Chapter 155: Twin Enigmas

Chapter 155: Twin Enigmas

Shoth was going to slit someone's throat, and at this point, he didn't particularly care whose.

This fourth floor was a nightmare, and it didn't have the decency of letting him wake up. Right beneath the flooded hellplain above, it was humid as anything he'd ever felt—the heady water-sickness that did its best to drown men standing on dry land. Every wall was an enemy, stretching out with lurching arms just begging for them to lower their defenses, spores just bright enough to keep their eyes from adjusting but never seeing through the darkness.

Shoth had the terrible instinct that the tunnels were moving, too, shifting under his feet in the laborious deed of the dead.

He hated this fucking dungeon.

Pau, who had originally been so helpful, was now being regulated to keeping the group together—quartz-lights would weaken both Lanc and Hulimat, which was dangerous, which meant they had to paw through near-complete darkness and just hope that they were moving in the right direction. Ossega still in front, Azkhal still taking up rear, as they cleaved through luminous constrictors and crowned cobras and platemail bugs

There were spiders here, which Gnat called to like a clicking monstrosity, but they were slow, bulbous things that wove webs of iron and stone right where a human's neck would walk through the tunnels. They could offer some direction, and did, but they were stationary enough they didn't know a complete way out of this miserable maze.

Even the child-wonder was useless now. Lovely.

On and on they traveled, searching for an ending to the endless; the only real thing they had to follow was Pau's mana-sense, a side product of his situational awareness. Whenever they killed something, he could feel where the mana was going as it raced to the core, the smallest of trails in the air. Hardly enough for a proper guide, but enough that they were more confident on picking left or right when the tunnels forked, which they did frequently. Unendingly. What a mess.

At least until they turned down another identical path, and the smallest member of their hesitant truce stopped.

"Wait," Gnat whispered.

Damn him, but Shoth immediately drew short, the rest of the party freezing in place. A miserable existence, listening to a tyke still undropped, but he hadn't led them wrong through the dungeon yet, and he was loath to fight what he didn't have a second response to.

They all looked at him, eyebrows raised, Alda stepping back. In the darkness, the black of his eyes was like the sea.

Gnat reached up, and one of the bulbous spiders crawled down to his palm, a thread of pure iron left in its wake. It sat over his spinneret, looking up at him with its multifaceted eyes, near invisible in the darkness. Click-click went its mandibles.

"There is something ahead," he said, quiet. "We are going the right way, but a threat lies at the end."

A threat? No, really? They were in a fucking dungeon. The whole place was made of threats.

For once in her pitiful life, Alda seemed to agree with him, a frown creasing her brow. "We're right drowning in threats," she said. "What's different about this one?"

Gnat held the spider higher, clicking to him with echoing repetition. "Strong," he said, pausing again. "Holds... many. Blue eyes."

A serpent, killed some tunnels ago, with blue eyes instead of habitual black.

"She is... controller," Gnat settled on, like he couldn't find the right word to put in place. "Greater than those around. Chosen by the dungeon."

Oh.

Ealdhere had mentioned the dungeon had Guardians. High Lord Thiago's hadn't had any, because he was a gormless twat without creativity, but legends aplenty told of them—creatures bound to the dungeon by soul and spirit and mana, fierce and clever, more than their making.

A brief spark of joy—if the dungeon was putting Guardians on its fourth floor, that meant it couldn't have had many floors in total—before wariness overtook it.

You didn't fuck around with Guardians. Ealdhere had spoken only a little on them, because a group of four Silvers who had only spoken of going to the second floor to commune with a god wasn't expected to go any deeper, but a psionic snake and draconic lizard weren't things to be taken lightly. Especially not when they were choked in an endless darkness and lost in a maze.

Alda grimaced. "What option do we have?" She said, brusque. "You said we're going the right way—no other option but through."

Gnat shook his head. The spider clicked its long mandibles in his palm. "The dungeon is made to go down," he said, and something stretched in his voice. "But its creatures need their own paths. There is another."

