Pendrackon

by Aaron Oster

  “Well, idiot, he might be,” Emma said. “But it seems he at least knows how to fight.”

  “I wonder how much of his story is actually true,” Sam said. “I mean, he’s literally contradicted everything he’s said so far. You think he’s really the bad guy, and we’re being led on?”

  “Could be,” Emma answered. “It would fit perfectly with the trope. Evil villain pretends to be moron knight, but is actually super intelligent and lays out their entire plan for no reason before attacking, giving us the time to devise a strategy for defeating him.”

  “Wow, you know your tropes well!” Sam said with a grin.

  “I took Tropes 101 as my major back in college,” Emma shot back.

  A small notification flashed into view before he could come up with a witty retort, letting him know they’d entered the Dungeon.

  DUNGEON

  You have found a dungeon.

  Name: Kamellittle Castle

  Age: Unknown

  Type: Temporary

  Difficulty: Very Hard

  Recommended Level: 23 – 28

  “This is interesting,” Sam said, noting the Dungeon’s recommended level.

  He’d been expecting the level to be somewhere in the 40’s, but instead, they got this.

  “Didn’t the knights mention that Borgana wasn’t all that strong?” Emma asked when he closed the notification.

  “Yeah, now that you mention it,” Sam replied. “Maybe that’s why the Dungeon level seems more manageable?”

  “What about the powerful knights?” Emma asked. “Won’t we have to fight them?”

  It was then that things finally began to fall into place for Sam. They hadn’t been given an impossible quest, after all!

  “That’s what he’s for,” Sam said, pointing back to the idiot knight who was looking around with mild confusion written on his face. “He’ll take on all the high-level beasties, while we deal with the regular monsters.”

  “Huh, guess you’ve got a point,” Emma said, looking around at their new surroundings. “Kinda creepy down here, though, don’t you think?”

  Emma’s right about that, Sam thought as he looked around the dusty, cobwebbed cellar. Creepy as it was, this place had nothing on the Vaald of the Shtainerzeid. That place’s creep factor had been dialed all the way up to eleven, while this place was around a five.

  “So, Spearlittle, this is where you live, right? How do we get to the throne room from here?” Emma asked.

  “Huzzah! The way is clear!” Spearlittle said, brandishing his lance.

  “I take it you have no idea, then,” Sam replied flatly.

  “Indeed!”

  Great. Just great!

  37

  Gordon took the lead, with Emma and Sam following closely behind, and Spearlittle bringing up the rear. Barry fluttered around their heads, staying as close to the ceiling as he could without bumping into it.

  “Are you picking up on anything?” Sam asked after five minutes of silence.

  “Indeed,” Gordon replied, lifting his dusty snout off the ground before sneezing. “I can detect the foul odor of humans just up ahead.”

  “Lovely,” Sam replied, shoving past the dog and taking the lead.

  “Are you sure that that is wise?” Gordon asked, coming to walk beside him. “After all, you are quite fragile, even for one of your kind. I would not want you to accidentally injure yourself.”

  “Your concern is duly noted,” Sam answered, speeding up his walk to a half-jog.

  “Well, while you say that you note my concern, it does not seem as though you are heeding my advice,” Gordon said, speeding up as well.

  “If I wanted your advice, I’d ask,” Sam snapped back, turning his jog into a run.

  Gordon sped up again, and soon the two of them were running full tilt, practically growling at each other.

  Sam was so annoyed with the dog that when he ran into the next room, he ended up colliding with something hard and was sent sprawling.

  “You know,” Emma said, dashing into the room and immediately engaging in combat. “If you two don’t start getting along, you’re likely to get yourselves killed!”

  Sam stumbled back to his feet, clutching at his head and looking around. The room they’d entered was small and cramped, containing two men dressed in heavy-looking mail. Their faces were slack, and their eyes were glowing a bright green. However, that didn’t seem to slow them down or make them any less deadly.

