There were no other exits. That was what Elias had finally decided after trawling through every inch of space in the room to find another way out. The feeling of inevitable disaster fell over him as the vortex of swirling crimson and orange power remained, the orange tendrils had slowly woven themselves around more and more of the crimson but he got a feeling as though it wasn't by design. He didn't know why, but the orange felt almost oppressive.
His mind shot to unanswered questions that had burgeoned from the appearance of the gateway—Uthred had never mentioned anything about 'Dungeons'? What was a dungeon, why did it appear and what was going on with his Essence?
All he knew was that every part of his rational mind was telling him to escape somehow.
As he thought—he realised that for the first two questions he was at a loss. He had no idea why that lunatic hadn't mentioned this or what a dungeon was. For the Essence situation though, he thought he'd made some headway.
During the fight with the rats, his store had reached its limit every time he'd been hurt, five of five. Immediately, his instinctual reactions brought the full force of the power into a retaliation—it wasn't doing that now. His initial guess was that this was due to his body not being in any imminent danger—which of course, was a completely subjective statement, but one he ceded to be accurate for the purposes of his reasoning. He guessed that that the power within him was waiting for a conscious effort on his part to spill out—the problem was that Elias had a complete lack of control for the abundance of energy within him, what would happen if he released one-hundred-twelve essence all at once?
"Let's not try that yet…" he thought.
In regards to why he had received Essence when the rats had damaged him: well, he could rule out both pain and the result of losing life force; he had experienced both daily—thanks to Uthred. No, it was something else.
He examined the ichor-covered fang of the rat that he held firmly in his hand, the yellowed fang showing hints of purple along its body—the same colour as he'd seen on the Aberrations at Haven's Point, that wasn't all however, at the base of the tooth, the roots were laced with depleted crimson veins. He put this down as the origin of the Essence. After his examination, he placed the tooth in his small backpack, it was one gifted to him by Uthred and it contained a small supply of dried rations, two water skins and his Skill Enhancement Crystal.
As well as trying to parse through the many questions he had, he also spent some time ravaging the room for secrets and to his surprise, he had found some, although, they did not consist of a secret exit to get him out of the situation. No, instead he found two items.
The first, an obsidian signet ring with an engraving of a lone wing—it matched the statuette from the altar. As he had held the ring, he noticed it glistening with a palpable aura of mana. He'd debated only for half a second as to whether he should wear the ring or not and had decided to simply stow it at the bottom of his backpack.
The second item was an obsidian gathering knife, the blade was a dark metal he didn't recognise and like the ring, there was a similar sense of mana, albeit significantly weaker. He decided to place the knife on his belt.
After both surveying and looting the room, his thoughts returned to the quest and imminent threat ahead. He felt entirely unprepared; he'd barely managed to survive fighting off three rats; how would he survive in a dungeon that quite clearly would not adapt to his partially awakened state, Tier zero. But, he knew he had no choice now; the finality of the consequence of failure was clear in his mind. Death; he couldn't die here.
Elias stepped towards the gateway, his eyes locking onto the dark void in its centre, the red and orange blending into a cacophony of colour.
His hands trembled as he clenched his jaw. A grunt escaped his mouth as he pushed himself into the event horizon of the portal.
A sensation unlike any other gripped him as a darkness enraptured his soul, his spirit and his very core. His body seemed to escape reality as the black void engulfed him. In the absence of the light, Elias felt pressure intensify, crushing him. It was as though he would be splintered into a million fragments, yet. An unseen force held him together, a strange counter-pressure that prevented total annihilation.
Time lost all meaning in the void. One moment stretching into an eternity—that vanished in an instant.
There was a lurch, a feeling of solidity beneath him as he was violently expelled from the darkness. He landed hard on a cold, damp stone. Thud!
"Argh!" Elias grimaced as his vision returned.
He glanced around, taking in faint, multicoloured lights pulsing from jagged crystals embedded in rocky, cavernous walls. The air around him was saturated with an earthy smell. The cavern he was in was the span of a small room and other than crystals and the drip of water; he saw nothing else of note.
[Quest: Survive Part: 2 – has been updated: Enter the Portal 1 /1. – New objective: Complete the Dungeon: 0 / 1 – Reward: Power – Failure: Death]
Elias raised his hand and smashed it down on the rocky surface beneath him, "Come on?! What did I ever do?!"
He had no idea what he was expecting when he entered the portal, still, a small part of him had hoped the System would provide him an escape, that it was just teasing him. After his outburst of frustration, he sighed. A cold sweat slick on his hands; Power, or Death. The System wasn't playing games and he was scared.
Once Elias's eyes fully adjusted to the natural light the crystals emitted, he figured he had enough illumination to navigate. He took a few moments to centre himself. He felt utterly taken aback by the lack few hours. How had collecting a red gem in the catacombs led to this? It was an impossible-to-refuse quest in a system generated dungeon that pre-warned him of his lack of power before entering. Everything in this dungeon would be awakened, Tier one. Everything, but him. HE remained almost powerless.
