Rise of the Living Forge - Chapters 121-122 (Patreon)

The dungeon had changed.

There was no other way to look at it. It had only been a few minutes and a few rooms since they’d started their way back out of the dungeon, but the one they stepped into was most certainly not the one that they’d passed through.

Normally, that wouldn’t have been all too big of an issue. As everyone knew, dungeons were neither alive nor dead. They opened entrances for monsters to enter to collect magical energy from death.

It wasn’t like they were going to wait around to be completely empty before things changed. As long as nothing was in a room, it was liable to shift. There had been reports of some dungeons transforming themselves into mazes once people entered, but those were largely unsubstantiated.

Normally, the worst that happened was that a room looked different and had a new pathway running through it. The way out was still usually there.

That was exactly what had happened. A new tunnel had formed in the rightmost wall that led down, faint orange light glowing from far into its depths.

Fortunately, the exit remained where Arwin remembered it to be, beckoning him and the group onward. He would have taken it. There was just one small problem that was turning his attention more toward the other path – the dead adventurer lying in a heap in the middle of the floor.

And it wasn’t just any dead adventurer. It was a nearly ungeared one. All he had on him was an empty sheath and his street clothes. That definitely wasn’t a good sign. Nobody walked into a dungeon like that.

Arwin knelt beside the man while the others spread out, drawing their weapons and looking around warily, most of their gazes sent toward the exit that the man seemed to have dragged himself from.

“Stabbed from behind,” Arwin said, studying the wound that had dispatched the man. The only wound he had, aside from a red rub line around his neck. It looked like the blow from a large dagger or a short sword, and one that had gone close enough to the heart to give the man time to run, but not enough to save himself.

It also doesn’t help that he ran in the wrong bloody direction. Why’d you go deeper into the dungeon instead of away from it?

“What kind of monster doesn’t eat the person they kill? And where’s his weapon?” Reya asked, her eyes darting around the room. “Did it hear us coming and go into stealth?”

“I don’t think it was a monster that did this,” Rodrick said. He joined Arwin in studying the dead man. “That’s a blade wound. Someone ran him through.”

“Probably why he’s got nothing on him. They took his gear,” Arwin said with disgust.

Reya’s lips curled down, but she didn’t even look slightly surprised at the thought of people killing each other in the dungeon. It probably wasn’t any less brutal than what she’d grown up used to. Anna just looked sad. She shook her head and closed her eyes, muttering a prayer under her breath.

“Scum,” Lillia said.

“He might have run deeper into the dungeon trying to escape,” Arwin said, rising and looking over to the new pathway leading from the room. “But… Olive, didn’t you say it was pretty hard to get in here as a solo adventurer?”

“Yeah,” Olive said. “I had to wait until basically the middle of the night, and even then it was difficult. Took me a day of just standing around like an idiot.”

“Meaning the chances of this guy having actually been on his own are pretty low,” Arwin said.

“Probably,” Olive said.

“His friends could be dead up ahead,” Reya said.

Rodrick knelt by the passage leading toward the distant orange light. “They might have. Or they may have gone this way. Look.”

There was a scuff of blood on the ground that looked like it had come from the bottom of a boot. Someone had definitely headed down the path.

“That was just the one that stepped in his blood. There could be more, and that might belong to the person that killed him, not his allies,” Anna warned.

“Could have been one and the same.” Arwin’s lips pressed thin and he drummed his fingers against the top of his thigh. “Then again, the people that killed him could also be above us somewhere. We no longer know if either path into the dungeon is clear.”

“If there are people from his group left, should we try to help?” Reya asked. “They could be in trouble.”

Arwin nearly said yes on the spot. His throat tightened around the words, strangling them before they could leave. He’d made a promise to himself.

I can’t save everyone.

He certainly couldn’t save the man on the ground before him. There was no way to tell what he’d been thinking. Hell, the man could have betrayed his own group and been put down because of it. He didn’t know.

