“Good. Now try to place it in your ring,” the necromancer said, awakening Lucas from his trance of admiration for his work, and he did as asked. With a breath of relief, he saw the staff disappear and enter his ring.
“It worked,” Lucas stated, his mind already wondering what else could he ‘steal’ from the tower.
“Well, it seems like my job here is done,” Faruk said. “I want to tell you something: before I go: you need to keep in mind that to rise above others and have a chance to fight against Arthur, you need to always be willing to do things others wouldn’t. You need to take the risks others won’t. This will be very important from now on.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Lucas replied, then took out Faruk’s journal from his ring. “Before you go, I have to say that your journal has been very helpful to me. I always wondered how accurate it was to the real thing.” Since the tree said that the system could have made that last part up, that doubt had always stuck with him.
Faruk frowned upon seeing his journal on Lucas’ hands, but his expression softened moments later, and he extended a hand. “Let me see.”
Lucas gave the book to him and watched as the necromancer browsed through its contents, stopping at the last pages as Lucas predicted he would. Those were the pages the tree said it were probably written by the system. His expression became ugly as he read those pages more carefully, and then he looked up with a puzzled expression.
“I knew they had to make a few things up for the quest, but why did they phrase it like that?” he asked, his expression colorful and sounding perplexed.
“Like what?” Lucas asked in reply, not understanding the question.
“Like this, for instance: ‘In the heart of the woods, I discovered an entity pulsating with enigmatic, dark energy. It presents an opportunity to elevate my power and perhaps a chance to transcend the confines of this world.’”
“Isn’t that how you talk?”
“I don’t talk like that. No one talks like that,” he said, offended.
“But the tree also agreed that you had a weird way of talking,” Lucas remembered, grinning.
“What does that crazy tree know?” He sighed. “And you were concerned about desecrating the dead. Isn’t this way worse?” He said this, raising the journal and handing it back to Lucas with disgust.
“So… is it different from yours?”
“Only a little. There’s more content in it than there is in mine, so yours must have been from a few months in the future—maybe years, I can’t say. But they are definitely the same journal, just that abomination towards the end wasn’t written by me,” he answered, shaking his head, apparently still bothered by the way he was represented.
“Anyway, as I mentioned before, there’s still things that need to do before you complete this floor, so I will bid you farewell now,” the necromancer said his goodbyes. Lucas wondered what those things Faruk wanted to do were, but didn’t ask. If he wanted to tell him, he would already have done so. The necromancer gave him a long look towards the end before jumping on his turtle and disappearing on the horizon. Like the tree, he had also placed a lot of expectations on Lucas.
“What should I do now?” Lucas muttered to himself, now alone in the woods. He could keep doing the necromancer tactic to stay longer on the floor and work on his dark magic. But the truth was, he didn’t like to be interrupted every hour to go kill someone. Apart from ruining his concentration, it left him in a bad mood to keep training afterwards. So after some thought, he decided that it would be better if he focused on his objective. After killing Sultan and rescuing the kid, he would still have two days to spare on this floor. Then he could try and learn more about dark magic before proceeding to the waiting room.
Having decided on his next steps, he didn’t dwell on it any longer and started moving towards his target hidden spot. This time, he wouldn’t back out after killing just one or two.
A few minutes later, he arrived at the spot. It was the same as ever. There was nothing to see above the surface, but he knew that hidden beneath the ground were a lot of people based on the necromancer’s previous assessment. Without Faruk, however, there was no one to tell him how many there were on the first floor, so he needed to go blindly, but he wasn’t afraid. Without further ado, he descended, and immediately he saw four people surrounding him.
It seems they are even more prepared now, Lucas thought. He immediately realized he couldn’t dodge properly due to the lack of space, being closely surrounded, so he instinctively did the next best thing when the attacks came his way at the same time: he ducked. And when he did so he saw all those wonderful feet and legs, reminding him of a fight he had just before he entered the Dark Forest. That time he had also seen a few legs, and so, without hesitation, he did what he already knew worked. His right blade made a full circle around him as he spun very quickly.
His opponents, caught off guard by the sudden change in the situation, almost struck each other when Lucas ducked. And when the attack came from down below, they didn’t have time to react. Moments later, loud screams could be heard. Four pair of legs had been chopped off like radishes, and the blood was pooling around them. Not prepared for what had happened, their reaction dropped to a new low afterward, distracted by the pain they were feeling. This way, Lucas quickly finished the job before he could begin to have second thoughts about it.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
*You have killed Human – lvl 10. Experience earned.*
*You have killed Human – lvl 9. Experience earned.*
*You have killed Human – lvl 10. Experience earned.*
*You have killed Human – lvl 10. Experience earned.*
Apparently Sultan, or whoever was commanding those people, had decided to go for numbers instead of quality, because their levels were back to tens and nines. Confirming that he hadn’t received any levels from those killings, Lucas looked for where he needed to go next.
