Unexpected Healer Book 2 -- Chapter 25

Chapter 25

While he didn’t have a physical map on him, Thaden’s Mentality had allowed him to essentially memorize the maps he had been allowed to study at the Adventurer Coalition in Forgestone.  Using his approximate starting location around Northbend, he knew that he needed to head far to the southeast toward the city of Rageharbor, which was situated along the coast of a turbulent sea.

Of course, the maps he memorized weren’t filled with all the little details concerning the terrain and exact nature of the landscape he was running through.  It was for that reason that he stopped just outside what appeared to be a massive forest spread out in front of him, which he hadn’t known about beforehand.  Every other forest he’d traveled through, from when he ran from Ashcleft to Forgestone and just recently when he took off from Northbend, had been relatively small, numbering only a 1,000 trees or less spread out over a half-mile to a mile of area.  A few of them were a little larger, but none of them could match what was in front of him.

It spread out to the northeast to the southwest in a relatively straight dividing line between him and his destination, and he tried to recall exactly how large it was – because he’d rather go around than through it.  For one, he could run faster over flat, open terrain than through a bunch of trees.  Secondly, trying to orient himself without being able to easily see the sun – which could be iffy inside a forest like he was seeing, with giant 150-foot-tall trees with enough foliage up top to darken the ground below – could end up with him getting lost or running in circles.  He wasn’t the best with directions as it was, and he’d been using the sun to navigate his way to the southeast as well as he could over the last day of running. 

Digging through his memories again, he recalled briefly looking at a map with a little more detail of the terrain where he thought he was in the Region, though he hadn’t studied it too greatly; there weren’t any dungeons nearby that he had been interested in at the time, so he had passed over it with just a few glances.  If he remembered correctly, this forest was a long strip of trees that stretched to the northeast and southwest for over a hundred miles, but it was much narrower than that.  He couldn’t remember the exact width, but it was only a fraction of that length.  With his legs already tired from all the running he was doing, and a short mental calculation based on his top speed along open ground and in the forest, he decided that he would probably save at least a few hours by just passing through the trees instead of going around. 

What made his decision even easier was the fact that he was following a well-used pathway that led straight into the forest; it wasn’t a road, such as one that would indicate that it was used by wagons or other types of merchant-type caravans, but more of a route that many people traveled through to get to something inside.  Given that he had just passed a town about five miles back and this pathway seemed to originate from it, he searched through his map knowledge and determined that the town was likely Gallecton and the pathway he was following led to a dungeon called simply, The Den.  The only thing that he recalled from it was the fact that it had a Recommended Level of 15 to 20 for its Minimal difficulty and it hadn’t been cleared by that time, so any other information about what was inside was unknown. 

He hadn’t seen anyone traveling down the pathway as he left the vicinity of Gallecton, but it was more than possible that he might meet a party or two of Contenders inside the forest if he kept to the path.  Even with the increase of the monsters’ minimum Level due to “Development Phase 2”, it had only been about two days since the announcement and this dungeon was sure to be a prime Leveling spot for most Contenders.

His first instinct was to venture off the pathway and make it through the forest to the other side so as to avoid people, but he had an almost insatiable desire to test out his new spells – and to attempt another dungeon.  He might not have a Quest specifically for it – and he’d been avoiding smaller towns over the last few hours because flashing around his Badge at the Adventurer Coalition in such a tighter-knit community would only raise some red flags, so obtaining one just for this specific dungeon wasn’t worth the risk – but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t get anything out of it.  On Minimal difficulty, of course, it wouldn’t be worth it because he wouldn’t get much out of it, but a harder difficulty with higher-Level monsters would at least allow him to add to his reserve of PICK and increase his Competencies simultaneously.

More than that, he would find out if he was going to have more problems with completing dungeons in the future by himself, like he had with the Magma Dungeon.  In addition, he wanted to test himself against a Boss that was a bit higher Level than him and see how he fared against its Level Compression, the phenomena he experienced back in the Mausoleum against Nehetmo because of their vast Level difference.  It had been extremely oppressive and he barely managed to fight through the pressure it exerted upon him,

In other words, it was a win-win for him no matter how he looked at it.  He wasn’t planning on attempting it more than once, after all, and while it would delay his travel a little bit, he thought it would be worth it.  If he was able to complete it – or get to a point where he couldn’t progress any further – in a few hours, then the timing would be about the equivalent of going around the entire forest. 

Whatever justification he needed, he’d made his decision.  Cancelling his current Celerity boost and then replacing it with a much smaller one after the cooldown expired, Thaden made his way into the forest along the pathway.  Almost immediately, he noticed something off to his left about 50 feet away, and he spotted the name above the large four-legged figure that gave him his first indication of what this dungeon might be about.

