Anima: A Divine Dungeon Series (Artorian's Archives Book 6)

by Dennis Vanderkerken

  Shut down on the spot, Artorian shoved his arms in the air and defeatedly trotted away. “Crackers. Now Deverash knows to go look. Hopefully he’ll be too busy to dig… particularly deep.”

  A smattering of giggles broke out as Artorian walked off. They all knew about the Demon’s Maw incident, and it was still funny. When Deverash the Die brought them some spellforms, the supervisors began with comparisons; practical people did well when they had an example to compare their results with.

  Spellforms unfortunately didn’t help the automatic fielding issues Marie and Henry were consistently experiencing. That was a matter of inner focus, but sitting around introspectively wasn’t their idea of a good time. Not when actual progress could be made with the rest of the group. Particularly in this rare setting where they could get immediate feedback.

  The S-rankers didn’t attend, but Chandra had the experience to talk those present through most Mana problems. If a person stalled, Artorian could give on-the-spot feedback of exactly what they were doing. Plus actually show them!

  Deverash caused the largest commotion. Not because his lessons were… odd. Rather because it was strange to take instruction from a geometric shape. Would it have killed him to show up as a Gnome? His chosen also came, and the gathered had a good laugh.

  They were also geometrically shaped. A full dice set worth of them, which is exactly what they looked like. Dev’s insight was helpful, but sweet Cal did his explanations get technical. At least nothing blew up in the background more than once during his enthusiastic attempts to show off what Pylons could do. Even if that was counted per attempt. This kerfuffle allowed for a hushed gamble on just how many dice-shaped holes were to be added to the landscape that day.

  After a week of hashing things out, those present determined that supervisors and chosen needed different lessons. Chandra told days’ worth of stories on what Artorian’s odd concepts were supposed to feel like, while Deverash explained the more mechanical concepts the Pylons applied. Spellforms assisted with diminishing the harsh costs of their abilities.

  A strange development arose when it was Artorian who had the most difficult time improving. That had not been the expected progression path for the old man. Though, it made the others secretly smirk; it was possible he was visibly struggling in front of them on purpose… but that seemed unlikely.

  Once they had a real chance to sit down and talk, Henry, Marie, Artorian, Deverash, Odin, and Chandra each made strides with personal cultivation difficulties. Brushing up left their realms in the cold, but with the reset coming, and their hearts bleak at what that meant… they all just took some time for themselves.

  Personal progress took more time than they’d care to admit, but good results did get produced. Henry got his flight under control. Marie and Chandra actually got to talking about Midgard problems instead of shooting one another sword-edged side-eye over the fence. They even quibbled at length on the future, and how to improve things the second time around.

  Odin proudly managed to get his passive electric emanations under control. While Artorian finally managed to get a single technique under his belt. Unfortunately, and to the great laughter of his peers, the ability that had managed to succeed on that front was his sleeping field. In retribution, he made them all enjoy a pleasant nap before they poked fun at the fact that the old man wasn’t immune to his own shenanigans. He’d pelted them with pillows the remainder of the day, but it had at worst caused them to collapse in giggle fits.

  Artorian thought he’d been doing alright with his tricks and attacks! Back in those early days when he was climbing up the Skyspear, to take it over from Cataphron, his little schemes had been such boons! It was rough to be a fool. Those skills were smears on the floor when he compared them to what the others could do.

  They practiced basic shaping for months. Lines, cones, blades, orbs, radii, orbitals, and area-of-effect forms. Some techniques and shapes came with more difficulty than others, as visualization didn’t come easy for some. Given the same information and patterns to work with, Henry’s first air blade mimicry cut clean through a Jotunheim mountain. ‘Oops,’ he’d said. Artorian had thrown his proverbial hat to the ground. “‘Oops’ my foot, young man!”

  Chandra rocked a vastly different method of going about techniques, to the great wonder of those in study. She could shape, move, and alter anything living. Turning tree roots into deadly weapons at the flick of a branch. She turned leaves into shields and blades of grass into honest-to-Cal murdersticks. To see that mess of death swirl around her like they were nothing but petals in a summer breeze was impressive.

  Like a nail in Artorian’s coffin, that was without her using Aura to make it easier. Chandra gleefully showed him up with raw technique, adding another notch to her stick. “Another win for me! You’re all making this easy since we’re excluding Aura manipulation practice.”

  The lack of Aura manipulation practice was for a good reason.

  Their group had to stick to Mana-refining skills, as both the human royals simply didn’t have the repertoire to engage with the concept. They may have been potent C-rankers, but as Mages they were beached whales. So long as their Aura fielded itself, they were going to see no progress until they no longer experienced difficulty tugging it back in. They’d work on it as they had time, but it was low on the list of abilities they wanted to shore up on.

