Critical Misclass Ch 25 27

CHAPTER 25 - Detour Force

I ended up taking the third watch, which I hoped would be as uneventful as the first two. It was the longest, uninterrupted, period of time with just me and my brain, with no distractions, that I'd had in ages. That included my time before Fielende: even on the most boring days at work, I had ways to keep myself busy. Puttering around in the small ruin while Ves and Thia slept made me wish I had at least an old magazine from some doctor's office.

Instead, I found myself concerned about every new noise, every sudden movement in the distance, every remotely potential threat. It would have been bad enough if a bandit, or a bear, showed up, but I kept expecting Red Gauze to just walk through the entrance and mutilate everyone without effort. I took a little solace in the fact that Ves and Thia were as horrified by that man as I was, which told me that people like him weren't commonplace in this world.

The rain stopped about halfway through my watch, but since the flooding would take longer to clear out, going through the former dungeon was still our best method of progressing towards Vanndrenvar. I was definitely looking forward to entering a real dungeon, even if it wasn't technically a dungeon anymore. Just the fact that it

used

to be, with monsters, traps, and treasure, was exciting. Thia had explained how the Starting Cave didn't meet all the qualifications to be considered a true dungeon, despite the cave rats that spawned there.

After waking up my party members, we ate some dried travel rations that Ves had purchased in Perrenbrook. Although it made us feel hungrier, we couldn't help but talk about the food we were missing out on at the inn.

Any

inn. I also did my best to describe the worst continental breakfasts I'd experienced at subpar hotels. Partway through attempting to describe miniature perforated cereal boxes, I wondered why I wasn't instead embellishing my past to impress these beautiful women.

The reason, I realized a bit later, was because they made me feel good about myself in the present, and gave me hope for the future.

When we grabbed our gear and decided it was time to head down the stairs, Ves held out her hand and created her mote of light - with only a bit of effort. "I'll handle this." She looked very serious about it, which almost made me laugh. (I'm glad I didn't.)

The cracked stone staircase went straight, leading underground, for nearly 50 feet. At the bottom was a large, reinforced, wooden door, the top half of which appeared to have been partially burned. I noticed just the very edges of a carving that had survived the fire, but it wasn't nearly enough to be able to tell what it once was. The door didn't seem to have any kind of lock or barricade, which I mentioned to my party.

"The door is not meant to keep anyone out - or trap anyone within," Thia explained. "It simply prevents wild animals from entering."

I opened the door with some effort, its loud creaking echoing throughout the dungeon. My breath caught in my throat, excited to see what would lay ahead, as Ves made her light float several feet ahead of us. I exhaled with a disappointed sigh.

Rather than a series of rooms, maybe even a maze, all I could see ahead of us was a long, straight, stone tunnel. Remnants of former walls could be seen along the sides of the tunnel at various intervals, along with doorways and other entrances that had been caved in. "This is it?"

Thia looked around the tunnel. "Yes, it appears so. Many sanctified dungeons are altered for convenience, and to prevent anyone from using the former rooms as living quarters or for any other purpose."

"Damn... I really built this moment up in my mind."

Ves gave me a quick side-hug. "You'll see more than enough dungeons sooner or later."

Regardless of my disappointment, I made sure not to lower my guard. If Red Gauze - or anyone, or anything - showed up suddenly, I wanted to be ready. While we moved forward, I continuously looked all around for anything out of the ordinary.

I noticed that there were multiple sections of the walls in which sections of the stone had been removed or broken. The sections were anywhere between one and three feet in diameter, and reminded me of how a similar-sized portion of the door had been burned.

If I had only seen one or two of these, I probably wouldn't have thought twice about them, but I kept seeing these missing or broken parts of the walls over the course of our walk through the tunnel. I asked the others if they knew what might have happened, but neither had any idea.

"You're probably overthinking it." Ves took a closer look at one of the missing sections of wall, revealing nothing but earth. "Anything could have happened here. Maybe the dungeon's inhabitants did it, maybe adventurers did it, maybe it happened by accident when it was being broken down and sanctified."

