Lucas watched with breathless rapture as Caleb descended upon the monsters. He hadn't even touched the majority of them and they'd fallen still as if stricken with sudden heart attacks. Lucas himself could feel his pulse pounding in his ears, a pressure weighing down on his shoulders, choking him as if Caleb himself were physically squeezing his windpipe. What power was this? To bring his enemies to their knees without even laying a finger on them. Even the troll, level seventeen, was barely able to stand against him.
He swallowed heavily as the pressure relented and he could once again move, breath, and think. The others around appeared to have felt much the same thing – Tyler's eyes had rolled back in his head. Like their bodies had frozen upon locking eyes with a hungering beast. It was unsettling. It was… powerful.
He wanted that power. For himself. He'd craved power and authority, always had. If someone like Caleb – a strange, antisocial loner – had gotten such strength, what was stopping Lucas? Nothing. That was what.
In this new world, the elite got to the top by fighting, by killing. Lucas was no stranger to brutality – the brutality of corporate life. He'd ruthlessly worked his way up the chain fast, stepped on the people he needed to, abused every connection his father had, pulled and clawed and climbed his way to success. And he was more than willing to do it all over again. Especially if that was the reward instead of just a larger office and higher salary.
All he had to do was find the biggest, baddest, strongest enemy he could, and slide a knife in their neck. And right now, he was staring right at that enemy. And they were already starting to bleed.
But he couldn't do it now. Not yet. Tonight. When the man was sleeping and defenseless, then he'd have his opportunity.
First, he needed to get the hell out of this cold.
***
It took them around three more hours of grueling hiking to get to the blue mountain plaza. Not grueling for Caleb – it was really quite easy, but for everyone else. By the time they stepped out of the wind and into the mountain, Caleb feared they might not make it.
He ushered them into the crystal map room as it was the furthest from outside and the bitter wind, and they huddled together in the corner, blue-lipped and shivering. Unfortunately, it wasn't much warmer in here than it was outside. He'd have to do something or freezing to death would be a very real possibility for all four of them.
"Stay here," he said after watching them for a few seconds. "I'll be right back."
"Where are you going?" Lucas's words came out clipped, teeth chattering with every syllable.
"To keep all of you alive." Caleb ducked out of the room, ignoring Lucas's protests as they echoed through the frigid chamber. He stepped outside and inhaled a deep breath of chilly mountain air through his nostrils. The snow muffled all sound. It was silent outside, stay for the hollow sound of Lucas complaining, but that soon disappeared as well. God, he loved the stillness. Just him and nature.
But he couldn't sit around and enjoy it right now. There were low leveled people he had to keep alive. Caleb went around the plaza, gathering each and every slain boggart's spear. It only took him a few minutes and by the end of it, both his arms and his spectral arms were completely filled.
Nearly three dozen four foot long shafts of wood, about an inch thick. Should be plenty to fuel a fire long enough to warm their bones and fight off the deadly cold.
Caleb walked back inside, arms loaded, and dumped his collection on the ground.
"Spears?" Lucas asked, disappointed. "Are we supposed to stab the cold out of us?"
Caleb eyed him. "You want to give it a try? Be my guest."
Lucas glared, but sat back and said nothing more. Each and every one of them looked in awful shape. Even Chloe, who until not long ago, didn't appear that affected by the cold.
Caleb sat down on the ground and grabbed two spears, summoning his spirit arms – you never realise how much you're missing out on with just two arms until you have four. He could feel all eyes on him. One spear was laid on the cold stone floor, held in place by his two real hands. The other was grasped within a spectral fist, held perpendicularly above. He placed the butt end of the vertical spear on the side of the horizontal one, then twisted.
The sheer overwhelming strength of his hands created a powerful sawing sound as the two pieces of wound rubbed against one another. A sizzle of smoke snaked up and a circular burn appeared on the wood as if it had been stamped by a cigarette. He twisted it again, then again, rubbing his hands back and forth, spinning it so fast that it started to blur.
In seconds, the thin streak of pale grey smoke had blossomed into a smattering of crackling embers. Caleb grabbed another spear, snapped it in two, and laid it over the baby flame as he started to gently blow on it. Fire.
When he'd finished, and his fear of the burgeoning warmth dying faded, he looked up to see everyone else gathering in close around him. They stuck their arms out, hands spread wide, trying to get their bare skin as close to the open flame as they could. All was silent but the crackle and pop of wood as their eyes sparkled with the dancing orange and yellows.
The odds of them all surviving the Dungeon were still pitiful – especially Tyler – but at least they wouldn't freeze to death now.
Caleb pushed himself to his feet. He had no need of the fire to keep warm, his body's constitution was more than capable of handling that in its own now. "Don't let it die," he said. "I'll try and come back within twenty four hours. I recommend you stay here and keep a couple spears unburned in case any monsters wander their way in here."
"Wait, you aren't staying here?" Lucas asked, a flicker of frustration passing over his features.
"No offense, but I have more important things to do."
