Vol.3 Ch.24 – Aerie

Chapter 24: Aerie

After seeing evidence of the cultists' presence in the dungeon we decided to continue through the dungeon instead of leaving and taking a rest. I could tell Annabella wanted to try getting in touch with her mother, to tell her about the assassination attempt, but she was levelheaded enough to know that her parents probably weren't back yet, so the best thing we could do would be to keep going and so we headed down to the fourth floor immediately.

After working our way through a water floor, an earth floor and a fire floor I wasn't too surprised to find an air floor awaiting us, but that didn't make the place any less breathtaking.

On the previous floors the crystal ceiling had been pretty high up but on this one the ceiling was so high it was almost impossible to see up above. As we reached the floor we saw an ocean of clouds, with dozens of mountaintops poking through them that were connected by bridges. Some of the mountaintops were only small platforms connected by rope bridges and others were huge areas that we could tell even from here housed monsters and that were connected by sturdy stone bridges. The bridges were clearly supported from below but thanks to the clouds we couldn't see how. Even more impossibly, some of the stone platforms weren't mountaintops but floating discs of rock similar to the village of Shackled Hollow, only held in place by the connections to the surrounding platforms.

I stepped fully onto the first platform, the wind rushing all around. The sound wasn't loud enough to drown out our voices but I was concerned about it drowning out the sounds of approaching enemies. In the center of the platform was a spring full of crystal-clear water. Annabella's journal had stated that the water on this floor was safe to drink, so I immediately walked over to it and drank my fill before digging in my bag of holding for all the canteens I'd emptied throughout the previous floor. After days of walking through an inferno the water tasted like ambrosia, fresh and clean and cool. I groaned a little from relief and so did the others once they had some of the water and filled up their own waterskins.

“Alright," I said once I was done filling up all the canteens. I had to raise my voice a little bit over the howling winds but I didn't quite have to shout. “The way seems fairly straightforward.” And it did. The rope bridges were taking us in one direction and there didn't seem to be any branches in the path as far as the eye could see.

“According to the journal that will change after the first day, but apparently it's still fairly simple. My great-grandfather noted down which path to take at every fork and has mentioned that when in doubt, we should take the path leading down.”

“Down?" I asked.

“Yes. Apparently the boss room is beneath the clouds instead of above them.”

“Alright," I said. “So, what enemies can we expect in here?”

“Wyrms," she said. “Very small wyverns, barely bigger than a man. And there are these monkeys that walk like people and can wield weapons.”

“Are they intelligent?" Alisha asked. It was a valid concern. None of us had a problem with killing mindless monsters, even goblins were fair game, but killing intelligent beings that meant no harm...

“As intelligent as other dungeon monsters," Annabella said. “They can apparently use tactics, but they're just as mindlessly hostile as everything else we've been fighting in here so far.”

“That's alright then," Alisha said.

“Yeah," Selene said. “Let's get to it.”

**

On the previous floor I had been a bit too distracted with the oppressive heat to really appreciate how difficult things had gotten, but now, with that nuisance removed, it became clear that we weren't on the beginner's levels anymore. The Wyrms were shockingly powerful, able to hurtle out of the sky and right into an attack if they spotted you at all and capable of breathing short but blisteringly hot gouts of fire. But, to my surprise, they weren't quite as desperate to kill us as other dungeon monsters. If wounded they would fly off instead of fighting to the death, which was distinctly unusual behavior for monsters inside of dungeons. I asked Annabella about it and she seemed stumped. Ever since her great-grandfather had come down here, only a few people had dared to go down to this floor and none of them had had much of an interest in studying monster behavior. It was only of academic relevance to us as we made our way through the dungeon, but it made me wonder if these wyrms could be captured and tamed. Without the dungeon's influence keeping them small they might actually be capable to growing into full-sized wyverns. Annabella bit her lip at that and seemed lost in thought, but then she shook it off and we continued.

The monkeys, to my surprise, presented a bigger problem than the wyrms. The wyrms, while strong and able to attack from above, were highly visible. We were above the clouds and so there was nothing obstructing our view of them. If there was one in the vicinity there was no way we would miss it. Even Annabella's journal stated that they never willingly went beneath the clouds, so if they were even capable of ambushing people from beneath they would probably not do that to people protected from dungeon malice, as we were thanks to Annabella's presence.

