Published at 16th of February 2024 2:24 pm

Chapter 2.42. It's Raining Slimes

This chapter is updated by JustRead.pl

The airship departed from the university’s docks at first light. After preparing the party and all the necessary brews, Nox spent the night on campus with Aria. They caught each other up on everything they had learned and experienced over the last couple of days. Several students had jumped at the opportunity to help the city with relief efforts or combat support on the walls. Almost just as many had fled on airships or sent messages to their families, requesting a vessel out of the city. Panic dominated minds and hearts.

All alchemists in the university were working overtime, creating recovery products, bombs, and similar mass destruction products. Apparently, the university and city had commissioned obnoxious quantities of them and sent identical requests to all brewers. Nox expected such an outcome and repurposed the cosmetics workshop for such products. The contract wouldn’t pay much, but Nox believed favor with the city council was worth just as much.

Several healers had commented on the value and power of his sterilization concoction during the relief efforts. Nox instructed Aisha to produce it in bulk. Word would spread before long, and he was sure the city would also request them. Disease and infection caused the most deaths in war and disaster zones, after all.

Lillin slept over at Pudge’s apartment—the university had upgraded his accommodations, and the Woodsons spent the night with their grandmother. None of them had to travel far to report for their transport on time.

Meanwhile, Joey already lived on campus and met them with the other party at the docks. He knew them from Intermediate Dungeon Combat and lived in the same building as them. Apparently, the party of primarily commoners—children of artisans and aether warriors serving local nobility—was the best in the course and had achieved their journeyman licenses in record time. The university had high hopes for them.

As Nox greeted the teenagers, he hoped the professors’ confidence in them wasn’t misplaced. Delvers regularly fell—it had the greatest fatality rates of all mage professions—but Nox didn’t want such fate to befall individuals so fresh-faced and young. It was wartime, and no one was safe. All the rifts spawned by Terrastalia were on the higher end of Journeyman or stronger. Meanwhile, the party had primarily challenged rifts with an orange danger level and a handful radiating solid-yellow—mid journeyman.

“So, no Michelle or Ernest ever again.” Caitlin sighed as the vessel took off. “I’m going to miss her.”

“We might’ve been too selfish and harsh with the pair of them,” Nox said. “Leaving the party and the university will be just as hard for them as it is for us. Let's organize a nice send-off for them once—” Nox paused as the airship gained enough altitude to see beyond the city walls. Distant monster hordes dotted the landscape. The groups ranged from clusters a dozen or two strong to masses so numerous and dense Nox struggled to tell where one beast ended and the next began. “Once things calm down some. They deserve as much, given everything they’ve done for me and the party.”

“I suppose so,” she replied. “They’re both lovely, and I haven’t known them long, but Michelle has been an excellent friend to me. My reaction to their news wasn’t the best, and I feel guilty, I suppose.”

“I’m sure Michelle will understand if you talk to her. She’s scared of losing you as well.”

Terrastalia had dented the countryside where he appeared and created vast craters with every footstep. His presence forever changed the landscape, making stone splinters several stories tall. The airship headed in the general vicinity of the titan’s trail.

Instead of making a beeline for its destination, the vessel zigged and zagged in the general direction. The airship angled toward the rare myconid clusters. Then Alexander dropped flame-slime-carrying squirrels on them. The agile clitters glided to ground level before seeking out the myconid colony’s leader and shattering their flasks. Hordes with more agile variants also received a second squirrel. They carried smoke screens or frost essence orbs scribed with the Freezing Mist spell. The myconids struggled with the cold. Ice and frigid temperatures won Alexander’s summons enough time to complete their jobs.

The two delving parties and the airship’s crew had to spend several minutes culling a horde to gain access to the first rift. Even then, landing proved impossible. The ship hovered, letting the younger party leap into nearby trees. Nox covered them with bombs made of fire essence glass as they fled into the rift. The mana radiating from the spatial anomaly often attracted dungeon-born beasts. They were realms competing with their creators’ domain, after all. Challenging and destroying them would make the creatures more powerful and could even help them ascend to godhood if they claimed the realm instead of letting it collapse. However, penetrating the rift’s energy appeared more difficult for the dungeonborn than strolling into an enemy god’s domain.

If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

“Was it this bad when you went north?” Caitlin asked as they bombarded another myconid colony. It was the smallest horde they had encountered so far but it had the most prominent leader and an entire retinue of elite royal guards. A black, slimy trail lingered behind them as the myconids ambled toward the city.

