Blood started pooling below Quint’s knees as the man couldn’t stay up. Mirgia assessed the situation as quickly as he could. The wound was deep but he could still live. Despite the feeling that something was off about Danil, this extreme betrayal shocked Mirgia to his core. He leapt at the priest, pulling his dagger out of its sheath as he did so. Danil took a step to the side and looked at the ground below him. “It’s not enough,” he growled, turning to Mirgia with the bloodied dagger still in his hand. “Two will do the trick.”
“What the hell are you doing?” Mirgia yelled. “What’s wrong with you?”
“Don’t you understand? The ritual needs blood to be completed. The wisdom and history hidden beyond this chamber are beyond the comprehension of modern people. This isn’t a temple from Venoria, it belonged to their enemies.”
Mirgia’s knowledge of history was too narrow to understand what that meant. “What’s that have to do with stabbing your allies?” Mirgia’s brain was working overtime, but the confusion of the moment prevented him from thinking straight and the priest’s comments only served to distract him.
Danil laughed. “Come on now, elf, we’ve only known each other for several hours, you’d think we’d be attached that quickly?” A wicked smile stayed on his face, hinting at something unnatural.
Mirgia’s face turned dark. “Fine, I’ll take care of your betrayal and then deal with your little friends.” He wasn’t one to turn angry quickly but on top of Quint being a trusted ally despite their short journey with each other, he’d also gotten quite fond of the young man, and the fact that Quint helped Danil climb up here only to be rewarded with a knife to the chest fueled an anger in Mirgia’s stomach that he hadn’t felt before. Danil’s dagger lunged at him and without hesitation Mirgia blocked it with his left arm, feeling the blade plunge into the flesh of his forearm. He grimaced but ignored it, instead bringing up his own knife and slashing Danil’s throat. A clean cut driven by years of cleanly culling hunted animals and the man staggered backwards. Mirgia pulled the dagger out of his arm and tossed it away. Danil looked at him and tried to speak, but his windpipe was too damaged. Blood poured out of the wound and instead of looking angry or scared, Danil just laughed. Mirgia could just barely hear the man’s last words.
“Two will do the trick.” Then he collapsed. Mirgia panted heavily and looked at his surroundings. Danil was dead, Quint was badly hurt and the insectoid creature was being held back by his companions at the bottom of the platform. Blood started spreading on top of the platform into a neat circle. Mirgia cursed. Carved into the platform was one of those magic circles they saw on Triban Island. Worried he’d be teleported away again, he grabbed Quint and jumped down the platforms as carefully as possible, leaving Quint on one of the higher ones to keep him safe from the creature as much as possible. He looked over the edge at the rest of the party. The priest called Masahi was near the back of the party, doing her best to support the others. He looked for Sereh. She was sitting next to Doroly, still healing her arm. “Sereh, I need you up here, Quint is badly wounded.”
She looked up at Mirgia and nodded. With a loud yell, Mirgia jumped off the platform and landed on top of the insectoid creature, driving his dagger into its shoulder. The creature screeched and threw Mirgia off to the side. The wound on his arm was throbbing quite badly and he felt unsteady on his feet from losing so much blood, but he did his best to push through it. He needed to deal with the creature quickly or Sereh wouldn’t be able to heal Quint. Luckily he wasn’t alone, as both Festar and Krashid showed off their years of experience as dungeon delvers. While Krashid put the pressure on the creature by repeatedly bashing it with the spiky shield he’d created, Festar darted around it, slashing and stabbing at any weak point he could find. This seemed to eventually wear down the creature to the point that was weak enough for Krashid to take his sword and drive it through the creature’s neck, killing it on the spot. As the creature collapsed, the room went awfully quiet. The only remaining sound was the dripping of blood from the top of the platform. Interrupting this quiet was a loud hum that turned into a whine as the top of the central platform lit up.
Sounding like the whirring of gears in a way Mirgia had never heard before, the piercing sound penetrated his head and immediately caused him pain. He looked around after a moment and saw that everyone else was equally affected. Sereh was clutching her head while sitting over Quint’s unmoving body while the rest of the party had fallen to the ground. Mirgia forced himself to push through the pain and look at the central platform. He was too far away now to get to it, and with his arm hurt he couldn’t make the climb anyway. The lit up platform spun around rapidly, shaking off all of the blood it hadn’t absorbed before stopping and after a moment of seemingly hanging there, it violently pushed down into the floor, until the platform was about a meter below the sandy ground. As sand started flowing towards it to cover it up, it seemed to have done whatever it set out to do. Silence filled the room again and Mirgia’s wits slowly came back to him.

As if to add chaos upon chaos, before Mirgia even figured out what to do about the remaining priestess, the secondary party entered the room through the door next to the one Mirgia and party had come in through. It would be more accurate to say they came spilling out of it, as something seemed to be chasing them. Mirgia cursed. It was another one of those insectoid creatures. This confirmed his fear that there was indeed more than one of these creatures. But now wasn’t the time to think about that, as the second group looked to be in disarray. Wounded spread out to the side while those still unhurt turned to face the charging creature. Mirgia saw Salandi take the lead of the group that he now noticed had also gotten smaller. He wondered if the worst had come to pass for their group as well. Having the creature surrounded in an open space, they didn’t take long to dispose of it but not before one of the priests was slashed through his torso and fell to the ground, unmoving. Mirgia winced at the sight. “Quick, get a healer over there,” he yelled.
Masahi darted over to her fellow priest and started attending to him while Mirgia made his way up the platforms to where Quint was. This was a painful endeavor and by the time he got to the two adventurers he had lost quite a bit of blood.
“Is he?” He didn’t finish his sentence as Sereh’s face told him everything. Quint was no longer moving.
“I’m sorry,” Sereh said through tears.
Mirgia put his hand on her shoulder. “It’s not your fault, if it is anyone’s fault, it’s mine. I was the closest to them but I got distracted.” He knew it was his fault. He had a bad feeling about the priest all day long but refused to acknowledge it.
She looked at Mirgia’s shoulder. “Let me try and heal that,” she said. As she started working on his arm, Mirgia was still in awe of her healing magic. Most healers were priests, but Sereh was using natural magic in combination with herbalism to achieve similar effects. It wasn’t as potent as a trained priest, but it was far more difficult to pull off and thus very impressive.
“What happened up here?” She asked.
“Danil went crazy and attacked both of us. He’s dead on the central platform. He was trying to fill the magic circle with blood or something.” Mirgia looked over the edge of the platform. Danil was gone. “Shit,” he cursed. Did he run away in the chaos? Mirgia thought to himself. It was possible, but he stabbed him pretty deep, so just walking away was unlikely. Besides, he couldn’t have gotten far enough yet and there was no trail of blood. One thing at a time.
“Why would he do that?” Sereh asked.
“I have no clue, but it’s going to haunt me for years to come, that’s for sure.” He moved his arm after she finished. “It’s still very hurt, I’ve only sped up the natural healing process of the wound. Effectively that means it has stopped bleeding and some of the surface tissue has connected again. The majority of the damage is still there and will take time to heal, but any immediate danger has been averted.”
“Thank you.” Mirgia smiled, although it came with difficulty. “Let’s go meet up with the rest down there and figure out what to do.”
Once down to the ground, Mirgia immediately pulled Salandi aside. The woman was panting from the exertion but looked otherwise unhurt. “What’s wrong?” She asked him.
“The leader of those priests turned crazy and killed Quint, we need to be very careful about what we’re doing next. I’m hurt right now, can you take the lead of the remaining group for the time being?”
She nodded. “I will sort things out until I get everyone’s story straight, that includes yours.”
Mirgia nodded. “Of course, thank you.” He fell down onto the ground and stared off into the distance while Salandi started rounding people up, being careful not to give away too much. After gathering everyone, she asked Mirgia to tell the entire group what happened between him and Danil as well as Quint’s fate.

