Chapter 2
In the end Alec had stayed a day longer than he initially had intended, but he didn't regret one second of it. After he had finished his last preparations and had checked his backpack and its contents, which Quaron had prepared for him, the moment of departure had come.
“Our kind never looks back when we leave to travel. We just aren't the type for long goodbyes. I hope you find your parents and return safely. Goodbye.” Quini said softly and turned away after giving him a quick kiss on his cheek. “Be careful my disciple. You have learned to use your body and mind in combat, but you still have to learn your hardest lesson. Be prepared, so that you won't pay too high a price to learn it.” Quarc said and turned away. Only a few others, which he had grown rather close to also had come to say goodbye. Among them were some that had been more interested into his original world and also some children that loved to hear some stories, which Alec had summarized for them from his memories. At last Alec turned away from everybody and began his march into the forest and far beyond it.
The terrain was rough and there were no roads to speak of in the area, as such Alec followed deer passes whenever he could without changing his direction too drastically. Speaking of direction, Alec headed south. At least he believed so, maybe it was actual north. Anyway he walked towards where the sun stood in its horizon. It had already gotten much colder in the last days and he didn't deem it safe to walk into colder regions.
He travelled for two weeks through the rough terrain. His provisions had long since been used up. But thanks to his survival training he had been able to salvage for fruits, roots and other edible things, he also had managed to catch some bunnies with slings.
As such he was rather well fed when he finally found his first traces of civilisation. It was an abandoned camp. When he checked he was surprised that the ashes were still warm. A quick search around the clearing showed him the traces of the prior inhabitants of the tents, that apparently had stood here for a long time, and now were gone, leaving behind dark patches of wilted grass.
Hastily he followed the tracks, but like he had learned from Quarc he always intently surveyed his surroundings. He didn't want to join the ranks of those who gave chase and had become the prey instead. And sure enough he found traces that worried him as he followed the campers. They were traces he knew all too well.
Finally he exited the forest and was greeted by a battle. 4 Quns were attacking a group of four humans. And the humans were only still living because they had been lucky enough to find a big rock to climb on.
The big brownish coloured cats were lazily laying around the rock and awaited the moment their prey had to leave their place of safety. Only the circumstance that the Quns were distracted by the ruckus the humans on the rock constantly caused, made it possible for Alec to strike at one of them with a sneak attack. With a lunge and a normally way to wide swing he surmounted the last bit of distance between him and the Qun. He instantly broke its back and left behind a deep bloody wound, as well as an agonized oversized cat.
It shrieks filled the air and the other four noticed their new adversary. But Alec didn't give them the time to start circling around him and instead sprinted towards the closest Qun. As he was just in range he instantly slashed out with his sword and jumped one step to his left. The Qun had already jumped to his old position and instead of digging its claws into flesh its guts were deeply bitten by Alec's sword.
Alec had almost lost his sword in this exchange, as the kickback had been harder than anticipated. The cut hadn't been straight enough, as the cat too had been moving. He had recovered just in time to dodge the third Qun, that he only had noticed out of the corner of his eyes. This time he hadn't been as lucky as before and he was wounded by its claws. Blood flowed from four diagonal wounds on his left upper arm and from the Qun's throat.
Alec's wound wasn't too deep, something one couldn't say about the cat's wound. It died in mere seconds. The last two cats ran away, as arrows chased them. That probably also had been the reason that they hadn't been able to intervene in the fight.
“Is everything clear down there?” A shaking male voice asked from atop the rock. “Yes, the last two won't return. They usually don't attack anything that they see as dangerous and we gave them quite the scare.” Alec answered.
Moments later a rope ladder was dropped. Alec managed to climb it without using his left arm too much and was greeted by four humans. Of which two lay on the ground, a blonde girl wrapped in a wide robe, who breathed heavily and only gave him a nod and a young red haired boy who bled profusely from a bite wound in his right leg. The other two looked like siblings. Brother and sister. Both had brown hair and green eyes and were dressed in leather armour. Their outfits were complemented by bows, quivers full of arrows and daggers. The red head was covered in plate armour, except for his lower legs.