When he’d been the Hero, he could have charged forward without a care in the world to find out. But that was then. He wasn’t the Hero anymore. Arwin had other responsibilities – a duty to his friends and group to make sure they survived.

His jaw set.

That doesn’t mean I’m going to be a coward. I won’t throw them into a fight they can’t handle, but if there are people fleeing in that direction, we might be able to help them. Any adventurer below Journeyman isn’t going to stand a chance against us. We aren’t full on energy, but aside from my missing greaves, I’d say we’re probably in shape for a fight.

“It’s up to all of you,” Arwin said finally. “I believe we could head down and investigate what happened carefully. If it looks like too big of a threat, we can back out – but it depends on all of you.”

“The blood shows him running in this direction. If people survived, it’s likely they kept going this way,” Rodrick with a nod toward the orange glowing passage. “If they didn’t, then we’re liable to run into whoever did this on the way up. Our chances are actually better if we head in pursuit of possible survivors. We’d have a numbers advantage.”

“Agreed,” Anna said.

“People that kill other adventurers deserve the sword,” Olive said. “I say we hunt them.”

“Hunt seems like an apt word,” Lillia said with a nod. “Rodrick is right. We’re equally as likely to meet the killers either path we go down, so we might as well take a bet that there are others alive and follow after them.”

Reya nodded, and that was that. Arwin summoned his armor back around him and let Verdant Blaze take form in his palms once more.

“In that case, down we go,” Arwin said. “Stay silent. Let me lead – if anyone feels anything at any point, let us know. Finally, if we meet others, I don’t care what the reason is, our lives over theirs. Hear them out, but if they try to attack, show no mercy.”

And then down they went. It was the brightest passage that Arwin had traveled through so far in the dungeon, even though he couldn’t actually tell where the light was coming from. The faint orange glow seemed omnipresent and unchanging.

Sweat started to form on Arwin’s brow as they continued on. It grew warmer the deeper they went. The walls turned craggy and dark, going from grey cobble to a pitch-black glossy obsidian with startling speed.

After around five minutes of travel, Rodrick caught their attention and pointed at his ears, indicating that his enhanced senses had picked up on something. They all fell silent to let him listen, and Arwin moved to the side so he could take the lead.

They set off again a second later. This time they moved even quieter than they had before. The look on Rodrick’s expression didn’t make Arwin particularly optimistic about the chances of any survivors. He certainly wasn’t rushing them down to save anybody, which either meant he was being cautious or there was nobody left to safe.

It was a minute before Arwin started to pick up voices as well. He couldn’t quite tell what they were saying, but their notes echoed through the halls as if to herald their arrival. Heat prickled Arwin’s nostrils and the distant smell of acrid sulfur.

The voices grew louder as they continued and the passageway finally came to an end before a pair of stone doors. A key jutted out from a hole on the door, having already been used to open it. While the door had been opened, the angle they stood at in the tunnel wasn’t quite right to see into the room beyond it.

Coiled on the floor beneath the key were the scraps of a metal necklace– and resting against the door was a short, middled aged woman. Blood trickled down her armor from a deep gash in her neck and her glassy eyes stared lifelessly into the wall.

The necklace looks like it might have been what caused the red line on the previous adventurer’s neck. They ripped it off, maybe? Doesn’t look like this woman got robbed, but whoever did this is definitely in the room beyond these doors.

“…here somewhere,” came the voice of a man from somewhere within the room.

A female voice voiced their agreement. A few seconds passed. Nobody else said anything. That obviously didn’t mean there were only two people in the room, but it was a strong reason to assume there probably weren’t a lot more.

Arwin and the others exchanged one last glance. Nobody gave him any signs of wanting to turn back. They likely outnumbered their opponents. And, even if they didn’t, Arwin was fairly confident in their powers.

