“And the new Boss? Any information on it?” The clerk continued inquiring, writing everything down as a report bound for the Guild leader.
“A several hundred pound, stone armor covered bunny.” Craig announced in a harsh tone.
The serious way he said ‘bunny’ made a few people snort and chuckle, even the stoic Josh had a smile playing about his lips. Craig blushed a bit, but grimaced and said nothing to stop them.
“Heh...Ahem... Ok, danger level?” The clerk tried to hide a chuckle.
“Mid D-ranking. Actual cultivation at F nine, but its’ speed, armor, and weight make it very hard to damage, blunt weapons are suggested. Few easy weak points, the eyes have armor surrounding them, and though the mouth is unarmored, stone hangs over from its nose - another possible weak point - to cover the mouth unless it opens. Which it did only once, when it was in pain from a broken shoulder.” Craig succinctly stated.
Dale was very impressed at the detail Craig provided. He hadn’t seen the mouth open at all, really he hadn’t thought about the possible points he should have been hitting. Mainly he had swung for the head, trying to concuss it with the heavy spiked end of his weapon. His ribs still twanged a bit, and he felt that may have been avoided if he had been paying better attention. Lesson learned.
“Loot dropped?”
Craig continued his report, “After the first floor Boss, roaming squads of improved Bashers,” He pointed at the bodies on the table, “dropped mid-quality of low level healing potions, rarely a holy pendant which we will most likely bring to Father Richard for his inspection, and a mixture of several copper and a few silver.”
“And the Boss?”
Craig spoke in a low tone to try and prevent others from overhearing, “Dropped a small amount of silver coinage, and two possibly Inscribed items, including a helmet and a dagger. We will be getting them both checked for quality and safety before activating them.” Craig didn’t speak quietly enough, and caused an explosion of noise, especially from the groups that were now forbidden to enter the second level. Rune inscribed items were worth up to several hundred gold, even a poor quality one might be worth fifty.
“Make sure we get a copy of the Spotter determination and value, and remember that if you sell them, twenty-five percent goes to the Guild. You are allowed to use anything you earn, or give it as a gift, but if it is sold you will be compelled to pay the fee, so be sure you know that the person you give it to won’t screw you over. If stolen, your debt is absolved unless it is recovered. Anything else?” The dry, bored tone continued as the now uninterested clerk looked at his notes.
Craig nodded and spoke loudly, obviously for the benefit of the people listening in. “Just one thing, the traps in the lower level are far more advanced than the upper level. We did not set any off, but we came upon one that had been set off by another group. The floor and walls were scarred by some force, there was no sign that the unknown group survived. Stay safe, friends.”
The crowd which was on the verge of fury calmed a bit. They all knew this most likely meant that group was dead, as there wasn’t ever a body to recover if a team fell in a dungeon. Maybe it was for the best that they stayed out of the lower level, and Craig was not just trying to hoard all of the good loot.
“Ah, by the way,” Hans turned toward the attentive crowd, “in the first room right there,” he pointed at the entrance below them, “there is a massive iron vein along the wall. Good way to earn some cash while you cultivate!” An explosion of motion followed as those too weak to reach the second floor raced to buy picks from an overjoyed entrepreneur who had set up a small kiosk nearby. His inflated prices suddenly not an issue, he quickly made enough to later find Dale and ask for some land to set up shop. Dale agreed, and assigned him a plot of land, for a percentage and a discount of course.
~Dale~
While the masses were distracted, Dale’s group went to have lunch. After a meal that was barely better than the dirt it was grown in, they cultivated in consideration of Dale’s sore ribs, promising him they would spar after dinner. Dale readily agreed, today showed just how poor his combat readiness was. In comfortable silence, each settled in to cultivate again. Pretending that it was not because he was bored of cultivating, having spent nearly five hours passively and actively cultivating in the Essence rich area underground, Craig determined that Dale had enough Essence built up to open another meridian.
“Now, the only reason you are ready right now is that you opened the first of the paired set. You opened the yin heart meridian, so the yang lower intestine meridian will be much easier to open. You don’t have the Essence to open one in a new set, so make sure to listen to my direction.” Craig directed in a serious manner.
Dale nodded, preparing himself. As before, he sank into his center, and pulled a thin stream of Essence from the spinning Chi. Moving it along the ‘wall’ he searched for the small holes he now knew existed. Craig stopped him a few times, until he apparently approached the correct one. It was nowhere near the first, and didn’t seem to go to the lower intestine. His brow furrowed in confusion, Dale still did as he was told. Craig hadn’t been wrong yet, after all.
Dale fed the Essence into the whole, and it was again sucked from his control. The Essence left his center, somehow splitting and moving directly into his little finger on each arm. On both, it crossed the wrist and ran upwards along the opposite side of the forearm as the heart meridian did, until it reached the back of Dale’s shoulder where it ended at the uppermost part of the back, or the bottom of his neck.
At this position, after creating weavings along its route, it traveled along the skin across his neck and cheek until it reached the outer corner of his eye, finally ending in his ear before somehow reconnecting into his center and joining the spiral from another small hole. Everything sounded a bit fuzzy, so he opened his eyes and blinked away tears. Wiping them from his check, he saw that it was actually blood dripping from his eyes.
Wiping at his ears, the fuzziness vanished as drops of blood were wiped away there as well. Surprised blood wasn’t coming out of his skin at this point, he asked why he was bleeding. Had he been hit while he was so focused? What he should expect now?
Craig waved at him to try and calm him down and slow the flow of questions. “As your meridians are opened, they are also cleaned. The impurities in your system that are forced away have to go somewhere, after all. That blood is helping the filth to be washed out, that is all. You aren’t damaged, actually you are now far healthier.”
“I see.” Dale murmured, thinking out loud about the incredibly foul poop he had taken after his heart meridian had opened. Now it made sense why it had connected to his intestines, it was depositing impurities.
“I bet you do!” Hans called, interrupting Dale’s reminiscence. “Your vision should clear up, any issues you had before are gonna be gone. Oh by the way… HA!” Dale gasped as Hans shouted next to his head, his hands clapping to his ears with a wet smack of blood.
“Yup, looks like your hearing is improving as well!” Hans laughed, grinning maliciously.
“Mean!” Dale gasped. ‘Heh’ was the only apology he got.
“Get ready for a few sleepless nights, kiddo.” Steve rumbled fondly. “You are going to wake up to a herder on the next mountain farting tonight.” The men laughed uproariously at this.
“I know the one! He’s been eating too much roughage if you ask me! He needs to add some fruit to his diet!” Josh sounded off. The laughter only increased at this comment.