Vol.3 Ch.23 – Aph

Chapter 23: Aph

The next day passed without any major incident. After the ambush we started being much more careful as we explored the dungeon floor, keeping a lookout and doing our best to sneak past any enemies we could avoid as not to drain our resources. Early in the morning we came across the fork in the road Annabella had mentioned. On the second floor we'd taken the right hand path to get to the boss arena but if her great-grandfather was to be trusted we'd find the entrance to the coliseum blocked by fallen trees on this floor, so instead we had to take the left-hand path.

Annabella had hypothesized, and I had agreed, that without her great-grandfather's notebook the cultists had probably tried going down the right-hand path again, a mistake that would have cost them at least two days. It was little things like this that made it feasible for us to catch up to the intruders without solely relying on the dungeon malice slowing them down.

By the time we reached the final rest spot of this floor we could see the entrance to a cave looming up ahead and I wondered what horrors would await us in there.

I found out after dinner, of course, as Annabella read aloud what her great-grandfather had written down in his journal and it sounded absolutely horrendous. Not that there was anything to be done about it so we just formulated a plan and made for the cave entrance the next morning after a hearty breakfast.

The cave opened into a long hallway lit by sconces on the wall and led to a great iron door with familiar looking runes on it. Despite the brutal heat of the dungeon floor the metal door felt cool to the touch and once again someone had scrawled a translation underneath the runes on the door.

Aph, the Hound of Gehenna.

I was about to push open the door when Alisha asked:

“You ready?”

I was going to reply when I realized she hadn't meant me. Instead Yume answered:

“Of course, let's do this.”

I turned around and watched the two of them. They simultaneously summoned up their auras, the visual representations of their magic usage. For Alisha it was gray-green butterfly wings on her back and for Yume it was a light blue flame wavering around her tails. Then the two of them turned to face each other, clasped hands, and pressed their foreheads together. Their auras were sucked back into their bodies and then seemed to pass each other and suddenly Alisha had a light blue pair of butterfly wings on her back and Yume had a gray-green flame burning around her tails.

“What the fuck?" Selene muttered.

“Is that the trick you were talking about?" I asked, stunned.

“Yes," Alisha said, opening her eyes. “The boss is all but immune to fire and I am on healing duty, so I gave Yume my wind magic.”

“That's impossible," I said.

“That's the Panta Rhei technique," Yume replied.

“Please tell me this is temporary," I said.

“Of course," Alisha said. “We can trade magic affinities for a bit but there's no way to make it permanent. In fact, the bond will probably snap if we move too far away from each other. But for now it's helpful.”

“Alright," I said, “everyone ready?”

I was greeted by a round of nods, so I turned around and pushed open the doors.

**

Beyond the door lay a large circular chamber with an illogically high ceiling. If this place had existed in the real world it would have collapsed since there were no pillars to support the ceiling. But this was a dungeon, so natural rules did not necessarily apply. We entered onto a high ledge that circled the entire arena, with large stone stairs leading down into the arena proper, at the center of which stood the boss.

Aph was roughly shaped like a gorilla, its forelimbs far longer than its hind legs and it leaned on the knuckles of the massive steel claws that tipped its arms. The entire beast was maybe twelve feet tall, slumped over as it was. It had a shiny metal ribcage wrapping around its body, the spine prominent on its back and the metal ribs wrapping around its torso like armor. The metal spine also led into a metal tail that ended in a spiked ball. Its head looked more like that of a dog or maybe a dragon, a metal skull with tiny red lights glimmering in the sockets and vicious teeth lining its metal jaws. Underneath the metal bones one could just see dark reddish-brown flesh that was the beast's only weakness. According to Annabella's journal the metal bones weren't brittle at all and would bend unnaturally, making them extraordinarily hard to break. The flesh meanwhile was supposedly very tough for normal humans to pierce, but from the descriptions we were certain that our Qi techniques would allow us to pierce it with ease.

But the most disconcerting detail about the boss was the liquid running out of the corners of its mouth, which looked like molten metal or maybe lava.

Of course Annabella had told us all about the boss with the help of her journal, but hearing her description and seeing the beast were two very different things. The boss wasn't particularly big compared to the last two but with the metal bones covering it the beast looked far tougher and more formidable.

