Azure: Gunner

Classes come in different rarities, with increased rarities giving more Stat points per Level and potentially more powerful Skills. Many people make the mistake of picking a Class Evolution option based only on its rarity.

Pick something you can dedicate yourself to. Don’t be the fucking twat who runs around whining about their Elite Class not being what they wanted.

- Delver’s Guild Handbook, Section 1 - "Classes”

<Anyone have an idea of which way we should go first?>

<I doubt there’s anything left alive around here, we made enough noise to wake the dead.> Raylan responded.

<Don’t jinx us, we’ve already fought one group of undead today.>

<I vote we check the path that didn’t have any orcs come out of it,> Elin suggested.

No one objected, so we started off into the tunnel furthest to our left. Raylan and Elin had cast Light, since they had plenty of mana. This path was narrower than the ones we’d tried so far, forcing us to move single-file. Elin took the lead, her shield and scepter out. I could tell she was eager to redeem herself for missing most of the last fight.

Would her Pain Bolts have worked through the chieftain’s armor? Or would it have ignored the pain the way those Berserkers seemed to?

A hundred or so yards in, the tunnel squeezed even tighter. Here, the ceiling spikes - stalac-whatevers - hadn't been broken off and some of them hung low enough that Raylan and Zaire had to duck to avoid them. I didn’t like the narrow confines at all. If anything attacked us here, we’d struggle to use our numbers effectively. Zaire could cast his Spells out in front of us, but I was going to have trouble shooting past Elin. The final straw was when the passageway started to go down.

<All right, that’s it. We’re turning around. We want to go up, not down - we’ll come back here if there’s no other way. Let’s check the other paths.>

We returned to the chamber, then tried the opening the initial ambush had come from. This tunnel was much wider, with a higher ceiling. It only went for about fifty yards, however, before ending abruptly in a wall of tightly-fitted bricks. They were distinctly unlike the ones we’d seen down where the skeletons were. Torches lit the wall, the light glistening off of a series of dark red shapes crudely painted over the brick. I took a couple steps closer.

Are those… runes of some kind? Painted in blood? Fresh blood? And what is that - I swear I felt the ground tremble just now. I quickly retreated to join the rest of the team.

<I fear this pathway bodes ill, Gunner Az. Surely something is sealed away behind this barrier,> Zaire said what we were all thinking.

<Yeah,> I agreed, <let’s check the last path. This seems to be a dead-end.>

Our final choice of tunnels led us up a short rise and then into the largest chamber we’d seen so far. It spread out in front of us, irregularly shaped but easily over a hundred yards long, perhaps fifty yards across in places, and with a high ceiling. Scattered throughout the space were a number of poorly-built wooden structures. Some looked almost like large piles of wood just leaned up against each other, sheltering a small space below them. A few looked like simple one-room buildings, with hides for doors and no windows.

The space was broken up by occasional pillars of stone that reached up from the floor into the darkness above. The flickering torchlight, even supplemented by our two Lights, didn’t reach the ceiling of the huge space. The only area that was well-lit was an open space in front of a single larger building, with a large, wide fire burning. Atop the fire were three charred shapes, giving off the sickly-sweet stench of burning meat.

Dead gods, are those the bodies of the orcs we killed first? The ones that disappeared from the tunnel? If they burn their dead, does that mean they’re… intelligent?

<Dungeon monsters aren’t intelligent, are they?> I asked shakily.

<Gunner Az, dungeon races like orcs are known to exhibit complex behaviors, but they have an instinctual hatred for anyone who enters a dungeon and cannot be reasoned with. For our purposes, they are no different than the wolves or skeletons, only more dangerous. It is only outside a dungeon that they are able to act with intelligence.>

<That doesn’t make me feel any better, Mage Zaire.>

<How about this?> Raylan asked. <They were going to kill us, we killed them first, end of story.>

I looked at him and smiled. Oddly enough, that brutally simplistic view of the situation did make me feel a bit better. Swallowing hard, I led the team through the - I guess it’s sort of a village - towards a single larger building that looked to have more than one room. As we approached, I realized that despite how generally shoddy everything looked, it was all much larger than I had thought. The doorways had to be seven, maybe eight feet tall - clearly these were sized for the huge orcs we’d killed.

<Let’s check the big place for anything interesting, then find an exit. I don’t want to risk the water catching up with us.>

Before I could come up with any sort of a plan, Elin pushed ahead, shoving aside the heavy furs covering the doorway. I rushed to follow her, sweeping the barrel of my gun around the room, but nothing moved. The room looked, well, a bit like the inside of the saloon back in Sunland, except shittier, with even worse furniture. And with a crude wooden throne sitting against the far wall. And with everything being several sizes too large. The whole place stank nearly as bad as the stables. I tried my best to ignore my sense of smell and failed.

The room was full of shadows, lit only by Elin and Raylan’s Lights. It seemed to fill most of the space inside the building. Slabs of apparently raw meat sat on one of the large tables, several crude daggers stabbed into the wood around them. There didn’t seem to be anything of value lying around, except for a pair of huge axes hanging from pegs on the wall above the throne. Raylan insisted on claiming one of them, though I doubted they were anything special.

The right side of the room held another doorway with more furs covering it. Through it, we found what looked to be a small sleeping chamber. There was a huge pile of stinking furs in the corner, but much more excitingly, there was a simple shelf on the wall, holding up a glowing, faceted object that I immediately recognized as a Spell orb.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from NovelFire. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

<Spell orb,> breathed Raylan reverently as he followed me into the room. He reached out to it, and I grabbed his arm.