The tunnel was definitely going in circles, although due to the slight slope, Mirgia figured this place was functioning like a sort of spiral staircase, and they were going down deeper into the ground. He’d accepted by now that this place made very little sense as a structure, and there must be some strange magic involved. Still, the eerie descent was taking its toll on the party and there was a nervousness in the air that Mirgia did not appreciate. He was walking next to Doroly, with Kimi not far behind him. The priest had taken the lead and seemed to be faring better, almost excited for what came next. Quint hung back for a bit to talk to Mirgia. “You alright?” He asked him.
Mirgia smiled. “I’m fine, how are you doing?”
“I’ve been better,” he admitted. “We’re all tense and because things have been so strange ever since we came in here, it’s been difficult. When we entered the dungeon it was just a small group of us.” He sighed. “But now we’ve failed once, some are in another group and we’ve been joined by several others. Everything feels very wrong now.”
Mirgia agreed. “We’re all here for the same reason and that’s something we can take solace in, but you’re right, everything’s changed from when we entered and that’s caused tension. Perhaps there is a magic here that’s similar to what we experienced in that cursed room, and that’s the reason we feel so off.”
That seemed to make sense to Quint and it gave him a little bit more confidence. The timing was perfect as Danil at the front halted the group, claiming he saw something. Quint and Festar moved to the front, getting ready to deal with whatever came next. The thing that Danil had spotted wasn’t dangerous on its own, but it was light, and light often meant there was something or someone there. Mirgia came towards the front as well but stayed a little bit behind Quint and Festar. A quick exchange between the two adventurers followed before Festar put a hood over his head and started moving forward as quietly as possible. Everyone else waited with bated breath while the seasoned Sahalid adventurer scouted ahead. They’d agreed on this beforehand, to avoid another situation where an entire group would get caught out by magic. It took about three minutes for Festar to return, but it felt like it took much longer. He looked worried when he returned and quickly shared what he found with the rest of the group.
“There’s a room ahead of us with two other entrances and there’s a strange insectoid creature in it.”
Doroly and Mirgia exchanged a look. “Did it seem wounded?”
“No? Why do you ask?”
“We fought one of those when it came running out of the dungeon the other day, before we went after you. We didn’t manage to kill it, but we chased it off, back into the dungeon. If you’re certain it wasn’t wounded, that means there are more of them.”
Festar thought for a second before shaking his head. “I’m not fully certain, I only looked at it for a little bit and didn’t get too close. It could be wounded and I just didn’t notice it.”
“Hmm, this worries me,” Cobal said.
“Well, we can take on a single creature with the group we have without problems,” Danil said confidently. “We have our lady’s protection and several very capable adventurers after all and between you and me, in a fight I’m putting more faith in the second part of that.” He smiled. “Are we all ready?”

The room they entered was far grander than any description Festar had made of it. It reminded Mirgia of a coliseum of sorts, as if it were prepared for large fights. The entire floor was covered in a layer of sand, not the red sand you would find above ground in the village of Redsan, but normal looking sand you would find in any other place. In the center of the room were several raised circular platforms that looked to be of different sizes. As Festar had told them, a secondary entrance was several meters to the right of where they had entered and a third was all the way at the back of the chamber. The entire thing must be at least a hundred meters across, Mirgia thought to himself. The ceiling was high up and difficult to see, as the light sources seemed to be focused on the circular platforms and nowhere else, making it difficult to see the insectoid creature that was lurking towards the back of the room as well. It let out a shriek when the party entered, but didn’t immediately charge at them. Perhaps it is the creature from the other day and it’s on edge because we wounded it, Mirgia thought to himself. He readied his bow and took an arrow between his fingertips. This space was wide enough that he could use his bow efficiently and that gave him confidence. With a few words, Priest Danil lifted up several lights that flew around him as if they were miniature orbs with owl wings, an evocative sight for sure. He sent several of them flying throughout the room to illuminate the darkest corners, with one of them being sent towards the insectoid creature. The creature swiped at it with its sharp claws but didn’t seem to be able to do anything at it. “It seems distracted for the time being,” Danil said, “I suggest that we keep it distracted while I explore those platforms. I think they might be important.”
Mirgia nodded. “I’ll come with you, if I’m up on those platforms I’ll have a better angle at the creature if I need to help fight it.” He looked at Quint. “You with me?”
Danil looked like he wanted to argue but didn’t end up saying anything. The feeling of mistrust was still in the back of Mirgia’s head and it was getting stronger. There was something going on here. He ignored it, there were more pressing matters.
“I can cloak the three of you, so you are slightly less perceivable,” Sereh offered.
“That would be a big help.”
Sereh reached into the sand and pulled up a handful before blowing it towards the three. A strange veil of sand covered them, making them harder to distinguish when among the sand. “Go, this spell only lasts for a few minutes.”
Mirgia didn’t have to hear that twice and immediately started making his way towards the platforms. There were a total of nine platforms, each at a different height from the others. Upon somewhat closer inspection, they almost seemed to function as circular stairs, with the tallest of the nine being at the center of the other eight. Both Quint and Mirgia were much more nimble than the priest, but the trio supported each other as they made their way up the platforms. While waiting for Quint to pull Danil up, Mirgia looked at the creature, who was now clashing with Festar and Doroly. They were holding it off alright, but they weren’t making much ground. Focusing his attention back on his own job, he inspected the platform he was on. They were about halfway around the circular pattern and so far they only looked like simple platforms that didn’t have any other function. He worried that the main thing they were looking for was hidden at the top of the central pillar. “I’ll scout ahead, you help Danil up,” He said to Quint before hopping from platform to platform. The distance between them seemed to be getting bigger and he wondered if the priest would even be able to make it all the way to the top. He got distracted by a yelp and saw that Doroly was clutching her arm, blood gushing from a wound. She cursed and stepped back, with Krashid taking his spot. The priestly mage had turned some of the sand into this large shield with spikes on it and used it to keep the creature at bay. Kimi started playing a tune to calm everyone down and boost their focus while Sereh started to heal the wound on Doroly’s arm. Mirgia took his bow out and nocked an arrow, aiming it at the creature. It was highly doubtful he could hurt it from his current position, but at least it might give the others some advantage. They were high up enough that they no longer needed to be quiet. He let his arrow fly and hit the creature square in the side, although the arrow bounced off of the hardened plates that formed its exoskeleton. The creature spun its head in Mirgia’s direction and let out a loud screech before dashing in his direction. “Shit.” Mirgia spun around and looked at Quint and Danil, who had already moved past him and were jumping to the center platform. “Best hurry, I think I angered the creature.”
“What did you do that for?” Quint yelled.
“I just wanted to give the others some room to breathe, I didn’t think it would come charging straight at us.” He wondered if this meant the creature was guarding whatever they would find at the center of the room. Mirgia took out another arrow and aimed carefully, letting it fly as the creature took a stride, hitting it in the chest this time. It seemed to push through some of the exterior and it made the creature more cautious, but it still headed towards the platform, with the other members of their group running after it to try and stop it. He slung his bow over his back and jumped the final few platforms, his elven reflexes making it much quicker than the other two. He got to the final step and jumped to the center of the platforms, just in time to watch as Danil plunged a dagger right into Quint’s chest.

“It looks like this doesn’t connect to the tunnel,” Doroly remarked.
They were stumped by the sudden end to the tunnel. It made very little sense that such an elaborate magical trap was set up to block a dead end tunnel, so there had to be more to discover here.
“Anyone good at getting rid of rock walls?” Danil said jokingly.
“Surprisingly, I am,” Krashid replied. He was the taller of the two Sahilid explorers and had an air of nervousness to him. He stepped forward now. “I can harden and soften most natural materials with my magic. If you give me some time and space I can likely turn this rock wall into a pile of mud. Of course if the wall is too thick for my magic to fully cover, it won’t help, but if we’re right and it is just a blockade of sorts, then it should be fine. It’ll take a lot out of me though.” He looked at the others.
“Do you need anything from us?” Mirgia asked him.
He shook his head. “If you give me time and space I should be able to handle it.”
“Then we’ll have lunch,” Danil suggested.
Krashid went to work, but it didn’t take long before things took a turn. The moment he focused his magic on the wall, while the rest of the party was still looking on to see how the magic would take hold, the magic was immediately repelled. A shockwave went through the tunnel and everyone present felt the remnants of the force that sent Krashid tumbling backward. A shimmer of bright white light covered the rock before it slowly faded away.
Danil sighed. “It is blocked with holy magic to prevent anyone from meddling with it.” He smiled. “Like we’re trying to do now.” He looked at his companion. “Masahi, what would you do in this situation?”
The woman stepped forward and tied her long hair into a bun before putting both hands on the rock and closing her eyes. She muttered some words to herself and the bright white light that they saw earlier returned. She traced the wall, the light intensifying the places where her fingers touched it until it seemed like all of the light gathered in a single spot of blinding light, dimming everywhere else. Finally, she let the wall go and the light remained on her finger. Danil took out a strange oil lamp and held it out for Masahi. She put the light at the tip of the lamp and it vanished into the lamp.
“What is that?” Kimi asked.
Danil showed her the lamp. “It’s one of the many powerful artifacts under the protection of the order of Owlana. The Luminescent Lamp allows us to absorb any light based and holy magic and undo whatever spell it is attached to. You do still need a talented wielder of Owlana’s gifts to be able to do so, but as you have just seen, there is a good reason I keep Masahi near me whenever I can.” he looked at Krashid. “It should be fine to wield your magic now, the protection spell is gone.”
“What happens to the energy you put into this lamp?” Kimi asked.
Danil smiled. “It gets stored inside the lamp until we decide to use it to strengthen our own magic.”
“So it’s a way to remove protections and gain some power yourself?”
“That’s right, it’s a very useful tool.” He put it away. “It’s actually a good thing we managed to put some energy into it, surely it’ll become useful later on in this strange place. 

