Chapter 147 - 146 The Platinum Mine

Marcus stared stunned at Jasper who had just given him a marriage proposal.

'What the hell, where did this come from. I mean he is a nice guy and I appreciate how hard he works for his people, but I am not looking for a relationship right now, and I am still a guy at my core.'

With a heavy expression Marcus replied to Jasper who had sprung a proposal on him and said, "Sorry Jasper, I have no intention of marrying anyone and while I like you as a person, I will never be able to think of you as more than a friend."

Jasper hearing Marcus' full-on rejection had his expression go from one of happy nervousness, to a sullen one.

"I understand Lady Geist, I knew it was a long shot and I understand. I ah have to go."

After that, Jasper left Marcus' room looking incredibly dejected. and Marcus could swear he saw a couple of tears falling down his face.

'Well, that was awkward, I feel a bit bad for the guy but in my old world, you normally do not start right out the gate with the marriage proposals. I suppose that is just one of the differences in this world especially for those in the noble class. I guess it is a good thing we are leaving tomorrow since staying any longer could cause a problem, but this will make the return trip a bit trickier.'

Sighing since Marcus knew what a heart broken man could do, especially to the one who broke his heart, Marcus could only hope that Jasper would try to remain amiable.

Not feeling like getting any sleep, Marcus instead decided to practice his skills even though he knew it was unlikely that he could level them up, he had nothing better to do and practiced till dawn.

With the new day arriving, Marcus went to the dining room where he met up with the Eternal Queens who were currently enjoying their breakfast.

Sitting down, Marcus half heartily ate a few things mostly just for show until it was time for them to leave.

With all of their gear and supplies gathered, Marcus and the Eternal Queens were about to exit the manner when the two knights who they had befriend came to see them off.

However, the baron was noticeably missing and Bridget who noticed this said, "Were is Lord Maltan I figured that he would probably send us off as well."

Vincent and Xander looked at each other awkwardly before casting their gaze towards Marcus for a moment before saying, "Lord Maltan is not feeling well but he did tell us to give you his regards, and to say that you will always be treated as heroes here should you be passing through."

Bridget simply nodded before everyone gave their own goodbyes and Marcus and The Eternal Queens left the Baron's estate.

Heading over to the stable that they had left their mounts at, Marcus got Blitz out who gave him a disgruntled whine since he had been couped up for multiple days.

"Okay I am sorry, I know you have not had a chance to stretch your legs for a few days, but here I have some of your favorite treats."

Blitz seeing Marcus take out a dozen or so of a nut called Nevanas, immediately began eating the treat and forgiving Marcus.

With Blitz appeased, Marcus hopped on top of him, and with the Eternal Queens who had mounted their snow horses they left the town of Klopot and continued their journey to the platinum mine.

After a day and a half of travel, Marcus and his group had managed to make it to the location of the platinum mine that was located on the outskirts of a mountain range.

'Yep, this is the place. I can see the main tunnel along with numerous other tunnels the lizards that are living in there are using.'

Looking at the Eternal Queens Marcus said, "This is the place, everyone drink your long-acting acid resistance potion, we are going in."

Drinking the incredibly bitter and expensive potion, Marcus felt a slight invisible membrane form over his body as the potion took effect.

With their preparations completed, Marcus instructed that Blitz keep the snow horses safe while they went inside and that if something he could not handle came by, to run away back towards Klopot, and Marcus would meet back up with him there.

Blitz nodding his head in agreement, looked out with a bit of concern as Marcus entered the mine along with the Eternal Queens.

Walking deeper into the mine Marcus led the way with the compass that detects celestial palatinum in hand.

'It is pointing down and to the left so the closest deposit must be that way, now we just have to find our way over there.'

Continuing down into the recesses of the mine Marcus and the Eternal Queens had their vigilance raised since they knew there was a good chance that they could be attacked by the lizards that call this place home.

Luckily by the time they made it to the first batch of celestial platinum ore they had yet to encounter a single lizard.

'Looks to be a pretty small deposit but every bit counts, now let me see how well this pickaxe Thabon gave me is.'

Charging the enchanted pickaxe with a decent amount of his mana, Marcus felt the magic tool begin to shake before it started moving on its own.

