(Second Book Complete!) Runeblade: A Delving & Skill Merging LitRPG

Soft autumn rays shone through ruby-red and peach leaves, dappling the forest floor like warmtoned stained glass. It was surprisingly soothing. Now that Kaius had been inundated by the rich iron scent of blood mana for so long, it was easy to tune out. If he ignored the lunging pink flowers, white nettles that burned like fire, and the general wealth of obscenely aggressive fauna, he could almost forget that danger surrounded them on every side.

Stepping up and over a bulging matt of roots that erupted from the ground, Kaius spotted a small cluster of toadstools nestled in the crevices between the cable-like growths. A soft mint-green, blueish spores wafted from their gills like mist. They sat heavy, like an undisturbed pond. No doubt one whiff would have him hacking chunks of his lungs out — the spores were rich in decay mana.

Smiling slightly to himself, he kept moving. Vainblood was a bit like a flake of obsidian: gleaming and gorgeous, but touch without care and it would take its price for your negligence.

They’d been on the move for a better part of an hour, searching for a good spot to make camp. This deep into the high-mana zone, they had to be discerning. Gold beasts had sharp senses, so simple camouflage couldn’t be relied upon. That included the illusions that protected their tent. They needed defences — a hardy spot to park the Pegleg and layer it in shielding. Preferably somewhere surrounded by stinging nettles or other plants the local inhabitants had long since learned to steer clear of.

The beasts of Vainblood weren’t depthsborn. There was no bloody compulsion to rend their flesh from their bones. While a beast would fight for strength, as well as food or territory, they didn’t live lives of constant war. Without a clear advantage or reason to fight, most wouldn’t bother — as long as they didn’t intrude deep into a creature's territory, at least.

A prospect that was sometimes difficult with how many powerful beasts called Vainblood home.

Kaius grabbed the hilt of his blade as a reverberating shriek shattered the illusion of peace. Small blue birds shot to the sky, soft orange leaves rustling as the beasts punched through the canopy.

The sound had come far to their right. A couple of leagues at least, away from the rim of the Midnight Crater.

Looking over his shoulder at Kenva, Kaius gave the ranger a nod. She vanished, the wind rustling through the undergrowth. She flew upwards, rising above the canopy as little more than a gust of fallen leaves.

Rematerialising a few minutes later, Kenva dropped through the boughs overhead, jumping from branch to branch.

“Looks like another Gold,” Kenva said as she landed with a thud, a few twigs crunching underfoot. Some sort of herbivore — pretty sure it was just scaring off a few scavengers, though I didn’t get a good look. Maybe a half hour away at our fastest pace.”

“Do we want to go after it?”

Ianmus tensed at the suggestion — it wasn’t hard to guess why. A fight meant experience — and Kaius was very close to unlocking his next Drakthar spell, and more levels were always good. However, they were at the edge of the Crater, which complicated things. There was always the chance that a fight would draw more creatures to them, potentially dangerous ones from the pool of darkness that lay at Vainbloods centre.

More importantly, they didn’t know where Brokenlight’s camp was. If they got into a fight, there was a non-zero chance they could alert their targets to the fact that there were others in the forest. They couldn’t risk it.

“Let’s leave it,” Kaius replied. “Kanmost is our focus, and we don’t want to accidentally give ourselves away if the camp happens to be close by.”

Some of the tension left Ianmus’s shoulders as he nodded. Kaius didn’t draw attention to it. The mage had been quiet for the last few hours, which was out of character. Normally he was as quick on the retort as the best of them. It must have been the looming possibility of finding the camp where Kanmost was being held. It had always been obvious that Ianmus had baggage in his past. The prospect of reuniting with an old friend must have brought up memories.

“Fine,” Porkchop replied with a low grumble. “No fighting then, but I still want to practice our skills when we find a place to make camp.”

“That I'm sure we could manage,” Kaius replied, grinning.

As long as they didn’t go firing off any beams of light directly into the sky, using a few skills would be easy to miss. The only way Brokenlight’s camp would notice that is if they were within a couple of leagues of them — Kenva would be able to spot the place long before they got that close.

“We’re in luck, then,” Kenva said, hoping from root to root as they circled the base of a particularly large red-leafed tree. “I spotted somewhere only a half hour away. A bunch of trees are absolutely covered in those stinging vines that hang from branches. It’d be easy for us to cut them away at the centre of the patch, walling us off some.”

That sounded good to Kaius. Those vines were nasty — even a short brush left a rash that burnt like hellfire, before going dead and numb. Health cleared it up quickly, but the beasts of Vainblood avoided them anyway. If something did attempt to brave the vines, they’d be all the easier to take care of.

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Deciding to check it out, they hurried on. Soon, Kaius saw it with his own eyes. Cream vines wound their way around thick branches, grasping them like the tendrils of some unseen monstrosity. Gossamer-thin hairs sprouted from the vines, winkling softly in the light. Wavering in the breeze, there were so many of them that they almost looked like a dense fog had gathered unnaturally under the canopy.

