S15, A Meal from the Dungeon
“Uh? Is that a chicken?” At the front of the group Bolton stopped abruptly and pointed at the shadows with his spear.
We were exploring a cave not very far from the entrance to the corridors. This was the first time we were exploring the area on our own after Instructor Remme had deemed we were ready. Ahead of us, with it’s body against a big boulder, an animal commonly seen in villages and farms was trying to hide from the light projected by our lanterns.
“It seems so… Maybe it escaped from the town and ended down here,” Falnid said unsure, peeking from behind Bolton’s big body.
“Um, I doubt it was able to come here on its own, the rats in the corridors would have eaten it,” Bolton disagreed.
“Then some adventurers must have brought it here to use as bait…” Falnid guessed.
“It must be a monster. Remember what Remme told us, the dungeon gives birth to creatures that mimic those from outside,” Terence interjected from our back.
On the meantime the chicken had gotten accustomed to our presence and was chewing a crunchbug that happened to be close to it. Similarly to most monsters I had seen it didn’t have great survival instincts.
“It doesn’t look like it wants to run,” Falnid pointed, looking at the monster. “We should roast it for dinner!” He exclaimed excitedly.
“If you want to eat chicken it will be better to just buy some skewers in town, remember what’s our objective for today.” Terence reminded him.
“C’mon! It will be good practice for when we go deeper inside the dungeon. We will need to cook monsters then.”
“…Alright, but I won’t be the one preparing it.”
“I will do it!” Falnid declared. “If Simon gives me a hand…” He added looking at me.
“That won’t be a problem,” I agreed, also interested to taste the monster.
“Nice, I’m going to catch it!” Taking a white stone from the ground Falnid aimed at the monster and hit it right in the head. The creature didn’t show any reaction before falling to the ground. “That was easy!” Falnid laughed as he went to recover the chicken’s body.
With the chicken in hand we kept advancing along the caves. Today’s task was to hunt a varan. It was part of the request to deliver five varans hides to the guild that was posted on the bulletin board. Since we had already caught two under Instructor Remme’s guidance we only needed three more to claim the sizable reward of four silver coins.
“There may be some varans in a cavern a bit ahead,” Terence informed everyone while checking a map of the caves he had acquired for this expedition.
“Let me take a look at it,” I asked him, turning around. Terence seemed to have less problems finding the way down here because the different galleries were mostly disposed in a horizontal way, it was less labyrinthine than the corridors with their multiple floors. In any case, it was always good to make sure we were going in the right direction.
Terence glared at me. “Please?” I added a bit intimidated.
He reluctantly handed me the map. “We are here,” he pointed confidently while scowling at me. “If we follow this path we will need to go through a couple caverns to reach our first destination.”
Before entering the dungeon we had already discussed which locations would be the best to find our prey. We planned to visiting all of them in order until we spotted a varan. After determining our current position we resumed our march.
“Ah, it’s so nice down here,” Falnid commented opening his arms and inhaling loudly. “I thought my boots were going to melt in this heat, although it’s not as bad as in the badlands.”
It was almost summer and the weather has gotten quite hot. The grass in the plains had begun to show yellow patches from the lack of rain and the streets in Algus were no longer muddy. Not that I had payed much attention to it, I had been using most of my free time trying to grasp how to feel my internal mana. I had already drank more than a dozen bottles of palemoss potion and I was sure I would soon achieve some results, or at least that was what I told myself after each session.
“In my village they must be harvesting strawberries right now,” Bolton mentioned in a longing tone. He seemed to have mostly recovered from the dungeon dogs’ incident and had been talking more as of late.
“In Vesturkal no one farms. There are only a few places in the southeast where the ground is barely good enough to plant crops.”
“Um, I see. Then I must be the only one that worked in the fields since Simon was a hunter and Terence lived in the city.”
