I sat on the ridge overlooking the cave entrance where the thieving apprentice must be. There was a single everlasting torch burning outside it. So far though, I hadn’t seen any movement. I wanted to approach this one differently than every other time I faced off against someone trying to kill me. I’d tried to be sneaky when I went after Vincent Voss, but this time, I wanted to be in and out without the guy even knowing I was there. I wanted to push myself to the limits of my class.
The game had given me the thief class for a reason, I just had to make it somehow fit my awkward and loud self. I had the blades. I had the bow. I even had the proper leather armor. Now I just had to do it. Did this game have a crouch button and a detection meter? That would be a helpful addition. Another thing to pass on to our new crocodilian overlords or whoever created them in the first place.
Stella nudged my hand until I finally gave her a pat. This was the hard part of my plan. How did she fit into it?
I played a game once where you’d been able to have followers but each and every time the follower had done something stupid and ruined all the plans I’d had for the quest. Would my girl do the exact same thing? I couldn’t exactly leave her behind though.
With a sigh, I stood and dusted off my backside. She would come and if somehow she did give us away, at least her strength would help win the fight.
“Come on girl, let's get this over with.”
We trotted down the rise and made our way up to the cave entrance. Everything was silent even with the sun nearing the horizon. I felt like there should have been birdsong or something but nope, just silence. It was the opposite of comforting.
I entered the cave and walked down the passage within, keeping to the edge where the deepest shadows were. So far, Stella was being a very good girl, walking just a step or two right behind me and keeping quiet.
The slope of the passage came to a sudden end as it opened up into a medium-sized cavern. The entire place was lit by the low glow of luminescent worms that were stuck to the walls and the ceilings. What they lit up gave me pause.
The cavern was round and at the center of it was a large metal fire urn surrounded by row after row of stone benches. A man and a woman were standing beside the urn arguing over something. Neither of them was what I expected from a blacksmith's apprentice.
They were tall and strangely slender, almost unhealthily so. They wore long black robes that were dragging on the ground by their feet. They each had their hood pulled up to hide their faces in shadows. On the front of the robes, embroidered in red thread, was a depiction of half a skull with a dagger pointed down above it. It looked a little creepy.
I crept closer to listen in on their conversation.
“… you don’t understand Ash, we need to take this information to the High Priest,” the man said.
“No, you don’t understand. If we do that with no other information they’ll kill us for sure. Use your head, Luke.”
I frowned. These two didn’t seem to be NPCs.
“They will be grateful we warned them of the risk to Melumek, we may even be promoted to Associates for our loyalty.”
“Oh, yeah right. We’ll just walk into the church and say, ‘hey, there is a whole group of good players who are determined to kill you all’. Well, where are they, Luke? What’s their plan? How many of them are there?
I’m telling you, the information you got from that little notebook is not enough. Maybe we can investigate it a little. Scout out the group and find out what they’re up to. At least then we’ll have something to give the High Priest other than a useless warning.”
“Do you really think we can do that?” the man asked.
“Sure. You said the notebook said something about Oliver’s Rest. That sounds a lot like a place to me. Maybe we can find it. There has to be a map of some sort in that town nearby.”
“Okay, sounds like a plan. Let’s get going. Should we tell the others?”
“Hell no, I don’t want those assholes getting any of the credit for our hard work,” the woman snarled.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“You’re right. Let’s go. The sun is probably up by now.”
I grabbed Stella's collar and pulled her with me as I hid behind a dirt-filled mining cart. The pair of crazy-ass occultists marched right past us. I held my breath until I couldn’t hear them anymore. When there had been silence for a moment I crept from our hiding place.
“That was weird,” I whispered to Stella.
She sneezed which I took as an acquiesce to what I said. We walked around the curve of the cavern, heading for the large archway on the other side. I checked my map again but it didn’t offer a closer view of the tunnels of the cave, just an overhead view of the landscape up above. I guess we’d have to find this so-called bad apprentice the old-fashioned way.
