Ron gave his whip to the enchantress who placed it into the magic circle on the table, the enchantress soon activated the circle and the whip lit up. On the whip Ron could see the inscription lines slowly changing, the enchantress seemed to be in a complete trance. Ron had never seen an enchanter manually inputting an enchantment, he only used the wish store. The whole process took close to 10 minutes but Ron didn’t make a sound, it looked stressful enough.
*Phew* The enchantress lifted a sigh as her complexion slowly became worse, it seems like enchanting items is an exhausting job. "Thank you for your patience" The enchantress smiled at Ron.
"No problem, mind if I test it here?" Ron asked, it was always good to try and at least test it to see if nothing went wrong.
"Sure as long as you don’t swing it here" The enchantress said to which Ron nodded, he wasn’t going to swing it just testing its weight.
"Weight times twenty-five" Ron spoke and the whip got heavier, much heavier than before at base Ron would have trouble swinging it around but it was perfect for the kindling state.
"Works perfectly, thank you very much" Ron thanked the enchantress, seriously why would people even be rude to someone who provided services like these.
"No problem, but it seems like you have a burning question in mind" The enchantress smiled a little and could read Ron’s facial expressions as baffling and confusing.
"Well, I don’t mean to be rude but you earlier said some people aren’t as polite, what do you mean by that?" Ron asked.
*sigh* The enchantress sighed a little she seemed a little sad just when Ron thought he wouldn’t get an answer she spoke "Because I’m not as good as my grandfather was, if my grandfather did the enchantment just now he wouldn’t even be fazed but it drains me a lot" she explained.
"Well, sure but that’s because of what I assume is a lack of experience. Did your grandfather travel before he came here?" Ron was aware that experience came with age and of course things seen, Ron himself became a whole deal stronger in just three weeks purely because he’s been risking his life over and over.
"He did always tell me stories of things he’s seen," The enchantress said with a little melancholy.
"Then why not travel? Or have you not experienced the dungeon yet?" Ron’s solution was simple, just go out and travel.
"I have done the first part of the dungeon yes, however there is a second part of the dungeon that I haven’t done yet" The enchantress explained.
"There’s a first and second part?" Ron asked, he didn’t know there were more parts to the dungeon.
"Yes, the first part is for level one beings and the second part is for level two beings" The enchantress told Ron. Ron thought about it and it made sense with what the town lord told them but wait didn’t this mean?
"Don’t tell me you have to get a new permit per level?" Ron asked carefully to which the enchantress nodded. (‘Well that’s just great’). Ron had to get 100 merit points once more.
"Oh well no use crying about it, still why not travel and experience more?" Ron repeated his question, just sitting here wasn’t going to work. The enchantress seemed a little hesitant to answer that, from that expression alone Ron could see the answer coming from a mile away.
"You’re scared, correct?" Ron asked, which seemed to surprise the enchantress.
"I-I am scared, grandfather told me all sorts of stories. Some happy, some not so happy. I’m afraid of those not so happy moments" The enchantress stammered out a little. She looked at Ron and hesitantly asked "Aren’t you scared?" he was around the same age as her she guessed and from their conversation he didn’t seem to be around from here.
"Of course I’m scared, when I first came to the tower my first instinct was to return home to my safe bubble. But I’m even more scared of what will happen if I don’t do anything; I will lose the chance to see everything. I want to see everything this tower has to offer and I need to face my fears to get stronger" Ron explained his reasons. The enchantress seemed to be speechless.
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"Speaking of getting stronger, I should go to the dungeon. Thank you once more for your services" Ron said and left the enchantress to her own thoughts. He didn’t know if she had even heard him leave, Ron could see a lot of himself in her and hoped she would find the courage to escape her own bubble.
Ron was off to the town lord mansion, he heard from the guild receptionist the town lord guards the dungeon directly so his best bet was going to his house. Ron came to a large mansion in the centre of the town, there was no way this wasn’t it. Knocking on the door a few times the door opened to the town lord himself.
"Hm? What is it? Are you lost?" The town lord seemed to think Ron was more lost rather than him belonging here.
"Depends, I’m pretty sure the dungeon was around here" Ron decided to be a little sarcastic while handing him the permit from the guild.
"Ah right, seems like you didn’t just sit back and tagged along the woman with those injuries. Although those aren't black ant wounds it doesn’t matter, you’ve improved nonetheless. Follow me" The town lord accurately spotted Ron’s growth and his encounter with something other than ants. Ron just shrugged and followed the man, there was no sense in trying to argue with someone much more powerful than you.
Ron followed the town lord until he walked down a staircase, the staircase seemed to go down for ages. Ron hoped he didn’t have to climb this whole staircase once he was done with the dungeon. Eventually the staircase ended in a wide open room and ahead was something Ron was expecting and at the same time wasn’t expecting.
