Chapter 5

  As the party collected themselves and cleaned up, the bodies of the monsters started to dissolve into the stone floor. As one of the corpses dissolved it left behind 3 small lightly glowing crystals. Tanner and Skyla walked up to the crystals and Tanner asked “Oh, what are these? And why are the corpses melting?”

  “Monsters that are killed in dungeons dissolve but no ones been able to figure out why. The current guess is that since the monsters were born from the dungeon and died in the dungeon, they return to the dungeon somehow. It is weird, monsters that are killed outside of dungeons don’t dissolve like that, they can be harvested and often contain useful stuff.” Skyla explained “As for the crystals, those are called catalyst. They come in different sizes and can be used to enchant magical items or power magical items.”

  “I can use catalyst to recharge my wands when they run out of oomph.” Annice added.

  Skyla bent down and collected the 3 pieces of catalyst and put them into a pouch at her waist. The room had one exit and she went over to inspect the hallway for traps. A low level dungeon like this shouldn’t have many divergent paths, but she had a dungeon mapping kit with her just in case.

  Tanner spent the few more moments that Skyla took to examine the hallway and declare it clear to settle his stomach, he hadn’t expected it to be so visceral. Hunting animals had never been like this, he had cleaned his fair share of hunting kills, but that was orderly compared to the explosions of meat, blood and offal that he had just experienced. Thinking back on it Tanner almost lost the rest of his breakfast, not that much was left.

  “Clear, we’re good to move to the next room.” Skyla declared and the party followed, once more with Gage taking the lead, Skyla a close second eyes peeled for anything trap like. The hallway had that same vertical wooden slat design that the previous room had, looks like that would be the theme of the dungeon. The party would have to proceed carefully, never knowing when enemies might break through the weak walls.

  The second room of the dungeon had no detectable traps so the party stepped inside. There were no exits to this room, however there was an obvious moving door with a puzzle in the middle of the room. “Bet solving the puzzle opens the door.” Gage stated.

  “The puzzles in these easy dungeons are never too bad. Lets see what we’ve got.” Skyla added.

  The middle of the room contained an empty armor stand and around the room were pieces of black-painted armor. On the left was some black-leather armor and some darkened chain mail. On the right was some onyx plate mail and a simple dark metallic helm.

  “Well, this is a little ominous.” Annice stated “My fingers are twitching, I think these pieces are cursed, I wouldn’t put any of them on yourselves.”

  “Agreed, lets try the leather armor and the helm first.” Gage suggested, moving to grab the leather armor from the left. Tanner moved to take the metallic helm from the right. After grabbing each piece they put the leather armor on the armor stand and then the helmet. Did the room just flex? “Did you guys see that?” Tanner asked nervously.

  “See what?” All three other party members asked at the same time, resulting in Annice giggling.

  “It was like the walls bent inwards… all of them.” Tanner said a little defensively.

  “Nope, didn’t see anything like that, don’t let your nerves get the better of.. Ooogh” Gage was interrupted by a suit of armor tackling him to the floor. The very suit of armor they had just built had animated and found a sword somewhere. The armor raised the sword to stab the point downwards onto Gage’s neck when Tanner knocked the sword out of the air with a well placed thrust. The armor moved as it if was howling in anger, or maybe frustration, but it didn’t actually make a sound.

  Gage, after a moment on the ground, regained his senses and with a little effort pushed the armor to the left side – off of him. He climbed to his feet and used *Strike* cutting the leather armor horizontally in half, his strength and attack more than enough to handle the toughness of the plain black leather armor. As the armor fell to the ground and started to dissolve a grinding sound drew the attention of the party to the obvious door that was in the process of sliding open.

  “Damned armor took me by surprise, thanks Tanner.” Gage said.

  “No problem, it was probably my fault you were distracted.. I must be imagining things.”

  “Keep your wits about you, could be anything in a dungeon.” Gage replied.

  Skyla went to work checking the new pathway for traps, finding none, and as the party continued forward the rest of the cursed armor melted into the ground leaving nothing behind. Straight ahead through the hallway the next room opened up, it was maybe 100 feet from the previous room.

