The insides of the cavern echoed with the sound of animalistic screams as the clash between flesh and metal continued. More goblins climbed and crawled through the harshly dug tunnels, all with the sole purpose of ambushing those who were foolish enough to invade their nest.
For six months they lived in peace, growing and preparing to take over the nearby lands to expand their colony but now not only were they attacked once but twice in a row, the first ending with them letting the invaders escape. They wouldn't make the same mistake again.
One of the goblins raised his head from where he was laying, trying to get a better view of the invader. The 'creature' was completely different from the last one; it was ugly, not having eyes or mouth, only a horn that could bend to any direction, piercing his brethren whenever they got closer to it. Many pairs of legs and arms moved through its sides, each seeming to be bladed and ready to strike.
But what really made the creature frightening were the shining lights that would occasionally shoot from its middle. Any goblins that were hit by it would grow a crystal lair on their body and become slower. They became afraid of that, but soon changed their strategy, keeping their distance from the being until it had passed their hiding spot before striking.
The goblin tightened his grip around a rusty dagger, one of the few spoils it had accumulated since his birth, and dashed after the creature's back ready to attack. He had barely taken 5 steps when he felt something piercing his chest followed by a stream of wind where his throat was.
The monster fell dead, the last thing he saw being a bipedal shadow bending down to grab whatever it was that had been embedded in his chest.
*****
"This one had a dagger with him, but the thing is so rusty," the shadow shook its head while glancing at the rusty blade, "what a waste of material."
"Stop complaining and take it Jake," Carol said a little annoyed as she proceeded to take another goblin down.
Jake shrugged and pocketed the dagger before joining the fray. The party of seven had been advancing slowly but steadily thanks to Mack's idea. At the front Sal and Joy held the shields to bar any possible attack, with Joyce using her spear to counter-attack when needed. In the middle were Lud and Gabby, the former assisting the front duo by casting spells against the farthest goblins while the latter waited to heal any injured member.
Jake, Carol and Leo stood as the rearguard, cleaning the ambushers and making sure the others were safe. Of course, thanks to Jake's competitive streak the attack soon became a competition to see who could take down the most enemies, and Leo was winning.
The two humans didn't think much of the cub at first, but when the goblins started to appear the little guy showed that he wasn't just for show. Mack, on the other hand, ended up as a wild card moving between all three positions as support.
Talking about him the boy popped from between the two shields and waved his hand towards the goblins in front of him, 6 icy blue cards appeared and shot straight at them turning into bolts of energy of the same color. Wherever a bolt hit a thin layer of ice would grow, followed by an icy hue covering the goblin's body.
"Nice! This spell is quite handy Lud!" he said looking down at a copy of the cards he had just used.
[Ice Bolt]
Grade: Common
Cost: 20 MP
* Shoots a bolt of frost energy at the enemy, causing frost damage and reducing their movement by 30% for 15 seconds.
* The amount of Damage varies with the caster's attack and MP.
"Shame it can't be upgraded," he murmured before turning to the other end of the group, only to be met by a pouting brunette, hands in her hips and a twitch to her eyebrows.
"Sorry if it isn't as good as yours Mr. 'Hidden Class'" Lud rebuked with just enough sarcasm to make Mack chuckle. She begrudgingly extended her hands to receive the now blank cards floating on the boy's hands, ready to 'reload' them again.
"It's not like I don't like the spell Lud, in truth, I quite liked it! But I wonder why you chose it in the first place?" He asked as the girl went to work with a small 'huff'.
"Well, I didn't want to go with fire, that's what most people would go after, I wanted something more unique and me. Something that I liked, and since I always had a thing for snow…"
The two looked at each other for a few moments until the sound of crushed bones reached their ears, followed by a whine from Sal, "I can't believe we are in a level 5 Dungeon, those guys can't even fill a tenth of my XP bar."
"Well, that's to be expected," Mack explained, "most of these Goblins are only in the Private Rank, if we met some in the Knight Rank then maybe we would see some really good XP."
"Private Rank?"
"Yup. Take a look at their stats," he said pointing at one of the goblins in front of the group, "right beside their level should be a Rank tag, and it's what tells us how strong the monsters really are. The levels only show the position inside that rank."
The four closest to him shared a look before turning to the monsters in front of them. Their eyes glowed for a second, the monster's information appearing in front of them right after and, true to his words, right beside the level was a red tag with 'Private' written in it.
