Mauri and I intruded upon the former troll’s home without hesitation… well, at least from my part. She mused on the fact we would be desecrating the home of a dead troll until I told her that the troll was still alive and that the entrance to the abandoned dungeon was right inside the cave so she had no choice but to follow me in.

We inspected the inside of the cave and found out there was more to it than just a hole against a mountain. There was a hidden manor built inside and the front door was a few steps inside into the cave.

“Fancy, isn’t it?” I commented as I held the knob of the door.

I tried to twist it but it remained stuck. In fact, even my hand was stuck.

Those damned trolls!

I slowly burnt off the superglue which was lathered all over knob with magic and placed my hand against the door.

“I’m going to pick the door lock,” I said, and Mauri nodded as she watched in anticipation.

With a quick thought, the entire entrance was blown off by an explosion but Mauri and I were left unscathed.

“W-Wait! You said you were going to pick it!” Mauri exclaimed.

“I was about to, then I remembered I was dealing with a troll. I found out that there was a hidden explosion spell in the lock, so I aimed for that one instead. I don’t know how to pick locks,” I replied as I entered the manor through the hole.

The whole place was tidy and had a pleasant atmosphere. There was a fake fireplace, a rocking chair, and a warm cup of tea which was probably left by the troll when it went to pick a fight with the students.

“Hmm? This can’t be!” I shouted as I spotted a particular thing on one of the shelves.

“Did you find anything?” Mauri asked.

I took a book off the shelf and took a quick glance at the cover. It was a book covering advanced theories on mana economy by a Vallen scholar… or something.

“Rookie always said he needed this book. It’s extremely rare and it’s said that only the top scholarists know where to get one. Guess I’m a top scholarist now that I have this in my possession.” I smirked in my mind as I raised the book for Mauri to see.

“Eh… I don’t think we should be stealing-...”

“Stealing from a troll? Nonsense. It’s all fair game,” I huffed as I placed the book inside my robes.

“But still, we’re here to find the abandoned dungeon, not plunder some poor troll’s house, right?” Mauri asked.

“Huh? Oh yeah. Sure,” I agreed as I nonchalantly stuffed one of the troll’s precious vases into my robes as well. “Can you faintly sense the dungeon?”

“Give me a minute.” Mauri held out a palm and slowly murmured to herself. From her feet, waves of light swam across the floor and washed against the walls. It took a few seconds and a few more stolen goods for her to find what she was looking for.

She strolled towards the firepit, then jammed her arm into it. After a few fumbles, an audible click sounded and the wall next to the firepit began to rotate until a large opening uncovered itself.

Strangely, this opening wasn’t big enough for a troll to fit through, so why would the troll have this in the first place?

I didn’t bother thinking about it and stepped into the opening. Mauri followed me behind with a floating ball of light, mostly for her sake since I could see in the dark somewhat well, what with the ‘undead have piss poor senses, but at least they could see in the dark’.

Soon, we began descending down a stone stairwell and finally made it into a large dark corridor. There was a door and two giant statues guarding the door, so we walked up to them to inspect them.

The stone statues looked like two cloaked knights crossing their halberd above the doors.

“This seems to be the entrance to the dungeon. I guess these two statues are for decoration. It’ll be funny if they were actually golems,” I joked as I rubbed my hand against one of the statues’ feets.

I was expecting something out of my comment, but was thoroughly disappointed that a massive stone halberd didn’t fall onto my head.

Mauri also placed her hand against the same statues’ feet and concluded, “I don’t sense any presence of mana in them, so they’re regular statues. It would make sense anyway, since this is an abandoned dungeon.”

“Yeah…” I sighed as I let go of the feet.

I took a few steps towards the door when I sensed that my disappointment turned into satisfaction. With one hand, I stopped a giant stone halberd from tickling my head, and used the other hand to force the other halberd from splitting the oblivious Mauri into two by stopping it mid-air. At the same time, I blockaded the entire room with a barrier to make sure that the golems didn’t send an alarm to anyone.