While they waited for Krashid to finish his magic, Kimi, Doroly and Mirgia sat together, a little bit separated from the other members of their party when Danil approached them. “Mirgia, Doroly, can I ask you to share with me anything you might have already learned about this place before we joined forces?”
Mirgia looked at Doroly who shrugged. He considered his options. The priest had been very helpful so far, but something about the sudden appearance of a group of Owlana’s priests still made him wary. “What do you know about the ancient kingdom of Venoria?”
Danil scratched his chin and thought for a bit. “A fallen kingdom from many centuries ago, the remains of which are supposedly still somewhere in the center of the Feral Wildlands. They were once well known for refusing to accept the Arpentara as gods and instead pledging their loyalty to the creators, Nera and Na. This caused them quite a few wars and disagreements with other nations in their time, but it also gave them access to lost magic.” He paused for a second. “Although it is heavily disputed that their loyalty to the creators is what gave them access to this magic and instead it is more likely that they discovered the secrets to this magic some other way.”
“Well, Roal, the smallfolk we sent to travel with the other group, deciphered the writing on the pedestal in an earlier chamber, one you had to have passed by. This is what it said.

“At the discretion of the highest order of the Na’s temple in Venoria, we warn any who travel into this tomb to do so at grave risk to their own safety as for what lies hidden deep within is something of power great enough to turn away any who would seek to find it.”
Mirgia looked at the priest to see if there was any sign of recognition.
“That text – if you’ll allow me to share my thoughts – makes it seem that this wasn’t a part of Venoria, but this was some location that the people of Venoria visited and caused them a great deal of worry.”
Mirgia nodded. “That’s the impression we got from it as well. Which makes me more than a little bit worried about what we might end up finding down here.”
They all shared a look.
“Well, I’ll share this information with the rest of our group, if that is alright with you,” Danil said.
Mirgia nodded. “No point hiding any knowledge we have, right?”
Danil walked off, leaving the three to sit and talk amongst themselves.

“What do you think of this situation?” Kimi asked.
“I don’t like it,” Doroly said.
“What do you not like about it?”
“There’s something off about this place and the way these priests seem to be very prepared for what we’ve encountered so far. It’s almost like they knew what to expect and came ready for the things we might face here. That would imply they know more than they’re letting on.”
That was it. Mirgia thought to himself. That explained the bad feeling he had about the priest. He seemed overly prepared for the situation at hand, almost as if he knew more about the place than the rest of them. “That leaves me with two big questions,” Doroly continued.
“What does he know about this place that he’s not sharing, and will that knowledge end up endangering us.” She thought for a moment. “If he knows more than he’s letting on, but his only real intent is to use that knowledge to get whatever is hidden in this place, without it causing us any harm, that’s not a big problem. But if there is something more nefarious going on here, it might endanger the rest of the party as well.”
Mirgia nodded. “That is what I’m worried about. He seems too prepared, and from what you’ve told me,” he looked at Kimia, “he even knew you were going to appear in this region, almost as if there was an element of planning to it.”
“We’ll just have to keep our wits about us and be ready to fend for ourselves at a moment’s notice,” Doroly said. She looked at Kimi. “It is very nice to have a spirit on our side, it makes me feel much more comfortable.”
Kimi looked at her with curiosity. “Do you have prior experience with spirits, that makes you feel that way?”
Doroly nodded. “When I was traveling with a different group of mercenaries – this was quite a few years back – we encountered a spirit of water that traveled with our troupe for a couple of weeks. Thoraln, which was the spirit’s name, helped us get out of so many tricky situations that I honestly don’t think I could have made it out of some of those without his help. Just having someone whose affinity for magic and the world around them is so different from ours makes the amount of ways you can solve a situation expand tremendously. The way you managed to get rid of the magic in the previous room is something that one of us could never accomplish.” That last bit echoed in Mirgia’s head. Did the priest know he needed the help of Kimi’s magic to get through some of the traps in this place? He shook his head. At this point he was just thinking of reasons to distrust the priest, without any logic or reasoning. Why did he feel so strongly about a gut feeling about a person he just met? He took a deep breath and looked at all the people in his presence. Many of them looked worried and uncertain. This dungeon was already taking its toll on the party and they’d only just begun exploring it. With how much there was still to come, Mirgia was definitely going to need to stay focused and keep his withs about him.

The Hesitant Hero will be on break next week. It will return on May 1st

Mirgia nodded. “How did you get here, Kimi?”The feeling of joy and togetherness slowly faded and Mirgia was now left with an empty sadness instead. Things had been so incredibly peaceful. He was here among friends, dancing, eating, drinking and having a good time. Then a high pitched noise rang through his ears and suddenly all of that splendor and beauty was gone and instead he stood here, hands still on the shoulder and hip of his dance partner as a tear fell down his face. He looked up to be faced with a monstrous visage. The person he thought he was happily dancing with was already decaying rapidly and had been dead for weeks. He pushed her away and scrambled backwards on the floor, bumping into something and letting out a yelp before looking up. He looked right at a stranger with a wicked grin on his face. The stranger reached out to Mirgia as if to strangle him but Mirgia was faster, jumping back with the reflexes he’d honed his entire life before brandishing a knife. He was about to pounce on the stranger when a voice commanded him to stop.
“Mirgia, it’s alright. All of you, it’s alright now.” Mirgia calmed down after the voice forced him to take a deep breath. It was a familiar voice of someone that he didn’t think could be here. He looked up to see his friend, Kimi’Thania, smiling at him.
“Kimi, what happened, why are you here?” He looked back at the stranger he was just about to attack and realized that it was no dangerous person but instead a friendly priest of Owlana. “What is going on here?”
“Calm down and let’s first make sure all of your friends here have their wits about them. Some of them seem to be malnourished to the extreme while others still need to process what just happened to them.” The priest put his hand on Mirgia’s shoulder. “Sit, you still haven’t fully adjusted to being back to your wits yet.”
Mirgia wanted to argue, but he knew the priest was right. He sat down and took in his surroundings. All of his party members were here, including Jom and Doroly who had run off. The priest that spoke with him and Kimi were accompanied by another seven priests. Outside of those two groups, another nine people were present in the room, all in various stages of getting out of the daze they had just been in. Mirgia recognized the two women he’d spoken with in the Big green house but he did not recognize the other seven. Two of these seven seemed to be doing quite poorly as two of the priests were attending their wounds and carefully giving them some water and food so they wouldn’t choke on it. “I was caught in a trap,” Mirgia said.
Kimi nodded. “This trap had several layers to it, including one that made you think you’d bypassed it successfully without this being true. Even as someone who has studied this type of magic my entire life, I wasn’t certain I could counteract it. I’m happy that I could though, because those two over there probably wouldn’t have lasted until the end of the day.” She didn’t add what would happen to them, but the spread of bodies in this room gave Mirgia enough of a clue. He shook his head. “What a mess. He got up and walked over to the others from his party. Roal and Sereh seemed to be doing alright but Quint was really spooked by what had happened to them. Lym was with his brother, who seemed to have hurt his ankle in some way and was having trouble walking. Doroly walked over to them and slapped Mirgia on his back. “Glad you had some capable friends nearby, right?”

“Same way you got here, presumably.” Her face darkened. “During that raid, someone pushed me and then I was sent here by a strange magic circle. Unfortunately I couldn’t see who pushed me, so I don’t know if it was one of the people from that pirate’s crew or someone else.”
“That is concerning. But I think we have to focus on the current situation first and talk about this later.”
Kimi agreed.

