<~> CHAPTER 23

After cleaning off the large bat wings and removing the wings from the smaller ones, I ate a few of the smaller bats as a snack. The large bat was tempting but it had already rolled in guano and I didn't want to risk any diseases any more than I already was. I was regularly eating raw meat now, best not push it by eating stuff that rolled in bat droppings too. My friends were starting to get used to my eating habits and I felt less of a need to drag the monsters away from the group before eating them. They still had slightly disgusted looks when watching me eat but I think that was more directed at the action and less at me specifically.

I could live with that.

That fight had been draining for everyone so we doubled back and rested in one of the rooms we had already cleared of traps, just far enough away to avoid the smell. We only planned to take a short break here, I was told the next floor was a lot more pleasant to relax in. At the very least the next floor wouldn't have as many traps on it, if any at all, so we could speed up our pace a lot if we wanted to. The slow methodical pace we had on this floor was starting to make me a bit impatient. I could also live without fighting slimes again if I could help it.

I licked the last of the blood from my mouth and peered over at Luna. She was holding one of the slime cores and staring at it intently. The dull core started to shine and a soft red glow lit up the area around her. I felt my heart speed up a little, the focused intense look she was giving the glowing magic stone made the mage all the prettier in the dim red light. She turned her focus away from the stone and met my eyes, smiling as the magic glow started to fade away.

Realizing I had been caught staring I cleared my throat and came over to sit next to her. ("What are you doing?") I asked.

Her eyes turned back to the stone in her hands, still smiling. ("Mana cores from slimes can be used to regenerate mana more quickly. It takes a lot of focus but I'm able to siphon the mana out of it to recharge my mana pool faster. I gave the rest of them to Piper, she'll be able to use them to talk with us more often. They regenerate mana over time by pulling it from the air but only so much mana can be taken from them before they eventually break. Another floor further up has slimes on it too, so these cores aren't worth very much here. They're more useful as tools rather than trying to sell them up in the dungeon town.")

I took a closer look at the dull looking stone. I wondered if that had been the one I pulled out of the slime I fought. ("So it's kind of like a battery then?") I asked.

Luna's smile faltered. ("Sorry, I don't know what that word means.")

I nodded, unsurprised. ("Don't worry about it. So if these stones are helpful, should we go out of our way to get more of them? To make it easier for you to talk to the others too?")

Luna tilted her head and looked off to the side in thought. ("Normally it wouldn't be worth the time but considering that we've gotten a lot more out of this trip than we had expected already, it might not be a bad idea. It would make it a bit easier for the others to talk to you too. Let me ask the others.")

("Sure,") I replied.

Luna walked off to talk to the others while I thought about fighting the slimes again. I hadn't been intentionally avoiding them, but had we not talked about how useful those stones were, I might have considered avoiding them in the future. I still wasn't sure how I would deal with them though...

"Helena," Piper called out to me.

I looked over and the group was beckoning me to come over. I shifted back to my human form and walked over. It felt more... proper to talk to them like this. I was probably spending too much time as a werewolf anyway. It made sense when I was in potentially dangerous situations but I probably shouldn't stay like that all the time.

("They want to know if you figured anything out about why those slimes were chasing you,") Luna told me.

I shook my head. ("Not really, no. The bats didn't react the same way, only the slimes, so I have no idea.")

("The other question is whether or not you can fight them without burning yourself again, Piper said that healing you was expensive. It wasn't a big deal, that was the only time she's needed to heal you so far, but we should try to avoid that situation again,") Luna continued.

I began to rub the arm that still had slightly shorter fur. ("That hurt like hell, I wouldn't want to repeat that if I can help it either.")

("Right,") Luna said with a nod. ("Which is why it seems like hunting more slimes seems like a bad idea, even if it would be helpful for using the rings more often. It looks like we'll have to be careful with the ones we have. Maybe by the time we get to the next floor with slimes, we'll have a better solution.")

I sighed. ("You're right, even if it's unfortunate.")

With that settled, we all put away the few things we had pulled out to rest and got moving. I shifted back into my werewolf form when we reached the guano room, as much as it felt gross on my pawpads to walk through it, I was somehow even more concerned about stinking up my boots with it. The smell on my feet would fade and I already had walked through it before while fighting. I didn't want to make my new boots stink like guano forever too. I was going slow, trying to avoid as much of it as I could.

While lost in my thoughts and walking through the elite bat room, my arm was caught by Luna who tugged at it to get my attention. I turned toward her and she was pointing up at the ceiling. I followed her gaze and my eyes widened when I realized what she was pointing at. There was a chest embedded in the ceiling.

"Piper," I said to get the healer's attention. When she and Maxwell turned to look back at us she looked up at the direction Luna was pointing.

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There was a chest straight above us, it was nearby where the large monster presumably had nested. The bat swooped down at us when we first entered the room so none of us really bothered to look up that far until now. In the back of my mind I had been wondering why we didn't get any treasure from fighting an elite monster but I just figured things didn't work that way and the others would know better than I did.

I looked around at the walls, this room had a few ledges made from decorated brickwork but nothing quite made it all the way up there. The chest was also in the center of the ceiling, meaning that even if we managed to climb up we would have to climb from stalactite to stalactite to reach it. The stalactites looked a bit out of place in the otherwise man-made looking room but I hadn't questioned that until now. Maybe they were there because of the chest.

I turned to Luna. ("How are we gonna get that down?")

Luna turned to look at me and then only a moment later Piper and Maxwell were looking at me too.