Alec didn't bother with greetings or introductions and immediately began to clean and stitch up the boy's wound. As he worked, he began to speak. “You are lucky it only were four and that their hunting patterns aren't optimized for humanoids. The Quns don't go for the throat immediately and tend to first cripple their prey. They do that because their normal prey are big ass rhinoceros lookalikes. First they circle it and then they go for its tendons, until finally they can kill it without getting smashed by their horns or being impaled by the thorns they can shoot.” He also quickly washed and bandaged his own wounds.
“So now we are mostly fixed up. Can we do anything for your companion?” Alec said to the now unconscious boy and his companions while pointing towards the panting girl. “Uhm, no. I don't think so. Or do you happen to have a mana potion?” The huntress asked. “No. I have never even heard of something like mana before. I guess I have done everything that needed to be done, so now we can do some introductions.” Alec said, “I am Alec Qu'Aranat.” He introduced himself like that, because that was his actual name in his status and he didn't knew whether there existed something that made it possible to check someone else's status. And it wasn't a secret anyway, it also didn't give away any information.
“That's quite a unique name. I am Marie and this here is my brother Peter he is mute.” The huntress said. “I am not! Don't spread such silly lies! I just prefer silence. That's all..” Peter said silently and indignantly. “Did you say something? No? Anyway, The redhead over there is Will our mighty warrior, that thought those... You called them 'Quns' right?...Those Quns would be an easy prey. And last but not least there is our dear Sarah, that saved our asses by creating this boulder here. I fear at the moment she is plagued by mana exhaustion. She is a mage you know?” Marie said.
“Strange. Is that something like a class then? But there isn't a class column in the status.” Alec asked. “Huh? You weren't in any big cities then right? The classes were invented by the Adventurers Guild that had been created not long after we got transferred here. They are used to create balanced parties. Nothing else.” Marie explained.
“And what do adventurers do? Except camping out in the wild and almost feeding big cats, that is.” Alec asked jokingly. She immediately answered “Well we scout the uncharted areas. The routes between the big cities were easily found, as there already existed some structure from the beginning. Among those structures had been way markers towards the other start cities. We also explore dungeons and hunt wild beasts. But as you saw we aren't quite ready for that yet. Nobody really is...”.
“It's getting late. We should set up camp up here, there is enough soil and room up here to set up some tents. While you two do that I will go down and get some firewood.” Alec said. “Uhm could we eat the cats? We haven't had any meat the last couple days.” Peter asked. “I wouldn't recommend it. But I got two bunnies in my backpack. We could make a stew from them. Aren't you two hunters? How come you didn't caught anything for two weeks, the forest is full of wildlife.” Alec asked rather surprised. “Strictly speaking we are Archers. We haven't learned tracking and sneaking yet.” He answered with a rueful voice.
“I could teach you a few bits and pieces if you want, but first let us get ready for the night.” Alec offered, to which the two eagerly nodded.
Two hours later the five of them sat around a fire and a pot that was hanging atop of it. As they waited for the food, the adventurers and Alec talked about their missions up till now. Alec was surprised at how well armed they were despite never actually having been in combat up till today.
“We got our equipment from the guild. You see there are these strange crystals there that linked up with some people. With the crystals help the managers of the guild can provide everyone with standardized equipment for their respective class or job. Another crystal allowed us to quickly build a medieval town, but now it is used up.” Sarah explained. “Strangely we haven't been able to create any thing more advanced than a few bearings and axles. Everything more advanced than that had begun to deteriorate extremely fast. Some mages say that they felt that those experiments drew mana towards themselves like crazy and then turned to dust. They say the world denies our old ways.”
“That's interesting and disturbing. Say did somebody encounter other races up till now?” Alec asked. “Yes a few. We know of dwarves, who already established trade with us. Centaurs, who shy away from us and don't want to associate with us at all. And close to our home there are orcs. brutish guys that's for sure, but they aren't hostile. At least not until now. Now that I think about it where are you from Alec?” Marie answered and asked.
“I lived together with some forest elves, although I am sure you wouldn't recognize them as that at first. But their way of live is so much in sync with nature that this is the only name for them for me. Anyway did anyone of you notice in what language we are talking?” Alec asked. “French of course” Peter and Marie said, at the same time as Sarah and Will said “English.”.
