Endless Conquest, page 1
part #2 of Dungeon Crawl Series
ENDLESS CONQUEST:
Dungeon Crawl
BOOK 2
Chapter One
The great halls echoed when a young man ran down the corridors, his hair was disheveled. The nose leaked mucus, but that did not slow him down, the dark corridors were lit by a mix of lanterns since this was the commoner wing of the school, the man reached the end of the hallway and grabbed the handle shaking it loose and falling on the floor, he went down on his knees to grab the handle, and he inserted it into the wall next to the door instead, he cranked it in a circling fashion and the door unlocked, and the magic vanished.
“Alex!” he shouted while the door slammed shut behind him, The deep blue eyes pierced his gaze. He diverted it immediately, and he stood there waiting for his friend to speak, Alex gave a smile he had been in the academy now for two months. Cecilia unlocked her class as well. It was a non-combat one focused on enchanting, which was something needed to be able to forge magical equipment.
She had been learning what she could in the academy about becoming an adventurer. Still, she would need a patron or a great master to spend the money, making her learn the craft. He had chipped in a few other silver he had earned from his own crafting, there was a massive demand for everyday wares in the academy, and the transports were monthly.
“Yes, Roach?” Alex had never understood why he had picked that as his name on the status card, Alex had not been able to choose one since he had not cleared his first dungeon yet, whenever a Player completes a dungeon he unlocks the ability to put a name and his level over his head.
It was a sign of strength and an excellent way to keep his real name a secret if he wore one of those magic hoods that concealed his face, every teacher in the academy wore one and a few of the wealthier students as well since they cost about two gold pieces each.
Alex had wanted to save up for such an expense. Still, there was no need, he had managed to finish the basics and were now in the waiting pace for enough students to pass so they could begin the real courses, reading, writing, and math was the cornerstones of being an adventurer for a stupid adventurer lowered the price for all of them.
Nobody wants to fight a dragon for a silver coin, the client could pay whatever they choose, but the basics had taught him about different monsters. How much he should charge for their demise, the most expensive ones were the undead since you needed to use holy magic to cleanse the curses they might cast on the land.
Countless religions and factions were dealing with just that kind of thing. The most popular one was the Lightbringer, he was one of the main heroes of the old world. He united most of the ancient religions into the same temple, or that was what the rumor was nobody knows for sure. It could certainly just be a story that been wrongly for hundreds of years.
“Alex, the teacher, is arriving tomorrow, there have been enough students for a while, and the teacher managed to complete her mission in time.”
Good news for once, he had spent almost two weeks making anything from socks to underwear, he was not allowed to level up since that could damage his future, there was some sort of boon of doing a specific ritual before level 10 to increase future ability points which was much needed.
Alex was only 50 experience from leveling, and he spent most of his time killing wolves in the nearby forest which were filled with wildlife, they were at the edge of what was called dark lands, or monster spawns as the adventurers called it, if you did not correctly use a rare magical artifact known as the land token and then defeated the boss that spawned the monsters would always remain.
Alex was surprised his old village had someone strong enough to push so far out and with a ragtag of adventurers from the town and then leave if the influential person that conquered the land was still there the village would be as well since the recommended level was at least 40 to even attempt to form a town, and that was the level of masters, Experience points needed for levels were at an extreme level the more levels you had. Currently, he was about 950/1000, but the next level would be double that, for at least nine more levels until he turned 20. After that, he had no adventurer would tell him, or they simply did not know.
The bell chimed, and that meant the next batch of goods and students arrived, Alex had gotten a silver a week for taking Roach under his wing as a mentor in math, he could only have a single student. Still, he had managed to teach the former slave how do mathematics successfully, his writing and reading were sub-par, but it was not his problem, as Roach said the money was the most important thing. If he could not tell how much gold he had in his pocket, he would rather have none at all.
Fools and kings were the same to Roach who was born as a lowborn, a mix of NPC and human, his father was an NPC that married his human mother which was frowned upon, the dogma was NPC, were same as the dark races they lived on the outskirts in the old world, where rape and pillaging was an everyday occurrence. Nobody could change that, the few NPC that came to the new world were either slaves or traitors.
Alex had no real opinion on the whole situation. Still, there had been a mandatory class about the NPC and the dark races alike, one would think dark races were goblins or ogres. Again, no, they were humans the same as him, but they lived in the old world wanting to bring back the old gods and force everyone to change their way of life for nefarious purposes.his life had already been forcefully changed when a new world wizard came to his village with his band of bandits and killed everyone he knew except for Cecilia, which he had not seen in a month.
They were separated by only a few walls. Still, he was not allowed to walk into the craftsman guilds area, there had been a lot of bullying before, and they had put a system where you had to apply to enter, he would like to learn a bit more about crafting since his subclass was craftsman, which were able to do everything but master nothing.