  DUNGEON MONSTER

  Name: Enchanted Foot Soldier

  Gender: Male

  Level: 23 - HP: 400/400 - MP: 0/0 - STA: 450/450

  Status: Hostile

  Greatest Threat: Double Slash

  Highest Attribute: Strength (51)

  Enchanted Foot Soldiers were once regular men, now twisted and enhanced by an Enchantresses’ magic.

  “Well, that explains that,” Sam said, pulling his staff from his back and firing off his Mana Shot.

  Four blue beams of mana shot from his staff, impacting the nearest soldier in the chest and knocking him back a couple of steps.

  You deal: -100 Damage to Enchanted Foot Soldier (Mana Shot).

  Sam grinned when he saw that the increased damage against monsters was working, which meant that the bonuses his gear gave him would come into play in this Dungeon. He’d been afraid that one of his great advantages against monsters, mainly the fact that his gear was perfect for fighting against their kind, wouldn’t be effective.

  His staff had been invaluable in all his fights, not only for its massive 22-38 damage boost with every attack, but also because of its ability to decrease the cost of all his abilities by 25%. When he leveled his staff to get off another attack, though, Gordon got in his way, slamming into the soldier and tearing at his throat. By the time Sam was back on his feet, both the soldiers were down.

  “Great show! Evil has been vanquished! Huzzah!” Spearlittle cheered as he walked into the room.

  “You know, I couldn’t help but notice that you did absolutely nothing during the fight,” Emma said, wiping her sword on the downed soldier.

  “I must save my strength for the battles ahead! Evil must be vanquished.”

  “I think that means he’ll only intervene if there’s someone above the level limit of this Dungeon,” Sam translated.

  Though Gordon had assured him that the people of this world were alive and not like videogame NPC’s, people like Spearlittle made him wonder if that was true.

  “Let us be off! Onward and upward, to the king! Huz—”

  “No! No more!” Emma yelled, cutting the man off. “If I hear one more ‘huzzah’ out of you, I’ll kick you in the nuts so hard you’ll talk in a high-pitched voice for the rest of your life!”

  “Speakest no more foul, wench! I haveth a codpiece, so mine family jewels be safe from thine misplaced wrath. Huzzah!”

  Emma swung for the man’s groin anyway but retreated as soon as her foot made contact, hopping on one foot and wincing. The loud clanging sound of the impact told Sam that the knight had not been lying about the codpiece.

  “How about we just move on,” Sam suggested, trying not to laugh at the pained expression on Emma’s face.

  “Fine,” she huffed, putting her foot down and glaring at Spearlittle, who stuck his tongue out at her like a petulant child.

  Sam ignored them both, deciding that it would be better to simply move on and pretend this didn’t happen. All he wanted to do was get through this damned Dungeon before the day was out and have some peace and quiet. Maybe relax for a few weeks.

  It was then that Sam realized that he literally thought this way every time he entered a Dungeon, which begged the question as to whether he really enjoyed all this danger and life-threatening adventure stuff. Back on Earth, he’d wanted nothing more than to go and slay dragons, kill monsters, and save a princess, but the reality was far from what he’d imagined.

  Instead of heading out on his trusty steed to slay a dragon, he was stuck with
an insulting dog, crawling through cobwebs to save a princess that an idiot knight had had kidnapped. Add to that the fact that he had only sixteen hours left to do so before he was cursed, and it made Sam crave the boring, depressing life he’d once had.

  Blowing out a long breath, Sam drew his Flintlock, slinging his staff over his back as they entered the next room. If he was stuck here, he might as well blow off some steam. The red beam tore from the barrel of the Hand-Cannon, slamming into one of the soldiers and sending him sprawling.

  It was all Sam could do to hold the powerful weapon steady, and he really wished he had a higher Strength score or at least less recoil.

  Oh, well, he thought, taking another shot.