He stepped forward and peered through the open door. The room beyond it was nothing like the previous ones that had been in the dungeon. It looked like it had once been a workshop. Strange tools littered the ground and surrounded oddly shaped bricks of metal. Thin rivers of lava ran through grooves in the floor and collected in a pool at the center of the room.

At the back end of the room was a locked chest, and huddled in front of it were two adventurers. A man, easily seven feet tall and clad in heavy black armor covered with sharp spikes stood beside a woman about half his height. She wore plain robes and carried a wooden staff similar to Anna’s.

The woman also had a short sword at her waist. Arwin wasn’t an expert at analyzing deaths, but the blade looked to be just about the right size to have run through the man he’d seen before.

Still… two people, and nobody showed signs of being killed by the big guy. Nobody had massive wounds at all. That means he probably didn’t even fight. That’s odd. I can’t imagine it would be much easier for two-man groups to get down here than four-man groups.

There was only one way to find out. Arwin stepped forward – and a gray blur slammed into him from above, where it had been hidden by the frame of the door. Bands of metal the thickness of his forearms wrapped around his wrists and forced Verdant Blaze from his grip, sending it clattering to the ground.

Magic hummed through them and the woman turned together with the man by her side, cocky grins on both of their faces.

“I told you I heard a rat coming,” the woman said, tapping her staff on the ground.

“I never doubted you,” the armored man replied. “Looks like there’s even more for the two of us. Good thing we don’t have to share anymore.”

Guess that answers the question of if the others were part of their group or not. Doesn’t seem like these idiots have noticed the rest of my team either.

“Any last words, big guy?” the woman asked, nodding to her larger companion as he drew his blade. “I won’t remember them, but he might.”

“Yeah,” Arwin replied, raising his bound wrists to his mouth. Team or not, there was no need to take risks. He took a huge bite out of the shimmering metal, jaws tearing through it like butter. It didn’t taste half as powerful as the magic that had been in the gargoyle he’d eaten. He could eat trash like this all day. Arwin swallowed and took another bite, freeing his hands and sending the rest of metal crashing down by his feet. “Your magic tastes like shit.”

Chapter 122

The woman’s eyes widened in disbelief, but her companion was better prepared. He readied his blade as Arwin charged forward. He heard the others piling into the room behind him, and could see by the flicker of worry on the man’s face that they weren’t ready to fight an entire group their size.

Should have thought about that before trying to kill me.

Arwin skidded to a stop before the man, and a wave of blue light slammed into him as he went to swing his sword. His movements ground to a halt and Arwin moved out of the way, letting the blow pass by him harmlessly before swinging Verdant Blaze.

The large warrior leaned back, just barely managing to avoid the hammer as it whistled through the air. He took a step back and pressed a hand to his sword, sending black fire coursing along its surface.

“Back off,” the man snarled, thrusting the sword for Arwin. A shadow shot out, wrapping around his leg and pulling at it. He stumbled, thrown off balance, and Verdant Blaze slammed into his chest.

Whatever his armor was made of was definitely better than average, because it held up against the blow. He staggered back, coughing in surprise, a new dent in his chestplate. Gritting his teeth, the man charged Arwin again.

His companion pointed her staff at Arwin, preparing to cast magic, but quickly had to abandon the attempt and raise the staff defensively as Rodrick’s sword crashed down for her. It struck her staff violently, sending a tremor through her arms.

“Handle the big idiot,” Rodrick called. “I’ve got this one. Olive will back you up.”

“You’ll need more than one and a half people to kill me,” the large man growled as Olive ran over to join Arwin, her blade resting in a ready position at her side.

“I haven’t heard that one before,” Olive said, her words curt. “We’ll see how that plays out for you.”

The man snorted. He pounded a fist against his chest, sending a wave of black flame rolling across his body and curling up from his shoulders. Energy gathered around him and erupted forth in a brassy roar, slamming into Arwin like a hammer blow.

