Wild Era, Ch 9: Leaving the Mine

As Kelin ascended through the tunnel, he collected the hides from the braggans that he’d left behind until his spatial storage couldn’t hold anymore.

Once it was full, he pulled the backpack out, sorted its contents so the mana crystals and other useful things stayed inside his storage, and then stuffed it full of more rolled up braggan hides and a handful of cores.

The cooked lizard tail was in his storage, but he sliced up another one and wrapped it in scraps of hide as an extra. 

Then he slung his backpack over his shoulder and kept walking.

On the way, he tested out the effects of the Ring of Everlasting Flame. 

The Rare grade meant that it was made from a high-quality material with innate properties. It looked like the base was a type of Fire-affinity gold, which had a durability much higher than regular gold. There wasn’t much that could leave a scratch on it.

That material and the Fire elemental energy it held was why the salamander’s flames and the magma hadn’t damaged it. The heat had actually helped it.

The Superb quality meant that the person who’d fashioned it had been near the top of their profession, and it was even more impressive than the base material. 

The only higher qualities were Flawless and similar variants, items so perfect they were like natural wonders of the galaxy. 

The strength enhancement was 25% for Fire spells, but it only added half of that to his soulfire spells, as well as to Wildfire and Soul Ignition. 

That was how fusion elements worked.

If he wanted to get the full effect from an artifact, he’d have to have one that boosted soul and fire magic together. He would almost certainly have to craft those himself. 

Possibly, the Path could find or make something for him, but it usually only moved things around, and his magic was too rare for there to be many others who used it. 

A 12.5% overall boost was significant, however, and something he hadn’t expected to find in the mine, but the greatest benefit of the ring was the temperature control it offered. 

The mine no longer felt hot at all. 

It was quite comfortable

Even if he walked across that river of magma, this ring would keep him cool. 

The spark of flame inside was from the Elemental Plane of Fire, like a very small dimensional portal. It drew flame into itself or released it as needed to balance out the temperature around him.

The soulbound effect on it meant that no one else would be able to use it while he lived, unless he removed his mark and gave it to them.

He experimented with the effects as he walked, testing out the quality of the crafting, and discovered that the ring was also able to turn invisible and ethereal if he wished, which allowed him to conceal it from prying eyes.

When he tested out the visible part of the Cloak of Everlasting Flames, an aura of flame poured away from his body like a radiant cloak and filled the air.

It looked very similar to the aura of flame around a salamander, like he was standing inside a blazing fire, and he watched it leave scorch marks on the tunnel walls.

They were real flames, but his temperature didn’t change at all.

He felt a draw on his mana pool and, after a moment of experimentation, he found that he was able to control the size and heat of the flames by channeling mana into the ring.

At the lowest setting, it was just a feeling of heat and the appearance of flames, while as he scaled it up, the heat turned into a bonfire and then an inferno.

Unfortunately, the larger flames drained his mana quickly, so after testing it out, he turned it back down.

Only the temperature control part of the ring drew its energy directly from the Plane of Fire. The cloak required him to summon the flames himself.

He was distracted from his experimenting now and then by another pack of monsters, but most of them had tried to go down as far as possible, and he’d already encountered them.

The ones he ran into now were weaker.

The first was a pack of braggans, but there were only three of them around Level 30.

He let Gaius trap all three of them, which the elemental did easily with his higher level, and Kelin killed each of them with a single Soulfire Bolt.

After that, there was another pair of Stoneclaw Crawlers and another trio of braggans, but nothing that slowed him down much.

He dealt with all of them in short order.

On the way up the tunnel, he stopped near the cavern where he’d recovered and sent Gaius to search the nearby area for more mana stones. 

There was a dense cluster here and no reason to leave it behind. He wasn’t going to raid the entire mine, but when it was right in front of him, it was worth a little extra time. 

When the elemental came back, he had another dozen crystals in his hands, mostly medium grade. Kelin tucked them away in his spatial storage and continued up the tunnel.

Before long, he’d gained another level and reached 30, which was about as strong as one of the newer mining guards who used to protect this place. 

The level raised his Intelligence to 301, so he tossed the five free points into Aura, bringing it to 165.

He was quickly approaching the average level for the mine. Even if it had been a regular hunting area or a Chaos Remnant, it would soon be time to move, at least if he wanted to continue advancing quickly.

After Level 30, the guards leveled slowly, with perhaps a level every month or two. By Level 45, they barely increased at all.

The Flametear Serpents had been on the high end of monsters that appeared here, so the guards didn’t have the strongest opponents to fight against, and even if they fought a dozen times a day, they usually faced the monsters three to one and split the experience. 

There was a moderate experience bonus for facing things alone and for facing larger groups, but they never saw it. It wasn’t an enormous amount, since it would drive people to try things beyond them, but the Path made a point of rewarding bravery.  

Between that and Wildfire, Kelin didn’t plan to group up much.

