Henrik Saetre
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Riftside - chapter 2
🕑 Added 2025-02-16 20:52:41 +0000 UTCI stumbled out into a hollow cavern of a room and immediately cleared my throat at the stench. For a moment I imagined myself standing in a rotting corpse, but it wasn’t that of a monster, but a great tree. The hair on my arms stood on end as if the place was charged with electricity.
The Titan's heartwood was missing, leaving a central shaft that vanished up into darkness like an oversized castle tower. The chamber stretched maybe a hundred yards across, with a spiral path winding up the walls to an entrance in the ceiling far above. Bioluminescent fungi clung to the walls, casting everything in pale blue light. Ancient tree rings glowed faintly, marking time in centuries. Sap oozed down the walls and pooled on the floor.
A screech of chitin on wood yanked my attention back to where we were and I steeled myself. With a twitch of my eye, I activated my sigil and a gentle green glow appeared around a monster. They were Ring Beetles—knee-high insects with armored shells and massive mandibles. A few had come out to battle the adventurers, scuttling across the wood like living drills, their legs ending in hooked claws that let them climb in all directions.
Edwin's orders echoed around the room, and the insects charged him, his taunt driving them mad. They shrieked in unison and then attacked.
With the creatures scratching at the commander's armor and his tower shield, one of the other adventurers, a man with a conical hat, breathed out a cone of cold, slowing all their movement and attacking speed. The other adventurers waded in, ending the monsters in seconds.
Beetle bodies hit the ground after being slashed, smashed, or blown into pieces, with green ichor spraying everywhere.
“Clear!” Edwin said and sheathed his sword as a golden light surrounded him, healing what little damage he'd taken. “The first group is dead. Scavengers, grab the corpses. Adventurers, save your storages. We're going up to the next level.”
One of the other scavenger groups hurried forward—I recognized their leader, Marcus, a scarred man who'd lost an eye to a dusk attack last month. His team descended on the beetle corpses, and they vanished in seconds.
“These claws, they'll be worth a fortune!” one said.
“I'm selling mine to the alchemists,” another added. “Green gooey ichor? It has to be useful for potions.”
My fingers itched to join them, but Garrett held us back.
“Plenty more where those came from,” he said quietly. “Let them have this batch.”
He wasn't wrong. The further up we’d go, the more valuable the carcasses should be. As long as the adventurers kept pushing and didn't turn back before we got our fill. Considering the whole purpose of this expedition, I didn't doubt we'd be here for a few hours at least.
Nina leaned on her spear and smiled.
“Who thought I'd ever fight in a goddamn tree? What I wouldn't give to find beautiful roiling grasslands Riftside, and then a horse who wouldn't go mad while passing through the portal.”
“Why'd you come here then?” I asked. “If you like grassland, why not head to the Humming Void rift? We used to live there. Flat as an anvil's face.”
“You don't get it. No point being in the grassland without proper cavalry.” She sighed. “I just miss horses, is all. Damn portal corruption. Did I tell you about the noble bastard who bought my best gelding and brought it through as a test? As if the hundreds of tests before hadn't been enough. Once I get my class, if I see him again—”
I tuned them out, watching the ringed walls. Marcus' group had stored the beetles and were preparing to move on. The third team, led by a giant grumpy guy named Rasek who I'd never seen smile once, kept watch with us.
Steel rang on wood above, followed by inhuman screeches. We all tensed, weapons rising. The whomp of an explosive spell echoed down the spiral path, mixing with shouts and the wet sounds of violence.
“Form up!” Garrett snapped. “Only attack trash mobs if they come through!”
I stepped back and raised my axe. One of the main reasons why adventurers brought us was to guard the path out. Nobody wanted to get cut off and be trapped in a dungeon, though in all honesty, there wasn’t much we could do but kill the weakest of monsters. Sometimes that was enough. Just making sure they didn’t all gather in a single spot and flanked the adventurers.
“Who died and made you captain?” Marcus shot back, his remaining eye narrowing.
Rasek stepped forward, his scar-covered arms crossed.
“We take orders from Commander Edwin, not some ex-guard.”
“The portal needs to—”
“Don't tell me what and—” Markus continued to argue, cutting him off.
“Both of you, shut it!” Nina hissed. “Listen!”
The fighting above had stopped. My heart was beating fast as I strained to hear what was going on up there.
“Scavengers!” Edwin's voice boomed down. “First platform. Move!”
We scrambled up the spiral path, boots slipping on sap-slick wood. The path wound up and up until my legs burned, but I kept on running. If anyone lagged behind, they’d either be left by themselves or pull the entire party back.
