A week later in the dead of night, the seven of them set foot for Mine Kormuhan in the east.

  They’d done well enough during the week. Six fetch jobs, two carriage escort runs, and rooting out a nest of cellar-squids under a vintner’s floorboards had earned them enough to pad their coin pouches. Of course, the failure four reinvested most of it back into relics that’d make camping underground more comfortable: two Sandram Pelt Mattresses that’d heat up when mana is poured into them, three Bell-Ward that’d ring automatically if anything heavier than a cat crossed its line of sight, and even several Cooling Orb relics that could generate small amounts of wind across a large area to provide ventilation in a cavern.

  They’d also bought enough oil and coal-strips to paint fire on a corridor if they had to. And explosives. Lots of explosives.

  For Anisa and Yasmin’s part, they visited the relics shop and bought miner-style leather clothes that gave them a few more levels of resilience, and even more resilience when they were surrounded by stone. Anisa almost looked like a miner now, but Yasmin wore hers under her steward’s dress as usual. If she ever removed that dress, the world would probably end. Not that Dain wanted to see that. The uniform had grown on him—at least as a warning sign for fools thinking she was just a harmless steward.

  As for Dain, he’d emptied most of the coins he’d earned on raw materials. Stuffed in his Void Archivist’s Satchel was his mechanical core and spare Tags, yes, but also a bunch of silverplume feathers and mana-infused metal plates so he’d be able to get Belara to repair his relics in an emergency. The rest of his income went to helping out the party with buying shelves upon shelves of Stamina Potions—which he couldn’t drink because even normal consumable-type relics counted as normal relics, but he still helped buy them for everyone else.

  Shame Belara won’t give me any Cursed Stamina Potions.

  Unfortunately, the offering recipes for Cursed Stamina Potions weren’t the same as the recipes for their normal counterparts. Whenever he’d tried to offer the same herbs and minerals to Belara, she’d rejected them as if the idea of Cursed Stamina Potions were an insult to her. It wasn’t the worst thing in the world, but he swore one day he’d figure out the recipes, or else ‘seeker’ wasn’t his middle name.

  He'd also upgraded his wingcloak, prosthetic, and cane a little bit more with mana-infused metal plates. The wingcloak now gave him one more swiftness level, and the prosthetic and cane one more might each. However, since he wanted to give his mana core some time off to digest all of the potions he'd drank in such a short period of time, he didn't get a Cursed Manabrew Potion the past week. He didn't want to risk his life for it.

  Still good enough upgrades overall, I suppose.

  ***

  Name: Dain Sorowyn

  Grade: Common-8

  Cursed Title: Collector

  Title Ability: Eye of Belara

  Acquired Skills: None

  Might: 14 (+6)

  Swiftness: 13 (+3)

  Resilience: 12 (+1)

  Clarity: 25 (+1)

  Mana: 72/72 (+2/hr)

  Relics: Windscar Prosthetic Arm (Common-7), Bloodlight Eye (Common-2), Firelight Oreblade Cane (Common-9), Silverplume Wingcloak (Common-6), Void Archivist’s Pouch (Uncommon-2)

  ***

  Finally, they were finally ready to depart on their long scorpion extermination request.

  The entrance to Mine Kormuhan hulked at the base of a blue-black mountain, one of the many surrounding Braskir. It was one of the larger mines in Braskir, too, so the fact that it was eerily quiet even in the middle of the night bode nothing good for the seven of them—but they still pushed past the entrance and lit up their lanterns, Rena leading the way with the latest map they’d gotten from the Guild.

  “This is the entry tunnel,” she murmured, tracing the parchment with a finger. “We go north, drift past the sumps, and then we take the long east turn according to the carpenter’s note. Then there’ll be seven more declines, and after that is the forked level where the Guild marked the tunnels and caverns with the infestations.” She tapped a cluster of circles near the bottom of the deep mine, marked with crosshatch. “Our steelplated scorpions should be here.”

  “We go careful,” Sahlir said simply.