He staggered, his ears ringing as magical energy wormed its way into his head and took his balance. The world swam before him, and through what little he could tell of the spinning wourld around him, Olive didn’t look to be faring much better.

Even as the black armored man stepped forward and raised his sword to take advantage of their weakness, blue fragments of light fell away from Arwin and his head snapped back into clarity.

He stepped into the other man’s attack, meeting it with a [Scourge] empowered swing of Verdant Blaze. The hammer struck the sword at an angle. Metal rent with a loud shriek and the top half of his blade spun across the room, clattering as it skidded across the ground before coming to a stop against a wall.

A series of muted thud rang out in the distance, but Arwin was too focused to turn his attention to them. Nobody was calling for his help yet, so they were probably doing fine.

The warrior stared at the smoldering remains of his sword in disbelief for just a second, but Arwin hadn’t stopped moving. He carried the momentum of his swing in a full circle, coming back around and sending Verdant Blaze hurtling for the man’s side.

It connected with a loud crack, driving into his chest and sending the larger man staggering. He definitely had some form of defensive skill keeping him alive, but it wasn’t enough to hold against Arwin forever.

His opponent clearly realized that too, because he dove forward and grabbed Verdant Blaze. Instead of keeping him from taking it, Arwin released the hammer. The man yanked it out of his grasp with a victorious laugh.

“Idiot,” he gloated, swinging Verdant Blaze – but the rest of his sentence was lost in a pained scream. White-hot flame erupted from Verdant Blaze, searing into his hands and melting the gauntlets holding it.

He let go, sending the hammer hurtling across the room. Arwin reared back and Verdant Blaze reformed in his grasp mid-swing. It struck the man in the side once more, activating [Shieldbreaker] and ripping through the armor to dig deep into flesh.

The man tumbled to the ground and skidded a foot, blood smearing beneath him. He wheezed, bracing a hand against the ground and pushing himself up – only for Olive’s foot to crash heel first into his helm and slam him back to the ground.

Her blade followed shortly afterward, driving straight through his eye hole and into the stone behind his head.

“Any last words?” Olive asked as she ripped the blade free.

Arwin spun toward Rodrick, but he needn’t have worried. His opponent was dangling upside down from a shadow. Her entire body was a painful-looking smear of blood – and about half of that blood was painted across the wall next to her.

It looked like Lillia had been repeatedly swinging her face first against the stone.

That’s certainly one way to handle a mage. Barely even got a chance to figure out what kind of magic she had other than that first attack. Good. That’s how you deal with mages. If they’re getting time to set their full powers free, you’re doing it wrong.

Arwin took a second to study the rest of the room and make sure there wasn’t anyone else lurking in the darkness before sending a look at Olive. “You stole my lines.”

“Huh?” Olive asked.

“She asked me if I had any last words. That means I’m the one that gets to say that when I kill them.”

“Oh. Sorry. Felt appropriate. If you wanted to use them, you should have said them earlier.”

“Only an idiot taunts an opponent before they’re dead. That’s just asking to lose,” Arwin replied. “Is anyone injured?”

“No,” Rodrick said.

Lillia’s shadow dropped the woman and she landed on her head with a crunch – it hardly mattered. It didn’t look like she’d been alive for some time.

“Nobody important,” Lillia said. “You?”

“Reya took good care of us,” Arwin said, sending the girl an appreciative nod. “Good timing. You’ve gotten really good at that.”

“Does she have a way to remove negative effects?” Olive asked. “I saw you start moving while I was still counting stars, and then I could suddenly move again normally. That’s a great skill. Haven’t run with someone that can do that for others before.”

“Thanks,” Reya said, her cheeks reddening. “I’ve had time to practice. It’s a pretty useful skill.”

“Hey, you can’t…” Arwin nodded vaguely in the direction of the dead adventurers. “You know. With your new ability?”

No point hiding it anymore. Olive has already seen it in the last fight and barely even brought it up.