“There are too many of us to be an efficient group of dungeon divers.” Salandi said. She was one of the two women who Mirgia spoke to in the big green house. Her and her partner Fezel – the dark-skinned woman who accompanied her – were experienced dungeon divers that did not align with the Sahilid. Not having their backing meant that they had a lot less certainty and protection, but they also had more freedom and could keep more of what they found. It was a risky business that the two had managed to expertly navigate themselves through. “I suggest that if we continue with more than eight people in total, we split up in two groups and have one group go down the other path.”
Mirgia counted. His own group had seven people and Kimi’s group had eight. Including Fezel and Salandi, there were still another seven adventurers. Three of which were weak and malnourished to the point that they wouldn’t be able to help. They would have to return outside, and as much as it pained him, Jom was going to have to accompany them. Two of Danil’s priests would go with them as well. That still left them with a total of eighteen people. Two groups of nine. Salandi wasn’t happy about going in such a big group, but she admitted that it would be dangerous to go in a small group. This dungeon was different from most of the ones that they’d explored, the magic here felt older and more dangerous. They all returned to the room before the road split in two and after seeing the group that left the dungeon off, they sat in a circle figuring out how to split up the groups. After some debate, one of the other adventurers who wasn’t looking too great was convinced to return with the return group. That left Mirgia’s group with a total of nine people. Besides himself and Kimi, their group consisted of Quint, Sereh and Doroly. They were joined by two Sahilid adventurers named Krashid and Festar, a duo of veteran dungeon divers that would be a welcome replacement of their frontline. Jom would return and Lym and Raol would join the other group. Finally, they were also accompanied by head priest Danil and one of his fellow priests, a woman named Masahi. The second group was led by Salandi and Fezel and included the remaining adventurers and priests. Mirgia wasn’t happy that Raol would join the other group, he considered the smallfolk to be his to protect, but he’d shown earlier how useless he was when it came to some things, and this was the best division they came up with to balance everyone’s capabilities. Sometimes difficult choices would have to be made, but ideally everyone would make their way through this dungeon safely. After everyone divided some of their rations and other supplies and those who were separating from their initial partners said goodbye to them before the two different groups each descended down their respective tunnels. When Mirgia’s group made their way through the room they had been trapped in just earlier. “Haunting,” was all he could say. Several of the others who had been stuck in the trap couldn’t help but agree. They’d put the corpses of the adventurers that had been there too long off to the side and the priests had covered them in the adequate cloth as was tradition, but there was no time or place for a burial. Head Priest Danil put his hand on the door and looked at the rest of the party. “Let us move deeper into this dungeon then.” He said, before pushing open the door and revealing the next hallway.
As if stepping into a completely different world, the hallway behind this door looked different from everything else they’d seen so far. The earlier rooms had been built and sculpted, clearly created by some people. This looked more natural, as if this was a hallway running through the ground that simply was. There were no smooth walls or ceilings, no light sconces or any sign of a mortal’s touch. Somehow it felt even more eerie than the previous space. With no light to go by, Danil ordered torches to be lit. Danil had access to similar magic that Raol had, as he’d informed the others that were with him, but he’d rather rely on torches first, so that if something caused them to go out, they still had the magic as a backup. It took some energy to cast, after all.
Mirgia walked next to Kimi, who looked exhausted. “Are you okay?”
She looked up at him and smiled. “I’ll be fine, it’s just that the magic I had to cast to get you out of that pickle took a lot out of me. It’s nothing permanent.”
“That’s good to hear, I don’t know what would have happened to us all if you weren’t there.”
She shuddered. “I doubt anyone currently in that camp, including the priests here, would have been able to deal with this magic. They’d have to call in someone who specializes in these sorts of traps and in the time it would have taken them to come here, everyone already inside would have likely died like the ones we weren’t able to save.”
Mirgia shuddered at the thought as well. He had been so close to dying and he didn’t like that idea. He was a careful person by nature. There weren’t really any dangers in Milinia, but he’d always been taught to be on the lookout for that to change. Not in a way that made him anxious, but he knew that it was his responsibility alongside his fellow guards to make sure nothing bad would slip past them. He’d always taken pride in his job as well as his ability to execute on it safely. He’d spotted Cobal and Mana’s approach early on and brought them into town as well. It was moments like that one that kept him on edge, you never know what might walk into the forest. But in this underground dungeon, he was out of his element and it made him feel a lot safer to have Kimi here.
Eventually the hallway they traveled down stopped and in front of them was a rock wall, blocking them from continuing.

Something had been bothering Kimi for several days. She knew that the strange teleportation trap that Mirgia, herself and some of the others present at the raid fell into could not have been planned. At least not to the point that they would know that she specifically went here. Yet the priests she was accompanying right now seemed like they almost expected her arrival. As a follower of Abreloka she knew how powerful the Arpentara truly were and it wouldn’t be the first miraculous thing she would encounter in her long life, but just chalking the whole thing up to Owlana’s interference in the fate of the world felt wrong to her. Still, despite being fishy, the head priest and his companions had been nothing but extremely polite to her so far, and with the confirmation that Mirgia was also inside the dungeon, she knew it would benefit her to go inside of it as well. Still, the feeling in the back of her mind didn’t go away when she stared at the looming dungeon. It also seemed like the humans here had absolutely no idea what the appearance of this building meant, but that wasn’t true for Kimi. Coming from the spirit realm, she was similar to Mana in the sense that this was the second world she found herself in. Although spirits traveling to the mortal realm was a relatively common thing and Mana’s forced transportation to their world was much more rare, it was still a similar experience. And the differences in their worlds made it so Kimi knew what this was. When a lot of magical energy flowed through the air – this usually happened after a great calamity or a clash between powerful mages – the magic could rend the boundary of space. When that happened, it could move things from one place to another in an instant. Not only that, but sometimes it would even move things from other realms to this realm. It has long been theorized that it could also move things from their world to other realms, but there has been no way to verify this theory. Kimi knew exactly what this was. This was a dungeon built in the spirit realm that somehow ended up here. How and why it was here, that was something she couldn’t answer, but knowing that it came from the spirit realm was enough cause for alarm. The traps and mysteries that laid within this dungeon would be much more twisted and confusing than the ones you would find in an excavated place. Mirgia was in danger. And as much as she hated to admit it, despite being a spirit familiar with these sorts of dungeons, she wasn’t exactly much better equipped to deal with much of what they had to offer. There were wild spirits back in her homeland who made it their mission to explore and excavate these strange magical dungeons, but many of them would inevitably fail to return. Those who did succeed in conquering dungeons would gain wealth and power beyond imagination. Some of them lurk in the shadows to this day, one bad decision away from upsetting the balance of both worlds. It was a delicate balance and she shuddered to think about what would happen if someone went rogue.
She shook the thoughts away and focused on the present. Head priest Danil was ordering his men and women around to get ready for their descent into the dungeon. He seemed to have a plan for what to do and from what Kimi could gather had been preparing for this inevitability for quite a while. It didn’t sit right with her. Still, when they called for her to join them in their descent, she didn’t hesitate. Her first step was to reunite with Mirgia, a plan for the future would come after that.

The first split in the road was one where there didn’t seem to be much explanation for where to go next. But Kimia knew immediately what route Mirgia and his companions would have taken. Not just them, anyone unprepared to deal with the chilling magic that hung stale in this space would go the left route.
Head priest Danil sighed in frustration. He’d translated the words on the little pedestal and relayed them to his companions, but they didn’t really tell them anything. “I’m not sure where to go from here, I have to admit.” He looked at Kimia. “Do you have any suggestions, wise spirit?”
“I have a suspicion, but I want to see if I’m right.” She looked at the group gathered here. “I would like all of you to stand a little bit separated from each other.” The priests looked among each other but hesitantly complied.
“Now, I want everyone to close their eyes.” This request went over less well. “Trust me on this, it will make sense shortly and it will only take a moment.”
Reluctantly, they followed her commands, although the head priest kept his eyes opened, trained on Kimi, who nodded acknowledgement. “Now, I want everyone who thinks we should take the path on the left to raise their left hand, and I want everyone who thinks we should take the right path to raise their right hand.” She paused for a moment. “Now open your eyes.”
Everyone now saw what the head priest and Kimi also saw. Every single hand that was raised was a left hand.
Danil smiled. “I was leaning towards the left hallway too, if I’m honest with you.”
Kimi nodded. “That makes sense, there’s magic in this dungeon that is trying to bring us somewhere. It’s got a frightening amount of layers to it, so that anyone who realizes they are stuck in its trap will only think to remove themselves from the deepest layer without realizing they were already stuck in the bigger web. It’s honestly awe-inspiring and I would not be able to recreate it in a thousand years. What I can do, however, is counteract it.”
“Please, by all means. Does that mean we should then take the right pathway instead?”
Kimi shook her head. “The right pathway might be the correct route, the left pathway might be the correct route, that I could not tell you. But if we follow the magic and counteract it, we can at least see what happened to those who went into this place before us, and save them.”
“A noble prospect, but are you certain you can counter the magic?”
Kimi nodded. “I am.” She wasn’t. But she was confident enough that she liked her odds. And she would feel much better about this dive into danger if she could meet up with Mirgia.
“Then we go left. Having more fighters that will hopefully help us in this dive will be a boon.” He smiled.
With Kimi in the lead – her flute in hand – the party descended the left pathway until they encountered two people.
“You need to get out of here right now,” the smallfolk woman said. “It’s dangerous further in.”
“Easy child, things will be alright now that we’re here.” Danil put his hand on the woman’s shoulder and looked her in the eyes until she calmed down a bit. “My name is head priest Danil, and we are here to help. We are followers of Owlana who are looking for an artifact in this dungeon. Now tell us who you are and what is going on so we can help each other out.”
The woman took several deep breaths before she spoke, the large adventurer behind her staying quiet throughout. “I’m Doroly and this is Jom. We went in with a small group after a strange insectoid creature attacked the camp. When we came upon a room with strange magic that seemed to be powered by music we tried to counteract it by destroying the instruments they were holding. When that succeeded, we traveled through the room, only for the music to suddenly start again. The rest of our party is now stuck in a strange dance of sorts they can’t seem to get out of. The room was already filled with other people who were caught in the trap, some still alive, some fully decomposed. Jom and I were the only ones to make it out of the trap but due to Jom’s hurt ankle it’s been a slow walk back.”
The man behind her nodded. Kimi could now see that he was standing a bit awkwardly, leaning on one leg instead of both of them.
“Well fear not, child,” Danil said, “as luck would have it, we have brought a powerful spirit of music alongside us.”
Kimi smiled. “I am confident that I can deal with this trap, although it will be a tricky endeavor.” 

