There were fuzzy spiders the size of Zarian’s head that had Level 1 in their profile info. Most of them would crawl away when the party walked near them. They were harmless. Bianca stifled a scream each time she saw them.
Zarian found more interest in the living slimes that rolled across the ground at a snail’s pace. Those things were also Level 1.
Zarian, Bianca, Hannah, and even Gilbert watched the slime roll around. The slime picked up small rotten scraps of a dead critter and ingested it inside of its see-through body.
“We should watch the ceilings more closely,” Zarian said.
“Is it normal for these creatures to drop on their prey from above?” Hannah asked, showing her inquisitive side for this occasion instead of being depressed and silent.
Apparently, she had been an engineer in Florida after leaving her family’s farm in Alabama. She’d married a rich man who had been nice at first before she found out he cheated on her with another woman from his Dungeons and Dragon games. She’d won the alimony in the divorce.
“They’ve got the tendency to do so from what I know back on Earth,” Zarian explained, poking and prodding the slimy outer membrane. Touching it left a tingle on his finger. “This Level 1 slime doesn’t look like a danger, but … what if we enter a dangerous area and the creatures become stronger and deadlier? Hell, we’re heading to a dungeon. That’s going to have monsters for sure.”
Hannah sighed deeply, probably thinking of her husband’s Dungeon and Dragons hobby. Everybody left that alone as Hannah went back to being sullenly silent.
Zarian’s interests remained on the slime. He found it curious that some of these creatures didn’t have alpha skills. The slime’s info read like this:
Perhaps the slime was so weak it didn’t have as many details compared to stronger creatures. Did it have a trait? Would that trait include how the slime moved around and digested food?
Maybe the slime’s anatomy was its own while having the profile and stats of the System. Just like how the System didn’t report on all the functional parts of a human, which were common.
Zarian had an inkling the System focused more of its attention on things that were uncommon and above. The System also had the tendency to hide deeper mechanics.
Aura Ignition, Aura Ignition, Aura Ignition.
Zarian couldn’t get that anime-like power out of his head. It was distracting. He already had a hard enough time studying the next viewable pages in his grimoire.
The latest section had something to do with a special type of fire. A few anecdotes about the special fire mentioned how wizards had fallen to those with dense vitalities.
Apparently, high vitality could mitigate even Bloody Lifesteal, snuffing its primary thirst for life energy.
This unique fire spell was the answer to high vitality. It caused the most damage to vitality and lowered the threshold to take a tanky enemy’s life.
It couldn’t kill directly, however. It didn’t even burn flesh or cause any pain.
The only significant warning about this special fire was how it sapped the stamina out of its victims. Since vitality covered health and stamina, an enemy might notice a loss of their endurance and try to remove the fire.
Even then, this spell sounded insidious.
This was the best spell for taking down high-leveled bosses without them knowing it. The only problem was that learning the special fire spell was more complex than the past two spells.
It was a strange element. It was the creation of some mad wizard long ago and should’ve stayed forgotten. The runes and symbols involved were intellectually deep, almost like studying chemistry.
The added difficulty made sense. This new spell was the key pillar of being a black wizard, a boss killer, a tank destroyer, a heavy damager. It would probably look cool, too. It might have an aesthetic that Zarian wouldn’t find anywhere else, not normally.
It still wasn’t as cool as seeing Foodie’s Aura Ignition in action.
Zarian felt crummy for acting like a childish nerd. He wished Wally was still alive. Then Zarian would have someone else to geek out with.
He wished Ariana was here.
“What’s with the long face, sir?” Naomi asked.
The party was taking a break at a new water site. Bianca kept the lights on, which was getting easier for her with practice.
Her use of aura had tightened while channeling it through the Lighthouse Falchion. There were mirror crystals, too. The water site, which was an open cave with a glistening pool at one side, shone with bright reflective lights.
The place looked all sparkly and magical.
At their feet were the cracked open carapaces of the millipedes Foodie had recommended. The little critters were the size of Gilbert’s arm and had peach fuzz on their carapaces. They had cute faces if you looked at them from an angle.
Bianca had once cried as they caught them, cracked them open, and ate the delicious meat inside. It had taken some time for the hunger to set in before Bianca ate her first magic, vitality rich millipede.
They’d eaten plenty since the firsts. Now Bianca ate them like a savage, without remorse.
Foodie was right about them being tasty.
Zarian stared at the broken millipede shells before looking up at Naomi. “I got people killed.”
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
“Yeah, you did.” Clearly, Naomi wasn’t the type to sugarcoat.
Zarian nodded. “But all I can think about is the fun stuff.”
“That’s what makes you an idiot,” Naomi said. “But that’s what makes you amazing, too.”
Zarian chuckled. “We took a colossal risk with Foodie, didn’t we?”
“We could’ve been in the shithouse, yeah, but we made it through alright.” Naomi shrugged. “If you think about it, she’s a colossal asset. Worth a whole kingdom. So the risk matches the potential reward. And that damn little green girly and her big-ass ears can fucking cook.”
Zarian laughed, and Naomi chuckled.
For however long it took, since it was hard to track time in this deep, twisty, cavernous place, Zarian and his party traveled. The map directions told them to take the right most tunnels.
No matter what, it would twist, loop, and curve in the right direction they needed to go. The biggest threats had turned out to be slimes dropping from the ceiling, but they were all Level 1.
Bianca nearly killed herself when one got into her screaming mouth and started choking her. Para used some thin tendrils to clear it out. That was a close call that taught them to look up more carefully.