Figuring that she was probably right, I tried to forget about it. The trek through the tunnel only took us about ten minutes, which probably made for a pretty damn sizable dungeon if it still had all of its rooms intact. There was another large door at the far end.

Something caught my eye before we reached the door. I split off from Ves and Thia, moving towards one of the caved-in doorways to the side. Up close, I wasn't quite sure what had stood out to me. My eyes darted all over the rocks and dirt, until I found it.

"Hey! There's a chest in here!"

That got Ves's attention. Her footsteps echoed as she ran in my direction. "Where?? Where is it?"

I pointed to what I had found: just a small part of the corner of what must have been a wooden chest. "See it? Must have been caught up in all this rubble when they filled in the rooms."

"Nice find! Let's get it out."

Thia walked over to us. "Is that going to be possible without making a mess?"

Ves was already removing loose stones from around the chest. "Don't worry about it..."

She casually tossed a rock behind her, which I caught with quick reflexes. "We'll at least try to keep everything close by." I dropped the rock by the wall. "How does that sound?"

Thia took a deep breath. "I suppose it will be fine. I doubt it will affect the purpose of the detour, after all."

Ves and I carefully removed rubble, trying to avoid having large sections come crashing down on us, while Thia practiced the cleaning spell to move dirt and smaller rocks so the mess was closer to the wall. We spent more time working on this than we did crossing through the dungeon, but eventually, I was able to see a handle on the side of the chest.

"You two, move away! I'm going to try to pull it out." I pulled lightly on the handle, to see if it might break, but it was pretty sturdy. I used the handle to shake the chest while pulling on it, to help dislodge it from the rest of the rubble.

"You've almost got it!" Ves clapped her hands together in excitement. Thia warned me to be careful.

With one final pull, the chest popped out, but the disruption caused a lot of the rubble and dirt to collapse and slide into the tunnel. I looked at the top of the doorway - whatever area was behind it was still almost completely filled with earth, so we hadn't actually done anything to mess with the tunnel. Except make a mess. I gave the chest, which wasn't much larger than the toaster I had in my apartment, to Ves to open while Thia and I did our best to straighten up the rubble with magic and good old fashioned pushing-stuff-with-our-feet.

"It's locked," Ves groaned. She picked up one of the rocks that had spilled out onto the floor and bashed the lock open. She giggled - well, cackled might be more accurate. "Look at me! I'm a Rogue!"

That just made me wonder if lockpicking was included as one of my class's talents, and then I remembered that Kael had let me keep the set of lockpicks we found on Gev's body. Ves had the right idea, though: why risk breaking the lockpicks when you can just break the lock?

"Ah, damn." Ves held up an old book with pinched fingers, like it was a rotting fish. The cover was entirely black, without any kind of title or images. "No treasure."

I reached out to take the book. "Maybe it's, like, a spellbook, or a collector's item, or something." After wiping off some dirt and dust from the blank cover, I opened it up and carefully flipped through a few pages. It appeared to be someone's journal: most of the pages were still empty, with only a quarter or so of the pages having any amount of writing on them. The language used was completely alien to me, using an alphabet or maybe coded symbols that I had never seen before.

With the book opened, I showed Ves and Thia one of the pages with writing. "Can either of you read this?"

Thia shook her head, and Ves squinted her eyes and looked closer. "Looks made-up to me." She inspected the now-broken, empty chest one more time before tossing it on the pile of rubble.

"Huh, weird." I checked some more pages, in case there was anything else. Maybe the equivalent of a twenty-dollar bill stuck between two pages. The only thing I noticed was a symbol being doodled in the margins of some of the pages. While it didn't look completely identical each time, it was clearly meant to be the same symbol. The frequency, as well as consistency, of the symbol increased as the entries progressed. There didn't seem to be any more doodles after the final entry.

The ladies didn't recognize it, either. I briefly removed my pack to carefully wrap the book within the blanket. "With any luck, it'll be worth something."

The door at the end of the tunnel led us to another staircase. Unlike the first one that we used to enter the tunnel, this one must have been added around the time that the dungeon was sanctified, as part of the conversion into a detour. While it didn't look

new

, it was clearly less aged and worn than the other staircase. The shelter-like structure that it led to aboveground had a similar appearance.

