Vol.3 Ch.12 – Dungeon Prepping

Chapter 12: Dungeon Prepping

I guess that was my punishment for thinking the worst was over.

The morning after the defense pact was finalized Alisha had used Homeward to bring us back to the capital, where we then accompanied Annabella to report back to her mother. And as it turned out, the way Annabella and Sir Nathan had gone over the agreements had been comparatively carefree given how the queen fretted over every single line of the treaty.

Annabella had admitted to us that she had been worried about her mother being upset with her for being too lenient but the queen had showed no sign of being dissatisfied with her daughter's work. But that didn't stop her from going over everything with a fine-tooth comb trying to find legal loopholes. You know, the loopholes Annabella and Sir Nathan had spent a day and a half ironing out.

Finally, after hours of us just standing there like idiots, the two of them were done and the queen asked:

“Third Princess, did the mercenaries protect you as they were supposed to?”

“Yes, your majesty," Annabella said. “They protected my life against assassins and suffered injuries in my place.”

“Ah," the queen said. “I did receive a report about an altercation. I suppose that was it, then?”

“Yes, your majesty," Annabella said. “The mercenaries proved themselves to be highly competent and they have gained my trust.”

“Wonderful," the queen said and then snapped her fingers. I was worried for a moment but then a servant approached us and offered us a bag. “As agreed, a bag of holding filled with supplies that will surely prove to be of use to dungeon divers. Among them are two bottomless potions and a reusable teleportation crystal that will take you to the last rest spot you used.”

My eyes widened. I had assumed this bag would be useful but this was tremendous. Damn near priceless, even.

Bottomless potions were potion bottles enchanted to refill after a short amount of time. They weren't truly bottomless, something about magic being unable to create true infinities, but if you didn't need to drink from them continuously they might as well be. And the crystal was a literal lifesaver.

All dungeons had rest spots dotted around, safe places that monsters couldn't approach and that would warn those inside its perimeter of anyone else approaching it, and this crystal would let us teleport out of trouble and back to the last one of those we'd rested at.

“Thank you, your majesty," I said as I took the bag. “As promised, we will find out what ails your dungeon.”

“See that you do, Felix Tailor," the queen said, a slight smile on her lips.

**

We had to get some preparations done so we decided to leave Annabella alone for the day and reconvene in front of the palace the next morning to head into the dungeon together. I could tell Annabella wasn't thrilled to spend another day in the palace but she'd said she understood.

So the first thing we did was head over to the Plucked Cockatrice, where the innkeeper handed me a letter.

I opened it to find out it was from Martin, informing me that he had a sword he was pretty sure would be to Yume's liking, and my little fox and I considered for a while whether to buy a spare. In the end she decided that it couldn't hurt and I sent him a letter telling him to give us a price. Risky thing to do, to just say that to a merchant, but I knew mom would give him an earful if he overcharged.

Next we went to a fixer. Fixers were very specialized time wizards who could roll back signs of use on equipment. Of course, blacksmiths were very good at repairing weapons and armor but there were things neither blacksmiths nor seamstresses could handle and that's where fixers came in. Most fixers overcharged horribly but I knew one who gave fair prices. It had led to other fixers spreading lies about him and so he got little business except from those like me who knew that he was an honest merchant in a sea of scammers.

The visit to the fixer had been just to make sure everything we had was in peak condition for the upcoming dungeon dive. I was also glad to find out that neither Helios Edge nor Kageshiro showed any sign of use, meaning the durability enchantments on them worked as advertised. I hadn't been too worried about Helios Edge. It was a legendary weapon and while it could dull if mistreated it was almost impossible for a legendary weapon to break. Just about the only way to manage that was for it to be struck repeatedly by a mythic weapon swung by someone supernaturally strong. But I had been slightly worried about Yume's new weapon given that I had never visited that particular enchanter before, but his work had been sound.

Once our equipment was back in peak condition we went and bought supplies. The queen's bag of holding was full of useful goods like healing items, antidotes and other more situational potions, but there were many other necessities to consider inside a dungeon. So we bought a couple dozen waterskins and filled them all to the brim. Then we went and bought a lot of spices and other ingredients to make sure our upcoming diet of monster meat and dungeon plants would go down easy. Next were a couple of twelve foot long poles in case we had to press some very far away buttons and a single collapsible twenty foot pole in case the dungeon got cute on us. After that came grappling hooks, rope ladders, spare arrows and crossbow bolts, some rocks to draw the attention of single enemies, and then I splurged and bought a few harvesting gems, single use magic crystals meant to magically separate the bodies of dead monsters into their individual components. Highly useful on big monsters you'd otherwise spend all day carving. I already assumed we'd be using one of these on every boss monster we found.

