image [https://imgur.com/qM2NVKZ.png]

The hallway twisted into the darkness, his armor illuminating the area around them with a gentle warm light. The Broken Tower did not go up, it went down. A maze existed under the ancient forest outside, and Luka knew that the depths contained truly powerful enemies. He wasn’t entirely sure why he was here. Well, he had promised, but even that promise had felt spontaneous to him. He heard the soft tread of Samantha behind him, and focused ahead. He hadn’t had someone to truly protect in a long time. Someone he wanted to see flourish. A Dungeon COULD be an excellent place for a Hero to learn how to fight, how to survive. Maybe they would find something in here that could really help her. Was that giving her an unfair edge? But even then, was that so bad? She could help the side of Good more competently with the proper tools and equipment. They were all in this together. In a week or so he would send her off and return to town. Maybe a new Chosen would arrive. He felt himself frown. A new forgettable Chosen. They would ignore him, or belittle him, or run off. And then he would help another. He gripped his sword more tightly, focusing again. What was he thinking? What were these feelings of discontent?

A delicate clatter emerged from up ahead, and Luka snapped into focus. “Something’s up ahead.” He heard a small sound of approval from behind, and held his sword at the ready. A vague shadow shifted in the gloom, and light reflected off of it. Greens, blues, purples. A stained glass golem. An almost flat humanoid shape, it moved slowly towards them, panes of the colored glass showing intricate scenes across its whole body. Glass golems of any kind were not especially dangerous, if you were properly equipped. They were fragile and slow, although you did have to take them to pieces.

“Samantha, loose.” An arrow thrummed past him, punching into the Golem and shattering one of the many designs, a man being devoured by some great mouth. He moved forward, blade moving deliberately up. “[Multi-Blade].” He swung, investing eight divine energy into the strike. Eight strikes, as well as his original one, punched into the stained glass golem. It reached out a jagged arm of blades as the body was shattered, and with a counter strike the arm easily broke off. “Hit it again Samantha.” An arrow whipped into the body before the Golem stopped moving.

“Woah! I got a level!” Luka smiled, still scanning up ahead. “I’ve told you, the first five levels come quickly. Each group of five levels requires a steep increase in the required death energy. Additionally being helped by someone at a much higher level than you are will result in you getting a smaller percentage.” He heard sounds of affirmation from Samantha. He scanned over the body. Dungeon monsters often carried “loot” on their bodies… and this one was no exception.

A small ring glittered among the shards of glass. “[Detect Evil]”. The ring glowed a bright red and he grimaced.

[Golden ring of Rage]

A ring owned by a desperate knight who failed to save his love.

Increase Physical by five per minute of wearing the ring, up to a cap of one hundred.

Increase Rage Debuff by fifty per minute of wearing the ring.

This ring bonds to the finger it is worn on.

Ring alters to perfectly fit any finger.

Removing the ring removes Rage Debuff and all Stat gains, and gives the Exhausted Debuff for twenty four hours.

A magical item, but corrupted. He stepped over it. “That ring is cursed Samantha, don’t touch it.” Breaking a curse required high level Magic, and most of the enchantment was bound up into the curse itself. Afterwards you would often be left with a mundane low level item. Not worth the trouble. Clinking sounds ahead alerted him. Two more stained glass golems clattered forward from the darkness. In spite of himself he appreciated the artwork of their bodies, even though the subject matter was clearly Evil. More people were being consumed by gigantic mouths, and beautifully rendered heaps of headless bodies were piled high. He shivered and charged as an arrow popped one of the panels.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

After he had cut the golems down the two of them walked around the shattered bodies, careful not to let the glass pierce their leather shoes. The hallway was hung with rotting tapestries, and occasionally a glimpse of the lost majesty of the tower would be visible through crushed furniture and torn paintings. Samantha was looking around, eyes wide. “So… is this place real? Like, real real? As in… could another group of people come in here at the same time as us? Does it reset?”

