A Soldier's Life

Chapter 165: Familiar Faces in Strange Places

The dire boars were huge, their size reminded me of American buffalo. Each of their off-white tusks was the size of my arm, and even with my armor, I figured getting gored would be painful if not deadly. One of the boars wandered closer to us.

Raelia studied the creature and informed us what she knew: “The tusks may look dangerous, but it is the hooves you need to be wary of. Once they get you on the ground, they will trample you to death.”

Each boar looked to weigh over a thousand pounds, and the thought of getting under their hooves was horrible. “So, you’ve fought these before?”

Raelia flushed at being questioned about her knowledge. “No. I was flying on Moonclaw over the Seagrass Plains and saw dire boars in action. I did not know what they were at the time, but my commander told me afterward. They chased down a pair of centaurs and trampled them to death. I have never seen a dire boar this close before.”

I assumed Moonclaw was her griffin, but she had never mentioned it before. “So, how do we kill four?” I asked my group.

“I think they charge mindlessly in a straight line, like a bull,” Maveith offered after a short silence. “Perhaps one of us could stand against the wall and trick it into running into it.”

“Are you sure about that, Maveith?” I asked uncertainly. Having been used as bait before, I did not like the idea.

Maveith nodded slowly. “Dire animals are common on Stone Mountain Island. Their instincts are to attack recklessly. Dire bears have killed many of my people”, he added, nodding to Raelia.

She voiced some concern, “Their hide is thick, or so I imagine. My fireball would just burn away their hair and make them angrier.”

We waited to ensure there were only four creatures as we discussed strategies. Two were large males, and the other two were younger males, about half the size. They were mostly concerned with eating grubs, but Raelia spotted one that found a truffle and consumed it while keeping the others at bay from its prize. After over two hours of watching, I finally decided on a plan.

“They are aware of us but seem disinterested. All three of us will attack a single boar when it is separated from the others. Hopefully, the other three won’t come at us together, and we can take down a second boar as a team. I will kill the third, and then we can all work together on the fourth.” As I spoke, I produced Raelia’s runic dagger and held it out for her. Her eyes widened briefly before she took it from me, and her expression was unreadable at the trust I was extending to her.

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She spent a moment attaching it to her belt before advising, “Do not run into the corridor if things go bad. Once we attack them, the creature will be free to pursue you if you leave the chamber. Dodging something that size will be impossible in the narrow corridor.” We had gotten that answer from the shapeshifters, but we had not experienced it yet. Once you started fighting creatures in a dungeon room, the fight had to end with a victor. There was no retreat, as the creature could pursue you.

It was half an hour later when our opportunity arrived. Just fifteen feet from us, one of the smaller boars was near and isolated. My heart raced, and adrenaline surged as I led the charge into the room. My plan was to stab with my black blade behind the shoulder to reach the heart for a fatal blow.

The boar turned too fast for me, and I only got a glancing slash, opening its hide on the shoulder. The cut felt as though I was cutting shoe-leather with a steak knife, despite the enchanted blade. It squealed loudly, calling the others. My shield arm stung as its head whipped around, and its tusk smashed into me, forcing me to retreat a few steps. With its attention on me, Maveith’s hammer came down on its head, crushing its skull and causing the beast to collapse instantly. Maveith’s hammer was buried in the skull, and he needed a moment to extract it.

I turned to look at the small hill as the thunder of hooves echoed ominously in the room. “Where’s Raelia?” Maveith asked. Shit, I did not see her. Had she ditched us now that she had two blades and thought she could escape the dungeon alone? I did not have time to worry. I braced myself for the first charging boar. It was one of the large ones. I layered five air shields in front of me and planned to roll to my right.

The good news was that the boars were spaced about twenty feet apart. Maveith towered behind me, weapon retrieved. “We are dodging right, Maveith!” I yelled as the boar thundered toward us. I dashed right, and Maveith dove. The boar suddenly jolted to a stop, destroying four of the five air shields on impact. I planted my foot and lunged with the blade, achieving excellent penetration behind the shoulder. The stunned boar spun, ripping my embedded blade from my grip. Maveith’s hammer came down on the back of its neck. I winced at the loud cracking sound on the spine, finishing the beast.

