Belated fear, which I had been warding off all this time, seemed to get a kick from the pungent smell of the nearby nends and almost overwhelmed me.
"What am I doing?!" Cried out my frightened mind.
"It's too late to be afraid. The step has been taken, and it can't be undone. There's a wall behind you." Logic retorted.
Barely holding back from a panic scream, biting my palm, I dashed into the nearest shadow and froze, trying not even to breathe. In my thoughts, what I had planned seemed quite feasible. Yes, not simple, yes, risky, but something I could do if I gave it my all. However, now, when I saw the vague shadows of nends just thirty steps away, when their smell sent chills down to my very bones, my entire plan seemed nothing more than a suicidal adventure.
Sitting, pressed against the rock, I wondered how I had wound myself up so much that my sense of self-preservation failed and allowed me to get involved in such a thing?! How could I even think that I could repeat the third feat of Evelan, the mythical hero of Ain and the younger son of Eyrat?! And not just think, but sincerely believe that I am up to it?! It's like trying to kill the Lernaean Hydra without being Hercules.
For about five minutes, I was afraid even to take a deep breath.
Five minutes of overwhelming, all-consuming fear. Until logic and reason finally prevailed over primitive instincts.
Indeed, I cannot go back the way I entered the dungeon. And without a fight, I can't slip through to the exit. That is, if I want to survive, I will have to fight. Staying put is not an option because the time to pass through the dungeon is limited to twelve hours, after which all who entered and did not manage to leave will be destroyed.
Stop the panic! In theory, what I have conceived is within my power! I just need to turn this theory into practical results. Although you can't fool yourself, I know it won't be easy.
Nends are undoubtedly a dangerous and challenging enemy, but in all of Ain, there probably isn't a better expert on them than "the past me." Earning the "Terror" of an entire race achievement doesn't happen for nothing. And I inherited the memory of all their weaknesses. Of the weak points of these ape-like monsters that are not even listed in the Tunnellers' Guild bestiary.
Gathering my courage, I took off my shirt and put it on the cave floor. After that, I examined the nearest stone walls and collected pieces of nend fur. When this fur no longer fit in my palms, I wet it in a small puddle and began to rub myself with this foul-smelling sponge.
Nends don't see very well because their fur partially covers their eyes. For the same reason, they have some hearing problems. It's hard to hear everything properly when you have a huge compressed ball of fur in your ear. At the same time, they have a decent sense of smell, and the fact that they haven't sniffed me out yet is only because the airflow in the cave is moving in the direction of the Door, which is behind my back.
Having finished wiping myself, I carefully looked around. Ahead is a fork guarded by two overgrown orangutans. Both are armed with primitive spears. But such simple weapons should not deceive anyone. Nends weigh about one hundred and twenty kilograms, and their arms are almost half a meter longer than human ones.
The main weakness of the nends? They almost never gather in large groups. I think if they moved in crowds or at least had a group of ten individuals, clearing a dungeon "populated" by this species of monsters would be an epic challenge, even for full-fledged squads of tunnellers. But usually, nends go in pairs, three at most. However, if you make noise or engage in battle with such a small group and don't kill them quickly, these super apes will gather from all over the dungeon.
The fork ahead was well-lit, and, in addition, I couldn't see what was happening beyond it. Therefore, attacking the nend patrol in my field of vision right there would be unwise. But it was also impossible to move on without killing them. I needed to prepare an ambush, lure the nend patrol into the corridor to the Door itself, and kill them here, in the darkness and shadows. The thought was undoubtedly sound, but implementing it in reality would be much more complicated.
First, I found a spot. A small ledge two meters above the floor. I managed to climb onto it on my second attempt. Having practiced this step, I returned to my shirt and attached it to the cave wall so that one sleeve was in the light. Then I picked up a couple of stones and climbed back onto the ledge, trying to blend in with the wall. Right now, some Shadow magic wouldn't go amiss. But in this Cycle, I had not yet acquired such skills and spells, so I had to rely on the enemy's nearsightedness and my luck.
The first stone, thrown at the very fork, caught the patrol's attention. Then I quietly groaned, which was also heard, and immediately set this pair of ape-like monsters into indescribable agitation. Mumbling something loudly and exchanging glances with each other, the patrollers, with their weapons at the ready, headed towards the Door.