He found a ladder on one side of the dungeon that lead downwards. He tried to peer through it, but the ladder seemed long and was enclosed by rock on all sides, forming a small tunnel. If I go down there, it might be hard to get out, Lucas thought. To leave that place, he would need to assure no one was staying on his way to the ladder or find a different way out.
He didn’t feel good knowing his escape route was so flimsy. He even looked at his dead opponents, trying to see if he could pull the same stunt from the prison, but their clothes didn’t seem to be a uniform; they varied in both color and style. Lucas sighed before starting to descend the ladder.
After descending about one foot, his surroundings opened up, and before descending any further, he took a look around. The place he was in was poorly lit, and Lucas’ position was in the darkest corner, allowing him to remain unnoticed while he observed the scene that was happening down below.
He saw a table in the middle of the room, with five people sitting around it, playing cards. The smoke emanating from two cigarettes clouded the room, and there were a few bottles scattered around the table, indicating they had been drinking.
Taking his eyes off of the group, Lucas surveyed the area for places to go after descending and noticed three closed doors, preventing him from peering inside. If I go down there and more people start to appear from those doors, it could be troublesome, he thought.
The smoke and the card game gave him a wild west vibe, unlike the medieval theme he saw in the king’s castle. Fortunately, there were no pistols in sight, only swords and an axe.
Trying to enter one of those doors without alarming the others seemed risky, considering that they had a clear view of them. And if he tried that and failed, all his momentum would be lost, and he could be forced to fight against more than those four if the door he opened was filled with more of Sultan’s people.
Deciding that his best shot at remaining unnoticed was to kill the men at the table as quickly as possible, he continued his descent. When he reached the ground, still hidden, he squatted and started moving slowly towards the man who had his back turned against him.
“I got you now!” one of them suddenly yelled, making Lucas halt for a moment, sweat pouring from his forehead, thinking he had been found out. But after a few moments of confusion, he realized they were talking to each other, much to his relief, and started moving again.
They were too distracted with their game and provoking each other to notice the crawling thing that reached behind the broad-shouldered man’s back. Right as their game was reaching its climax, something odd happened: out from the chest of their friend came a weird glass blade. Perplexed, he looked down with an expression of surprise and pain before his head dropped to the side and the glass retreated.
Immediately, all of them jumped from their seats, reaching for their weapons.
“What the f…” one of them began to say as Lucas jumped across the table and landed on the man’s chest with both his blades. Before Lucas could turn, he heard the sounds of steps approaching him and jumped, rolling on the floor, escaping from a sword that was aiming at his head.
After creating some distance, he turned around and saw the two men running towards him with erratic movements, probably still under the effect of alcohol. With only two to face, things became much simpler, but still, Lucas had to take the initiative.
He knew his weak point was still defense, so he needed to kill his opponents before they could surround him. With blinding speed, Lucas reached the first one before he could take a defensive stance and punched his ribs on both sides before dodging the attack from the other that was close by.
With two deadly wounds on his body, it was no surprise to see the man fall limply to the ground, but the one who was still alive looked really spooked, like he was about to scream for help.
Seeing that face, Lucas became alarmed. He couldn’t have that man screaming to the top of his lungs, so he jumped towards him, and he was barely able to block. Lucas blade didn’t break this time, however, and with three punches in a row, the man was killed.
*You have killed Human – lvl 10. Experience earned.*
*You have killed Human – lvl 10. Experience earned.*
*You have killed Human – lvl 11. Experience earned.*
*You have killed Human – lvl 10. Experience earned.*
Phew, that was close, Lucas thought. It became clear during this assault that his defense wasn’t his only weakness; he also lacked good options from long range. Although he had his fireball, using it could provoke the men to scream even louder since the fireball didn’t hold sufficient power to kill someone instantly.
Should I try to improve the fireball? He wondered. Maybe if I could make it smaller, more condensed and release it like a bullet…
Before he went too far on his musings, he stopped himself; that was something he should consider later. He still had a job to do. Dragging the bodies, Lucas placed them back on the chairs where he found them and laid their heads on the table. He had aimed for their torso for that exact reason; he wanted to create the impression that they were only sleeping.
After he dropped them off at their places, he took a look at the scene and was satisfied with the outcome. It wouldn’t withstand a more attentive look, but if one just glanced at it, it seemed like they had drunk to the point of passing out.
“All right now, which door should I pick?” Lucas muttered, looking at the doors.
Not wanting to delay too much, he picked the door on the right, but only found more bottles and a few snacks. Going to the other door closest to him, Lucas opened up and found a smaller room with a table in the corner, filled with what looked like maps. The walls too were filled with charts and other things Lucas couldn’t recognize, but sitting at the table, musing over the papers, there was a single young man, and he had a glow in him.
“Well, well. What have we got here?” Lucas said, smiling, looking at the freaked-out prince in front of him.