(Second Book Complete!) Runeblade: A Delving & Skill Merging LitRPG

Julian dapped some more water on his rag. Four lilies had been embroidered into the corner, braided together in a motif that represented his house. Cleaning his armour had stained the once pure, stark-white cotton a rust brown. He attacked the grooves of his plate, trying to work out more of the blood and mud that had been worked deep into the seams.

He’d known it would only be so long before they were attacked, but did that beast really need to unseat him from his saddle?

It had been pure, bad luck. The beast had been hideous. Thin-bodied, with a bulbous head and six thin legs that it used to clamber through the canopy above. It had been Mid-Silver — the bastard had struck when he’d wandered behind a tree to relieve himself. Its mottled red and deep grey coat had let the creature blend into the canopy.

Unfortunately for the beast, they were equal in level — and it had been no larger than the hunting hounds his father kept. Lacking the physical might that made beasts so deadly, he’d run it through in short order.

“Lord Flowers!”

Julian looked back, seeing Sir Violetguard looking at him with wide eyes. He frowned — it was clear the retainer was worried. Had Kaius and his team gotten injured fighting some beast they had no right to? He was beginning to second guess the wisdom of working with the delvers. I mean, really — did they want to rescue the Archivist, or did they want to die at the hands of Golden monstrosities?

“What is it, man?”

“The Crater, sir! It expanded — the dark bubbled up, swallowing our quarry for a moment.”

It what?! The Crater had sat unchanged for the entire length of his line! His family had used Vainblood as hunting grounds for nearly a millenia, he would have heard if it could warp.

“Did Kaius and his team escape?” he asked hurriedly. Terrors lived in that blackness. Dark-aligned spirits of great power, and ephemeral shades that could tear through the unprepared like so much wheat. Many of his ancestors had lost promising inheritors and loyal retainers to the Crater — it fed on the vainglorious and unprepared.

Kaius was strong — but the Crater was something else. As reckless as they were, the delvers were vital for dealing with both Brokenlight and his turncoat.

“Y…yes, Lord Flowers,” Sir Violetguard said quickly. “It surged like a wave, swallowing them for just a moment, but it’s settled. I saw them convening for a few minutes — they looked rattled, but unharmed. They’ve started to move on.”

Julian nodded slowly, deep in thought.

“Think the phase change and the mana levels rising has disturbed it?” Kel asked.

It was certainly possible — he knew of no expeditions to the Crater since the phase change, either Guild-run or from his own network. But the timing — had Kaius and his team done something?

“Keep to their trail — but we stay a half hour’s ride from the furthest you saw the darkness swell,” he said.

Whatever the cause, he hoped it was just a temporary disturbance. He was almost certain that the Wellspring lay somewhere in the black reaches of the Crater — that meant they would have to brave it soon enough. He would hate to put off a true expedition until they could secure more man-power. It would really interfere with his vengeance on those who had betrayed him.

…

Plate-sized leaves covered in fine hairs brushed against the back of Nox’s neck. Pain bloomed along their feather-light caress, ripping through her skin like boiling pitch. She could feel the searing heat — her flesh bubbling as it sloughed and ran down the back of her shirt.

She bit down, the swatch of leather she had pulled from her bag creaking in her mouth. Tears blurred her vision, but she forced herself deeper into the nettles. The feeling of melting flesh was fake, no matter what it felt like. Vipercoil, the System called them. An apt name, for the stems of the plant wound upwards like a spring, rising high over her head.

Every motion was agony, but she buried it deep, breathing slowly. It was shelter, that’s all that mattered. The large, bone-white leaves of the bush were layered and thick, creating an obscuring dome of safety that hid her completely.

More importantly, every beast in this forest knew more than well enough to avoid the plants. A small fact that might just save her life.

Clenching her fist tightly around her crossbow, she felt the ground shudder as an unseen beast took a lumbering step.

Nox had barely caught a glimpse of the thing. She’d thought it was a deadfall at first, with its deep brown fur. It had been a leg. How the fuck she had missed a Gold she would never know — her da would have skinned her alive if he’d seen her cock up this bad. She was a bloody hunter.

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Another shudder rumbled through the earth. It made the nettle rustle — one leaf swaying to brush against the thin gap between her gloves and her sleeve. Nox bit down harder on the leather in her mouth, doing her best to shut out the second spike of agony.

It was just pain. Only pain.

The words rolled through her head like a mantra. She’d picked the vipercoil as her redoubt for a reason. Its touch might have felt like you were being flayed by red-hot knives, but physically it only caused a mild irritation that her health would clear up in seconds.