“Is all of this really necessary?" Alisha asked as I was busy stuffing yet another bag of holding full to bursting with gear.

“I'd rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it," I told her.

“Wouldn't it have been useful to have Annabella along for this?" Selene asked.

I shrugged. “She says she's only ever gone down to the second floor of the dungeon before but she knows there's more, so even if she told us what to expect of the first two floors that would still leave us with little clue of what we might need for the others.”

“Yeah, that makes sense," Selene said, then she turned to Yume. “You said you've been in dungeons before, right? What were they like?”

“Well," the fox girl said, “the first one was a boring cave full of monsters. The only signs that it was truly a dungeon were the chunks of ore sticking out of the walls, all of which belonged to metals that don't exist in this world. I went there to get magical ore for a divine blacksmith to make me a sword out of. A sword that is probably lost forever, now.”

“I'm sorry," Selene said but Yume shook her head.

“You have nothing to feel sorry for," she said. “Anyway, the second dungeon I went to was meant to unlock my true potential with Qi. It was gorgeous. I went through a cave entrance and then found myself on an impossible mountain peak. It was covered in cherry trees and lightning kept striking down everywhere from a roiling dark sky. At the end of it was a sacred tree guarded by a giant dragon. I fought the dragon. To this day I have no idea how I survived that fight, let alone won it, but when I did I was allowed to eat the fruit of the sacred tree and it made my Qi powerful beyond measure.”

I nodded. “Dungeon bosses always guard treasures mortals can only dream of and they're not always pieces of equipment," I said. “Though I must say I wish I could visit that dungeon as well.”

“You shouldn't," Yume said. “I was in that dungeon for three days but by the time I got out a year had passed outside. It was... disorienting. I was very glad I didn't go in there while my father was still alive.”

“What happened to your father?" I asked.

“He died of old age," Yume said. “He was forty when he met my mother and he lived a fulfilled life until he died at ninety-three.”

It was always disorienting to hear her say things like that, given that she looked to be just barely twenty, even though I knew intellectually that she was somewhere between fifty and ninety. The only visual cue of her age was the number of her tails, since she would grow the fourth one at ninety.

“I see," I said. “Well, it's a shame I'll never get to meet him. I'm sure he was a spectacular man with a daughter like you.” One of the reasons I endeavored to make Yume blush as much as I could was how amazing the redness looked combined with her red hair.

“A-anyway," she said, “what about you? You claimed to be the expert on dungeon diving. So tell us a bit.”

I shook my head. “I never claimed to be an expert," I said. “I just have a bit of experience with them. You see, Dark Lords don't always reside in castles. Sometimes they make their home deep in a dungeon, replacing the dungeon boss. Those are the worst. The mana of the dungeon makes them stronger and whatever treasure they're guarding as the dungeon boss they have no scruples wielding against you. But alright. So the first dungeon I was ever in was also the most bizarre. It was a temple ruin buried underneath the ocean, except not. There was clearly water all around us, we could see fish swimming in that water, but our movements were barely hindered and we could breathe just fine. We could have stayed there for months just grabbing all the valuable resources just sitting there but the asshole Dark Lord collapsed the temple as he was about to die and we had to scramble to get out or be buried alongside him. And then that bitch Athena showed up and whined that I didn't stay to make sure he actually died.”

I really should have considered my surroundings more. I had just called one of the Olympians a bitch in the middle of a busy street. So of course someone walking that same street turned out to be a cleric of Athena.

“How dare you speak ill of my goddess?!" a man in white robes hollered at me.

I glared at him. “I'm the Godsforsaken, I'll speak of the gods how I damn well please!" I told him and he wilted, his bravado gone.

“Y-you...” he stammered. “You're him. The one my goddess told me about!”

I smirked at that. She whined about me even in front of her own clerics? “So, what did she say about me?”

“She loathes you,” the man said, his hand twitching towards the dagger at his belt. “She teaches all of us about the great blasphemer. Who would have thought that he is hiding right here in the capital? I should slay you right here and now, for her.” His fingers wrapped around the hilt of the dagger.

“Really?” I asked, my tone skeptical. “Does she tell her clerics to come after me?”

“Of course not!” he spat. “The great Athena is far too merciful for that! But still, you are a constant thorn in her side. There is no way she wouldn't be glad to be rid of you.” He drew the dagger.

“Felix?" Yume and Alisha asked at the same time, the subtext clear. Want us to take care of him?