In Gnat's palm, the spider hesitated. All around them, mana sharpened to a dagger's point, the dungeon looking in at the active betrayal happening—but tough luck. If it hadn't wanted them to learn of its secrets, it shouldn't have left them around for its creatures to partake in. And for a boy that wasn't a boy to discover them.

Shoth found himself vaguely curious if the spider would be smited for its actions later. Maybe he'd force the core to keep it alive in a bit of petty entertainment.

Gnat nodded, lifting his hand so the spider could skitter back onto its web. "Go back," he murmured. "And take the left instead."

Wonderful. Reversing progress. But their other plan revolved around hope, and Shoth hated that more than he hated Alda, so on they switched around their positions and loped back up the path they'd already come, clambering over corpses and smoking sections of algae.

The sharpened mana followed them—followed them closely, really, in the most the dungeon had ever been explicitly tangible in their presence. Never enough to do anything, because that wasn't how dungeons worked, but enough that the hairs on the back of Shoth's neck stayed permanently raised. It didn't want them taking this path.

An excellent point as to why they should be.

Gnat moved slower with this path, pausing at each fork to trace back his thoughts, but they were moving, and picking up less and less kills as they went. The lack of enemies sparked each of their excitement—nothing was ever truly random, no matter how much the twisting maze of tunnels seemed to be. If a dungeon didn't want them to reach its core, it would place obstacles in their path. Encountering less meant they were going on a route less traveled.

At least until Pau took a half step and faltered. Safely sequestered in the center of the group, surrounded by shorter members so he could keep his head on a swivel, he seemed the most hesitant he'd been since the start. "Something is following us," he said, glancing back. "Not close, but fixed. Not a bug or serpent. Its eyes are higher off the ground."

Fucking lovely.

And the mysterious monster wasn't the only thing—though the enemies ahead of them kept decreasing, more serpents with blue eyes kept appearing from behind, gleaming through the darkness. One in a side path they didn't go down, and another behind, and a third slithering up until it almost reached their heels before Ossega cleaved its skull from its spine–

No. Trying to lead them back.

Shoth lived life by a very simple ideal—if someone tried to stop you from doing something, the chances were that something was worth doing.

The air grew thicker, more water beading over the algae as it lurched for them with sluggish arms; mist in the air, drifting through the stone, weighing down the glowing spores until the darkness was enough to drown in. Pau stayed achingly aware, their only sentinel unless they wanted to hamstring Hulimat and Lanc's abilities, Ossega's quicksilver eyes bright at the front.

Shoth's fangs vibrated in his mouth. He had never been more ready in his life, which was helpful, because the dungeon wasn't going to let them avoid its Guardian without a fight.

From the darkness came the click of claws. Not against stone, because that was drowned and buried beneath algae, but against each other. The hiss and chitter of insectoid voices.

Pau went very still. "A dozen," he said, fast and grim. "No, two—a swarm–"

Unfamiliar they all were with each other, but adventurers first. Before he'd even finished talking, Alda tore the cork off a vial with her teeth, clapped her rings to produce a spark, and hurled both behind the group.

Fire, orange and blinding, erupting into screams—hurtling through the smoke and flames were mantises, tall as a man's chest, claws long as sickles and black eyes full of hatred. Ossega howled a battlecry and lunged to engage.

By Alda's side, Gnat fully emerged from his ratty clothes, dead eyes gleaming—from the holes in his palms emerged silk, thick and thrashing, spun as webs and nets and lashes and leads. Whatever was in Alda's alcohol wasn't normal, and the fire leapt for the webs greedily, suckering to them like tinder. Every web he spun was a bomb waiting, sparks blowing holes in the approaching swarm, feeding Ossega and Nolla a thin stream to bully off.

But not all. Too many, too fast, and capable of climbing upside over the walls to reach those past the twin dervish fighters—Shoth picked them off with an assassin's precision, culling numbers to collapse with legs curled in, the tunnels cramped and only growing narrower.

One, with pink-white chitin and the sinuous grasp of a snake, lurched up from the side with its claws extended–

Aedan reared back and punched the mantis.