<Don’t touch it, it should go to one of our casters! If you touch it you’ll absorb it!>

He looked at me in confusion.

<That’s not how it works, Az. You have to intentionally try to use it, right Zaire?>

<Fighter Raylan is correct, Gunner Az.>

<That’s not how it worked with the one I found in the Tutorial,> I pointed out, a bit stung.

<Was that not part of your Level up reward?> asked Zaire. I nodded, and he continued. <Likely that is the difference, as any gems found in your rewards will be attuned to you. This one, however, appears to be unattuned.>

<Who gets it?> Elin demanded, looking at it longingly.

<What Spell is it?> I asked, turning to Raylan, who just shrugged. Great. I wanted to give the Spell to Zaire, or even take it for myself, but I couldn’t justify that. I’d promised that the loot would go to whoever could use it best, and honestly that wasn’t me.

<Well, I guess it’s between Elin and Zaire. Uh, rock paper sword snake bird?>

<Sounds reasonable to me,> Raylan grinned.

<What is this ‘rock paper sword snake bird’ you speak of, Gunner Az?> Zaire asked.

After a slightly too long explanation, the Earth Mage predictably threw rock.

<Haha, bird shits on rock!> the Healer exclaimed gleefully, wiggling her middle finger at Zaire.

She snatched up the gem with a huge grin, cupping it in her hands and concentrating. A few moments later, the gem seemed to soften and flow into her hands.

<Well, what is it?!>

<Shadow.>

<What? Also, WHAT?!>

The second what wasn’t directed at Elin. A loud sound had echoed through the cave. We all dashed outside to see what was going on.

boom boom boom

It was coming from the entrance to the orc village.

<I do not like the sound of that, Gunner Az!>

<I think we should get out of here,> Raylan echoed.

Looking for an exit, we ran to the back of the cavern, but didn’t see anything that looked like a tunnel leading out. We found a couple of deep crevices, but nothing more than a few feet long. We split into two teams, circling the cave in opposite directions, but we soon found ourselves at the same opening we’d entered through. The sound was getting louder.

<I don’t think we have a choice guys, we have to go out here…>

Tentatively, we got into formation and moved into the chamber full of bodies, stepping carefully over the corpses. It was now obvious the sound was coming from the tunnel that had been walled off.

BOOM BOOM CRASH!

The sound of bricks crashing to the rocky floor made me gulp and tighten my grip on my gun.

THUD THUD THUD

The cave trembled with booming footsteps, bits of rock and dirt falling from the ceiling, as they drew slowly closer. The… thing that finally came into view was like nothing I’d seen before. A massive being, seemingly made of blackened iron. Its shoulders were as broad as Vale’s would be if she was taller than an orc. Huge slabs of metal formed its chest, wider and thicker even than the orc chieftain’s armor. Its head looked like a massive, squat greathelm, wider than an orc’s and illuminated from within by a menacing glow. Every joint glowed molten hot, rivulets of liquid metal running down its limbs like sweat.

<Dead fucking gods, what is it?!>

<Metal Golem, Level 4,> Raylan answered grimly.

An Earth Spike drove out of the ground only to shatter on its armored shin, barely leaving a mark. Elin’s Pain Bolt had no more effect, not slowing the creature in the slightest. I put two shots into its face with no better results.

<Fall back! Into the cave! We need to come up with a plan!>

Backing up, I stumbled and tripped over one of the bodies on the ground, landing on my back hard enough that I felt the hit on my barrier. As I scrambled to get up, the golem reached the first orc body. The massive foot rose, came down, and pulverized the dead orc’s chest, blood spraying out almost far enough to reach me. Another ponderous step, this one smashing an orc’s skull into a paste.

I felt a tide of panic rising in my body as I stumbled back into the large cavern. My teammates were waiting there, eyes wide, breathing fast. My thoughts raced.

How in the Wasted hells are we supposed to fight that! It looks just as indestructible as that fucking elder treant. I’m sure one hit from that thing would kill any of us… FUCK, Az, get it together, everyone’s counting on you!

THUD SQUELCH THUD

Each step brought it closer to us. As it came over the small rise leading into the cave, its head scraped the ceiling, breaking off chunks of rock that bounced harmlessly off its shoulders. I studied it, trying to come up with something we could do. It was clear there was no way we could get through its armor, not after we’d struggled so much with the chieftain. I was sure even my slugs would just bounce off its chest, maybe leaving a little dent or two at best. The only thing keeping us safe so far was that it was so very slow.

<The joints!> Raylan shouted, <those have to be its weak points! It wouldn’t be able to move otherwise!>

<They’re still made of fucking metal!> Elin objected.

She pointed with her scepter, and something gathered at the end of it, a black void like an absence of light. The Shadow Bolt hissed forwards, aimed for its right shoulder, and splattered over the monstrous construct like a pot of spilled ink. Part of it landed on the glowing joint, and we all held our breaths as the red glow dimmed for a moment. Then the shadow evaporated, leaving the creature untouched.

Nothing. FUCK! What do we do… I don’t know what metal is weak to! Acid, maybe? I thought I remembered something about that, but it didn’t really help. OK, we don’t have anything to counter metal, and Force is going to be useless against something this big and strong, but it’s also hot like fire. Ice and cold counter fire, and we don’t have those either… I can infuse my shots with Conjure Water. Would that actually do anything though? Only one way to find out!

It took me two tries to get the spellform just right. I’d practiced it dozens, maybe hundreds of times, but never while backing away from a terrifying sight like this. Please fucking let this work…