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Drip-Fed – A Rivalry 25 – Again?
🕑 Added 2024-09-18 10:28:06 +0000 UTC
The day of the Expedition had come.
Apexus, Reysha and Aclysia looked at a force of roughly 150 adventurers – Korith was looking at their knees. To the combined confusion of the Inevitable Party, the Expedition had separated itself into three very clear camps. One was very large, the other two comparatively small, and all three were glaring daggers at the other.
“Where do we go?” Korith asked, moving her eyes between the three camps.
Apexus did not have an answer ready. While he tried to come up with one that was satisfying, he was instead handed one. A raised and waving arm from one of the two smaller groups beckoned him closer. “Let’s ask them,” the Monk stated and led his group towards the one inviting them.
“I have to assume you have no idea what is going on?” Atlas greeted them in a laughing tone.
“I have no idea how we keep running into each other,” Reysha joked.
Kumlin laughed, before supplying an answer in his oddly melodic, yet typically deep dwarven voice. “We go where the money is, so if you move in the same direction, you’ll find us.”
“We learned by happenstance that an Expedition was occurring,” Aclysia informed them. “We wanted to head into Chimerion independently.”
“Brave,” Atlas stated, “although with your party you could do it. Once you get past the entrance area, it’s not that bad. Anyway, I’ll have to guess you haven’t partaken in an Expedition before?” The group shook their heads. “Alright, Rahesia, you want to explain?”
“Why me?”
“You have the prettier voice.”
“Can’t argue with that,” The green-skinned Witch bumped shoulders with her man, then cleared her throat. “Expeditions typically separate themselves into at least two, typically three, subgroups. Group 1.” She pointed at the largest assembly of adventurers. “You can call them exterminators or experience farmers or whatever else. They are here to kill enemies and grow stronger. Once inside the dungeon, they will coordinate and spread out through individual corridors to clear the dungeons out of monsters. They’ll coordinate so every individual party can have difficult but predictable fights.”
That made immediate sense to everyone involved. Dungeons were often unpredictable places and the best way to prevent getting ambushed was to have the entirety of the enemy monsters be busy with fighting all over the area.
“Group 2,” Rahesia continued, now gesturing at the other small group. “The scouts and treasure hunters. They are apt at avoiding enemies and use that skill to move a couple of hours ahead of the extermination group. They then make maps, take stock of enemy formations, ambush points, and so on. All of that is shared with group 1. In return for the service, they are paid and they clean out any treasure rooms they come across.”
“Man, everyone must hate those guys,” Reysha laughed and put a hand on Korith’s head. Already the kobold was glaring across the divide. Treasures were rare and often contained items that were either ahead of what adventurers could currently afford or practically impossible to make by mortal hands (like the Mobile Estate). It was only the importance of map intel that let a group that picked the treasures clean even be tolerated.
“Quite, and that brings us to Group 3.” Rahesia gestured at the Atlas Party and those behind her. “We’re the independents. We remove ourselves from their coordinated advance and in return gain two important freedoms: one, we can pick up the treasures we find ourselves and, two, we can rush to the boss. It’s more risky and you don’t make yourselves a lot of friends by being an unknown quantity. Only one party can kill the boss though.”
Apexus looked westward, towards the massive mountain that housed Chimerion. “I had not considered that,” he admitted. “How long until the respawn?”
Alabasta, the high-elven Ranger, weighed in “If you’re asking in general, then 2 to 4 weeks – long time to squat out in a dungeon. There’re a bunch of parties that will do so though. Wouldn’t surprise me if there’re still some stragglers from the last Expedition.”
“Is that common?” Korith asked.
“More common than you would think.” Atlas scratched the back of his head and glanced at Reysha. “Some people really want the boss loot and some more try to deliberately contract Noir. Haven’t ever heard of it working, but going through the gauntlet helps adventurers that are stuck reach a new level of ambition.”
“You know?” Apexus asked.
“We know,” Atlas confirmed. “We didn’t do it to try to get Noir though. In any case, this here is the group that will join in the initial push into the dungeon, then each party will shake hands and do what they want. There’s no guarantee for treasure this way, but if you find the boss room first you make it big.”
Treasure rooms in the dungeon itself were random (and often trapped in one way or another). Boss rooms always had a number of treasures in addition to the reward that fighting the boss itself was in terms of personal power growth. This was more than just Levels in the case of the party. Apexus needed to kill the boss to acquire an additional Growth.
“We will stay in this group,” Apexus declared, to no one’s surprise.
Ten minutes later, the time for the gathering had officially come. The head of the local Adventurer’s Guild outpost climbed on top of the tables that remained from the trading village that was now starting to dissolve. Many of the traders would linger to buy up materials that the adventurers brought back from the Dungeon, but the time to sell was over.