Mother of mercies, he'd actually done something.

From the moss over his hands, thorns emerged, wicked and bone-pale—a scatter of chitinous armour went wide as his hit connected, the insect whipping back. He choked on a yelp and punched it again, throwing it back, stumbling back himself. Shoth could hear how fast he was breathing from here.

Pau froze, throwing dagger going wide. "In the middle!" He cried, stumbling back. Shoth snapped to cover him, fangs rocketing through the eyes of the mantis sneaking up on Lanc, and nearly froze himself when he saw it.

Fucking hells.

Because in the middle of the mantis horde, a perfect disguise if Pau hadn't felt the difference of its gaze, was a new kind of predator—one enormous and rippling with muscle and perfect for these jungle halls. A jaguar, with rosettes through its emerald fur, a long, lashing tail with iridescent blue feathers at the tip, golden eyes bright at Alda's fire. It snarled, and even past the madness, the sound was loud enough to thunder into Shoth's ears.

He'd certainly never seen the like around Calarata. Where the fuck had the dungeon gotten this?

The jaguar was a new threat. A new distraction.

In the wake of its discovery, as they all tried to figure out how to kill an ambush predator in near-complete darkness and when swarmed by other attackers, one of the mantises slipped through their defense and slammed its claw into Nolla's leg.

The wave-dancer took the hit like a mountain for all she immediately spun and cracked her blade across its eyes, tearing out one and hurtling it back—but she wasn't Azkhal or Ossega, whose attunements helped with defense. She was built to move like water and avoid everything, fast and lithe, and this struck her like she was still a Bronze. Blood, rippling and bright, poured over her grey skin.

Everyone moved to cover—Hulimat surged forward, shadow snapping at the bit in his twisted reflection, Lanc throwing a false shadowed human to pull the mantises' attention, Myra pressing more mana into Azkhal for a fierce returning blow—but the mantises were dull and simple. Their charge stayed the same.

The greater predator saw the weakness and hunkered down—let the mantises swarm around its side, covering its enormous form until the shadows drank it down entirely. Nolla stumbled back, seeking shelter behind the other enhancers of their party, but–

Shoth saw it coming with a wretched kind of helplessness, trapped in the middle of the group as he was. His fangs sprang forward, racing, but he couldn't hit what he couldn't see, and the jaguar stayed within the swarm until the very last second.

Alda sighed. She only seemed half disappointed. "Well, the kid's laid it out. No need to worry your ugly head over it, qanra. Just a gentlemen's agreement."

Shoth looked at her. At her smile.

He should have expected this. She was from Athábakhanú—an exile, not a willing adventurer. Athábakhanú was a land of desolation past the corners shelter curled up beneath, and fragility wasn't allowed. For an exile to survive banishment and make it to the outer world, she would be more than the typical Calaratan mark he was used to fighting.

In isolation, this deal didn't seem like much. Food, discovery—maybe Gnat wasn't a typical member of her party, and she'd needed to bargain to get him alongside her. Hells, that was likely what the rest of the group was thinking, if how they'd turned away meant anything. A normal adventurer's extortion. Perfectly in line for Calarata.

But Shoth wasn't green behind the ears. He looked at Alda's face and saw what was written beneath her empty smile.

"You're going to betray me," he said.

Alda laughed, a dark, mullish sound. "Betray," she parroted. "Are you mad I'm doin' it before you could?"

In a word, yes. Shoth had a rather marvelous plan that ended with her head on a pike and him standing tall with core in hand. Even if he didn't make it to the end, a final petty revenge would be instructing Aedan to only pray for his party's protection—letting her and hers die while they were unharmed. He imagined that would have been a nice balm over failing to obtain the core.

But she was speaking like she had something else. Something tangible.

"See, you got some big talk in your teeth," Alda said, shrugging. "Grab a priestly bastard who the gods will fall over backwards to save. But that's hopin' on hope. Clutching that delusion like a babe on a teat."

Her grin was sharp. "I've got one a little more real. Wañuymanta atipay—and plans big enough for it."