My eyes widened and I pointed at myself. ("Me? You want me to scale that wall and monkey-bar my way across those stalactites?")

She smiled up at me. ("Sure! I'm not sure what 'monkey-bar' means, but it should be easy for you!") Without even hearing our conversation Maxwell and Piper immediately began to pat me on the back and give me unintelligible encouragements as I was ushered toward one of the walls.

I scoffed and looked at the wall more closely. The wall was made of bricks but I couldn't tell if they would be easy to climb. I could try stabbing into the walls with my claws but I hadn't tried that on this floor yet. At least the walls weren't covered in guano too. Because of the 90-degree angle from the floor to the wall, there were only some spots covered in guano, mostly near the bottom.

I sighed and rubbed my hands together before reaching out and trying to grab the bricks. They were smooth but not slippery, I could kind of grab the edges of the bricks but they didn't stick out too far. I tried shoving my claws into the wall. The bricks were solid and dense, I would be able to scar them if I slashed at them but I didn't think I would have enough leverage to push directly into the bricks themselves while trying to climb the wall. Instead, I tried pushing my claws in between the bricks, into the mortar, and bingo. This would be doable. Even better, pushing into the mortar let me use the bricks as handholds. Okay, it wouldn't be easy, but I could do this.

Taking a deep breath, which I regretted from the awful smell, I reached up and dug my claws between the bricks and hoisted myself up. I was a lot less agile with my foot claws but I managed to find a spot between two bricks and wedge my toe-claws into it too. Once I felt stable I reached up and dug my claws into another brick higher up.

This was grueling. I couldn't help but grumble when Luna gave me some words of encouragement when I reached the halfway point, a small ledge I was balanced on. This was the last resting point I would have before climbing to the top and climbing across the stalactites. Even resting here wasn't all that refreshing, I was still balancing on the the small lip. I shimmied against the wall, getting myself closer to where I would be able to reach the nearest stalactites when I made it to the top.

Once my breath was even again I decided to get going. I grunted and kept moving forward, shoving my now aching claws between the next set of bricks and continuing to hoist myself up to the next spot. Eventually I reached the ceiling and was in arms reach of one of the stalactites. This part would be tricky and while my new body seemed really durable, I didn't want to test how easily I would be able to take a fall from this height.

I gripped the brick tightly in one hand and leaned out toward the stalactite. I didn't know for sure how stable they were so I gave it a few shoves to make sure the whole thing wouldn't just fall when I tried to put my body weight onto it. Even pushing most of my weight against it, the rock seemed stable. I dug my claws into the stone stalactite next. Unlike the brick, the stalactite was slightly slick but felt just as yielding as the stone walls on the floor I originally woke up on. I dug my claws in as deeply as I could and tried again to yank the stone pillar but thankfully it didn't budge.

Okay, now or never.

Using my feet to wedge myself between the stalactite and the wall I released the brick and dug my other hand into a different stalactite. Now both of my claws were dug into stalactites in front of me while my feet were still pushing against the wall behind me. I would have to pull my legs forward and claw into the sloped stalactite and hope these things would support my weight without any issue.

I made the dumb mistake of looking down at the ground and was suddenly questioning how in the hell I had been talked into this so easily. The ground looked so far away and I was about to swing myself forward onto stone stalactites hanging from the ceiling. I had never been particularly acrophobic but I had also never done anything like this before. I don't think I've even had the arm and hand strength for something like this until very recently. However, despite all of my worried anxiety-filled thoughts, I was smiling ear to ear.

This whole thing was thrilling. I felt alive. This felt different from the twisted instincts that told me to do things like eat raw meat and rip monsters apart. No, this was me. I was enjoying this. Getting a thrill out of this. And that was why I curled my back and swung forward onto the hanging pillar of stone over the distant floor. I think I'm a burgeoning adrenaline junkie. I think I enjoy putting myself at risk and coming out the other side stronger.

Once all four of my limbs were dug into the stalactites this next part was actually easier than I had expected. The stalactites were solid, I didn't need to worry about them falling. My sharp claws dug into the stone like they were made from clay and for the first time I realized that this stone wasn't much weaker than the stone I was accustomed to. No, I was just that strong now. In less time than I had spent climbing up the wall, I had traveled from pillar to pillar until I reached the chest. I wiggled it and pulled at it but the whole thing was stuck there as solidly as the stalactites were.

("Helena, just open it from there. The only thing that could break are potions and other glass wares, it's not a big deal if we lose a few this way,") Luna's voice called out to me through the rings, all the way from the ground.

("Okay, I'll try.") I reached for the lock and managed to pull it off with a tug. The metal of the lock was brittle this time so it broke apart without any trouble. The contents of the chest spilled out and tumbled to the ground but more surprisingly to me, a knotted rope spun out with one end tied to a bar on the inside. The spooled rope undid itself until the very last knot touched the floor with a foot to spare. I reached forward and tugged on it hard, hoping that it would be an easier way down than having to go back to the brick wall.

It felt solid so I took the chance. It wouldn't have been any safer to go back the way I came, my muscles were screaming by now and I wasn't sure how much more I could take. I hoped that this wasn't some mean spirited trick by the dungeon, but a subtle reward for taking on its difficult challenge. Finally, I let go of the last stalactite and transferred my full weight to the rope. It felt sturdy but I didn't want to test it, so I swiftly climbed down eager to reach the bottom. If it wasn't for the guano covering the floor I would have collapsed right there, luckily I had the wherewithal to follow the others back into our previous resting room before collapsing onto the floor and giving myself a well-earned rest.

I would see what all of that was for after a little nap.