Yani lifted his hands and made flicking motions to the two men on either side of him. They took out daggers, making our group immediately eye them as dangerous. “Do not worry, it is part of the process.”
The two men stood on either side of the doors and slid their weapons across a palm, touching the door, then stepping away swiftly. The doors flew open, cracking into the mountainside with a crash that made rubble and dust fall from the stone above.
“You may enter now, and remember if you are going to die, die well.” Yani grinned evilly as we stalked by. The now-lit entrance was stone covered in bronze. The scent of drying blood hit me, and I knew that this was a place of death.
The fuckers wouldn’t be letting anyone out unless there was no risk to them—if they actually let anyone out.
After the last of us were in, the doors slammed shut once more, and darkness took over our sight. The dwarves would be fine; they could see underground, and what was a mountain, but heavy-ass ground? The elves and I had darkvision, but it was limited greatly at sixty feet, and it only made things look like they might in dim light.
“Light incoming,” Balmur said with a grunt so that we could shield our eyes. A second later, dim light glowed in front of us.
“For this first one, we’re all going to hang back and let Zeke and Bea do the majority of the killing so that she will be able to level,” Yohsuke explained. “Fainnir, since you’re level four, these first few floors will be where you start to get an idea for how we operate as a party, and you can learn what to do from us. I take it you know how to use that axe?”
“As well as I be know’n how to walk.” The dwarf pulled his weapon out and readied it.
“Good, Zeke, unleash the beast.” I snorted at his pun and let Bea out of the collar around my throat.
As soon as the hatchling was out and on her feet, she turned to us and immediately began to search for food. She halted in front of Fainnir, eyeing him curiously. She looked from his face to his hand, then back to his face before calling out to him.
“What’s she be wantin’?” Fainnir mumbled his question and backed a step away.
“Food.” Yohsuke sighed.
I touched her mind with mine, and I realized why. She thought that he was Nick, and when she saw the other dwarf, she usually got treats and pets. Now, there were no treats and no pets, and she was upset. Was the feeder and petter broken? Was he angered?
“It’s okay, baby,” I called to her softly. “It’s time to hunt, then he can pet you. But we have to hunt first, okay?”
She seemed to take heart in this, as I mentally called to Kayda, Sit on Jaken’s shoulder and watch our backs, okay?
As father pleases. Do not allow my sister to become too hurt. She squawked and shrunk as she hopped onto Jaken’s shoulder, dancing as she turned to watch our backs.
“Time to go and play, Bea,” I encouraged her, moving forward with her.
These tunnels were large enough that three of us could easily fit side by side in them, but it was me and her out front with Fainnir behind.
“Oh!” Fainnir snapped his fingers and tapped the ground with his foot. “Pebble, I summon you to my side.”
The elemental separated himself from the wall quietly. “I feel many presences up ahead, small ones.”
“Thanks for the heads-up, Pebble.” I nodded at the elemental, then returned my sights to the fore. The walls and floor still had a brown tint to them, but the ball of floating light thirty feet ahead of the party allowed us to see very well. Balmur was getting pretty damned good at his magic.
The first thing that we came across was a large beetle the size of a chihuahua. Bugs. It had to be bugs.
Beetle Level 1
Mind you, I don’t really care for bugs, but I’m not a huge fan of small things that can give me diseases that wreck my life.
I shuddered and began to go through how to proceed with Bea when I realized she was already on top of the beetle. Chomping at it with her teeth didn’t work, so she slapped it with her tail like it was an over-sized hockey puck, sending it careening into a wall. It smacked into it, the wings coming out to steady it before she was on top of it, snatching off the bug’s wings.
I didn’t know if bugs could hiss or not, but this thing sure as hell sounded like it was, and she didn’t give one single fuck. They landed with a thud, and she dug her nose under the beetle's side, scoring a strike to her snout, but she lifted her head, sending the bug onto its back where she stomped a triumphant foot onto its exposed, softer underbelly.
