Chapter 13

Note: Thanks to Alex for beta reading this!

As much as Fara wanted me to immediately start searching for the First Dungeon, I had more work. I liked the observation tower. It would let us look down the mountain at the valley that led to the dungeon entrance. However, it needed to be hidden.

“Wow, this view,” Hagane said, showing a surprising amount of excitement when she joined me up here. She leaned on the parapet. I gave it teeth-like crenellations like a medieval castle. The tower’s smooth sides rose from the rock. There was no way in or out save by flying.

Or by the rope ladder that I had made and could be thrown over.

“You can see so far,” Hagane said. She adjusted her glasses. It was strange she kept those since they had no lenses, but she did look cute in them.

“Kweh, heh, heh, I can see all your domain, big bro!” Garnet cried. She jumped off the tower and spread her wings wide. She caught the air currents and soared out.

Lana Fulmine joined her, the lightning sprite had similar wing bones to Garnet, albeit made of cracking lightning, but she had no membranes stretched between them. She should have no way to generate lift, and yet she flew anyways.

I smiled as I watched them soaring over the mountains. Our peak rose behind us to a glacial-capped point. A dome of clouds had formed around it. Mount Rainier, back in my world, had that same effect. The shoulders of the mountains went to the ridges of the range that stretched out in both directions. Another snow-capped peak rose higher up.

I peered in Astovin’s direction. The valley led down to the farmland. The village was a dark smudge I could just make out. The river that flowed south towards the lands of Lord Shorvin, and where Jindag had made his dungeon. It was breathtaking up here.

“We are in a stratovolcano,” said Hagane. “Is it seismically active? Have you encountered its vent? Or has it cooled.”

“Cooled?” I asked.

“Yes. The magma cools in the chamber and gets compressed into granite. Then the rest of the mountain is worn away by erosion, leaving behind the harder batholith.” She pointed to the south. “See that sort of dome-shaped mountain of gray. That’s the remnant of a stratovolcano. The magma chamber. It’s been lifted higher due to plate tectonics and because it is not as heavy as it once was so the underlying ground is not deformed as much. Mountains are like objects on a mattress. The bigger they are, the more they sink into the mattress. Or the continental plate. As they erode, the land rises so the hardened magma chamber is raised.”

“Huh,” I said. “No, no, haven’t run into any magma. It might be dead. That’s interesting. I guess I didn’t think there would be that sort of thing here.”

Hagane shrugged. “The world tells you a story wherever you look. The history of it.”

I nodded and kicked the rope ladder over.

I climbed down it, which was not as easy as I thought it would be. But I managed to reach the bottom. I had work to do. I had a ritual to cast. I had never used one of the ritual magics. I had a few of them now.

Today, I was using Strengthen Stone. It would make the tower’s stones far, far stronger than they should be. Impervious to being sapped. I didn’t want to take any chances with someone mining into it.

The words filled my mind.

“I call upon Lord Abzu and Lady Ki to strengthen the stones of this tower,” I chanted, throwing my arms wide. “Let the power of the earth flow through the bones of this structure and strengthen them. Deep in the earth, are stones strengthened. Crushed by the weight above, they are hardened. Let those forces be unleashed.”

Power surged out of me. Magic.

The words kept coming on and on. My mouth ran dry, and I still had to keep talking. The words could not be stopped once I started. I was creating a permanent effect. That was the difference between a ritual and a spell. This was no flashy release of power that would be over in a heartbeat.

” ... meld and harden, unite and strengthen...”

There was so much tower, that I had to repeat the formulas, focusing the mana flowing from the Void Crystal into the stone. I worked up and up. Garnet and Lana flew above. The other monster girls came to take their peek.

I hardly noticed them. The sun climbed the eastern horizon and reached its zenith then started its descent as the words kept spilling from my lips. They enchanted the stone with the strength to outlast the mountain I was building it upon.

Would it one day tumble down the face of the mountain when its foundation eroded from it, an intact column of stone that would smash into the trees growing on the slope below, caving through them on its way to the valley?

That would be thousands and tens of thousands of years in the future. I wouldn’t be alive to see it.

Finally, the top of the tower was finished.

“Here,” Maya said.

I blinked to find my undine beside me. She grabbed my face and kissed me with her wet lips, my own dry and cracking. She thrust her tongue into my mouth and ... her water flooded me. She gave me her water. I gulped it down. The water splashed into my stomach. I felt rehydrated in moments. Refreshed by her kiss.

I broke it and gasped, “I didn’t know you could do that.”

“Me, either,” she said. “But you looked thirsty. You were hoarse. I could hardly understand what you were saying.”

I swallowed, my throat burning. “Yeah. A lot of words. And I’m not done.”

“Not done?” she asked, glancing up at it. “It’s impregnable.

“But people can see it. I know it will only take them into the guard room, but why make it easy for them.” I drew in a deep breath and began casting the ritual of Illusory, a Light spell that would make a permanent illusion over the tower. It would become an outcropping. You could pass through it and it would be transparent from within, but from without, especially at a distance, it would just be part of the mountain. “I call upon Lord Shamash and Lady Sherida to bend the light and conceal this tower in trickery. Let it fool the eyes...”

It didn’t take as many hours to cast, but the sun was setting by the time that I had finished creating an outcropping of rocks that covered it. By then, Maya and Hagane were watching over me. Guarding me, I realized, since I was vulnerable while I chanted. Before the sun set and I lost the light, I examined it. The rocks accepted the changing of lighting as twilight crept on the world like it was the real deal.

Though I had no idea what rain would do.

Probably fall through it and spoil the illusion.

It was better than nothing.

I had spent the day talking, and I was starving and exhausted. Maya gave me another refreshing kiss and then we climbed up the ladder and pulled it up. You couldn’t even tell there was an illusion around it. The sun set behind us, the world falling into darkness.

I headed down the tower for another wonderful supper cooked by my mother and Mrs. Lucina. This time, they had prepared a roast with a savory gravy and mashed peas. That was different, like green mashed potatoes but not quite as good. Still, I wolfed it down.

The next day, I walked with Usiku, Halia, Mom, Mrs. Lucina, and Terra to the end of the tunnel that opened up on the outskirts of Astovin, wishing I could teleport myself around the dungeon. We stepped into the daylight and marched onto the road. Word quickly spread before us that we were coming.

The people of Astovin appeared. Some of the young men did not hide their disdain while plenty of the young women, and a few of the older, were staring at me with interest in their eyes. A flirtiness in the way they shifted.

Halia marched at my side with Usiku leading the way, a shadowy sword on her belt. Terra and Mom were behind me. We needed supplies as well as I had business here. A promise that I had made, and now I was here to keep.

“Lord Leo,” Mayor Bevlin said. He smiled as he rushed up and extended his hand. “It is a pleasure to see you. A group of dwarves passed through a few days ago. They said you had defeated the Twins.”