It took her a second to register that she had almost mortally died. Mauri jumped back as the statue in front of her lifted the halberd back, then began making its way towards her.

“Hey, spirit! Just in case you haven’t realized it, you should begin fighting back!” I shouted.

“I couldn’t sense any mana at all! This should be impossible!” Mauri protested as she held her palms out. The approaching statue began sinking into the ground slowly as the floor underneath it crumbled and quaked.

While Mauri did her thing, I turned my attention to my opponent. It raised one of its palms at me, then a hollowed voice began chanting a spell at me.

“You know, back then, golems couldn’t cast spells. Truly technology is both terrifying and amazing.” I nodded my head in approval.

“Wait, Lord Archlich! This isn’t the time to be- AAH!” Mauri jumped back just as a halberd slammed onto the spot she was at.

“I told you to call me Bos-”

I was smothered with a dosage of purplish fire before I could even retort. Usually, I kept a plethora of barriers of various types on myself at all times so most spells and attacks weren’t a problem for me. But the fire spewed out by the golem had actually managed to erase the surface layer of barriers.

I floated away to keep a distance between me and the statue that was trying to murder me, then inspected it from the bottom up.

I shot out a simple near-divine arcane bolt at the statue, but the statue simply swiped it away with a fling of its arm, causing it deflect onto the ground beside the stone knight.

“That’s weird. It reminds me of Lard’s ability for some reason,” I pondered as I placed a hand on my chin.

No. Was I remembering wrong?

If this was like Lard’s ability, the spell would disappear once it was too close to Lard. The statue only managed to deflect the spell.

I threw a few more spells at it, but found out that they were mostly useless as they bounced off the angry statue. I even made sure to create an anti-mirror and anti-ricochet property to the spells, but they all turned out the same.

“Boss! None of my spells are working!” Mauri shouted as she began running towards me. The only thing that worked against the statues were indirect spells. Mauri used magic to sink the earth, which meant that it wasn’t a direct attack.

Noting that, I snapped my finger and caused the floor to become slippery. One of the statues fell, but the other managed to stabilize itself by balancing its halberd against its body.

“Can we even beat those things? We’re purely magical in terms of combat,” Mauri asked.

“Magical only?” I looked at her with disdain. Even with my mask on, Mauri could sense that I was mocking her.

I didn’t like working, but I also had a large pride to uphold. I took off my sword, Fatebinder, from my hip, then held it by the blade. I turned to Mauri and ordered, “You stay here.”

I began skipping across the air as raised the sword’s hilt up. The statue which managed to keep its balance tried to slap me away, but instead, I slapped its hand with a pommel strike. The force was so great that it caused its hand to crack, but not crumble.

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The statue adjusted itself in order to swat me down with the halberd, but it couldn’t keep up with my speed. I found a vulnerable spot to strike into then took off my mask in preparation.

I managed to get beside the stone giant’s side and kicked it with my knee, before slamming my face right at the statue. The heavenium plating on my bones weren’t only for defense since heavenium had numerous properties. The plating on my head could also enhance any direct impact a hundredfold, so a normal headbutt would be like a horde of giant minotaurs slamming straight at the target.

The statue shattered into many pieces of fragments the moment my glorious forehead blessed its stone cold life. Satisfied, I placed my mask back on, then began beelining for the other statue, which was struggling to get up.

I spun into the air rapidly to gain a lot of momentum before crashing down onto the statue. Its entire chest cave in and it raised its head to chant a spell. Of course, I didn’t give it a chance to do so as I smashed its face with a crossguard strike.

Finally, the room quieted down, and I diffused all my spells.

Mauri ran up to me and said, “As expected of an Archlich! But still, what are these golems? Are they even golems?”

“The bigger question is why are they active in an abandoned dungeon,” I replied as I held my hand out towards the door. I closed my hand into a fist, and the door crushed itself into a ball. I walked up to the now-open entrance then swiped my finger in the air.