She clacked her teeth in victory before sinking the exaggeratedly long talon on her foot into it, the beetle’s health bar falling from 50% to zero in a blink.
“What the hell was that?” I grumbled. I hadn’t needed to tell her anything. She was a natural-born predator, and all she needed to do was be set free.
She got enough experience from her kill, a measly three points, that I could finally see her stats.
Name: Bea Arthur
Race: Gust Raptor (Hatchling)
Level: 1
Strength: 2
Dexterity: 10
Constitution: 3
Intelligence: 4
Wisdom: 1
Charisma: 3
Unspent Attribute Points: 0
Well then, I know a certain little raptor whose constitution is getting added to at second level. Then I projected my pride to her. She’d only taken a couple points of damage from the beetle, so we moved on.
This portion of the dungeon was fairly easy to make it through like one might think. It had a beetle, or ant every now and then, and the path was almost linear in design. The ants were an issue, as they were also larger than normal ants and were much stronger than her, so she had to creatively use her speed to confuse them, then whittle down their health. Watching her move put me at ease. At level one, she was fast; at higher levels, she was going to be a fucking wrecking ball with teeth and an attitude.
And boy, did she know it.
After each kill, she gave a shrill chirp, or bark of challenge into the darkness ahead of us before we would move on. Muu was to pick up any shells that were salvageable so that we could maybe make something with them or use them as components. Materials were important to gamers.
“She’s gonna get her ass whooped by something eventually.” Yohsuke snickered behind me.
“Yeah, she is, but man, can she move or what?” I agreed, adding that last bit proudly.
“Hell yeah, she can, she’s god’s gift to speed. Looks like something is up ahead.” He nodded toward our path. “Go check it out.”
Bea was close to leveling up anyway, so it wouldn’t hurt. We walked into a larger room, roughly the size of a classroom back on Earth, and waited until the others joined us. Once all of us were inside, a wall of solid stone dropped from the ceiling to keep us from escaping.
“Boss room?” Muu asked excitedly as he glanced at the others. “Any takers?”
“We know what it is, where is the boss?” James growled.
Bea sniffed at the air, casting her eyes up into the darkness above us.
“Balmur, light that darkness up, if you would?” I pointed to the ceiling, already sending my awareness forth and finding what I thought I would.
“Happily.” The globe of light shot up into the dark and illuminated a spider the size of a Rottweiler with venomous fangs and many eyes descending from a large hole in the ceiling.
The rear four legs held the web behind it for stability, and the fore four began to reach down toward Bea.
Sinisper Level 3
“This thing will be too much for her on her own, Fainnir, you’re in too.” The young dwarf stepped around me as I said his name, his axe in hand. I caught him on the shoulder before he could go too far in. “Weapon and magic, let her distract the spider while you attack.”
He nodded stoically before turning back toward their foe and stepping closer.
Bea, I want you to distract the spider, but don’t get too close. Le
t Fainnir do the work. She didn’t acknowledge me at all, so I growled. “Hey, scaly, you better fucking listen to me.”
She turned her head back just enough to side-eye me and waved her tail as she readied to pounce.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” I stepped forward, but two sets of hands grabbed my shoulders.
Jaken and Yoh both had me and pulled me back, Jaken whispering, “Let her learn the hard way.”
“I’m gonna beat her ass, is what I’m gonna do.” I grumbled but let them go. There was going to be a time when she would have to learn to listen to me. May as well be now.
“Pebble, you stay out of it,” Fainnir called back.
The elemental said nothing, but I got the idea that he would do as he was told until he felt it time to step in. I was of the same mindset.
“Mind the fangs, you two,” Muu called, like a parent calling to his children. “They’re sharp and have venom. Okay, I love you, have a good time at school!”
“Why are you this way?” Maebe asked Muu with genuine concern in her voice.
Muu responded, very matter of fact, “Making others laugh gives me existential validation,” There was a slight pause, then, “And because I didn’t get my first kiss until I was eighteen.”
