Chapter 26 – Interlude
Slade’s party finally conquered the ore mine, converting into a new Dungeon town. To celebrate this victory, Violet unleashed a mysterious massive spell.
The setting sun cast beautiful orange lights on the snowy mountain peaks.
“Really can’t see shit outside…” an infernal troglodyte muttered, blinded by the sunlight.
He stuck a paper magazine right into his face.
The ‘bright side’ was that black ink absorbed more sunlight radiation than the blank paper, improving the heat infrared contrast of the text. Hence, the troglodytes could read despite not having eyes.
“Hmm?” He turned Eastward.
His instincts sensed a pressure, as if someone was about to unleash a spell right next to him. But nobody was there.
“Must have been a fly…”
While Violet performed shining miracles of Eath magic in the eastern ore mine, Dungeon overlords were diligently working all over the world.
The overlord rook waited alone at a cave on the western side of the mountain.
He was an infernal variant of troglodytes, a lizard-looking humanoid with spikes on his back and brown patterns over his scaly skin.
Despite wearing an intimidating set of Overlord armor with horns, spikes, and belts, he was casually engrossed in reading in the middle of neutral territory.
He didn’t even lift his head when a huge flying monster with a lion head, bat wings and scorpion tail landed near him.
“Farlach, are you alone?”
A middle-aged looking woman stood atop the flying monster, pulling him from his musings. update 08-20-21
“Yes, I sent the rookie with the warlock to claim the artifact themselves.”
The amber haired woman rubbed her chin, caressing the mole next to her mouth. Her purple eyes peered into him.
“I did ask you to train them but...” the sovereign said.
Farlach didn’t like it when she put her nose into his methods.
“Don’t worry, they should be here any-” he said.
“aaaaaaAaAaAaAAAAAA-” screams echoed from the cave, and grew louder as its source approached.
Farlach jumped on the lion-headed flying monster, landing next to the middle-aged sovereign.
“Scorpicore, take some distance please.”
Their flying steed took off, circling in the sky.
“-AAAAAAAAAHH!”
A red-haired woman dashed from the cave, carrying a blond boy in one arm, and a red two-handed flamberge in the other.
She had freckles, red horns, and a reptilian tail dangling from her butt.
Throwing the kid on the ground, she could finally catch her breath.
“Ow!”
“Farlach! Huff- I got the sword! Huff- Help!” the red-haired woman yelled,
“What are you saying? It’s your training, you’re supposed to kill them all by yourselves!” the troglodyte shouted from the scorpicore’s back.
“What the hell, man?! You sent us with a pair of troglodytes and you only told us to get the relic!” the kid screamed.
“Minotaurs are lower tiers than you, so why are you complaining? You have skills, use them! What about your new artifact?”
“I don’t even know what it does!” the red-haired horned woman protested.
“Then read its description, haha!” Farlach said.
“Shitshitshi- Ah- Reddragonflametongueweaponart-”
“And you goldilocks! Do you want to be featured in ‘useless rooks’ magazines again?” Farlach shouted.
“No way I’m doing this shi-! Oof!”
While the blond kid tried to run away, the red-haired woman tackled him by reflex. She grew used to stopping him from running away during the whole cave exploration.
“Fuck, alright!” The blond boy sluggishly got up, drawing his wand and spellbook.
The sovereign stared at Farlach, raising her eyebrows.
“Please stop looking at me like that. You told me to train her as fast as possible,” he said.
“Raaaaah!” A crowd of minotaur finally emerged from the cave. They charged at their two targets as soon as their eyes were accustomed to the light.
Large bat wings unfolded from the boy’s back. He hovered a few centimeters from the ground, releasing his magical sigils.
His spellbook spat out a cloud of sparkling dust which gathered into clumps around him. Eventually, the harmless looking powder turned into dozens of floating swords.
“Magic arrow!”
The swords flung at the minotaurs, slicing and stabbing their flesh. Once they lost their momentum, they scattered back into nothingness.
It was his expert earth version of magic arrow -Blade Dance-.
The three minotaurs leading the charge stumbled from pain. But the horde of angry minotaurs leaped over the fallen comrades and headed straight at the rookie.