  Fielding was a nuisance, avoiding burnout a requirement.

  On the plus side, their weighty Auras were helpful for scaring off the local Jotun that liked to peep. Due to constant fielding, the signature they both gave off made Henry and Marie come across as massive beings. Giant creatures of significant size and girth, as their Auras determined how untrained others evaluated their size. The feeling they both exuded wasn’t believed, and didn’t correlate when the Jotuns saw them. These observations were grounds for skepticism, and many a glory-seeker strode out to overthrow this odd gathering of people.

  Fielding forced a fierce demerit on one’s fighting capacity, limiting Henry and Marie’s ability to properly defend themselves from an aggressor’s Auric attacks. If they ever got struck with a high-density effect, or got trapped in a wide-scale explosion of some kind, they’d be burnt toast.

  Henry was essentially defenseless against Mana-based explosions. Marie was better, but it was a hair’s difference. They would have to rely on impeccable physical combat prowess until they managed to get their fielding under control, but building those skills would take up precious time all on its own.

  Time they didn’t have.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Where the supervisors could be considered to be ‘stuck in their ways,’ their chosen were visionaries of adaptation. Unfettered by thought patterns instilled across decades of life in a troubled world they didn’t know, the chosen flourished. They possessed flashes of memories gained from their Dreamers, sure. But they didn’t suffer from deeply ingrained social patterns, nor learned ways of thinking.

  Chandra had summarized the situation excellently. “The chosen compare to young adventurers in their prime, while us supers are old fogies.”

  For Artorian and company, them checking in was akin to watching the talented grow and come by their tavern with ever growing tales of amazing acts and daring bravado. The Dreamers silently lamented as they watched their chosen show them up like gifted children.

  Artorian sighed. “Abyss, what a difference. Yet Celestials above am I proud.”

  The Dreamers played it safe with their growth. Testing basic, simple forms. Practicing them. Getting a grip for what was efficient, practical, and easier to control. They were focused on how to advance to the A- and S-ranks, and the requirements for such journeys. The latter being an unattainable aspect at the moment, since their resident S-rankers were occupied with Cal.

  The news behind why they were unavailable had inevitably done the rounds, and that had led to a week of eating, drinking, and napping. Nobody had been able to find the energy to improve for a while whe
n the secret got out. The prospect of being turned inside out when Cal did was… stomach twisting. So they watched their chosen make impossible strides in power and ability after having provided what the supervisors considered basic instruction. There was a warmth to be found there. Those smiling young faces, eagerly discovering new goodies day after day.

  Surtur and Valhalla needed a while to get their cultivation techniques up to snuff, but once present, they took off. Karakum and Zelia took to cultivation so naturally that the supers tried their best to chew away the jealousy with heavy plate helpings of Chandra’s finest.

  Those with Beast Cores couldn’t acquire a cultivation technique, but that mattered little since they were ravenous hungry monsters in their own right. All Manny, Sleipnir, and Halcyon had to do to gain power was eat the fallen, and those with the techniques caused plenty of those.

  Jotunheim’s natural predators and fauna wouldn’t need any additional mopping up, because the chosen going around made quick work of them. If they had a few more years to go hard on hunting, they would have undoubtedly cleared out the whole continent.

  Artorian flopped onto the grass in his pink rose petal robes. He thumbed them over, wondering why they looked so incredibly familiar. Why not just ask?

  Zelia rested in a nearby hammock, a wispy cloud of purple gathering above her as she further purged the accrued Niflheim poison. Purging was a slow process, even with assistance. Her voice cracked when she tried to speak, so she silenced and did it mentally instead.

  A fondness filled her mental tone.

  The old man understood, nodded, and didn’t judge. That was touching. He closed his eyes and dropped into his Soul Space. Extending a hand, a person-sized pillow *fuffed* into his grasp. His A-ranked Soul Item. He’d been building on it little by little during the time where he could not help the others, nor be helped by them.

  In his opinion, gaining Essence and Mana in Cal should not be the focus. They would get the energy; that wasn’t going to be the problem. The issue was establishing the pillars of advancement. He didn’t have a proper support crew this time to help him through the ranks. So, progress would be slow. Like it was for everyone else!

  How he missed being ballsy. Scheming under the watchful eyes of a full crew of healers, while he opened meridians just to make them yelp and jump to it.

  Floating freely in his personal Soul Space, he grumbled that the darn thing now had borders. Cal’s soul was pushing in on him from all sides after the dungeon Core connection was put in place. He expected his space allotment might open up once he returned to the real, but there was just no feasible timeline for when that might be. So he would work with what he had.