The patch was huge — a full copse of towering red-leafed giants that stretched for two-hundred strides in every direction.

Leaning against a nearby tree, Kaius frowned at the hanging stingers. There was a good five strides between the ground and the hanging stingers. They could crawl under the things, but clearing out a space to make camp would be a pain. Each wispy growth was fragile — any of them could tear through them with ease — but they could still sting you after being removed. Blanketing the floor of their camp in them would be…unideal.

“I’ll deal with it,” Ianmus said, stepping forwards as solar mana shone at the tip of his staff. Working quickly, the mage pulled together a spell. A burning orb raced away, dipping low to fly under the hair-like stingers. It was weak compared to the spells Ianmus normally cast, but he didn’t need overwhelming power to deal with a few weeds.

Stopping in the centre of the copse, the orb lengthened into a bar of golden energy. It spiraled up, slow and thorough. Every fine hair that touched the spell fizzled, thin streamers of smoke dispersing on the wind. Bit by bit, Ianmus cleared out a patch for their camp, leaving the stingers in the actual canopy untouched to ward off any flying beasts that might spot them.

“Done,” the mage said, his spell winking out of existence.

Kaius clapped him on the shoulder. “Great job.”

Ianmus just nodded.

That was odd. Normally his friend would have at least waved them off while spouting how simple it had been. They’d just gotten new skills! Ianmus had always been one of the most excited of their team when that happened — especially now that he was getting to play with something novel like keyseals. With how vital a healing Skill was to his kit, he should have been rushing into the glade.

He’d have to keep an eye on it. Whatever was bothering him had only started in the last few hours. Maybe the man just needed some time; the gods knew Kaius got a little glum at times.

Ianmus strode forward, crouching down to avoid the untouched stingers at the edge of the copse. As he left, Kenva met Kaius’s eye.

“What was that about?” she asked through their rings.

“I’m not sure. Kanmost might be bringing up some old memories of Mystral?” Kaius replied, ducking low as they reached the drifting curtain of threads.

“Do we ask him about it?” Kenva replied, before jerking down with a hiss as a longer than normal thread brushed against the back of her neck.

Kaius hesitated. He didn’t want to make his friend feel like he had to talk. If he had kept it to himself up until this point, it had to be something sensitive.

Before he could answer, there was a heavy thud, and dirt showered his back. Behind him, Porkchop had dived flat on his belly, soft dirt and decaying leaf litter piling up the front of his chest like a bowwave. Thick claws dug deep, and he shuffled forwards.

“Bah, don’t over think it,” Porkchop said, reaching them quickly. “Give him a bit of time. Fiddling with some new magic might perk him up. If he’s still mopy by the time we go to bed, then one of us can prod him about it.”

Still rubbing her shoulder, Kenva grunted in agreement. “Yeah, probably for the best we don’t ambush him about it. Lord knows I felt off-kilter when everyone found out about Mother heckling me in the nude, and that was just an embarrassing story, not something serious.”

“Maybe you should do it?” Kaius said. “You guys have a shared cabin, so it’s a bit easier to find a moment to pull him aside.”

Kenva nodded tentatively. “I will, but still keep an eye out to check in with him yourself. No harm in him knowing we all give a fuck.”

Kaius had already planned on it. Up ahead, Ianmus rose to his full, towering height in the open space he had burned clear. While he wasn’t frowning, he did seem to be staring at a whole lot of nothing: piercing blue eyes staring up into the bright red canopy above.

“Okay, plan made!” Porkchop said, redoubling his pace as he clambered forwards. “But he’s a grown man, not a kicked puppy. No handling him like a cracked egg. We’ve got Skills to test, and I’d rather spend my energy on trying to cheer our friend up.”

A moment later, Porkchop spread his natural telepathy further, the sensation palpable through their bond.

“Hey Ianmus! Did you get hit on the head when I wasn’t looking? Show me your new keyseal already!”

Ianmus froze, blinking in surprise. He opened his mouth, only to pause when he turned back to them and caught sight of Porkchop furiously scrabbling his way forward, halfway digging a trench as he tried to avoid touching the hair-like stingers that hovered only a few fingerwidth’s above his back.

Kaius kept pace, looking at his brother incredulously.

“Magic, mageboy! Magic! Show it to me!”

“What are you doing? You look like some sort of mole!” Ianmus said, doubling over as he laughed.

“Slander of the highest order!”

Ianmus brightened as Porkchop flipped repeatedly from heckling to all but begging the mage to show off his new spell. Kaius wasn’t even quite sure how he did it, but everything Porkchop said seemed to tug Ianmus just a little bit further out of whatever was bothering him.

By the time he reached the clearing, they were all laughing as Porkchop shook himself and showered all of them in dirt. It was infectious — Ianmus’s earlier excitement had returned in full force, a familiar gleam shining in the man’s eyes. Kaius too felt that familiar itch. His new skill sat heavy in his soul, practically begging to be used.

It was time to see what Dissolution Edge could do.

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