  From entrance to deep shaft, the mine swallowed them whole for two long hours. They moved through old and layered tunnels, braced by splintered beams and newer metal veins half-mined, and every few minutes Rena consulted the map just to check if they were still on the right path. Dain, unfortunately, had no navigational sense underground, so he could only put his faith in her practical experiences.

  He sighed a breath of relief when, at the end of the third hour, they finally reached a large mineshaft. It was a vast and hollow cavern with supporting pillars and minecart rails still left all around, but it was evident all the metals had been harvested already, so there was lots of open space for them to set up their tents—but why do that when they could just make the entire cavern their camp?

  Without a word, Anisa and Rena set their heavy satchels down and got to work immediately. They unfurled the pelt mattresses all across the ground, making it soft and fluffy everywhere, before setting up the Bell-Wards in the tunnel they just entered the cavern from for early danger detection. While they did that, Sahlir, Ilvaren, Kargun, and Yasmin helped hang additional lanterns on the pillars and the walls, lighting up the cavern so bright one wouldn’t even think it was already fully abandoned.

  And while they did all that, Dain alone trudged to the end of the cavern where a narrow, dark mineshaft led to the deepest part of Mine Kormuhan.

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  Supposedly, the steelsplated scorpions were right beyond this mineshaft—and the one-eyed he was hunting, too.

  Gentle winds started swirling in the cavern as Anisa and Rena even set up the seven Wind Orbs around the cavern, bringing in much needed ventilation and natural cooling.

  “... Be careful,” Dain said, drawing a slow breath as the four warriors stepped up behind him, scowling into the ominous mineshaft as well. “These steelplated scorpions aren’t normal scorpions. Apart from their metallic chitin, they’ve also been tamed by someone, which means they’re probably stronger and more coordinated than your usual brood.”

  Then he glanced back at the four, eyeing the satchels on each of their backs.

  “Remember the plan:” he started. “There are five mineshafts around this section of the mine that lead into the infested cavern. The one we’re looking at is one of them. Each of you will set your bombs and collapse the other four to block the alternative exit routes, and once they start starving, they’ll have no choice but to rush through this last mineshaft—and into us. We’ll cut down as many scorpions as we can going through this funnel, and once their numbers are thin enough, we’ll push in and clean up whatever’s left. Everyone clear?”

  “Yep,” Ilvaren echoed, resting her hand on the pommel of her shortswords.

  “Aye,” Kargun rumbled, loosening his gauntlets.

  Sahlir gave a curt nod. “Okay.”

  And Yasmin just murmured, “Understood.”

  “Good.” Dain waved them off, giving them a slightly anxious grin as he did. “Each of you already knows the mineshaft you’re gonna blow up. Set up your explosives, and at exactly three-thirty in the morning—about twenty minutes later—detonate them manually so we have simultaneous collapses. I’ll stay here to guard Rena and Anisa while you run back, because I’m pretty sure the scorpions are gonna get pissed the moment they hear their doors being blocked.”

  The three warriors, if nothing else, were quick to heed orders of destruction. Giddily, they sprinted back into the mineshaft they entered the cavern from, making the Bell-Wards chime on their way out, but Yasmin lingered a moment longer to glance at Anisa.

  Anisa noticed and lifted her head from the campfire she was trying to start with Rena, smiling back.

  “I shall remain perfectly still,” she said. “Go on, Yasmin. I’ll be just fine here with Dain and Rena.”

  That seemed to do little to ease Yasmin’s worry considering they were about to provoke a small army of giant scorpions, but after one last look—at Dain as well—she turned and sprinted down the mineshaft as well, leaving only the three of them and the slow, steady hum of the Wind Orbs filling the silence.

  Nothing to do now but count breaths and wait until three-thirty.

  … We should be fine.

  We’re prepared for this.

  One could make the argument that he should’ve obtained a construct-type relic with his mechanical core a long time ago, but the materials for a construct-type relic were both costly to buy and time-consuming to assemble. He promised himself he’d finally work on it after this request—and especially after getting the large payout of twenty thousand curons.