“We had some plants, but I never payed them much attention.” I had never been very interested in farming. Mother grew a few crops in the backyard, but they weren’t enough to feed us. We got most of our vegetables bartering with the farmers and merchants from the nearby villages.
“I didn’t live in Flodbred all my life, but it’s true I have never worked as a farmer.” Terence said. “But I did see the farmers working in the fields after winter.” He added.
After a while we arrived at our destination, a big cavern in the westernmost part of the caves. The ground was full of rocks and big white boulders impeded our vision.
“Be careful, we don’t know what may be lurking in here,” Terence warned everyone. “Simon, you will be in command if we encounter an enemy.”
We entered the cavern in our usual formation, advancing close to the right wall where there were less obstacles.
“Falnid, do you want to change places with me?” I ask concerned after noticing he was in the most vulnerable position on the left side.
“No, I’m good, if a monster comes looking for trouble I will give it a good stab,” he declared thrusting his spear. “Uh? There is something there.”
Following the tip of his weapon I spotted something big and yellow crouching between two boulders. We carefully moved towards it.
“It’s a varan!” Falnid exclaimed joyfully.
Looking at us from its hiding place there was a big lizard about ten feet long. “No, that’s not a varan, look at the yellow scales on its back, it hasn’t promoted yet,” I said.
“So, it doesn’t count?” Falnid asked disappointed.
“No, we should come back in a few days. He seems to be in the later stages of its growth phase.”
“It isn’t attacking us, let’s retreat,” Terence commanded.
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We left the cave from a near passage. There was no need to search further, lizards and varans were territorial, there wouldn’t be another one occupying the same cavern.
“Alright, let’s rest a bit before heading to our next target.” Terence said, then looked at his map and showed a troubled expression. “Simon help me here… I’m not sure where we are.”
A little later, already refreshed, we traveled towards the second stop of our itinerary, another cavern with a small pond.
“It’s a pity that monster wasn’t a varan. I thought we would have more than enough time to search the forest for wood and herbs to roast this chicken,” Falnid commented looking at the chicken dangling on Bolton’s back. “We could also find a few heelen stalks while we are at it.”
The request for medicinal herbs had been posted again, but this time the rewards were smaller than before. We had seen it in the bulletin board but had decided that hunting monsters would be more exciting and profitable.
“I already have some herbs and salt to flavor it,” I told Falnid. “I went to the forest during our free afternoon a couple days ago.”
Since the dog’s incident we always carried a couple blood potions with us, but I had decided that medicinal herbs would be a cheaper way to treat minor injuries.
“Oh, so you also have those kinds of herbs, do you have something with a strong flavor? All your southerner food tastes a bit bland. I wish I had brought some spices from home.”
While chatting our group arrived at another cavern. This one was almost empty, with only a pond and some stalactites and stalagmites near its center.
“Oh, we are lucky!” Falnid exclaimed in a low voice. We had caught a varan drinking water from the pond.
“This is going to be slightly difficult,” Terence said in a worried tone. “If we don’t strike it decisively it will flee.”
There were many passages that the monster could use to escape and the four of us weren’t enough to block all of them.
“Everyone, take combat positions. Simon, you give the orders.” Terence ordered in a rush and without bothering to lower his voice, the varan had already spotted us.
We assembled our usual formation with Bolton in the middle, Falnid and I at his left and right and Terence at the back. Meanwhile the reptile kept staring at us, unsure of what to do.
“We should advance slowly and try not to startle it. If it flees or gets into the water it’s going to be pain to hunt.” I told everyone in a quiet voice without taking my eyes off our prey.
We didn’t have many options to fight it. After several trials we had observed that monsters tended to run after we used repellent or mouthburner on them. We could only take a frontal approach and aim to end the fight quickly.
“Should I use some bait? Or even better, I can lure it with the chicken!” Falnid exclaimed as he reached for the poultry on Bolton’s back.
