Level Three of Teth-Odin Dungeon:
The first reality of adventuring for Selphie was the unexpected appearance of monsters too powerful for the upper levels of the dungeon. She should have known that the monster population was higher than normal after a Red Moon, and in retrospect, she should have known that the chances were also much higher to see one outside of its “usual territory.” While she was not in any way a real adventurer, she had heard of stories about various abominations from different Rift worlds coming to claim parts of a Dungeon as their own, and the inevitable infighting as others would try to take it from them. It should then be no surprise to find such creatures ousted from their usual domains by stronger newcomers and seek refuge in higher, less-contested ground.
The second reality was the tedium, shortly after Ingrid froze herself, the party got to work hauling the carcasses to a neat pile for their mage Siria to place into her Item Box.
Siria conjured an energy blade on her staff and started puncturing the hearts of the fallen creatures as well as those still weakly moving to ensure their deaths. The Kobold brothers, Kinu and Kvaris did so with their swords, while Arek, and the swarm mice used the bladed ends of their long, noisy crossbow-like weapons. Selphie was given such a weapon. It looked like it was made of wood and had a long metal tube where the blade rested. She was puzzled when Arek assured her that it “wasn’t loaded” and thus she needn’t worry about “harming herself” but focused on her task. One by one, they delivered their coup de grace then dragged them over to the pile.
The third was the tension in the air. With their leader and most powerful warrior Ingrid having frozen herself for some reason, she felt vulnerable. Cecil, nestled inside his “Dialogue Box” hovered around, keeping an eye out for scavengers attempting to catch an easy meal or more interlopers wanting to attack the party. A few times, Cecil would allow a bold scavenger or two to make off with a far-off body, but those who loitered too long were shot; a noise that Selphie still had problems getting accustomed to.
“Ankhegs, five of them,” Cecil said. As his Dialogue window was facing away from Selphia, she only saw a hovering magic circle in the air. She was familiar with such portals, she new that if someone tried go through the area covered by the portal from behind they would be repelled, and in theory if someone tried to disrupt the portal then whoever was halfway through it would either be pulled back from where they came from or pushed out before it collapsed on itself, depending on how the spell was designed.
“Shoot them if they get too close.” The elf Siria said, keeping her voice even as she dragged another carcass to the pile.
“Fortunately they’re doing their own hauling away,” Cecil replied.
“Let them,” Kvaris said. “I’m sure they can smell us from here, they should not attack.”
Ankhegs were large ant-like creatures that preyed on the various monsters of the Dungeon. They generally ignored adventurers unless they were wounded badly and dying. Ingrid had made sure nobody had gotten hurt, so in theory they should not attack, but the air felt tense. There are only five of them now but soon there’ll be a line of them stretching all the way to their nest in some corner of the Dungeon.
Cecil’s Dialogue Window alternated between three directions. First was the corridor with the steadily-growing number of Ankhegs that were taking more and more of the carcasses that Ingrid decimated with her Storm Fist. The other two were the corridor perpendicular to it. The side that Cecil came from before the fighting began had the occasional creature that crawled along disinterested and there were a few scavengers patiently waiting in the distance. Some crept closer but largely hesitated, figuring that the adventurers must be very dangerous to have eliminated that much prey, and there was also the figure inside the large formation of ice which was radiating an extremely hostile aura.
One of them got bolder, prompting Arthur to run forward and aim his rifle at it, squeaking furiously. Cecil quickly turned to see what was going on and then focused on the Ankhegs. If a fight broke out, it might encourage them to swarm in.
The scavenger, resembling a horse-sized gecko with too many eyes and legs, was getting closer now, seemingly deciding that snatching a live prey like Arthur was worth the trouble, provided it was quick enough. Brody, shotgun in hand tapped Arthur’s back to let him know he was advancing.
The two mice were now squeaking at the giant lizard, which refused to budge. Brody slowly closed the distance, his squeaking more strident which caused the lizard to lunge at him.
Brody opened fire at the last moment, sending all pellets into the lizard’s soft vulnerable mouth. It recoiled in pain and flipped to its side, legs flailing about. It tried one more time to bite Brody as he approached but Arthur sent a bullet right between its eyes.
