“That’s not great,” Sang muttered. “But fortunately, neither of us get close to our targets.”
“Except for the fact that we’re going to be underground, in tight quarters. Trolls have low hit points but they bleed like crazy, so they’ll be on us as soon as they smell our scents.”
“So, we need to prepare for this,” Sang replied.
“Big time.”
“Hmmm, well... there’s no stores or anything around here, so what do you recommend we do?” Sang asked.
Van pulled out his bagpipes. “Well, I have a song that’s perfect for this! I just learned it. It’s called “The Dirge of Resistance”! It makes you resistant to things like poison, fire, and anything that causes damage over time. It won’t protect us from the initial damage we take from acid splash, but it will prevent the damage-over-time effect. That’s how Trolls really get you.”
“Do you have any solutions that don’t involve you playing music?” Sang asked.
“If I did, I wouldn’t tell you!” Van cheerfully replied as he began to blow into his bagpipes, creating more horrendous noise. No matter how many times Sang heard him play, it never got any better. In fact, she was beginning to wonder if he was starting to get worse. As the horrific noise played, though, she saw that her stats were beginning to increase.
Health: +50
Stamina Regen +20%
DOT Resistance: 100%
Time: 24 hours
“Not bad,” she muttered. As awful as the sounds were, she was impressed with his ability to boost her stats as high as they were getting. She grabbed her bow and walked towards the big hole. Gazing down, she could see that it was a straight drop. “You ready?” she asked as she took out her lantern and tied it to her waist. The lantern had a big enough aura to where it would illuminate everything within a twenty-foot radius, courtesy of Kraggoth.
“Yeah, I am,” Van said as he walked over and looked down the hole with her. “Remember, don’t let them get close. Oh, and also, I’ve got a cool new spell; it’s called Ignition Switch, and—”
“Spell? You can do magic?” Sang interrupted excitedly. She had yet to see a player do any kind of magic and was fairly curious as to what was possible.
“Don’t get too excited—magic for players is incredibly weak. Doubly so for bards. But, now I can cause a single item to ignite by pointing my finger at it.”
“Well, that might come in handy somehow,” Sang said.
“Yeah, because Trolls hate fire. So, if we’re in a pinch, starting a fire will cause them to back off for a few moments,” Van said. “Unless they have a boss. Trolls are pack creatures, so they’re usually directed by a Troll boss, who will yell at them to suck it up and keep fighting in spite of the fire.”
“So, kill the bosses first, and then use the fire to scare them back,” Sang said. “Good plan.”
Van grinned. “Alright! Let’s go Troll hunting!” And with that, they both leapt down the hole. Sang fell for a few moments before the tunnel began to slope, causing her to slide down the rest of the way. It would have been fun, had the ground not been full of rocks, gravel, and roots, all of which were causing her some level of pain as she slid across them. Of all the things she wished that she could deactivate in the game, she really wished pain were one of them. It didn’t make any sense why pain existed in a silly video game, but exist it did.
“Ahhhh!” Van cried as they came sliding to a halt at the bottom of the tunnel. It was cramped and the tunnels weren’t tall enough for either of them to stand fully. Van was laying on the ground when she looked to him, grabbing his legs.
“See, this is why I wear leather leggings,” Sang said as she pointed at Van’s burning and bloodied legs. “I have no idea why you would wear cloth pants.”
“I can’t wear leggings! Geez, it burns!” Van cried out.
“Buuurrrrns!” echoed all the way down the tunnel.
“Quiet down,” Sang grumbled as she looked ahead. The tunnel was incredibly dark, and it smelled wretched. She could see piles of bones scattered throughout the space around them, which they looked as if they had been chewed on for quite some time.
“Alright, well, we better keep going,” Van said. “Don’t want to get caught up in a raid.”
“Yeah, better to surprise them,” Sang said as she walked forward. Her Map skill wasn’t working underground for some reason, which concerned her. The words TRAIT NEEDED: STONE SENSE appeared whenever she tried to bring up her map to detect threats. Why couldn’t anything in this game be easy?
As they walked through the darkness, Sang heard a hissing noise ahead. Wordlessly, she raised her bow up and drew the string back, preparing to attack. In the distance, she could see a pair of red eyes staring at her from the darkness. The hissing grew louder.
“Shoot!” Van shouted.
Sang let loose an arrow and it sailed through the air, crashing straight into the red eyes. A burst of flames from the arrow illuminated the darkness for just a moment afterward, revealing a squat, blue creature with long arms, bumpy skin, and razor-sharp teeth. Its head looked sort of like a lizard’s, but with fins on the sides that were almost like ears. The words Troll Level 9 hovered above it. Its health had rapidly dropped down to zero in response to the arrow causing it to catch on fire.
“Nice shot!” Van said. “But don’t get too cocky. They drop quick, sure, but if enough of them get the charge on us, you won’t have time for that many shots before they swarm you completely.”
“Well, make sure you have some kind of strategy for that,” Sang said as they continued walking deeper into the tunnels.
“Hold up!” Van hissed, causing Sang to freeze. “Look!” he said, coming around her and pointing at the ground. There was some kind of a bear trap lying there.
“Weird,” Sang said as she moved her foot away from the trap. She knelt down to inspect it. “Are Trolls smart enough to use traps?”
“No, they’re not smart at all. Troll bosses can speak a few words and the Troll Lord might know enough of the human language to mock us, but even he’s not smart enough to use traps.”
“That’s strange then, right? I mean, a bear trap lying here in the middle of a Troll tunnel. Do you think another player put it down here?”
Van shrugged. “Who knows? But now we need to keep our eyes open for traps, too, since there could be more. Might as well grab that thing—it could be useful.”
Sang nodded and used her Trapping skill to disarm the trap and put it in her inventory.
Trap gained: Beartrap.
Effect: Immobilizes target
Set-up Time: 1 minute
Reusable: Yes
“Man, we need to buy more traps,” Sang said as they continued through the tunnels. “These things seem pretty handy.”
“Yeah, they’re nice, but I’ve never messed around with them much. I don’t know if you’ve noticed this about me, but I’m a bit of a trap magnet,” Van replied. “I mean, ask any of my friends... the moment we get into a dungeon, I’m going to be immediately tangled up in the net, falling down the pit, turned to stone by the statue—it’s inevitable.”
“But it still bugs me; who put that there?”
“Well, this quest might be a little more complicated than just killing all of the Trolls,” Van said as they continued walking.
Up ahead, there was a wide hole to be seen, and the tunnel grew large enough to where Van and Sang were able to stand up straight. There was also a lot of chittering off in the distance. It sounded like the Troll that Sang had seen earlier. The hissing and shrieking seemed to signify some kind of crude communication. And between the darkness of the tunnel, being in closed-in spaces, and hearing the strange hissing and shrieking, Sang was beginning to feel uneasy.
“You hear that hissing? I bet that’s a nest!” Van said as he held up his own lantern and began to walk forward. The light flickered as its beams reached a large pile of bones. The pile was huge, almost as tall as the tunnel itself. Sang could see the hundreds of etch marks on all of the bones. Some of the skulls had been shattered, and many weapons and swords were strewn carelessly around the area.