I really should jog more. Make sure I can keep up.
After a minute, we reached a broad platform carved into the living wood. It was so straight and round that it looked as if someone had carved it all out by hand. Two massive branches split off there, each one as wide as a city street. Both tunnels vanished into darkness.
Corpses lay strewn against the walls of the platform, burned. I counted six carcasses, my new sigil naming them as Branch Walkers. Their impossibly long limbs were twisted in death, and joints bent backward, bodies folded in ways that made my stomach turn. Beside them lay seven Sap Seekers, their crystalline eyes dark and lifeless. Blue blood was mixed with golden sap on the platform's floor.
My sigil provided the names, but once dead, the monsters had no glow to indicate their power relative to my own. The chance of them being anything but green or yellowish was very small, which meant that even we could fight them.
Edwin stood at the center, his shield bearing new scrapes.
“Easy enough fight, but we've got a tactical situation. We can't leave these branches unchecked. Too much risk of being flanked. However, the resistance has been minimal so far.” He planted his shield on the ground and leaned against it. “New plan. My team continues up to scout the next platform. Teams two and three take a branch each, followed by one scavenger group. Garrett, your group stays here, gather the carcasses, and then move up to the next floor when we're done. Questions?”
None came as there wasn't much to say. We were to follow orders and gather as many carcasses as we could, and that was an order I intended to follow to the letter.
As they headed out, Garrett stepped into the middle of the floor and caught our attention.
“No greed now, yeah? Equal division until we each got our five, then we get the chance to swap out corpses for new ones, starting with the highest level.”
“So once we are all full, you'll take the best corpse?” I asked.
“Yes, because I am the highest level.”
“And I'm the lowest,” I said with a flat stare.
“Yes. But, we follow standard looting rules. Once I accept a new corpse, I'm at the bottom of the list until you all accept a new one.”
“Fine. But that's only once everyone's storage is full, right?” I asked again, wanting to make sure everyone heard it.
“Of course.”
“So if you all have filled your storage and something awesome drops—”
“Why would the adventurers leave something awesome? It'll be all trash mobs for us,” Nina said, sounding a bit annoyed by my questioning.
“Just agreeing on the rules,” I said, raising my hands as the adventurers ascended toward the next floor. “As I was saying, if something awesome drops, anyone with a free slot gets first dibs.”
“Sure,” Garrett said. “But you don't get to leave carcasses behind just to keep a slot free.”
I nodded.
“Of course.”
We split the monsters, each getting a Branch Walker and a Sap Seeker, with Garrett taking the additional Branch Walker, while Nina and Finn took an extra Sap Seeker.
“Wonder what they'll be used for,” Eryn said as she stored a Branch Walker, her spatial storage tattoo glowing faintly on her left wrist with each transfer. “With the way their limbs work, maybe the bowyers will want their tendons?”
“I bet the alchemists will want the Sap Seekers' eyes,” Finn said. “Notice how they look like crystals?”
“Or maybe the enchanters.” Nina shrugged. “Could make for pretty jewelry. Nobles like pretty.”
“I don't care either way,” I said. “I'm bringing one of each to my Pa to butcher up and see what they can be used for.”
“Pretty exciting, isn't it?” Eryn asked. “Getting to see new monsters before anyone else.”
“Why did they wait so long to go for this dungeon?” Nina asked. “So far this is all bottom-tier monsters? I've seen the adventurers struggle worse with stuff in the killing field.”
Pa had been wondering the same. It didn't make sense for the guild to let the portal be attacked again and again when they could at least attempt to clear the dungeon and slow the monster waves. Would give the village much-needed breathing space. Not that I was complaining about them waiting until today. My upgraded inventory had been my ticket to joining, the commander knowing full well the more resources we brought back, the stronger we'd all grow, despite him harping on about not focusing on loot.
“Could be they were farming the monsters and letting people grind levels out quicker?” I said with a shrug. “Easy loot when they have to just step out of the walls and gather the carcasses instead of going out and hunting monsters.”
“It's slowing the town's development, and—” Garrett trailed off as an explosion sounded from the left branch. Before we could react, roars and sounds of combat echoed down from the right, almost as if both sides had been attacked simultaneously.
I held my breath, listening to steel meeting chitin and steel-like bark armor, to screams both human and otherwise, to the creaking of the living wood around us.
I stepped closer to Eryn, axe firmly in hand, and glanced upwards.
Suddenly, Edwin's voice rang out as he taunted, but it was followed by a curse.
“Incoming! They're in the wood!”
