by Konrad Ryan
Tad turned to Bunta, the question burned in his mind. “Were these chairs and furniture already in the dungeon?”
Bunta’s face was still dark with anger, but he shook his head. “Fat Jack has a dungeon pouch as big as a warehouse. He doesn’t like to be uncomfortable.” Bunta’s words were quiet and sharp, not aimed at Tad, but likely frustration that he hadn’t been able to fight again. For a split second, his face returned to his jovial former self, “Speaking of dungeon pouches…”
Bunta rummaged through the pouch affixed at his side, it was still covered in drying blood from his previous wounds. He rummaged for a moment and then pulled out an impossibly large, yet familiar sword, the huge mosquito needle-nosed blade that was covered with miniature jagged spikes, where a translucent green slime bounced merrily on the pommel of the sword. Tad couldn’t believe his eyes. It was the mosquito sword!
“How did you get that, I thought we lost it!” Tad had thought it lost forever in the depths of the roach dungeon. A guilty look passed across Bunta’s face, before his eyes gleamed, dangerous once more.
“Terrance… died, and the lizard knocked you and Brando from the anvil,” Bunta paused for a moment, gritting his teeth he continued. “I retrieved the blade before I attacked the lizard. It’s not really my kind of weapon, so I want you to have it.”
Bunta unceremoniously pushed the bandage-wrapped hilt of the blade into Tad’s hands. Tad marveled at the greatsword, reading the description of the weapon that appeared before his eyes.
*Meztlegoph’s Greatsword: The severed proboscis of Meztlegoph the Mosquito Conqueror.
This greatsword can absorb a slime to enchant the weapon with elemental damage.
Damage is equal to the strength stat.
Current slime absorbed: Acid.
Strength required: 20*
Tad read the description with renewed fervor and lifted the weapon in one fist. This sword would be amazing for his current stats as a fighter class. He couldn’t help but chuckle at the memory of when he had first identified the blade. He couldn’t lift it, not even with two hands, but here he stood, blade held in one. It was as light as a feather.
“Ethan told me you were going to have to fight if we want to clear the dungeon. Use these.” Bunta removed the gorilla gauntlets from his hands and pushed them into Tad’s. Next he pulled off the mosquito ring and flipped it to Tad like a coin. “Use the ring’s ability if you need, it’s not much use to me. Just… don’t die. And… not just because I need those gloves, so I won’t be useless in warrior dungeons.”
The items filled Tad’s hands, the sight of which caused a familiar pain in his chest to return. His tongue slicked to his missing teeth. Tears almost formed in his eyes, but he stopped them. Why was Bunta being so nice to him? Wasn’t he mad at him?
“Thanks, Bunta. When you didn’t call, well, I guess its only natural you’re mad at me, but…” Tad struggled to find the right words to express how he felt.
For the first time the aura of danger disappeared around Bunta, his eyebrows climbing high onto his brow. “Why would I be mad at you? Because of what happened with Brando? Tad, dungeons are dangerous. We all knew what we were getting into. We each willingly stepped into danger, for riches, for glory. Terrance raided dungeons just to feel alive, I mean, he didn’t need the money, and it only got worse after he lost his brother.” Bunta’s eyes shimmered with pain. “That we survived was a miracle, I mean, you pulled me out of the dungeon by yourself. Brando was my brother, but I consider you my brother too, I owe you my life.”
Something inside Tad broke at Bunta’s words. His hands covered his eyes, ashamed at the tears that flowed freely down his cheeks. Was Bunta right? He clearly didn’t blame Gruff for anything, why should Tad?
The thought hurt more than his shame.
He struggled to get his tears under control.
Bunta’s face reddened slightly, his old jovial self returned, if just for a minute. “Truth be told, I just lost my phone, I think I left it in the director’s car dungeon.”
Tad wiped his eyes one more time, and his nervousness dissipated. Finally, he moved his attention to the treasure trove of items in his hands. Gently he put the gauntlets on first. His muscles bulged and swelled before morphing back to how he set his appearance. Bunta’s eyebrow raised at that, but he said nothing. The gauntlets fused with his hands, the gorilla’s flesh became his own. It didn’t feel like he was wearing gauntlets, but instead, he could still feel the air against the tough, hairy skin. Tad read the item description.
