Death Cap - Eleven - Diving Deeper Towards Perils Known

Name:Sporemageddon Author:
Death Cap - Eleven - Diving Deeper Towards Perils Known

Death Cap - Eleven - Diving Deeper Towards Perils Known

I found a bit of cloth at the bottom of my satchel. A knitting project that I hadnt finished. Using that, I wrapped up the [Blackbottle] Id found and tucked it in the bottom of the satchel. I was hoping it wouldnt burst. Id tugged a fair bit of its mycelium along too, so maybe I could replant it once I got back to my farm.

I didnt know what Id use it for, but there was certainly potential there. Anyway, more kinds of mushrooms would mean more potential combinations, which might give me the edge at some point. All I needed was to luck out a few times to get even more useful mushrooms.

Hey, kid, you done? the woman delver asked.This chapter is updated by nov(e)(l)biin.com

I jumped to my feet, nodding already. Yes, maam, I said. Im going to go tell the others now. Thank you!

With that said, I glanced around the room one more time, then darted away. I paused by the entrance to change back to the delver crew.

Um. Will the other rooms on the first floor be cleared already? I asked.

The woman frowned. No. Theres Lucas crew in the forest room. Well be moving in deeper once thats cleared out.

Okay, thank you, I said.

I didnt stick around to push my luck any more. The delver crew might start asking questions and I didnt feel like answering them. The spider rat monsters theyd killed were also making me nervous. They were frankly kind of terrifying.

Could I take on a whole nest of those? Maybe, if I tossed in one of my [Dead Mans Cough]s before the spider-rats could react. They looked sort of mammalian, so clogging up their lungs would probably work to kill them.

Stepping back into the previous room, I glanced around and got my bearings back. The way Id come from was to my right and the dungeon continued onto my left. Frowning, I stepped to the side and behind a small outcropping of rocks--after checking for spider rats--and pulled out my map again.

I was... three rooms from the entrance at the top left of the map. The other passage, currently to my left, was a long corridor that led into a room with those big circles. I had no idea what those were meant to symbolise.

I tucked the map away. My plan was to poke my head into the big room, then continue on through the dungeon for a while. If my guess was right, then the Ditz dungeon crews hadnt scoured the entirety of the first floor yet. There might be more stuff worth finding down here.

My end-goal was to reach the bottom of the dungeon. That was not going to happen in one day. Today was all about getting the lay of the land and learning what I needed to prepare so that next time Id be able to go in even deeper.

Plus finding cool mushrooms.

That was a nice bonus. I wondered if there were more. The dungeon was supposed to provide a lot of materials to local factories. Wood and coal and iron and... meat. I paused mid-step. Had I been eating spider rats my whole life?

It was dark. Cave dark. I couldnt see the far end of the room, and only a bit of light came in from behind me, around the bend of the tunnel.

Water was splashing by somewhere ahead of me, but I couldnt see it.

Carefully, I reached into my satchel and pulled out the sample of [Blue Glow Lichen] Id harvested earlier. The mossy lichen still had some glow left to it, enough to push back the nearest shadows.

It was supposed to react to mana, so... with a bit of a frown, I twisted my mana around my hand and into the little glass vial Id placed the lichen into. With [Aura of Growth] triggered, the lichen started to glow much brighter.

It wasnt a flashlight, but it was something.

With the darkness pushed back I was able to make out more of the room. It was long and narrow, or more narrow the forest room had been, at least. There was a passage off to one side that I could see, and I knew there was one at the far end, but it was obscured by the shadows.

Id need to get closer to see it, but it was right there on my map, and the map hadnt been wrong so far.

I raised the lichen vial higher. Maybe Id bring more of these next time, especially if I intended to dive into parts of the dungeon that hadnt been explored or cleared yet.

A stream ran through the centre of the room, pouring out of a crack along one wall, then across the uneven floor and down into a pit by the far end. My light didnt go far into that hole, and I had the impression it was basically endless.

I squinted at the wall next to the stream. Were those things next to the water mushrooms? Feeling rather giddy, I started across the room.

Then the things shifted and lifted their heads, revealing many-eyed faces with mandibles and cruel eyes that glinted in the light from my lichen.

I froze.

The spider rats didnt.

A dozen of them skittered on eight legs, approaching me even as they moved diagonally across the rocky ground, hissing like alley cats meeting a dog in the night.

Oh shit, I swore.

Then I did the sensible thing and tried to run.

That worked for all of a step before I realized that somehow my boots were stuck to the ground. I half-turned, as best I could with my legs stuck, and stared at the incoming swarm. Oh, shit shit shit!

***