Emily stalked down the winding tunnel prepared to counter any attack but did not see any monsters when she finally came to a dead end. She tried using her runic sight to see if any runic devices were around the door but failed to see found what she had expected, next Emily tried using her mana sense to see if there was any magical switch to open the door or if the rock face was itself just an illusion without any luck. Emily turned off her enhanced sight and used her regular eyes and knowledge to study the rock face and the surrounding area.
A rock protruded out on the left and something about it made Emily reach out and press the rock. The rock suck into the wall and the rock wall swing towards Emily. Stepping back Emily readied for an attack but one failed to appear. Looking passed the revealed doorway she saw a small cave that several tunnels branching off.
Emily causally advance and when she was in the cave the secret door behind her swing closed. Turning around Emily studied the door only to see it blended into the cave wall so perfectly that there was not even a hint that a doorway was there. This made sense because Emily had studied books and maps that had been produced over the hundreds of years that this dungeon had been searched and nowhere was mentioned a secret passageway in this area. That made even more sense because no one had found the runic passageway that ultimately led her to this cave. Given that runesmiths would rarely, if ever, visit dungeons, that explained why no one had found the hidden passageways or it could mean, like the hidden cave she had just came from, that the people who know keep it a secret.
The fact nobles had used the secret cave to set up an out of the way place to power level gave a lot of weight to the idea this was a closely guarded secret.
If the maps Emily read where right then she needed to take the right tunnel to get to the 30 th boss cave that led upwards. In dungeons there were usually bosses that separated tier areas. To go form the tier 1 area to the tier 2 area you needed to defeat the boss on level ten and pass through to level 11, the start of the tier 2 monsters.
Emily found herself just after the 30 th boss that separated the tier 2 area and the start of tier 3 area. Emily was lucky that this level only had one tier 3, the tier 3 monsters became more and more pervasive the further you traveled downward. Still this area meant there were high level tier 2s around and Emily had to be careful to avoid them.
Emily started to stalk the tunnel and silently cursed this was not a forest, it was hard to be stealthy in an open tunnel that had very few hiding places.
After a few hundred meters the main tunnel came into view and Emily sent a magical pulse into the armor to switch the stealth on. Emily’s form wavered then faded out as it took on the surrounding area with a very faint blur around her when she moved. Not a moment too soon as a high level toll stomped passed.
Breathing slow and even Emily stalk forward, looking to the left she saw the toll and looking to her right was clear. Turning right she made her way towards the boss coven. She passed anther troll and several goblins but made it to the 30 th boss camber. Emily breathed a sigh of relief when there was no boss inside. Bosses took the longest to respawn. The high level tier 2 boss took a week, the tier 3 boss on level 40 took a month, and it was said that the tier 5 took a full year to respawn.
Emily made her way through the boss cavern an into the tier 2 area but she still had to remain on the lookout for swarms of tier 2 monsters. Emily felt good about her chances if she fought only one. Another concern was the mana it took to keep the stealth running. Her large mana pool and regeneration along with the reduction for using runes helped her balance the mana cost against her mana regeneration.
Emily’s luck failed as a large wolf started to sniff around, alert to Emily’s smell. Moving as silently as she could, Emily knelt down and set her sword on the ground and then used it to pull out the boot knife, with her other hand she reached into Bagmor tied to her left waist and pulled out one of the enchanted wands.
When Emily finished her preparations the wolf seemed to hone in on her location and was preparing to attack. With no more time to prepare, Emily lunged forward and overpowered the knife’s sharpness rune so the mana blade extended several centimeters passed the blade and had a molecular thin edge only an atom thick. Emily also overpowered the enchanted wand and with her left hand plunged the knife into the surprised wolf’s eye and with her right shoved the wand into the monster’s mouth, detonating all the stored charges in it.
The knife embedded in the wolf’s skull but the explosion made it redundant as the monsters head became so much bits and pieces of bone fragments, brains, and a shower of blood. Emily drafty jumped back and out of the way for most of the blood but some still landed on her. Hearing noises further up the tunnel, Emily retrieved her sword and gore drenched knife and left the scene as fast as she could.
She was just able to hide in a small off tunnel before a horde of goblins and two tolls ran past to investigate the explosion. After they passed Emily run the way they came because one of the positive that came out of the fight was now the passageway was clear for a few hundred meters.
Emily slowed down as she started seeing other monster and went back to slowly and stealthily making her way up towards the first floor.
Emily’s next challenge happened five levels up. Coming into at a cave she was behind three trolls and half a dozen goblins that were in the middle of fighting a group of adventures. Two of the adventures looked injured but they kept fighting. Emily was torn between helping, waiting, or trying to make it passed the fight.
One the middle trolls throw a fireball, showing it as a witch troll, Emily decided to take it out. Emily took out another enchanted wand and quickly made her way to the back of witch troll, it was too distracted by fight in front of it to notice Emily. Jumping up, Emily slammed the wand into the witch trolls ear and, again, detonated anther wand, as she activated the suits teleporting ability. Instead of aiming to where she first entered the cave, Emily targeted the back line of the fights.
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Emily saw a blur of sights too fast for her to register and then Emily appeared behind the fights, dizzy and disoriented. It lasted only a split second and then Emily took off up the tunnel the fighters entered in, leaving a confused group of adventures wondering just who took out the witch toll.
A quick glance at her status show Emily had gained seventeen levels form the fight with the wolf and troll. Given the fact both had been over level one hundred and her experience bonus it made sense that she had leveled fast. It had only required the sacrifice of two mithril wands and was well worth the price.