We were not done, as the second large boar was too close, and I was forced to kill it with my dimensional space. Now brainless, its legs folded, and it skidded into the first boar. The final opponent was one of the smaller boars, weighing only six or seven hundred pounds by my estimation. The ground still rumbled as it charged.

Raelia suddenly stood up, whipping her camouflage cloak back to reveal herself, and leaped onto its back as it passed her. She squeezed the creature with her legs, preventing herself from being thrown off, and drove her dagger and short sword into the creature's back. The whole sequence took just a few heartbeats but demonstrated incredible timing and skill.

It reared and squealed at the sudden pain. The boar smartly started to roll onto its back to crush its rider, and I worried for the elf. However, as the boar rolled, she gracefully dismounted and rolled to cushion her fall. She had left her two weapons buried in the creature, and it did itself no favors by rolling. When it righted itself, it had trouble walking with the blades lodged deep in its shoulder. Grunting in pain with every step, it moved spasmodically toward Raelia.

I took a moment to pull my black blade free, as it got jammed between the boars ribs when the beast collapsed. Maveith was already taunting the crippled creature, keeping its attention from the unarmed Raelia, allowing me to flank it from behind and slash the tendon on a back leg. After that, it was easy for us to finish off the immobilized creature.

Raelia smiled as she went to retrieve her weapons. I, however, was not happy. “That was not the plan! And you were hiding in the open. What if the boar trampled you? You did not tell us you were doing it! We thought you ran away!”

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A shocked look came over her face at being yelled at. I think it was the first time I had truly shown anger at the elf. Her mind seemed to race, and guilt appeared on her features. But instead of defending herself or yelling back like I expected, she just squeaked out softly, “I’m sorry.”

Her response was so unexpected that I was caught off guard. I gave her my angriest stare and waited for Maveith to intercede and defend her, but he did the opposite, reiterating my points, “Raelia, I am disappointed in you too. The plan was clear, you should have voiced your intentions to us.” Maveith’s statement was like a slap to her, and she physically stumbled. Maveith had taken her side ever since I had released her. She stared at her feet, no longer able to make eye contact. Was she going to cry? Why was I feeling bad?

I relaxed. “You did look like a badass doing it. But if our partnership is going to work, we need to communicate better.” I looked over the bloody boars, soaking the earth into a pasty red mud. Maybe a token punishment? “Maveith, Raelia will help you harvest the boars. Make sure she does most of the work. I am going to search the rest of the chamber.”

I walked away and heard Raelia trying to understand what I said by asking Maveith. “How is my ass bad? It does not smell at all. I just bathed!” I chuckled to myself as Maveith tried to help her sort out my colloquialism.

The ground was torn up around the chamber as the boars scavenged under the sod for grubs and truffles. The stone chest was near a small spring that fed a small pool on the far side of the hill. I shattered it and looked at the coins spread out in the grass. I was more excited about the silvery runic knife inside. The metal gleamed on the blade of the short, single-edged weapon. No, not a weapon, but a skinning knife. Maveith was going to love this.

There was only one exit from this room, so the choice of direction was easy. Rather than dig for grubs, I returned to the others while waiting for my aether to recharge to retrieve the collector. With a grin, I handed the goliath the knife. “Maveith, try this out. It was in the reward chest.” I presented him with the skinning knife.

Maveith took the blade reverently while Raelia looked on, her eyes clearly recognizing it as an artificed weapon. Maveith cut into the belly of the next boar, the skin parting without much effort, and the gray-skinned man smiled. “This is remarkable. Thank you for letting me use it.”

“No, Maveith, it’s yours. As well as two of the essences from these creatures. We definitely wouldn’t have won without you.” It was a small jab at Raelia’s actions as well. She had abandoned us at the start of the attack, doing her own thing.