Standing on the precipice of the room that was doused in old magic, Kimi’thania let the light of her instrument dance along her arms as soft notes came out of it. Her visage turned into a ball of light as she transformed into her most primal form, the way she truly looked when none of her glamor magic was applied. Only in this form could she access her most powerful magic and she would rather not do this in front of strangers, but with how intricately woven the spell she needed to counter was, she had no choice. She needed to find where exactly it was located in the room so that she could break the source of it, but with how thick the magic was, it was hard to locate the source. The light faded and Kimi was now in her primal form. A body humanoid in some ways, but alien in others. Her face was as tall as the rest of her body combined with eyes the size of kitchen plates. Where normally a pupil and iris were, was just a constantly moving and twisting series of musical notes. Her hands wove skillfully through the air as she accessed magic that belonged to her and her family for generations, plucking notes from nothingness as the song she needed to solve this problem came to her.
It was an old song, one she’d heard her grandma sing only once. It was meant specifically to counter magic that was not visible to the eye but only touchable by music. The notes she so expertly sent into the sky would roam the room around her making for a kaleidoscope of colors. The priests, Doroly and Jom could do nothing but stare at the entire endeavor in awe. So drawn in were they to Kimi’s performance that the magic that would have otherwise compelled them to dance until death could not grasp them. Kimi saw Mirgia among the dancers and wavered for a moment, scared for his safety, before she steeled her resolve and sent a barrage of energy into the room, smashing everyone living and dead into the walls as gusts of wind started disrupting the musical notes in the room. Suddenly the movement of magic allowed her to trace it back to the source. A magical circle set into the ceiling at the far end of the room was causing everything. She took a dagger from Doroly’s belt and placed it suspended in the air in front of herself, with the point aimed at the magic circle. With a high pitched noise it shot through the air and straight into the center of the magic circle, deafening the room.

“Hold.” Something seemed to have disturbed Jom greatly as his voice trembled while he said this. They had just rounded a corner and now there was a faint bit of light in the distance. Not only that, after Jom told them to stop and they all listened intently, they could hear music coming from up ahead. “Roal, can you move your lights a little bit ahead of us?”
Roal nodded and slowly walked to the front of the group, moving the lights even further ahead. It was hard to look past the lights despite them not being super bright, but it looked like something was moving ahead of them.
“My eyes are better in the dark than most of your eyes, should I move on ahead and see what is going on?” Mirgia suggested.
“I don’t like it,” Quint said. “You’d be on your own if something happens until we can close the distance.”
“I’m quick and quiet, I should be alright.”
They all looked at each other as if waiting for someone to come up with a better plan but no one did so they eventually agreed.
“Here, let me do this for you,” Roal said. He reached out and plucked one of the lights from the air before affixing it to the inside of Mirgia’s sleeve. “This way it’ll move with you, but you can also keep it hidden so that whatever is in there doesn’t notice you.”
Mirgia nodded. “Thank you friend.” He then pulled the hood over his head and darted into the shadows. The source of the light was still quite a ways away and although he could see better than the humans in the group, he couldn’t exactly see well in the dark either. And besides that, the kind of darkness he was used to was one where the moon was out above the canopy and some of that light would still trickle in through the leaves. Here in an underground tunnel he was more out of his element than he would like to admit. Still, he pressed on, using the tiny bit of light from the spell that Roal cast to keep his path lit. After a short dash he reached the end of the tunnel they were in and pushed his back against the side, looking into the room ahead of him. What he saw there was nightmarish. Two large dinner tables were set up with plates and glasses on them, but no food or drink was anywhere. A strange mix of people were in the room moving, dancing and eating food that wasn’t actually there. One of the people was playing a piano in the corner which explained the music. But what made the sight so nightmarish was the fact that the people there were all at different levels of decay. It looked like a handful were still alive, dancing while having a pained smile on their face, while others looked like rotting corpses and others still were reduced to nothing but their skeleton. Still, all of them moved around and seemed to be in some state of animation. It was terrifying yet Mirgia felt tempted to join them. He hesitated, wanting to step a little bit closer to explore. What could it hurt to do so, right? He would get more information that way. He was about to take a step forward when a hand grabbed him from behind and dragged him back. Stunned, he didn’t fight the rough treatment and a few moments later he found himself tossed roughly against the ground, a terrified Sereh clinging to his arm. “What were you about to do?” She asked him, her voice shaky.
“I was going to check things from a little closer,” he trailed off at the end of the sentence. “Oh no, I was about to be lured into their trap, wasn’t I?”
Sereh nodded. “I’m glad I followed my gut and came after you, whatever magic is in there is a powerful charm that almost took hold of you.”
“Then I owe you for treating me roughly.”
She smiled. “It’s the least I could do.” Her face turned serious. “Let’s go back to the others and move back a little bit to discuss what to do next, I’m worried that the closer we stay, the more likely we fall for the magic. The only reason I followed after you was because I was feeling a strange pull all the way back there. The others have already retreated a little bit.”
Mirgia nodded and the duo quickly went back to the others, although Mirgia couldn’t help but look over his shoulder once more before they turned the corner.

“So what next?” Jom asked. He seemed to be more worried than most of them about the room that was described. He sat next to his brother and was drinking from his waterskin.
“I think we should head back and go the other route,” Mirgia said. “Not to say that the other route is safer than this one, of course, but unless we have a good way to deal with this trap, I’d rather not walk into this and lose my sanity.” He was perturbed by how quickly he fell into the trap earlier and did not like the feeling one bit.
“But you were the one who wanted to investigate it more properly earlier.” Roal brought up.
He was right, Mirgia thought. It was a fascinating bit of magic that felt ancient and alien, and knowing more about it would make him better prepared for what else came their way.
“Maybe you’re right. But we still need a plan.” He failed to recognize that he was leaning towards pressing on again without intending to. “How do we counter the music?”
“I think the music is a red herring,” Sereh commented. She had been quietly staring off into the hallway since they went back. He had her to thank for not already being stuck there. “It felt like there was something else that was drawing me in, maybe the food and drinks are the real reason the people get stuck there. Perhaps if we can get through the room and deal with the skeletons that are playing the music, then we can move on safely if we just don’t touch anything else.”
It wasn’t a bad suggestion, but it felt off. What if the music wasn’t a red herring to begin with, and the music would take hold when they stepped into the room.
“I suggest we go in one at a time,” Doroly said. “That way if one of us gets caught in a trap, we can return.”
“But that would condemn one of us,” Roal countered. “I am not about to let myself fall into a trap and I would assume the same holds true for the rest of you.”
They all stayed silent, knowing he was right.
“What if we take out the undead that are playing the music from a distance? Wouldn’t that stop the magic completely?” Quint suggested. “I know arrows aren’t the most effective against a skeleton playing music, but perhaps I could destroy the instruments from a distance and that way we can move through the room safely.”
“I like that plan,” Mirgia said. He looked at the bowman. “Can you do it?”
He nodded. “If someone accompanies me and makes sure I don’t get distracted by the magic while making the shot, I can confidently hit a target at that distance. And even if I miss, we can just try again.” He added, “unless it angers the moving corpses.”
Mirgia considered that. “I think we’ll be fine, approaching them didn’t change anything, so unless we actively harm them, I doubt the magic will let them change what they are doing. And I hope that if we get rid of the actual magic, the corpses will return to their natural unmoving state.”
Jom wasn’t convinced. “There’s a lot of possibility for this to go wrong. I still think I prefer Mirgia’s suggestion to check out the other tunnel first.”
Mirgia knew that Jom was right, and it had been his suggestion in the first place, but something inside of him prevented him from agreeing with the reasonable fighter. Instead he leaned more towards Quint’s idea.
“Let’s try shooting the instruments first. If that fails, we can backtrack to the other hallway, how does that sound?”
Jom nodded his agreement, but didn’t look too happy about it.

