Chapter 145: The FeastI tightened my grip on the bear pelt and stepped through the portal. My senses were o, but I was not prepared to walk straight into Brutus. “What in Pluto’s realm!” He barked at me. “Eryk? You’re alive?” He turned around, and Felix was right behind him. “Eryk’s back! Move bad let him out.” There was someone behind Felix as well, a small train of men.

  It was a little bit of a cluster getting everyoo turn around a the narrow snow tunnel in full, now ill fitted, armor. I don’t think they saw what I ulling behihe pany men were excited to see me alive as I ehe tavern. Mateo cheerfully said, “Told you he was still alive. Eryk could go to bed with a medusa in a brothel and e back satisfied with a smile.”

  The bear hide behind me was dragged into the room, and everyone’s eyes suddenly became fixed on the harvest. Everyone was silent. Benito rubbed his eyes with his good hand, “Tell me that is real. Please, someoell me that is real!”

  Maveith’s rge body moved forward and poked the meat with his hammer. His deep voice echoed, “It is real.” But he let out a long sigh in disappoi. “Eryk, you didn’t scrape the hide properly. You have fotten everyoaught you when we harvested the manticore. Don’t worry, luckily, we still save it.”

  The men didn’t wait any longer and started to sort through the leg quarters, ks of meat and mushrooms. Konstantin warned everyone, as he held a mushroom in hand, “The mushrooms are not poisonous but still o be cooked. If you eat them raw, you will regret your life decisions.” Konstantin, with his arm in a sling, me. Was this reition for doing a good job? I think I was momentarily stunned by the small sign nition.

  Castile and Adrian stood smiling nearby, “Eryk, e a.” I sat at a table while everyone else began to process the meat using practiced efficy.

  Lirkin yelled to our table, “Where is the liver, Eryk? Don’t tell me you didn’t get the liver! No kidneys here either? If you had brought the iines, we could have smoked some sausage.” His tone was not pletely serious, but he set. Adrian gave Lirkin a hard stare, stopping his pints about my animal processing skills. “I’ll make sure to learn more from Maveith iure.” I replied back at Lirkin. He gave a nod of approval iurn.

  Castile’s own smile slowly faded, “Well done. We were sending in teams to look for you.”

  “Teams?” I said, fused.

  Adrian warmed his hands and cracked his knuckles, “Yes, we figured out how the dungeon worked. You o be in tact with the others as you ehe portal. Up to four people eogether this way. There is oeam of four already ihe dungeon, but they should be back soon as they were not to leave the entry room. We started a mapping effort after you did not return.”

  Castile looked over at the men and asked curiously, “What kind of meat is that? How did you kill it?”

  Adrian added, “Whatever it is, it looks tastier than spider legs.” Castile gave him a sidelong snce as she had provided the spider legs.

  “It was a rge gray bear. At the end of a corridor was a room with a pool and just one bear. I distracted the bear and got a good strike on the head. My attack was so sudden the bear had trouble using its head to fight back.” I couldn’t help but smirk at my py on words. Rather than go into details, I gave as little information as possible. “It wasn’t easy. The rest of my time ent cutting up the beast,” I indicated the meat. Castile and Adrian looked over at the excited pany. I think their mouths were watering as well.

  I decided to tih the good news. “I found this in the reward chest after killing the bear.” The small potion vial was oable. Castile’s eyes popped and she snatched it and looked at the runes.

  Adrian already knew what it was, “A healing potion? Who gets it?”

  Castile firmed, “A greater healing potion.” Adrian and Castile had a lot of discussions as they went through the injuries in the pany. There was a lot of frostbite, but the only real use of the potion would be getting someone bat-effective again. That meant Konstantin was the most likely didate.

  Their discussion narrowed it down to Konstantin or Maveith. Castile looked at me, “Maveith is in some pain but should be fine, especially if we cim more of these.” She hadn’t released the potion from her grip. “Konstantin will heal with time, but if we are going to explore the dungeon, having our best scout capable would be the best use of it.”

  The decision was made. Adrian addressed me, “Go give it to him.” Castile relutly pced it oable, and I could see why. Her fiips were bck, and she had been hiding the advanced frostbite from us.

  Lirkin rushed over to our table, “ we start a fire? I know it is not dark yet, but the men might start eating the meat raw if I don’t cook it soon and bear o be cooked properly to be eaten safely. It is incredibly tough and greasy if not cooked properly!” I was about to produce the thermal sto paused. I had stuffed the box in my dimensional space with fish.

  Castile was sidering the request. I decided to show my st ace, “I have some fish, too,” I announced.

  Three sets of eyes turo me, and I dumped the fish oable. The pile of fish was the shape of my legion box and quickly spread out across the table as the fish slid across each other. Instead of praise from Lirkin, he scolded me, “You cut off the heads and tails! Eryk, those are the best parts for making soup!” He spped me on the ba jest much harder than I appreciated, “ime, just brihe entire fish.”

  Castile was smirking at my sternation at being criticized for failures. I leaned back to look Lirkin in the eyes to reply to him, “ime, Lirkin, you fight the bear solo and wiggle your toes ier to attrad catch the fish! My space is only so big.” I didn’t know if that was a thing, but I remembered noodling was a way to catch catfish using just your hands by wiggling your fingers.

  Lirkin got serious and apologized as my tone had been somewhat harsh, “I am sorry, Eryk. I appreciate your incredible effort. There is enough here to feed the pany for seven ht days. We might actually start putting ba some weight.”