“I welcome and thank everybody that has decided to join the 74th Chimerion Expedition,” the Guild official says. “As per usual, we also thank the sponsors of this effort, the people of Summerdawn. 4500 Gold have been gathered this time around!”
There were obligatory shouts of enthusiasm from the crowd. It sounded like a huge sum of money and it would have been if it had gone to any individual. Before it went to the hands of anyone, the pot of money was first diminished by 20% by the guild for the effort of organization and acquisition of the supplies for the journey. Of the remaining 3600 Gold, another 10% was put aside for the return celebration. That left 3240 Gold to be distributed between roughly 150 participants. That came out to something around 22 Gold coins per person, or 88 per averagely sized party.
Not a sum to sneeze at, but considering the time invested and danger experienced, it was a pittance. Only the most destitute parties joined an Expedition for the money. Most did it for the connections, the opportunity to Level, and to get a break from regular Questing.
“Your efforts will echo for… uhm…” The Guild official snapped his fingers a couple of times. “Fuck, I forgot the word.” Everyone laughed. Someone said something and the head of the local Guild then repeated it loudly, “ETERNITY! Yes, thank you, your efforts will echo for eternity. Every raid of Chimerion is a further depletion of its magic and more farmland for the good men and women of the Sleeping Empire. Bla, bla, heroism, bla, bla riches;” the Guild official cackled at his own lack of seriousness. “Okay, the real talk. We’ll head out now. Protect the carriages. You receive your payment once we’ve made it to the first Healing Fountain, after which you can hack and slash however you prefer. Let’s go!”
The official jumped off the table and marched towards one of the two carriages that held the supplies the Guild had bought for the journey. It was more than enough for the three-day journey and the subsequent stay inside the dungeon.
________________________________________________________________________
“Feels weird to be part of a group this large,” Reysha commented. Deliberately, the party hung out at the rear end of the trail. “Been months since we killed the Deathhound and that was a whole different kind of effort.”
“We will not be part of this group for a prolonged period,” Aclysia stated.
“What, not happy with it, bubble butt?”
“Not particularly,” the metal fairy confessed. “I enjoy a sense of community and this has none. Everyone is in it for themselves. A band of mercenaries with no higher cause.”
“Mercenary work pays…,” Flora suggested carefully. The slime woman had fallen back to chat a little bit with all of them. “It is a bit godless though, I agree.”
“Sometimes a sell-sword is required for a swift solution,” Aclysia agreed. “I aim only to express that it is not my preferred company.”
Apexus listened to the conversation with only half an ear. His attention instead lay with the front of the caravan. Since they had left the walls of Summerdawn behind, the trail of adventurers had been subject to constant harassment by monsters. There was nothing stealthy about a procession this large and so every creature in a several kilometre radius that was programmed to attack humanoids on sight did so.
The wheels of the carriages never stopped turning. Warriors, Knights, Fighters, and other melee Classes formed a loose wall around the rolling supply hubs. Their help had not been needed so far, except to go out and pick any valuables off the corpses that the attacks of the ranged Classes produced. No monster ever made it within 50 metres of the caravan.
Once they arrived at the entrance of the dungeon, they cleaved their way through the gathered monsters. What had looked impossible to the Inevitable party was child’s play for a group this large. The Guild official gave them a simple battle plan – a pincer manoeuvre that would see all of the monsters shoved together in the centre of the valley. They executed it and an hour of slaughtering creatures later, the entrance to Chimerion was open.
Things got more complicated from there.
“Parties of level 25 and up take the sides and rear. Anyone want to take the frontline?” the Guild official asked. “We need two parties, that will be enough to cover the entrance tunnel.”
“Here!” Atlas raised his hand.
“Aren’t you 25 average by now?” the official asked.
“24, only been Questing the last year.”
“Mhm, alright. Someone else? You?” The Guild official looked at Apexus, who had raised his hand to volunteer. “Inevitable party, right?”
“Correct,” Apexus answered. The official had known of them because they had delivered the ink and also because he had checked the record of every party that partook in the Expedition to see if they were troublemakers. Because this was their first Expedition and because of their swift rise in the rankings, the new party had stuck in the Guild official’s mind.
“You seem a bit underequipped,” he noted, looking at Apexus specifically. “Any healing items? I don’t want to send you to your death. The first stretch will be the most dangerous.”
“I have very high regeneration and I am a Monk. My reflexes are my armour.”
“Alright, works for me,” the official said and gestured ahead. “We’re looking for the first Healing Fountain. That’s where we will put down the main camp.”
Apexus and Atlas nodded, then stepped into the maw of the large skull. The rest of the caravan followed as soon as the carriages had been moved through the gap.