The monkeys, meanwhile, were clever and resourceful, hiding among bits of rubble to ambush us. Not only that, they were capable fighters even on their own. We'd come a long damn way from the mermen of floor one.

The monkeys were about five feet tall, able to walk almost but not quite upright, dressed in black cloth and wearing masks. They had long simian tails they used to great effect, like snaring one of your limbs in the middle of a fight or hanging off ruin pieces. They wore surprisingly good gear and if we hadn't all been wielding at least high tier magic items we would have probably found a use for theirs. Some dual-wielded curved swords, others used short bows, yet others were casters with long staffs capped with gems. Thankfully that last variant was very rare, because they were capable of using air magic and only the fact that we had an even stronger air mage with us in Alisha prevented those bastards from just blasting us off the stone platforms.

We hadn't seen any elite variants on the first day, for which I was profoundly grateful as even just three of the monkey warriors were a tough enough challenge that we had to use limited abilities like Alisha's or Selene's miracles or my magic items to deal with them.

It wasn't that the monkeys were that tough, but they had great reflexes, able to dodge a flurry of Annabella's sapphire pinions and a spell from Yume or Alisha while dashing in to engage one of us in melee.

As we traveled I was beginning to worry what we were going to eat. The wyrms usually flew off to lick their wounds if we hurt them enough so it would require a concerted effort to actually capture one of them and I was absolutely not going to eat anything even slightly humanoid, so the monkeys were right out. But then, on a platform so close to the rest spot I could already make out the glowing blue runes on the dark stone, we came across a grove of trees bearing fruits I'd never seen before. Of course Alisha was ecstatic about that, but I checked in with Annabella first.

“Are these edible?" I asked her. “Did your ancestor's journal mention them?”

“It did," she said with a nod. “They're called dragonberries. This isn't the only dungeon they've been found in, so he already knew what they were before he got here. They're supposed to be very delicious and very very good at keeping you fed.”

I could certainly see that. The things were huge. First of all, the trees were so big that Selene would need to stand on my shoulders to even reach the fruits and the fruits themselves were... They had the general shape of an apple, but they were the size of a large watermelon and were blue and yellow in color. The stalks connecting them to the trees were so thick it would take a sword to hack through them. They had to be, otherwise these massive fruits would have fallen right off.

“Anything else special about them?" I asked. There was no way they were just good for nutrition.

“Have you ever had a golden apple?" she asked.

Alisha, Selene, Yume and I shared a look.

“They extend one's lifespan?" I asked.

“Oh, you know of them?" Annabella asked. “Good. Yes, exactly. You'd have to eat them regularly to get much of an effect, but...” Her voice rose a little and she knelt down to search for something on the ground and when she found it she stood back up and showed a seed. “They can grow outside of dungeons, so all you need is the seeds and you can grow your own.” Annabella had only just finished her sentence when a dozen wind blades shot out from Alisha, cutting down the dragonberries closest to her.

“Grab them," the elf told us. “And make sure to keep the seeds when we're done eating.”

I chuckled. “Alright alright.” The way she so desperately wanted to increase our lifespans was amusing, but I could hear the undercurrent of sadness in her voice whenever she said something like this. She was terrified of us leaving her behind, so if eating the fruits she gave us alleviated that fear for her, of course I would do it. But that didn't mean I wouldn't lighten the mood by teasing her for it. “If you don't eat them all by yourself, I'll have some.”

She narrowed her eyes at me, but from the twinkle in her eyes I could see that she knew what I was doing and was grateful for it. “I am not obsessed with fruit," she said, doing a very good job of trying to sound indignant.

“You seemed pretty obsessed when you all but ate my face a few hours ago," Annabella chimed in.

Alisha narrowed her eyes at the princess. “Watch it Anna, or you'll find out what else I'm willing to eat.”

Annabella blushed and it wasn't lost on me that this was the first time one of us had addressed her with a nickname.

**

And so, after days on end of eating first turtle stew and then... deer monkey tentacle thingie stew... we had a nice, relaxed dinner of dragonberries, just cut up into slices. Their flavor was divine. There was no other way to describe it. They were just the right amount of sweet and tart, their flesh pleasantly firm, like a ripe peach. Their skins were edible and thin like an apple's and their seeds were big and noticeable and clustered towards the center. Except for those seeds, the entire thing was edible, there was no unpleasantly tough core to worry about. I had never tasted ambrosia, that mythical food the Olympians ate, but I couldn't imagine it being better than this. And I wasn't even the one in our party who seemed to experience spontaneous orgasms when eating new kinds of fruit.