Footsteps were now echoing down the hall, and Roach began to shuffle out the room, they had to walk down there to collect their goods before anyone bought it from under them, he had ordered a few skill books that were extremely common and only available to people at the academy, they were Regeneration, Alarm, Rest and Channel.
They were the bread and butter of every adventurer. You had to buy them to graduate, Regeneration made. Hence, you healed one hitpoint and one mana point every minute, Alarm spell was used to guard objects like a client or a campsite. Channel was the one that allowed you to expand the length, time, and aura of the spell so you could reach further.
The normal spell only had a range of 5 meters, which were nothing. Still, with a channel and proper mana cost, they could reach almost 500 meters. With his intelligence, he could get 26 meters free. Another five per mana point, The best one was Rest, which allowed full hitpoint and mana, if you did not move for an hour, this was the number one spell used for all classes even craftsman.
Alex had immediately seen the benefits being able to cast as many spells he would have wanted then just simply rest in a safe spot for an hour, he would probably try to kill the giant squid that chased him on the way here if he knew he could simply rest to regain his mana if he failed instead of sleeping or drinking an expensive mana potion.
They approached the caravan, which was swamped. The new students looked terrified of all the yelling and shoving to reach the carts. Still, Alex knew there was a process to the whole ordeal which people seem to forget, the merchants would never sell their spare goods on the first day but keep it for tomorrow to get the customers that had forgotten something.
The shoving started to die down, and people were leaving with either crates or pouches in their hands, there was a nifty item called magic bag that allowed you to store another 10 items, the price was extreme to someone at his level with the gold cost reaching as absurd as 25 gold for the worst quality one.
Roach rushed up to the cart and grabbed his order and snuck away, not even waiting for Alex. He knew Roach only ordered stuff like food or precious gems, which stacked a lot better in the inventory compared to copper. Emerald was always valuable and quite plenty in this region, Roach had accumulated almost 10 of them worth a whopping 30 silver in his inventory, and that was how he kept his wealth. He had silver as well, which surprised Alex, there was a lot more to Roach than he shared, but it was probably nothing big like murder.
Alex was handed his skill books and a few extra rolls of cloth he would use to make a few more goods to sell, this was how he earned his money while waiting for the next class to begin, the noise around him was unbearable. Hence, he walked straight back to his room, which he had modified with the smart magic system.
There were plenty of other more practical solutions than what he used, he had made a magical spell to always be on unless you removed the magical plate that supplied magic, there was a simple winch inside the wall which he had easily removed with his hammer and screwdriver, which were something of the old world that was adapted to the new world, there were countless machiners in the ancient world that could do the job of a thousand men.
Alex could make maybe fifty underwear per day with his speed, but he had read some machines could make thousands a minute, he was very intrigued about the old world which his father had come from, there was nothing in the library about warlocks or any legends of old, most were religious text or gossip, the few that existed were diaries of early adventurers that left a copy of what they had seen in the dark lands.
Alex sat down in his room, which was quite big and able to fit four beds. Still, there had been a shortage of student in the massive school that could meet at least a thousand , this whole area was one of the old villages several hundreds of years ago where they first settled and then moved inwards toward the ocean to clean out all the monsters.
The village token had been destroyed, and monsters spawned. Still, there were villages all around that kept the stronger monsters at bay, the biggest game in the forest was wolves. They were no problem for someone with a combat class, or even a peasant if sufficiently armed.
He opened the books, and they immediately entered his mind as he had always known their secrets since birth, he was happy with his purchase and tried to cast alarm which worked flawlessly, his entire schedule was empty and the day was still fresh, so he decided to walk around the property to clear his head and maybe get a lucky sighting of Cecilia which were separated by a building, the crafters guild had classes always and most of the time they built goods which the merchant took, this was their most active week since the caravan of merchants would head back to the harbor and not return for at least a week, depending on if more students were being shipped.
There was a stench in the air when he hit the garden. He looked around, his curiosity got the best of him when he walked down the road looking around for the source, he heard a scream. He immediately looked over, she fell to the ground hitting it hard with her butt, Alex approached and frowned at what he saw, a student with frozen eyes lying still in the bush almost like he was dead. Again, if he was dead, there would have been just a pouch instead of a body, a few more students arrived after the yelling, and there were, even more, yelling this time.
“I know what it is!” Alex turned his head and saw Ragnar with his posse, he had gathered up another four people. Hence, they were now six, Ragnar was level 14 as well, which he displayed proudly, money moved the world thinking about it, Ragnar’s father must have spent a lot of money to hire enough adventurers to power-level his son considering his talents.
Everyone was quiet, waiting for Ragnar to speak, which boosted his ego like he was a scholar. “It’s necromancy. Someone either cursed him or he died and turned to undead. Still, he will only awake when the sun goes down, so he is harmless now, but we should bring an adventurer here to take a look, I call dibs on the experience points.”