I didn’t get the chance to even go in on that weirdness before the spider made its move, hissing, and its fangs flashed forward toward Bea’s throat, and the raptor hopped above its head and bounded over it. A slap of her tail brought its attention to her while Fainnir used the opening to summon a spire of stone from beneath its thorax, goring it a little.
Ichor splattered the retreating spell and floor beneath the spider and took 10% of its health with it. Sinisper screeched loudly, spitting a globule of something dark-colored and phlegm-like in appearance at the young mage, but a wall of thin stone rose in time to stop the gross projectile.
“Pebble!” Fainnir howled. “Ye’ll nae do tha’ again!”
“If you say so, master,” Pebble replied in stony stoicism.
“Good save,” I muttered to the elemental, but he remained quiet.
The spider’s hissing brought my attention back to the fight, Kayda calling out in support as Bea flitted between the creature’s legs causing it to fall. She bit at one of them savagely, tearing through a section of chitinous joint and pulling little of the meat away, stripping a few points of HP from it and a little of its mobility.
Not enough to really put it in a bind, but enough to slow it a little.
A leg whipped out and cut through the air just behind Bea, then in front of her, and she used her little air step maneuver to get around it. Two more stone spikes poked into the spider’s gut, and it reared before turning and sending a line of web beneath it that caught Fainnir on the foot.
“Wha—” he began but grunted halfway through the question.
The spider greedily pulled him forward, swatting at Bea from where she worried at another leg. I cast Renewing Flames on her before she crashed into the wall behind her. That kept her from serious injury, the regeneration on the spell acting as a buffer for the damage she took, like a small shield. She took more than half her full HP bar, but it was recovering swiftly.
And she was pissed. The spider’s dripping fangs shivered delightedly over Fainnir’s prone form, then it tried to bite him.
“No!” He sputtered, a hand up in front of him to deflect the blow, but the fangs clanged off his skin, now encrusted in stones. Stone Skin! Clever kid.
He whipped his axe up into the spider’s throat and exposed underparts, savaging it while growling in wordless rage. His left hand whipped out to the side, and after several motions and a flick of his wrist, a large spiral of stone drilled into the creature’s head, taking the majority of the red in the HP bar with it.
A final chop of his axe saw the creature dead, crashing on top of him.
The dwarf grunted and tried to get the corpse off him, but to no avail.
“Suppose we can help them out now that the threat is dead.” Yohsuke said playfully. Muu and Jaken stepped over and easily tossed the spider’s body off Fainnir, who was covered in ichor and other gore-like bits.
“Good work.” I helped him stand and patted his back. “Stand still.”
I sent shadows crawling over him to wick away the disgusting battle residue. He panicked a little when it went over his face, throwing his hands up to check the few growing hairs on his chin. His sigh of relief when he found all was in order was too funny.
“Well, obviously, you know what needs to be fixed, right?” I asked him as he finished looking over himself.
“Fight better.” He grunted, but I shook my head and grabbed his shirt, jerking him closer to me.
I pointed to Pebble. “You need to fight smarter and not hold yourself back by cutting out one of the most powerful tools at your disposal.”
“I be a dwarf!” The boy howled indignantly. “We don’t let no one do no fightin’ for us!”
“And while you are here training with me and my brothers—my wife and my precious familiars—you will fight to the fullest extent of your capability!” I snarled into his face. “I will not have you, the first Earth Mage, champion of Fainne and the Primordial Earth Elemental, slacking off and doing as you please. I promised I would protect and train you, but you make it harder when you refuse to protect yourself.”
“Zeke!” Muu called, rushing over to shove me away from Fainnir. “He’s only a—he’s still learning, man. Cut him some slack.”
“Either he’s a child, and needs to be taught valuable lessons on proper ways to handle situations, or he is an adult, who will learn because if he doesn’t, he will die.” James stepped between us, his gaze cast down at Fainnir. “Look, Fainnir, you’re the only one who can do the things you do with your element. Fighting the way you wanted almost put you in a really bad situation.”