I shared a look with Selene before we descended down to meet the beast while Alisha, Annabella and Yume stayed behind on the upper layer.

“The arena consists of two layers," Annabella had read out to us, “a raised outer ring surrounding a circular arena. While the boss is able to get to the outer ring, it has a single-minded drive to kill what is in front of it, so a group of close-ranged fighters can distract it away from the outer ring, making it an ideal place for supporters to do their job in relative safety.”

So of course we took his advice, though not before Alisha used her newfound powers to place blessings over all of us. The new blessing was still not as powerful as her enhancement miracle, but it was noticeably closer to that than it had been before. It sped us up and made us stronger and more durable and also fanned the flame of life powering our Qi.

The beast didn't wake up as we approached it and I was beginning to think we would be able to get a good hit in before the fight could start but it began stirring when we got within twenty feet of it. It started moving with disconcerting creaking sounds, flexing the metal claws it had for hands, the lights in its eye sockets flaring up and finally it let out a bellow that shook the entire chamber. Selene and I were both wielding shields and swords, with my shield being made of the water-elemental metal from the first floor. Selene, of course, was wielding the legendary shield she'd gotten from the goddess Freya as the ice enchantment on it made it extremely good at defending against fire attacks.

Aph stared down at us as if considering whether we were worth its time and then rammed its right claw into the ground in front of us and slashed forward and up. Annabella's journal had warned us of this attack but honestly the warning had been unnecessary as the attack was very well telegraphed. From where the claws had dug into the ground orange glowing lines extended forward for several feet and we made damn sure to stand between and not on the lines because a second later flames erupted from the ground exactly where the four lines had been. Clearly standing on the lines would have immolated us but there was no way this attack could hit unless the target was distracted.

The way the boss reared up during this attack exposed its comparatively squishy underside, but Selene and I couldn't take advantage of it, seeing as we were stuck between the fire streaks. But that was why we had allies.

On the dungeon floors we had seen that Annabella was a phenomenal shot with her bow but in the previous boss fights her bow had been pretty pointless. The first boss had been pretty much invulnerable to arrows save for its eyes and the second boss had been entirely invulnerable to arrows, but this one had actual exposed flesh that could be pierced and Annabella's arrow found its mark with ease. Even better, she'd used one of the arrowheads we'd had fashioned from the water ore and the effect was surprisingly devastating.

The arrow sunk into the beast's chest and then there was a hollow whoomp and red steam shot out of the wound. Clearly the beast was so hot on the inside that the water arrow had caused a steam explosion within it. The monster rocked back hard, just in time for an air spell from Yume. The little fox had taken to the new type of magic quite well, creating what looked like a serpent made of cutting winds that she sent at the beast's chest where it shredded and tore and dug a hole into its flesh.

It did not like that. The moment it recovered from being thrown off balance it shielded its weak point, leaning forward and keeping its head low so most of its vulnerable underside was protected by the metal bones. Then it stared at the juicy targets in front of it again and started biting at us.

Without me even having to say anything Selene took point, turning her shield just so that the beast's jaws glanced off without ever finding purchase and when it was disoriented I retaliated for her. I'd drawn my mace and charged a Qi Burst, smashing the blunt weapon sideways into its upper jaw, rocking its head sideways and exposing its underside once more and just then Selene came back in and thrust with her sword, sinking the enchanted blade deep into its flesh.

The ice enchantment on the weapon had a similar effect to Annabella's water arrow though not quite as volatile, with bloody steam shooting out of the wound, making us scramble back as to not get scalded.

Its eye lights flickered and I had the feeling that it was narrowing its eyes at us even though it couldn't and then it opened its maw in a roar.

“The boss has a breath attack, but it's not exactly a fire breath," Annabella had told us. “It spews a stream of the molten substance dripping from its mouth. This attack must be avoided or protected from at all costs as it is guaranteed to be lethal for anyone hit by it.”

We knew it was coming and so did Alisha so instead of scrambling out of the way we stood our ground and, sure enough, Alisha's voice rang out not a moment too soon:

“Protective Warmth!”