“No,” Nox replied. “Terrastalia only dropped beasts occasionally during his journey. Perhaps a couple of colonies every day? It looks like the dungeon expelled several dungeon-worth of beasts.”

“Grandmother thinks someone is manipulating and controlling Terrastalia or hurting him using the dungeons on his back,” Alexander added. “I don’t know if you noticed, but his body had fresh cracks, and tar-like sludge covered his legs.”

“Did your grandmother's druid senses tell her anything?” Nox asked. He had heard that Dean Woodson had empathic powers. It worked primarily on non-humans and magical beings. He wondered if she had the ability to confirm Kris’ hypothesis. A clandestine organization or mage capable of manipulating a titan and high-expert dungeon was indeed more terrifying than the Imperium.

“She felt Terrastalia’s pain,” Caitlin replied. “Something or someone is torturing him.”

“I felt something, too.” Lillin kept her eyes focused on the struggling myconids as the airship moved on. Her gravity orbs didn’t last long once out of her mana zone. She had dropped a couple to keep the beasts from fleeing the slimes and tracked how long the spheres took to fade. “It wasn’t just whatever magic brought Terrastalia here. His pain is older and has been plaguing him for quite a while.”

“It must be a cult,” Nox stated. “What else could have the resources to summon a blighted titan, torture it, and make the dungeons overflow?”

“A god,” Lillin said. “If given enough time to gather power, an archon dungeon lord like my mother could pull off such a feat.”

“What?!” Joey exclaimed. His eyes widened as he backpedaled. “You’re a dungeon born?”

“Oops.” Lillin flashed an embarrassed grin. “I forgot about you.”

“You knew?” Joey asked, looking at Caitlin.

“I’m sorry,” the Woodson woman replied. She kept him from retreating further. “She’s been with Nox for almost twenty years now. We can trust her.”

“What’s stopping her from—”

“Lillin and I have a contract,” Nox interrupted. It was then he realized that Joey and Caitlin had spent most of the voyage glued to each other’s side. Their intertwined fingers suggested their relationship was more than platonic. Both had proven themselves as highly private individuals. It wouldn’t surprise him if they started a romance and then kept it a secret. “She won’t hurt you as long as you don’t mean her or me any ill will. I trust Lillin with my life; she has better judgment than most people—about people and dungeons, at least.”

“Almost two decades?” Joey thoughtfully glanced between Nox and Annabelle. “That would mean you were born in Sundarshahar?”

“I was created during the godfall and gained sentience moments before meeting Nox,” Lillin said. “We’ve been together ever since.”

“You betrayed your creator?” Joey asked. “How is that even possible?”

“Didn’t they cover the topic in Intermediate Dungeon Theory? I’m an anomaly. A freak among my kind.”

“Which is?”

“I was a mimic. I don’t know what I am now.”

“That explains your odd magic.” He opened his mouth to say more but hesitated when Caitlin squeezed his arm. Joey looked into her eyes momentarily as she mouthed a couple of words. Then, he nodded. “Any enemy of Sundarshahar is a friend of mine. It doesn’t matter where you came from, Lillin. Given everything I’ve learned about djinn magic and the authority’s thoughts about its sources, I should understand you better than most.”

“That’s right,” Nox said. “We’re all a bunch of oddballs or freaks.” He paused, chuckling. “Actually, that’s no longer true without the Beauforts, is it? You, Woodsons, are as normal as they come. Bonded with Ygg and contracted to Ratotaskr. You might as well be royalty among peasants.”

“Please don’t go there,” Caitlin begged. “We’ve had to deal with that nonsense for most of our lives. I don’t think we can stay in the party if you start with that nonsense, too.”

“I’m only kidding. Despite your power and affiliations, you choose to group with the likes of us. That makes you the greatest oddballs to have ever existed.”

The party’s destined rift sat inside one of the craters left behind by Terrastalia. No beasts awaited them. Instead, black stained the ground around the spatial anomaly, radiating a shade closer to green than yellow. Either Kris had undersold the danger level, or the rift had grown more potent since the diviners last checked on it. Both possibilities concerned Nox. Even though Caitlin and Alexander were excellent delvers, he didn’t have enough experience with them. The pair lacked Ernest and Michelle’s years of experience, too. Joey only added another complication. Nox double-checked his equipment and everyone’s store of delving supplies before entering the almost-adept-ranked rift.

Share