It was still mostly cloudy, but it hadn't started to rain again. The air smelled wonderful with the mixture of rain and trees. We had to be careful not to slip on some of the wet undergrowth, though.

We followed a sign that pointed us to the nearest road, which turned out to not be the same road we were originally traveling along. It went north-to-south, but another helpful sign on the side of the road informed us that it intersected with the road to Vanndrenvar a short ways to the north.

That wasn't a terrible detour. Wonder if it was here when Tabur moved to Perrenbrook.

The north-to-south road had seen much more use than the Perrenbrook-to-Vanndrenvar road we had been taking. I asked the others if they knew much about where it led, and Thia replied. "As it happens, if you follow this road north long enough, you will reach Karneissdran."

"Oh, that's your hometown, right?"

"Yes! However, we took a shorter route that had us enter Perrenbrook from the west. This road is used more often, as it facilitates travel between my city and other large cities, including Vanndrenvar."

Ves chuckled. "Yeah, not many people have much reason to go to, or

through

, Perrenbrook."

We reached the intersection of the two roads before long. Sure enough, there were more footsteps and wagon tracks going to the north and to the east than there were going west, back towards Perrenbrook. Something else caught Thia's attention as we turned east. She suddenly stopped in her tracks. "Is that blood?"

"Is

what

blood?" Ves sniffed the air, looking side to side. I also stopped to look around us, but didn't notice anything immediately.

"I-- I was certain I saw it, somewhere in this vicinity. But now, it seems-- oh! There!" Thia pointed to some tall weeds growing on the side of the road to the southeast, close to the intersection.

Once it had been pointed out to me, I could clearly see a dark stain going into the weeds. "Damn, I can't believe you noticed that. Looks like you tapped into the Rogue senses." Thia smiled proudly. More evidence that class abilities, both those that were natural to our classes as well as the ones we were "borrowing" from each other, worked best when we weren't actively trying.

Thia was pleased with herself for noticing the blood, and her excitement was infectious. I moved in to hug her, and she happily reciprocated, but Ves interrupted before we could linger. "Weird reaction to finding a big bloodstain, but okay."

I laughed at myself. "Right! Let's be cautious." My words didn't have the gravitas I had hoped for, as I was still amused at myself for getting distracted in the moment.

Ves and Thia spread out to my left and right, respectively, as I approached the bloodstain. Despite all the noise we had been making, I made sure to move stealthily to not startle anything that could be in the weeds. There was no sound or movement coming from the side of the road, even when I reached the bloodstain, and I looked around carefully. Ideally, I wanted to find a dead animal, or even nothing at all... but unfortunately, I found a further trail of blood leading further away from the road.

I let the ladies know, and they moved closer, still keeping a look around to avoid any potential surprises. We removed our packs, stashing them in a nearby bush so that on the off-chance anyone passed by, they wouldn't find our stuff.

The trail of blood wasn't especially obvious, so whatever had been injured hadn't just been gushing blood everywhere like something out of a hyperviolent video game. It was difficult to see the stains at certain points in the undergrowth, preventing me from trying to look far ahead to get a better idea of where it was leading us.

Before long, it led into some thick bushes. I crouched next to them, motioned for my party to get close, and spoke as quietly as possible. "I'm going to find a way around the bushes. If there's no way to do that without going through them, or if it looks like the trail goes on much farther, I think we should call it quits and just continue walking. I don't feel comfortable being off the road any longer than we need to."

Ves and Thia nodded, although with some apprehension. There was really no reason for us to be checking this out in the first place, especially since there didn't seem to be any immediate threat to us anymore, but I was enjoying the thrill nonetheless. The "dungeon" had been a bust, so I suppose this was my way of finding some excitement, as well as a chance to practice my Rogue talents.

My calico companion touched my arm, concern on her face. "Don't do anything stupid. Just yell if you see anything weird."

It was difficult to separate myself from these two at the best of times, and seeing their faces up close was making me rethink my original plan. "Maybe trail behind me at a distance, if you can. I've heard people say 'never split the party' before, and now I'm starting to really understand why."