A dome of warm orange light sprang to life around us and the lava breath couldn't find purchase on it, sliding around and piling up around the boundary, rapidly cooling into stone. Thankfully the miracle protected from the intense heat as well and all we felt was the warmth the circle itself exuded. If we hadn't read Annabella's journal before this fight Alisha would have probably dispelled the miracle right after the beast stopped spewing lava, which would have gotten us killed. Because the moment it stopped spewing it swung its claw through a mighty slash that broke through the newly formed rock, trying to throw it at us, but that attack, too, glanced off the dome of Alisha's miracle harmlessly.

Only when the follow-up had failed as well and the beast had exposed its underbelly to us did Alisha drop the miracle and all of us took a shot at it. Selene and I rammed our swords into its belly and as it staggered backwards it also took another arrow and another air serpent to the gut. The beast was bleeding from over half a dozen wounds now and I was beginning to wonder how much more it could take when it suddenly spun around in almost a full circle. I wondered for a moment what that was supposed to accomplish when I remembered the tail with the spiked mace on its tip. Thankfully we were close enough to it that neither Selene nor I got hit by the mace tip, but both of us did end up getting struck by the metal tail and went flying.

So, turns out getting hit in the side by a whip comprised of metal bones hurt like a son of a bitch. Both Selene and I let out high-pitched yelps of pain and I was sure I at least broke something, either from the hit or from the landing. Much worse was the fact that the beast took our momentary incapacitation as an excuse to go after our companions. It charged at them, running on all fours and gaining speed until, with a mighty burst of strength that shook the cavern, the impossibly heavy beast leaped at the three women standing on the upper ring.

Thankfully Yume had planned for something like that. She literally ran up the wall of the cavern and kicked herself off it, hurtling at the monster. When the beast was at the apex of its jump Yume met it, wreathed in so much Qi she looked like a shooting star, and hit it with one mighty kick of her own that sent the beast flying backwards to the middle of the arena where it landed in a crater of its own. It left her exhausted to the point where even down here with the two of us moaning in pain and with the crash of the beast still echoing around the cavern I could hear her breathing like a bellows.

And I saw it as a testament of the faith Alisha had in Yume's abilities that she immediately began healing us rather than try to help Yume deal with the monster. It took the elf just a few moments to cast her healing miracle twice and by the time the boss had gotten up again I was back on my feet as well with Selene getting up behind me.

“This thing is getting on my nerves," she growled as she stepped up next to me.

“Same," I said, readying myself for its next attack.

The beast raised its right claw to swing at Selene, who blocked it almost effortlessly, but then it followed up with its left claw. I interposed myself between then, intending to bat the second claw away, but instead of swinging at me the claw wrapped around me and clutched. I had a moment where I could have dodged away but it would have caught Selene if I had so I let it grab hold of me and gritted my teeth, waiting for the pain.

Honestly, its grip wasn't as strong as I had expected. It hurt, good gods did it hurt, but a giant would have already squeezed my innards out. Of course, just as I thought that the beast raised me up high above its head, intending to slam me down and crush me. I was already trying to time the moment it opened its claw to use a Qi Dash and get away but then a barrage of wind spells and a water arrow hit its chest, making it drop me to the ground and I narrowly avoided the magical mulligan Yume had thrown at it trying to get me out.

I hit the ground hard but before I could even begin to peel myself up off the ground Alisha's healing miracle washed over me as Selene rushed over to me, defending me as I got up.

“That was stupid of you," she said tersely.

“I didn't want it to grab hold of you," I explained.

“Save it. We'll have words about this later.”

Ouch. Well, nothing to be done. I got into a ready pose and waited for the monster's next attack.

Clearly being slammed down into the ground had rung its bells pretty well because it simply tried the fiery claw swipe again and once more it was the easiest thing in the world to step into the gaps between the glowing lines before they erupted into fire. While Selene and I were still hemmed in by the fires Yume and Annabella launched projectiles at its exposed chest, but after all the abuse the beast had taken the new volley seemed to rock it back further than before, so I used the time I had to stand still to charge a massive Qi attack, a Burst to enhance the force and then a Projection to enhance the area of impact, and when the fires finally subsided I slashed at the beast's chest, cutting a deep line into it from shoulder to pelvis. With the fire enchantment on my blade I had been worried I'd cauterize the wound as I cut it, but clearly the beast was fairly heat-resistant and so the wound I'd cut continued oozing blood until Selene produced a mighty thrust backed by a Qi Burst that kept going and going until there was a loud clank as she hit the metal bones from the inside. The beast's insides erupted in steam and I grabbed her around the waist and Qi Dashed back to safety as the monster howled in agony and finally crumpled in a cloud of red steam.