He shook his head as he decided to move, "No time like the present," he muttered.
He resolved that no one would help him; time wasted debating his bad luck wouldn't fix anything and he stepped forward into an open passage ahead.
The passage led to a series of small and unremarkable open caverns. Needle sharp crystals glowed dimly and cast long shadows throughout. Elias moved deftly through the passages and the sound of scuttling and scratching loomed ahead of him.
Elias cautiously followed the unsettling noises—the first signs of life would hopefully mean one step closer to his objective. The System avoided giving him any further information besides 'Complete the dungeon'.
He found himself winding through a long passageway that led to a much larger cavern that the one he'd been in before. Murky water pooled in the area ahead of him and reflected in the crystal light. His boots splashed through the shallows as he traversed it. The chill seeping into the worn leather. Glowing moss also covered the cave walls and pulsed in the faint light, almost like it a beating heart. The tunnel widened, leading him to the edge of the cavern.
As he approached, the rock seemed to melt away into an almost natural balcony. Elias stepped towards it, the balcony dropped off sharply about ten meters but what caught Elias's attention wasn't the drop—it was the view.
Before him stretched an enormous expanse of open rocklands, blanketed with glowing crystals, pulsating moss and mushrooms. Otherworldly flora bloomed in dark greens and purples with their leaves and petals shimmering in the crystal light.
But—it wasn't just the unfamiliar vista that made Elias anxious. It was the movement—the entire expanse below teemed with life—creatures scuttling, scratching and scurrying about. Insects with far too many legs darted across rocks; fleshy mushrooms waddled on stumpy, root-like appendages, pulsating with a sickly green luminescence; rocky crab-like crystals with eyes like burning coals scuttled wistfully through the eerie light.
The entire landscape was alive, an entire ecosystem buried underground.
Elias's legs gave way beneath him as he slumped to the balcony floor, the smooth stone cold against his skin. "Shit," he muttered under his breath, "This can't be real."
His instincts screamed at him to run, to find a way back to the surface and the world he knew, but the System's threat echoed in his mind.
His mind jumped from the System to Uthred: "By the Twins, lad," his voice resonating in his memory, "Doubt is a poison, courage is the antidote!"
"Wise words," Elias grumbled as he shook his head, "You're not the one faced with an army of giant, creepy death insects."
The memory did, however, spark a tiny flicker of resolve in his chest. He knew he had no choice, he had to move forward.
Elias took a moment to steady his breathing as he unleashed his scan ability and mentally catalogued the bizarre creatures below:
The first to catch his eye was the Urstok:
[Name: Urstok – Race: Urstok – Tier: 1 – Level: ?]
Eight fleshy legs supported its slug-like body, shielded by a grimy dark carapace, like polished obsidian. Spikes are seated centrally on each segment, and the bulk of the carapace is split into two main sections. The back part extended and underhung the rear, while the front curved around a yellowed fleshy maw. Disjointed 'tongues' of varying lengths flailed from this maw, mopping up greenery with a disturbing rhythm, leaving a trail of slime that shimmered with an oily sheen. The stench of decay seemed to hang heavy in the air around it, making Elias's stomach churn. What in the gods is that? he thought, trying to recall anything similar in the tomes of creatures he'd researched in Haven's Point after the attack. He knew that a creature this grotesque would have jumped out at him. He recalled nothing.
Next, his gaze fell upon the Mushroom men:
[Name: Mooshroom – Race: Mushroom – Tier: 1 – Level: ?]
They were a disturbing blend of the familiar and grotesque. These creatures resembled waddling stalks of mushrooms with uneven faces sprouting haphazardly from their bodies—a chaotic spread of eyes, mouths, and mismatched teeth, making each one uniquely horrifying. They moved slowly, a faint but visible aura of sickly green energy clinging to them, pulsing with the crystal light.
Finally, there were the crap-like things:
[Name: Naeru – Race: Crab – Tier: 1 – Level: ?]
These rock-like crabs scuttled across the terrain, no bigger or more expansive than a couple of feet. Jagged crystal formations impaled their shells, creating a luminescent glow wherever they moved, leaving a trail of eerie light in their wake. Oversized pincers hung from fleshy muscles that strung out like chains, producing a scratching noise as they dragged them along the rocky floor, a sound that set Elias's teeth on edge. The idea of those pincers tearing into his flesh made him wince.
With a final, deep breath, Elias stepped off the balcony and back into the cavern behind.
He needed to find a way down—after a small search he found a descending passage that looked to lead towards the open expanse.
As he moved, he pictures Tess's kind smile. He wouldn't fail her and he wouldn't forget them. Their memories would be his strength.
The air grew heavy as he moved forward, the silence punctuated by the scraping of the Naeru and the guttural gurgles emanating from the Urstok. He pushed forward into the alien expanse.
"Maybe they're friendly?"