Mauler Bear – Minimal

Level 16

The brown-haired Bear was at least 8 feet long and 5 feet tall at its shoulder, and it had massive paws tipped with vicious-looking, 6-inch-long claws that seemed capable of mauling a fully grown adult person within seconds.  Given that it was nearly 50 Levels weaker than Thaden, it simply glanced at the Lifewarden and then walked away, but it was interesting to note that it didn’t seem to roam in packs like many other monsters he saw throughout his journey. 

As he jogged down the pathway, keeping to a reasonable speed so that he didn’t run into a tree or even a group of Contenders coming back the other way, he saw another few dozen of the Mauler Bears in the distance, and the further he traveled, the higher their Level.  Just as he saw one that was at Level 19 far to his right, he heard – and felt – a deep roar coming from up ahead in the direction he was traveling, followed by the high-pitched scream of a woman.

Uh, oh.  Get involved or mind my own business?

As another scream reached him, he instinctively sped up along the pathway, the decision taken from him by his traitorous feet. 

It only took about 20 seconds for him to reach a clearing in the forest, and he felt refreshed stepping out into the sunlight after being in the darkened environment beneath the leaves of the massive trees.  He quickly stopped at the edge of the clearing as he took in everything going on in front of him.

First, the clearing wasn’t so much a break in the trees as it was a cleared area around what appeared to be a large dirt and stone hill that emerged from the ground like a cresting whale.  On one side of the hill was an opening that led into darkness, and he recognized the shimmery distortion across the entrance that indicated that it was likely the dungeon named The Den.  He didn’t think that the hill was large enough to house the entire dungeon, as it was only the size of a large house, but a gradual decline of the ground just past the visible portion of the entrance hinted that most of the dungeon was likely under his feet.

Thaden took all of that in within the first second of his observation before it was pulled away to the fight going on in front of the dungeon’s entrance.  Four Contenders, all at Level 18, were facing off against a Level 19 Mauler Bear that was absolutely tearing into their Fighter, tearing strips out of her—

Wait.  That’s not a her.  That’s a man—

The high-pitched scream that came out of the Fighter as his knee was practically torn apart by a powerful swipe of the Bear’s claws would’ve been humorous at any other time he heard it, but when it was accompanied by the violent and bloody attack of the Bear, he was able to resist the urge to giggle.  That was because the Fighter, Armas by his nametag, was a 6-and-a-half-foot tall behemoth of a man, with a bald head that was spattered with blood making him look like some sort of medieval Viking as he worn leather and chainmail armor and wielded twin axes in his hands.  The incongruity of his voice and his appearance was so profound that it took Thaden a few seconds to comprehend the rest of the events going on.

Armas wasn’t fighting alone, and he also hadn’t been just fighting the single Level 19 Mauler Bear, because Thaden could see the corpses of two others nearby.  He wasn’t able to determine if they had all attacked the party simultaneously or one right after another, but it was obvious that the entire party of Contenders was exhausted, which was what was leading to mistakes that allowed the Fighter to be hurt.

An arrow released by what appeared to be the Scout Class archer of the party missed its intended target, as it impaled itself into the Bear’s upper back, not near anything vital.  The shaking in the man’s arms as he lifted his bow again after nocking another arrow from his quiver indicated how tired and out of energy the Scout was, which was reflected in faces in the other two party members.

The Mage Class member was wearing a light blue robe, which Thaden thought was fitting considering the shard of ice that materialized in front of his hands and then shot out to embed itself into the side of the Bear, and just like the archer’s arrow, it missed anything vital.  The other member, which he assumed was a Control Class, wore relatively normal-looking if a bit fancy for traveling through a forest, was singing.  The song was apparently in a language he didn’t know, though it seemed infused with power to his ears, but the man’s voice was cracking every few words. 

Still, it was enough to do something, which was when Thaden saw the dirt underneath the Bear’s front paws suddenly seem to liquify and flow over the appendages, solidifying within a second to keep them trapped.  The effect only lasted a few seconds before the monster’s strength managed to free one of its paws, but that was enough for the Fighter to push through the pain in his knee and fling himself at the Bear, bringing his axes down on its head.  The blows weren’t enough to kill it immediately, but as the monster broke free, it reared its freed paw back to swipe at the Fighter – only to find that it was blind in one eye from the axe blows.  It couldn’t see Armas move to its blind spot and throw himself under its head, before chopping into its unprotected neck with a very unmanly, high-pitched yell of exertion.  As the blood gushed out from its opened neck, the Fighter was barely able to roll out of the way before he was squished by the rapidly dying Bear, who couldn’t stay upright anymore from the loss of blood. 

“Would you like a heal?” Thaden loudly asked, breaking the silence as the Bear collapsed into stillness and the others simply stood – or in the case of the Fighter, stayed on his back – there breathing heavily. 

At his question, all four of them whipped their head around toward him, their weapons raised as if to ward off an attack.  When they saw Thaden, now wearing his Bloodletter’s Robe and having changed his name back to Christopher with a Level of 20 because he was far enough away from Forgestone that he figured he would be find risking it, they immediately put their arms down seeing that he was alone. 