A shattering noise erupted but quickly stopped.

“I don’t understand. This is supposed to be an abandoned dungeon, but why are there active spells protecting the entrance?” Mauri asked. There were multiple spells blanketing the door and the entranceway so I destroyed all of them simultaneous since I figured that if I spent any effort analyzing any of the barriers, they would all go off and sound an alarm.

“Well, this’ll be fun. Let’s go, spirit.” I placed Fatebinder back against my hip and walked into the dungeon entrance.

As we began exploring the ‘abandoned’ dungeon, I realized that there was something wrong with this place.

“You sensed life, too?” I said as I stopped. Mauri nodded which confirmed that I wasn’t going crazier than I already was.

What a relief.

As we walked down a corridor, we heard metallic footsteps clanking in the distance. Mauri dispelled her ball of light and pasted herself against the wall while I placed my hand against the floor.

“Don’t move or make a sound. I’m creating an illusion,” I warned Mauri.

Two men emerged from the shadows, decked from head to toe in one form of metal armor or another, and walked passed us. They had purple tabards each with a different heraldry, but it didn’t explain who they were.

Well, they didn’t need to.

I stabbed one from behind then immediately snapped the other’s neck. Mauri was too busy hyperventilating in the corner to help me, but not like I needed her help.

I placed my hand on one of the corpses’ then tried to seep my influence into it.

“What in the name of the Abyss…” I murmured.

“Is there any problems?” Mauri nervously asked as she crawled close to me.

“You see, I’m trying to raise them as the undead to interrogate them but…”

Something clicked in my head. It’s those Order bastards! The last time someone couldn’t be raised was because they were part of the Order.

Since they had some sort of magic nullifying capabilities, they probably rendered this place inert, which could explain why my companions thought that this place was abandoned. I should have realized that!

But then again, I always automatically assumed that ‘Abyss could be summoned’ equals ‘Fairy or Order Knight’. The golems didn’t feel like they were connected to the Abyss, neither were these guys.

I grabbed one of their sleeves and rolled it up. My suspicions were confirmed when I found out that they didn’t have those weird black or purple markings on their arm. It seemed that only high ranking members or elite Order members had them.

I hid the corpses with a blanket of illusion spell since indirect spells wouldn’t be dispelled by them and that grunts only get to have bare minimum anti-magic defense.

Mauri and I trekked through the dungeon stealthily. I handled most of the killy and stabby parts since Mauri wasn’t too fond of shedding blood, but she wouldn’t think twice to kill someone if necessary. She was, after all, willing to pick a fight with me even if it meant certain doom for her.

The whole dungeon seemed to have been converted into a fully operational base with large quarters, supply storages, and other necessaries needed to maintain a small army. Of course, that meant that there was a lot of troublesome pests patrolling the dungeon. Many of the dead bodies we dropped off must have been uncovered already since the entire base began signalling a high-alert signal.

“This place is ridiculously big. I think I’ve seen enough,” I concluded now that we had been discovered.

“What now? Do we go back?” Mauri asked.

I guess we could always come back with a bigger force. My companions had been waging a silent war against the Order across the Sorcerer City States and other regions, so it wouldn’t take too long for them to assemble a strike force against this place.

“Alright, let’s-...”

A tinge of headache ran amok my mind. Something wasn’t right here.

I sat on the floor then fell in deep thought. I tried to listen.

Hear them.

Take them in.

No. The voices are slowly going hollow, and shallow.

I tilted my head then said, “What will we do?”

“Pardon me?” Mauri asked.

“Not you.”

Them.

Find.

Locate.

Extract.

Why?

Hear.

“You think there’s one here?”

No.

Maybe.

Yes.

No, idiot. Not yes. Yes no.

There is one. But not one.

Mauri was starting to look frightened at the fact that I was talking to myself. Of course, who wouldn’t be frightened when an Archlich suddenly began talking to the concrete wall?

“Mauri. I need to head deeper to the core of the dungeon. You’ll have to head back up yourself,” I ordered.