  I stood, took the potion, and walked across the tavern to Konstantin. The aged scout was watg a table where four mehinly slig some meat and hanging it on a spear shaft to be dried and smoked. Standio Konstantin, I asked casually, “Konstantin, how is the arm?”

  “Colrbone is still broken, and fortunately, no iion has set in, unlike Firth” he replied grumpily.

  “Well, you just wotery.” I produced and held out the potion. His eyes held fusion as he puzzled out what I held in my outstretched hand.

  “You found a dungeon healing potion?” He muttered loud enough for almost everyoo hear. Everyoopped w and focused on the magical vial of life. There robably not a single person here who couldn’t be from the healing potion.

  “Castile decided you were the best person to e it. I don’t know why,” I said with some snark, letting everyone know it was Castile’s decision, not mine. Konstantin didn’t object to beied and took the vial, broke the dungeon seal, and draihe small vial. He winced, and an audible pop could be heard in the room from his shoulder as the magic alighe bone. Seds passed as Konstantin waited for the potion to finish its work.

  Konstantin windmilled his arm, testing his arm while his armor cttered from the movement. He looked around at the envious men, “Don’t worry. Now that I am healthy, Eryk and I will go and cim more healing potions ihe dungeon.” A few men nodded, and soon everyone was back to processing the meat, fish, and mushrooms.

  My mind was rag, though. If I had to explore the dungeon with three others, how was I going to use the collector? I could still probably use my dimensional kill, but losing so many essences was already starting to tug at my greedy nature. Maybe it was time to reveal I had the collector?

  The snow tuned as the group of four returned from expl the dungeoran. Bze, Linus, Lu, and Kolm emerged to see everyone cheerfully preparing the meat and starting a fire. The men in the room were all smirks at their surprise. Mateo poi me, “Eryk is alive and brought us dinner!” Their vision broke from the food preparation and turo me.

  I was sitting across from Maveith as he prepared the checkers board. I waved, and Bze walked over to me, hugged me, and cried. It was not a sobbing cry, just tears of joy at the feast being prepared. Kolm, Linus, and Lu just patted my pauldrons in appreciation as they made to help.

  Kolm hahe Schor a piece of paper, and I assumed the Schor was responsible for mapping the dungeon. The activity in the room got more lively as the fire grew to heat the room. Lirkin was lively as he went from prep station to station to guide the pany. Most of the work focused on preserving as much food as possible. Most of the fish were shoved into the snow iunnel. Lirkin had focused oing as much fat from the meat I cut as possible so he could fry the mushrooms and cubes of meat together.

  Each man was given a pte stacked with braised meat cubes and sauteed mushrooms. Lirkin had his cauldron simmering with fish bones after he had cut the fillets away and stuffed them in the snow. The fish soup was going to be the meal. Everyone in the pany stopped by at my table to thank me, and it felt good to be reized.

  The meal was interrupted a few times by wandering specters, a stark reminder of where we were and that we were still in danger. Konstantih Castile and Adrian, and I already knew he was trying to vihem to let him in the dungeon. The sun was setting, and suddenly, someone shouted, “Bird in the window.” There was a single window iavern that the snow had not covered. A small white owl had nded on the snow and was staring into the tavern, watg us eat.

  Adrian spoke, “Maybe it was not sent by the summoner.” Bze released an arrow, striking the gss and boung bato the room, not even crag the gss. “Use a runic arrow!” Adrian yelled, but it was too te. The owl took to the air and flew away.

  The mood iavern suddenly turned somber. Castile broke the mencholy, “The summoner would have found us eventually. Now that we know we ehe dungeon in groups of four, we always retreat into the dungeon. Now that the summoner knows where we are, we keep the fire going during the day.”

  Someoarted pounding the table like he was challenging the summoo e. Others quickly joined him until all of us pouhe stoables in unison. The beat built to a cresdo, and everyone cheered and then tio eat. Everyone slept that night with a full stomad tented smiles. Castile used her nightmare spell on a third of the men.

  In the m, Castile sent seven men, led by Konstantin, to the wine vault. I sat with Castile and Adrian. Castile was not as optimistic, “The storm elementals were not over the city this m.” Her tone was heavy.

  “How long do we have?” Adrian asked.

  “He is preparing a rge summoning circle just outside the city. My guess is a wyvern or some e flyi. The city is too deep in snow and has too many specters for anything on the ground to reach us iy’s ter,” Castile noted.

  Adrian thought on it, “He might have seen the dungeorance as well. The tree opy shielded it, but that owl was close.”

  “Are we going to send everyoo the dungeon?” I asked after a period of silence.

  Castile nodded, “I asked Konstantin to get as much wine as possible.” The weight of and on her, she announced, “We o decide what the groups of four will be.” There were twenty-three of us. Meaning there would be five groups of four and one group of three.

  Castile wanted me in her group with Adrian and Konstantin, but I didn’t want to leave Maveith. I felt I owed him something for influeng him to e with us. Castile ceded, and we assigned everyoo a team over the hour. The goal for the pany is to reunite ihe dungeon. We would spend the year living in the dungeon and the together in the hope the summoner had abandoned his pursuit.

  I looked at the groups and hoped I made a good choi lobbying for my entry team.

  Castile, Adrian, Konstantin, Bze

  Firth, Wylie, Mateo, Felix

  Eryk, Maveith, Schor Favian, Brutus

  Lu, Benito, Pavel, Lirkin

  Kolm, Linus, Donte, Fvius

  Cyrus, Soren, Remus

  ? Chted 2024 by AlwaysRollsAOne

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