*Hands of Meztlegoph: The severed hands of Meztlegoph the Mosquito Conqueror. Increases the strength of the wearer by twenty percent. Grants resistance to elemental and acid damage.*
“Wait, Tad, you’re supposed to equip the ring first-”
Tad slipped the mosquito ring onto the thick middle finger of the gorilla gauntlet. The ring morphed to fit the size of the massive finger. Bunta went quiet at this, his intensity darkened further, in thought.
*Ring of the Conqueror: Obtained by defeating Meztlegoph the Mosquito Conqueror. Once per day consume 100 mana to cast the skill ‘Speed of the Conqueror.’
Speed of the Conqueror: Increase dexterity threefold for ten seconds.*
Tad heard an unfamiliar chime, it sounded like a secret passage had been discovered.
*All three items of Meztlegoph have been equipped. Do you wish to form an item set?*
What! In games he had found countless set items, but he had never formed one! Excitement gushed through his chest; he was a child on the cusp of Christmas morning. Tad hastily pushed ‘yes,’ a new window appeared, outlining the new powers of the items.
*Metzlegoph Set Bonuses:
Hands of Metzlegoph: Now increases total strength instead of base strength by 20%.
Meztlegoph’s Greatsword: Elemental/Acid damage is now done in addition to physical damage
Ring of the Conqueror: Experience gained from slaying monsters is doubled.*
Tad couldn’t believe what he was reading. Bunta gave him an inquisitive look from the side, but Tad couldn’t hide his excitement. He pulled up his strength stat.
*Str: 180*
His strength had jumped again, it just kept climbing! And the sword’s damage basically just doubled. With Tad’s strength score, he did more damage with Metzlegoph’s greatsword than he would have with a strike from both Wraithford’s axes. Instead of converting the damage to elemental, it did the physical first, then added the same amount of acid damage onto it. Before the set bonus he would have already been doing 180 damage per swing, but now it had skyrocketed to 360 damage per swing!
But the bonus on the ring excited Tad most. Immediately his thoughts turned to how he could steal this entire set from Bunta. Guilt caught up a moment later. Bunta needed the gauntlets to be effective, but by wearing the complete set, Tad would level up twice as fast as before! This was exactly what he needed, at least for the next five days. Maybe he could explain his predicament to Bunta after the dungeon and borrow it until his warrior trial finished. It wouldn’t be useful during his warrior trial anyway, since the minotaur class restricted his items. In almost every case, the set bonuses were useless to Bunta. He didn’t get experience as far as Tad knew, and he didn’t like using the sword, and while more strength might help a little, the strength bonus on the gloves were already enough to remove his weakness debuff.
Tad’s grin grew into a full-blown smile and he gave Bunta an enormous hug.
“Tad…” Bunta sounded alarmed. “You can keep the sword, and maybe even the ring if you can use it, but… I’m going to need the gauntlets back after your fight. You know that right?”
Tad laughed. Let a man dream, Bunta. The man sure knew how to hit him where it hurt the most. “I know, I know” Tad said. He was sure he could eventually find an item to boost Bunta’s strength, and then Bunta would have no qualms trading it for the gloves. Still, despite having to give the gloves back to Bunta, he was excited for his upcoming fight. He was worl
ds stronger than even in the last dungeon he had cleared with Syphon’s team. Stronger than in his fight against the wraithford clan. How could he lose with both his double stat bonus combined with the triple dexterity skill of the ring? Even though he had been nervous about fighting alone, he realized it was the best part. He had no friends to lose this time.
Cheers rang out just before the door from the second battle crashed open. Liz’s already pale face was white as a ghost, her long blonde hair flowed behind her, somehow it had fallen out of the bun in the frantic battle. Wounds covered her arms and legs, some down to the bone. Her health bar fell as she collapsed, unconscious to the floor. Tad sprang toward her, catching her before she hit the ground and slammed healing into her with the ‘heal other’ spell. An alarm blared in his mind.
*Venom from the Wolf Spider Clan prevents healing.*
“She’s poisoned!” Tad shouted as the other healers rushed to his side. “Someone help her!”
