The Runesmith

“We have sent two of the adventurers along with two knights to deliver a message to the adventurer’s guild. Lady Lucille, I’ll have to ask you to remain strong!”

Roland and Robert were to the side and looking at the crystal ball. In it was Lord Percival who was now talking with Lady Lucille. Two days have passed since they had become trapped in this series of underground caverns.

They were all now before a hidden door that could lead into another trapped room. From what his mapping device told him, it looked to be quite an open space. It was even larger than what this device could show him.

From his previous experiences, it could mean a few things. One it would be similar to the Troglodyte cavern. When they entered the doors would close and monsters would start piling on top of them.

The second option was a more tame one. It could very well just be the exit into the larger volcanic dungeon. The large space that he could not map fully could be the lower dungeon. He did not believe that this was the case, as it would be far too easy.

It could also be a room filled with more traps, maybe some puzzles, and then finally the thing that he was afraid of the most, a hidden boss chamber. He only had two party members that he was not very familiar with.

They have also sheltered nobles that didn’t have experience in fighting against monsters bigger and stronger than they were. Even though Robert had trained in a similar way as he did, there was a difference in fighting goblins than large hobgoblins that out leveled a person.

“Thank you, Lord Percival, tell Charlene that I’m doing fine.”

After a bit, the magic sphere went out and the talk was over. Lucille didn’t disclose much after Roland asked her not to tell the noble commander that they were moving deeper into the dungeon.

“Are you sure it was the right thing to do, Sir. Wayland?”

“It’s better to not make them worry, they can’t really help us here and the rescue party won’t be arriving for at least a few more days…”

Lucille was not a person that liked to lie. He had to convince her that it would be unwise to make her friends worry, after this, she changed her tune. Roland felt bad about using a person that had a more rosy outlook on life like this girl but he needed to look at his own wellbeing.

“Lord Percival would have told us to return if he knew, I think you made the right decision Lady Lucille.”

It seemed that Robert on the other hand saw it his way. He wasn’t sure what his reason for it was though. More than likely he just didn’t think that sitting around and twiddling their thumbs would help with anything. He had always been quite headstrong and someone that pushed on forward even when many things got in his way.

“What do you think is past that door, Sir. Wayland?”

“It could be another trapped room…”

Roland was a bit suspicious about this place as after entering these corridors they had not come across any type of monster.

“Can your device ascertain such a thing?”

Lucille asked while glancing at Roland's orb that she did previously get the chance to use.

“Regretfully no, but I’ve been meaning to add that function.”

This item was still a work in progress, getting it to detect monsters and other living beings was the most he could do for now. He had used part of the golem code that he had bought not that long ago.

The golems came with a function of recognizing people, animals, and monsters and that’s why his device could do it as well. To come up with a trap analyzer he would need to be a bit more original but with the help of some of these new runic books that he studied recently he had been given some new ideas.

“I won’t lie to you, I have no idea what could be behind that door, it could be a swarm of volcanic monsters, or maybe just a room filled with treasure. We won’t know until we enter it and I won’t force you to come with me.”

He wanted to move forward as waiting for other people to help him was not really his style. Depending on others was something that Roland did not enjoy. Even though there was a noble lady here that everyone wanted to save, this didn’t mean that he would be helped.

The rescue party could very well climb down and only take Lucille with them. Then Robert would be next in line while he, a regular adventurer could very well be used as an expendable resource. They could even say that he died down in the cave and not bother with him. Thus he would rather try his luck in these unknown caves. His high level and gear gave him some confidence in being able to survive.

“Sir. Robert… what do you think we should do…”

Lucille looked to her knight, if she told him to stay he would stay. It seemed that Robert did not know how to go against people in a higher position than he was. He just looked at Lucille with a confused look without knowing how to answer.

“If Lady Lucile thinks that we should wait, then I will remain with her here!”

Roland wondered if the years of subservience to his father had shaped Robert to be the perfect soldier. Which was the one that didn’t ask questions and followed orders while striving to be stronger.

The girl pouted slightly after seeing that Robert wouldn’t give her a straight answer. He was probably unsure which option was the safer one.

“Sir. Wayland, you’ll continue without us if we stay behind?”

“Yes, I think that this should lead to some kind of exit, the dungeon monsters should not pose a big threat to us.”