And with that the two mice chittered with one another as they dragged its carcass towards the group. Another scavenger inched forward trying to take advantage of the two mice being unaware only to halt when it saw Eli aiming his gun at it. The scavenger slinked back to the shadows, leaving only its glowing eyes as it hungrily watched on.
Ankhegs continued with their business, the sound of gunfire did not halt their activity but none of them ventured halfway through the tunnel.
The ice around Ingrid loudly cracked, letting everyone know to stay back. Rather than explode into all directions, the ice became extremely brittle and broke into tiny little pieces the size of ice cubes. Climbing out of the pile, Ingrid quickly got to work with the carcasses.
“Sorry about that, I think we should get some more people.” She said, quickly moving in to assist everyone.
“I told everyone to take their time.” Cecil said “I wouldn’t do if everyone worked really hard and suddenly we needed to make a run for it.” He still kept an eye on the Ankhegs, which unlike them were far more industrious, making it clear that they were not venturing halfway through the tunnel at all. Ingrid, on seeing this, decided to start on the Ankheg tunnel and clear the bodies. There was some tension when Ingrid entered the other half and started tossing the bodies over but it was clear that the Ankhegs were not hostile, at least to her. A few wandered over and touched its antennae to her before returning to the rest of the group.
Cecil relaxed, and put his BMG rifle away and joined the group in hauling away the bodies.
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The Whale’s rented Farm House, Outskirts of Teth-Odin:
Siria watched in fascination at SABER ‘s intelligence. If she had never seen Tixi Mice before and Ingrid said they were creatures from Earth, she would have believed them, although no animal on earth could fully emulate what the rodents were doing.
Sully and Arthur were performing maintenance on their guns, disassembling them as Cecil taught them and making sure they were free of contaminants. Brody, and Eli, were industriously assembling new bullets. Their paws working with quick animal efficiency tempered with sapient intelligence. Ralph was on the other end of the table, using a borrowed book from Arek to assemble a grenade.
Shortly after the team split up at the Dungeon’s entrance, the mice quickly scampered to Bvalinn’s Forge, a popular smithy in Teth-Odin. Siria, who was heading for the Dismantling house with Arek (given his smooth talking and merchant skills) saw the mice later dragging a large cart, squeaking loudly and happily amongst themselves.
The grenade was another weapon the mice had taken to with gusto. Arek had shown them how it worked a few days ago, but dismissed it as something they could only use in an emergency. The mice however decided to make it a personal project of theirs.
Having assembled one, Siria followed Ralph as he went to an empty stretch of gravel and threw the grenade. A loud BANG filled the air and Ralph waited a second, sniffing around. He then scampered to the epicenter of the explosion then started sniffing the chemicals for reference, using this nose he got an estimate of the damaging radius and scampered back to the kitchen.
Arek then returned, having stayed behind to deal with the haggling for the prices. He also brought back some soulstones for Siria to pore through.
Apparently, the ones that Ingrid had used were incompatible with her and thus caused her to overheat sooner. Fortunately, they shattered during the fight when Ingrid powered up, thus preventing any more undue drain on her mana.
“It’s nobody’s fault, just in case anyone’s thinking that.” Arek said reassuringly, "there hasn’t been a human in Terragalia for like, an eternity so there was no way anyone would know.”
“I know… but it just feels like I could have put us all in trouble.” Siria sighed.
“Ahhh…that’s nothing!” Ingrid said she entered the room. She brought in Selphie as well as some newcomers. “I’ve experimented with crazier stuff when I was starting as a Starchaser, tell em, Cecil!”
As Cecil regaled them with the crazy things that Ingrid had tried out, the newcomers quietly filed into the room.
The first was a Felmoon Healer named Iohann of the Treanthorn Tribe. To the earthlings’ eyes she looked human except for her goat-like eyes with the long horizontal pupils, the curved horns on her head and long droopy ears with downy fur. Unlike Millarna’s silky hair, hers was quite wooly, tied into braids which in turn tied back into a puffy ponytail capped at the end with various rings. She wore some kind of tribal-type dress: a matching white frock and long skirt with large blue accents over which very stylish-looking patterns were embroidered.
