The Runesmith

“That's about it…”

Roland screwed in the last screw to the device he was assembling while Agni gave out a yawn. After clearing out the last of the monsters there wasn’t really much to do for him anymore. Even if they spent a week here the monsters wouldn’t respawn that fast. Thus the only thing he had to do was to sniff at the strange thing that was standing there.

“Be careful with that Agni.”

“Awoo?”

Agni moved his head sideways while looking at his owner. The thing that was standing here was on something that looked like an adjustable platform. At the rear side, there were two long support limbs that would keep it from sliding back. In the front, there was a really long cylindrical shape that made this object look like a massive gun.

This thing had the shape of a cannon but it lacked a hollowed-out bore. There was no inside chamber to house anything resembling a cannonball or bullets. There also weren’t any fuses to be lit but instead, it was connected to a side canister by thick cords. This canister was the actual fuel portion of this magical device that Roland was slowly filling up with the crystalized Elokin’s fluid.

The cannon had handles that he could hold with both his hands as well as a sight for aiming. It was a fully functional magical cannon that could cause a lot of damage but had a very limited aiming angle. It was made as a tool for farming monsters and used the naturally forming crystals here as fuel.

Roland had thought about ways of hastening his leveling process. It was possible to use his current armor to produce a strong enough blast to kill some of the lower-leveled tier 3 skeletons. It was a very inefficient way of going around it and also a fast way of damaging his expensive creation. Instead, he decided to create a bulky magical cannon from cheap materials. The thickness of it would counter the deterioration effect and he could just repair the runes by himself.

With the cannon now assembled all that was left was to open up the wall. After going through this part several times he was convinced that the monsters inside would not attack him. Even if they did they could not penetrate to the side of the dungeon he was residing in. Thus he could go ahead and create a large enough opening for the cannon to shoot through.

“It doesn’t seem to be getting thinner at least…”

Each time he visited this space he had made measurements. The area between the two dungeons didn’t seem to have moved at all. At first, he was concerned about the opening spilling into this dungeon but after further investigation, this didn’t seem possible. The dungeons had separate areas of effect, something was keeping the creatures from being able to leave them.

‘Could these dungeons really be some type of living organism made from magic?’

This was not the first time two separate dungeons came across each other. The main theory was that the creatures that came from one dungeon could not survive without the support of their dungeon's mana. They would even be separated into levels by their dungeon as well.

‘Perhaps they require a certain mana signature to survive? That would explain why they can’t go out or even go to separate levels.’

This was only a theory that was somewhat faulty. If a higher level collapsed with a monster falling to a lower one they wouldn’t just die. He had even tested this out on one occasion while trying to find a shortcut to the lower levels.

‘What makes more sense is that the dungeon blocks its monsters from leaving in certain areas like passages between levels. There is probably some kind of barrier right before its region of effect ends as well.’

Yet that was only when the same dungeon was considered. It didn’t look like the monsters could break through this invisible barrier and travel into another dungeon at all. He couldn’t find any research on anything like this happening and his contact at the magical academy didn’t have any information on it either. It seemed that this was a very safe way of grinding and he was in no danger at all.

‘Even if a monster breaks through, it should not be able to survive in this environment, the mana in this area should be like poison to it or at least its reserves should run out and it would just die.’

After putting his worries to rest he moved the cannon closer. For the time being the opening to his grind spot was devoid of any monsters. He took this time to heft his weapon closer and aim it towards the middle. Luckily the dead-end corridor on the other side wasn’t very wide so his targets would not have that much space to dodge.

“Agni, whatever you do, don’t get close to that hole, just stay there for now.”

Roland pointed to the opening that he made. Agni was very interested in what was in there and would be able to venture forward. He would not be able to contend with the tier 3 undead monsters in there. It was a possibility that he would try intercepting one of them if they attempted to charge towards his cannon. He knew that they would be bounced back by the invisible barrier but Agni didn’t.

“Woof?”

“Yeah just stay there and look at what the golem for now…”

Finally after about ten minutes of waiting his first enemy appeared. It wasn’t a Skeleton Champion that usually showed up. Instead of the rattling knight, he saw something that was a head taller and much bulkier. Its bones were a lot thicker and it looked more like a gorilla than a human being.