  As planned, the stuffing for his pillows were just smaller pillows. Once he had a few together, he formed a new cover over them, then compressed their size down to something manageable. All it took was Mana and time. “Rinse, weave, repeat.”

  Still, he’d found that making his pillow wasn’t the real advancement bottleneck. The actual limiter was that since achieving A-rank zero, he hadn’t budged a solitary inch from that position. Artorian held supreme suspicion that he wasn’t supposed to be at this rank at all, and his Law had just helped him get there to make a point to Cal. He felt like he needed to play catch-up on something, but couldn’t figure out what. Chandra didn’t have any answers for him. Was it the Soul Item? So far there was no change to his rank even though he’d been building on it.

  How did Cal improve? He built his Soul Space, sure. Though that by itself didn’t seem to count as thresholds for when he made progress. Only when he had applied his concepts and knowledge. Then, when putting it into practice, did Cal appear to cross barriers and make strides. So what was he supposed to do? Exemplify methods of Love? Wasn’t he already doing that daily? He grumbled and released the latest pillow improvement, pulling himself back up to his body.

  His eyes opened to greet the night sky. At least it was a familiar sky. Always a bonus. He turned his head, having a gander at the party his chosen were having around a campfire. Was Yuki in armor? No, that Zelia-made kimono was just reinforced and imbued with some spectacular power. Oh, there was material from Vanaheim woven in. No wonder. Defensively, Zelia had them covered. Offensively, they’d all gone with some interesting choices.

  Zelia had chosen the parasol as her public weapon. Yuki went with a fan, and Cy had stuck to her trident. Though she was eagerly eying up other options, such as tonfas. Their adopted fighting styles matched the idea of what their own realms taught.

  Where Vanaheim was meant to instill the idea of preparing for the unexpected, Jotunheim didn’t care for any of that, and sought to instill methods of how to face overwhelming odds, power, and might.

  Neither Dev nor Artorian’s realms were big on civilization for people to embed themselves in. Their realms were meant as specific challenges that travelers would need to overcome to continue forward. If one attempted to tackle Niflheim, given the current rumors, without mastering oneself on Vanaheim first, they’d just die.

  Equally, based on the bridge layout plans, travelers would be able to head into Muspelheim and pass by Jotun entirely. Doing so without some mastery of Jotunheim would make the attempt a laughable experience. Good luck tackling a unified empire that lived in gravity conditions which crushed you on principle.

  Artorian considered that thought a second time. It wasn’t pleasant thinking travelers would just be able to skip realms. They should institute some kind of gate that required unlocking first. Didn’t Cal mention something about this in a meeting? World bosses? Yes, he believed so. Before a traveler could open a bridge to the next realm, they would need to tackle the world boss. Then, they would be able to realm-skip.

  A fair challenge, he supposed. Unless the challenge was Crabby. Not a single Jotun had managed that. Well, the hard-shelled pain had been A-ranked, so that was unfair. Maybe world bosses were a bad idea. Cal should change it to something tied to personal progress.

  Did he have a high B-ranked threat that could currently count as a world boss? He turned his head to look off into the distance, and spotted the Long-flag. Oh, Abyss… could he not? That form was a pain to control! Still, he didn’t have anything else that would currently count. Might as well. Plus… it was one of Bob’s last, proper, finalized creations.

  “Do the Gobbo proud.”

  Sitting up, he watched a momentary interaction between Manny and Zelia. The manticore had taken a greater shine to the spider at the prospect of more time together. The miniature escapades enjoyed during moments of postal service just didn’t offer the same quality time experience.

  Sleipnir wasn’t amused at Manny’s dawdling since he wanted to return to the newly minted sport of Jotun-hunting. Those frost giants were weeds that needed tending, and his cleavers were perfect to cut the problem down to size. Still, the lad was rebuked by mutual spider and manticore glares. Instead he went off with Valhalla. At least she was a proper huntress.

  Artorian tried not to smirk too hard, but said nothing of it. Their chosen had their own lives and favored activities. Who was he to get in between that? If they came to him with questions, as they often did, that was one thing. Sti
cking his nose into budding romances that would be injured by his doing so? He spoke to himself without realizing. “Mmmno. Let them be happy, the canting will come any day now.”

  Cal mentally nudged him.

  Artorian stepped into the forum space Cal had opened with a dejected spirit. He hadn’t wanted this day to come. Instead, he got straight to answering questions.

  The dungeon nodded.

  Artorian opened his eyes as he left the forum. Again, what a lovely night’s sky. He pushed to his feet, sighed, and clapped his hands together so loud that the *wub* it formed shuddered across the full reach of the realm. It cracked his own Mana-body something fierce, and mercy, that hurt. Not that it mattered, he was about to lose it to canting anyway.