“I thought so. Just so you know, neither of those two are my mother-tongue. And we don't speak either of them right now. Or maybe we do... Anyway we understand each other thanks to a gift we got through the transfer.” Alec explained.
“That explains a lot actually, I have always wondered how nobody had problems understanding each other.” Sarah said. The conversation came to an halt when everybody stuffed their faces with the stew. After they had eaten and cleaned the dishes, they sat together and talked for another hour. The themes of their conversation reached from day to day live in this new world to stories from their old one. Then they went to bed in their respective tents. Nobody deemed it necessary to stand guard.
The next morning they arose rather early and quickly got ready to move out. Alec let the others lead the way and at the same time explained to Marie and Peter what they should look for while walking through a forest and how they should place their feet to walk silently through it. Like himself they had problems at first, but their experience with their harsh camp live in the forest was enough motivation for them to eagerly try their best all day.
They needed a whole week and three days to leave the forest. In these days Alec taught them as much as he could and showed them how they could further improve themselves without his guidance. After another two days they had reached a small town called Cerfort.
Alec was stopped by the guards, at the city gate, at first, since he didn't have an identification card. Those cards were issued by the adventuring guild and every person that entered a city got one. After a brief examination, which consisted of him touching a crystal ball, Alec too gained one and was free to go.
Since he didn't have any money and the others had invited him he stayed with the four adventurers. They had rented a house from the adventurers guild. Together they rested for the first day and only left their home for necessities like food. Alec used the time to check on his own and Will's injuries and was pleased to find that beside small scabs they both had made a full recovery.
Eager to finally being able to train again, and probably also because he had witnessed the improvements of his teammates under Alec's tutelage, he challenged Alec to a spar. It went disastrous. Will couldn't even hold his sword right. It seems like surveying and slaughtering critters, like horned rabbits, didn't help them one bit to improve their abilities.
Alec described to a depressed Will all he knew about how one trained and fought with a one-handed sword. Luckily Quarc had explained a lot in that regard, as he got most of the training methods he taught Alec from modified versions of his own training.
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After an hour of explanations he left Will to his basic training and went into town. He was interested in the adventurers guild and wanted to check it out. Just as he left the house he met Marie, who apparently had went groceries shopping, as her arms were loaded with bags full of food. He quickly helped her to stash away all of it and told her of his plans. She immediately had decided to tag along, as she still had to report in for their previous mission.
The adventurers guild building was a bland and really quiet place. It had more of an office building than of the legendary rowdy tavern one normally would imagine. Our cases were handled quickly and efficiently. All I had to do to register as an adventurer, was filling out a form. And all I gained for registration was an additional column on my identification card, which stated my class as a warrior of rank one. The lowest rank everybody starts with.
The building on the opposite side of the actual adventurers guild was in stark contrast to its cold and efficiency oriented setup. It was a big raucous tavern. Marie and Alec had agreed to meet up again at its entrance and not long after they had found the rest of their party, who was merrily drinking and chatting with some other group of adventurers.
“Hey Carlos, I see you guys too have returned from your job! How did it go on your side?” Marie excitedly greeted. “Just as usual, a lot of the damn critters and us chasing them down. Not interesting at all, but it has to be done, or we won't ever harvest anything from those fields. I see and already heard that you gained a new addition, is that him?” Carlos, a dark haired and apparently Mexican guy said.
What gave his nationality away someone might asked and follow up with some accusations, but Carlos looked like he tried to dress up as the most cliché Mexican in existence. Surprisingly he didn't look half bad with his poncho.
“Yeah, that is Alec. Alec these here are Carlos, Steve and Anna.” Marie answered and pointed towards Carlos, a brown headed plump boy and an equally plump and brown haired girl. All of them seemed to be around the same age as Alec and the others. “Hello.” they answered.
They sat together until late in the evening and talked about the latest happenings and the newest gossips, since he didn't knew most of the people they talked about Alec mostly remained silent and just listened. He wasn't in the mood to do much right now, as such he opted to relax and bath in the atmosphere, which was completely different than anything he had witnessed in the elven village.
