Chapter 04

We traveled for most of the morning. All the first year students walked in pairs through the valley and up a perpetual slope. In that time, Shiye and I got to know each other a little better. As usual with new friends, the topic of my missing finger came up and I was glad to see the warrior didn’t pity me.

“Noble,” he said, “A memento of battle!”

“Not really a battle though. Just caught in a brutal blizzard.”

“Well, battle doesn’t have to be against monsters and the like. It can be against the elements too.”

I mused internally after that comment. It was a wonderfully refreshing take on my four-fingered “battle.” I couldn’t help but smile and feel a bit like the experience was a private warrior moment of mine. Something to look back on and think, “I won that battle against the ice and snow and bone chilling cold.”

Shiye knew I had healer’s dust. Everyone did, since the other classes had to come to us for healing through their rigorous training. I recalled the wounds I’d seen on warriors. They were caused by the broad axe Shiye wielded. All the warriors were starting with that weapon for their first dungeon crawl. The end of the handle was S-shaped and the blade was single sided. The beard swooped down dramatically to provide for a long bit. The metal was brutish, having aged and weathered over time.

“Looks like it used to belong to someone,” I said.

The line of students had slowed and we waited our turn to enter the dungeon. Nearly all dungeons were underground. There were exceptions.

The mouth of the dungeon was a maw of stone and rock tripe. A wagon could pass through, “Or a large Kefvolo,” one of the trainers from the rogue class had said. We were allowed no additional information going into the dungeon and stepped in blindly.

The wind we had grown accustomed to did not enter with us and we looked back as it howled a soft farewell. Then we were in. Every party entered a variation of the dungeon. No party could run into another, or walk the same path.

I don’t know where the dungeon began, but once the entrance was out of sight, there were neither students in front of us nor behind us. Their excited voices had dwindled away.

“After me,” Shiye said. “Your job is to keep me healed.”

“Don’t get yourself killed and I can do that,” I said. “Remember, just because I can heal you doesn’t mean you should go vaulting into danger. You have to be careful. I’m not armed yet.”

Not even the light of the dungeon entrance came in with us and we were pitched in pure darkness. The further we ventured, the darker it got. Our pace slowed from the need to carefully move forward. I paused when I began to hear wood scratch on stone.

“What’s that?” I said.

“Oh my bad, that's me. I’m using the handle of my axe to feel my way around. We don’t have anything to help us do we? No torches? No light? Nothing?”

“Nothing,” I said.

I tripped on something grimy and slow moving. It gave a snort and a squeal, and bit my shin. I yelped and leapt back, smacking into the dungeon wall. I could feel the rocktripe scratch through my tunic. It caught tufts of my hair, but I easily pulled away.

“You ok? What’s that-Ow!” Shiye said, having run into the same biting pest.

“Crawling things,” I said. I could hear them moving now.

Sqrish! sqrush! Sqrahsh!

Shiye’s broad axe slammed tip first through one of the mysterious slimy things and the blade rang out as it struck the stone ground.

“I think they’re easy to kill!” I said, “I’m not sure you have to swing so hard. Careful cause you can’t see me. I don’t want to lose any more fingers.”

“I’ve got a good system here,” said Shiye. He was swinging his axe upside down like a pendulum, and letting it slice through the squishy things. “Kick them my way, straight ahead of you”

So it went. Shiye would clear the way forward, slicing through the squealing slimy things. I ran into a few that slipped by the warrior and gave him a heads up as I punted them ahead of me.

“Sorry Tosin, I’m trying to get them all but I can’t see squat!”

“No worries, we’re doing good so far!”

Eventually we could make out more of the dungeon. There was a source of light ahead. The walls lightened to stone gray with millions of shadows folded from rock tripe. We were soon able to discover that the slimy things were maggots. Great maggots the size of thighs. They moved like thighs would move if cut fresh from the leg and slapped on the ground. They pulsed and spread small fangs that begged in voiceless hunger.

The light brought a race to our hearts and we were soon plowing through the maggots with deftness. At least Shiye was. I kicked at those that he missed until we at last came upon the source of the light.

This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.

The tunnel we’d been in, emptied to an open tundra. It was cold, though there was no snow. Short stocky evergreens provided the only color. Great boulders mashed together to form an undulating terrain. In the distance were burial cairns.

Before we trod on, we each donned a pair of the sheepskin gloves I had.

“Impressive,” Shiye said after donning them and testing their grip with a few wide swings of his broad axe.

I used a few dashes of Dust of Life to heal the bite wounds we suffered through the tunnel. We shared a bitter resentment for the innocuous things and continued our journey.

Naturally, we gravitated towards the burial cairns. The evergreens that survived in their gnarled grapple with stone were the only other landmark. There was no path.

Shiye approached first and cursed as maggots began crawling out from holes where the cairns met the stone ground. These were larger, and their teeth grated like scissors against each other.

Sqrreeeehlchch, Sqrraaaahlchch, Sqruuuuuuhlchch!

They came from two of the nearest burial cairns. They crawled slowly and steadily. I watched Shiye divide them as they came upon us. I kicked some at bay until the warrior was free to chop up some more. Given our obvious advantage over the maggots, we advanced upon the cairns that stood at least our height.