"Um, and how do you know that?" Joy asked looking back at him then snapping back to the front right in time to use her shield to block a jumping goblin.
"Simple," he stopped dramatically, "Library." He answered with a toothy grin, albeit a forced one, while his friends almost fell down anime style. Inside his mind, though, he was praying that they would buy his lie.
Joy and Sal exchanged looks then shrugged, Lud kept her gaze on him but resumed inscribing his cards while Jake and Carol continued looking after their back, not really paying attention to them. Gabi, on the other hand, furrowed her brows and only let go after a few moments.
Happy that his lie had worked Mack turning his attention towards the monsters surrounding the group and began to once again cast his spells, cards flying everywhere as the grin from before became even bigger, and more real.
The rest of their attack was quite uneventful. Goblins continued to pour from the tunnels in attempts to stab, lunge or slash at them, all of which would end up in them either being pierced by Joy's spear, crushed under Sal's hammer, frozen/burned by Mack's spells or simply cut by Jake and Carol's conjunct effort.
The party of 8 descended moved through the Dungeon with a steady pace, the level of the monsters rising the deeper they went until it didn't.
The had been inside the Dungeon for nearly 2 hours, and while it was very possible that they had indeed hunted all the monsters inside, there hadn't been any notification of them clearing that space, nor had they ever met the Boss in that period of time.
The group was feeling uneasy, their formation broken due to the lack of enemies, but their nerves were at high alert. Something in the tunnel they were in was really pushing them to the edge, the heavy smell that accompanied that feeling doing nothing to appease their worries.
That was when Mack saw it.
Symbols.
No, not symbols, Runes. Magic Runes.
They were both painted and carved on the walls, an intrinsic mix of white, red and hollow that covered the entire rock surface.
Mack widened his eyes and looked at the floor, then at the ceiling. Both had runes and lines running through their surface in a weird pattern, but it was one that he did recognize.
The Runes were used for Dark Magic, but not the type of Darkness or Shadow Magic. No. These were much more evil, much more malicious.
They were Demonic.
His friends noticed him looking over the weird runes in the rock surface, but only voice their concern when Mack stood in front of a section of the wall, eyes a blaze as he stared in what could only be described as an attempt to open a hole through the thick wall.
"What's it? Did you find something?"
Mack had to force himself to tear his eyes away from the lines to answer. "Yeah. Lud, Gabi, can you two come here?"
Both girls exchanged confused looks and walked towards him, stopping besides Mack to stare at the wall.
"Do you know what these are?"
Both shook their heads, eliciting an exasperated look from Mack. "You two are Casters! How can you not know what these are?!"
Lud was about to reply but Gabi beat her to it, a pensive expression in face. "I know these are Runes used for spells, and that every spell has a certain set of them so that they can work."
"That's right," he took in a breath, "every spell needs a set of runes to work. Now, can you tell me what kind of spell would need so many Runes and patterns to require an entire cavern?"
Gabi shook her head, and Lud simply gave him a look that was telling him to cut straight to the point, something that Mack really didn't want to.
"These runes are part of a Ritual."
The atmosphere around the group shifted without the party noticing, the temperature falling rapidly as the air became even heavier. A certain Disaster noticed the changes, his hackles rising immediately as he adopted an attacking stance.
"A Ritual?" The brunette asked, completely oblivious to the little guy's reaction, confusion written in her face.
"Yeah, and a big one at that."
"But, a Ritual for who?" She asked again, and the small pit inside Mack's stomach became a full black hole as his eyes went past her and onto the other end of the tunnel.
He pointed a finger towards it, his friends' eyes following right behind and widening as fear overtook them.
"For him."
Inside the swirling darkness a pair of blood red eyes looked at them.
The sound of bare feet against the stone floor echoed in the quiet tunnel as the creature revealed itself. Lanky limbs made of only bones and skin were hanging from his shoulders almost lifelessly, the only features that said this was a goblin being the green patches of skin that weren't covered by the dirty rags that covered his body in a nearly religious fashion.
His body was taller than that of a normal goblin, being 5 feet tall (1,5 meters) and standing straight rather than hunched forward like the others, but the most disturbing thing, what stole the party's attention and breath was his face, covered by a plague mask, the only thing visible were the same blood red eyes that looked at them with anger and disdain.