Dungeon Annihilation 3-12

Good Morning Everyone!

Chapter 12

Louella
Where was Earle when you needed him? Ezal was breaking through, but we couldn’t move. We were in the middle of a dangerous floor of the dungeon. I just hoped the host didn’t decide to bother us. Ezal’s face was turning red from the heat and lack of air. I was doing my best to keep some of the fire mana away from her face, but when originates from inside her body it is a little hard to control what it will do.
“Come on! Show me what you can do!” I yelled at her. She was on her hands and knees struggling to breath while I was a couple meters from her. Even from this distance the heat was almost unbearable. I couldn’t imagine what it must be like in the center of that. Even for a fire cultivator.
The ground had thoroughly melted by this point turning to slag. It had been almost five minutes and we hadn’t been attacked, which I thanked both Lelune and Nyx for. I was starting to tire from holding the passage of air for Ezal. Breakthrough’s varied from person to person, my own during the storm had been violent and had taken a fair amount of time as well. It could take her five more minutes, or five more hours. It was all up to the universe.
Another five minutes passed and it felt like my arms were lead. Just standing was becoming a burden and my vision was tinged in black. The only thing that kept me from giving up was the fact that Ezal herself was still fighting. I had seen her almost break several times but each times she screwed up her face and powered on.
“Ezal!” I gasped, my mouth dry from the heat. “Any… time… now!”
A boom from above me nearly caused me to drop my concentration. If we were about to be attacked, there was nothing I could do about it. I almost jumped out of my skin when something shockingly cold touched my face. Before I could react, it looked like the entire dungeon floor was overtaken by a rainstorm. The cooling water feeling amazing on my parched skin.
The heat from Ezal also started to die down. She was still breaking through, but the rain was counteracting the tremendous heat enough that Ezal was no longer suffering quite as badly. Her breathing also returned to normal. I took it as a sign that I could drop my arms which resulted in my entire body flopping forward.
“Are you trying to burn my Garden?” the creepy voice of the host asked, the rain not affecting it at all. I rolled over and found the host standing over me with his giant shadow form. The abundant light from the floor dimming as it neared him.
“We didn’t intend for this to happen. She is breaking through,” I explained patiently. I wasn’t about to forget what happened the last time we got on the wrong foot. Many more people died than they had to during the Greed raid.
“I’m not stupid. I know what is happening. That doesn’t change the fact that a good tenth of my Garden is currently ash,” the host retorted, the white line that made his mouth frowning in such a way that it split his face.
I straighten then dropped my head in a small bow. “I will apologize of her half, but I must risk saying that this game we play is dangerous for both sides. You can not expect us to always be the ones taking the loss.”
The host stared at me and I wondered if I’d crossed the line again. The tension only lasted for about a minute before the host broke out in laughter. I wasn’t sure how to describe it, but it sent shivers down my spine. Hearing it, I was convinced right then and there that there was something wrong with this host.
“Very well said! I suppose I can’t always be selfish. Very well. I will forgive you this time. Hell!” I exclaimed before he dropped a pile of sparkling gems in front of me. “Here is a gift to celebrate her breaking through. Buy yourself something nice.”
I thought about refusing the gift, but something inside me told me that it would just give me a bigger headache. I was already suffering from mana exhaustion. I’d rather not push the host right now. “Thank you for your generosity.”
“Think nothing of it,” he replied before his form sank into the ground like a black liquid. Once I was sure his immediate presence was gone, I took a deep breath. I was exhausted and soaked, but at least Ezal had broken through. I could feel her mana receding, indicating that she was almost finished.
Scooping up the gems, I looked one over before shaking my head. These gems were worth more than I cared to admit. That would make them dangerous while trying to convert them. It would also invite more than a few merchants to try digging for gold in my valley if they caught wind of it.
I should be surprised that the dungeon was already producing items like this. Sadly, I just felt it was a natural part of the world. There were too many unbelievable things happening in the valley that I had to stop trying to make heads or tails of them after a while. Especially when I was sporting one of the biggest headaches I’d had in a long time.
Heavy breathing and a body collapsing to the ground informed me that Ezal had completely finished. Crawling over, I laid down next to her. “Next time, I request that you find a bit more suitable place to break through.”
A chuckle escaped Ezal and she rolled over to look up at the storm covered ceiling. “Thank you, mistress. Without your help, I would have died in the first few seconds.”
“Good bodyguards are hard to replace! Plus, I need you to start training the valley’s forces. I’m not letting you get out of work that easily,” I replied with a smirk even though I knew she couldn’t see it.
“Of course. How foolish of me to try and take a vacation without asking first.”
“Exactly,” I shot back. We laid there for a few minutes before I broke the silence. “What caused you to break through?” I asked. She had been unconscious at the time so she might not remember.
“The… the explosion. I felt or saw, I’m not sure how to describe it. Either way, when I was knocked unconscious, something just clicked inside that by using catalysts rather than just my own mana, I could create much stronger magic.” Her hands were in the air, but she was making empty gestures like she wasn’t quite sure how exactly to explain. “Those flowers took so little mana to cause such a large explosion. I can’t wait to try other plants and materials to see what I can achieve.”
“I see,” I said slowly before sitting up. “For now, let’s get out of here. We sort of pissed the host off by burning part of his Garden.”
She sat up and nodded quickly. “I heard.” I tossed the bag of gems over to her. “Here. This is from the host. Hopefully, they’re not cursed.”
She pulled one out and gasped prompting me to shrug knowingly. “What can we do?”
“Be very careful.” We looked between the bag and each before we started laughing. With some effort we climbed to our feet, bracing each other, and trudged our way to the teleport matrix.
We found Ioa waiting by herself with a serious expression that quickly melted to relief when she saw us. She ran over and grabbed Ezal’s other side. “Thank god you’re both alright.”
“Which one?” I asked.
“For now, both of them.”
Once on the platform, Ioa pressed the rune for the first floor. Appearing without any fanfare, we made our way out of the dungeon. I spotted Tez looking nervously at the dungeon entrance. He hadn’t cleaned the blood from his armor yet, and made quite the sight. Many people heading into the dungeon were making a good effort to avoid being near him.
“Tez! How is Cane?” I asked once we got close to him.
“Not good. We took him to the church, but they say injures of his scale require a Deacon, there aren’t any in town.”
“Were they at least about to save his life?”
“They did what they could.”
“What about the church of Nyx?”
He rubbed his head and looked into the distance. “Raven and Mary got into it. We finally managed to convince Mary to at least go over there, but she is strongly against it. Says it is unnatural.”
“I can’t say much about that, but if it let’s Cane see tomorrow isn’t it a moot point?” I replied with some exacerbation.
“It is as you say,” he said dropping his head.
“We could use some healing ourselves,” I commented. Both Ezal and I had suffered a few burns from the explosion and the resulting fire break through. Mine were closer to that of being in the sun for several days, but Ezal’s were a much worse. “Let’s us go to the cathedral to check on them.”

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