  A funny thought crossed his mind as he dropped back and let Emma and the others close with the small group of soldiers. People loved to complain, himself included, so why did they complain about other people complaining?

  Probably because they’re a bunch of dicks, Sam thought as he slotted the Flintlock into his waistband and unslung his staff.

  A great example of this were the people who would complain when reading a book.

  ‘Waa, the MC complains too much! My delicate sensibilities have been triggered by the MC's vulgar language! I’m a self-entitled prick living in my mom’s basement, so what I say matters the most!’

  Sam hated people like that, well and truly. Sure, he also happened to be a self-entitled prick who liked to complain, but at least he had the decency to read more than the free sample before leaving a bad review. He’d actually tried his hand at writing at one point before he discovered he didn’t know what the hell he was doing, but cowardly dicks like Mr. Anonymous or Customer, should all be beaten within an inch of their lives by preschoolers wielding plastic baseball bats.

  It was people like that, the ones who loved complaining the most, that hated other people’s complaints. Why? The answer was simple. Because they were so self-obsessed, they believed that no one else’s problems – other than their own, of course – could be real. These people took out their anger on everyone else, especially poor college kids who were just trying to write fanfiction about their favorite princess who was, coincidentally, owned by a massive multinational media company that threatened a lawsuit if he didn’t stop plagiarizing their work.

  “Fucking Anonymous,” Sam muttered to himself, just before the wall beside him exploded, sending him to the ground as debris flew.

  “Shit!” he yelled, clutching at his bleeding cheek.

  One of the soldiers had broken free from the group and moved to attack him while he’d been reminiscing. He was a massive brute of a man, dressed in heavy-looking plate armor and wielding a morning star. Sam immediately realized that this was no ordinary soldier, and a quick Inspect told him he was correct.

  DUNGEON MONSTER

  Name: Enchanted Brute Soldier

  Gender: Male

  Level: 25 - HP: 600/600 - MP: 0/0 - STA: 360/360

  Status: Hostile

  Greatest Threat: Spike Smash

  Highest Attribute: Strength (112)

  Enchanted Brute Soldiers were once regular men, now twisted and enhanced by an Enchantresses’ magic. Their brute strength comes at the cost of damage to their bodies with every missed attack.

  The soldier staggered, his body taking some damage from the recoil. This allowed Sam to get off a Mana Burn, impacting the center of the soldier’s chest. However, instead of pushing him back, the attack seemed only to anger him even more.

  “Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!” Sam yelled, rolling over as the soldier brought his morning star slamming down in a flurry of wild attacks.

  Wait, why the hell am I running? Sam thought a second later and activated his Mage Shield.

  The next attack bounced off him as the blue shield sprang up around him. The soldier staggered back, the power of his blow causing recoil damage once more, and Sam took the opportunity to use Mana Flare. An explosion of blue light shot out of him, staggering the soldier even more.

  He then pointed his staff at the man and unleashed two more spells, finally succeeding in knocking the man out.

  “Don’t mess with the best, bitch!” Sam yelled as he got back to his feet.

  Suddenly, something hard slammed into the back of his head, shaving off a good chunk of his health and sending him reeling.

  Brute Soldier hits you for -124 Damage (Blunt)(Critical).

  You are Stunned! Duration: S 12

  Sam lay on the ground, vision swimming and head throbbing as the timer on the debuff ran out. Only once he saw one of everything, instead of five, did he finally get back to his feet, clutching at his still-pounding head. Emma was currently engaged with the soldier who’d snuck up on him, and Gordon and Barry were dealing with the last one behind him.

  In truth, he felt kind of stupid for dropping his guard that way, but he couldn’t be held accountable for everything that went wrong, right?

  Emma’s body blurred as the soldier took a massive swing at her, her sword flashing in an arc of red light. She turned then, sheathing her sword and walking away. The soldier stood frozen in place for a few long moments, then a fountain of blood erupted from several places at once, and he fell to the ground in a heap.