Mauri opened her mouth then closed it to carefully think of her next few words. She shook her head then asked, “Do you really have to go down? My deepest apologies to you, Boss, but I do not think I can go back up to the surface by myself. Is it possible if you could-…”

“No. I can’t bring you back up. I need to go down, and fast,” I sternly warned as I stood up.

“Then I’ll go with you, if it doesn’t bother you,” Mauri bowed as she suggested.

“Hm. You are a spirit. A natural variable. Born to the surface of existence, and blind to meaning…” I mumbled.

“Pardon me?” she asked.

“Spirits cannot die, right? Just like demons?” I asked back.

“Like fairies? I don’t think fairies are immor-”

I raised my hand to cut Mauri off. “The real demons.”

“In a way, yes. Just like the demons, if we die, we can return at a later time, but it would take such a long time that I might as well die permanently,” Mauri explained. “Why are you asking this?”

“Are you afraid because of Yomi?” I tilted my head the other way.

Mauri looked away then replied, “Admittedly so, I have grown fond of her as a friend. If I wake up many decades - or even centuries - later, Yomi would have been…”

“Yes, yes. Dead. If you’re going to be like that, you’ll have to bind yourself to me. Temporarily,” I said.

“Bind… myself to you?! My apologies, Lord Archlich, but I simply must refuse!” Mauri bowed to me as respectfully and as low as she could.

“This is what’s wrong with you variables. Always so annoying,” I complained as I massaged my forehead.

“Forgive my limited knowledge, but what are ‘variables’?” Mauri asked as she raised her head, but still bent her body forward.

“Never mind that. What you should mind is that you’ll never see daylights ever again if you refuse to bind yourself to me. Temporarily.”

I had to really put the emphasis on the last part to get it right hard into her head.

There was a moment of sweet silence which dominated the room we were in. Sweat fell from Mauri’s head and down to her neck. She was thinking extremely hard about this.

“You promise in your name that you would release the binding once we are out of the dungeon?” Mauri questioned nervously.

I nodded, then shrugged. “Really, I have no use for a spirit, and a spirit which accommodates my companions at that. Just think of this as me returning a favor to you again.”

Mauri sighed then surrendered herself. She placed both of her hands on her chest, then slowly raised it. As she spread her hands out, a ball of smoke floated towards me. I trapped it into my palm and it slowly fizzled away, confirming that she had bound herself to me.

Spirits needed a magical connection to stay in the mortal world or they would be evicted to the spiritual world, and since dungeon cores weren’t sentient beings and had massive magical capabilities, they were the perfect candidates to bind themselves to so that they could stay in the mortal realm and go back to the Spirit World if they want to.

But if someone was powerful enough, they could also be bound to, but spirits risk becoming slaves to the binder. Sure, they could simply cut the binding and force themselves back into the spiritual world, but being forcibly evicted was another word for ‘dying and waiting for centuries to come back’.

Spirits like Mauri had reasons to stay in the mortal realm, after all. And they had good reasons to be wary of powerful mages.

“Here.” I held up a piece of parchment towards Mauri.

Mauri took it then studied it. “May I ask, what is this?”

“You’ve been respectful to me, unlike some people, so I’m giving you this. The spell embedded to it will allow you to cut your binding to me without fault. Courtesy of that new fancy Angolian spellcraft,” I explained.

Mauri stared at the parchment, then back at me. Her eyes popped out and she shouted, “EEEH? If you had said that in the first place, then I wouldn’t have refused you in the first place, Boss!”

“What do you think I am? A saint? Don’t forget that I’m at the top of the undead hierarchy. Do you think Archliches run charities or something? Anyway, since you’ve given me your trust somewhat, I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to give you my trust,” I answered partially truthfully. I also wanted to see her reaction when I give her the parchment after defiantly resisting me.

“But still, I didn’t think something like this was possible…”

“It’s because I’m the one and only Archlich, spirit. Now come. I need to erase someone from existence,” I said.