The guards who reached Level 50 usually left the mining company’s payroll for better positions. That level was a mark of basic strength in Highmist, the standard for private soldiers and the required level to join the town guards, but in the greater picture of things, it wasn’t much.

He would check out the local dungeons and work through them, which would take a little while, but once they were exhausted, he would head elsewhere, either taking the kids with him if they wanted to come or leaving them with a stable place here.

He would also try to figure out what was going on with the war and the Path, and regain as much of his power as he could.

In between, he would do some crafting to raise his skills and for the extra experience, but it would be mostly for his own use. He wasn’t out to turn crafting into a business. All he needed was enough money to live on, and hunting should cover that.

It was a good enough plan.

As he approached the exit of the mine, he could hear some voices outside, so he turned his ring invisible and adjusted his pack. 

Then he continued walking.

A moment later, the tunnel opened onto the cave that marked the entrance, which had been reinforced by cut timbers and some stonework. It was a rough job, just enough to make sure that the stone didn’t collapse.

He’d only worked here for a few weeks as his younger self, but he felt like he’d walked across this cavern too many times. It would be good to get out to where the wind blew and the trees towered into the sky.

Through the opening on the other side of the cave, he could see the forest. 

Standing in the way, however, were a group of guards from the mining company and the mine foreman. 

The foreman was a Level 40 Miner with a subclass as an Accountant, while the guards were mostly between Levels 40 and 50. The guard captain was at Level 55, a lean and scarred older man with a perpetual grimace.

From how they were milling around near the entrance and not coming very far into the cave itself, it was clear they’d just arrived. 

The mana density was much thinner up here, but both it and the fire essence from the salamander were about twice what they normally were. It was apparently enough to stop them from coming in.

For a moment, Kelin felt disgusted with all of them, a remnant of how they’d left the workers to die, but his heart turned as calm as still water as he headed toward the exit.

It took them a moment to notice him, but as soon as they did, the guards spun around and pointed their spears in his direction. Their shields came up as well.

“Halt!” The guard captain shouted as his hand fell to the sword at his belt. 

The weapon distinguished him from the other guards, who all used spears. He had a shield, but it was slung across his back rather than being in his hand.

Kelin stopped where he was and waited for them to recover. His hand was laced through the strap on his shoulder, and he leaned most of his weight on one leg, looking relaxed.

Once they saw that he wasn’t a monster or attacking them, the guards muttered in surprise and their spears tilted up slightly, just enough to move the points away from him.

They were a good fifty feet away, outside of the river of mana that was pouring out of the depths, so the weapons weren’t doing much either way.

“Who are you?” The mine foreman looked like he’d bitten a lemon as he stared at Kelin. His voice was gruff and his eyes were narrow with suspicion

He looked Kelin up and down and the irritating tingle of an inspection ability followed.

“There’s no way you could have survived down in that mine,” the foreman frowned. “Especially not at Level 30. What are you, a thief here to steal everything not nailed down?”

The foreman didn’t seem to recognize Kelin at all. He probably didn’t even remember the names of the dozen or more people who’d died.

It didn’t make Kelin happy, but it worked out for the best. He hadn’t felt like explaining how a drudge completely changed his situation in a few days.

His younger self here might have been confused on how to conduct himself in this life, but he was not. 

As a son of Irian, it was beneath him to lie. It was also inappropriate to allow this foreman to speak to him like that. He raised an eyebrow at the foreman, and his words were calm. 

“Mind your manners, man,” he said. “I’m here to help you. Your mine was sabotaged, if you weren’t aware.”

While the foreman and the guards looked shocked, Kelin swung the backpack off his back and reached inside, pulling out the remains of the runic plate and the shards of the fire core.

He tossed them onto the floor in front of the foreman.

“A level 150 Fire-affinity core and a trigger plate,” he said as he pointed at them. “There were also some shards of a Wind-affinity spatial crystal, but they disintegrated at the site of the blast.”

He didn’t bother going into the specifics that half of it had done so under his control.

“Put them all together and it makes a nice explosion,” he continued. “Not a very skilled one, though. Clumsy, really.”

“Sabotage?” The foreman froze in place as he stared at the remains of the device. He looked nervous, but not completely surprised.

It seemed he’d expected something similar.

“Yes,” Kelin said as he pointed at the device. “That’s what caused your mine to collapse. The explosion ruptured a number of mana crystals on the walls, causing the earthquake and the mana flood, although there’s a bit more to it. The tunnels are clear of monsters for now, but they’ll come back soon. I cleared them out on my way up.”

“Wait, you cleared the mine by yourself at Level 30?” The guard captain looked shocked as he interrupted, barking out the question. “In this high of a mana density?”

The guards behind him seemed stunned as well and their spears tilted further away from Kelin, but their grips tightened.

The captain’s words woke up the foreman, who’d been staring at the fire core, and his head whipped toward Kelin.