The three healers worked at the latches of her armor, it came away in two segments, front and back, then they removed the chain mail to look for poisoned wounds, revealing a white spaghetti strapped tank top beneath. Two deep gashes, almost like a pair of fangs, had pierced deep through her armor and into her ribcage. Blood stained her tank top. The healers pulled out various bottles that Tad could only assume were antidotes, and they poured one after the other down her throat, even massaged them into her wounds. The three healers looked at each other in horror.
“They aren’t working!”
Tad had to do something. Her health bar was still visible, so she wasn’t dead, but the poison could finish her off any second. Tad forced himself to calm down. The panic receded, his mind started working once more. He had a spell for this. Tad pressed his hand to the open wound on the side of her ribcage.
“Neutralize poison.”
Tad felt a sharp pain rip from his lungs as the health necessary to cast ‘neutralize poison’ was consumed. Tad’s hand glowed from the spell, Liz’s body glowed too.
The room was silent, likely everyone was holding their breath.
A moment passed.
No change.
Chapter 25
Tad looked down at Liz in his arms, her body still, her shallow breaths turned to silence. Even in death, covered in wounds and in the gore of her enemies she was beautiful. Tad hated himself for the thought. Who cares if she was beautiful, she was dead. And he hadn’t been able to do anything.
Silence gripped the room like a small stone in a tight fist.
“Can… can we use a resurrection vial on her?” Tad said, the first to find his voice.
Someone pressed a vial into his hand. Without looking, he uncorked it and pressed it to Liz’s lips.
Tad jumped at the sudden sound. It was deafening in the silence.
*Target is not incapacitated. Resurrection vial will have no effect. Do you still wish to use it?*
Tad blinked as he read the message again and again, trying to understand what the message was saying. Was she too far gone for a resurrection vial? How could she not be incapacitated? She was pale as a ghost, and her body was already cold to the touch. Her life bar, now that he looked closer, had a sliver of red on it, and still stood above her head too. Tad calmed his racing thoughts. Think! You can’t just panic every time something goes wrong! Liz’s body had become cold far too quickly. She had been warm just moments ago when Tad cast his spell, and she still had a health bar. She couldn’t be dead. At least so far, that had been his experience. Logically, Liz wasn’t dead, neutralize poison had worked, or at least it was still working. For this venom, the spell must have needed to put her into a coma and lowered her body temperature to slow the poison, or maybe this was how to neutralize that specific poison. But it must be working. Tad pressed his ear to her chest to confirm his suspicions.
An eternity passed.
Thump-thump.
Relief flooded Tad’s chest as a weak voice broke the silence.
“What are you doing?”
Tad jerked his head away from her chest as he slowly turned his head to the source of the voice. So close their faces were almost touching, Tad stared into the liquid sapphire eyes of a now-conscious Liz. He was so close he could smell her breath, distressed, yet somehow still minty. All thoughts left his mind as he stared into her eyes. He had never been this close to a girl before. A sudden thought forced itself into his muddled brain.
You were resting your head on her chest!
Tad suddenly realized how bad this looked. His face ignited. It burned hotter than his firewalls that had defeated Leo. Hotter than the magma that the bladehyenas had drank, hotter even than the lightning from the class tower that had paralyzed him. He was sure he looked just like an overripe tomato. Pink touched Liz’s own pale cheeks, her arm still cold to the touch in Tad’s hands.
“I wasn’t touching your chest! Well I was, but… you were dead so it was okay.” Tidwell’s ghost No! “I mean, I was checking to see if you were dead. I was listening to your heart, not your breasts!” Tad choked on his own words, mortified at what he had just said.
“Yeah, boy! Get some!” Fat Jack laughed, his words reverberated through the tiny space. Several other voices also rang out in deafening laughter.
Tad wished he were dead. He wished he were more than dead. He wished Leo had absorbed his own void essence and now controlled his body. His embarrassment eclipsed any emotion he had ever felt. Never had his need to escape been so strong, but everywhere he looked he was met with smiling, laughing faces.
The door!
