GH - 237

“To the right!” Luvarci swerved right. We all followed him. Our party might win fighting the herd with some kiting—and I really wanted to farm the Kankaratops—but that’d take awhile and we couldn’t tarry in Blighted lands.

Some of the Arcane Blighted Kankaratops spotted us and began to chase. The rest of the herd started to follow. Amusing that I was getting chased by many fans today. They might not be regular fans, but they still wanted me. Wanted to kill me, to be accurate.

“Is this still the way to Sajilis?” I asked Luvarci.

“It is not,” he replied. “The path to Sajilis is through the herd of abominations, which we cannot take. We’ll try to seek another way, but our success isn’t assured. The forests brim with abominations.”

“What happened to accomplishing our mission without fail?” I looked down. Our hooves thundered on the remnants of a cobbled road partly covered by the snow. This appeared to be part of an olden network that must’ve connected Mardukryon settlements before the Great Quake. “Where does this road lead to?”

“To the Catacombs of Heroes,” said Luvarci. “An ancient grave for the bravest of our people, abandoned after the Immense Heave. Roads and tunnels branched out from the Catacombs to connect various cities and towns, allowing our people to visit our heroic ancestors.”

“Why was it abandoned? Was it because the Great—I mean, Immense Heave destroyed the surrounding settlements, so there were barely any people left to visit?”

“Not so, lad of a once-forgotten village. The Immense Heave indeed destroyed cities and towns, killing many of our people, but that wouldn’t stop the survivors from paying homage to our ancestors. No, the real reason no one visits the Catacombs of Heroes is that the central cavern where our brave ancestors have been laid to rest had collapsed into a great abyss filled with the energies of the Mountain Guardian.”

“I see…” I nodded. “I also see Saurians coming up ahead. Blighted Saurians.”

“Do we fight them?” asked the Mardukryon to Luvarci’s right. “They are forming lines to receive us.”

“And so, we shall meet them,” said Luvarci. “However, we will charge through their ranks and move onward. The noose is tightening and we must avoid getting bogged down.”

Luvarci pulled up ahead and positioned himself in front of me. The four other Hunter-Warriors flanked my left and right, forming a V-shape with Luvarci at the tip and me in the middle, protecting me from the enemy. The Hunter-Warriors levitated their spears and directed them to fire at a single point in the Saurians' ambling formation, punching a hole through the Blighted monsters. Luvarci charged into the gap.

“Don’t falter!” Luvarci said, stomping on shrieking Saurians.

The other Hunter-Warriors angled their shields to shove the monsters out of our way. Some stray arrow hit me, but I was able to tank it. And we were out of the mob of Saurians.   

Looking behind us, I saw the Kankaratops herd stomping over the Saurians, killing many of them. But instead of fighting amongst each other, as their regular versions did, the Blighted Saurians and Kankaratops joined forces to chase us. I also spotted a few flying monsters circling above. Blighted too, I assumed. Would be bad once they called the rest of the swarm. Difficult to lose the flying monsters.

“Anyway, back to the Catacombs of Heroes,” I said. “Three Spears, you mentioned it has roads leading to other settlements?”

“Yes,” said Luvarci. “Road to settlements destroyed by the Mountain Guardian’s heaving.”

“And tunnels?”

“Tunnels as well.” Luvarci nodded over his shoulder. “Sajilis, however, is a new city. It isn’t connected to the Catacombs of Heroes if that’s what your thoughts are leading to. If we descend into the tunnels of the Catacombs, we might likely find ourselves buried there, reaching a dead-end while abominations incessantly attack us. The Immense Heave destroyed many of the underground passages.”

“Oho, but we won’t get trapped in a dead-end,” I said. Nothing could ever trap my greatness. For the matter at hand though, I did have a plan. “We have Sigil Totems. We can warp out of the tunnels! That is if we can travel far enough to connect to a warping Totem.”

“That just might work. The ruined towns of Tagamut and Bellofestra should be near Sajilis. I have seen them on maps but have never visited them myself, nor the tunnels that should lead to them from the Catacombs. What say you, lad? The ancestors have guided you thus far. Have they further counsels in this dire situation?”

I grinned. “To the Catacombs we go! The ancestors are ever on my side.”

“We trust in you,” Luvarci replied as he faced the front again. “This is very well a gamble, but one we have no choice to take. For we are surrounded by abominations on all sides, and down into the earth might be the safest route.”

“Yes, it’s our only choice,” I said “We don’t have a Pathfinder to help us stealth our way through the Blighted. And the narrow passages of the tunnels would give us a better fighting chance against the Blighted.

Luvarci pointed with his spear due left. “This way, to the Catacombs of Heroes!”