  As he tapped his feet idly, still staring daggers into the mineshaft ahead of him just in case any scorpions scurried out preemptively, Rena walked up to him and lifted a soup of bone broth and pepper.

  “Snack?” she said.

  He blinked, taking it. Steam kissed his cheek. “You’re frightening. I was just thinking I wanted something warm to keep my mouth busy.”

  “Drink instead of worry.” She eased up beside him with her own bowl and matched his stance: both of them standing and staring at the mineshaft, bowls in two hands like two patrons on a balcony waiting for a play.

  He tasted her soup. The broth was marrow-thick, and the pepper, scallion, and some bitter root he couldn’t place were all heated well with a steady amount of salt.

  “You’re wasted on adventuring,” he muttered.

  “I ran a tavern once.”

  He knew. He just didn’t say so again. “Yet you’re surprisingly relaxed for someone who won’t be able to defend herself if a giant scorpion shows itself before you.”

  “Why wouldn’t I be relaxed?” Rena’s smile stayed easy. “I’ve been underground in worse situations with people I trust less. We have a plan, Ilvaren and Kargun and Sahlir are good warriors, and we even have a camp.”

  She gestured behind her, and he finally glanced around to see—in the ten or so minutes between the warriors leaving and him spacing out—that Anisa had even placed several vibrant flower pots around the cavern to break the dull evenness of color. Anisa herself was sprawled on one of the large pelt mattresses, relaxing in the soft fur and staring up at the ceiling.

  It really was like they’d turned this entire cavern into an actual house.

  “To that extent, my instincts tell me I can trust the three of you too,” Rena said simply. “Short of an entire earthquake causing a total collapse of Mine Kormuhan, I don’t see a reason why I have to be nervous.”

  “... And do your instincts tell you there’s anything off about this request?”

  She didn’t answer immediately. The soup in her hands rippled faintly from the Wind Orbs’ gentle current, and then, after a long moment, she murmured.

  “There is something. A presence past that shaft.” Her gaze stayed fixed on the black tunnel ahead. “It’s hard to describe what it is, but it feels… wrong. Like there are too many relics inside.”

  He glanced sidelong at her.

  “However old you think I am, I’m probably a little bit older than that,” she added, tone wry. “People who grew up with the war can feel it. Back when Obric and Auraline still flung relic-magic across the borders every hour of the day, you could tell when the magic was about to fall, and you could tell when relics were being activated. Older folk like me, who lived through that… once you’ve been near too many powerful relics, you start to feel when something nearby is humming in anticipation.”

  Her fingers tightened slightly around her bowl. “And it hums wrong in there.”

  Dain narrowed his right eye slightly.

  Right now, the one-eyed he’d been chasing could be just a few dozen paces of stone between them, so he exhaled through his nose and tried to steady himself.

  But the thought had barely settled when four distant explosions finally rolled through the tunnels—deep, overlapping booms that shook the ground underfoot. Dust spilled from the ceiling, and even Anisa jolted upright where she laid on her pelt mattress, reaching for her crossbow.

  “Oh,” Rena said mildly, taking one cautious step back as the bowls rattled. “We’re starting, I see.”

  Then the rumbling began.

  The single Bell-Ward that Rena had placed in the mineshaft ahead of them chimed once, then twice—high and sharp—and somewhere in the dark came the sound of a hundred legs scraping stone.

  “Stay back,” he said flatly, stepping forward and raising his prosthetic. “If anything breaks through, I’ll handle it. If you feel like it, Anisa, take a few crossbow shots.”

  Rena nodded, while Anisa had already risen from the bedding, crossbow drawn in a kneeling position.

  When he opened his Bloodlight Eye to shine a cone of reddish-purple light down the mineshaft, he saw the first glint of movement in the dark—a bunch of dull yellow eyes and thick metal limbs crashing against each other.

  It’d take around five minutes for the four warriors to get back. That was how long he had to hold this chokepoint for by himself.

  He could do this.

  He had to do this.

  So as the first wave of giant steelplated scorpions burst into view, their armored bodies clanging against the narrow walls, he steadied his stance and poured mana into his prosthetic.

  Fire.

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