Morcster Chef - Chapter 24 (Patreon)

“Well, this is new,” Belmont said. “It’s the most open dungeon I’ve ever seen.”

“Does anyone see the enemies?” Ming asked, turning in a slow circle. Arek did the same. The island rose up behind them like a small mountain. It was covered in a dense, lush jungle that started just a few feet behind the beach and the tall trees around them.  The ocean stretched out in every other direction. There was no sign of anything else on the island from where they stood.

“Maybe in the water,” Belmont said, eyeing the gentle ocean suspiciously. “They could also be hiding in the foliage. Don’t let your guard down. This is the highest rank dungeon we’ve ever been in. Danger is everywhere.”

“Even behind you?” Ming asked.

Belmont spun, drawing his sword from its sheath and bringing to bear before him. There was nothing there. He turned an eye toward Ming.

“Sorry, I couldn’t resist,” Ming said. “Don’t worry, Belmont. We can do this no problem. And look at all the trees! There has to be a bunch of tasty fruit waiting for us to find it. There are just some weak monsters in the way first.”

Belmont ground his teeth together and sighed, shaking his head. He put the sword away and drew his staff, speaking in the weary tone that only a father or exhausted older brother could muster. “You’re going to give me a heart attack before I turn thirty, Ming.”

“Yeah, yeah. It’s a good thing you’ve got healing magic,” Ming replied. She pulled a staff out of the bundle on her back and pointed it at the jungle before them. “Onward!”

Arek extended his hand, green magic lighting around his clothes as the runes on his claws flared. His guandao formed in his palms and armor shimmered over him. The orc spun the weapon and sliced some of the vines in front of them out of the way.

“Trees aren’t magically enforced,” he said. “I can cut through this no problem. I’ll take the lead.”

“I’ll be behind you,” Malissa said, her daggers at the ready. “I don’t really want to be taking too many fights in dense foliage, though. Spinning daggers around isn’t really conducive to tight quarters.”

“Neither are explosions,” Ming said as the Happy Sunflowers started into the jungle, their eyes sweeping for any sight of enemies. “But I’ve got some new stuff now, so I won’t be completely bad if it’s a close fight.”

Arek swept his guandao in broad slashes, carving the dense leaves and vines apart with ease. The jungle seemed to part before them as they burrowed into it. The occasional squawk of a bird or the chirp of bugs were the only things that joined the sounds of him hacking the leaves apart.

“I don’t understand what the bugs and birds are here for,” Ming whispered. “I mean, everything in the dungeon is fed by magical energy. That means only monsters should be here. So why are there normal things?”

Malissa flinched as Arek pushed a branch away and it snapped back, nearly smacking her in the face.

“Sorry,” Arek rumbled. “It didn’t snap.”

“It’s fine,” Malissa replied, shooting the stick an annoyed glare. “And maybe the bugs and birds are actually monsters? Or, at the least, maybe they can use magical energy to sustain themselves?”

“They can,” Belmont said. “Just like the plants here. Everything in a dungeon thrives off magical energy, although not everything needs it. Many of what we would consider normal lifeforms here are actually commonly used in potions for their magical properties.”

“Does that mean they’re worth a lot of money?” Ming asked, eyeing a large caterpillar on a leaf. She inched toward it and Belmont smacked her hand away, shooting her a warning glare.

“And also potentially dangerous. Most creatures we run into aren’t going to be worth much anyway, and none of us know enough about them to tell if we’ve got something worth getting. Transporting it just isn’t worth the trouble. And don’t eat the caterpillar.”

Ming threw her hands up and crossed them in front of her chest, pouting. “Damn. But it’s so colorful!”

“Probably means its dangerous,” Arek said with a chuckle, cutting away a veritable wall of vines and nearly stepping into a clearing that stretched open before him. He froze, holding a hand up, and the others all snapped their mouths shut behind him.

The clearing was wide enough for a small crowd and roughly circular. Four large, yellow flowers the size of a human man grew at the back of it, thorny branches wrapping around their bases and stretching out like limbs. They swayed faintly in what little breeze made it through the jungle.

“What are the chances those things come alive and try to kill us?” Arek whispered.

Belmont poked his head out next to the orc’s shoulder. “One hundred. Anyone have fire?”