I waited until the steam had dissipated before I approached the boss. It looked dead but I still approached it cautiously and then stabbed it through the throat. It didn't even twitch.

“Finally," I heard Alisha groan as she, Annabella and Yume approached.

“Great job, everyone," I said before Selene grabbed me by the collar. “Hey, hold on!”

“What the fuck were you thinking?" she barked at me.

“Going to have to be more specific," I wheezed out. She was not playing around and her hold on me actually hurt.

“You could have let that thing grab me," she said. “You should have let that thing grab me!”

“I didn't want it to hurt you," I said. Of course I knew what she was talking about, but that didn't change anything for me.

“I'm wearing plate armor, you're wearing leather," she said. “It wouldn't have been able to hurt me the way it did you.”

“All the same," I said, “I didn't want it to hurt you.”

I could actually hear her teeth grind. “That goes both ways, you idiot.”

“Huh?”

“I don't want to see you get hurt either, you dumbass," she said, shaking me. Her voice broke a little as she added: “Don't do this to me again.” She pressed her face into the crook of my neck. “Moron.”

I looked around to find some help, but the other girls were looking just as angry and Yume voiced what they likely all thought:

“You won't find any sympathy here, lover. You were stupid and reckless. It's admirable that you want to keep us safe but you're important to us, too.”

I sighed and reached out to pat Selene's head. I could feel the warm wetness against my skin and knew she was crying. “I'm sorry," I told her as I held her. “I'll do better by you next time.”

“You better," she muttered.

**

It took quite some time before Selene had calmed down enough that we could move onward. It wasn't as if I didn't get why she had been upset, but I couldn't help wanting to protect the women with me. They were the best thing that had ever happened to me and I'd rather die than lose any of them. Of course I understood on some level that they felt the same way, but I was a selfish bastard like that.

When we had finally stepped apart I chucked a dismantling gem at the boss and it fell apart into brownish meat that we all agreed we wouldn't touch, a pile of metal bones and a huge ruby the size of a cabbage. I was still wondering just how much we'd get for it when a wall at the far end of the boss arena retracted to reveal a stairway downward to the treasure room.

We made our way down there and found the by now familiar pile of gemstones as well as a grove of trees with strange fruits hanging off them. This one didn't have any weapon racks or barrels full of rings, though. Apparently the third floor was a bit too hard for the royal family to use for convenient farming.

“So, what do these fruits do?" I asked. They looked really odd. They consisted of individual bubbles like a blackberry, but that was where the similarities ended. The fruits were spherical, roughly twice as big as an apple, and the bubbles were blue. Not blue the way fruit usually is, where it's really just a particularly bluish purple, but blue as the sky and held together by a thin golden mesh that sparkled in the light of the magical crystals lighting up the chamber. Annabella was already grabbing for one of them as she said:

“According to my great-grandfather's notes they enhance your reflexes and your senses. He described it as having been blind your whole life and finally getting to see. I've actually been a little excited to try these.”

“Is it just me or do these fruits seem kind of peculiar?" Selene asked.

“What do you mean?" Alisha asked.

“It's like... they seem to want to push us beyond mortal limits, don't they? The ones on the first floor gave rare double affinities to mages, the ones on the second floor gave stronger bodies and longevity and these give better senses. I wonder what's going to be next.”

“Well, it is said that those who spend their days diving into dungeons end up beyond mortals," Yume said. “The fruits I found years ago are proof of that.”

“If it's any consolation, my great-grandfather couldn't make sense of the fruits found in the next two treasure chambers, so maybe the trend doesn't continue," Annabella added.