Something was weird about the whole situation considering, Necromancer was an infrequent class just like his Warlock, and also categorized as a dark race, they were not a dark race, but Alex knew there were demon NPC’s. They lived in the dark areas, considering becoming a Warlock was simply a drink of demon blood then that would mean there could be a whole cabal of them out there.
Necromancers he had no idea how they became as such he guessed it might involve death, maybe by sleeping a few days surrounded by dead peoples pouches, since the corpse vanished when someone perished.
Ragnar was bragging about his exploits fighting the undead when finally someone with knowledge arrived, she took one look at the body and then thrust her spear into his neck turning him into a pouch she put the items in her inventory and spoke “Who discovered him?” the girl stepped forward and simply said she saw the body and moved the bushes, the adventurer immediately took hold of her hand and turned it over to see if there were any blue spots.
“You are clean, anyone else touched the corpse? The undead has some curses.” Everyone shook their heads and started to clear out, Alex did not recognize the adventurer. Hence, he guessed she might have been the new teacher, but there was also a murderer on the loose. Still, nobody seemed to care, most people walked in pairs and the corpse probably been walking around at night outside, perhaps killed by a monster or a roaming undead.
The adventures patrolled the outside regularly, but the inside park was often deserted since classes were going on always, this was one of the days were classes were off due to the guilds wanting to increase their coffers by selling a few cheap wares for outrageous prices.
Alex walked down the path although the smell was gone with the corpse he still felt a lingering scent, almost like almond that blended with the smell of the body, he followed the road and came upon an old overgrown sideroad covered in black stone with a few kinds of grass on top, he walked down the road. The stench got a lot stronger. The scent of almonds was overpowering, and he saw an old shed.
Alex pulled out his sword from his inventory and approached the door, he heard a noise inside. He hesitated if it was a monster that gave more than 50 exp he would hit level 11, and if it was a person, would he have time to call for help it if got tough?
He hesitated no longer when he heard something metal hit a table he opened the door and looked inside, he saw a woman with black piercing eyes staring at him.
The girl jumped to the side and pulled out a dagger that was glowing black she was frightened, he looked above her head and saw NPC, which meant she was one of the dark races, he had never liked to call them that since that was too much of a broad stroke, A Warlock was a dark race as well so he did not like the term, he looked at the table and saw it was a simple cooked meal. After a second of looking around, he saw what looked like a bedroom, he pulled his sword into his inventory and left.
The girl stood at the door and stared at him walking away with a dagger in hand, she was staring at that man with the same aura, almost like kin from the homelands. “Wait!” she called out, and Alex turned around, looking at her with his piercing blue eyes.
“Are you from the City?”, Alex stood for a second and replied “No, I’m not from the dark lands.”, There was a silence, and she stepped into her little shack and closed the door, he walked down the road after returning to the main way he glanced around the area.
There was an apparent alarm spell active, but it seems it did not trigger people with dark classes. He learned another trick to use the alarm spell, so perhaps he should trust his nose more often.
The street was busy with the crafters guild starting to unload the many carriages that arrived filled with precious good and training material so they could graduate and begin paying back the debt they took on.
Alex looked around for Cecilia, and she was walking with a posse of girls and boys wearing loud colors like purple or orange, this was one of the trends of the northern cities where there were just too many people around. Hence, they needed a way to stand out, the well-off wore bright colors. In contrast, the lower classes wore more standardized, He looked at her. He gave a light wave, almost like an awkward brother at the playground, She smiled and approached, Alex strode forward as well.
“Snort!” Alex glanced at the man and saw he had bright red hair and quite good looking, comparably to Alex he was a step above with his green eyes and shapely face, there was no need to even humor them since they all were crafters and had no combat profession to speak of.
Alex could wipe the floor with all of them with his magical spells if he needed to. Still, there was no need. The corpse earlier was probably a craftsman that bothered a real Player, someone that could fight back and probably got his just due.
Cecilia smiled “Alex, My latest experimenting with enchanting is going great, but I am running low on funds again. Can I borrow some more?” he had been quite accommodating with his fund, and she had almost borrowed up to a gold coin.
“You have not succeeded in making a piece of magical equipment yet?” Alex said with a frown.
“It’s not that easy, Alex! You don’t understand the talent needed to enchant an item!” He did not understand, but she had spent over 90 silver trying to.
The primary material for enchanting was either mana crystals, monster cores the same he got from the demon rat in the village or weird and rare plants. Mutations were the thing that gave mana to plants and beasts. Hence, they formed a crystal inside their heads, Boss monsters were the first place to get them, and there were plenty of them around the dark lands.
The young man stared at Alex and motioned him to leave “We got the coin, you can leave now. Do make yourself useful and get some more coin, there are plenty more needed.” Alex flicked a windblast onto him, so he fell over, “Ah!”
Alex walked away with his hand up, Cecilia did a light smile before the posse helped the young man up, He cursed out Alex but not loudly, he did not want to face a combat class no matter how arrogant and higher stock he was.
