This Quest is Bullshit - Chapter 140

Chapter 140 - The Biggest of the Really Big Doors

“Are you sure it’s hers?” Preston called down as Eve examined the unnatural root two levels below him.

“It’s hard to say for certain,” she answered. “Alex’s spear definitely isn’t the only enchanted item with a root-summoning power, and it’s also entirely possible there are classes out there that can do that too.”

“But it looks like one of hers?” Wes asked.

“I think so?” Eve squinted at the summoned root where it pierced the giant snake’s heart. “Hey Art?”

Yep!

Eve focused on the image in front of her, keeping it at the forefront of her mind. “Can you show this to the others?”

On it! the boy chimed, relaying the view to Wes and Preston.

“It’s not conclusive,” Wes eventually said, “but you’re right. It definitely could be hers.”

“Which means we have to function under the assumption that there’s a hostile Unique somewhere down here,” Preston followed up.

Eve sighed. “That doesn’t change anything.”

Wes snorted. “Yeah, before I was acting under the assumption that ancient high level dungeon was harmless, but now I’ll have to start being careful.”

Preston blinked. “Feeling snarky today, aren’t we?”

“Sorry.” Wes sighed, rubbing his neck behind his mask. “Might’ve progressed a bit too far from sad clown into mean clown territory.”

“I’m coming back up!” Eve called to them as she climbed up onto the guardrail. Given the two roads between her and them, the act of jumping up made for a fun maneuver involving leaping backwards over the rail, falling for a second as she gathered distance from the stone streets, then Jetting at an angle to launch herself up and over the guardrail of her intended destination.

“So, what do you think?” Preston asked once she’d landed.

“It’s gotta be Alex. Sure, it’s possible someone else could’ve made that root, but Alex has a reason to be here. It’d be too much of a coincidence if someone else with the same enchantment or ability just happened to come through the place Alex has a secondary quest to visit, especially when only a handful of people even know this place exists.”

Preston nodded. “Okay. Stick to the plan?”

“Stick to the plan,” Eve confirmed, referring to the combat plan they’d made months ago for a potential encounter with their former friend. Lacking an idea of the Defender’s limits and uncertain if she’d unlocked her Unique ability yet, the party couldn’t be certain which attacks would prove ineffective and which might prove too effective. In the end, they’d pinned their hopes on Art.

If the young trellac could hold Alex in place, Eve would have a chance to maybe talk her through whatever lies those behind the black pieces had told her. If she proved resistant to telepathic control and refused to talk… that’s what scared Eve.

The Defiant hadn’t a clue how much Strength it would take to break through Alex’s defenses, and activating Mana Rush for too much could mean killing her friend. Preston lacked the firepower to even scratch a tank like Alex, while Wes’s flames burned so intensely and indiscriminately that Eve doubted even Alex could survive them.

Eve hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

The party walked on in silence, keeping a lookout now not only for Managorged animals or sentry constructs, but also for signs of Alex. Given that the Defender had clearly come in from the other direction and thus descended on a different road than Eve’s group, they found little. Still, they kept an eye out. Eve even leapt to and from the lower street every once in a while just to check, but always her search came up empty.

The further down they traveled, the more complex were the rooms carved into the stone around them. After gods knew how many revolutions around the vast shaft, single-room shops and houses disappeared entirely in favor of large suites and open markets.

Even further along, the party grew hard pressed to find a space that didn’t span four levels and thus access each of the spiraling roads. It was as if—under Preston’s twisted city comparison—they’d reached a part of town where every building took up an entire block. Instead of houses they found mansions. Instead of individual shops they found single structures shared by a multitude of vendors.

The descent seemed never to end. Around and around and around they walked, stopping to explore every room along their path. The hours came and the hours went, untracked by the adventurers for lack of any method of timekeeping.

Without any semblance of moonrise or sundown, and having no true sense of exhaustion herself, it almost came as a surprise to Eve when Preston spoke the words.

“I think this is as good a place as any to stop for the night.”

Eve blinked. “It’s nighttime?”

“Hells if I know.” Preston yawned. “But it is time for sleep.”

Eve stood alone at the guardrail while the others set up camp, staring out into the brown fog that shined white with the light of her eyes. A part of her wanted to simply jump, allow herself to plummet as far as the shaft allowed before Jetting to a stop. As fun as that sounded, she knew the mist would stop prevent her from seeing the ground coming until it was too late. She could, of course, dissociate into a cloud of Mana and simply float down, but she also knew that splitting the party to run off alone in the middle of a dungeon with a potential hostile Unique in it would’ve been a terrible idea, even for her.

