A Soldier's Life

Chapter 144: Solo

I was prepared and didn’t even stumble entering a dungeon for the second time in my life. A strong blue light filled the hexagonal room I was in. As Adrian had said, the floor and ceiling emitted light. It looked like frosted glass with swirling white-blue glowing rivers moving underneath. Every once in a while, an oblong silvery shape flashed in the flow, and it was a bit mesmerizing. I guessed this was why this was called the Shimmering Labyrinth.

I focused on studying my location. The hexagonal room had the dungeon exit behind me, and it felt good to know I could leave at any time. Two of the six walls had wide corridors leading off into the distance. I spun in the room and found the elven script Adrian had mentioned. I went and stood before it, studying the writing. It took a long time to puzzle it out as my grasp of the elven language was not overly strong, yet.

Northeast Quadrant, Room Thirteen. The right corridor leads to a bear chamber. The left corridor leads to water.

I immediately guessed the elves had mapped the maze somehow, and the writing gave the dungeon delver his location. Why couldn’t we have found the map in the library? I was also feeling a little superstitious about arriving in room thirteen. I considered leaving and trying my luck in another room. I eventually decided it was unnecessary and best to use my time in isolation productively.

I first removed the large black desk and chair from my dimensional space. Taking a seat, I pulled out the two elven backpacks from the summoner and the griffin rider. I was searching for food as I emptied the packs on the desk.

The spare clothes made it easy to figure out which belonged to the griffin rider elf. The spare garments were smaller and dirty but had no odor that I could detect. The male elf summoner had been leaner than me, but I could probably wear his clothes, if a bit snuggly now. As expected, there was a lot of dried meat and fruit in the bags, all neatly packaged. There were maybe twenty meals between the two packs. I slowly munched on some glazed nuts and dried apricots. At least, I think they were apricots by the peach color and chewy texture. The taste was more bittersweet than I remembered of apricots.

I stacked the clothes, bedroll, and tarps off to the side. I ate about a single meal’s worth as I searched the packs, and my stomach was gurgling at the fiber that had been missing from my diet for so long. I couldn’t tell whether it wanted more food or was just too surprised that I had sent actual food to it. It was not long before I felt bloated and hungry at the same time. I reluctantly packed the remaining food to save for later. I started sipping cold water to settle my roiling stomach.

There was a fishing kit in the woman’s pack with a few lures and a spool of thin braided wire. I already had a fishing kit, but she also had a fist-sized stone. It didn’t make any sense that she would carry around this two-pound weight. I placed the shiny black stone on the desk and stared at it. It looked like an oval piece of volcanic obsidian glass.

Maybe it was a glowstone and just needed aether? I touched the stone, and it greedily took my aether. The stone didn’t glow, so I pushed more aether into it. I felt the heat and smoke started rising from where in contacted the desk. I slapped the rock off the desk to the floor and cursed. A small off-black ring now marred my beautiful black wood desk.

I also realized what the stone was. It was a thermal stone! I had a frigging thermal stone in my dimensional space this entire time I was freezing my arse off! I groaned and felt like an idiot. Just what I get for throwing things randomly into my space.

I had two waterskins from the elven packs. Sniffing the water, it smelled a little off. Maybe it was elven tea or something. I decided I didn’t need to test it at the moment. There was a simple mess kit with a pot, plate, and cup in each bag made from what I was sure was an aluminum alloy by its weight.

The summoner had individual bags of claws, chitin, and other unusual monster parts. Not something I needed to concern myself with. I moved them off to the side with the other things for now.

The best haul from the elven packs was the food and thermal stone. I checked on the stone, and it was still emitting a strong heat. I still had the griffin rider in my dimensional space. She also had gear on her, but she was barely alive. I thought she might even have some healing potions on her. The summoner had a healing potion, so it was possible.

A few men in the company desperately needed healing potions. I was considering bringing her body out when, out of the corner of my eye, a movement flashed down at the end of one of the corridors.