“Who are you to trespass here?” he growled, turning angry. “This isn’t your business. And how would you know anything about the explosion unless you were the one to cause it? Are you with the Wind Hunters?

“Turn out your bag!” he demanded. “Show me what else you took from this mine. I know your group wants something from here.”

“I’m hardly with the Wind Hunters,” Kelin replied, ignoring the order, “but it’s interesting to know they were responsible for that. I’ll keep an eye on them.”

He was already on bad terms with that group, since they were the ones who’d framed the kids. It was good to know they were up to other things as well. He hadn’t expected them to have a hand in this.

“And no,” he added, “while I have some connections to the Blade and Shield from Highmist, I’m not with anyone locally. You can say I’m from the Army of Silver Stars, if it makes you feel better. Or at any rate, I’m on good terms with them. I was heading there to check in.”

The Army of Silver Stars was the main force in the galaxy, the followers of the Sovereign of Silver Chaos. They had outposts on every world.

“You’re with the army?“ The guard captain spoke up again, but this time his voice was more polite. There was a trace of wariness there as well. 

“What would the army want with this place? It’s nothing.”

“It was about to be a Chaos Remnant,” Kelin said with a shrug as he slung his backpack back over his shoulders. “I was passing by, so I thought I would help out.”

That was enough of an explanation, and the captain knew it.

The army kept track of Chaos Remnants and used them for training. They had also formed a guild of sorts to patrol them as a looser organization, which was called the Stars Alliance. 

Technically, the guild was a reserve part of the army, but most people just treated it like an adventurers’ guild. 

It had more laid-back rules.

“It might still turn into one, but that’s up to you,” he added. “You’ll have to keep clearing it. That explosion broke through a wall into an old cavern that touches the mana vein, so this place is about to be very attractive to monsters. It’ll keep you busy.”

The captain frowned, but he changed his tack, examining Kelin more closely.

“I’ve never seen someone at Level 30 with the army,” he said, his wariness turning into a frown. “Which part are you with? Do you have any proof?”

“It’s an inherited position,” Kelin said drily. “As I said, I was about to check in and make it official. Feel free to confirm it with the outpost in the city, but you’ll have to wait until I reach town. I simply sensed the explosion on my way by and checked it out.”

It would’ve been nice if he could summon a Seal of Silver Stars, the main badge of the army, to prove his words, but he’d tried it on the way up and it hadn’t responded.

“That’s possible, I suppose…” the captain said, still frowning, “but why are you dressed in braggan hide clothing…? Those things mostly only appear in this mine.”

“I had to make some new clothes after my old set got burned down here.” Kelin shrugged. “Needs must and all. The braggans helpfully supplied the materials.”

“I don’t believe you,” the foreman snapped. “You have no proof. You’re probably just here to raid the mine, like the rest of those thieves. Those fragments aren’t proof you weren’t involved. How else would you know what they were? You’ll come with me and talk to the mining boss.”

Kelin raised an eyebrow at the man. His opinion of him was dropping swiftly, which was impressive considering it had started at rock bottom.

“Feel free to step inside,” he said as he waved at the cave around him. “If you can’t tell, I’m doing fine in this mana density, while you’re still lingering at the entrance. I’m quite certain that Level 30 members of the Wind Hunters or whoever wouldn’t be standing here so cheerfully.”

The mana density was a little lower than it had been at its peak, but not much.

Unless someone had the skills of a reborn archmage or at least a decent amount of mana control skill and a high affinity for Fire, they’d have to be around Level 150 to survive for long.

None of them stepped forward to take him up on the offer.

The guard captain looked at the foreman and shook his head, warning him not to go into the mine. None of them would have survived for long.

“How did you make it through this mine at Level 30?” the foreman demanded, turning angry as he saw that he couldn’t do anything. “That’s ridiculous!”

“He has a strange class,” the captain answered slowly. “It’s not impossible. I’ve never heard of a Soulfire Warden, but it sounds like a defensive class or even one that can make monsters fight among themselves. Maybe he was careful and avoided some of them. I doubt he cleared them all, but we’ll see.”

“You’ll find out soon enough,” Kelin said. “And you’re welcome to ask after me in town later, where you’ll find that I’ve checked in with the army and am not part of your bandit group. For now, farewell.”

With that, he hiked the pack up on his shoulder and walked straight toward the guards, effectively daring them to stop him.

The foreman tried to move into his path, but the guard captain grabbed him by the shoulder and held him back, shaking his head. 

His warning was clear. 

If Kelin really had cleared the mine by himself, the outcome of a battle was not in their favor, and if he was part of the army, even tangentially, they wouldn’t gain anything by interfering with him.

It was luckier for the guards than for Kelin. 

He would have tried to pull his punches, but with his current abilities it would have been difficult to avoid injuring them if they decided to attack.

He tracked their movements in his aura, but he didn’t bother looking at them as he walked by.

A few moments later, he was whistling a cheerful tune as he walked down the forest path toward Highmist.