Movement flickered along the wall. Four bulbs, like peas in a pod, moving inside the wall.
“Loose!” I said, and Eryn sent an arrow straight at the closest, thudding into the wood. Green goo ran down the haft to drip from the fletching, but whatever was inside the wall kept moving.
“Form up!” Garrett's voice cracked like a whip, and we took our spots around Eryn, with Garrett at the front with his shield at the ready.
The bulbs reached our level, and four Ring Beetles blasted from the wall, surrounded by white liquid, their shells gleaming wet. Their clawed limbs scored the wood as they scuttled toward us.
I activated my sigil again, just to make sure. They were surrounded by a light green glow that meant we should be able to take them.
Garrett stabbed at the first, piercing straight through its face. I went left, axe swinging in an overhead chop at a bug attempting to flank him, catching it just behind the head. The blade bit deep, nearly killing it, but got stuck in the armored shell. To my right, Nina let out a battlecry of her own as I yanked on my weapon, but the bug stubbornly stayed attached.
Come on!
I turned to see Nina falling to the ground, scooting backward, her lance held horizontally in front of her and a beetle's mandibles clicking against it.
Eryn drew and loosed another arrow, but it ricocheted off the creature’s carapace.
Garrett and Finn were busy with the fourth, and unable to help.
Muscles fighting to free my weapon, I heaved on the axe, lifting the entire bug into the air, legs feebly moving.
One step.
Two steps.
My arms and back burned with every move. With a roar, I brought the axe-bug combo down like a sledgehammer on the bug attacking Nina. The axe crunched through, coming loose as it killed one, and stunned the other. Nina scrambled back and stood as I raised my axe and cleft the bug's face like a log.
My heart thundered in my throat as if I'd relocated Pa's anvil after that stunt. I quickly turned to see Finn's short sword cut across the final monster's eyes, blinding it before Garrett's spear found the softer underbelly. His stats were more than a match for the trash mob.
For a moment, silence fell, and then I cheered. Finn joined me, then the others.
Suddenly, Edwin came jogging down the ramp but slowed upon seeing us.
“You alright? Sounded like you were getting slaughtered down there!”
Garrett waved a hand at him.
“All good, commander! Just four beetles and the exhilaration of combat.”
I grinned up at the adventurer, my axe dripping with goo.
He shook his head but a grin was plastered across his face.
“Good to hear, but get your asses up here. We've got a problem.”
We stored the corpses, everyone getting their third, with Garrett and Nina getting their fourth, and then headed up.
I took a deep breath and smiled at Eryn, who smiled back.
This is what I wanted. This is what it would feel like all the way up to level sixty, so I took it all in, burning muscles, monster blood and all.
I gagged almost as we stepped onto the next platform at the stench coming from the monsters.
“Take them, quick,” Edwin said, standing in the opening of a branch, nodding at the five monster corpses. Blightpedes, as my sigil told me, were strewn across the platform. Nine feet long, rotting centipedes, like black husks with no legs, only a wide opening in front filled with an uncomfortable amount of teeth. Brown liquid oozed from their wounds as if someone had taken a wet crap in a bag and poked it full of holes.
The adventurers held their noses, standing just inside another two branches, as far from the bodies as possible.
“Hurry, damn it!” the wizard said, waving his staff at us. “If this stink sets in my good robe, I might never get it out!”
“One each,” Garrett said and moved to store his.
I rushed over to the largest one and swiftly touched and swiped it into my inventory. It really did feel like a crap-filled bag and I hated it.
“Eryn!” Garrett said when she prodded hers with a toe but made no move to grab it.
“It's icky!”
“God damn it,” Finn said, and stalked over, grabbing hers as well. “And I'm keeping it. Something this stinky has to be valuable.”
“You are more than welcome to it,” Eryn said, gagging as Nina laughed at her.
“Problem solved, commander,” Garrett said and touched a hand to his helmet.
Edwin barked out a laugh.
“That was just courtesy, Garrett. You'll smell worse as an adventurer, but Benedict is a bit particular about his clothing, aren't you?”
“Hey!” the wizard said. “The ladies like sharply dressed men. Right? Besides, I’ve got an image to uphold.”
He looked at Eryn and smiled, angling his coned hat.
“Sure. But I prefer them to be younger than my father.”
“Bah!” He waved a hand. “Underneath this beard, my face is like a—”
“Enough,” Edwin said, and everyone quieted. “As I said, the smell wasn't the problem. That is.”
He pointed upwards, and we all looked up.
“Monster muck,” Finn said.