She waited, ready to explode into a sprint at the first sign she’d been found.

‘Just deliver the books’ they’d said. ‘It’s a short track, and you know that forest better than most’ they’d said.

Fucking bastards. She was a single Silver! Every fucking hour she’d been forced to run from yet another beast that wanted to eat her alive. Two entire days and she’d made it, what? A handful of leagues?

Reaching Brokenlight’s camp was going to take weeks at this rate!

Nox scrunched her eyes shut as another footfall jostled her, ever so slightly closer than the last. She’d given it the slip, and she’d left no tracks or scent for it to follow. But who knew when she was up against Gold.

She sent her prayers to the gods that the beast would soon lose interest. She knew vipercoil well — the rash it left behind would only grow more painful until she treated it. The ingredients to the balm were common, and the recipe simple — but it was an ordeal to harvest the nectar of the carnivorous flowers that clung to the trees. She hadn’t found a good opportunity yet.

A lapse she was paying for now.

Biting down harder, her mouth filled with the taste of leather. Nox did her best to think of the barrel of platinum that was waiting for her — one that she hopefully wouldn’t need to split too many ways.

….

Trudging along the border to the Midnight Crater, Kaius watched the surrounding forest slowly change. As they circled south, new trees started to appear. They were smaller than the towering behemoths he was used to — a respectable forty strides — and their leaves were a pinkish-orange, and round. They almost looked like someone had taken a peach and squashed it flat.

The ground grew progressively dryer, too. A good six hours after they had left the site of their run in with the Adamant spirit, the mud disappeared entirely. He could have wept when he took his first step on solid ground in days. No more water seeping into his boots, no more hidden mudholes, and no more constant grime working into the crevices of every scale of his armour.

“Thank the bloody gods,” Kaius said, falling to his knees in a dense patch of grass. If only the ground cover was a nice, normal green, instead of a pale yellow — then the moment would have been perfect.

“Time to make camp?” Ianmus asked, looking up to eye the soft orange that was starting to bleed into the western horizon. “Day’s almost over.”

Kaius laughed, pushing himself back to his feet. “Yeah — not here though. Maybe in the next league or two — let’s just keep an eye out for somewhere nice and defensible.”

They’d been sleeping in the pegleg — and never had he been more glad to own the landyacht in his life. Having the creature comforts of a warm bath, a kitchen, and a full bed? In the middle of a high-mana zone, no less? It was unbelievably revitalising — he hadn’t quite realised how annoying it was to sleep rough for weeks on end until he no longer needed to.

If anything, he was a little worried that so much access to easy luxuries would make him soft.

More than the comfort, though, the Pegleg was armoured. Even if they were attacked in the night, its defences would give them more than enough time to scramble into action — especially when they were still sleeping in their full kit. It had happened twice since they’d arrived. Though, both times had been Steel beasts that had hightailed it as soon as they’d sensed his team’s strength. They’d battered the craft a little — but nothing the self repair enchantments couldn’t handle.

They kept walking, cutting their way through brambles when they had to, and walking around them when they could.

Conversation was thin. Part of it was diligence — in a forest of Gold and Silver beasts, they had to stay on their toes.

Part of it was that they were rattled. Kaius wished that they could simply brush off their encounter with the Adamant beast. They couldn’t. It was…humbling, to come face to face with a creature that was that much stronger than him.

Ever since they’d left their last delve, he’d grown more and more comfortable with his power. Few reached Silver, and they were far far stronger than most of their level. He knew with a certainty that they were amongst the most powerful people to live on the continent.

Now, he knew just as certainly how little that meant. If they wanted to be truly strong, they had a long long way to go.

Beneath the nerves, the thought stoked an ember of eager excitement.

Kaius took a deep breath, allowing himself to sit with his feelings. The more time passed, the more certain he felt that the spirit wasn’t just toying with them. Since it seemed to tolerate their presence, who was he to second-guess it? He’d just use the memories as fuel for the fire — another reason to keep clawing his way upward.

He smiled to himself, pushing past a crimson hanging vine.

The wind changed. With it, came the scent of new mana. It was rich, vibrant; a thick bouquet of bubbling life and vitality, like the smell of a restful evening under the stars, or the feeling of burning strength as you split a log in one heavy swing of an axe.

He stopped dead. Life — the synesthesia was as strong as he got from any tonic. A reagent, it had to be. One that was close by.

“Wait,” he said.