The second stone guided them toward the shirt. One of the nends noticed the sleeve in the light and, with a loud hoot, gripping his spear with both hands, lunged forward. His partner followed him immediately.
Fear almost paralyzed my hands, but nevertheless, I managed to push myself off the wall and fell down. The enemy spear pierced my shirt just as I fell from the ledge straight onto the back of the nend that was leading the way. My left palm landed on the back of the enemy's head. Through the fur, my fingers could feel the nend's skull, which was so strong that it could withstand a strike from a war hammer. I straightened my palm, and the wound left by the obsidian knife opened; blood seeped onto my skin, forming a Rune.
"Des!" my lips whispered.
And at that very moment, the enemy's skull, which just a moment ago seemed more like a granite boulder than a bone, turned under my palm into something resembling a leather bag filled with blood, bone shards, and jumbled brains.
According to my plan, the second nend was supposed to jump back and raise his spear into a defensive stance, which would give me time to arm myself with his partner's weapon. But everything went wrong. Instead of retreating, the second enemy threw away his spear and simply wrapped me in his huge arms! I have never been embraced by a gorilla, but now I know what it feels like.
My chest was squeezed so tightly that my bones started to crack. It became impossible to breathe. Fangs the size of a thumb reached toward my face. The incredible stench from the monster's maw assaulted my senses like ammonia. I didn't have the strength to break free.
I couldn't get away.
The only thing I could do was raise one arm.
The nend smiled in a way only they could. Bloodthirsty, terrifying. His teeth were already touching my nose when my left palm pressed against his chin.
"Des!!!"
With a loud guttural roar, the ape-like monster recoiled from me. The lower half of his face looked like minced meat that's just been through a grinder, but the nend was still alive.
I struck him in the stomach with an open palm:
"Des!"
The nend doubled over and exposed the top of his head. My palm lay on its back:
"Des!!"
I fell to the floor of the cave alongside the second corpse of the enemy. My whole body was in pain. If it weren't for the achievement "Enhanced Body" that was granted to all earthlings after passing the initial trials, I would be dead. The bones of an ordinary person would never have withstood the embrace of an enraged nend.
Spitting thick saliva on the cave floor, I found the strength to get up. Cautiously peering around the corner, I surveyed the fork and listened carefully. To my relief, the roar of the second nend did not attract the attention of its kin. I spent a couple of minutes scrutinizing the diverging corridors but saw nothing.
Then I advanced first down one corridor to the next patrol, then returned and checked the second path, which also led me to a trio of nends. Of course, it was unlikely that I would be able to calmly reach the exit, having to overcome only one patrol. But as they say: hope dies last.
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I could handle the patrols of two using the same scheme. Even though it was risky, it had already been tested. But with three enemies at once, a similar attack is likely to be unsuccessful. As luck would have it, both patrols ahead consisted of three ape-like monsters.
To deal with them, I would have to resort to a strategy invented in my "past life." Moreover, it was conceived by my "past self," not read somewhere, not observed from the locals, but developed by my own mind. For some reason, this filled me with a strange sense of deserved pride. When the group of nend hunters I had assembled almost completely disbanded, leaving only five of us out of the original twelve under my leadership, we had to resort to cunning. One of the tricks, the very one that I came up with, proved to be simply magnificent. But again, the current me knew the theory, and I would have to learn the practice on the fly.
Chipping off a small piece of obsidian from the wall, I returned to the Door. Theoretically, I know how to make the simplest stone knife. In practice, the "past me" had to master this skill once - when he found himself naked on the Tyberian Plateau due to a spatial portal malfunction. Now I had to combine all of this and, at the same time, keep all my fingers intact. The latter point, when working with obsidian, which is nothing more than volcanic glass, is perhaps the most important.
About half an hour and a dozen cuts - that was the price for putting theoretical knowledge into practice. Thirty minutes, and in my hands was a very roughly made stone knife, so primitive that Neanderthals would have laughed at such a contraption but at the same time so sharp that it could cut paper.