The cairns trembled at our approach and tumbled in on themselves. From beneath came groans, rasping from pierced lungs.

Ouuoouuoouurhhhhh!

The toppled burial cairns trembled some more and the stones flung away as monsters rose, disturbed and enraged. Up they stood from shallow graves. There were two.

“Skeletons?” I said.

“Not quite,” Shiye said as we slowly retreated some distance.

These monsters were skeletal, and they staggered from their deathly lots, armored with graveyard robbed skins. They looked at us with eyes plucked from sheeps. Their swaying limbs each carried a shepherd's staff. The strength of their staves defied their rotting handles.

Ouuoouuoouurhhhhh! Ouuoouuoouurhhhhh!

While I was struck speechless and lowered to a crouch, Shiye bellowed, “Arghhhh!!” and charged. We were engaging in battle:

Shiye leaping forward in single bound, the monster swooping his staff past Shiye, hooking the warrior around the belly, pulling him forward, Shiye’s boots scraping the ground, stumbling forward, and the second monster staggering towards me with it’s staff raised high.

I was forced to dodge:

leaping aside, stumbling over incoming maggots, hearing their teeth grate together, bolting to my feet, evading my pursuers attacks, hearing Shiye struggling, scrambling for rocks, and hurling them at the monster relentlessly after me.

Eeeeeoounnh!

“Got him!” Shiye said having felled the first monster, then bolted to my aid in a flurry of footsteps. I distracted my attacker, keeping it blind to the incoming attack:

Shiye charging, his broad axe whistling through cold tundra air, his tunic wrenching with his swing, the striking of the axe on skull, the crack of bone and the mashing of brain matter.

Maggots swarmed the corpses, finding nothing to sustain them. They came for us next, but we moved forward towards the next burial cairns in the distance. The maggots were easy to leave behind, being slow as they were.

“I’m damaged,” Shiye said, panting and taking a knee.

I tossed a handful of Dust of Life over him. It floated like spilling stars and fell leisurely upon him. His arm bore broken and bruised skin in the shape of a wicked bite. In moments it healed and the shadow of the bruise faded off.

“I’m useless,” I said. “I wish I had a weapon or something.”

“You’re not useless,” Shiye said. “We don’t know how long this dungeon is and your powder stuff is gonna make sure we get out of this alive.”

“I’m gonna grab some rocks at least. Help me gather some. Not too big though.”

Before we continued, we collected about a dozen rocks the size of my fist. I would have liked to grab more, but my bag was already quite heavy.

“What were those?” I said.

“Beats me. I have a feeling we’re not going to know until our next lessons. Sucks, but what can you do?”

There was nothing we could do except to move forward. Burial cairns led the way and the terrain veered up a slight slope. We encountered dozens of large maggots that Shiye easily sliced through. I kicked them away for the most part, sometimes stepping over them.

We came upon the last burial cairn in front of a gaping cavern smoothly carved in stone. It was more like a hole in the ground and a steep slope disappeared into its depths.

The stones on the burial cairn trembled and tumbled away. From the simple tomb rose another monster. This one was quicker and it managed to throw its weight behind successful swings of its staff. I was knocked twice with it and sustained bruising welts on my parrying arm. Shiye had been knocked to the side and was only a moment in getting back to his feet. His broad axe cleaved into the monster and it gurgled in pain. I bashed it’s skull with a rock and kicked at it’s grappling hands. A final swing of Shiye’s broad axe killed the fiend.

“I might try using its staff as a weapon,” I said, but on touching it, the wood fell prey to years long rot. It disintegrated to fiber and filth in a soft hush.

“Tosin!” Shiye said, waving me over to the disturbed cairn. There was an engraved rock in the shallow pit.

“Disciple of Bekbah,” I read.

“Who is Bekbah?” Shiye said.

“No clue. I’m guessing either a god, or the boss we’ll be fighting at the end of this.”

Shiye took a moment to bring the blade of his axe up for closer inspection. He mumbled beneath his breath and brushed his thumbs over faint chipping that the bit now bore. I wasn’t at the level to understand where our health was so I doused us in Dust of Life once more for good measure before continuing into the chasm.

The tunnel was dark. Again we cursed our lack of light. It was colder. We couldn’t tell whether it was due to magic or altitude. The gloves were a blessing but the rest of us shivered as we moved onward. The chasm tunnel dropped down and quickly leveled out. We made our way forward against a persistent breeze. A burnt smell was carried on the breeze and as much as we debated, we couldn’t place it. “Pitch? No. Oil? No. Wood? Don’t think so. Fat? Nah. Magic? Maybe.”

This went on until we ran out of possibilities. The further we traveled, the stronger it got. We could see nothing. Not even our hands in front of our faces. We could hear the gnashing teeth of large maggots as we began to come upon them. In the dark we succumbed to several bites on our ankles. Twice I had to heal our wounds.

“Yes!” Shiye said from around a corner.

I followed him around and noticed a flickering light on the wall.

“Must be a fire ahead,” I said.

“Not sure what else it could be.”

“Just don’t rush into danger alright? We need to stick together.”

“100%, Tosin. Now follow me.”