My heart started thudding as I thought entry rooms were safe rooms, and no dungeon creature could enter them. The movement down the corridor that the writing indicated led to a bear. I focused on the corridor, and something was definitely moving down there. I began to pack things back into my dimensional space, saving the thermal stone for last. The glossy black stone was still quite hot, but I didn’t need to touch it to store it. Finishing my clean up, I readied the elven spear and walked toward the bear room.

I moved as silently as my armor allowed, cautiously approaching the room. I thought that if I could bag a bear, I would be a hero to the others. I didn’t see the movement again as I approached. The end of the corridor was close, and it obviously opened into a large room. I could hear water running and studied the room, ten feet from entering.

The room looked about a hundred feet across. The ceiling shot upwards to maybe forty feet. Thankfully, I didn’t see any movement up there in the river of light. A small waterfall on the far left fed a pool on the other side of the chamber. I had thought the other corridor led to water, but apparently, there was water here as well.

I edged forward, my armor accidentally scraping the wall and causing me to pause. I noticed the shoreline of the pool had a field of small dark gray mushrooms. The surface of the pool rippled, and a large gray furry mass rushed from the left and dove into the pool. If that was a bear, it was too damn big!

I waited, completely still, and the massive bear emerged from the water with a long fish that reminded me of a pike in its mouth. It shook out its coat, a mist of water filling the air, snapped the fish in half with its powerful jaws, and then consumed each half noisily. Its massive head then looked up, and its black eyes stared directly at me. I shouldn’t be surprised, as my red armor made me stand out even if I was still.

I didn’t know what to do. If there was just a single bear, I could deal with it. After a few minutes, the bear yawned and lay down, but it didn’t take its eyes off of me. I assumed I needed to enter the room to draw its attack, but I couldn’t surprise it now. What I needed was some type of distraction.

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I edged closer to the entrance to see if I could see any more of the large bears. As I got closer, it raised its head in anticipation. It looked like there was only one of the gray bears. I had plenty of aether and enacted my plan. First, I removed the collector and a bag and slung the items onto my back. Then, I removed the goblin.

The goblin I had collected at the farm appeared in front of me. It was clearly, massively confused because of the sudden change in the environment. No time had passed since I had captured it, and this room was much brighter than the dark barn in which I had captured it. Getting its attention, I threatened it with my spear, it got the message, tumbling backward and into the room. The massive bear lurched up and charged at the unsuspecting goblin. I felt a little evil feeding the goblin to the bear, but it was the best way to make sure the dungeon creature was alone and distract it.

I edged forward as the bear charged, ready to take its head. The goblin’s summersault brought it around enough to see its fate charging. The goblin regained its feet, flight instincts taking hold as it raced toward another exit. The bear changed direction, skidding momentarily on the floor, to chase the tiny creature. I paused at the entrance to take in the entire room. There were two exits and just one bear.

With the bear currently chasing the goblin in a direction away from me, I entered the room and raced after the two of them. The goblin dashed right into a passage, and the bear’s momentum took it past the entrance and roared in frustration as its prey escaped down the tunnel while it skidded to a stop.

The bear spun and faced me, growling in challenge, but it was within my range. I already had the overlay of a box ready and removed the bear’s head, sending it into my dimensional space. My aether bottomed out satisfactorily at my quick victory. It remained standing, the body awaiting orders from the brain as the heart pumped blood spurts out its neck at me. I evaded its final attack and remained on alert. The patter of the feet of the fleeing goblin echoed in the distance. I was sure it would eventually meet its demise to a spider, bear, or some other horror in the dungeon. Seconds passed, and the bear slowly crumbled to the ground with a large puddle of blood in front of it.

“That was just as easy as I thought it would be.” I announced aloud, praising myself to the dungeon since no one else was here to do it.

I didn’t know how creatures reformed in a dungeon other than that they eventually did. The dungeon would also eventually reclaim the corpse, so I needed to work fast. I approached the wet bear and got to work. I skinned a large section of the pelt using the elven runic dagger. Then I started working on the flesh, removing the legs at the joints, and carving off meat sections along the belly, ribs, and back inexpertly. I was soon a bloody mess and not sure if I was getting the best cuts of meat but going for the large, easy muscles.