Iohann looked quite young and rather chic to the earthlings, she would blend right in with the cosplay crowd as some kind of sheep cleric. To everyone else’s eyes however, her impressive horns with their dangling jewelry and a pair or ribbons drooping down from them said otherwise. For them, she was the equivalent of a single, still-attractive office lady in her mid-thirties whose main source of romance and expenditure was being a sugar mommy.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
The next one was the half-orc Samantha “Sammy” Foster (a name that only Cecil had the luxury of turning away to chuckle because of how earthly her name was), Ingrid had learned in most people’s eyes she was rather hideous and she could understand why; she looked so human aside from her short pointy ears. The lack of handsome tusks and huge stature made her look like a horribly malformed orc conceived five feet away from Chernobyl’s elephant foot and born at Three Mile Island’s clinic.
To the earthling’s eyes, she was beautiful enough to launch a thousand ships, which to probably the rest of the world, meant enough to launch a thousand nukes.
To compensate, Samantha wore a headdress of a sacred boar that she had slain herself. Apparently to orcish culture, one could only “wear an animal you hunted yourself” and thus orcish insults revolved around accusing people of wearing parts of harmless or easy-to-hunt prey such as “slowbird” implying one wore feathers from a bird even a child could shoot down or “rabbit feet” which also required little skill to hunt.
In a way, Sammy’s sacred boar helmet and her “ugly” looks made her intimidating to everyone, so it was a genuine surprise to her that another “ugly” creature like Ingrid came over and casually asked her if she was looking for a team to join.
To Ingrid and Cecil, she looked like the archetypical gyaru, the rebellious, freewheeling girl in Japanese subculture. A gyaru cosplaying as a fashionable fantasy barbarian that is. Her hair was blond which matched the sacred boar’s hide, where the boar’s fur and her hair began was a mystery to all, it looked like her head was wreathed in golden flames.
Just like George and Roger, Sammy’s armor did not look in any way like the earthly depictions of orcs which wore filthy leather and cloth with rusty pockmarked metal. Her cloth was crisp and clean with elaborate patterns that reminded her of what bikers would use as a bandana, the leather was rugged, well maintained with newly riveted gold accents for vanity, the metal was lacquered with inlays of (predictably) horses in full gallop. Ingrid was sure that if this world had smartphone and social media she would be trending right now.
The final newbie to join the group was Viel Yulga, a Citrilan which is Terragalian's word for “catgirl” ; she was the youngest of the group in every sense of the word and had been following Sammy first. She was a sorceress by trade but the more mundane type, focusing more on utilitarian abilities such as item box, telekinesis, and various little cantrips for living a comfortable life. She was short, with big green feline eyes, chestnut brown hair in a bowlcut, and two big cat ears poking out of her head. Her hood, which she doffed politely when stepping into the house had cat-ear extension on it which she had enchanted with enhanced hearing so in reality, she heard better with it on. These ears twitched anxiously, as did her white and brown tail and for good reason.
When she started adventuring nobody wanted her since everyone was focusing on combat skills, and her only way of supporting herself was taking repetitive low level jobs. Then she met Sammy and the two had been inseparable, now that her protector and source of income had thrown in with this group, she was afraid of being cast out.
At least, if it wasn’t for Ingrid carrying her. For some reason this “human” was purring, which for the moment made her feel at ease. Her tone when speaking also seemed to make it clear she wasn’t putting up with any dissent.
“...she’s a cute widdle kitty, and she joins us. Objections denied. Discussion over.” Ingrid said before putting her down. Viel straighted out her robes and bowed politely to the group as was the custom of her people.
“I’m… Viel Yulga of the Na’geanna Clan. I’ve been working with miss Foster for a year now, I hope I don’t become a problem.”
Ingrid, Cecil, and Arek clapped their hands as if she had done some magician’s trick.