As if taking control of Marcus' arm, the pickaxe went to work knocking out the rock surrounding the celestial iron ore, smashing away with great precision and force.

Not long, in only around five minutes, Marcus had excavated the small baseball sized lump of ore.

Picking up the piece of ore Marcus could only think that this pickaxe really did work some magic, before storing the lump of celestial platinum into his item box.

However, in the next moment Marcus heard the crack of a bow string and saw that Atalie had shot an arrow hitting something that had been crawling along the ceiling around thirty feet away.

Walking over Marcus could see the corpse of one of the monster lizards that live in the mines pinned to the ceiling of the mine shaft they were in.

'So, this is what the acid lizard looks like, it is a bit different than what I imagined but still quite formidable.'

Marcus continued to inspect the around two feet long lizard that had eight limbs four of which were normal stocky lizard feet, while it had two extra limbs coming out of its neck that were shaped like a praying mantis's forelegs, and two others in the back that were shaped like grasshoppers.

It also had a stinger at the end of its tail and a row of vicious teeth that were dripping with a highly acidic saliva that could even melt through stone.

'This must have been a young and low leveled one. From what Thabon told me they can easily reach eight feet in length when they are around level thirty. Also, I can see why they are classified as monster and not magic beasts, no way whatever this thing is came about naturally from a normal animal.'

After thoroughly examining the corpse of the acid lizard, Marcus and the Eternal Queens left the area following the compass to the next deposit of celestial platinum.

Diving deeper into the mines Marcus and the Eternal Queens slowly but surely were increasing the amount of celestial platinum mined, with Marcus having already obtained around six hundred pounds of ore.

However, along the way they were having to deal with more and stronger of the acid lizards living in the mine's tunnel's.

'Shinning Lance.'

Piercing his tier two spell into the body of a five-foot-long lizard, Marcus turned around and saw another dozen crawling along the tunnel towards him.

Some of them stopped around twenty feet away and shot globs of acid out of their mouths' towards Marcus.

Jumping out of the way Marcus dogged the globs of acid he could while casting his shield of light spell to block the others.

Hearing a loud hissing sound Marcus saw as the acid began melting straight through the stone around him.

Unfortunately, Marcus did not have much time watch the deadly acid as seven acid lizards jumped at him mouth wide open ready to take a bite out of him.

Taking his scythe Marcus swung in a wide arc cutting through the heads of four of the lizards attacking him, killing them instantly.

However, it seemed that the other three were going to make it and sink their teeth into Marcus, when two of them where blown back one by an elongated sword and the other by a heavy impact crossbow bolt.

The third lizard though, managed to get its teeth to connected biting down onto Marcus' torso, but instead of its teeth sinking in they were repelled by Marcus' mithril chainmail.

Feeling that its teeth did not find purchase, the acid lizard tried to swing down its mantis like claws, but before it could, Marcus had slammed the handle of his scythe into the body of the lizard flinging it against the wall.

The lizard smashing into he wall with great force died immediately, and Marcus looked towards the other five lizards that were rearing back to shot off more globs of acid.

'Not happening, Blades of Darkness.'

Finishing a quick chant to keep up appearances, Marcus slashed his left hand forward a blade of darkness flying off of each of his fingers.

The five powerful blades created by Marcus' tier three darkness magic spell, flew towards the five remaining lizards that were attacking him.

The three closest lizards were sliced in half without resistance not being able to react at all, while the two that were farther back managed to avoid being killed immediately only having a portion of their bodies slice off.

Unfortunately, they still received fatal wounds as the corroding properties of the darkness magic continued to assault them until they fell over dead.

With the lizards assaulting him defeated, Marcus turned around to see the two members of the Eternal Queens that had been supporting him, Jesnay and Hella.

However, farther past them was the other members of the Eternal Queens fighting off the lizards that were attacking them from the other side.

Rushing towards them Marcus, Jesnay, and Hella, joined the fight providing ranged cover and quickly helping to finish off the remaining lizards.

Waiting for the Eternal Queens to catch their breath after the hard battle, Marcus looked at the lizard corpses that had been left in their wake and thought, 'No wonder Gurrom said he would never come back here.'