Tad turned back toward Liz, still held in his arms. Her body seemed so small, so fragile, her giant blue eyes still wide in surprise and her cheeks were even more crimson than before.
“I’m sorry! You’re very beautif- I mean, you’re very soft-” What was he saying! Laughter exploded throughout the room once more. Tad gently laid her down onto the stone floor of the dungeon. Finally, his brain sorted out what he had meant to say all along “I’m just glad you’re alive.”
And with that Tad stood up, strode to the third door of the dungeon and reached out to grab the ring.
“No, Tad! Wait-”
Bunta’s voice rang out behind him, but it was too late, Tad couldn’t be in that room even a second longer. His fingers gripped the cold iron ring attached to the door and a bright light flashed before his eyes. He was sucked into what he could only describe as what he imagined a wormhole to be. He spun and tumbled endlessly, an immense pressure crushed the air from his lungs. Pure white light blinded him, even with his eyes closed and a green afterimage already filled his vision.
With a jolt, he stopped tumbling and was back on his feet. He fought the dizziness to stay upright. Thick forest undergrowth cushioned his steps. The trees above glowed a soft crimson in the dark of night, but where Tad stood, in the midst of thick forest foliage it was pitch black. He gulped, the first gasp of fresh air since his escape. In his mortification, he might have even forgotten to breathe. Tad closed his eyes to settle his soul. He wasn’t sure why, but every time he was around that girl, he seemed to almost revert to his previous awkward self. Gone was his self assuredness. When had he even gained that? It came so gradually that he only realized he had it, now that it had disappeared sporadically. Was that courage in action? Or maybe charisma?
He trembled in the darkness. Not from fear, or embarrassment, but from the need to start the fight, equipped with new weapons, his eagerness demanded to test his new abilities. To be thrown into a fight so intense that it burned out his previous feelings of embarrassment. He longed for those images and feelings to disappear.
Overhead, through the trees, Tad could make out four bright moons, all of which were full but partially hidden behind thick red clouds. But there were no stars. None. The two smaller moons were an icy blue and a deep violet color. The third resembled earth’s moon, white with a similar texture. But the fourth was massive in the sky, it dripped blood red, casting its light on everything below,
drowning out the smaller moon’s light. Surely that was a gaseous moon of some sort, or its own gaseous planet that circled this one. Giant swaths of orange and green marred its otherwise perfectly red surface.
Tad inhaled deeply through his nose. The lush undergrowth scents permeated his senses until the soft wind carried a foul scent past his face.
Surely that was the scent of his enemy.
A siren blared through Tad’s mind.
*Warning! The Werewolf Twins miniboss approaches!*
Enemies, apparently. He squinted to scour the forest with scrutiny, but the foliage was too thick, there was no way he would see them coming, instead he stretched out his cloud of perception as far as he could.
Two minibosses were his first warrior battle. That big wolf Bunta had fought was probably a miniboss, and Tad had been too occupied with his conversation with Bunta to watch Liz’s fight.
Tad shook his head to clear his mind, his tongue slid to the missing teeth. These were the stakes, but instead of the lives of his friends, it was his own. Not completely true. By fighting this battle, he might save the life of someone else. Ethan perhaps, though he seemed strong enough in his own right.
The thought of Ethan brought the image of Liz with it. Their faces had been so close, almost close enough to kiss…
No. He had to focus. The scene he had just fled played and replayed in his mind. Liz must hate his guts now with how he had embarrassed her, and he hadn’t even set the record straight. It was his spell that had saved her life.
Tad shook his head once again. Leave those thoughts for later. The minibosses were approaching. He closed his eyes and stretched a portion of his perception into a tendril. He sent it upwind, from where the foul scent had originated. He would defeat the two warrior miniboss werewolves. All by himself.
Where fear had gripped his heart in the past, instead, he was met with tranquility. This wasn’t the first time his life had been on the line. This was what, his sixth dungeon? Another emotion mixed with the calm that preceded battle. Anger. The emotions swirled, but didn’t mix, they were oil and water. He explored that anger. What was he angry at? The answer came quickly, Fat Jack. The large man who had made such a terrible quip at exactly the worst moment possible. Fat Jack and his stupid fat face. His stupid fat quip.