I told myself Lirkin and Maveith could scold me later. If anyone complained, they could come and kill their own bear. The bear had easily been over a thousand pounds, and I had almost a hundred pounds of meat on the hide. I planned to drag it back to the portal. As soon as my aether recovered enough, I removed the collector from the bag and used it on the bear.

As the smoke coalesced above the disc, my anticipation rose. It had been quite some time since I had used it. The smoke seemed thick, and from experience, I knew dungeons left for a time returned powerful essences from their creatures. The sphere that formed was apex-sized and dark orange in color! An essence of power! I gently rolled it off the collector’s center into my hand and consumed it on the spot.

Unexpectedly, my stomach groaned in protest. I doubled over in intense abdominal pain that laced through me in waves. I instinctively knew it was because the essence needed some caloric assistance to complete its work. I sat hard on the ground and pulled out the elven food. I didn’t taste the dried fruit and jerky as I rapidly consumed what I could. I ate almost a quarter of the elven rations before I felt the essence finish its work.

I probably didn’t need to eat anything, but my instincts were telling me it was the right thing to do to help get the most out of the essence. My stomach felt full to bursting, and I rolled to continue my work on the bear. I paused with the six-by-six pelt stacked the quarters and other bits of meat. I looked at the mushrooms. Konstantin should know if they were safe to eat. I cleared off a small section of the hide and dragged it toward the water.

I proceeded to create a large pile of mushrooms on the hide, away from the bloody meat. The water’s surface churned behind me as one large fish surfaced for a moment, reminding me of their presence. Carefully at the pool’s edge, I stared into the water, and the light illuminated quite deep. I could see large, elongated fish swimming toward the bottom like I was looking into a massive fish tank.

I had two sets of wire fishing lines in my storage. I was not thinking much about adding fish to our company’s diet, but a little variety couldn’t hurt. Besides, perhaps the fish might offer some essence spheres. Maybe it was too much to hope for, but Durandus’ collector supposedly yielded an essence from all dungeon creatures, which meant even the harmless creatures in here, like the fish, should yield one.

I finished with the mushrooms first and made to wash the bear’s blood off my arms and armor in the pool. The red cloud caused the fish to go into a frenzy, coming to the surface. Maybe they were savoring the defeat of their lifelong mortal enemy in the dungeon.

I eagerly retrieved the fishing line with a lure and used the spear as my pole. The lure only touched the surface before the first pike bit it. I pulled the prize to shore past the mushrooms and inserted the dagger behind the eyes, severing its spinal cord. The fish stilled, and I reached for the collector. Light wisps of aether life essence pulled from the thirty-inch-long fish. It seemed to take longer than normal, but a minor essence eventually formed.

I was too giddy at my success, and the dark green sphere rolled toward the mushrooms. I snagged it before it got too far as it was headed toward the pool. The marble was dark green—the quickness attribute. I looked into the pool, grinning. How many fish were in it?

I had twelve fish in my dimensional storage an hour later. I figured I would surprise the men with my fishing skills after they praised me for my hunting and gathering skills. I hadn’t emptied the pool, but the fish had wizened up some and were not biting the lure. I also did not see much movement deeper in the water, so maybe I had thinned their population. I also secured twelve dark green lesser essences to show for my fishing prowess. I dropped the bear’s head into the water in appreciation of the fish’s contribution. As it sunk to the bottom, a feeding frenzy ensued at the bottom of the pool.

I had been gone for over five hours. I figured Castile and the company were probably worried about me. I grabbed the corners of my bear carpet and started pulling my harvest toward the dungeon exit. I noticed an alcove in the wall as I pulled my feast. Dropping the corners, I inspected it to find a small granite box. It was the dungeon reward for completing the room. I had forgotten about that little tidbit, I was excited to see what was inside.

The box rattled as I picked it up. It was solid, and there was no way to access the contents. I cracked the box using the runic dagger’s hilt, and the stone crumbled away. Large blank silver coins spilled out, rattling on the ground. I sifted through the rubble, finding fifteen large silver coins, maybe an ounce each. There was also a single vial of some potion. I couldn’t read the runic writing identifying the contents, but maybe Castile could.

I grabbed the corners again and started down the corridor to the dungeon exit. It was time to eat!

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