Now L46 Emily only had one or two more fights with high level monster to max out her second class. The only problem with this was her options for tier 2 classes would be limited. The generally taught lessen was that you wanted to max out your skills to receive better class choices. The other option was to take another tier 1 class and spend time leveling all her skills up, as Emily leveled up her 3 rd tier 1 class. People usually avoided this option because it became harder and harder to level but with Emily’s bonus to experience this could be countered.
There were classes that needed three tier 1 classes to unlock more prestigious classes, the runesmith for one. People looking to become tier 2 runesmiths needed first a mage class, then a smithing class, until the final 3 rd class of mana scribe. Emily wondered if her class skill runic scholar scribe would circumvent the required mana scribe class. Form Emily’s reading the mana scribe did not offer much in the way of stats or skills, at least the standard class. Emily had been lucky to receive a prestigious class on her first ascension but now with becoming a mage it throw all her assumptions and plans away.
If she wanted to become a runesmith she would need two classes, or maybe one, to unlock the tier 2 runesmith. Having four tier 1 classes would slow her leveling drastically, even with her experience bonus. On the other hand if her class skill could be used instead, she only needed to become a tier 1 blacksmith.
Still debating her options Emily ran up six more levels, passing more and more adventures. Emily came to another battle this time without trolls. Over two dozen alive goblins, and at least a dozen dead ones, were attacking a team of five. Three of the team was on the backline, one was an archer shooting arrows, the other two were mages, one shooting fire and the other ice, and the two remaining were in front taking the brunt of the goblin attacks.
They were holding their own, but Emily could see the growing exhaustion of the fighters and the slowing mages as they used up their mana. Emily paused to assess the battle, then, dropping her sword, Emily reached into Bagmor to, this time, pull out the two runic wands stored there. Taking aim Emily unleased a relentless barrage towards the enemy monsters. To say everyone, both the monsters and the adventures, were stunned, was an understatement. The few seconds of disorientation allowed Emily to take out eight goblins, each one receiving a mana blast to the head.
The fighters seemed to rally and attacked with renewed vigor. Emily was till shooting as fast as she could and moving position after each barrage. The few goblins that turned to attack her lost their heads as Emily expertly blasted them apart. It was only a few minutes later that all the goblins were dead, more than half taken out by Emily.
As the last one fell Emily quickly stored on of her wands and went back to pick up her sword. Having a sword without a sheath was getting annoying. With the sword in her right hand and the runic wand in her other, Emily turned and faced the adventure party she helped save.
The adventure party was the first to speak. “Thank you for the help miss.” The dwarf fighter said.
“We could have taken them!” The human fighter yelled in challenge.
“O shut it Ron you know we were running out of mana and I know you were running out of stamina!” The ice mage human female shot Ron an in annoyed look. Turning to Emily. “Thank you for your assistants! Things were getting a little out of hand. I am Kaylin, you meet Ron, the dwarf is Kaliss, the fire mage” There she point to the female human fire mage “is Renna, and beside her is Telindra.” Kaylin finished pointing to the female elf archer.
Emily nodded to each. “I am Emily. Looking to get back to level 1.”
Kaylin nodded back. “Yes! I was not going to say anything but you are a little under leveled for these parts.”
Emily quickly checked her status, seeing her class level maxed out at L25 for a total of 50 levels.
“Yes I was with a group and got separated, then lost. I am glad to have arrived to help your group.” Emily made an excuse of why she was in a Tier 2, then tried to change the subject. She did not want a group of adventures wondering just what she was down her for.
“That is unfortunate! Tell us who are your companions and if we run into them we well tell them we saw you!” Ron yelled, Emily wondered if that was his default volume. Still as helpful as he was trying to be, Emily could not just tell them she found a secret tunnel and saw a noble party blow themselves up.
She tried to think up a good excuse of where her friends were. “Thank you for that. They are a group of five adventures like you..” Emily quickly described the adventure party she had helped before this group. “But do not worry! They know if we get separated that we will meet back at the adventures guild.”
Ron looked relieved to hear this. “That is good to know Emily! For now were most get back to fighting monsters!” All the woman gave him and exasperated look, Emily almost laughed at how identical the glares were.”
“Yes well it was good to meet you and help. I will let you get back to dungeon diving.” Emily tried to use Ron’s exclamation as an excuse to leave.
Kaylin looked torn. “Yes well what Ron said. It was nice to meet you and I hope to see you at the adventures guide!” With a few more back and forth comments Emily made her exit. She really needed to leave these levels.
Four more levels placed her on at level 15 just 5 more levels to the tier 1 area at level 10 when Emily runic sight picked up another runic wall switch. Slowing down Emily inspected the surrounds and seeing no monsters, adventures, or anything amiss touched the switch and sent a pulse of magic into it.
Another secret door swung open leaving Emily staring at another deserted tunnel. Emily sighed in relief at finding a second runic passageway and one that seemed to be going up to. Stepping inside Emily waited for the door to swing shut. After running up the tunnel and not seeing any monsters Emily stopped and sat down. Pulling out her runic jug and a load of stuffed bread Emily rested and eat the simple meal.
Feeling the renewed energy the loaf of bread imparted, Emily pulled out the second ascension stone. Looking at the softly glowing orb Emily debated rather to use it or not. Finally curiosity got the better of her and she activated the ascension stone.