This Used To Be About Dungeons полностью

Mizuki smiled, then made to bite Verity’s hand, and they laughed together for a moment before finding a place to sit together.

“Isra, can you scout ahead?” asked Alfric. “Just to see whether there’s a door or not. An arrow there, an arrow back. I’ll come in an instant if there’s trouble, but I think we’re done with at least this room.”

Isra nodded. “Of course.”

“I cracked a rib,” said Hannah, as Isra prepared. “Fixed now. Let me look at you, Alfric, you took a bit of a hit. Present your profile to them, ay? Better for the healin’ that way.”

Isra loosed the arrow and followed, walking slowly and keeping her eyes peeled for anything moving, though it was difficult, with time slowed so much. She passed close to the corpse of the bear, following the arrow’s flight as it slowly dropped due to gravity, and prepared her second arrow as the first was about to hit the ground. There seemed to be no other doors though, no corridors or tunnels, just trees that were rooted in obsidian and a piece of large oak furniture with a curious dial set into its front. Isra was keen to investigate, but she had told Alfric she’d be back, and she fired off another arrow back the way she’d come, ready to deliver the news that they’d finished the dungeon.

Alfric was right though. Their work had only just begun, because with the fighting over and the dungeon apparently fully cleared, it was time to go through all the work of taking everything of value.

“I want to get this out of the way now,” said Alfric as they sat and recovered. “We shouldn’t have fought the bear. Things were going well, but we got overconfident, and I should have put my foot down. When you’re dungeoneering, you shouldn’t get that close to dying. So I apologize for not being a better leader and allowing that level of risk.”

“We did fine,” said Hannah. “We were barely hurt.”

“We were lucky,” said Alfric. “I don’t want to rely on being lucky. The room was potentially valuable but optional.”

“I really thought that I could kill it straight off,” said Mizuki.

“You can’t rely on conventional biology,” said Alfric. “But the real problem was that we didn’t make an immediate retreat, and we didn’t follow the plan. I saw Verity go down and my instinct was to get in the way and protect her. I should have grabbed her and run as fast as I could. I should have been shouting commands.”

“Don’t be hard on yourself,” said Hannah. It was, in her opinion, an overreaction. Perhaps she had simply been inured to the prospect of injuries by seeing how close a person could come to death and still be pulled back by a cleric of even moderate skill, let alone a team of clerics devoted to different gods. Alfric had the dagger, and all he’d have to do was make it to the dungeon entrance before getting whisked to the temple. She did feel a bit of guilt though, because she was the one who’d been pushing for it, and it very well could have gone wrong.

“I’m fine,” said Verity, waving off Mizuki. “Sorry for falling, I just… lost the song more than I’ve lost any song before.”

Hannah could feel many things, but whatever had happened to Verity, it was beyond her. The bard seemed like she’d be all right though. She was just a bit dazed and had even offered some music to help with the looting, if they needed strength to carry things. Alfric hadn’t thought that it was necessary though, not with him and Hannah being as strong as they were, and make no mistake about it, Hannah was strong. Alfric had also thought that Verity had too much of a tendency to push herself, but he seemed somewhat reluctant to share that with Verity, and either she hadn’t picked up on the hints, or she’d been ignoring them.

Once they’d finished their rest, they moved as a group through the dungeon, clearing the branches they’d gone through backward, bringing things they couldn’t stuff inside the book back to the entrance. Alfric had been excited by the wooden wardrobe, though they’d no idea what it actually did, and it was going to be a right pain to carry all the way to Liberfell, if they could even manage it. Alfric could just barely lift it on his own and needed Hannah’s help to actually move it anywhere, but six miles across uneven terrain, especially with the crags and roots that were on the paths through Traeg’s Knob… well, that was a fool’s game. Alfric thought that it could be warped, so long as it was resting on his foot, but Hannah was extremely skeptical of that, given how heavy it was. If the warp failed, then he wouldn’t just have six miles, he’d have twelve, and anyway, they’d been planning to go for Liberfell, not back to Pucklechurch. The whole thing was a logistical nightmare, but Alfric seemed enthused by it, as though this was one of the parts of dungeoneering that he most enjoyed. Hannah didn’t quite understand it, but that was fine.