Quint, Sereh, Doroly and Mirgia all moved up. Sereh had already proven keen at keeping the magic at bay when she stopped Mirgia from walking into the trap earlier and Doroly was a veteran and would be more cautious than most of the others. Quint was true to his word and his aim was perfect. After Mirgia’s keen eyes pointed out where he had to point the arrow, he let it fly and moments later it crashed into the wood of the violin that was being played. Quint rapidly readied another arrow and shot the corpse sitting behind the piano. The music faded and eerie quiet filled the space.
“I think that did the trick, did it not?” Doroly asked.
Mirgia nodded. “Looks like it. Let’s get the others but let’s not be too hasty. We’ll carefully approach and see what the corpses are doing.” He squinted. “From where we’re standing I can’t see any movement.”
They retrieved the rest of the party except for Jom, who wanted to stay behind. In case everything went wrong, he could return to the camp and warn the next party to go in here.
Mirgia led the group. The strange pull that he felt before had gone, and he was now confident that the music was the source of the magic. Stepping into the beautiful room was a strange experience, now with the corpses and unmoving adventurers – who probably still had a chance of being alive – all standing completely still, like mannequins. Mirgia walked up to one of the people, a young man looking to be no older than twenty. He had an empty scabbard at his side and a wicked grin on his face. Mirgia moved his hand in front of the boy’s face but the eyes stayed fixed on some point in the distance. Meanwhile Quint picked up the destroyed Violin. “I think we did it.”
Mirgia nodded, looking for a way out of the room. This place gave him the creeps and although he wanted to save the people stuck here, his gut told him not to linger. They could probably deal with it later. He spotted a closed door in the back.
“I’ll go get Jom,” Doroly said, as Mirgia went to investigate the door.
Mirgia looked at the door which had an intricate set of symbols on it that he didn’t recognize. A puzzle of sorts? He motioned Roal to come over, as he was the most experienced with this sort of stuff, and Sereh joined them too. Suddenly a panicked feeling rose from his gut to his head and his body shuddered. “The trap,” he yelled, but he was too late. Suddenly, without any instruments still able to be played, the music continued. Mirgia turned around and saw Jom and Doroly approaching. “Quick, go back, get help.” He started to run in the direction of the exit but could feel control of his body loosening. “Find someone who can dance and sing and be merry with us. Oh won’t you please come join us here and partake in this feast.” His body started dancing. He silently cursed himself for not being more careful, but there was nothing to do now as he started dancing along the tables, grabbing Sereh by the hand and jumping on top of one of the tables to dance among the plates. He saw Jom grab Doroly by the shoulder and retreat. Good.

Captain Arios had a worried look on his face. Dealing with mercenaries and members of the Sahilid order was well within his skillset and he’d dealt with some strange folks over the years. Being confronted by the holy order of Owlana was a different story. Not to mention they seemed to be accompanied by a powerful spirit. Things were tense for him as the priest sitting opposite of him finished his explanation. The group sitting in front of him, all orderly and quiet, consisted of seven priests, the head priest and the spirit. “Thus, by declaration of the Lady of Knowledge, we will take control of this camp and lead an expedition into the ancient dungeon. I appreciate your understanding.” The priest had introduced himself earlier as head priest Danil, before launching into a long story about how they came to hear about this place and what their deity told them to do here.
The captain scratched his chin covered in stubble, which was slowly turning into a full on beard. “You understand that this request comes as a bit of a surprise to me, right? I am here on orders of the emperor of our great nation of Severanti to ensure that our people safely and successfully figure out what exactly is going on here. The law states that we can claim any found treasure as our own. Having to then hand it over to the church is not going to go over well with my men, you understand the predicament right?” He crossed his arms and looked at the priest, a middle aged man with a receding hairline.
The head priest nodded. “Of course I understand the predicament, and I wish for an amicable resolution to this quandary. Any treasure found within this dungeon that is of no significant value to our Lady will be yours to keep, but I say this knowing full well that those things with the highest value will likely not fall into that category.”
Captain Arios smiled. “I appreciate your honesty in this matter, although it does not change the problem, at least it lets us discuss things properly.” He looked over at the spirit, who looked like a young girl if not for the fact that some of her features were much sharper and stranger than those of any regular young girl. “Spirit whose name I do not know, may I presume you are here on orders of the holy order of Owlana as well?”
The spirit looked up at the captain. “I am the spirit of music, Kimi’Thania. You can call me Kimi. I came here to investigate this place when I found out it might have ties to a spirit of music that lived a very long time ago.”
Why is she lying? When he first heard about her, it was due to a scuffle with some of his men. He then heard about her again from Mirgia, who just headed into the dungeon earlier that day, and from what he said it seemed like something completely different was going on. She would have only just arrived in the region a couple days prior. He thought for a moment, but didn’t think it wise to call out the discrepancies in her story. He would speak with her later. Dealing with the priest was going to be enough of a headache on its own. Letting out a deep sigh, he answered the priest’s request. “Look, my job here is to keep things from getting out of hand. If arguments break out between your party and my men, I will do what I can to mediate, but anything that is found and taken from the dungeon before you get there is out of my jurisdiction. I would ask that you act in understanding that the men and women who have already journeyed into this strange place do so at risk of life and limb.”
“So a group is already inside?” Kimi asked. She seemed eager to learn more.
Arios nodded. “A few of my own men are joined by some locals as well as an elven fellow who showed up the other day.” He purposefully withheld MIrgia’s name for the time being.
Kimi’s surprise didn’t go unnoticed although she seemed to attempt to cover it up quickly.
“Either way,” he continued, “could you give me the benefit of the evening to consider what to do from here on out? We’ll reconvene in the morning and I’ll have my answer at the ready. Until then you are of course free to use one of our tents as well as the mess tent.”
Priest Danil looked as if he wanted to argue, but then held his tongue and nodded. “I understand that we arrived very suddenly and the laws of this land do not prohibit your Sahilid from raiding for artifacts ahead of time, but the relationship between the church of Owlana and the emperor of Severanti is one of mutual respect, I would hate for that to be broken. But keeping that in mind, I will take you up on your hospitality and take my rest. It’s been a long day on the road after all.”
“By all means, make yourselves at home. As long as you are in my camp, you are under my protection.” He reached out his hand.
The head priest hesitantly shook it, then smiled. “I appreciate it.”

“You wanted to talk?” Captain Arios asked. He had just finished cleaning his gear and preparing his bedroll and went for a stroll around the perimeter of the camp before going to bed.
The spirit that accompanied the priest and his party had been hovering around him for the past hour, seemingly debating if she should go up to him or not. Getting tired of the movement in the corner of his eye, he’d walked up to her.
“You said something about an elven traveler?”
He nodded.
“Just out of curiosity, did you catch his name?”