“I’m out!” the blond boy turned around, only to see the rookie holding a scorching flaming sword downward.
“Wai-” he dashed away from the red-haired woman.
She screamed, stabbing the sword into the ground.
A sphere of flame engulfed the minotaurs, the rookie and the boy.
“Oh my…” the sovereign muttered.
The flame receded, and the rookie was fanning fresh air to dismiss the smoke. The boy rolled on the ground to put out the fire on his half burnt hair.
“Ah-”
A two-handed axe struck into her abdomen, sending her flying. She was knocked out, crashing into a tree.
“Farlach, stop fucking around and save meeeee-” the kid screamed as a minotaur lifted his axe right above him.
A translucent spear landed between the minotaur’s and the kid’s legs, startling both.
“I’m going! Brace yourself,” Farlach said as he lowered his helmet’s visor.
“Hmm? AH!” the sovereign yelped.
Farlach kicked the scorpicore so hard that it dropped a few meter down.
For an instant, he soared into the sky like a dragon. Picking up tremendous speed, his figure sundered the sky as he fell down.
BOOM!
He landed right in front of the minotaur’s leader, leaving a crater from his two-handed spear’s impact.
“What in the world-” the minotaur king stuttered. He froze, realizing that Farlach already brought the tip of the spear against his neck.
The blanking monster dropped his axe, and his followers dashed back into the cave.
[The minotaurs awed by the power of your force, begin to scatter. Do you wish to pursue and engage them?]
Farlach relaxed, leaning his spear against his shoulder.
“It's useless if I receive all the experience points. Rookie, goldilocks, go back inside,” he said.
The red-haired, bloodied woman limped back from the tree, but she froze hearing that order.
“Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeh?!”
The blond kid already transformed into a full scorpicore and flew away.
“Farlach, that’s enough with the training. I need them both in good condition to go beyond the mountain range,” the sovereign said as her steed landed.
The red haired woman spread her arms to the sky, thanking the heavens for their mercy.
“What? But Amber, she’s not ready! We barely even started! She has no experience leading an army!”
“It cannot wait. My plan must proceed to its next stage, in the one in a million chance that another sovereign else replaces that bitch. So it’s fine as long as she knows how to fly,” the sovereign said.
“You better take me with you then,” Farlach said.
“No, I can’t afford to take your spare bodies and slow us down,” the sovereign said.
“I’m fine with a single life-”
“I’M NOT. You have your own tasks here. End of the discussion. Frenpiya, come here.”
“Yes! Thank you for the training, old geezer!” The rookie climbed the scorpicore.
Followed by another scorpicore with a half-burnt mane, she showed her middle finger at him as they disappeared in the horizon. To which Farlach responded with a warm wave of his hand.
“Ah… Talking back like that... Look at how they grow so quickly,” he sighed.
He picked up the magazine paper he had thrown down when he jumped on the scorpicore. Folding it, he slipped it inside the gaps of his armor, tucking it in his briefs, and walked home.
At the same time, in Lerarch’s mage guild…
An apprentice wizard ran through the corridors with a stack of papers. He blasted through his mentor’s office door.
“Master! We detected a singularity at Bleakwoods!”
He shoved the reports in front of the old wizard with great expectations.
“...”
The bald elderly man finished writing his letter, paying no attention to his student. Then, he opened the next letter and read it.
“Are you reading your letters right now? We have an emergency!”
“Shut it! Did you send your abstract for the oncoming symposium?”
“N-no-”
“What are you waiting for? Stop wasting my time! Shoo! Go away!”
The apprentice was gently escorted out.
He spaced out, staring at the ceiling.
“I should talk about it to the adventurer guild…”
At the same time, in the Bleakwoods forest, right outside of the ore mine cave...
“We almost caught it!” a female elf shouted in frustration.
The gnoll they were chasing disappeared from their line of sight because her partner suddenly stopped and drew his twin arming swords.
“Didn’t you feel a weird pressure coming from this direction?” a male elf asked.
“No,” she stared at him, very displeased.
“Maybe we should check it later. There might be other gnolls.”
She rolled her eyes, not wanting to take on more workload. After kicking her partner’s butt, she dashed through the woods.
“Why?!” the elf yelled.