Reya’s lips curled in distaste and she shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t really want to find out. I have to really try when something dies. It’s kind of like scooping water with your hands. Except it’s your mind, so it isn’t really like your hands. And it’s nothing like water.”

Then that’s not a very good analogy, is it?

“That makes sense,” Olive said with an approving nod. “Probably for the best to avoid sticking your mental hands into other people’s souls. Great way to head down the wrong path.”

Arwin couldn’t argue with that. He walked over to the dead warrior and knelt beside him, prying the armor off his body and snapping the straps holding it in place with [Scourge]. He rifled through the man’s pockets and pulled out a pouch. There was nothing else on him.

“That’s disappointing,” Arwin said as he opened the pouch to look inside it, only finding 32 gold. “Did the woman have anything on her? Any indication as to why they did this? Or was it just pure greed?”

“Nothing,” Lillia said. “Some gold as well, but not much.”

Arwin let out a huff. That didn’t make much sense, considering they’d literally stripped the man they’d left behind. It was possible that had somehow been yet another group, but he doubted it.

“Where’d the first guy’s equipment go?”

“Did they toss it into the lava?” Reya asked, walking toward the bubbling pool in the center of the room. She had to step carefully as she grew close to avoid plunging a foot into one of the thin streams of liquid rock flowing through the ground around it. Reya came to a stop a fair distance away from the center of the pool. “It looks like all the rivers flow out from here, but the pool isn’t completely full.”

Arwin’s eyes traced the rivers. Reya definitely had a point. There were grooves in the stone that had yet to be filled where the rivers had bubbled to a stop, lying in wait. And yet something felt like it was missing. It didn’t really make sense for someone to murder an ally just to throw their equipment into a pool of lava.

“Why wouldn’t they just toss the whole guy in?” Arwin asked. “Or the lady outside? It sounded like they were part of a team that betrayed the first bloke. The three of them were all probably in on it, but then these two betrayed the third one – that or they made her come down here and then left her at the door.”

“It does seem odd that they wouldn’t throw in as much mass as possible if that’s what they’re going for.” Rodrick scratched his chin. “Maybe they don’t want organics in the lava for some reason? It isn’t much of a reach, but I suspect their goal was opening this big hunking chest.”

“Which probably opens when the lava is at the right level,” Arwin concluded as he walked over to join Rodrick. There were several rivers of lava running up to the chest that hadn’t been filled. “Honestly, when I walked in here they looked pretty confused. They were just staring at the chest. They might not have known what they were doing either… but if they decided that sticking armor into the pool was the right move, they must have had a reason why they didn’t put a body in.”

“Would have smelled bad,” Rodrick volunteered. “Could be as simple as that.”

“True,” Arwin said. “Well, I don’t see the reason of coming down here and doing all this shit if we don’t at least try to open the chest. My first thought is to start smashing the shit out of it with my hammer.”

“Of course it is,” Lillia said with a laugh. “Might even work. There aren’t any rules, but it could also damage something inside the chest. We should see if there’s a different way to go about things first.”

That was definitely preferrable. Arwin turned in a slow circle, letting his eyes drift along the room. He had a lot of questions that didn’t look like they were going to get answered.

Why is there a big ole workshop just sitting around in a dungeon? Why did that bloke have a key to enter it? The dungeon must not have just changed at random if he was holding that necklace. He knew it was here – or he had a way to make it show up here.

The answers had to be somewhere in the room – or possibly in the key itself. That was worth checking, but not before they finished looking around. Who knew what fiddling with the key would result in. Arwin didn’t want the room to seal itself shut on them.

He walked over to the pool of lava in the center of the room, his brow furrowed in thought. The puzzle seemed to begin right here.

As Arwin stared down into the bubbling lava, something in his mind shimmered. A faint tingle of energy ran through his body and buzzed at his fingertips.

[Molten Novice] was responding to the lava.