The collector appeared in my hand, and I collected two apex constitution essences and two major constitution essences. I gave the two apex essences to Maveith, while Raelia watched jealously. I moved a distance away, pocketing the other two essences. I had not gotten used to the gamey smell of animals being harvested. Maveith was joyously using the new knife, cutting away chunks rapidly and handing them to Raelia, who could barely keep up with stacking the meat and organs. Raelia was covered in blood and did not look happy.

Four buffalo-sized boars gave a lot of meat. Maveith asked for the other bag of salt, and he only cured one slab of belly fat, conserving our dwindling salt stores for cooking. He stacked the other slabs nearly three feet high. I sent them to storage so they would not spoil, but I doubted we would find more salt in a dungeon.

I also had to temper Maveith’s excitement over his new tool. I added less than a quarter of what he harvested to my space. “Maveith, that’s it. I do not have more free space.”

Maveith pleaded, “Eryk, can I peel the intestines? Surely you have enough room to take the casings so we can make sausage in the future?” How long did the goliath think we were going to be trapped in the dungeon?

I acquiesced and made a small box with my hand. “This big, Maveith. I need to have some space reserved for killing creatures too.” Maveith eagerly started working on the intestines. He had to strip them, scrape them, and then turn them inside out and scrape them again, all while washing them thoroughly.

He needed water for his work and fouled the only pool in the room. He had a dozen six-foot sections when he was done. I guess the saying that you do not want to know how the sausage is made is true.

We spent over half a day in the room before packing up and heading to the next one. The corridor was not long, and we were a bit surprised to find another safe room. But this safe room was special, as it had stairs ascending to presumably the first level at one end and a black, oily door at the other. It had been so long since we had seen a dungeon exit. Maveith and I just stared at it in disbelief.

Raelia questioned, “Are we going to leave? I thought you said the city was full of specters.”

“Yes, it is. We cannot leave, no matter how tempting it looks right now. We will certainly be killed. We need to find Castile first.” I could not tell her there was also an Elven summoner out there trying to kill us. She might risk running to seek his protection.

Raelia went to the elven script on the wall. “It says dire boars ahead. Guess dungeon notes are not useful if you are going backward.” She offered a weak smile at us before continuing to read the faded script.

Maveith asked curiously, “Does it say anything else?”

“Nothing useful. The truffles the boars were eating are valuable, but other than that, it does not say much.” Raelia claimed one of the stone shelves and started unpacking her pack.

“Maveith, what do you want to prepare for dinner?” I asked while breaking my eyes from the tempting exit. I spent time getting his supplies, and then I went to scout the stairs.

Raelia jumped to her feet. “I will come with you.”

I considered her for a moment. “Stay with Maveith. If there are legionnaires at the top of the steps—well you can imagine,” I stated neutrally.

Frustrated, she said, “Just do not go in the room. It will seal you inside if it is the final room before a descent.” Was Raelia actually concerned for my safety?

I paused but did not respond to the elf as I climbed the stairs. There was a lot of hope riding on each step I took. Was the rest of the company on the first level? Were they still alive? Was Castile among them? The stairs did not corkscrew as I climbed, but the wall had a long, slow curve. When the stairs ended, I was on a small landing with a large circular room beyond. The floor was packed earth. The walls of this chamber had a thick green slime covering them, giving the entire room an eerie green light, but that was not what caught my attention.

A massive drake circled restlessly in the center of the room, its powerful body rippling with hidden muscle. The drake’s dark mahogany brown scales glistened under the flickering light, and its lack of wings marked it as an earth drake—an imposing creature I had recognized from the pages of the bestiary. Yet, it loomed much larger than a typical member of its species, creating a daunting presence that filled the vast space.

As I scanned the chamber, a flash of crimson caught my attention on the far side, where a legionnaire who had been seated in quiet observation had now risen to his feet. The chamber stretched over two hundred feet in length, an expanse that made it difficult for me to discern his features. In a moment of resolve, I lifted my helm to reveal my face, revealing myself. He met my gesture by removing his own helm, and for a brief instant, our eyes locked in mutual recognition.

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