Clutching this knife in my hand, I turned to the nends of the first patrol that I had killed - to spend almost two more hours and skin one of them. To say that I got all dirty during this process would be an understatement. I was soaked in the nends' blood, their guts, juices, and everything else. I had to weave small ropes from the unyielding monster fur to keep everything in place. And yet, no sane human, after I put the nend's skin on myself, would confuse me with a monster, even from thirty steps away. But that's a human, whereas this worked for the nearsighted, more reliant on smelling ape-like monsters. Or rather, my memory of the future suggested this, but whether it would work in reality, I had yet to find out in action.
Dragging the second corpse to the first fork, I collected the pooled blood from the floor. Then, using a primitive brush made from fur, I painted over the glowing crystals sticking out from the walls here and there, which illuminated the corridor and the fork itself. It didn't become pitch black, of course, but it grew noticeably darker. From the two trophy spears, I chose the one that was sharper, with a thinner tip, and took it for myself. Then I retreated into a corner near the Door and began to train my throat and tongue. This had to be done quietly, so that, Eyrat forbid, no one would hear me.
Unlike orangutans, nends had not just rudiments of speech but their own language. A very simple one, no more than a hundred words. Of course, I did not know it fully, and in fact, no one in Ain knew the language of the nends. But when you kill someone hundreds and hundreds of times, you involuntarily pick up something. Thus, my "past self" had learned a few words of their language.
Warming up my throat, I adjusted the skin and, gripping the spear more securely, moved forward, first deciding to clear the left corridor from the fork. Stopping about twenty steps before the patrol, staying in the darkness of the passage, I began to hoot and wave my hands, attracting attention. My cries meant alarm, but not a military one, rather something like deep concern.
Noticing me, the trio of nends glanced at each other; they muttered something among themselves and walked toward me. Moving ahead, not letting them close the distance, I gradually raised my voice, expressing more and more anxiety and concern. And when I led them to the fork, I pointed to the corpse of the second nend lying on the cave floor and wailed tragically. The sight of their fallen comrade attracted the attention of the others so much that they passed by me just three steps away and did not notice that I was a human in disguise and not another nend! As soon as the first monster bent over the corpse, my palm landed on the back of his head.
"Des!"
The second one managed to open his mouth wide, for which he received the tip of the spear right into his open maw, unprotected by fur. After that, he fell to his side, choking on his own blood and forgetting about the stone ax in his paws. The third one didn't see anything at all from behind the backs of his comrades and climbed forward, wailing about something, when:
"Des!" - right in the forehead, it turned out to be a complete surprise for him. The last one in his life.
Having dealt with this patrol, I dropped to my knees. My legs and arms were shaking from the excitement and fear I had experienced. When the first patrol member passed just three steps away, I thought that was it, and my end had come. But no, my calculations were correct; I did everything right. And as a result, I was alive, and the patrol was wiped out.
For ten minutes, I composed myself. Then I dragged three new bodies to the Door and headed down the right corridor. Again, my concerned hooting and, like trained animals, the nends rushed to the slaughter. The first two perished just like the previous patrol: a destruction rune on the back of the first one's head and a spear in the throat of the second.
But the third in this group turned out to be more quick-witted or just got to see more. A sharp lunge with a primitive spear. Had it not been for the skin on my body, I would have been lying on the cold floor, oozing dark blood from a pierced liver. But this time, the nend's fur saved not one of them but their killer. I closed the distance, getting in point-blank to avoid receiving another blow. The ape-like creature roared with joy and anticipation, instantly wrapping me in its paws! But that's exactly what I needed.
"Des!" - Fragments of teeth, tongue, lips, and lower jaw splattered against the cave wall.
"Des!" - And the monster's intestines churned inside as if being run through a blender.
"Des!" - I was merciful and finished him off, placing my left palm on the back of his head.
The Rune Magic is a real cheat at lower ranks. Yes, by the time one reaches the wootz level, it will start lagging behind classical magic, and the gap will further widen at the precious ranks. But if I master the Words, everything will change again.
Rune Magic was forgotten on Ain, and for many centuries, no one practiced it under either of the two Moons. In the future, it will be the earthlings who will restore it. The funny thing is, they will do it not because of its power but to learn the true history of this world, which is so new for them.