Far above was another flat roof made all out of wood, with tiny glowing mushrooms dotting it. What it lacked was any kind of opening. And that's when I realized that the platform even lacked a proper walkway.
“It's a labyrinth,” I said, looking around at the three branches.
The commander nodded, and his scarred face pulled tight as he pursed his lips. “We're at a breakpoint. We either need to pause here and wait for the other groups to catch up, or go back down and help them clear their branches.”
“Why? The combat is nothing,” Benedict said. “Just trash mobs. Might as well be killing flies. I bet there's something amazing up there on the higher floors. Something that—”
“No glory chasing,” Edwin said, eyeing the three branches, fingers tapping a rhythm on his shield. The man had it all: levels, gear, and skill, but the rumour said it hadn’t come cheap. They said he'd lost a lot of friends ever since he started adventuring. And every time he lost someone, the resolve to be a better Commander only grew.
“Can we afford to wait?” the warrior in Edwin's group said. “You said it yourself. We need to be efficient. If we take too long—”
“Then we might get caught in a monster wave. Today’s wave never came,” their healer said. He was an old man with a long silver beard, yet moved like someone in their prime. “Sentinel Station will have to weather it without us, and we'll get the joy of finding out if the monsters first hunt before charging mindlessly at the rift.”
I glanced at the right branch. It was like a polished wooden floor. One streaked with black rot. I studied it for a long moment and then shook my head. The tree was a mystery all in itself, and no matter how much I’d love to explore every branch, it wasn't meant to be.
I glanced at the two leading left once I pushed the thought away. Which one was supposed to lead up?
Nina began speaking, but Garrett silenced her with a look.
Benedict threw his arms up.
“What the hell are we waiting for? Come on, let's do something! Anything!”
“The right decision,” Edwin said, lifting his shield with a sigh, “Would be to return to the previous intersection—”
“And let Shay find the good stuff?” Benedict huffed at where the dead centipedes had been. “Edwin! We could two-man these trash mobs easily! You and me! Hell! The scavenger team has kicked their ass!”
“A poor argument for diving ahead,” Edwin said. “You got a point, but the situation remains. We can't leave our flank open. The scavenger party would be overrun. Not just that, but I'm a bit disappointed, Benedict. Greed doesn't suit you.”
My spatial storage was barely half full. If Edwin decided to wait until the others re-joined, what loot would I miss out on? Maybe we'd even end up calling it a day before I’d get to fill up.
I traded a glance with Garrett and nodded. We could do this. I didn’t want to go home with an empty storage. None of us did.
“Commander,” Garrett said, raising a hand. “We can definitely hold this platform unless a monster variant shows up.”
“Totally, Commander,” I chimed in. “We'll do right by everyone.”
“And since there are three branches here, you can clear one out before the others arrive. If they catch up, we'll send them down the other tunnels.
“Too risky,” the commander replied. His jaw tightened. “No offense, but—”
“We easily killed four,” I said, hefting my axe. “They went down like rotted wood. Trust me, we’ll have your backs or we die trying.”
“Yes, but only because they were trash mobs,” Edwin said calmly but firmly. Still, he stared out into the branch ahead of us. “Who knows what else lurks in there.”
“Then you won't go far,” Garrett said. “And we'll be fine holding this place. So far the monsters haven't been charging up or down the branches on their own, right?”
Eryn fidgeted with her bow beside me.
“Just one branch,” Benedict said, sighing theatrically. “We can handle it. They can handle it. You've seen how easy it is. Just think about what we might find!”
“And that, my good man, is exactly what I'm worried about,” Edwin said, raising his voice. He stood there for a short moment, obviously lost in thought, but then straightened. “Very well. Adventurers, on me. Garrett, watch our backs but don't be afraid to retreat if things get hairy. We'll fight our way back if we must.”
“Yes, commander,” Garrett said, straightening to attention.
It was probably a habit from his guard days.
I smiled, my hand tightening around the axe's shaft. Once they cleared out a few monsters, they'd have to call us in to store the carcasses.
Perfect!
“We move slow,” Edwin said, turning to his team. Then his eyes settled on Benedict. “If anything feels wrong, sounds wrong, or looks wrong, we're falling back. Is that understood?”
Benedict grinned as he held up his staff. I swear I saw ice crystals forming in his beard.
“They won't know what froze them.”
“Okay then.” Edwin turned from his team and pointed at the right passage. “Let's go up this—”
“Left is best!” Benedict said.
Edwin took a slow breath. “Fine. Left it is. Keep your shields up and your eyes open. No glory hunting.”