"More important than keeping everyone alive?" That time it was Angela who spoke up.
That struck a nerve with Caleb. His eye twitched. "Is that not what I just did? Multiple times? Without me, you'd have died twice over – to the wolves back at your burning car, then to the cold. I am keeping you alive. But I'm also getting us out of this Dungeon. And the only way I can do that is if I'm strong enough to kill the boss. Which means I need to hunt and fight. Which means I can't stay here, doing nothing. Understand?"
Without meaning to, he'd let slip a bit of his Presence. All four of them were frozen, eyes locked to him, like they couldn't move. It was exactly how the boggarts and wolves had looked when he'd released it during the fight.
Shit. I need to learn to control that better.
It wouldn't do to go around paralyzing everyone he interacted with. He didn't exactly want allies, but pissing off any potential ones would only hurt him in the long run. His Presence was a weapon, and you don't go around blindly wielding your weapons at everyone around you.
After a couple seconds, the effect faded and they nodded silently. Chloe said, "We understand."
Caleb nodded then turned to leave, then paused and glanced back at them. "Remember, I'm not abandoning you. I'll bring back a wolf for everyone to cook and eat. Just stay here where it's safe."
The gemstones clinked in the bag at his waist as he stuck a hand and grasped one. Blue sapphire sparkled in the firelight as he pulled it out. "And keep this with you. If you need me to come back, just touch it and channel your Aether into it. But please only use it for emergencies. I have a matching one in my bag that will glow when you do that."
"Channel Aether?" Chloe asked. All four of them looked as if he were speaking gibberish to them.
"Uh, here." He rolled the gemstone across the ground toward Chloe. "Just imagine a thin stream of energy going from you, into the stone. And close your eyes, it might be br–"
Chloe's hand touched the surface of the sapphire and the room exploded in shining light, a dozen times brighter than the fire. Everyone shouted in alarm, stumbling back, hands going to their faces. Caleb just chuckled, squinting as the light died down.
"Yeah. Just like that."
***
Caleb trekked through the perilous mountain range, making his way toward the distant yellow mountain, the home of the next boss he was going to kill.
The concentration of enemies appeared to shift as he got further from the blue mountain and closer to the yellow. On and around the blue mountain, the only enemy type he would encounter was the boggarts and occasional ice troll. The farther out he went, the fewer boggarts he saw, and the more wolves. Now that he was nearly at the base of the yellow mountain, it had been some time since he'd last encountered one of the nasty, spear-wielding assholes.
Packs of wolves stalked the snowy ground, padding softly through the powder. He could hear their distant, and not-so-distant howls echo, bouncing around the valleys like an ominous, hungry choir.
It was unsettling. Not a few days ago, hearing such a thing and being surrounded by predators would have set him shivering. The rational human part of his brain told him he should be scared. A primal fear from his ancestors. But he'd evolved past that fear now. He wasn't a normal human, his instincts just needed to catch up.
Caleb leapt from a high up rock outcropping, soaring in the air, four arms outstretched. The three white wolves below him looked up at the sudden rustle of air and shining light, but it was too late.
Bonebreaker exploded out the front of his swinging spirit fist. The combined power of his muscles, his falling body, and the skill, created a miniature bomb that tore through all three wolves as if they were made of dust.
When Caleb landed on the ground, his feet touched rubble. The snow had melted away, revealing a cracked crater from where he'd punched his skill into. Only a few blackened bones and charred bits of flesh were all that remained of the wolves. They'd been utterly annihilated.
He felt the Aether rush into him, savoring it like a delicious meal. A level twelve and two level thirteens killed in a single blow. He couldn't help but laugh. So much stronger so fast, at the rate he was currently growing, he'd beat the Dungeon and be out within a few days. And when he'd first fallen into the Dungeon, the System had had the gall to say he had less than a one percent chance of survival. He wasn't just surviving, he was thriving.
Level Up!
Level eighteen now. Caleb craned his neck up to look toward the peak of the yellow mountain. He could see vague shapes of more wolves prowling along the rocky surface, more enemies to kill, more levels to gain. Was he a bit crazy for already trying at a second boss? The first one had been level twenty five – that was a seven level difference. But he couldn't help himself. He had to try. He had to push himself out over that edge and either fall, or climb.
Caleb took one step further, his first step to ascend the mountain in front of him, and he froze.
A dreadful wave crashed over him, like a tsunami of freezing water. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't move. His chest tightened, stomach dropped, it felt as though he were already falling, his fingers failing to grab onto something, anything as his body slipped over the edge and tumbled through the open air.
Something atop the mountain moved. It looked like a massive rock at first, just a grey streak in the snow, but soft, furred. Then dual spots of yellow appeared on the furry rock. Two glowing amber eyes bore down from high, high above. They were staring right at him.
The boss of the yellow mountain, a hand of Thrymm, one of the most powerful monsters in the Dungeon, one he'd have to kill. And Caleb could feel its Presence.
Fenryr, Third Hand of Thrymm the Storm Titan
Aether Level 24