Chrysalis

It was strange to be able to smell death. It seemed like the sort of thing that shouldn’t have a smell. Sure, things like decay and rot, they had a distinct scent, an extremely potent one, but those were distinct from death itself. A function of death, in a way. When a person died in front of you, or around you, there wasn’t a discernible odour, as far as Jern could tell. It wasn’t like the soul leaving the body was something his nose could detect.

Yet, as he stood on the precipice of the second stratum of the Dungeon, he could smell death.

He didn’t like it.

“It’s so cold,” Alis shivered as she stood by his side, looking down into the slowly stirring darkness.

“It’s going to be colder once we get down there,” he said.

“I don’t want to think about it. At least it’s supposed to get warmer once we reach the third.”

From what he’d heard, Jern wasn’t confident she would enjoy that heat much more than the cold. He’d conversed with a few ants from the next two layers, and it seemed to him that neither were all that hospitable. Only when they reached the fourth would they find a climate they would consider suitaboe for life.

“I never thought I’d be standing here,” he noted aloud.

Alis looked at him, and then back down the sharply sloped tunnel. The border between the first and second lay before them, a sharp border in the Dungeon. To both of them, it looked like a cloud of ink that revolved almost imperceptibly, a dark pond he could toss a stone into. After a moment, he shrugged, picked up a small shard of rock and lobbed it forward, gently, just a couple of metres.

As it fell into the ‘pond’, the flat surface didn’t ripple, it wasn’t disturbed in any way, and the sound of the rock hitting the tunnel floor reached him a second later, muffled.

“What did you do that for?” Alis asked.

“I was curious,” Jern defended himself.

shadow beast lunges up out of there and rips your head off?” she scolded him. “You’ve

idly considered telling her he was much better at killing monsters than she was, but decided against it at the last minute. Alis

back,” he told her. “Beyn told us we shouldn’t

“Good idea.”

he was told. Passages between strata were much rarer than regular tunnels, so there was often a convergence

the ants swept the surrounding Dungeon on a never ending cycle. Even so, the effects of the wave were impossible to ignore. Monsters would burst out of the ground inside the camp at all hours; one even emerged from just under the wall, collapsing a wide stretch as it forced

probably a good thing they’d been doing so much fighting recently. Pretty much everyone was

Even the old ladies.

made their way towards the back of the camp,

insisted. “Your devotion is to your credit,

us from the Dungeon Sickness?” the grey haired woman demanded. “Everyone is certain our lack of symptoms can be attributed to

from much harm, of that I have no doubt,” Beyn agreed, “but for other trials, we are expected to carry the burdens ourselves. The mana thickens precipitously as we descend, and were we to advance to the Shadow

of reflection and meditation since it sounded holy enough for her liking. She thanked the priest for his time

pilgrims approached and Beyn smiled

and Jern, how fare you

the tunnel down. Are we really going to have to wait a week

looked grave and

and I would hate to force them to delay on their holy journey. Dungeon sickness is a

low-mana zone within. All of them had been expected to spend time inside, slowly letting the mana in their bodies out, then stepping back outside. By

and I are probably due to go back in, Alis,” Jern told

cough, not wanting to appear difficult in front

advance my Class and I thought I should do it today.