So Eve waited.

She kept her eyes and ears peeled through the night, catching every little scrape and knock and growl in the distance. Even as the mist obscured vision, noise echoed along the stone walls of the shaft, forming the perfect tunnel from each and every source of sound directly to Eve’s ear. Most carried the hollow tone of great distance or the softness of muffling, but sounds did make their way to her.

There was life down there somewhere, however small and far between.

The next morning—if one could even call it that—came ever so slowly, the concept itself stemming only from the fact the others began to wake up. When at last the party reembarked, Eve led the way with a vigor.

The descent, to put it plainly, had gotten boring.

The side rooms they checked blended into each other, looking all to similar for their lack of furniture, signage, or other distinguishing features. Still they stopped at every doorway, less in hope of loot than in the knowledge that accidentally passing by a monster would leave their backs exposed. It was boring, but it was safe.

Safer, at least.

Some three hours—or as close as Eve could guess, anyway—into their second day within the dungeon, the party found the most exciting thing since the dead snake.

They found the enchantments.

The lines of white Mana were faint at first, practically invisible as they ran along the gaps between the square stones of the floor. With her eyes drowning out their glow, Eve couldn’t see them at all.

It took another three revolutions around the shaft before the Burendian enchantments could overpower Eve’s own light to cast their rhythmically pulsating hue across the adventurers from below. Eve found the ghostly glow strangely comforting, a spark of familiarity reminding her that for all its grandiosity, this ruin was just an extension of two she’d already beaten. The added visibility made for a nice bonus.

Eight circles along the spiral road later, their descent finally came to an end.

All four roads jutted away from the wall for the final stretch, twisting down into one final intersection before joining into a single ramp down into the center of the cavernous space. It spat the party out right in front of a door that dwarfed even the monstrosities they’d snuck past on their prior Burendian excursions.

From their vantage at its base, the top of the double doors was obscured in mist, forcing the party to estimate its size from how long it’d taken them to go from seeing its top to seeing its bottom. The same familiar twisting and twirling lines of enchantment decorated it, meeting in the center in what could only be the locking mechanism. No creature nor construct stood guard.

Wes craned his neck up at imposing entryway. “Why is it here?”

Eve frowned. “There’s always a door.”

“No, right. I meant why is it here? Usually they’re out front.”

“Because this isn’t an outpost,” Preston breathed. “Or a stronghold. It’s a city. A capital city. Which means…”

“We’re looking at the palace gates,” Eve finished.

“But if they’re still closed,” Wes said, “and locked if those enchantments do anything, how did whatever killed the Burendians get in?”

Eve shrugged. “I get the impression the answers to that question will be inside.” She stepped up to the door. “Let’s see if I can get this thing open.”

Without waiting for a reply, Eve an open palm on the line between the two doors, shut her eyes, and cast her focus forth. With second nature determination and practiced exertion of will, she pulled at the Mana running through the enchantment. In under a second her pool was full. In under two she threatened to overload.

Eve knew white lines that traced out the shape of dragon scales had lit up all over her body.  She let them. With barely a thought she activated Mana Rush, dumping tens of thousands of Mana into the skill each second purely for the sake of making room for more.

Still the Mana came. It rushed through her in a torrent, new Mana racing in as fast as she could burn through it. Eve grit her teeth and pulled harder.

Even through her closed eyelids she could see glow of the door flicker. First once, then three times, then at last the enchantment went dark. Eve didn’t wait for it to resurge, shoving forward hard and canceling her Mana Rush before it could run her dry.

With a great and terrible groan, the door swung open and Eve stumbled forward, landing on her hands and knees in the chamber beyond. The others rushed in after her.

“Are you alright?” Preston asked, reaching out to help her to her feet.

“That looked like a lot of Mana,” Wes breathed.

Eve ignored them. She didn’t stand up. She didn’t cast her gaze about whatever room she’d just stumbled into. She didn’t look back at the door behind her. Instead, she simply stared at the message floating before her eyes.

[Alert!] Mana leak detected!
[Alert!] Mana leak detected!
[Alert!] Mana leak detected!
[Alert!] Enchantment Failure Imminent!
[Error!] Gate Enchantments Offline.

“What the shit?”

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