Chimerion greeted the people with the sour smell of its spawning pools. Finally in possession of the encyclopaedia, the party knew well enough about the dungeon’s structure. Like a dense anthill, Chimerion stretched both up and down into the mountain. In the current entrance area, the tunnels were horizontal and wide, but the deeper they would go, the more archaic things would become.
Nestled into that layout were the spawning pools, large bodies of an acidic substance from which fresh monsters arose periodically. There were many of them near the entrance, responsible for the birth of most of the creatures that left Chimerion and flooded the outside realm.
The Atlas party stuck to the right side of the hallway, the Inevitable party to the left. The walls were oddly smooth and glistened. Dragging his thumb over it, the humanoid chimera felt the thin layer of oil that coated the surface. Light came from crawling insects with glowing abdomens the size of human heads. They were harmless, yet had to be taken note of. Their light died with them, so area spells were a quick way to be stuck in darkness.
The first monster they encountered was a bulky mixture of boar and ape. Broad and fat, it squatted in the tunnel, turning its hog-nosed face towards them and immediately charging. It lost speed as it went down the length, a swift Curse laming its muscles.
“Let me,” Apexus stated and stepped in front of Korith and Atlas. The sharp tusks of the monster, galloping on the hooves of a pig and the forearms of a great ape, were coming at a diminished but still highly lethal speed.
Spreading his arms out wide, Apexus prepared himself for impact. The creature did not know an obvious trap when it saw one. The tusks gored the slime, punching through his midriff with barely any resistance.
The impact was harsher than Apexus had anticipated, shoving him backwards. It was not harsh enough to stop the Monk from enacting his plan. Wrapping his arms around the neck of the monster, he pumped as much ki as he could into the muscles of his arms and back. The boar squealed as it was lifted, swung overhead, and then slammed onto its back behind the humanoid chimera. The rest of the other two parties lost no time in slashing and hammering at the exposed belly.
“Here ya go,” Reysha said and threw a thick cut off the creature’s pectoral muscles at Apexus. The Monk caught it, then devoured it raw. The biomass and magic within were not enough to make up for all of the damage sustained from the impact, but he did not have the time to eat the entire corpse.
“You weren’t kidding,” the Guild official commented, staring with respect at Apexus’ completely healed midriff.
“I was not,” the Monk confirmed, carefully watching the reaction of the man. He had felt comfortable revealing a bit more of his capabilities to the wider world with the Atlas party there to vouch for him should they have a poor reaction. Some of the adventurers were visibly confused by seeing one of their own at this level displaying this sort of regenerative capability. Confusion was where the reaction remained.
Knowing that he would not be hunted, Apexus turned towards the tunnel again. The entrance tunnel was the only part of the dungeon that generally remained stable in its shape. Sometimes it bent left, sometimes it bent right, but it was a consistent level of girth and there was always a Healing Fountain adjacent to it. After four hours of carefully advancing down the pathway, they finally found it.
It was a large chamber. The clear, healing waters fell from a hole in the ceiling onto a great crystal, and further down from there into four pools. Some of the adventurers immediately started stripping the moment the carriages had been moved into the room. Only some would fit into the healing fountain. Big as both the chamber and the pools were, the size of the Expedition was too much for it. The treasure hunters immediately set out, taking some of the strain off it.
The independents gathered up near one of the corridors to talk. In addition to the Atlas and Inevitable party, four more groups of four each had decided to set out on their own. “Basic code of competition?” Atlas suggested. Nods all around, but he explained for Apexus and his party. “The basic code means we agree that we owe each other nothing, but that we will come in to help if we find someone that’s overwhelmed and that we won’t pull any dirty tricks like poisoning one another.”
Aclysia pressed her lips together in disapproval. “There is a code where that is allowed?”
“No code would be that, yes,” Atlas answered and shrugged. “Expeditions are lucrative.”
“If we play our cards right,” another party leader spoke up, then extended his hand. “Let’s not dilly-dally when there’s monsters to kill. For loot and levels!”
Following the example of the others, Apexus joined his hand in the middle of the circle. It was a nice and short-lived moment of camaraderie, culminating in all of them shouting what the first man had shouted, “For loot and levels!” and throwing their hands up in a celebratory gesture.
Then, they all set out. Three parties went down the current corridor, including the Atlas party. Apexus deliberately separated as soon as possible. Guides were good, but so was learning things on their own. Of the remaining three parties, two chose to follow the two other paths that led out of the Healing Fountain chamber.
“Where do we go, darling?” Aclysia asked.
“Back,” Apexus said and pointed towards the corridor that they had come from. There had been a great many side paths that they had ignored. “I will explain once we are alone.”