They were all at the tier 2 level and the lack of tier 3 monsters was well documented. Even monsters above the hundredth level were quite rare. With his prestigious class and an assortment of runic weapons, Roland did not think that he would suffer a defeat.

“I think… we should follow Sir Wayland, he seems to know this dungeon. We would have already been dead if he wasn’t here in the first place!”

The blue-haired lady proclaimed while looking at Roland with those big eyes. He was taken aback by how much faith this girl was putting in him. They met about a week ago and now he was trusting him with her life. If the roles were reversed he wasn’t sure if he could do the same.

Roland nodded while feeling a bit of pressure being put on his shoulders. This girl was putting her trust into him and even his older brother that liked to bully him in their youth was somewhat doing the same. Even though he was putting on airs, if he really didn’t trust him he would probably say it. Endangering the noble lady that he fancied would come first.

“Okay, check your equipment before going in, there could be monsters inside, the area is suspiciously spacious.”

Roland had his arming sword on his hip and the magical rod. He also possessed various spell scrolls and his magical armor. Robert was limited to the shield that he borrowed from his younger brother and an enchanted longsword.

While they were talking yesterday, to break the silence he had asked his older brother to show him his sword. Regretfully the enchantment on it was not a runic one so he could not enhance it. It had the usual sharpening enchantment on it which would have to be enough.

Lucille only had her smaller magical rod along with some magical trinkets that enhanced her mana regeneration and spell potency. She would remain in the back with Agni as her role was backline support. Robert would be in the very front along with Roland that would also use some spells to aid him.

“Let’s go!”

The three humans nodded at each other while the only wolf in the party wiggled his tail. Robert pushed the door open and all of them glanced inside.

The cavern was large with a lot of similar rock formations everywhere. There didn’t seem to be any small openings in the walls through where the bug creatures could crawl from. There were also no lava pools through which lava-resistant ones like the volcanic salamander could go through either.

It was a wide area with quite the high ceiling, it was actually hard for them to see it.

‘Doesn't look that anything is in here?’

Roland thought to himself while they all inched inside. He even threw a sizable rock as far as he could to see if any traps or monsters would react. There was nothing here so the party advanced while looking around.

“Look, Sir Wayland.”

Lucille pointed into the distance. There they all saw a larger closed gate, it was clearly the only way that was leading out of this large chamber. Roland could also not spot any secret doors but his debugging skill had a limited range so he would have to examine them quite closely.

“Is there really nothing here?”

Robert asked while they all slowly moved towards that large gate. Roland also didn’t like it, it seemed strange for nothing to be here. Unless someone cleared this room out there should be a trap or some monster to beat for them to advance.

“I’ve read that some Dungeons have dummy rooms! They expand too fast and can’t always fill them with traps or monsters, maybe this is one of those?”

Lucille added some of the knowledge that she learned at the academy. Without seeing anything out of the ordinary Roland would have to agree to this theory. Even after getting to the middle of the room and arriving at the larger gate, nothing was happening.

“Is it fine to open?”

Robert asked while glancing towards Roland and Lucille.

“I can feel magic around this area but that could just be the dungeon…”

It was hard to make out magical traps in dungeons that were created through magic as well. Only when a trap was obvious, or when people had specialized skills for magic trap detection would they be alerted to them.

Roland used his ball to scan what was further inside but this time around he was getting a lot of interference. It seemed that this door was blocking his sphere from scanning what was behind it.

Robert slowly pulled on the large chain that was attached to the door while Lucille prepared a spell. A monster could be waiting for them on the other side and with nowhere else to go they needed to open this large door.

The door was about four meters in height and quite wide as well. Even Robert with his tier 2 strength had problems in pulling this door open.

“Hey… watch out!”

As the gap in the door opened wider Roland saw something. An elongated hand with four claw-like fingers extended while trying to claw whoever was there. Robert was lucky that he was opening the door while protecting his body with it at the same time.

Roland was quick to fire off an ice arrow spell that connected with this hand. Robert quickly closed the door by pushing on it which caused the now frozen monster hand to snap and fall to the ground.

“What was that?”

Lucille lost her composure slightly but luckily they had Roland to pick up the slack.

“Why are those monsters so close to the door…”

Roland asked while finding this dungeon area a bit odd. Soon he would have his answer as after closing the door they heard some kind of strange sound. This sound was coming from above, it was as if something was falling down.

