Rastel sighed in admiration as he moved in the dark damp tunnels he found himself in. He never would have expected the old man to have something like that. An instance dungeon scroll!
Still thinking back to it, he felt a bit shocked!
10 minutes ago
"Oh dungeons, well there are two types of dungeons, normal dungeons created by the game that resets every day for a player and then the special hidden dungeons that can only be cleared once." Rastel recalled carefully.
"Have you heard of instance dungeon scrolls?" Oron asked him.
"Yeah but those are super rare, people would pay a lot of money to have them since each scroll has its own unique dungeon. You will never know what special thing you'll get inside the dungeon, but they're are dangerous though." Rastel was now looking at Oron seriously, he couldn't have an instance scroll, could he?
"Mhmm" Oron nodded his head while scratching his chin as he thought a bit.
As if concluding, he smiled and waved his hand, bringing out an old tattered scroll. He handed it to Rastel who looked with wide eyes as he received the scroll and tried to identify it.
Name: Instance dungeon scroll
Rarity: Unique
Type: consumable
"An instance dungeon scroll! You really had one!?"
Oron looked at him with a small smile as he answered.
"I found it in some corrupt Noble's castle I had to take down for a quest. I'm not sure what is inside the dungeon, but I do know that it'll grant you a subclass if you successfully finish the dungeon."
Rastel stared at the scroll in amazement; a dungeon that gives out a class would give an advanced ranked class at the very least!
However, he suddenly thought of something.
"What do you want in return?" Rastel was now on edge, something so valuable was not to be given so easily to someone you barely knew. He knew he would not. What does Oron want from him?
"Honestly nothing, I and Mary already have a subclass, so we can't use it, and besides, money is not something I'm lacking. This old man lives a life of luxury. Just take it as I took a liking to you."
Rastel still looked at the scroll warily. The temptation of an advanced subclass was too much. However, he was not sure he wanted to go through with such a shady looking deal.
"Well, what are you waiting for? Activate the scroll and get in!" Oron said as he brought out 5 health potions and another 3 pale blue mana potions and handed them over to him.
"How about this then, tell me all you encounter in the dungeon and the class you get in return." Oron said as he urged him on.
Rastel nodded his head after a while before deciding to tear the scroll to activate it.
The torn scroll glowed with light before floating in the air and burning up, a glowing yellow portal slowly appeared in its place.
"Don't worry too much, an instance dungeon normally adjust itself to the user's level so it should be alright" Oron told him and he nodded his thanks before stepping into the portal and disappeared. The portal slowly faded away.
"Grandfather" Mary called out as he disappeared. Her voice was soft, sweet, and musically appealing to the ears.
"Why did you give him that scroll? I thought you said it was important to you?" She stared at him over her book.
"Yes it was" Oron sighed but smiled suddenly afterwards.
"But it's not like I gave it to some random player. Didn't you wonder why we came to such a village in the first place?"
Mary shook her head, dropping the book in her hand.
"Haha, you'll be surprised when I tell you this, turns out he's..." he whispered into her ears.
Mary showed a surprised expression for a while before smiling and nodding her head.
"So you see, don't you think it was worthwhile now?"
Mary nodded her head before going back to her book.
Oron smiled before looking off into the distance thinking to himself, hopefully, the boy would pull it off and finish the dungeon. The subclass there was no ordinary power.
"Shit!"
Rastel cursed loudly as he stumbled on another piece of rock jutting out of the ground. The floor was uneven and wet with sharp pieces of rocks everywhere.
There was no source of light so he had to be stumbling through. He had been walking for almost 30 minutes now and still had not found anything yet, the silence had started getting to him.
"Why in the fuck would someone create a dungeon and not even light it up with some torches or something?" he grumbled as he slowly felt his way around.
Just as he was about to curse again, he received a notification.
New skill acquired! 'Dark sight'.
Be able to see even in the absence of light.
It sounded like quite the handy passive skill.
His sight noticeably got better as he could suddenly make out the sides and floor of the tunnel and also, the characters were drawn all over them.
The characters were all written in some ancient text and had different patterns and diagrams all over. As he kept walking, he saw that the water in the tunnel originated from some of these characters, and that piqued his interest.
'Runes?' he was a bit excited.
Having nothing better to do, he brought out a piece of paper and a quill from his inventory, which he had gotten while buying resources for his travels. He had concluded then that having such practical tools would not be a bad idea and they were cheap.
Runes, according to the game's lore were weapons of the dark elves or Daelor as they called themselves. These cunning sinister beings had created this art by studying magic to the utmost limit and creating the language of runes. They hoarded the knowledge among themselves and shared it with no other race.
They drew these runes on weapons, armor, and even themselves to enhance their strength. They did sell the weapons and armor for astronomical prices though, their arrogance leading them to believe that no other race would be able to recreate the art of runes except them.
However, their arrogance proved true as no one except the Daelor has been able to draw working runes till this day.
Rastel found it fascinating, something like runes and the mystery behind them struck on his good cords. He copied all the runes he saw and kept the diagrams in his inventory. He was drawing one particular rune when he saw a piece of text there, it was hard to notice as his dark sight was still low leveled and only provided him with enough to barely see around him.
He took a closer look and read the text.
To walk my path, one must have eyes that see through the darkness.
To see through all lies and illusions.
To see through falsehood.
For I created this path to fight for that which is right.
And defend that which is weak.
Accept my path if you think you can uphold my Creed.
For if you fail it, my wrath upon you shall be everlasting.
Let your essence flow into these words.
And I shall show you the path to my world.
"Interesting...so this class is actually a unique class!?" Rastel was pleasantly surprised.
According to the poem on the wall, the person in question said he created the path, which would have to be the hidden class he was here to get.
"So how do I let my essence flow into the words? Essence should mean mana right?'
It was not like he had control over his mana or something. The game did not allow that. Nevertheless, he tried anyway and placed his hands on the words trying to envision his mana flowing out of his hands.
"..."
"Hmm..."
"I don't..."
"I don't think this is working..."
Rastel sighed and looked at the poem again.
"Maybe essence means something else? Like blood perhaps?"
He wanted to draw a bit of his blood but realized he no longer had his dagger. He forgot to recover it after the fight with the wolf. He was not too keen on biting himself either. Nor did he have any spells that could deal precise damage. After standing there for about thirty seconds, thinking of a way out, he concluded.
'Spells are essentially mana condensed into an attack. If mana is actually what is needed, blasting it with a spell should work'
He placed his right hand on the text and quietly activated lightning blast. There was a muffled blast of lightning then a rumbling from the stone. The walls started creaking heavily before splitting in the middle and opening up slowly.
'No damage at all huh? Wonder what the stone is made of'
There was a wide cave hall behind the doors. Rastel stepped in gingerly careful not to activate any traps that might be found there.
The hall was circular and had torches all around that weren't lit. it was about 50 meters in diameter and 20 meters in height. The walls were oddly very smooth considering it was a cave cut in stone. There was an impression of a door right opposite the entrance that was closed but that did not register to Rastel as he kept staring at the three apparently large mud balls sitting in the middle of the cave.
'Huh?' His dark sight ability was proving useful as he saw some intricate carvings all around the bodies of the mud balls.
As he took one step closer, there was a low humming sound as the mud balls all shifted and started to do what looked like disassembling to him until finally, three 2 meters' tall humanoid mud creatures stood in front of him.