But this atmosphere was rudely interrupted when a bulky guy, wearing a hilariously impractical chain armour that was cut like an muscle shirt on his bare chest and a leather pair of leather pants, walked towards their table and slammed his two hand on it.
“I've heard you vermin hunting noobs found someone who knows how to hunt those stinking cats.” He said in an overly aggressive tone. “Hello Roch. Always a pleasure meeting you.” Will said with a cold voice that oozed with irony. “Yes we know someone, he is right here by the way. And no before you command he isn't obliged to help you and your brutes, like you always seem to forget.”
“How many Quns are there? And how many people do you have?” Alec asked in a neutral and emotionless voice. “Aren't quite happy with these wimps, huh? We know of a pack of twenty to the west. And I have five men following my command, interested?” Roch asked with a louder than necessary voice.
“Interested in a certain and gruesome death? No. And you shouldn't be either. It would simply be suicide to try it with so few people.” Alec said with a frosty voice.”Do you doubt our strength? Maybe you should witness it first hand first? I challenge you to a duel. If I win you come with us, or at least teach us how to hunt these bastards.” The muscle head shouted. “And if you loose?” Alec asked. “You can have my third adventurer rank for all I care.” He retorted confidently.
The rules were quickly set. Best of twenty rounds, which ended with the first 'deadly' hit. The weapons could be freely chosen, but had to be practice weapons. While they picked their weapons Alec asked Marie why Roch was so obsessed with the Qun. The story was short and ugly. He had lost his daughter to them, when she was out near the forest to the west and searched for usable herbs. Her whole group had been wiped out.
Rosh's group was indeed the strongest in the whole city, but the average fighting strength in the city wasn't good enough to form a group that was able to hunt the Qun's with a relative low risk of most of them dying. The average human of their old world didn't have to learn fighting, especially with close quarter weapons. There weren't any guns around either, because like most other high tech stuff they hadn't been transported or had simply disintegrated.
There were 3000 people in this city and over 90% never held a medieval weapon in their hand prior to coming here. Many knew how to use a knife in a fight, but that wasn't really useful against big beasts. As such it wasn't surprising that a pack predator that wisely choose its encounters and feared range weapons had been hard to hunt down. Groups small enough to not scare them away simply lacked the ability to handle them.
Alec met His friends and Rosh's group outside. The muscle man had a big wooden two handed hammer propped atop his right shoulder. This weapon barely qualified as a practice weapon and could easily break some bones.
For most people this scene would look rather menacing and Alec too had to fear getting hit, but he was confident that he wouldn't. His confidence stemmed from his observations of Rosh's movements.
“We can start if you are ready.” Alec said. “Round one.” Will announced. Rosh immediately raised his hammer high over his head and charged towards Alec and tried to squash him. Any sane person would have tried to evade the attack, and that was what Rosh anticipated and what normally happened when he charged. But Alec didn't move from his spot. Instead of stepping to the side, he stepped forward and stabbed past the hammers handle towards Rosh's throat and turned his body in a way that placed his weapon between himself and the hammers head.
The tip of the wooden blade stopped inches away from Rosh's throat. Had he not stopped he would have ended the man's life with this very wooden blunt piece of hardwood.
“STOP! One point for Alec. Take your start positions.” Will announced. In the next round Rosh didn't dare to use such wide swings. But it didn't took long for Alec to find a flaw in continuously swinging Rosh's movements. He simply feinted a false step, while he actually only had placed his foot loosely on the ground and his supporting leg hadn't moved at all.
Rosh immediately tried to grasp this 'golden opportunity' and overextended himself in his eagerness to hit Alec. To his surprise his hammer hit nothing but thin air and he felt something poking him in his armpit.
“Another point for Alec. Retake your position!” Will announced. Rosh was way more careful in this round and focused on his defence. Sadly he had no experience in this, as his normal fighting style mainly consisted of rushing forward and smashing everything in sight. Alec feinted an attack from the left and turned it into an upwards slash and stopped right beneath Roch's crotch.