The noises Alisha made while eating the dragonberries had Yume and Annabella blushing. Selene and I had built up a resistance to her antics, but even we were slightly impressed with the volume of the elf's moans.

After dinner Selene sat down next to me.

“I'm sorry," I said quietly.

She shook her head. “No, I am. I shouldn't have gone off on you like that. I was just... frustrated.”

“It was good that you did," I said, causing her to look up. “I can be pretty stubborn sometimes so I need you to clip me 'round the ear if I'm being stupid. You were right. You were better armored than me, so I should have let that thing grab you instead, but it's hard to keep that in mind when I see you in danger.”

She leaned into me. “Yeah, I get it. But please remember that I feel the same way about you. All of us do.”

“Yeah," I said, wrapping an arm around her.

**

The next morning we continued on our way and it was just like Annabella had said. The path suddenly started branching out, but the way forward was still fairly obvious. It wasn't just that one path obviously kept going forward and it wasn't just that it kept leading down ever-so-slightly, but it was also the path that had the most enemies on it.

If I'd thought the normal monkeys were dangerous, then the elite variant was brutal and I was very glad that we had encountered the first one of them on its own. The crystals didn't just not slow the beast down, the crystal enhancement actually made it faster and stronger and the way it launched itself forward and cut through the air with its curved swords was so forceful it was reminiscent of Qi techniques, to the point where Yume engaged it directly and even she had to use her illusion magic to mess with its senses to come out of the duel unscathed.

On the plus side, we had finally gotten used to fighting under the extreme winds of this floor and Annabella was slowly becoming a force of nature with that bow of hers. The fruits we'd eaten in the treasure chamber of the third floor were taking their time with unfolding their effects, but just one day had given them enough time to enhance our ability to see long distances and for an already accomplished archer like her it was a massive boost. Every single fight began with her burying an arrow in an enemy's head, long before they had even noticed us. She'd even managed to land us a wyrm for dinner that night.

Over all, we were doing well enough. We used up every single miracle available to us and had to sip from the bottomless potions multiple times, but thanks to Annabella's archery, Alisha's air magic and Yume's illusions we faced nothing truly worrisome.

Until the next day.

The enemy encounters had gradually been getting harder and with our increasing familiarity with the enemies of this floor we were keeping pace with the threats facing us, but then we came across a platform that was much bigger than the ones we'd seen up until this point. The platforms had also gradually gone lower and lower to the point where we could already see a bridge leading down into the clouds in the distance, which would likely lead us to the final rest spot before the boss room. However, the large platform also held a group of fifteen monkeys, all of them entrenched in a large ruin. Even worse, three of the monkeys were elite variants, two of them the air mages that had been giving us so much trouble. It wasn't that they were that dangerous on their own, it was that they were all very good at sending out hammers of air meant to knock fighters off the platforms, which would surely be lethal. Even if there was a bottom to this floor of the dungeon, it would likely be so far down that there was no way to survive an impact with it.

Of the other monkeys, thankfully only two wielded bows while the rest of them held two swords each. Not that the melee variant wasn't dangerous, but dealing with the archers while fighting the sword wielders was a recipe for death.

“How are we doing this?" Selene asked quietly as we observed them from the next platform over.

I considered for a moment, then I had it.

**

The monkeys only realized that they were under attack when an arrow hit one of the air mages through the left eye and he toppled. The other mage spun around and began casting, but he realized that he couldn't get a clear shot because somehow there was a monkey between him and any of us. He howled at them to get them to move, but they were staring at something in the sky that none but them could see.

I had hoped Annabella would be able to kill the second caster before he could act, but when he realized that he couldn't get a clear shot without moving from his position he summoned up a cocoon of air magic around himself to fend off arrows. It wasn't that big a deal because Annabella simply targeted the other elite variant, one of the melee fighters, next. He was already charging towards us, Yume's illusions unable to snare him as they had the others, and seemed ready to dodge Annabella's arrow, but the moment he twisted out of the way a gust of wind from Alisha corrected the arrow's course and sent it right at the elite variant.