“No!” I admonished him trying not to raise my voice. “It won’t fall for that trick after seeing us, leave the chicken here, it will only get in your way.” Falnid looked at me with a disappointed expression and put down the chicken. Then we started closing in. “At my signal, Bolton you take its attention, I will aim for its neck, Falnid and Terence cover us… Now!” I shouted when we were a dozen steps away from the reptile.
Bolton thrust his spear towards the raised monster’s head, meanwhile I circled it and aimed at its weak spot. Both our weapons struck it and the varan sizzled furiously. I did a follow up attack but failed as the reptile turned and aggressively snapped its jaws in my direction.
“Damn!” I retreated a couple steps and almost lost foot in the wet floor, giving the monster the opportunity to rush into the water.
“Are you alright, Simon?” Terence asked concerned.
“Yes, don’t worry,” I looked at the pond and grimaced, it was about twenty foot wide and three feet deep. “But I think we have a problem.”
“What do we do now?” Terence was also frowning.
“We will have to wait, it’s wounded and it can stay underwater forever. Sooner or later it will have to come out.”
“Should we use some bait now?” Falnid inquired carefully, he was a bit wary after my last reprimand. “I think we can put some here and hide behind a boulder.”
“No, we have to stay nearby or it will run away. Also, don’t get too close to the water, the ground is slippery. If someone falls into the water things are going to get ugly.”
The reptile had taken refuge at the bottom of the pond and its body was partially obscured by the brown and green plants that grew inside. The crunchbugs, tubeplumes and small fish that could normally be seen under the surface seemed to have gone into hiding. The neck wound was giving the water around the monster a red tint, but it was too shallow to finish the monster.
“Falnid, gather some rocks for everyone.” I said. “Once it comes up to breath we will bash its head.” It was our best bet in this situation, we needed to harass it until it came out of the water.
After collecting the stones we keep hitting the varan every time it tried to get some air.
“Take that!” Falnid’s throw struck the monster and it retreated back to the bottom of the pond.
“Careful now. It’s going to try something soon,” I warned everyone seeing the monster was getting restless.
The varan started ascending again, but this time it was aiming for the other side of the pool.
“Watch your steps! Falnid, keep throwing rocks from a distance. Bolton, circle the pond from the other side. Terence, stay behind me.” I quickly instructed everyone as I started running.
We rushed to intercept the monster, but the wet floor forced us to advance with caution, giving the reptile the chance to reach the border and flee towards one of the cavern’s exits under Falnid’s shower of rocks.
“Shit! It ignored my throws.” Falnid swore form the other side of the pond. I looked behind to see Terence and Bolton had stopped moving and wore frustrated expressions.
“What are you doing? We have to pursue! Get into formation, we may be able to corner it in another cave.” I ordered everyone. As a hunter I couldn’t let my prey escape so easily.
…
“First you have to remove the head and open its belly to take out its innards, don’t worry about the skin.”
“That’s easy, it’s just like skinning a lizard,” Falnid’s comment reminded me of our failed varan hunt. We had pursued the monster relentlessly, but after a while it had entered a narrow opening and we lost it. I was disappointed, but I couldn’t do anything about it. Following it into the small hole was out of the question.
Now the sun was setting and I was teaching Falnid how to prepare the dungeon chicken we had caught. We had camped outside the town, near the south gate, and Bolton and Terence had gone into the forest to gather wood. The fallen tree branches were dry thanks to the summer weather, so they shouldn’t take much longer to come back. We had already started a small fire to heat water inside an old pot we had borrowed from the guild.
“Its done! What’s next?” Falnid asked, unlike me he was in a good mood. I looked at the dark green chicken. It wasn’t very difficult to prepare. Like most meats the most important step was to drain its blood as soon as possible and I had already done that when Falnid caught it.
“Now you have to dip it inside the boiling water, it will help you pluck the feathers from its wings and tail.”
“Alright! How long do I have to dip it?” Falnid asked grabbing the chicken by its legs and submerging it into the pot.