“What is going on? Why is this happening?” Where the thoughts that went through Rosh's head as yet another point was given to Alec. “He isn't like these imps I have fought in the dungeon. He is faster, and yet he doesn't seem to move much faster than them. I can clearly see his movements yet I can't react in time. He is weaker than me and yet he was easily able to change my hammers trajectory. What is the difference between us?” His thoughts raced.
“Its simple. You lack technique. You have to think about every movement you do and can't think about which you should or shouldn't use. As far as I can tell all you have fought were creatures with skills as bad as yours and low morale. You couldn't even help me if I wanted to hunt the Qun. They aren't foolish and fearful. They are cunning predators and they are fast. Also your weapon is completely impractical against them, it is way too slow. If you want to hunt them get yourself ten shield bearers and ten spear men or other long weapon wielders. Train them to fight and move in a circle formation and you might have a chance.” Alec said. “I think we are done here. Don't you agree, Rosh?”
“Yes. I understand. If even a warrior like you, who also has more experience with them, says we can't, then we can't. I see that clearly now. But I won't give up. Never!” Rosh said and dropped his weapon. He turned around and together with his men he left.
“Uhm, so how do I gain his rank now?”Alec asked, as he turned around to his friends and the mob of spectators. “That won't be a problem we have more than enough witnesses here and I also saw everything personally.” Said a man, who wore a similar uniform as the guy that had processed Alec's application to become an adventurer, “If you would follow me we could handle this matter right now. The Adventurers guild is open 24/7 although the night shift isn't as numerous in personnel as the two day shifts.”.
Alec followed the man into the guild building. The man led him through empty and silent corridors. Finally he opened the door of an office. Puzzled Alec noticed the sign beside the door. It read 'Guild master's office'. He followed the man in and seated down on a chair in front of the big table that dominated the whole room.
“So where did I put these forms...” The guild master mumbled while rummaging through a stack of paper. “Ahh here they are. I will quickly fill them out, feel free to ask whatever you want. Nothing is better at ridding a clerk from boredom than idle chatter you know?”
“Then let me ask away. I want to check out the dungeon soon, so my first question is what I have to do to do so? And secondly what exactly is a dungeon? What should I expect about it?” Alec asked.
For a moment all there was, was silence. Then the man behind the desk burst into a mad laughing fit. “Do you know how long I have waited for someone to ask these questions? One would expect that everyone would ask it before they dove into a dungeon! But no! They believe to already know it from all the books and manga's they have read in the old world! First of all, the dungeon is right here, the whole frigging city is part of it. But if you want to enter the actual fighting zone you have to be at least rank two. The entrance is in this buildings basement.”
“That explains how this whole place has been built so fast. But why?” Alec said. “Because it needs us. It is a symbiont. It gives us a home and a place to get stronger. It even willingly prevents our deaths should we fail in one of its trials. And if do good in them it rewards us. What does it need us for you might ask. Its simple, all living organisms drain and filter mana from their surroundings. And like we do with oxygen we emit a processed form of it. Its really funny, we need plants to be able to breath and the dungeon and all its inhabitants need us. And if we get stronger we filter more mana, so it helps us to get ever stronger. It also hopes for us to protect it from those that wish to harm it.” He explained.
“You are also the first to ever hear this explanation, as we Managers swore to never give this information freely. Its one of many tests the dungeon created you see? And most have failed miserably and paid the price for their ignorance in pain.” He further said and slipped the form over the table to Alec. Who quickly skimmed its contents and then signed it. A small light shone out of one of Alec's pockets. When he checked it his identification card had already changed its contents.
“I am anticipating your future achievements Alec. Fare well and never anger the dungeon.” The Guild master said as Alec departed.
Disturbed he left the building of those who had willingly joined hands with an entity that could prove to be the most terrible dictator humanity has ever seen. Until now the dungeon had presented itself as a friendly symbiont and Alec hoped that this would never change. Tomorrow he would inspect the dungeon. He hoped to see for himself what kind of creature this dungeon was.
Deep in thought he arrived at his friends home. An all encompassing snoring indicated that they had already went to bed. As he lay down himself he tuned down his hearing through his ability and switched the music in his mind to a calming tune of elven music, that had been played at the celebration. His dreams this night were filled with sweet memories, but there always seemed to be a darkness lurking around.