----

“There’s only a few Blighted here,” I said as we traversed a road lined with crumbling statues of Mardukryon heroes. We managed to shake off the Kankaratops and Saurians in a thick forest on the way here. The flying monsters, however, were still above us. Luvarci and the other Hunter-Warriors had killed some of them, but they kept coming back.

Our party headed to the ruins of some sort of temple, with a cracked ornate dorm adorned with carvings partly collapsed over toppled columns. The remnant of the entrance was a meager opening that I could probably pass through if I squeezed myself. But there was no way the Hunter-Warriors could enter the hole.

“This place has been damaged further,” said Luvarci. “There had been previous attempts to repair the entrance for explorers to descend. Now, it looks as if the Immense Heave had just occurred. Or I imagine it so. Sixty years after the tragedy was my birth.”

“Can you make the hole bigger?” I asked. “Just be careful because we don’t want to bring the rest of the roof down. Careful and quick. The Blighted in the sky are gathering.”

Luvarci assigned his subordinates to slowly chip away at the entrance with their spears while he shot at the flying Blighted above us. But widening the hole was taking too long and the enemy on land and in the air was growing in number. We had to do something drastic.

“Do any of you have a barrier skill?” I asked. “Something to hold up the ceiling?”

“I can conjure a barrier,” said one Hunter-Warrior. “It should be sturdy enough for your purpose. I assume that you intend for us to brute force our way inside.”

I entered the hole and stood a few feet of the way inside, right before where the passage narrowed. This was the part that should be demolished. “Cast the barrier on me!” A blue dome formed, reaching up to the tunnel’s low ceiling. This should prevent our progress from being wasted. “Fire in the hole!”

The Hunter-Warriors sent their spears into the tunnel and down the narrow path. The spears exploded inside. The earth trembled, the confined space amplifying the shockwaves. Rocks fell and dust clouded my vision. A burst of wind swept away the rolling dust.

“Is the way clear?” Luvarci shouted from the outside.

“Yes!” I replied. “Enter quick before it collapses!”

The tunnel didn’t collapse as I expected even after the barrier was dispelled. Great. The Hunter-Warriors didn’t have any problems entering the lower level of the temple, the catacombs part of the Catacombs of Hero. The not-great part was that the Blighted were also free to enter.

“Come out! Come out!” I pounded on the walls as if I was doing anything to help. The sound might encourage the NPCs to hurry up. We have exited into a large cavern with multiple tunnels branching out from it. Some thinking was needed for the next part of our journey, which we couldn’t do if Blighted were on our literal tails. “Collapse the tunnel after the last guy exits!” 

Luvarci followed my suggestion despite our age gap—it was the right move, after all. He attacked the top of the arch of the tunnel’s exit while the others held the Blighted at bay. The olden construction, weakened by the Great Quake centuries ago, and other movements of the earth since then, crumbled and sealed the tunnel.

“No entrance for them,” I said. “And no exit for us if my plan doesn’t pan out. We have to make this work. The fate of the Mardukryons rests on our horns. Mostly, mine. Three Spears, which tunnel do we take? Are you familiar with the layout of this area?”

“I’m familiar with the way to Tagamut.” Luvarci pointed to the rightmost tunnel. “I have explored it in my youth, honing my navigation skills as a fledgling Hunter-Warrior near the tombs of our heroes. The path to Bellofestra might be this one.” He pointed to the tunnel two holes down the first one. “But I am unsure for I have never been down it before. We’ll aim for Tagamut.”

“Let’s hope that the way to Tagamut is unblocked,” I said. “I’m jinxing myself, aren’t I?”

Surprisingly, we didn’t find any obstacles. We swiftly progressed through the tunnel. While there were no Blighted, we did find many corpses. But whatever killed the monsters didn’t show its face. Luvarci assured me we were getting nearer to Tagamut. The exit to the aboveground would be closed—the edge of Tagamut town collapsed into it, he explained.

“We don’t need to reach Tagamut,” I said. “Whether we’ll get near enough to use the Sigil Totem is another question. How far do you—? Three Spears, is anything wrong? Should we go that way?”

Luvarci stopped in front of a tunnel to our side. His subordinates did as well. All of them activated their spears. I was about to ask them what they were doing when I noticed the ground vibrating. In the darkness of the tunnel Luvarci was looking at, a very lengthy health bar appeared with a name on top—[Lvl 86 Arcane Blighted Guardian Fangwyrm: Bha’amon].

“Collapse the tunnel!” ordered Luvarci. Powered spears bombarded the tunnel.

“What? We have to run!” I grabbed Luvarci’s arm and pulled. I couldn’t budge him. “Don’t bother trying to stop it!” This must be a child of the Mountain Guardian that was affected by the Arcane Blight. If Karnon, way weaker than this Bha’amon, could easily make tunnels, then so should this guy. “Run! Just run and teleport!”