“Just a moment, you don’t want to cook it.”
“Ouch! It’s hot.” Falnid said after he took the poultry out of the water. While he removed the feathers I took the pot out of the fire, we didn’t need it anymore. At the same time two figures emerged from the forest.
“You aren’t done yet?” Terence threw a heap of branches near the fire.
“I’m almost done, I only need to season it.” Falnid answered him, now concentrated on splitting the chicken in pieces.
“Here, use these,” I handed Falnid my knife and a pair of small pouches with a mix of herbs and salt.
“We found some berries, we can cook them with the chicken,” Bolton said taking a bag full of tiny red fruits from his belt.
“Done! Now I only have to roast it.” Falnid exclaimed cheerfully and looked for some branches to skewer the chicken.
While waiting for the poultry to get roasted we recounted today’s events.
“It’s a pity we lost today’s varan,” Terence began while sitting near the fire.
“It was my fault, we would have caught it if I had hit it harder.” I apologized.
“We should have attacked when it was escaping instead of letting it run away,” Falnid said placing the cut pieces of chicken near the flames. His words stung a bit, I had also thought the same thing when we lost it.
“No need to worry, we just need to go back there tomorrow. Now that we know its location we will catch it sooner or later,” Terence reassured me.
“We were unlucky, that wasn’t the best place to fight it,” Bolton said, throwing some wood into the fire.
“I don’t think it will approach the pond after today. We will need to explore the area and try to catch it when it leaves its lair.” I told everyone. “At worst it may have fled into a different den, if so it will be difficult to locate it again.”
“Thankfully we have you, Simon. Otherwise we would be searching blindly, those monsters aren’t so easy to find,” Terence spoke, poking the fire with a branch. “If that lizard we found promotes soon we will only need another one to complete this task. We encountered two in our first day, no need to rush things.”
“What are you going to do with the reward? I’m going to eat out everyday! Also, I will buy that cool dagger in the smithy.” Falnid said excitedly while trying to turn the chicken pieces over the fire.
“If you do all that you won’t have any money left in a week. On my part, I don’t have anything special in mind, I guess I will save most of it for latter.”
“You should buy a better map, you are still getting lost with the current one,” Falnid chuckled.
Terence glared at Falnid before throwing some more branches into the fire.
“Um, I think the meat would taste better if we cook it over the hot embers of the fire.” Bolton said looking worried at the strong flames and started moving the pieces of poultry.
“Oh, I see, thanks, Bolton.”
“We used to cook fish like this in my village.”
“I see, we rarely eat fish in Undglas, and when we do it’s from the dungeon. There are no rivers in the badlands. Anyway, what are you going to buy with the reward?” Falnid asked Bolton.
“I need to buy some clothes, the ones I have now are beginning to feel a bit tight. I will safe the rest and give it to my father once I get back. He had to pay quite the sum to send me here.”
“What? You are still growing? How big are you planning to be?” Falnid looked astonished for a moment, then turned to me. “Simon is probably going to buy more hunting tools.”
“Yes, I have a couple things I want to buy,” I smiled. I had a list of things in mind since long ago.
Soon the delicious smell of roasted chicken began to reach our noses.
“Is it done?” Falnid asked drooling.
“Just a bit more,” I said. “Let it cook properly on the inside.”
After waiting a bit more Falnid started distributing the pieces. Everyone was looking forward to the taste of our first dungeon caught meal.
“Hmm, it’s quite good, I didn’t thought monster meat could be so tender.” Terence gave it’s opinion after taking his first bite.
“It tastes almost like the hens in our village,” Bolton added after swallowing a mouthful.
“It must have been a newborn monster, I heard their meat is really tender,” I commented looking at its crispy green skin.
Falnid laughed and puffed out his chest. “Shouldn’t you be praising me for cooking it? I will treat you to a rat dish next time, it’s even better than this.”
After hearing his last comment the three of us glared at Falnid with our appetite half ruined.