NOVEL WEB Ch.54 – The Unusual Core Guardian
POV: Tamara
She hadn't told her two adventure companions, but she had already entered the dungeon and checked that it was safe: the monsters inside were rather weak and did not present a threat to Luchael and Helen unless the two turned overconfident and lowered their guard as a result. She was taking them there because she wanted them to level up too since at this point she had reached the twentieth level and by feeding on monsters to accumulate more EXP she had reached a point where she had decided to take at least a day off.
So... relaxing day for the little monster, who would only intervene if she saw that her friends were in real difficulty.
Tamara accompanied them out of Wadencap and then led the way into the forest. Moving under those branches wasn't that complicated since the trees were quite tall and below their tops the branches were few and far between. The trio walked for an hour without ever going wrong thanks to Tamara's instincts which in those days had helped her quickly learn how to maintain a sense of direction. They walked to a remote cave partially hidden by ivy that only revealed the shadows of the dungeon entrance behind it.
The monsters I faced were barely a level or two higher than those in Sleepy Swamp. It should be easy for them to farm a few levels here, Tamara thought as she approached the ivies and moved them with her snout to indicate the entrance to the human and leporan, not to mention that if the monsters threatening the village come from the dungeon, this should give them some time of peace and quiet even after we are gone…
“How about today we try to clean it up as much as possible?” Luchael proposed, raising a hand to push aside the ivy and take a look inside, "and then we go back and report to the village about the presence of this dungeon."
“Poor couple of lovers…” Helen whispered, giggling, “they escape from dungeons and find one where they decided to settle.”
“Perhaps the villagers can find a way to kill him, perhaps by hiring some adventurer who works for the Brotherhood of Shadows,” the leporan replied, shrugging, “or perhaps they could make its existence known. I am sure that few nobles are interested in a dungeon like this and therefore it would become the purview of the Adventurers' Guild.”
“Life around a dungeon is ultimately about the delicate balance between the riches it can grant and the risk it represents for those who live near it,” Helen said, giving her companion a nod, “come on , enter the dungeon, and stay on guard!”
“Yes, yes, I'll stay on my guard,” he replied, sticking his tongue out at her.
Luchael was the first to enter: unlike Sleepy Swamp, this one did not descend with a staircase underground but extended towards the interior of the mountain via a gnarled tunnel, wide enough to allow two people to walk side by side . Once past the tunnel, the dungeon opened up showing a space so large that it almost seemed like they had emerged from the opposite side of the mountain, with a cloudless sky above them and a valley that was almost enchanting when looked at from the side. their elevated position.
“It looks…nice,” Helen said as she appeared directly behind Luchael. She had already taken hold of her messer, cautious as always. “I think this dungeon is so weak that it can't even have dungeon outbreaks but rather periods of constant monsters spilling out.”
“Then it won't take long!” Luchael put a hand over his eyes trying to shield himself from the magical sun shining over the enchanted valley, "but I don't see where the core guardian room could be, aside for... that old hut?"
Tamara had already noticed it the first time she entered that dungeon, she had also decided to glide around and take a look at it and felt in a position to easily rule out that it had something to do with the dungeon core and the boss who guarded it; when she walked around it the cabin looked neat and clean as if someone lived there, but she didn't notice anyone nearby.
Is it possible for someone to live in the dungeons? I lived in one for some time without ever leaving, but… Tamara looked down at her paws, I'm not exactly human, not anymore.
“How about we fight our way through the monsters to that cabin?” Helen offered with a wink at the leporan.
The leporan didn't answer her, he unsheathed his rapier and set off quickly trying to go down the disconnected path that led to the valley itself, Tamara was instead more practical and opened the membrane before throwing herself from a ledge and going down quickly but in a controlled manner towards the ground.
Once in the forest, the monsters that Luchael and Helen found themselves facing proved to be complicated not so much in terms of level but in terms of numbers: they were many, many but weak, in a certain sense for the human and the leporan the fantastic adventure that they had imagined was more like a jungle expedition against insects far larger than any terrestrial canon than the expedition one could imagine in some game of Dungeons and Dragons.
When they finally came in sight of the hut, all three stopped their steps - some on the ground and some on the branch of a tree -. The cabin looked exactly as Tamara had seen it the day before, with the addition that that day there was a gray column of smoke coming out of the fireplace.
So this house IS inhabited! Tamara thought, maybe some Wadencap resident? Yet the villagers act as if they are unaware of the existence of this dungeon... so if it is one of them, it must be someone who has been missing for a long time and left without explanation.
Her curiosity was quickly answered when a tall figure with very long hair as red as the autumn leaves arrived from the vegetation. The woman was dressed in a way that reminded Tamara very much of her druidic dress when she took human form, her eyes were green like grass after a day of refreshing rain and somehow shone with a light that was almost anomalous to a human. Tamara remained gazing at that splendid figure with the delicate curves of a goddess as she approached the entrance of the hut, strutting and proud as if she were the mistress of the entire dungeon.
Probably one of the three adventurers wasn't very good at hiding, because the red-haired woman stopped her pace and turned around looking around a few times, mostly in the direction where Tamara, Helen and Luchael were.
“Would you mind coming out of your hiding places? I haven't had visitors in a long time, but that doesn't mean I've stopped being bothered by snoops,” the woman said, sliding the wicker basket she was carrying from her forearm to her hands.
“Don't listen, it's a trap…” Helen whispered, “a beautiful woman who seems to live in a dungeon as if it were her home? It has to be a trap."
“Wouldn't she have attacked us already if she wanted to?” Luchael whispered back.
“Yes, also because I have good hearing and therefore I can hear you grumbling behind some trees,” the woman interjected, “what intrigues me most is your monstrous friend. It hasn't ascended yet, but it acts as if it is capable of reasoning like a person."
But how many eyes does this woman have?? Tamara asked herself, using only the voice of her own thoughts.
“Um… hey there?” The leporan tried to open a conversation, emerging with only his ears and one eye from behind a tree, "we are three adventurers passing by, can we ask you who you are? How come you live inside this dungeon?”
“We don't even get to the presentations before the questions?” The woman replied in an indignant tone, “I live in the dungeon because I couldn't stay anywhere else and I am the core guardian of this dungeon... happy now? Can we pass to the presentations?”
Silence fell on the three adventurers.
