little duller. He would return to that cave once they were done here. Maybe with a patch of moss that he could use like a rag.
They walked past Mimi in the core room, where dozens of miniature mimic crabs wandered about. Some of them picked at Depths’ remains, even if they couldn’t actually consume any of the pieces. They just weren’t big enough yet. Damian ignored them, marching through the room and into the outer cavern, where he took a sharp left, aiming directly for the ladder below where the upper caves joined the cavern. Owyn’s boots squished through the moss carpet, and he bent over to collect some before quickly rejoining the others.
They saw the bodies soon enough.
All three of them just laid there, blood long since dried. Moss was beginning to cling to their sides, nearly halfway up their arms. Owyn and Mr. Vernant recognized two of the bodies immediately as the lumberjack and his son. The third one, with the ax sized hole in his neck, must have been a knight.
Mr. Vernant’s grip on his baton visibly tightened. He raised his arm to look up at the cave out of sight.
Damian spoke. “The church has offered us a deal. For every five rooms up above that we claim as our territory, Lucid gains five of the villagers. Alive, if not well. He does not want to encourage the church, and so refuses to expand his territory, even if it will get him in contact with your Baroness.”
“And what does the church get in return?” Owyn asked.
“We were hoping you could tell us.”
“What is the church's end goal?” Mr. Vernant growled. “Are they just leading Setterton to the slaughter?”
Domain actually shook his head. “We think not. Lucid believes that the church want’s something from Lucid, and are willing to play along with Lucid’s wants in order to get it. Lucid has made it clear that he doesn’t want any of Setterton’s people to be hurt, so they seem to be playing along. There’s two farmers up in the last room. Gifts from the church.”
“What does this have to do with trading with the Grove?” Owyn was beginning to see some implications he didn’t like.
Damian raised his hands, not changing his expression. “This has to do with what you want. Lucid will alter his reward for your deal as mercenaries. No meal. No fire. But you get to decide with how he proceeds with your people.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Mr. Vernant took a threatening step closer to the demon.
“Does Lucid expand his territory? What do we do with the people? They’re being fed, but not enough, and they’re still tied up and helpless. What would you like to do about the church?”
Mr. Vernant thought about it. Owyn did too.
“Lucid has been a good host.” Owyn pointed out. “For the most part.”
Mr. Vernant rounded on Owyn. “Are you suggesting a rescue? Isn’t that just trading one captor for another?”
Owyn spread his arms, gesturing at the land around them. “We’re not exactly bound to servitude here. We’re stuck between a rock and a hard place, and between the church and Lucid, I’m starting to trust one more than the other.”
Mr. Vernant stood quietly for a second. “At least we know what Lucid wants…”
Owyn nodded. “Exactly. So we can make deals with him.”
“And he can make deals with the church.” Damian finished. “To a degree.”
Owyn faced the demon. “Take them down here. We’ll explain everything.”