Right before we got to the arch I noticed a book leaning up against one of the benches. It was small with a black cover and the same skull and dagger on the cover that the occultists had been wearing. The edges of the pages were a deep red that looked a little odd in the greenish light of the glow worms.
I carefully reached out and picked it up turning it over in my hands. There was nothing but a long slash on the back cover. I wanted to delve into the pages for information but there was no time for that. So instead I stuffed it into my bum bag.
New Item Received: Fundamentals of the Fellowship of Fayum
Description: A tomb with all the basics you might need to become a Novice in the Fellowship of Fayum. Read and submit to the teaching of Melumek.
Weird. I’d look into it later. One bizarre task at a time. We moved through the arch and followed another slopping passage down to what must have been another level. It was clear this place had been carved into the rock but the caverns looked like fairly natural formations. The one we walked into next was wonkier than the first which had been a nearly perfect circle.
This one was jammed packed full of people, all of them dressed like the pair up above had been. They were gathered around a few tables in the center of the cavern. There was enough ale and roasted meat and petty arguments to keep them busy. I eyed all of them as we crept behind a fat stalagmite. There were fewer glow worms here. The group of people were using candles and torches to light the place instead.
It worked for me though, the flickering light cast a lot of shadows for us to hide in. We eased ourselves around the curving cavern. Racing from one hiding place to the next before stopping and waiting for another opportunity to do it all over again.
The next run was nearly my undoing. We bolted for another stone pillar right as one of the gathered people shot a fireball from their hands. The magic lit up the cavern much brighter than the torches and for a split second cast our shadows up high on the wall behind us.
Fuck.
“Wait,” one of the people said. “Did you see that?”
The revelry died down. I sucked in a desperate breath and clutched Stella against me, my back pressed firmly against the cold stone pillar.
“No, what?”
“I swear, I just saw some shadows on the wall. Shadows of people.”
There was a dull thump like someone was punching someone else. “Duh, dude, there like ten of us here. Are you dumb or something?”
“No. Shut up, Eric. Not one of us. There was a dog shape too. Do you see a dog in here?”
“Yeah,” another laughed. “I’m looking right at him.”
“Shut up you dick.”
What followed was a pretty damn impression punch-on with lots of hollering and bodies flying left and right. It made it pretty easy to weave through the cavern and out the next archway to another passage. There was a wooden door opposite this archway but when I yanked on it the thing didn’t move. There was no lockpicking icon either which was a shame. It had been a while since I’d been able to practice that little skill.
I don’t know why I was still aiming for the lowest level of the cave. It seemed a little cliché, but I was pretty sure that’s where I would find the stolen goods and probably the naughty apprentice as well. It was pretty clear that whoever the apprentice was, he was part of this cult we’d stumbled across.
At the end of the passage, there was a big wooden door like up above but with a fancy-looking metal lock. This time, there was a little icon and for some reason, I got a little jolt of excitement when it popped up. It felt a little similar to the zaps Sob liked to plant on my ass but this time I liked it.
I looked around to make sure I was alone before kneeling and focusing on the icon. The same lockpicking window popped up with the parallel lines and the bouncing dots just waiting to be put in their place.
I couldn’t help but smile. I liked this part of being a thief. Probably a little more than I should. This lock had four balls that I needed to place. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.
I focused on the first right as it landed in the open ring. The line lit up, the ball stopped bouncing and I moved on to the next. I wasn’t being cocky or anything. This was just a fairly easy lockpicking mechanic. I’d dealt with more difficult ones than this in my time.
With each ball that I succeeded in placing the others started bouncing faster. By the time I reached the final one, it was moving damn fast. Sweat was starting to dribble down my face. The ball landed in the ring and I focused on it.
A sound I’d not heard before rang out as the ball flew past the ring and continued to bounce. It sounded like shattering glass. All four of the balls were bouncing again and the count in the upper corner had dropped from two to one.
I’d failed and broken a lockpick in the process. All that bravado I’d felt moments ago rushed out of me in a wild rush.