‘So that’s how Armand looks under all those muscles?’

A little smile covered his face as he moved the monster into the cannon’s sight. He had a clean shot as the monster was just standing there and minding its own business. While holding onto this contraption he could integrate it into his own targeting system. Thanks to this he knew when to finally pull the trigger.

This weapon required quite a bit of time to charge. The canisters with the mana crystals started glowing as mana was transferred towards the runic structure. Various bright runes started appearing on the cannon's shaft that continued to become brighter and brighter. At the end of it, a large ball of blue energy was forming, and with each passing second, it continued to grow until it reached the size of a football.

Finally, it was ready, a tiny jolt of his own mana was the only thing required to make this cannon roar. Agni that was on the side jumped up in fright as the beam of condensed mana drilled its way towards the Infernal Skeleton Berserker. It collided with the top part of its body and started spiraling out of control.

The monster was caught off guard, its bones started shattering after a moment as the beam of blue light exploded in the corridor. Roland was forced to brace himself for impact, even with the two large support limbs he needed to hold the cannon with his own two hands. If he did not the beam would push him back and probably burrow its way into the ceiling from how much firepower it possessed.

The moment he noticed the system prompt he instantly cut the mana injection. The roaring beam of light slowly dispersed into the environment. Tiny sprites of mana that looked like tiny dots traced a path towards the hole in the wall that had been made slightly wider. The whole metallic frame was still flashing with glowing runes that continued to give out smoke.

“One shot, one kill huh? Not bad.”

After the smoke had cleared he glanced towards the opening to the other dungeon. There was not much left of the monster that he had defeated. Most of its upper body was blown away while the legs were pulled back into the wall behind it. The more astonishing part was that the walls behind his target didn’t seem to have taken that much damage.

The mana drill spell was created to achieve a lot of penetrative force by using drill-like movement. It didn’t drain that much mana and for this reason, could be overcharged to produce a very powerful hitting spell. Even then for some reason, it was not really able to produce much damage to the wall that was behind the monster. He could only see a small gash appearing there.

‘So that material is stronger than a tier 3 monster’s body? Would it be possible to get those stones over here?’

After noticing the resistance of those walls he wanted to bring them home. If he could create walls made of those materials then he wouldn’t need to worry about most intruders. The spell he created was able to one-shot a tier 3 monster but it was only able to produce a small scratch on the stone wall. There were some of those stone slabs on the ground along with some thinner tiles, the problem was getting them over to his side.

‘Should I send the golems in?’

After thinking it through, he decided to give up on getting those materials for now. There weren’t that many of them laying around there and if a monster appeared his golems would be instantly destroyed. Going in himself was out of the question for now as he wasn’t really sure about traps or hidden enemies.

It was also possible for some kind of monster with camouflaging capabilities to be in that area. Even the Lich he previously saw might have been able to use spells to hide. If he just entered as he was now, death was quite probable. This didn’t mean that he wouldn’t attempt to get monster drops that were close by.

“That one is close by… it might be useful for something…”

There were a few spells that he could use for this matter. Close by he spotted some bones that seemed to belong to the creature's forehand. With the help of a mage hand spell, he was able to ‘float’ his net over to the desired spot and quickly pull on it to get the parts. This allowed him to get this monster drop any perhaps more future loot if he was lucky.

“No, you can’t eat this Agni and I’m not sure you’d be even able to chew through a tier 3 bone…”

Agni was very interested in the skeletal hand. When Roland compared it to his own, the monster's digits were almost twice his length. There were sharp claws at the end that seemed like short knives instead.

“These wouldn’t need that much work… the bone could be sharpened into a blade…”

Only one of the forearm bones made it towards his side with only three fingers. It was quite thick and would probably be able to be made into a blade of a dagger. Roland knew that these sorts of weapons were quite popular with the rogue types. They were very light while still retaining a lot of sharpness.

“This thing should be able to sustain runes too… maybe I should start gathering those bones…”

While the bones would lose some of their durability after the monster's death, they were still around the upper tier 2 level by themselves. There was no reason other than safety for not gathering these. If he managed to get the skulls he could even create masks or helmets that would go for a bit of coin. Making bone armor wasn’t a problem either and the light weight would make it quite popular.

