The rest of Chapter 36 (35.51-35.99)

Going to take a break on revisions for the time being and try to get a chapter or three ahead of the RR story. Enjoy.

(still gladil)

When Gladil was a younger elf, shortly after joining the army, he tried his first drink. It’s not that the elves didn’t have their own alcohol in the forest, but it was reserved for festivals and he’d left home almost the day he came of age to join the military. That being said, the day he had his first drink was a day he wish he hadn't forgotten. From what he was told it had been a riot of a time, with all the men drinking and partying to their heart's content, and both female elves and humans joining in on the merriment. 

Several of his fellow army members regaled him with stories of his antics the following morning, of the busty red headed human and his apparent ballad he sang to the tavern while standing on a wobbly table. He remembered none of this apart from what he had been told, but what he did remember was the pounding headache, sore muscles, and what felt like bone fatigue, that following day and well into the week. 

That miserable hangover could not hold a candle to the way he felt right now. Against his will his eyes slowly opened and drank in the new scene around him. He was no longer in the forest, but in a large cavern. So large, in fact, that he could not see any of the walls or the roof above him. It did not help that there was little to no lighting, of course. The only source of light he could see was a faintly glowing moss on the ground not too far from him. Not enough to really see by, but enough to know that his eyes were not still closed. 

With a pounding headache and sore muscles, Gladil decided to just sit there and accept that he’d made a mistake. His arrogance had caused him to fail the trial set for him by his new god, and now he was paying his dues. Slowly his senses came under his control again, and he realized that he could hear something. A slow babble of water was resounding from somewhere in the cave, and the ranger could not remember having been this thirsty in a very long time. 

After a couple attempts to stand, in which his disorientation in the dark and general fatigue quickly placed him back on his ass, he decided it would be best to crawl toward the noise. 

After about 10 minutes of crawling, bumbling his way through the dark and stepping (kneeing?) every stray pebble, Gladil arrived at the small brook. It was a steady stream of water, surrounded by more of the glowing moss enough to finally see by, that trickled from the roof of the cave into a small pool. The stream was about 2 fingers wide, but that was more than enough for Gladil who had not had anything to drink since his run through the forest started so long ago. 

He descended upon the small pooling of water ravenously, desperately lapping up the water before it could evaporate. Of course it made no sense for the water to be evaporating at any sort of rate, but his sleep deprived and malnourished brain did not need to see reason at the moment. There was water, and it had to be consumed before it was cruelly snatched away.

After drinking his fill, his eyes had finally adjusted a bit to the dim lighting and he took in his surroundings. The moss here, around the water, was not only much thicker but seemed to glow brighter as well. He could see dim spots in the darkness of the cavern in the distance, which could very well be more spots of this glowing plant. He also noticed growths in the wall around the brook, and after a bit of investigation, came to the realization that they were camouflaged mushrooms. They did not look like any mushrooms that the ranger knew, but the fact that they were camouflaged instead of bright intising colors, and the fact that he hadn’t eaten in a very long time, tempted him into testing their edibility. 

Gladil had been raised as a wood elf and, whereas they were not as stuck up and fancy as the ‘high elves’, he’d been taught certain manners and etiquette. After he managed to stomach the first bite of the fungus, however, all of that went right out the proverbial window. The starved wood elf clawed into the surrounding walls looking for any edible morsels that he could possibly reach and stuffed them down his gullet as fast as elvenly possible. The spongy feeling of raw fungus would usually have been off putting, but in this very moment, the elastic feel of mushrooms between his fingers and teeth was pure bliss.

Eventually the ravenous impromptu feast was at an end, and with a couple sips of water that he pooled in his hands from the wall, he managed to keep it down. Once again he decided it was time to reflect on his situation. Feeling down and beating himself up about a decision he made that did not work out would get him nowhere, and if he was going to survive that line of thinking needed to stop immediately. 

First thought, his god had not abandoned him. Even if he had failed the trial, and he was fairly confident he had, the god had deposited him in the dungeon with food and water to survive rather than allowing the direboar or other forest creatures to ravage him while he was unconscious. 

Second thought, he was in the dungeon. He supposed he must have unconsciously realized it sooner, but now that he slowed down and tried to reassess his situation he realized that he was in the dungeon. He’d felt the composition of mana before, when he first scouted out the area, but it was a lot more potent now. The dungeon had grown a lot in a very short amount of time and although it was still obviously a dark dungeon, he could feel a sliver of the forest diety’s power in the ambient mana surrounding him.

His third and fourth thought lined up pretty well. He needed to escape the dungeon and to do that he needed his weapons. He still had his quiver on his back but his bow was not there with it. Cursing himself for not checking his surroundings when he first awoke before crawling off to the water, he began to backtrack. He followed the furrows that his knees had created back to where he woke up and found his bow. He also found a small leaf parsel filled with forest nuts and three very juicy looking apples. Damn his overactions earlier! Of course his god had given him the resources he needed to succeed. Not only had he failed the trail due to his own hubris, but he’d even lost faith in his new selected deity’s. These were not mistakes that he could afford to make again, and he intended to repent. 

The ranger decided to try his luck walking back to the stream, intending to follow the wall back to an opening of some sort, using his longbow for support. To his surprise he found that when he stood he did not need the bow for support, and his legs were functioning again. Not only that but the abbrassins and small cuts that he’d received crawling on the cave floor were mostly sealed up. Either the dungeon, his new god, or the mushrooms, had healed him. Either of the three options convinced him that he was in a safe room. 

Safe rooms were areas in dungeons that allowed the delvers to rest and recover, and were usually located far into the dungeon on later floors. Gladil did not know if that boded well or ill for him. On one hand, he may be able to leave close to his ideal condition but he could also be far deeper than he was prepared to escape from. There was only one way to find out.

Gladil made his way back to the stream and drank his fill once more before following the wall. After 30 minutes or so of walking, he finally came to an opening. The tunnel was lined with the glowing moss and allowed for a small amount of low-light vision. He slowly made his way through the tunnel before coming to a smaller, but still largeish, chamber. The chamber was much more brightly lit and had two other entrances/exits. There was what looked to be a set of stairs leading down on one side of the room and another tunnel opposite it. It may have been his hopefulness speaking, but he could almost swear that the tunnel inclined upwards. 

The most important feature in the room, however, was a disgusting looking snot-colored monster with two tusks, staring at him with hate filled eyes. Both Gladil and the creature gazed intently at each other for a while, before the room’s guardian huffed and kicked dirt behind him. As he flexed, Gladil could see muscles rippling under his too-loose skin.

Right. Safe rooms were usually located after a floor boss, and he hadn’t defeated the boss before arriving in the safe room. The ranger really wished that his memory would stop failing him so, and hoped this was just due to the sleep deprivation. 

With a silent prayer to the forest god, he prepared to fight for his life.