And then I felt something snap and the previously dazed monkeys all charged at us, except for the archers who hid away among the ruins. Selene sent out an icicle crash to go over the ruins, hopefully to hit the archers while we were busy with the melee fighters, and then her and I charged into the fray.

Ever since her promotion to minor saint Alisha had been using her blessing on us before every encounter and right now it was all that saved my life. Despite the magical fruits I'd eaten, despite the ten years of experience as an adventurer I had, despite having already fought so many terrifying foes, these monkeys were more than enough to keep up with me. Fighting them one on one was a tall order. Right now I had three of them bearing down on me.

But Alisha's blessing was giving me the edge I needed. I wielded Helios Edge alongside a shield and I blocked the first monkey with my shield, intercepting its cross slash as I sent a fire lance at the one leaping at me. The beast twisted out of the way at the last second and so it only suffered an extremely painful injury instead of instant death. The fire lance bored through its side and set its clothing and fur ablaze instead of going straight through its heart the way I'd meant it to. Even so, the monkey would be busy stopping, dropping and rolling for at least a few moments, which gave me just enough time to bring my sword back into position to block before the third monkey was on me.

As I said, these things were fast and smart, so it didn't just mindlessly slam its swords against mine. I managed to block the sword in its right hand, but the one in the left grazed my sword arm, making me hiss in pain. The reflex was to recoil in pain and back off but I fought it tooth and nail. I trusted my companions and so I simply charged a Qi technique and a plume of blue fire sailed over my shoulder to hit the monkey bearing down on my sword arm, allowing me to use a Qi Burst to swing at the one bearing down on my shield, bisecting him. I was waiting for Alisha to heal me but then I chanced a look up and saw a magical battle raging between Alisha and the other elite air mage, so I pulled out one of the bottomless potions and took a sip as I turned back to the two monkey trying to put the fire out as well as a third one to take the place of the one I'd just cut apart.

I'd only very rarely seen Alisha engaging other mages in proper duels. Most of the time mages were either something we dealt with before the fight or they were so weak that Alisha could deal with them handily, but this elite mage was apparently enough for her to fight him properly. Mage duels were something to behold. It wasn't a frantic flinging of spells at each other. If I had had the time to turn back and look at her I would have seen her in a ready stance, her eyes flicking back and forth, trying to keep track of a dozen subtle cues and then she'd occasionally send out a spell to either capitalize on a perceived weakness or blocking an attack sent at what the other mage had perceived as a weakness. This methodical approach had the advantage that we probably wouldn't need to worry about the enemy air mage hitting us, but it also meant that we couldn't count on Alisha to support us in any other way until she managed to strike a decisive blow.

And frankly, the fact that this elite air mage could keep up with Alisha even after extensive Qi training and learning about the Panta Rhei technique was more than a little concerning. She was one of the most powerful mages I'd ever met. Even Yume wasn't as powerful as her. Or rather, Yume wasn't as powerful of an offensive mage as her. Her illusion magic was likely just as powerful as Alisha's air magic, but it didn't lend itself to flashy displays of power. But Yume's fire magic was nowhere close to what Alisha could do.

Either way, I decided to ignore the two writhing on the ground and instead focused on the one sprinting at me, readying my shield and a Qi Burst when an arrow whistled by me and struck one of the monkeys on the ground, putting it down for good. Then the running one was on me and went into a sliding tackle.

I had no idea what it was trying to do but I positioned my shield slightly lower so it wouldn't be able to scythe my legs out from under me. At the last moment it pushed up with its tail and launched itself high up, over the guard of my shield.

I almost managed to avoid it, backing off and interposing the shield with one of the blades, but the tip of the other still bit into my shoulder and I growled in pain as I released my Qi Burst and lobbed its head right off. I expected Annabella to take care of the monkey slowly getting up in front of me, the other one that had been set on fire, but instead there was a clang in front of me and only my newly enhanced senses let me see that there had been an arrow coming at me and it had been met with one from Annabella.

Damn, she had just shot an arrow out of the sky.

Sadly I didn't have much time to be impressed because the one I'd set on fire was coming at me again. I saw a flash of motion, telling me that Yume was probably rushing forward to deal with the archer. Apparently Selene's miracle hadn't gotten them both.