“It's fine," I said and stepped away from my women and addressed the man again. “That's funny, because it wasn't too long ago that Athena told me how much good I do in this kingdom and that she'd rather I continue doing so.”

“That can't be true,” he said. “She always tells us how terribly you treat her.”

I snorted. “Of course. But I can at least grant that the goddess of wisdom is smart enough to put the needs of the kingdom ahead of her own feelings. And despite how much we hate each other, she still respects me.”

He scowled at me, clutching his dagger tighter.

“Consider this,” I said. “How many times have you actually spoken to Athena? Five times? Ten? Then trust me, I've spent more time in her presence than you. She's yet to even lay a finger on me. She's just using you all to vent but when it comes down to it she doesn't want any one of you to do me any harm.”

“So what?” he spat. “I'm just supposed to leave you be, to infuriate her more and more?”

“Yes,” I told him bluntly. “Consider also that you just drew a knife in the middle of a public square and that you are outnumbered four to one even before we count the guardsmen coming up behind you.”

He hesitated after having been confronted with the reality of the situation he had placed himself in. Then he glanced behind him to see that there were indeed two guardsmen coming to see what the commotion was about, put the dagger away and ran off.

“For a cleric of a goddess of wisdom he wasn't very bright," Alisha commented.

“To be fair, Felix did just insult his goddess," Selene said. “What would you do if he insulted Brigid?”

“Not draw a knife on someone obviously more physically capable than me, for one," Alisha replied. “Then I wouldn't attack someone for that anyway. I would just scowl and hope they stub their toe. And finally, as Felix told me, he doesn't actually have anything against my goddess anyway so it's a moot point.”

“Well," Selene said, then patted my shoulder, “you can insult Freya all you want.”

“Thanks," I told her. “I will.”

**

After our little shopping trip it was almost dinner time and so we all sat down in the Plucked Cockatrice and had a hearty helping of their house special, basilisk shank with alraune herb butter and seasonal vegetables. It was always a great dish and even with the girls' newfound knowledge of how alraune leaves were harvested they didn't refuse the dish. If anything, Alisha seemed a little more excited by it.

After the great meal and a dessert to go with it we went back to our room. Or rather, the girls went to our room while I double-checked our equipment, so I ended up coming back to the room a little later.

I opened the door and was greeted by a butt. It was a very shapely butt. Not big, but still with a nice curve and the skin as smooth as could be. The butt was naked and attached to a similarly naked elf writhing on our bed. Clearly my girls had started the fun without me. As I stepped fully into the room the picture became clearer.

Alisha was on all fours, her face buried between Yume's thighs and her butt sticking up in the air as Selene was busy fingering her.

“You couldn't even wait until I was back?" I asked and in response Selene spread Alisha's ass cheeks, showing off how wet and ready she'd made her for me.

“We probably won't get any fun during the dungeon dive so Alisha decided to start early," Selene explained.

“Alisha decided, huh?" I asked as I pulled off my tunic. “Meaning she jumped Yume, probably saying something like 'there wasn't enough fruit in the dessert', and started eating her out right away, right?”

“Something like that," Selene agreed and Alisha raised her head just long enough to whine:

“I can control myself around her and I am not obsessed with fruit!”

“Sure you can and sure you aren't," I said and pulled my pants off, then gestured at my cock, which was already getting hard. “And how about this? Do you want this?”

She grumbled and pushed her ass a bit higher in the air, inviting me, but Selene slipped off the bed and sank to her knees in front of me, saying: “Mine!” moments before taking me in her mouth.

I made eye contact with Yume who was busy massaging her breasts as Alisha licked her pussy.

Well, the girls were right. We probably wouldn't be able to have any fun for a while, so there was nothing to it but to do it, right?

**

We ended up going for several rounds. None of us wanted to be exhausted for the dungeon dive, so we kept going until three in the morning and then all took a sleeping drop.

Sleeping drops weren't something alchemical or herbal. They were magical, a spell in liquid form, and thus they had some interesting properties. The effect they were supposed to produce was always the same no matter how much you took because the spell was made to either work or not work, which meant you couldn't accidentally overdose on them or something. And the effect was that they made you sleep like a rock for four hours and when you woke up you felt as rested as if you'd slept a whole night. This was a frivolous use for them but we all agreed that it had been worth it.

**

The next morning we got ready and then headed off in the direction of the palace, where Annabella was already waiting for us, in her adventurer garb rather than her dress.

We made some polite greetings and then she led us to the dungeon entrance. I had expected the entrance to be somewhere in the palace's basement or something, but no, we ended up going all the way to the outskirts of the capital and then descended some long tunnels.