‘Wish the mage hand didn’t have such a short range…’

Roland gave out a sigh while looking at all the large bones that were blown back to the end of the room. Perhaps he needed to come up with some kind of suction spell that would suck the spoils of war toward his direction. Yet he would rather repel all monsters from this opening as he still wasn’t one hundred percent sure that they would be able to come for him.

During his wait, he also needed to produce a chilling effect on the cannon. It tended to overheat quite fast and it was almost impossible to produce more than one shot at a time. After the beam killed the monster he needed to at least wait for two minutes before the second attempt. This cannon was powerful but its use as a weapon was very limited.

However, for the purpose of one-shooting tier 3 monsters in this closed location, it was the perfect tool. There weren’t that many monsters wandering into that small corridor that he was limited to so there was enough time for the weapon to cool itself down. It took another twenty minutes for another skeleton to appear, this one was wearing armor which would make piercing it a bit more problematic.

“Is it Resistium again? At least it's not so good against magical attacks…”

The torrent of magical energy erupted again and connected with the unsuspecting Infernal Skeleton. Even though it tried to react after the beam traveled through the barrier between dungeons, it wasn’t fast enough. The spiraling beam collided with its upper chest area and head before another explosion quaked through the entire area.

‘This feels too easy…’

Roland didn’t know how he should react, within an hour he had leveled up twice. This speed was staggering as he was taking care of boss-level monsters that no one would normally be able to take out themselves.

‘The title appeared a lot faster than usual, do you gain them faster if the monsters out-level you?’

He wasn’t complaining as the title would make things easier, a flat damage buff was always appreciated. Thus the grind continued and hours turned to days and soon close to a week had passed since he had gotten here. The cannon that he had constructed had deteriorated to a sorry state and some of its parts were heavily melted down.

‘I should go back but this has been a giant step in the right direction…’

This was truly something to be happy about. When Roland glanced at his status and the whole ten levels that he gained he was ecstatic. Normally a person that was at his level would need many months and lots of hard work to catch up to this pace. It wouldn’t be unfeasible if he managed to get to his tier 3 class within this year and finally be part of the upper echelon.

“I shouldn’t get ahead of myself… but this method can still be improved, let’s go back home Agni.”

“Awooo!”

The hole in the wall was loosely covered up before he left. It took a while to disassemble the cannon and packing it up was quite the hassle. After the first three levels, the leveling process became slower and he started to reacquire multiple kills. The intervals between the monster encounter was also quite sluggish so he wasn't able to kill more than a handful each day. There weren’t that many of them but still, he was gaining levels fast, this was truly a way to quickly power up.

…

But while the runesmith was making his way towards the exit another scene was playing out not so far away. As if it was waiting for the right moment to emerge a creature made itself known. A boney visage peeked out from behind the corner, it glanced at a spot in the wall that it could not see through.

It slowly traced those flaming eye sockets down to the ground. There it could see parts of its skeletal brethren. It used the large dark staff to poke the bones that were slowly deteriorating. It could sense that the dungeon was reabsorbing these parts back to itself to recover what it had lost.

Finally, it walked towards the small dead end of the corridor where many of its comrades had fallen. There was no enemy, nothing was there besides the empty wall at the end. Even then it raised its staff to produce a green skull made from flames.

The flaming skull made from emerald flames gave out a screech before it flew towards the unsuspecting wall. The collision of condensed magical power caused the whole place to shake and rubble to come down from the ceiling. The whole area was bathed in green flames along with the monster that produced them.

Yet the wall remained there, the skeleton moved closer as if it didn’t want to believe it. The staff that it was holding was used as a regular club as it started repeatedly smacking the wall with no end. Tried it did, but it could not cause any lasting damage to this wall, it was as if it was something forbidden, something that it was not allowed to get through.

Finally, after several minutes it decided to touch the spot that it was attacking. To the creature's surprise, its bony digits were repelled by something. It was a strange feeling that lacked pain but only caused more indignation to arise in its decrepit soul. The flaming eyes that filled its skeletal eye sockets increased in size the more it continued to try.

Yet without seeing any progress even this creature decided to give up. There was something that it was missing. Perhaps if it observed the strange phenomenon more it could decipher its secrets, break it down and then understand it. Thus it returned back to the original spot it was guarding, when the strange mana appeared again it would be there to study it...