“But I got out of it!” Fainnir implored softly, pleadingly as if he needed us to see that.
“But what happens if you run out of mana?” Bokaj grabbed his shoulder softly. “What if you’d been knocked unconscious? There are too many ‘what if’s’ not to take advantage of the surest thing you have—your partner.”
Pebble stepped forward, his misshapen hand on Fainnir’s shoulder, “They are right, my friend. There is wisdom to be gained from knowing that no matter where you go or what you face, you are no longer the keeper and maker of your fate. I am bound to you, too.”
“But I don’t want you to get hurt, too,” the young dwarf’s voice was barely a whisper. “You’re my friend. I need to protect you.”
“I am your friend, and I will die to protect you,” Pebble gently corrected. “These ones are here to protect and train you, and the Druid—Zeke—knows well what it means to use all his strength. His bond with his familiars is even stronger than our own. They are a part of him. To lose one is to lose part of himself. He meant well.”
“I did.” I let the anger I had within me flow out with a breath. “Look, Fainnir, I’m a huge part of who you are now—I’m your first oath. I know that you are destined for greatness, but I need you to listen to us and learn from us so that you can achieve it and not die.”
“He will.” Maebe stepped forward, her eyes on the boy. “Come with me, child. I have much to show you. If you will all wait here?”
The rest of us nodded and let her walk away with Fainnir, Pebble hobbling along after them.
While they were gone, I turned my sights on my unruly familiar. She had begun to dig through the spider’s corpse, the sickening squelching sound of tearing meat and hurried gobbling reaching us from more than twelve feet away.
“And you!” I barked, pulling on my bond with her so that she would step out from the corpse. I stepped around the floor boss until I stood directly in front of the hole, she had carved into it and where she currently dug. “Come here. Now!”
She continued to dig into the body, ignoring my order completely. I centered myself, so I wouldn’t act in anger, then took a deep breath
, sending the shadows at my feet snaking toward hers until I had them connected like a leash. I tugged once, and she resisted, mindlessly digging for something.
“Bea Arthur!” I snapped. She paused for a heartbeat, then began to dig again with doubled fury. I shook my head, “Fine.”
I brought the leash of shadows into my hands and yanked. The little raptor screeched as she flew through the air into my grasp. I held her wriggling body while something brown reflected the light in her jaws. I reached into her mouth, her teeth grating against the metal of my right hand as we fought for the item.
“Bea, I command you, release!” I spat the words on instinct, her mind blanked for a moment, and her mouth slackened enough for me to retrieve her prize.
It was a small, brown crystal of some sort, roughly the size of a thimble and still dripping blood. Once it was in my grasp and my attention was off her, she began to struggle and snap at the item, so I willed her back into my collar, but she wouldn’t go.
Finally, I’d had enough and put her onto the ground.
It calls to her, Kayda finally explained, fluttering to my shoulder to observe it. Kayda’s closeness to the object making the raptor hatchling go mad. Barking, calling, and trying to jump up and snatch it out of my hand. I do not know why, but she wants it badly.
“No duh.” I grumbled and threw the item into my inventory. She immediately stopped acting the way she had been but threw me hateful glares here and there. “Hey, you listen to me, and I may let you have whatever it is so long as it’s safe.”
“What is it?” Yoh called over.
“Some kind of crystal, no stats came up when I touched it.” I sighed and began to go through Bea’s level up. Her dexterity went up by one with her natural point, no surprise. I put two of her points into constitution and then the last one into strength. That would do her for now. Looking at her, she looked a little fatter, which given that she had gorged herself on spider meat, wasn’t too great of a surprise.
“Think it could be some kind of boss crystal?” Jaken walked over and glanced from me to Bea. “There are plenty of games that have bosses in dungeons drop rewards that could be used as components or power-ups.”
Into the Darkness: A Fantasy LitRPG Adventure (Axe Druid Book 4) Page 34