A cheat? Well, let it be! I intend to exploit my knowledge of the future fully!
A new fork in the path. Moving the bait corpse, smearing the light crystals with blood, and:
"Des!"
"Des!"
"Des!"
Again and again, it sounds softly under the dungeon vaults, and with each activation of the Rune of Destruction, the dungeon walls are painted in new blood-vomit colors. Then everything plunges into silence again. A short-lived silence. A silence that will be shattered again by a quiet whisper: "Des!"
"Des!"
"Des!.."
"Conqueror of the Nends!" - Such a label appeared on my Core when I finished clearing the dungeon of ordinary mobs. Exactly fifty ape-like monsters fell by my hand today, and in most cases, this phrase could be taken literally.
Frozen just a step away from the Exit, I looked at the Door's Seal and could not believe my eyes!
Did I do it?
Did I?
I?!
I can't believe it.
If I leave the dungeon right now, I will receive a mithril level achievement! An achievement that only a handful of local heroes have earned, and among the earthlings, only the Four! "Palm of Four Empty Fingers"! Or, as Nate once called it, "Three Crowns Solo."
To get it, one had to pass through the dungeon while adhering to four conditions: first - do it alone, second - do it without bringing any weapons, third - enter without any protective gear or artifacts, fourth - do not use any external enhancements, buffs, elixirs or other alchemy.
"Palm of Four Empty Fingers."
Why am I not leaving? Why am I standing in front of the Door? Is this not enough for me?!! And I answer myself: "Yes, it's not enough!"
Turning my back to the Exit, I marched on unbending legs to the dungeon's center. I stopped only in front of a large, well-lit cave that looked like a ring or arena carefully prepared by someone.
In the center of this cave, sitting and admiring the reflection of light on numerous shards of mountain crystal, was the Monkey King. A three-meter-tall, completely black nend, weighing more than half a ton. In one of its long paws, like a weightless feather, fluttered a ten-kilogram stone hammer. This creature was not just four times larger than the average nend, it was ten times more dangerous than a regular patrol member. Killing it with a full group of twelve tunnellers would still be difficult. That's why the locals don't touch it - because although they would probably kill it, the risk is not worth it. For the locals, clearing dungeons is not a heroic feat; it's a job, routine, everyday work, and not many are willing to take risks.
For five minutes, I stare at this monster.
In theory, in a very deep theory... If I collect all the spears left from the slain nends, I can pelt him with them after applying the Des Rune with the nend's blood on these spears. This would inflict several wounds, slow him down, weaken him, and then I could get close and hit him with the Rune on my palm. Moreover, one hit of Des in the head won't be enough for this monster. But theoretically, I can do this. The chances are about three out of four that I will succeed.
Five minutes, and I make a decision. The risk is not worth it. "Palm of Four Empty Fingers" is enough for me. The mythical achievement, which no mortal has ever accomplished, and which is only known from the epics of the blessed hero Evelan, the son of Eyrat, "Pure Palm of Five Empty Fingers," is not worth it. For this achievement, in addition to other conditions, one must kill the dungeon boss. None of the Four have succeeded in this; even Nate, the future God of War, did not risk it at the time. He retreated.
I take a step back.
Another one.
And then the Monkey King raises his hand to scratch himself, and I see a strand of silver hair flashing under his armpit. The very ingredient that the "past me" sought for over a month, killing thousands of nends! Having left no stone unturned in almost all the dungeons of Ain where these creatures dwelled. An ingredient as rare as it is unwanted by anyone. It cannot be bought even in the best alchemical shops of Pentapolis because it is too hard to get, and there is no demand.
"Silver strand of nend fur" – the final touch in the ritual compiled by Arien. The finishing element, the search for which took us a month. A month in which Arien was stagnant. A month is a sea of time that I can save for the future Goddess of Spontaneous Magic. And maybe she won't perish on the fields of Regilos under the swords of the Demon Prince's bodyguards.
Maybe.
But for that, I have to kill the Monkey King, kill him here and now. Because once I leave the dungeon, it will Reset, and in the new refresh, none of the nends may end up having a silver strand.
With a heavy sigh, I shook my head and stepped into the shadows.
It's time to gather spears…