Chapter Forty-Six: Forward Thinking

FORTY-SIX

“ROAN!” Taoya’s big voice seemed weak in comparison to the massive monster’s screech but it still drew every eye as Roan stepped out around a tree and saw the massive group. More people had found them it seemed as he saw faces he didn’t recognize, the group now up to nearly fifty people. Half of them were wounded, but there were a few of the bloodline fighters he recognized.

Taoya of course, Darren off to the side, Harris and one of his friends who Roan couldn’t remember the name of. There was no sign of Moira or Tyler, but he was sure they’d be around eventually.

“You have my gear,” Roan said, keeping his voice even as he walked with careful steps, eyes on all the wounded. His hand rested on the pommel of the sword, but he kept it sheathed for now.

“Yeah, I saw it as we were retreating and figured I’d grab it. After all, if you didn’t make it, you wouldn’t need it,” Taoya said with his customary smile.

“How thoughtful,” Roan said as he stepped toward the bag and snagged his warhammer. It felt right in his hand as he threw the pack around a shoulder. Taoya didn’t make a move to stop him, instead was prattling on about how they’d run into that beast.

“I got ambushed by those little goblins, like everyone, but figured I’d help others out. Started running around and gathering up anyone who I could and fought a few of the bigger ones. The ogres. Darren, they’re called horde lieutenants!” Taoya said. He pulled out a trio of the necklaces and clattered them around.

“Kept going around and found a big ass cave and thought maybe there’d be treasure. Flew down it, went fairly deep, and found that monster instead. So, my bad on that guys!” Taoya said.

“It was in a cave underground?” Roan asked.

“More like a burrow I should say, but yeah fairly deep,” Taoya said with a shrug.

“I saw a tumor on it. Under one of its legs when it turned,” Roan supplied as he sat down and drank from his canteen. More than a few eyes followed the canteen and he made a note of that. Thirst could drive a man to make dumb mistakes. Or a profit.

“What do you think then?” Harris asked. For one of the secondary fighters in the primary group, the man didn’t seem too special. Aside from always being next to Darren.

“Rough idea. We started underground in the crypts right. The items there were all corrupted life energy items. Our big fight was cleansing the mushroom, right?” Roan asked, turning to look at the others who would have been in different instances of the first level.

“Yeah, sounds right. You’re thinking this is a storyline or something? A continuation of the first level?” someone asked.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“That’s a big jump in logic,” Darren said, but it was half-hearted.

“If this is a storyline, or something similar to it, then I think we know where we can find the staircase,” Roan said, turning to look at Taoya.

“To go up we have to go down?” the big man asked. He shrugged his shoulders and nodded before saying, “sounds about right.”