Luka frowned at her. “Why would it reset? This has all lain here for untold hundreds, possibly thousands of years.” Samantha gestured. “But it still has monsters. How could people have come here and killed monsters for all that time? Wouldn’t it be depleted?”

A shrieking sound came from a side room and a long needle-like beak emerged. Luka neatly cut through it and the shrieking increased. Moving around he silenced the monster with a quick thrust. “Be a bit faster with the arrows Samantha, you won’t get any death energy from that one.” He glanced down at the odd birdlike monster. The first floors of a dungeon sometimes housed outside beasts, and perhaps this was one. “Dungeons are almost always places that went through some immense tragedy, the huge amount of death energy or the like pooling and creating a stable wellspring of magic. It “sinks” down, and the deeper it goes the stronger the monsters that are birthed are. Items from the location are twisted and enhanced, often given power or curses. Dungeons in turn respond to the Heroes who enter, and parties of people under six will attract an appropriate response. I guess in a way it can ‘reset’, in that monsters will emerge from the depths, carrying treasure with them. Also the Dungeon itself seems to resupply chests in an effort to lure Heroes in. Many heroes meet their end in Dungeons.”

Samantha strode up beside him, walking fast. “And bigger parties? What about if an army was sent in?” Luka frowned. “The Dungeon will respond with everything it has, throwing a true monster tide against it, often spilling out into the surrounding area. It is a forbidden act and foolish. Even if you could overwhelm the Dungeon through an army of skilled Heroes, what then? The Dungeon would be left fallow for years, and the amount of treasure and monsters killed would never be able to compensate for the lives lost and number of people involved.”

Samantha looked like she was thinking hard. “I see. That’s very interesting. A carrot and stick approach to attracting only the correct number of Heroes in.” She blinked at him. “But couldn’t a few high level Heroes just plow into the Dungeon, taking the good treasures for themselves?”

Luka held up a hand and they moved forward slowly. He pointed and Samantha loosed an arrow at a very tall pale humanoid figure that rushed down the hallway towards them. He easily cut it down. The figure had sad eyes, but the gaping mouth made it too unsettling to feel bad for. A wight, of some kind. “Sorry… oh yes. That is what quite a few Heroes do. The problem is that Monsters, and Dungeons, are not entirely without cunning. They will only attack people that they feel there is some chance of defeating. If a very high level group went into a dungeon, especially a group of high level Chosen, then they may find almost no monsters. They could wander for days and only fight one or two creatures that find themselves backed into a corner.” He gestured at the wight on the ground. “You are providing a tasty “bait”, but even so we are seeing much fewer monsters than this Dungeon can provide, because I’m here. If you came alone there would be a steady stream of monsters.”

Samantha’s eyes widened. “Fascinating.” She looked back the way they had come. “Could we stay the night in the Dungeon? I know you said six hours but-” Luka shook his head. “No. We will descend for six hours then return. This is a shallow Dungeon dive. And we are only doing one of them.” He heard Samantha let out a pitious sound behind him, but he held strong. Even this was FAR more than what was expected of any Greeter.

As they descended Luka found himself enjoying the experience more than he thought he would. Samantha was pleasantly competent with her bow, and he guided them away from any trapped areas or suspicious rooms. They got to talk and she would likely reach level five soon. He used to adventure, back when he was younger, and this was scratching an itch he had long forgotten about.

There was some kind of scuttling sound up ahead, and he once again held up a hand and peered around the carved stone corner. Skeletons. There were several of them, chattering at one another, gathered around a stone pillar with a book on it. They clattered rusty swords against their bones, almost seeming to laugh. Each of them had rotting leather armor or belts hanging off their bodies. Small horns emerged from their skulls. He slowly withdrew, moving back to Samantha.

“Seven skeletons ahead. I will engage first, and only once they have fully targeted me should you join. Any one of them would be very easy for me to defeat, but with several enemies one should always be careful. It is very hard to track multiple blades.” Samantha nodded, eyes wide and determined, nocking an arrow slowly and deliberately.

Luka smiled in spite of himself. She really was a true Hero in the making. He shook off the last feelings of discontent. He was going to help her become something amazing.