There was a door indicative of the dungeon that was to be expected, what wasn’t expected was the fact that it was connected to what seemed to be a pyramid. This dungeon was pyramid themed? Also this whole pyramid was underground? Did this mean?
"You built the whole town on top of a dungeon?" Ron asked the town lord, it was insane yet the safest spot in the whole town. Just bury it underground.
"Pretty much, you want to chit-chat or enter the dungeon?" The town lord was pretty impatient with Ron so far, probably because Ron was weak in the eyes of the town lord.
"One last question, do I come back here after clearing the dungeon?" Ron asked if he had to climb all those stairs again.
"Nah, you get thrown just outside the town" The town lord explained to which Ron just nodded.
With that out of the way Ron walked up to the dungeon door and placed his hand on the entrance. Just like the last time information about the dungeon came up in his view;
Dungeon: Nameless Pharaoh’s Tomb
Difficulty: Medium
Limit: Level two beings
Warning only 1 may enter per party, once repeatable per level
A nameless pharaoh? Atem? All jokes aside, pyramids were often made to be the burials of the pharaoh’s and oftentimes riches were offered to the dead and traps were installed to thwart would-be grave robbers. It looks like Ron was the one who was going grave robbing this time. Ron also noted the increase in difficulty from the kobolds dungeon, this wouldn’t be a walk in the park.
Just when the town lord thought he had chickened out Ron pushed the door wide open and stepped in. The town lord looked at Ron’s back before shaking his head, he didn’t have high hopes for Ron. He did however have more hope for the woman who was with him, she entered a little earlier and usually it would take a week to exit both levels.
Ron entered the dungeon and was greeted by an immediate change of scenery, Ron entered a passageway that was made by what seemed to be yellow stones. There was nothing worth noting about them unlike the previous dungeon. Walking further along the path the path suddenly split in two, looking down both paths Ron could see there were more forks in the roads on both paths. ('Don’t tell me that this is massive maze?') Ron started to get a headache from the possibility of there being a maze.
('I wish I had a map right about now') Ron thought about feeling the upcoming headache when a realisation hit him. ('Can I wish for a map?') If Ron could access the wish store couldn’t he just wish for a map? He had enough points after the black ant nest extermination plus he was getting timed on this dungeon. The faster he cleared it the more points he got in return.
Ron opened the wish store and wished for a map of this dungeon. "CALCULATING…… THE PRICE FOR MAP OF THE CURRENT DUNGEON IS 250 WISH POINTS, WARNING ONLY THE CURRENT FLOOR IS MAPPABLE". Looks like there are more floors to this dungeon judging from the message, still Ron accepted and soon there was a map in his hands. He could see many dead ends that would have cost Ron a ton of time.
Soon Ron saw the path he had to take to advance to the next area and started walking the path. He wondered if he could sell this map for merit points after the dungeon, suddenly as Ron was walking he felt his foot sink slightly. Getting a bad feeling immediately Ron jumped back to see the walls opening up and shooting darts all across where he had been standing.
In all his excitement of getting the map Ron had forgotten that traps were always a thing in pyramids. He couldn’t let his guard down if he wanted to remain unharmed and finish this dungeon in record timing. Ron pondered for a while if he should wish for a trap sensing item, however he eventually threw that idea away, if he was more careful he wouldn’t fall for more.
Ron traversed the path careful not to step on any more traps by accident, only activating the traps that he couldn’t avoid, however being aware of a trap made it hard to get hit by it. From the lookout of the entire floor along with the multitude of traps in here without the map Ron guessed he would’ve spent days walking back and forth including turning around and getting lost.
It took Ron only 1 hour to find the staircase going to a deeper level of the dungeon, along the way Ron looked for clues or hidden secrets but sadly nothing was ever given, it was all just plain stone walls not even murals or hieroglyphs on the walls. Descending down the staircase it opened up in a wider room.
Inside the room there were four statues, these statues were humanoid but with a canine’s head, wielding a staff and dressed in what looked to be chainmail. ('Statues of Anubis? In a nameless pharaoh’s tomb?') Anubis was the god of the afterlife in Egyptian folklore and as a result statues of the god were built as a way of guarding the tombs.
Looking more around the room Ron could finally see hieroglyphs on the walls, sadly Ron couldn’t make heads or tails of them since he didn’t know the translation. He pondered if he should wish for the translation but before he could come to a decision the statues suddenly cracked and came to life.
The statues all locked onto Ron and they didn’t look happy an intruder was in the sacred tombs of a pharaoh. These statues were all over 3 metres tall dwarfing Ron as they walked up to him. ('This isn’t going to be easy') Ron thought as the closest guard smacked its staff at Ron and cracked the ground from the force when Ron dodged.