Shoth stared at her. At the boy by her side, the not-boy boy with spiders in his soul.

Calaratan was full of those who would serve a better time on a stage than in reality. No reason to be so proud of your plan you shouted it to the rooftops instead of keeping it tucked away—for all the many moons he'd traveled with Myra and Therrón, they still didn't know the full power of his attunement. Oh, they suspected, and likely the rest of the party did as well, with how he'd made Aedan bleed through his fucking gums at a hint of disobedience.

But there was a reason he'd felt a kinship with the mangroves of the higher floors. He kept his secrets in his mind or in corpses. And here was Alda, prideful enough she'd tell him to his face of her planned betrayal, and think he would just play along.

He'd told her the essence of his plan, let her fill in the gaps where he hadn't said anything. Gather a group of twelve, trick Lluc into letting them in piecemeal, then make a charge for the core. Little guess she could imagine that he planned to fight all the others to be the one to claim the core himself, because of course he was, they all were—and it seemed she thought that was it.

It wasn't.

Shoth let his gaze slide over the cramped cavern they were waiting in.

Pau would be useful, but not enough. Especially if Shoth's plan worked to perfection. Not a threat, either, considering he was mostly support for Azkhal's party. Hulimat stayed much to the shadows—toss a quartz-light in his direction to weaken him, same for Lanc. Not enough. Too different from his attunement.

Azkhal himself was dangerous, fast-twitch and paranoid—even though the blood in his tattoos was promising, Shoth didn't trust he could finish what he needed to before the man would gut him to his grey masses. Ossega, too, considering the man didn't speak Viejabran and was a whirling dervish with his axes.

Gnat? Shoth didn't trust the spider in human skin, particularly not with whatever deal he'd made. Not worth risking it all.

Alda raised an eyebrow when he looked at her, arms crossed, smile shining through her singed beard. Fully fucking content in the delusion she'd won, and he was just trying to find a way around.

Oh, he'd love it to be her—but her attunement was useless. Alcohol, brewing, fermentation—intricate knowledge of effects and calculations, yes, but not enough. He'd kill her later, when everything wasn't on the line. When the world was in his grasp.

That left one, considering he wouldn't risk Aedan when Rhoborh could still be arsed to interfere. He looked at the only remaining member of his party.

Myra was a horrid bitch who used her attunement as an excuse for keeping herself as bitter and biting as possible. Oh, he'd enjoyed that for quite some time, fencing insults and blasphemy with the understanding that they still had each other's back—but there was another reason why he let her join his party. Why he kept her around, even as she scared off all other prospective members.

A plan he'd kept in the back, hoping for a more conventional path that held the potential of developed power, but never one he'd discarded. And one that was critical now.

Shoth stood fully. He shook off the façade of normality he'd shucked over his shell for this whole adventure, for bowing before Lluc as a normal Silver on the pursuit of impossibility. The mana, sparking through his chest, through his eyes, through his teeth.

With hindsight he could see in the moment, it would be safer to wait. To pull the weeping coward's act, promise to help if only so she wouldn't leave him behind, wouldn't make him have to fight through the dungeon alone. Wait until her back was turned, and then act.

But Shoth fumed now, steaming, seething, and the risk would be worth the expression on her face.

"Aedan," Shoth said, dragging the shivering priest's attention back to him. "Can you run?"

Alda laughed, all teeth. "Run, run, little ukucha," she purred, like he understood the insult. "And where will you run, beyond straight to the death?"

She had an odd way of phrasing it—the death. An Athábakhanú understanding, perhaps, a more spiritual take on a soul traveling the world beyond. Fitting, for the dwarves that burrowed into the marrow of mountains and never poked their heads above the stone.

Shoth didn't bother with a response.

To his credit, miniscule though it was, Aedan just nodded, arms still tucked feverishly tight to his sides. "As much as I am needed to," he said, quiet.

Acceptable. Shoth wasn't one who kept all his ships in one harbour, and as much as they were many floors below Rhoborh's territory, Aedan was the kind of spineless pious bastard that could still plead for protection. Shoth would have to work with it.