“...and this is SABER!” Ingrid said, introducing the three members to a the surreal sight of swarm mice gathered around the kitchen table like people, working on a series of strange machines. Brody ran over to Arek’s phone which was playing “Shine On, You Crazy Diamond” and muted it before the mice got up in unison and squeaked in greeting, waddling over to squeeze their hands with their soft paws.
“They’re Sully, Arthur, Brody, Eli, and Ralph!” Ingrid said. The mice, already knowing how to read earth’s written media, had arranged themselves accordingly. Viel was the most enamored with the mice, giggling happily as Arthur gave her an otter-like hug.
“What are they making?" Iohann asked, seeing the small cylinders and jars of black powder.
“Cartridges, they’re the arrows to our bows, so to speak.” Cecil explained “as we said, we’re from another world, and we commissioned Bvalinn to make more of these bullet parts, and…what’s his name again? I forgot, but the local alchemists make that black powder for us, though in our world we call it propellant.”
“Sounds like these things explode.” Sammy said, noting in admiration as the mice quickly assembled the bullets. She noticed stacked against a counter a row of long objects with apparently a lot of moving parts. “Those are the guns you’re talking about?”
“Precisely.” Cecil replied, picking up an assault rifle from the row “It’s unloaded, so you don’t accidentally shoot someone.”
Sammy looked at the alien weapon in front of her. As they mentioned earlier it really resembled a crossbow and the way she held it was met with approval from Cecil, who said that she was holding the gun correctly.
“When you pull that trigger over there, the gun will shoot out a bullet from the cartridge.” He gestured at the un-assembled slugs. “They looked quite small but the speed they’re travelling through makes a small object hit as hard as a much much larger, slower moving object. The same principle as your hand; you clench it and swing it fast enough you can break someone’s jaw, but you can also just shove them, same hand, different speeds, different results.”
Sammy nodded, although Cecil was sure that she probably would like to see a demonstration later, continuing he said “The speed these bullets travel through are too quick to be seen by the naked eye, so you can imagine how much force that would generate.”
“Probably hits just as hard if not more than a mounted lancer at full gallop, but without the awkward rest of the spear in the way…” Sammy said “I like it, it should punch through most armor. What’s ummm… Ralph doing?” she pointed at the little egg-like object that seemed to make Arek and Ingrid overjoyed as if he had brewed an immortality potion.
“That’s a grenade, you throw it and it explodes. Ingrid and Arek, the sea-folk, I believe what you’d call people like him, are proud of Ralph for recreating a grenade all by himself. I’m quite surprised too.” he explained.
Ralph then hopped off his chair, taking one grenade, squeaking excitedly as he went outside to demonstrate. Cecil, Sammy, Arek, and Ingrid followed him. It was starting to get dark outside and Ralph led them to a stretch of gravel. Holding up a paw to let everyone know to stay back, he pulled the pin and threw the grenade, it exploded in a few seconds, causing the three earthlings to cheer in assent.
“That’s amazing, Ralph!” Ingrid lifted him up for a big snuggle, and he responded by smushing her cheeks, causing her to purr again.
“Yeah, Ingrid’s been domesticated by the tixi mice.” Cecil chuckled.
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The Heucuva Tavern, Demon City of Teth-Odin:
The Whales convened at the Heucuva Bar to celebrate and welcome the addition of the newcomers. Viel had put up a muffling spell around their booth so they could talk to each other more easily.
“See?” Sammy said “Viel’s really talented, now THAT is real magic!”
Viel meekly bowed, trying to hide her face by blushing.
“About that…” Ingrid continued with her discussion “Arek here is our porter, and we’ll need Viel to assist us when it comes to transporting monsters to our item box. Like him, we don’t need her for combat and with all of us out there, she wouldn’t need to protect herself.”
Everyone including the newcomers nodded.
“...speaking of protecting our porter, that’s where Iohann will help us. I’ll summarize what she told us when Cecil and I were looking for new teammates; she’s been a healer in a local mining town, so she’s seen her fair share of serious injuries and illness, she’s also had several experience in joining adventurer teams on a short-term basis. Iohann would be what we call in our world a Medic. Aside from those she can also cast protective spells on the party.”
