“What the...?” Akira looked at the Wind spirit for only a few seconds before he walked forward into the tunnel that was no longer blocked.
Because of the unusual fight with the wind spirit, Akira was more cautious as he took his time walking down the new path. He needed to catch his breath and regain his energy spent on the fight with the wind spirit.
Nox and Fluffball were on full alert as they walked next to Akira ready to fight at any slight movement.
When they reached the next room which was similar to the last one, Akira's energy had recovered and he was ready for whatever awaited him.
Akira looked up to the ceiling as they walked across the room and watched the wind spirit that showed no signs of movement.
“Nox,” was all Akira said.
“I got it!”
The same thing happened in this room as in the first room. After the green wind spirit was damaged enough it flew away from them and pouted out of reach.
Akira Ignored the pouting wind spirit and looked at the branching tunnel in front of him. He sniffed the air to try and get a sense of danger from each path.
“Fluffball, which path should we take?” asked Akira, looking at the branching paths. He could not see or smell any difference between the two.
Fluffball, who had also been pouting because he was not able to deal any damage to the wind spirits, perked up and shot forward to sniff the air in front of each of the tunnel's branch entrances.
“Yap,” said Fluffball after a few seconds of sniffing the air.
“As expected, they both have wind spirits. Let's take the left and see where it goes,” said Akira.
'So you're actually good for something after all,' said Nox 1.
Fluffball ignored Nox and continued to walk alongside Akira, his head held high.
When they cleared the next room they were forced to stop, unable to move any deeper into the mountain since there was no other tunnel connected to this room, it was a dead end.
“Don't tell me this place...” Akira looked at his map that tracked and revealed the explored paths he had taken so far.
“... is this place a maze?” Akira asked himself as they retraced their steps back to the previous room.
The wind spirit was still pouting and ignoring them as they exited the left tunnel and entered the right tunnel.
It was as Akira suspected, as he explored each path he found that for some reason the majority of the left tunnel branches ended in dead ends.
So Akira decided to continue to follow the right tunnel branches going deeper into the tunnel until he reached a path that had three branches.
“Let's see what's down here,” said Akira, stepping into the middle tunnel.
“Yap!” said Fluffball, reminding him that the others were still probably looking for them.
“I know, but I have a good feeling about this tunnel,” said Akira.
When they reached the end of the tunnel there was a Wind spirit hovering over a large green stone chest that was lightly glowing. The wind spirit looked at them and challenged them with a loud “CHEEE!” and charged the intruders.
After a quick battle with Nox 1 and 2, who were now well experienced in fighting the wind spirits along with Akira's Reflect skill, the Wind spirit floated back over to the chest.
The lid of the chest opened and a light green leather chest armor flew out. With the help of the green wind, the leather armor floated over to Akira.
Fluffball's hackles were raised as he sniffed the suspicious armor.
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Akira could not see any malicious traps connected to it so he reached out and grabbed onto it.
Ding!
Wind spirit chest armor [unique]:
Defense: 35 Durability: 50/50
Movement speed +10%.
1 of 5 set pieces.
“Sigh... It really is a nice piece of armor... but it is something I can't use. I guess I'll have a present to give her if I get out of here,” said Akira as he placed the chest armor in his bag.
He had no concrete idea of how long he had been inside the maze of tunnels, the only way he could judge the time was by the meals he and Fluffball ate.
Judging by the meals he had eaten, they had been stuck inside for around 3 days...
“Che!” harrumphed a Wind spirit turning its back on Akira in what seemed the 1000th time.
A green pair of leather boots flew out of the green glowing stone chest that stood in front of Akira.
Ding!
Wind spirit boots [unique]:
Defense: 10 Durability: 50/50
Movement speed +10%.
5 of 5 set pieces.
The Wind spirit set has been collected!
Effects of wearing the full set: Movement speed doubled. Gain skill Wind Walking.
Wind walking: this skill can be used once a day.
Wind will gather around your feet allowing you to take three steps on nothing but air.
“As one would expect of a Unique set,” said Akira as he looked at the stats of the full set buff.
He shuddered at thinking how much of a pain in the butt a certain person would be using this along with her new skills.
“Yap,” said Fluffball as he sniffed the boots.
“It can't be helped. Once I received the first set-piece I had to get the other pieces. Plus I was able to find a lot of Wind ore in here,” said Akira as he pat Fluffball.
As they had been walking he had quickly mined the special green ore that had appeared on their path to the certain rooms so they could move forward. With all the mining his Dexterity rose over 10 points!
He wasn't sure how useful the wind ore would be but he had enough to experiment with creating many different items to see what suited it best.
This dungeon was full of rewards but... with all the fighting they had been doing... they got 0 experience. Not even one point!
“I feel that following this path has taken us closer to the exit,” said Akira walking forward once more.
They continued walking down the many winding paths that had been slanting down leading them deeper into the mountain.
“Yap!” said Fluffball. He had become excited after sniffing the air from the right tunnel branch. It had been a long while since they had received the last piece of the wind armor.
Fluffball ran ahead with Akira and Nox picking up their speed to follow him down the stone tunnel.
As they ran the air in the tunnel started to feel colder and damper. It had a far more heavy feeling to it than the air inside the dungeon.
“Is this the exit?”
Far ahead he could see a dim glowing white misty fog. It was swirling lazily at the end of the tunnel.
It was quite thick and blocked Akira from seeing anything past it.
Fluffball sniffed the air but could not find anything unusual other than the warmth of the fog that was battling with the cold air.
Akira, just to be safe, activated [Eyes of the werewolf].
He found nothing in the 500ft range in front of them... but that didn't say much since the wind spirits never showed up whenever he used the skill.
“We've come this far, don't get careless,” said Akira.
“Yap!” Said Fluffball.
The three of them cautiously walked into the dim glowing white fog that surrounded them and deafened any sound including Akira's footsteps.
Ding!
You have completed the wandering wind spirit maze!
+10 fame.
The Wind spirits have begrudgingly acknowledged your strength. They will not attack you or anyone with you if you enter any one of their many territories.
New title received!
Wind spirit Bully.
You managed to fight every Wind spirit in the dungeon and took everything they had!
+10 fame
'Could this be considered a sort of non-aggression pact?' thought Akira as he looked at the messages.
“Skreeeee!”
“Kreeeee!”
Boom!