"We will. And this will allow me to attempt to move quietly, like you can." There was a fire in Thia's eyes - she was still feeding off of the confidence she had just gained by spotting the bloodstain.

"Good idea, but keep in mind that the stealth ability only lasts for maybe half a minute or so. Not sure how long it takes before it can be used again. So only try to use it if you absolutely need to move closer without being heard." Thia wasn't in the Cave with Ves and me when I had learned that the hard way, and I would prefer she not have to go through that experience herself.

I had to go now, or else I'd never be able to do it. Turning away from the others with slight hesitation, I began moving quietly around the bush. My goal was to use stealth for as long as possible, then stop for the same length of time, and see if that was enough to be able to use stealth again. As before, it only took about half a minute before I could hear my feet stepping slowly onto the muddy ground. After counting

one one-thousand, two one-thousand

in my head until I reached thirty, I took a cautious step... and could still hear myself.

I counted to thirty again, but I was still unable to activate the ability. This definitely tracked with some of the games I'd played before: stealth wasn't something that could usually be repeated as often as one might want, and needed to be used only when it was absolutely necessary.

Still... I wonder if using it more often might improve it.

Taking a deep breath, I decided to continue on without using stealth, and just progressing even slower than before. I could imagine Ves giving me a hard time for crouching in one place for over a minute without doing anything.

When I was finally able to move around the bush, I first took a peek to get an idea of what I might be heading into. There was a small clearing, with a few bedrolls around an extinguished fire, along with some packs. Everything was soaked, looking as if no one had been here since sometime before the storm began the previous day.

My first instinct was to call for Ves and Thia, but I caught myself, realizing it would be better to check everything further before potentially announcing myself to anything else nearby. My second instinct was to yelp with surprise when something pulled my leg, making me fall onto my back.

CHAPTER 26 - Ambushed

I was too damn focused on trying to be quiet, and on the camp itself, to pay any attention to what was going on around me. When my back hit the damp ground and I realized what was happening, it was clear that my heightened Rogue senses were screaming at me.

Whatever was grabbing onto my leg kept pulling, dragging me across the bedrolls and scattered supplies. I shouted to alert my party. "

Hey!

I need help!"

Ves and Thia rose from behind the bushes, each exclaiming in disbelief. They ran towards me, with Ves going in the same direction I went, and Thia taking the other way around the bush. Just as Ves reached the spot where I was grabbed, she jumped back, as if evading something. "Shit--" She slipped on the wet undergrowth, but narrowly managed to avoid falling.

Thia drew her sword and swung it hard at the ground in front of me, where it stuck into the ground. The tight grasp around my leg loosened, and I was no longer being pulled. As I scrambled to my feet, I saw a green tendril flailing around before it whipped back into another bush like a tape measure being released.

Next to my feet was the part that Thia cut off. I gave it a light kick to see if it was still alive, but there was no reaction. "It's... a plant?"

"Looked like a vine." Ves moved closer, looking all around. "There's more. I just barely dodged one over there."

I drew my daggers, and Thia held her sword in front of her with a determined expression. Ves and I flinched as Thia's sword suddenly burst into flames.

The burning sword reflected in her large eyes."It worked..."

"You beat me to it!" Despite hoping that magical flames would engulf my daggers right at that moment, I wasn't so lucky. I held my daggers in a cool pose - well, at least it looked cool in my head - but nothing happened. My heart beat faster.

These things can attack us at any second. Stop fucking thinking about using the spell, and just do it.

"Give me one!" I looked at Ves, who was impatiently holding out her hand. "I don't have any weapons to try that on."

I offered a dagger, remembering at the last second to turn the blade away from her hand. Ves accepted it, and it immediately became covered in flames, almost burning me in the process.

"Oh, damn!" The netharri's eyes widened with excitement. She spun back around, towards the direction in which she was nearly grabbed, holding out the dagger threateningly.

Still no luck with my remaining blade.

Not the end of the world. Thia cut one of the vines before her sword was enchanted. But why won't this work?!