B3 Chapter 296: Rematch, pt. 1

Returning to their trek across the sand-buried city, Kaius passed over empty dunes with a new degree of focus — now aware that lethal threats may lay hidden under the sands at any point.

The suns slowly moved over the horizon, only further confirming in Kaius’s mind that it was no mere illusion that had recreated the open sky under the ground. Step by step they drew closer to the far off building. With Truesight, he could now see the building in a decent amount of detail.

Unlike some of the other ruins he had spotted, it was no manor sized protrusion — barely larger than the small spire that had housed the portal they had entered from. Considering that his Champion sense consistently pulled him towards the closest larger structures, it gave him hope that the league’s off building was what they were looking for — the entrance to the next biome.

The Temple-palace of Hyythenal wasn’t the worst as far as biomes went, but he was more than eager to get out of it. Beyond the discomfort of scorching heat and fine grained sand that seemed determined to worm itself into every unmentionable crevice he owned, it was simply poorly suited to their needs.

Sure, the ruinbringers were solitary monsters, but they were also rare. They’d been crossing the sand for hours now, and they’d only encountered one. Impossible to track and sense as they were, they had no way to consistently work on hunting the beasts for levels, and they would be almost forced to confront them on unequal terms.

Moreover, they were Elite, large, naturally armoured, and their tails were a lethal threat that were incredibly difficult to survive.

He’d much prefer more frequent, but comparatively fragile monsters, especially in a biome where his and Kenva’s tracking and ambushing experience could be brought to bear.

At the very least, the open sand and low concentration of enemies allowed them to make good time as they walked towards their target. Every league they put between them and the entrance way increased the difficulty that any followers would face if they wanted to track them.

Skills did much, especially in the second tier, but Kaius suspected that with a week-old trail and their tracks being erased by the constant low wind there would be more than a few headaches if they were followed. That went double if they were lucky enough for the biome to reset before the portal opened.

Huffing as his feet sunk into the ground, Kaius forced himself up another dune. Even with his scalemail repairing in his spatial storage — he didn’t see too much risk in going predominately unarmoured, what with the ruinbringer punching through his defences like they were made of paper — he still struggled to get more than a modicum of traction on the sand.

Reaching the peak of the rise, Kaius shaded his eyes with one hand — surveying the landscape for any unlikely changes.

He locked on immediately to a ruin nestled in a depression, only a few hundred long-strides to their left — it would have been hidden from view until they’d gotten close enough to see past the dunes that guarded it like silent sentinels.

It was as large as a manor, with wide stone verandas that swooped around its exteriors, covered by large curved awnings and a pyramidal roof that was a larger, more ornate cousin to the one that had capped their entrance room.

Kaius frowned — his Champion sense was still pulling him far off to the right. So it seemed that the larger buildings weren’t exclusively home to challenges he would much rather avoid.

A conundrum, one that he would have much preferred didn’t exist. On one hand, the building almost certainly contained depthsborn — likely the four-armed figures that Ianmus had identified. They might be a better and easier source of levels than the enigmatic ruinbringers.

On the other hand, the devil they knew was often the most preferable. They had no clue of the numbers, arrangement, or danger of whatever creatures would wait for them inside, and he was certain that they would be able to garner more levels on their way to the next biome.

He much preferred dealing with unknowns with another skill or two, and plenty more stats under his belt.

“Thoughts?” Kaius asked, nudging Kenva to grab her attention from her own scouting.

Following his nod, Kenva’s eyes roved over the structure, her head tilted.

“No Champion, I assume?”

He shook his head.

Running a hand through her hair, Kenva sighed. “I think we should probably leave it. As tough as the scorpions are, they are solo ambushers, and I doubt we have much chance if we’re forced to fight more than two things at once with our current levels.”

Kaius grunted in agreement. “That’s what I thought too — we push on, then.”

As much as his curiosity dragged at him to explore the strange spaces of the Depths to the fullest extent he could, Kaius knew it was the right decision. There would be plenty of opportunities to explore to their heart’s content later. They just needed to get a little stronger first.

Continuing on, Kaius thoughts started to drift as he scanned their surroundings for threats.

Despite their confinement, they’d managed to grow far more than he would have expected in the last month — each of them earning new skills that they would have to develop and integrate into their kit. It presented a problem that would leave most delvers green with envy.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

Even with their meteoric rise, as a team they had regularly had down time where they could grow used to using their new abilities — both training with Rieker, and in their long stretches of relatively easy travel.

That option wasn’t available — not down here, where dealing with only a couple of deadly battles a day was light work. To make it all the more complicated, if their levels did rise as quickly as he expected — ‘Wall’ or no — they were only going to gain more skills. Hells, he and Porkchop were going to gain another after their next fight, and Kenva and Ianmus were likely to as well.

Leveraging those new abilities required active work, and would have to be carefully managed. A new Skill helped no one if they misunderstood its full capabilities and made a call that left one of them crippled or dead.

He took a swing from his waterskin, making his way down the dune pace by pace.