Then with a resounding roar it appeared, a monster fell down from the high ceiling as if it was some kind of trap waiting to be triggered.

The creature was quite large as well and was somewhat similar to a theropod. It had dark red scales covering its body. Two rows of dark blue, bony plates running along its back, going from the eyes to the tail.

It had a large mouth, very similar to the popular predator from the Jurassic world. The main feature of this dinosaur-like monster was its huge, sword-like tail. The moment it landed it started swinging it around while trying to home in on its prey. This would be the blue-haired noble lady that at this moment was the closest person to it.

“My lady, get behind me!”

Robert shouted out loud while also tapping his shield with his sword. This was enough to move the attention from the panicking ice mage. The monster gave out another loud scream as it charged towards its new target. Each time its large feet took a step the whole cavern rumbled and pebbles rained down on them.

Roland was not far behind, while the monster took the bait he activated his magical rod. It gave out a chilling sensation before a large ball of ice was created. This ball traveled at high velocity and collided with the large monster’s side.

Crystals of ice started to appear on the monster the moment this spell connected. The monster turned its large T-rex looking head towards Roland while stopping its advance. Lucille had since recovered her composure and followed Roland’s example by hitting the monster with one of her own ice spells.

“Frost ball!”

They were lucky enough to be on the other side of the room as the beast fell right into the middle. Roland circled around it from one side while Lucille along with Robert stayed on the other. Both of the magic casters utilized their freezing spells to slow down this dinosaur-looking monster.

Just like the other creatures in this dungeon, it didn’t seem to be able to contend with the cold. Most of these monsters were cold-blooded, this meant that their temperature varied depending on the environment they were in.

They required high temperatures to make their bodies operate. If these temperatures dropped for some reason these creatures would start to slow down. Their metabolism would be halted and they would go into something similar to a coma or winter sleep. At that point, it would be easy to kill even a big creature like this that was unable to move.

“It’s working!”

A cone of snow along with sharp ice crystals was released by Lucille as she followed Roland’s instructions. The monster was slowing down but it was also able to take quite some of this freezing energy. The icicles that would normally shred any normal skin were just bouncing off the Xornotaurus’ hard plate-covered body.

Roland could also see it, without the freezing advantage it would be hard to damage this monster. It out-leveled everyone here and it was even armored. Their swords would have a hard time piercing down to the fleshy bits. After freezing it, on the other hand, they would probably be able to jab them through its eye sockets to get to the brain.

It was a bit strange that this monster appeared after they opened and then closed the door. Roland could only attribute this to the way they entered here. It almost seemed like they were going through a dungeon in reverse.

That would explain why there were monsters in close proximity to the boss chamber. They were probably meant to kill them from the other side before going inside of here. Then the monster would come out after they closed the door.

If they had that knowledge beforehand it might have been better to not close that door. The monsters on the other side didn’t seem to be as strong as this one here. Luckily they had two ice mages working on disabling this monster and it seemed to be over.

Roland shivered slightly while looking at the giant ice statue before him. Most of this monster’s body was covered in ice with just a part of its head sticking out. Its eyes were now closed and it was not moving.

“Did we do it?”

“Good job Lady Lucille!”

Robert and Lucille rejoiced while Roland slowly moved closer. He was the furthest from the creature while his brother and Lucille were a lot closer.

“Hey, what are you doing? Quickly kill it!”

Roland shouted as he felt something, this was all somewhat too easy. Was putting this monster on ice enough to kill it? He shouted at Robert to deliver the killing blow as he was too far away to sink his blade between those armored plates.

Then before Robert could realize, the monster opened its eyes and gave out a strange high-pitched screech. The whole party had to cover their ears while backing away.

“Argh… what is it doing?”

His vision became blurry for a moment and when he looked up he could see a big cloud of steam. The monster started glowing red with energy and the ice it was covered in started to thaw.

Soon it burst free, now covered in red lava-like energy that slowly dripped down those thick-looking plates. The sword on its tail was ignited as it swung it towards the ground. This attack after connecting with the hard rock sent a barrage of flaming earth straight at Roland who quickly activated a magical shield to protect himself.

It didn’t seem that the battle was over yet, it had only just begun...