I half expected to already be in the dungeon and that expectation was not squashed when we ended up in what first looked to be an enormous catacomb so dark we needed to light them up, which Yume's fire magic did quite excellently.

“What is this?" Selene asked.

“The old capital," Annabella explained in a reverent voice. It was the kind of place that inspired that tone of voice. “The current capital, including its sewer system, was built atop the old capital. Most of the old capital has collapsed but this part is still accessible because our family has made sure to reinforce it.”

“What happened to the old capital?" I asked. This was history I didn't know yet.

“Centuries before my family rose to power there was another civilization here," Annabella said. “We don't know why they collapsed. Some think it had something to do with the Outsiders, others claim it had something to do with the dungeons, yet others believe the gods smote them for their hubris. Either way, our family watched this civilization rise and fall and though our records of that time are fragmentary at best we stayed here all the while, our connection to the dungeon slowly growing. And then, centuries later, when a layer of earth had buried most of the old capital my family used the wealth we gained from the dungeon to build the new capital, though of course the city wasn't the capital back then. The country used to be a mess of tiny fiefdoms that my family unified one by one, some with economical superiority and some through war.”

“Hold on," I said. “So your family got all of its power through the dungeon? Then what about the favor of the gods that everyone keeps talking about?”

Annabella chuckled, the sound echoing through the catacombs. “You of all people shouldn't be surprised by this," she said. “Our family's rise to power had nothing to do with the gods. The gods saw how powerful we were and decided that it would be stupid to antagonize us, so they let us do pretty much what we want so long as we pretend to be dependent on their favor.”

I felt my eyebrows rise. “Well," I said. “Now your mother's willingness to hire us makes a lot more sense.”

“Precisely," she said. “Mother chose you not just because you were competent but also to remind the gods that we are not as beholden to them as they like to pretend we are. And because she really doesn't want to associate the gods and this dungeon with each other. Something about it confusing the balance of power.”

“I see," I said.

“And... we're here," Annabella said and I could tell that this, finally, was the dungeon entrance.

Felix? I heard Syr's voice say. I'd never heard her quite this frightened.

What is it? I asked in my head, turning away from the women.

I... I know this place, she said. I've seen my body in this place.

A lot of things began to fall into place for me. You mean the Holy Maiden is the one who went into that dungeon? I asked.

No, Syr said. But that team of cultists she sent? This is where she sent them. I didn't know what the place was when I saw it through her eyes, but I'm certain this was the place.

“What's he doing?" I heard Annabella ask from behind me.

“He's probably talking to Syr," Alisha said.

“Who is Syr?" Annabella asked.

“Um... Syr's body was stolen and her mind took refuge in his," Alisha said and then Annabella's tone shifted.

“So, does he talk to 'Syr' a lot?" she asked in that 'don't upset the crazy person' kind of voice.

“Syr is real," Yume said. “I've spoken to her. We all have. But others need me to link their mind to his to be able to perceive her.”

“I... see," Annabella said, still not entirely convinced. “So you're saying I could talk to her too then?”

I looked over at Syr who had materialized next to me and rolled my eyes at her, then turned around. “Go ahead," I said. “Might as well get this over with.”

Annabella walked up to me and Yume stepped between us.

“This is invasive magic," my little fox told the princess. “Do you permit me to use it on you?”

“Yes," Annabella said and Yume got to work.

A second later the connection snapped into place and Syr gave a polite curtsy. I noticed with amusement that she had copied the exact same motion Alisha had used when introducing herself to the queen.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, your highness," Syr said. “My name is Syr Tanner.”

Annabella boggled at the sudden appearance of another person. And then her gaze traveled down from Syr's face to her enormous chest before coming back up again. “Ah, um, right," Annabella said, the picture of royal dignity. “Nice to meet you, Syr. Please call me Annabella. So, um, sorry I didn't believe you were real.”

“You had no reason to believe them, but I assure you I am very real," Syr said.

“So, what were you talking about?" Alisha asked.

And so Syr recounted the entire story, which unfortunately meant admitting to Annabella that her body belonged to the Holy Maiden Sir Nathan had mentioned.

“So, if I understand this correctly," Annabella said, “then the intruders mother wants us to find are cultists of Shub-Niggurath, right?”

“Right," Syr said. “Powerful ones, too.”

“I'd love to go report this right away," Annabella said, “but we've come too far to head back already.”

“I agree," I said. “The longer we leave these cultists in there the more damage they can cause.”

And so we headed into the Crystal Crown's dungeon, something I'd fantasized about for years but never thought I might ever get to do.