  “That is some anime level bullshit right there,” Sam said as she approached.

  “I’ve always wanted to do that,” she replied with a grin. “Did I look like a badass?”

  Sam wanted to say no but had to admit that she had looked pretty cool.

  “Yeah,” he said with a sigh. “Trope or not, it was still pretty damn impressive.”

  “Keep saying things like that, and I might even give you a peek,” Emma said with a wink, pulling at her collar suggestively.

  “And now you’ve ruined it,” Sam replied, turning away.

  “Aww, don’t be like that!” Emma called after him, but Sam was too busy looting the not-corpses.

  He was very pleased with what he found. The people here left a much wider variety of items than the monsters he’d faced in the last Dungeon.

  ITEMS FOUND!

  Name: Steel Dagger

  Durability: 70/85

  Rarity: Uncommon

  Quality: Good

  Damage: 6-9 (Slashing) 7-10 (Stabbing)

  Requirements: 15 Agility

  Name: Powerful Healing Herb

  Durability: 15/20

  Rarity: Rare

  Quality: Sturdy

  Effect: Restores +500 HP

  Name: Heavy Morning star

  Durability: 92/105

  Rarity: Uncommon

  Quality: Good

  Damage: 15-20 (Blunt)

  Requirements: 75 Strength

  “Woah. This is what I call a good haul,” Sam said, stashing the healing herb and motioning to the weapons. “Neither of these are useful to me, so you can have them, Emma.” What he didn’t say was that he’d tried to lift the morning star but had been unable to so much as budge it from its spot on the ground.

  “Thanks, you’re too kind,” Emma said as she easily hoisted the oversized weapon into the air with apparent ease. “It’s got some heft to it,” she said, swinging it around. “But I don’t think it’s for me.”

  “You ready to move on?” Sam asked, turning to where Barry and Gordon were arguing over the downed body of another soldier.

  Listening in for just a second, he could hear Gordon reprimanding the bird for pooping on the soldier, saying they were bewitched and should be treated with respect because their actions weren’t quite their choice.

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” he muttered, getting back to his feet and heading to the next room.

  Fighting in the tight confines of the catacombs wasn’t exactly a fun experience for anyone. The soldiers seemed to pop out of nowhere at any given time, taking huge swings at them with weapons they were easily able to maneuver. The more difficult fight wasn’t with the Brute Soldiers, but with the Rogues, leather-clad soldiers who moved too quickly for Sam to do much more than
blast areas and hope he could hit them.

  I need to get her off guard, he thought in frustration as he missed yet another attack.

  The woman he was aiming for easily dodged to one side, sliding effortlessly through his Mana Shots and closing with him. Sam had been casting with his hand instead of his staff, due to the narrow corridors, so when the woman slid under his next attack and came to attack him from below, she found herself face to face with the barrel of his Flintlock.

  “Yeah, you probably should have looked first,” Sam said, squeezing the trigger.

  The red beam of light blasted through the woman’s skull, doing critical damage and taking her out of the fight.

  You deal: -127 Damage to Flurry Rogue (Flintlock Blast).

  Flurry Rogue collapses! +1,832 XP

  Sam whirled in place, blasting off another shot just as another Rogue made her presence known. He had to wonder how the system didn’t interpret them as dead with holes drilled through their skulls, but he wasn’t about to ask questions. His Mana Flare went off, and two more of the Rogues were halted in their tracks.

  He might not be able to parry their attacks or follow their movements, but he could still damage them. And, if they weren’t moving, they were just as easy to hit as the others. Another Rogue moved in, and when Sam leveled the Flintlock at her, she sild to one side, avoiding the blast.

  “That trick won’t work on me,” she hissed, coming right up into his face and driving a dagger into his side.

  Flurry-Rogue stabs you for -62 Damage (Stabbing).

  “Yeah,” Sam said, grabbing her wrist and trapping her in place. “I figured.”