He held his silence for a few moments before replying. “If I answer your question, will you tell me what is really going on?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” she replied, but he could see the doubt in her face. She was hiding something.
“Then I have no obligation to tell you the names of the people I sent into the dungeon. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll return to my tent.” He started to walk away before she called out to him.
“Wait.”
He turned around expectantly. She looked around the area nervously for a few moments. “Something strange is going on. I only got here the other day.”
Arios nodded. “Mirgia said something similar, about being teleported here after falling into a strange trap.”
Kimi’s eyes lit up. “So Mirgia is here after all?”
“He is, he’s one of the people who went into the dungeon.”
Kimi waited for a moment before nodding. “Very well, I’ll tell you what I think.” She sat down on the ground, crosslegged and Arios felt obliged to do the same.
“So when I woke up after falling into a similar trap that it seems Mirgia fell for, I found myself being harassed by some mercenaries. They wore similar attire to yours.”
Captain Arios nodded. “Sahilid mercenaries, we’re part of the same group, although I suspect they didn’t treat you well.”
“That’s one way to put it. After putting them all to sleep, I went on my way to search for a way home, when I ran into Danil and his group. He told me that they were going into this dangerous dungeon soon and would love to have the blessing of a spirit. I told him I would consider it but honestly I wasn’t convinced. When I stayed in their camp, I saw one of his men do something that gave me pause. I won’t go into details, but I think either they are pretending to work for Owlana, or part of their group is not who they say they are. I decided to stick around to find out more and I’m glad I did, knowing Mirgia is here too.” She sighed. “Have you heard of anyone else who was sent to this region unexpectedly?”
Arios shook his head. “I only spoke with Mirgia and heard reports about you, but I didn’t think much of it. Mirgia was sent here and arrived in the nearby village of Redsan. From there on out he came with Doroly, who is an adventurer that I had heard of before, and after two of my men got wounded by a creature that came out of the dungeon he promised he would help out the group that went into the dungeon, mainly to protect the nearby village.”
“That sounds like him. I hope he’s alright in there.”
“There’s some good people accompanying him, at the very least he should have a fighting chance to deal with whatever they might encounter in that strange dungeon.”
“That’s good to hear. I’m curious how these priests will do in the same situation, but I should be relatively safe. I have learned some pretty useful magic tricks throughout the years.”
“Can I ask you a favor then?” Captain Arios asked.
“That depends, what would you ask of me?”
“I don’t like the way these priests force their rights upon us. As if they own the dungeon or something, pushing us aside. Would you keep an eye on them while you’re in there and make sure that everyone gets out of there safely?”
Kimi considered the question for a few moments before replying. “Isn’t forcing your way into this dungeon and pushing aside others kind of what you are doing?”
A long pause filled the space, Captain Arios being unsure how to respond to that. Finally, Kimi broke the silence again. “Either way, I would like for everyone to make it out unscathed, so I will see what I can do.”
After Kimi had gone to bed, Captain Arios found himself sitting in front of his tent, still awake, staring into the fire. It’s not like the things that Kimi said to him were incorrect or were particularly new to him, but it was definitely a bad feeling to be seen the same way as someone that feels like a threat to the public safety. Maybe the system wasn’t as sound as the people thought. He let out a deep sigh and fell onto his back, staring at the stars after the blinding light from the fire left his eyes. Maybe it was time to find a new job. One that required less people skills than this one.

I have been a bit under the weather lately, so I would like to give a heads up in advance. I was ahead on chapters for a while, but I finished today’s chapter just the day before posting it. I hope to finish chapter 9 by next week, but if not, we’ll take next week off. Apologies in advance and thank you for your continued support

Doroly returned two days later, with four villagers in tow. One of them was Teddy. He had volunteered to be in charge of keeping the camp fed and working properly. Despite his worry for the smallfolk farmer’s safety, Mirgia was happy to have the jolly spirit among them. Of the other three, two would help out Teddy and the last person would actually come with Mirgia, Doroly and the small group of Sahalid that had been selected. Raol, as the man was called, was a smallfolk mage. Trained in the specialized arts of his people, he would be able to provide them with many tricks and cantrips as well as some very potent healing magic. Of the Sahilid camp, four would come along with them. Captain Arios would stay in camp, his position as an overseer requiring him to keep things civil. As the plan had been carefully constructed by the men, several of the Sahilid present had already shown their discontent for the more organized structure of this mission, wanting to go in on their own terms. One party of three men ignored all warnings and went into the dungeon last night. No one had seen any sign of them since, so they were presumed dead.
The four Sahilid selected were all veterans and all of them were well into their thirties and forties, wearing the scars of their experience proudly. The two brothers Lym and Jom were these broad shouldered humans with deep suntanned skin that looked serious at all times, but weren’t unfriendly when spoken too. They wore thick layers of armor and had these large shields on them. Their specialty – as Mirgia would be able to guess without asking – was to be at the front of the group and hold off whatever came at them. Sereh was a tall, lanky woman with an affinity for magic. Her skill with telekinesis was apparently well respected throughout the empire, although Mirgia had never heard of her. She seemed like the nervous sort, reminding him a bit of Mana, but the man accompanying her, a bowman named Quint, assured Mirgia that she was more than capable. Quint was the friendliest of the lot, making small talk with the people he didn’t yet know. All together they were a party of seven which was a little bit too large for Mirgia’s liking, but he did appreciate having a solid front line that would protect them from imminent danger.
With Teddy’s help and some quick thinking on the farmer’s end, they had a pack of provisions ready, including some tools and things that he had brought from town. The man was endlessly clever in the things he prepared ahead of time. Raol would carry most of their burden, as most of his skills were useful outside of a fight, so he wouldn’t be hindered by it too much.
Mirgia, Doroly and Roal were to be at the center of their marching order with Lym and Jom up front as Sereh and Quint covered their rear. Having checked everything they needed, the two brothers stepped into the dungeon. Mirgia followed and shuddered as he stepped through the threshold. His elven senses immediately told him that they were no longer in the desert near Redsan. That or they were on the other side of some sort of magical barrier that changed the climate. “You feel that?” He asked Quint?
The bowman nodded. “Strange business afoot. Lym, everything good up front?”
“Nothing yet, just a hallway.” Quint turned to Raol. “Can you give them some light?” he asked the smallfolk mage.
Raol nodded and took a strange metal contraption from his side. It looked like a book but when he opened the clasp it changed form into what looked almost like a mechanical spider. Raol fiddled with one of the spider’s legs before it suddenly extended and protracted into several red hot needles that melted in place. The needles each dropped a bead of metal onto the floor, which stayed there for a moment before taking shape and changing color into a bright blue. The blue blobs of light then floated up from the ground and Raol willed them to sit atop the shoulders of the two men near the front, with another flying to Raol’s own shoulder and the final two moving to Quint and Sereh, the latter flinching as it reached her. “They’ll be warm to the touch, but nothing beyond what your skin can handle, so don’t worry. They use air to stay alight, so if you need to get rid of them quickly, fully cover them with your hand or some fabric.”
“Neat trick,” Quint commented, poking at the small blob of lit metal.
“Neat tricks are my specialty,” Raol grinned. “They should last a couple of hours, but I can renew them twice more today.”
“That’s good to know.” Quint looked at Lym and Jom. “Lead the way.”
The initial hallway led on for a good ten minutes at their slow and careful pace. Seemingly carved from some type of sandstone, the hallway was wide enough for two people to walk side by side without too much issue and seemed to be sloping downward as they went on. Eventually it widened out into a square chamber of about five meters. Two passages went deeper into the dungeon, opposite of where they entered the chamber from. A raised dais stood at the center of the room with writing inscribed on it. Lym walked up to it and shrugged. “Not a script I’m familiar with,” he remarked. “It looks somewhat similar to the elven alphabet, but it’s not the same.” He looked over at Mirgia and Raol. “Either of you familiar with the script?”
The two walked over. Mirgia recognized the script but couldn’t read it. He had seen it before, but had no interest to learn the old language.
“It’s ancient Venorian,” Roal said.
Mirgia was impressed. “I’m surprised you’ve heard of it, that’s a long dead language and culture.”
Roal smiled. “I’ve done quite a bit of studying in my time, but unfortunately I also cannot read this script.”
“So we know absolutely nothing then,” Doroly commented.
“That’s not necessarily true,” Roal said.
“What do you mean?” Mirgia asked.
“Well, for starters, knowing that the writing here was done by someone who knew the ancient Venorian language gives us some idea about where this place comes from. I doubt there are many survivors of a fallen kingdom running around, so that makes it more likely that this place was built a long time ago but suddenly appeared here. It’s also a little ways away from where Venoria was historically located.”
Mirgia nodded. Venoria was a kingdom of scaled people, draconic beings that were distantly related to the dragons of legend. The story of their fall was well known, as they were at odds with a flying kingdom helmed by serpentfolk. The two races couldn’t stand each other and when the kingdom of Venoria stole the holy animals of the city kingdom of Kanarth, an all out war broke out that eventually destroyed both nations.
“But more importantly,” Roal continued, “if I know what language it is, I can use some of my magic to read it.” He produced a rolled up piece of parchment from his pack and started reading it. While Roal was immersed in his scroll, Quint and Lym investigated the two hallways leading away from here, both making sure not to step into them in case something strange would happen. They looked for footsteps and traps. They found the former, but no sign of the latter. The footsteps they did find were quite fresh. “Probably those who were impatient and went in against the wishes of the captain,” Lym commented. Quint agreed with the assessment. “But how do we know which of the ways is best, if they’ve gone both ways?”
Lym pointed at some scorchmarks in the ground. “Didn’t the creature’s blood leave behind strange marks too? The one that came out of the dungeon?”
Mirgia walked up and looked as well. “I think you’re right. That means it retreated into the left passage.”
“What does that tell us?” Quint asked.
“Not much, but I hope Roal can tell us some more.” He looked back to the smallfolk mage who finished his incantation. The scroll shriveled into a small little ball and fell to the ground. Roal’s eyes looked strange and when Mirgia found himself staring into the man’s eyes, he realized he could see letters and numbers scrolling around the man’s irises at rapid speeds.
“How does that work?” Lym asked.
“When someone writes something, the text is imbued with meaning, regardless of what sort of script they use to write it. This spell allows you to look past the written language into the intent of the message.”
“Oh,” Lym said, not convinced. “So what does it say?”
Roal looked at the text and Mirgia could see his pupils grow and shrink as his eyes tried to focus on something beyond the words. Then he read the message out loud.
“At the discretion of the highest order of the Na’s temple in Venoria, we warn any who travel into this tomb to do so at grave risk to their own safety as for what lies hidden deep within is something of power great enough to turn away any who would seek to find it.”
“Ominous,” Jom commented.
“But is it enough to stop us from exploring deeper in?” Quint asked.
“I don’t think so. I would say it gives us cause to be cautious, but we already were,” Mirgia said. He looked at the smallfolk, whose eyes were still strange and alien. “Does it say anything about which path to take?”
Roal shook his head. “Just a warning that this place is dangerous.”
Mirgia thought for a while. Na was one of the two creator gods, alongside Nera. It was said that both deities were one soul split into two that would coalesce and diverge at times, turning each of the two entities – chaos and harmony – into different versions of themselves, to allow for a neutral creation of the world. Few sects nowadays actively worshipped the duo as they did not interfere with the world of mortals at all, leaving that task to the Arpentara. But many of the ancient kingdoms probably still had worshippers to the creators. The Arpentara were ancient beings even by elven standards, but there was a time before they existed. He had no idea if any of that information was relevant to the problems at hand, but it was always good to keep information given freely at hand. You’ll never know.
“I suggest we go right,” Sereh said. “No real reason, it just feels correct.”
Mirgia looked at Lym and Jom who both shrugged. “I prefer picking a random hallway over splitting up, so unless someone has a better idea,” Lym said.
“Let’s go into the right pathway then,” Quint said, and none disagreed.