  This one didn’t seem to have anything in it, it had the same wooden slats the other two rooms had but that was it. The ceiling was solid stone, no holes this time. “Hidden loot room?” Gage asked with his head inclined towards Skyla.

  “Probably, lets look around – be cautious though.” Skyla replied.

  The party set to looking around, Gage and Skyla knocking against the wood paneling looking for hollow sounds, Annice kicking around at the stone floor looking for loose stones or anything that might trigger or hide something. Tanner was standing guard by the exit, looking out for any funny business the dungeon might throw at them.

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  After a few minutes of knocking around Gage found some success with a hollow recess behind the northwestern section of the room. He kicked the paneling in, and pulled out the rest with his gloved hands. Hidden in the alcove was a small chest about the size of Gage’s forearm, and three rings – two of which were set with a small gemstone, all three rings had copper bands.

  “It’s a shame we don’t have an analyze skill among us.” Gage stated, “We’ll have to get these rings looked at back in town” He added while handing the rings over to Skyla who put the rings into the same small pouch she had added the catalyst earlier, it seemed Skyla held onto the parties loot during the dungeon run. Gage opened the chest with ease, as it was unlocked, inside was a bunch of gold coins, unstamped as all dungeon coins were.

  Gage bit into a coin to ensure it didn’t bite back and said “Good find here, rings and some dungeon coins.” He then closed the chest back up and slipped it into Skyla’s bag. The other side of the room contained stairs heading down deeper into the dungeon.

  “Next floor then? Anyone need a breather first?” Skyla asked, the party responding that they were all ready to move on. Skyla performed her function as lead trap detector and detected no traps along the stairs going down. She held up a hand with a stop signal near the bottom of the stairs, point downwards and holding up 3 fingers, Gage stepped down and in front of Skyla shield at the ready. They slowly walked down the stairs from there, in formation with Gage in front Tanner taking second place, Skyla in third, and Annice holding a little behind the three others.

  In the room were 3 green lobster looking creatures, if lobsters were four feet tall and had a dozen pink tentacles reaching down from their maw. The party wasn’t as stealthy as they had hoped to be and one of the creatures noticed Gage, it made a terrible screeching sound and all three creatures turned and rushed the stairs. Gage at the first sign they’d been made rushed forward, out of the stairwell and into the room proper to meet the monsters before they could block the party into the close confines of the stairs.

  Gage slammed his shield into the first of the three green monsters but it took the hit and barely slid backwards, these monsters displaying more tenacity than the first set the dungeon had provided for them. Tanner ran out behind Gage as the other two monsters slammed large claws into the shield and stabbed out at the leftmost monstrosity, which drew the attention of the monster. The monster turned and started to move towards Tanner when Gage activated *Draw Attacks* and said “No you don’t you puke colored crustacean” which instantly refocused the four foot tall green monster back onto Gage as Tanner took the opportunity to *Lunge* at the thing.

  Unlike the squat monsters from the first room the crustacean didn’t burst into chunks, it took the hit and kept slamming its large claw into Gage’s shield, which was starting to dent under the heavy blows.”

  “Can’t keep holding them like this, do some damned damage people.” Gage growled out, barely standing against the three monsters at the same time. Tanner pulled back and *Lunged* a second time, this time aiming further forward in the monsters thorax, this time doing enough damage to knock it back – killing it.

  At Gage’s growl Skyla caught up and jumped to the right of the room getting a better angle on the two remaining monsters – utilizing *Flame* and casting a plume of fire out from her outstretched hands. The flame wrapped around the first crustacean and began cooking it as the tail end of the plume broadsided the second monster, directly in front of Gage.

  As the flame started to flicker and die out the monster closer to Skyla dropped in place, the shell bright red where the fire traced across it. The final monster was still going though, Gage’s shield giving out as a particularly potent strike from it bending Gage’s solid metal shield in half, piercing the leather armor and eliciting a growl from the man as the claw further pierced into his right shoulder. When the claw pulled back a large spurt of blood erupted out of Gage’s now ruined shoulder which dropped uselessly to his side, the shield clattering to the ground.