“I'd still like to take a look at them," I said. “Selene's right. It's weird that all of these fruits that shatter mortal limitations can be found here. I'd expect one or maybe two in the whole dungeon but so far every single floor has yielded one of these and even if your ancestor couldn't make sense of them, the trend of mystic fruit does apparently continue. It's almost as if the dungeon wants us to overcome our limits.”

“Maybe that's the only way to overcome the depths of the dungeon," Selene mused.

“Either way, I'm not going to knock it," I said. “At some point we'll need to get Syr her body back and if these fruits make it even the tiniest bit more likely that we succeed they'll be worth it.” I could feel a pulse of warmth inside me that I knew had come from Syr. It felt like a hug inside my head.

With her approval I walked over to the tree and leaned forward to pluck a few of the fruits, making sure to brush up against Annabella still standing next to it. She shivered a little and leaned into me while I was busy with the fruits. When I was done I handed them out to Selene, Alisha and Yume while keeping one for myself.

I stared down at the huge blue and gold fruit in my hand and hesitated for a moment, remembering how phenomenally disgusting the last dungeon fruit had been but then shook it off and took a bite. It was nothing like the last one. The first blue bubble I bit into burst under my teeth and the juice that spilled into my mouth was an explosion of flavors, tart and sweet and fruity and of course the familiar heat of the fruit's enhancing effects running through my body. I wasn't even that crazy for fruit and even I thought this tasted amazing, so of course...

“Oh goddess," Alisha whimpered, her legs wobbling as she stared at the half-devoured fruit in her hands.

“Is she alright?" Annabella asked me quietly.

“Yeah, she gets like that sometimes," I muttered back. “If you want to see something fun, leave a bit of the juices on your lips when you're done.”

She looked at me questioningly but then shrugged and started being a little messier as she ate the rest of the fruit, the blue juices staining her upper lip.

Soon enough we were all done and Alisha was looking around. I, of course, knew what she was looking for so I had deliberately left some of the juices on my lower lip. Annabella's lips, by contrast, were stained blue. Not enough that it seemed implausible for it to be a coincidence but enough that Alisha would notice. And by the gods, did she notice it. She started fidgeting, no doubt thinking about Annabella being a princess, but then I saw her glancing at Selene and me, probably remembering that the two of us had spent the night with her, and then she stepped forward, all but prowling towards Annabella.

“You've got some fruit juice on you," Alisha told the princess, her voice a little slurred.

“I do?" Annabella asked, still a little confused about what was going to happen and that's when Alisha mashed her lips against Annabella's and then began a frantic, raunchy kiss with lots of tongue where she systematically cleaned Annabella's lips while making out with her.

Annabella, for her part, seemed taken aback for only a moment before she returned the kiss just as aggressively, snaking a hand around the back of Alisha's neck to pull her closer. Yeah, the little elf tended to inspire that kind of reaction in people. When they broke the kiss and pulled apart their tongues were connected by a thin line of saliva, which Alisha licked away as well before giving Annabella one last peck goodbye.

Only then did Alisha look a little bit nervous for mauling a princess like that, at least until Annabella commented with a breathless:

“Wow.”

The priestess blushed and sought eye contact with me but then she noticed the berry stains on my lips as well and dove in to kiss me next, her embarrassment already forgotten.

The lingering taste of the berry mixed with Alisha's and Annabella's flavor would have been enough to make me lose it even without how ravenous Alisha's kiss was, demanding and needy and desperate. I could tell she wasn't just after the last of the berry flavor when she'd started kissing Annabella and me, but that she was desperately in need. I'd hoped that we'd gotten it all out of our system the night after the banquet but Alisha's sex drive was almost legendarily high and so she was already close to her breaking point again.

Logically I knew we couldn't spend all night taking care of our urges since we needed every last sliver of stamina on the coming floors, but part of me wanted nothing more than to ravish her, right here on the ground if necessary. My hands were already slipping lower, one squeezing her cute ass and the other sneaking in between her legs from behind, but just as Alisha started to moan Yume cleared her throat loudly and we jumped apart.

“As much as I'd love to relieve some stress," the little fox said, “it'd be much smarter if we waited until we're done here.”

Alisha grumbled into my chest and I groaned:

“Yeah, fair enough. Gives us something to look forward to, at least.”

“That's the spirit," Yume said, the grin on her face only a little forced.