"Myra," he said, because as much as he wouldn't go laying out his intentions for Alda like he wanted critiques, he wasn't above some dramatics. "It's time."

She grinned, sharp. Mana crackled under her skin, preparing for what she thought was a miraculous sort of thing, grinding Alda beneath their heel and claiming the core. The hunger that had led her to searching him out, though she didn't understand quite what she was partnering with. No one did.

There was a reason he had killed the previous master of this attunement in order to learn it. There was a reason he had stayed at Silver for so long despite the years that were crawling up on him. There was a reason he had worked so hard to disguise himself as a normal adventurer when he met the Guildmaster Lluc.

Something like caution entered Alda's eyes. She hadn't expected him to do anything but roll over and show his stomach. "Don't tell me you're that foolish," she snorted, flicking an impassive finger at his chest. "Take certain death in the dungeon, or a chance of survival with the core in my hand."

Shoth didn't respond.

Myra laughed, this vicious mix of hyenas and thunder-screams. "We've got our own offer," she said, sneer firm in place. "Bow your head to the true masters of the core."

Well. Shoth was polite enough he'd let her die with a final retort on her lips. He rather imagined that was how she would've liked to go.

But her opinion didn't much matter as he stepped forward and sank his fangs into her throat.

Myra screamed—everyone did, this panicked exhalation of surprise and fear. Shoth wrapped his arms around her and pinned her to the wall; slammed her skull against the stone with a satisfying crack as he drank. As he drank and drank and drank, filling himself, emptying her, scouring power and death in turn.

He was adept at this and all it took was a drag of his canines to tear open her windpipe—drain blood and air at the same time, forcing her mana into trying to heal her body instead of retaliating. Myra clawed at his sides, pulses of mana snapping and billowing against him, but more sank through his fangs—into him.

The reason he kept her around. By its very existence, her mana was attuned to help others. Even if it wasn't blood-attuned, it was compatible with him. He drank it down like the finest wine at a feast.

Mana thundered through him, this shrieking tidal wave and monsoon and earthquake ripping around his channels—and then outside, bouncing off his surroundings, filling his awareness until the world paled in comprehension and the walls of the cavern became known. A sense. A Gold-sense.

Myra struggled, faltered, struggled, fought—and slumped in his grasp, head spilling over his shoulders. She pawed weakly at his hands, gasping nothings to the dungeon, and the last of her blood—of her mana—sank into him. Dead.

Shoth stumbled back, mana crackling through him, and laughed.

Gold.

Shoth, greatest of his attunement, stretched out his hands and let mana burn through him in ascending purity. The tunnel heaved and shuddered in wake of his power.

Much like he'd thought, everyone was too startled by his actions to retaliate, giving him the precious moments he needed to show the last corner of his attunement he'd never shown anyone else, at least not without them being on the receiving end. A martyr's attunement, he'd called it once, with a kind of laugh no one at the time had understood. They never would.

A thief he was, and a Gold-ranked one at that. Finally. Finally.

Alda was stiff, frozen, hands over the vials on her waist. Oh, where was her deal? Where was her precious little betrayal and the plan she'd wanted to bash over his head?

Gone. Just like she was about to be.

Ever pragmatic, Azkhal turned to him—the war-like man was built for fighting and little doubt he could have raised his club in the mere moments Shoth was distracted by his ascension, but he didn't, because all Silvers were bound by this intrinsic fear of Golds. Prey versus predators, no matter how much they could slaughter Bronzes. Golds were above. Golds were beyond.

He felt like he could take on the Dread Pirate. He felt like he could take on the world.

But Shoth wouldn't let the euphoria control him. The death of all great things, heaving their weight up to categories stronger than them—no, he knew his mission. Claim the core. Don't waste his time pattering about with lesser fights to test himself when instead he had to leave them in the dust.

Let them try to claim the core. Let them distract the dungeon with frivolous fights—he had something else in mind.

"Aedan," Shoth said, and smiled around teeth that were all sharpened—that were all threats. "It is time to run."