Iohann bowed lightly, confirming that Ingrid had summarized her history and abilties correctly.
“Sammy here is warrior and experienced rider of the Sun Mane Tribe, our teams’ last encounter in the dungeon and my failure to account for channeling gem’s effects on me…” Ingrid made sure to say this to make Siria know she was not to blame. ”...has led me to realize we need another seasoned warrior to… in our world Tank for the team, that means meeting the brunt of combat. Sammy here has not only distinguished herself as a great warrior but also had reliably protected Viel from harm.”
Sammy nodded. “An orc with a tribe to protect is invincible!” she boasted and the team thumped their tankards in agreement.
“And finally we have Selphie here, you’ve all known her but I’ll let Iohann explain.” There was silence as the felmoon healer made a quiet bleat then spoke up.
“Selphie had been suffering from the effects of a curse that I managed to remove from her. Her mana was approaching very low levels and that’s what affected her vitality. It was a good thing that Ingrid brought her to me so quickly because the injuries she had sustained today would have become fatal for her. Selphie?” She nodded at the dryad girl whom now everyone noticed the flowers on her head were looking more beautiful and blossoming more.
“I don’t remember how I got this curse, but that could have been the reason my magic had been deteriorating slowly. I specialize in druidic arts like my mother and grandmother before me, when I couldn’t use magic anymore I turned to hunting from my father…”Selphie paused, her voice choked up a bit, Arek put a hand on her shoulder and nodded.
“Well team, there we go, when we advance in a dungeon, one of our Kobolds, either Kinu or Kvaris, will lead the way alongside me. Siria will be my second-in-command and she follows behind us. In the middle will be Arek who carries all of our vital supplies, accompanied by Iohann and Viel. You will be escorted by Arthur and Sully, their sharp senses, fast reflexes and long-range guns will allow them to react and attack from any distance. Following behind will be the other Kobold and Sammy.”
The booth was quiet, and there was no dissent, the formation made sense to everyone.
“Iroquois is the group consisting of Cecil, Brody, Eli, and Ralph, they’ll be flying above us providing support. Now, when fighting breaks out, everyone will gather around Arek. Arthur, and Brody will be assisting from a distance. Kinu, Kvaris, and Sammy, I’ll leave the protection of our center to you three. Sammy, go for the biggest threat you see and leave our boys to handle anyone else who tries to get in. Siria, if this situation happens you should focus on assisting them and not me.”
This time Kvaris raised his paw “We got pretty good rapport with SABER, we should cover them if the enemies get too close.”
Ingrid smiled, remembering today’s battle when the four of them turned into a blur of white fur, silver blades, and orange gunfire. “Very well, but you and Kinu should prioritize our porter.”
“Now” Ingrid paused to drink first “When the fighting is concluded, Cecil will be handling security, that means guard duty while the rest of us start hauling the corpses. Viel, you and Siria will be divvying up the monster carcasses…”
“That sounds like a lot of carcasses” Iohann frowned
“Ingrid’s… a little special, she’s like a hero or something.” Kinu said.
“Yup, it’s not the monsters that will kill you, it’s dragging hundreds of them that will.” Kvaris laughed and the veterans joined in, making the newcomers regarding Ingrid incredulously.
Continuing, Ingrid spoke up “Viel, your telekinesis will definitely help with hauling away a lot of monster carcasses. Oh and Selphie, we haven’t seen how your abilities work yet so for the meantime, you could join Siria, Arthur, and Brody in shooting enemies from a distance.”
“BASS” Cecil said, standing for Brody, Arthur, Siria, and Selphie
“There we go! Another sub-group name.” Ingrid said. “Iroquois as our gunship, and BASS for fire support!”
“AVI then for the middle group?” Arek suggested.
“SK for rearguard.” Cecil added
“IK for the point men?” Ingrid asked.
As the three argued in their strange fae-land terms, the rest of the group were left wondering what “bass” “ayy-vee-eye”, “ess-kay”, and “aye-kay” were and why “kay-back” stood for Kvaris,Brody, Arthur, and Kinu.