“Yes, please,” the Fighter said almost immediately, his normal—as in, not screaming—voice actually quite deep.  “Waiting for my Health to regenerate with these wounds is literally a pain.”  Armas groaned as he sat up, and the Lifewarden could see that he’d been cut deeply across his chest, practically shredding his armor. 

Switching out one of his Access Slots for his Major Healing spell, as that was the most common spell that all healing Support Classes likely had access to, he channeled healing energy into the sitting Fighter, and his Health shot up to full within seconds.  While he couldn’t tell exactly how much Health Armas had, his dimmed nametag was enough evidence that he’d been hurt pretty bad, but now it shone brightly just like the others.  He wasn’t surprised to see that the back line of Contenders weren’t hurt, just exhausted, because it seemed like the Fighter normally had a good handle on keeping attention away from them and could handle himself fairly well even without a shield to block attacks.

“That’s… a lot faster than I expected,” Armas remarked, immediately getting to his feet once he was fully healed.  Thaden could still see some exhaustion in his stance, but it was less-pronounced than it was.  “And what is this glow around me?”

The Lifewarden had forgotten that most of the Contenders probably hadn’t seen his Afterglow effect trigger after healing someone, or perhaps didn’t even know about it.  “It’s just an extra healing-over-time effect that occurs after one of my healing spells.  It won’t hurt you.”

“Nice,” Armas said with a grin, before frowning at his party members.  “See, this is why I said we should get a Support member for our party.  Can you imagine how quickly we could tear through The Den if there was someone who could heal me?”

The ice-chucking Mage spoke a bit condescendingly, which didn’t seem like it was directed specially toward the Fighter; Thaden could tell that it was his natural disposition, and immediately didn’t like the man.  Or it might have been the douchey mustache he seemed to be proud of sporting on his face, but the Lifewarden preferred to think his own judge of character was based on personality, not looks.  “We’ve already discussed this, Arm.  We’d lose out on PICK and loot if we had a fifth member.  Besides, you rarely ever get hit, so it isn’t needed; this was just us getting unlucky when we emerged from the dungeonand aggroed three of these bastards when were already low on Mana.”   

“Exactly,” the singer quickly agreed with a clearing of his throat.  “And even if we wanted one, there aren’t any available Support Classes within 50 miles of Gallecton.” 

Unfortunately, Armas turned toward Thaden and he immediately knew what was coming.  “Speaking of that, I haven’t seen you around here before.  Where’s your party?  Or are you in between parties right now and want to join us?”

The Lifewarden held his hands up.  “Ah, no, I’m actually meeting my party here.  Thank you for the invite, though.”  He might’ve partied with Armas, but the other three gave him a bad vibe for some reason.

“Ah, well, it was worth a shot,” the Fighter remarked.  “C’mon, let’s get moving.  I want to get back before dark.”

Thaden breathed a sigh of relief as the party left the clearing, after extracting their loot from the three Bear corpses.  Even in that short time, all four of them appeared a little less tired than they had been, and he figured they would be fine getting back to town now that they didn’t have to wait for their main frontline member to heal up.     

When he was sure that the party was long gone, Thaden stretched and limbered himself up dramatically, psyching himself up for the dungeon.  His last visit to a dungeon hadn’t gone so well, but he was determined not to let that affect his next experience.  When he felt like he’d delayed long enough, he walked up to the The Den’s entrance and walked through the shimmery distortion.

The Den Dungeon

Please select dungeon difficulty:

Minimal    Medial    Maximal

Dungeon Slayer World First Achievement override!

Please select dungeon difficulty:

Minimal    Medial    Maximal

Given that the Minimal recommended Level was between 15 and 20, he didn’t think Medial would do what he wanted.  From what he could determine, the Level ranges increased by about 10 to 20 for the minimum Level for each step up in difficulty, so he estimated that the monsters in Medial’s difficulty would be in a range around Levels 25 to 45, the highest being the Boss.  For Maximal, he estimated that it would be around Level 45 to 75, as this dungeon had a slightly higher Minimal Level range than the Mausoleum, with the Bosses in the Medial and Maximal difficulties being at 40 and 70, respectively.  At Level 63, he might not get PICK for everything he killed inside, but he thought it would still be a decent test of his new spells.

You have entered The Den Dungeon (Maximal Difficulty)!

The Den Dungeon

Current Difficulty: Minimal   Medial   Maximal

Recommended Party Size: 5

Recommended Party Levels: 60 - 70

Huh.  I guess my calculations were wrong.  Maybe this will be a better test than I thought.  With a deep breath that smelled of dirt and a musty smell that reminded him of a wet dog, Thaden took his first step down the ramp into the unknown dungeon, his Fields already around him to protect him from whatever he might find down there.