Crawling out of the dungeon entrance came a monstrosity that would likely haunt the present soldiers’ dreams for centuries to come. Though that would only be the case if they were able to dodge its fangs bearing down on them. Mirgia was quick to react, having felt like something was wrong about a second before the creature appeared. It had both fangs and mandibles, making for a strange latticework in front of its insectoid facial features. It was about the size of a human walking on all fours, with a bright green exoskeleton. Sharp points and joints painted a hostile figure and shiny eyes were looking around rapidly. Mirgia’s bow was in his hands as the creature bore down on the first guard, but he was too slow to prevent anything. The second guard at the entrance – the friendly older man – was quicker than Mirgia and Doroly were. With a mighty leap he slammed into the creature’s side, pushing it off balance. The younger guard managed to slip away and regain his composure before grabbing his sword and shield. It was at that point that Mirgia’s first arrow flew through the air and hit the creature perfectly in the head. Except where Mirgia thought it’d fell the creature at once, it simply bounced off the hard exterior. He cursed and slung his bow back over his back, taking a hunting knife from his belt and dashing towards the creature. Sounds came from the camp nearby as people started realizing something was wrong.
The creature rapidly moved its head around, looking at the different people around it. The older guard had taken a few steps back, blood pouring from a wound where he impaled his arm on one of the creature’s spikes. The younger guard’s training kicked in and he started circling the creature, sword and shield at the ready. The creature dashed at him mandibles and fangs colliding with the steel buckler of the young soldier. He held strong and took two slashes at the creature, one bouncing off its tough exterior, but the other finding a joint in its arm and seemingly doing some damage, as the creature shrieked out in pain and took a step back. It then changed direction to go at the older guard, who looked like an easier target with the damaged arm. The guard held up his shield to defend himself and was promptly shoved backwards by the force of the creature’s pounce. A terrifying mouth opened up larger than should be possible and bore down on him.

“No you don’t,” Mirgia yelled, barreling into the creature like the older guard had done just before. He’d spotted most of the spikes and hard points as he approached and was able to avoid hurting himself too badly. He did feel a sharp pain just under his knee but he ignored it. His knife found purchase in the creature’s arm joint and with the same crack you’d hear when opening up a lobster or a crab to take out its meat, the creature’s arm went limp. It let out a strange sound that Mirgia took for a whimper before slamming Mirgia into the ground, the air leaving his lungs. As he struggled to get back up, Doroly came charging in, low to the ground with her sword arcing upwards. The creature reared back and threw its damaged arm in front of itself to protect the rest of its body. Doroly hit the joint and the weapon effortlessly pushed through the cartilage that was holding it together, separating it from the rest of the creature. Green blood splattered over her and Mirgia and the creature roared. Her sword continued and slashed at its stomach, which seemed to be a weak point. At this hit, the creature hesitated for a moment, and as it spotted the rest of the Sahilid approach from the nearby encampment it let out a final roar before quickly turning and dashing back into the dungeon, vanishing in the darkness. Silence filled the sandy desert, green blood seeping into the red ground.

Mirgia was applying his new bowspring to his bow as the previous one had snapped when he hastily put his bow away during the scuffle. Captain Arios had summoned Mirgia, Doroly and the two guards that fought the strange creature to his tent, to discuss what had just happened. Everyone was nervously sitting in their chairs while Garath –  the older gentleman – explained what he saw. Arios had ordered several of the other members of camp to guard the entrance. Some of them complained as although he was there to preserve orders and not to command them, they eventually relented when Arios stood on business and threatened to kick them out of the camp. Mirgia could see why he was given a role of authority amongst people who are so quickly to be in conflict with each other. He still didn’t understand the Sahilid’s strange hierarchy, but it seemed to work for them. “So if I’m understanding everything correctly,” Arios summarized, “an insectoid monster suddenly leapt out of the dungeon, started indiscriminately attacking people before retreating back into the dungeon after it took some damage and this,” he pointed at the severed arm of the creature, “is what we have left of it?”
Garath nodded. “That is correct sir.”
Arios took his dagger and slashed at the creature’s arm, the impact sounding almost like a clash between two swords. The arm came away without much damage, a shallow cut that didn’t breach the exoskeleton. “Our most pressing question then is to figure out how many of these creatures are in there. If it’s just one or two, then a well prepared party can take care of them with minimal losses. If this strange dungeon is teeming with them, then that’s a big problem.”
“I think there’s a more important question,” Mirgia said. He hadn’t spoken much but he’d been thinking about what just happened and what it meant.
“And what is that question?”
“If this dungeon appeared only recently, and we’re positive that the entrance was not here a little while ago, that means that it was either elsewhere and somehow transported to this place – which seems highly unlikely – or it was spawned out of nowhere which seems even more unlikely. The original idea that it might have been hidden under the ground and somehow appeared at the surface doesn’t hold much value if a living creature is inside of it, as they would have no way of surviving without food.”
“Not necessarily true,” Doroly said.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, there’s a chance that this dungeon, whatever it is, is connected to tunnels or something else underground, and that the creature could get food that way.”
“Either way,” Captain Arios interrupted the discussion, “what’s clear is that we know very little about this place and it’s more dangerous than we thought it would be.”
This they could all agree on.
“So what’s the plan?” Mirgia asked.
“Well, I will send a message back to Sar’Doth and the emperor, so we can perhaps get some back-up. In the meantime, I suggest you either return to town, or you help us investigate the entrance and see what we can find out. It’ll take weeks for back-up to arrive if the emperor deems it necessary. Worst case we wait for that long only to hear back that we have to figure it out ourselves.”
“Sounds like a caring leader,” Mirgia said.
Arios shrugged. “The nation is thriving under his rule, so people have tolerated his whims for a while now. Some of the older folks say this won’t last, but he’s won over the younger population quite efficiently.”
“And what is your opinion?” Doroly asked.
“On the emperor? He’s a powerful man with an impressive drive. If he continues on this path then Severanti will continue to be a prosperous empire.”
“But.” Mirgia added.
“But as good as his qualities have been until now, if he starts heading in a wrong direction at any point, there are no systems in place to stop things from going bad.”
“He’s a ruler with no one to tell him when he’s wrong,” Mirgia filled in the blanks.”
Arios nodded.
“Well, let’s hope that he won’t be wrong for a very long time,” Doroly said. She got up. “I’ll go back to Redsan and see if I can’t find some friends to back us up.” She looked at Mirgia.
“I’ll stay here, I want to keep an eye on the entrance here. Say hi to Teddy for me.”
“I will, I’ll return tomorrow.”