The sword wielder went for a decisive thrust with both swords, but I was so keyed up that it was the easiest thing in the world to step between the two swords and run the monkey through with my sword. Its swords clanged to the ground and it probably looked like it was just giving me a big bear hug before I pulled my sword out with a wet slurping sound and the beast crumpled. Then there was the loud exhale I'd come to associate with Yume using a Qi technique followed by an aborted scream and I knew the archer monkey was no more. I looked around and saw that none of them were coming at me anymore, so I turned to Selene.

The paladin was surrounded by three corpses, with a fourth lying a ways away with an arrow in its forehead, and she was currently fighting the final sword wielder, parrying one sword on her buckler and the other with her sword before giving the monkey a mighty kick in the midsection that sent the beast flying. She drew her Qi in and I could tell she was preparing a Qi Projection. She wasn't that good at it yet, but the three seconds she took were faster than anything she'd ever managed before and by the time the monkey had managed to get back up a massive vertical slash bisected it.

I looked over to the air mage and saw that it was still locked in a duel with Alisha. Clearly she was slowly gaining the upper hand and I decided to let her finish him off, but Yume had other ideas. With the air mage thoroughly distracted Yume used that weird flash step technique of hers to appear right behind the air mage and then ran him through with her blade. And then she immediately blinked away before a torrent of air magic came crashing down on the mage's body, now that his magic was no longer fending Alisha's off.

The resulting carnage was so impressive it was a miracle that the mage's staff had survived it intact.

“Is the other archer dead?" I asked when it became clear that all other enemies had been dealt with.

“Yeah, I saw him die," Selene said. “I thought I'd gotten the other one as well. I'm sorry.”

“It all worked out in the end," I said. “I shouldn't have assumed they were both dead.”

I turned around to see Alisha breathing like a bellows. She'd been able to hold it together during her magical duel, but it had clearly not been a trivial fight. Finally I saw her relax and then she began casting healing miracles, healing all the wounds Selene and I had taken during the fight. Even Yume had apparently been nicked, as I could see Alisha's miracles sweeping over her as well. The only one who had apparently been doing great had been Annabella. I turned to her.

“Those were some great shots," I told her. “Thank you.”

She blushed a little, but then caught herself. “Yeah. Those fruits from the last treasure room are amazing. Great-grandfather wasn't wrong. It does feel like I have been blind my whole life.”

“Honestly, I had expected a little more," I said. “Though yeah, they are very useful at letting you make out things in the distance.”

“Apparently the rest of the benefits take a few more days to take effect," she said. “I'm a little excited to see what will be different tomorrow.”

I smiled. “Me too.” In fact, if my eyesight was going to improve, I couldn't wait to look at my beautiful women with those new eyes.

**

Compared to that encounter the way to the next rest spot was fairly uneventful, aside from Annabella netting us another wyrm. Once at the rest spot we wasted no time taking one of the beasts apart to roast over a fire. Flame-grilled was really the only proper way to serve any type of draconic species. They were essentially just big lizards and lizard meat usually behaved very similar to chicken, right down to the texture, flavor and cook times, but dragon-like species were slightly different. Their meat was darker, more like duck than chicken, and more flavorful. However, unlike duck, something about dragon meat made it extremely tough unless direct flame was involved in the cooking process. Of course, that meant it was very easy to ruin dragon meat and oftentimes people cooked it until the outside was black as charcoal and the inside was still raw, but between Alisha and me we managed to prepare it as skewers with thinly cut wyrm meat and vegetables with a spicy vegetable dip on the side. Normally I would have preferred some bread to go with that, but we had so many of these skewers that we were all stuffed and still had some left over.

The meat was a weird hybrid of chicken and beef, similar to the hydra meat we'd had a while ago but much less fatty. Obviously. These wyrms hadn't had an ounce of excess fat on them, which made sense given that the dungeon had created them to be efficient fighters. Either way, it was quite tasty and the vegetables we'd found on this floor, mostly oddly-shaped root vegetables, had an invigorating effect to them.

After dinner I thanked Annabella again for saving my ass.

“I'd say we're even now," she said with a slight blush. I could have argued. I could have told her that when I had saved her from an arrow I had been her bodyguard and it had been my duty to save her from such things, but I didn't. Instead I stroked her cheek wordlessly. She leaned into it, just enjoying the simple pleasure of the skin contact for a few minutes until she said:

“Let's go sit down with the others and we'll talk about what we can expect from the boss.”

“Yeah, let's.”