  Gage thinking fast called out to Skyla “Skyla, head left, get on the other side of the room behind Tanner, I’ll need more space” As he danced to the right, parrying a weak follow up from the crustacean’s smaller claw with his short sword. Gage dodged right and danced left around attacks, dodging and parrying his only options now that he couldn’t use the shield. This final monster was a fair bit beefier than the others, Tanner had already stabbed it three times along the flank and the thing didn’t even notice. Tanner wanted to activate *Lunge* against, but his instincts screamed against it, as if three times in a single fight was more than he could handle at this time.

  Skyla, having repositioned herself took the opportunity to fling out a small ball of fire at the not-a-lobster while Tanner stepped back briefly. As the ball flew towards the monster’s face she could see Annice chanting in the corner of her vision, a green glow glimmering around her. The fireball slammed into the monstrosities face, causing it to hiss loudly. *Draw Attacks* having been over-taken by the attack the lobstrosity turned and charged Skyla who yelped in response, backtracking toward the wall.

  Just then green energy poured out of Annice and flowed into Gage, who’s shoulder knitted back up. With both arms functioning once more Gage charged the last remaining monster trying *Draw Attacks* once more, however the things ire was raised too much and it kept charging Skyla. Tanner having stepped back to catch his breath for a moment decided to *Lunge* after all, the consequences be damned – he wasn’t letting this thing get to Skyla.

  He surged forward his spear slamming almost directly into the front of the creature as Gage activated *Strike* and slashed into it from behind. The combined attack causing enough trauma to finally fell the tenacious beast. Skyla collapsed onto the ground, falling onto her knee’s as she said “I hate when they charge me…”

  “The hells was that? Those weren’t monsters from a level one to three dungeon, that last one was level five at least or I’ll eat my own boots.” Gage spat out.

  “I dunno, how’s your arm Gage – do you need more healing?” Annice stammered out, a little shaken at the blood still dripping down Gage’s side.

  “I could use another round if you’ve got it in you, yea…” Gage replied.

  As Annice started chanting again Tanner fell to the ground, rolling onto his back. “Over… used…. Skill….” He said, breathing heavily. “Doesn’t…. feel… good…”

  “We’re going to need to take an hour or so” Gage said, waiting on Annice to finish her healing before heading over to sit down by Skyla at the wall. More green light suffused Gage’s wounds and they finished stitching together, Gage trying to avoid scratching at the area. Annice took a seat at the wall as well saying “That was rough… why were they so powerful?”

  “Bastards at the guild must have misread the dungeon level, only thing I can think of. Never heard of a dungeon that got higher level like this part way through.” Gage replied sourly.

  “Do we continue, or go back?” Skyla asked, as the monsters corpses started to dissolve.

  “We should press on, this has to be a fluke, and even if its not if we take it slow we should be fine – this is a well balanced party. You alright there Tanner?” Gage said, looking to where Tanner was laying.

  “Just.. over extended… Should be fine after a.. bit, I think..” Tanner replied.

  Skyla added in a heartfelt manner “Thanks Tanner… Probably saved my life there, not sure I could have taken a hit like Gage did from that thing. You too Gage, great work.”

  Tanner nodded his head towards Skyla and then quickly said “Ow… too much… movement.” which prompted light chuckling from the other three party members releasing some of the battles tension. As the corpses finished the process of melting back into nothingness there was the sound of stone bouncing onto stone as a rune stone dropped. Skyla stood up and jogged over to the new rune stone and took a look. “I don’t recognize the rune, do any of you?” she asked the party while holding the rune side of the stone out to each of them in turn.

  “Nope.” Tanner replied.

  “No.” Gage added.

  “Its a cure boost, mid level.” Annice said excitedly.

  Skyla looked over at Gage who nodded at her, and she walked the rune stone over to Annice and asked “You sure?”

  “Yea, looks exactly like the cure boost I’ve got active but it has a second tick mark showing its the mid level one instead of the low level one.”

  “All yours then!” Skyla said, handing over the rune stone to Annice.

  “Really?! Thanks! That will help a ton, will speed up my casting so I can keep you three in the fight longer.” Annice excitedly blurted out while activating her new zero point rune stone. Annice shivered as she froze up for just a moment while the rune stone converted into her new skill. Once she regained momentum her eyes glazed over and she added “It replaced the basic support skill with the new one, I guess they don’t stack.”