In what felt like weeks of rugged but peaceful cave adventuring, they reached a new location.
Zarian felt it as soon as he crossed a certain threshold. So did the others. They then saw an entrance to a grand, almost coliseum-like structure where there should be more caverns and tunnels.
The structure didn’t belong. It didn’t seem naturally built as part of the surroundings.
A System notification appeared for all of them to see:
“We’ve made it,” Zarian said, smiling with excitement. “So who’s ready for their first dungeon crawl?”
***
As Zarian’s party prepared to crawl the White Spider Dungeon, Jack had nearly died multiple times for however long he’d been in the godforsaken lower floors of Castle Grimrock. Of course, Jack didn’t know the name of his location, nor did he know Zarian had left.
Jack was truly on his own now. Without Zarian, Jack had quickly learned leveling up and surviving on his own was almost too hard.
Fortunately for Jack, it wasn’t completely impossible.
He’d crept everywhere, slowly, carefully, and strained his hearing. He’d crawled into nooks covered in bugs that bit hard and left him itchy, bloody, and miserable.
He’d taken a risk on some strange growths in the wall that were moist. They looked like spongy moss. He sucked water from them.
He’d suffered some stomach problems but avoided having major diarrhea, or that would’ve killed him. He’d ditched his clothes, found a dead goblin, and bathed in its blood to mask his scent.
He’d eaten the goblin’s flesh to survive.
Eventually, he’d found his first living prey. A scuffle between goblins had left one alone and injured.
Jack had ensured everything was perfect before he blasted the goblin in the back of the head with Star Bolt empowered by the Blessed Mage Bracer.
The goblin had fallen over with a smoking dent in its head. It had remained alive still.
Another bolt had finished the goblin off and gave Jack two levels. He’d dumped them into Agility and Wonder.
That was how he’d lived. He’d become less a human and more a scavenger. He’d become one with this maze-like place.
He’d learned the patterns of the goblin patrols and used every trick to hide and scurry around them.
They were way stronger and faster than him. But they weren’t smart. They were loud and crass. They were undisciplined and vile. He picked them off and grew his power the hard way, on his own while living on the wire’s edge.
Eventually, Jack reached Level 10. When that happened, he stood victoriously over his latest kill and was drinking in the moment.
He’d eaten the flesh of these horrific monsters and drank their blood to survive. He’d fought off waves of sickness with the Wonder of faith alone.
Jack believed himself to be chosen. That was the only explanation that any of this could be possible. He had to be the one true hero!
Before he opened up his class selection, he heard a scratchy crooning. Then he noticed the scent of cooked food.
Jack blinked once and ended up down the steps from a doorway leading into a magic underground kitchen. It was big and spacious. It had rock shelves filled with ingredients, pots, pans, utensils, and all sorts he’d find in a major kitchen with a medieval twist. And it had dining tables and chairs.
Then Jack noticed the little goblin looking up at him.
He’d made a huge mistake. He’d lost concentration for one moment and let the weaker parts of himself take over.
His first temptation was to kill the goblin. He stopped himself when he noticed the goblin was smaller and greener than the ones he’d ambushed, killed, and eaten. It was also wearing an apron over some rags that covered her groin and chest.
The Slave Cook, Jack realized, making the connection before he did something dire.
He glanced up at the basin that refilled itself with fresh water pouring from a pipe in the wall.
Jack heard a whimper. It was a weak sound. It was coming from him.
“My name is Foodie, and I’m known as the Slave Cook if you haven’t heard already,” Foodie said, confirming Jack’s suspicions. “You look like you’ve been barely surviving on your own. Come, let me wash your hands. Then I will feed you and let you rest here. As payment, you will tell me how you’ve survived.”
“My hatred,” Jack croaked, using his voice for the first time in a while. “It kept me alive. It helped me survive.”
“Who is it you hate?”
“Zarian Darkrun.”
It hadn’t taken Jack long to realize Naomi was merely a symptom of the disease. Killing the source was worth more of his attention. Then he would have his way with Naomi later if she still lived.
Jack continued: “I must overpower him. I must be stronger so I can annihilate him. Then eradicate anything infected by his influence.”
Foodie plodded over to a step ladder and moved it over to a sink with a hand pump. “Is that so? Do you consider this Zarian Darkrun powerful?”
Jack walked dreamily over to the sink and let the goblin girl pump water over his hands. She lathered them with a bar of soap. She washed his hands thoroughly for him.
It took everything for Jack to not shove her aside and drink directly from the faucet. But something wondrous told him he should not upset the Slave Cook.
He’d listened to his Wonder stat for long enough to know it wouldn’t lead him astray unless he fell to weakness. Which was why he spoke openly about his true desires. It felt right with his sense of Wonder.
“Zarian is a monster. He’ll cause mass deaths, irreparable damages, and lead people astray. He needs to be stopped. I’ll stop him,” he declared.
Once Foodie dried his hands off with cloth, she led Jack to a seat at a dining table. A minute later, Jack found a mug of iced water in front of him.
Foodie instructed him to sip slowly. The first sip was a taste of heaven. He did as he was told and drained it a little at a time, savoring it all.
“You’re weak right now, and you remind me of my mother,” Foodie said. “But your hatred is real. With enough of that emotion, maybe you’ll become stronger than Zarian. That’ll depend on what class you choose.”
“The Star System must give me the best one. It has to,” Jack said with conviction.
He went into his class selection. And immediately found something perfect. It was beyond his hopes and dreams.