“I can make them explode,” Ming said in a hushed tone, barely able to contain her excitement. “That’s basically fire.”

“Might as well,” Arek muttered. “They’re giving us the first move, after all. It would be rude not to take them up on it.”

Belmont nodded, his knuckles white around the hilt of his pink staff. “Let’s do it. Make sure to get inside the arena as soon as Ming attacks, though. We don’t want to somehow get separated.”

They all nodded. Ming drew in a slow breath and aimed her staff. Her eyes narrowed in concentration, and she let it out in a shrill whistle. Blue energy erupted from her staff. It leapt across the clearing and passed through the first flower, jumping to the second before a string of loud explosions traced its path.

Pure magic tore through the air, ripping the first plant to pieces. The spined vines around the second one twitched, managing to form a rough cocoon before Ming’s magic struck it, tearing much of the foliage apart.

The Happy Sunflowers charged into the clearing. Arek made a beeline for one of the uninjured plants as it ripped itself free of the ground, vines twisting around it. One lashed out at him. With a grunt, he vaulted over it and brought his guandao on a second one, splitting the green tendril in two.

A dagger sailed over his shoulder, burying itself in the center of the flower. A hissing screech escaped the creature and it flailed viny appendages all around itself, trying to keep Arek back.

The orc ignored lowered his grip on the guandao and thrust it like a spear. Sharp spikes scraped along his energy armor, but they couldn’t pierce it. His weapon punched home into the center of the plant and he twisted it, trying to do as much damage as possible.

To his side, another series of explosions rang out. Plant matter splattered across the ground and petals flew through the air in a beautiful dance. Malissa charged another plant, vaulting past its attempts to stop her in a blur of silk and steel.

Arek’s opponent twitched, taking advantage of his distraction to send a thorny vine whipping for his throat. He caught the attack with his free hand, barely looking back at the flower.

Malissa’s fight with her flower was mesmerizing. Tendrils whipped past her, but nothing could get close enough to touch the spinning woman. Every time a vine managed to get past her acrobatics, Belmont’s reactionary shields blocked the attack before it could strike home.

A screech escaped Arek’s pinned monster and it smacked him in the head with a vine. He snarled, battle rage flaring as he surged forward, ignoring the beating appendages as he drove the guandao further into the flower’s body.

His armor flickered from the constant beating, but he managed to get his other fist far enough into the mass to shove it into the center of the flower. He grabbed as much of the soft matter as he could and pulled.

The flower screeched, then fell silent as the vines collapsed around him. Arek shuddered as the pleasure of victory washed over him. He gathered himself and stood upright. Malissa had finished off her opponent, and Ming had destroyed the other two flowers beyond recognition.

“You okay, Arek?” Belmont asked with a frown. “You look distracted.”

“Apologies,” Arek said, dismissing his guandao and shaking the plant guts off his glowing hands. “The battle rage nearly got me. It really is closer to the surface than it has been for a long time.”

“Are you going to be fine doing this dungeon?”

“I should be,” Arek replied, pushing confidence into his tone. “I’ve dealt with it when it was far worse than this. It will be good training for my self-control. I will be sure to let you know if I feel like I am about to lose myself. I should be able to extract myself from the fight before that happens, though.”

“What if it happens in an important fight?” Belmont asked. “We need your abilities.”

Arek sent a pointed glance at the mushed remains of Ming’s flowers. They were scattered all over her side of the clearing. “I think you’ll all be fine, even if I have to stop fighting for a little. You’re a lot stronger than you realize.”

Ming plucked a petal from the pulped corpse of one of the flowers and inspected it quizzically. “You think this is edible?”

“Anything is edible once,” Malissa said with a smirk. Her eyes went wide and she snatched it out of Ming’s hands. “That was not an invitation to eat the flower. It was a joke.”

“I know. I’m not an idiot.” Ming rolled her eyes. “And I’m pretty sure that, even if they were poisonous, I could eat at least two of the flowers before they got me. Maybe even three.”

“Maybe you should have loftier goals than that,” Arek suggested. “I don’t think you want to be known for taking out three flowers by eating them before you died of poisoning.”

“Maybe if I could get all four. That would be pretty impressive.”

They all laughed. Arek nudged what was left of his flower and glanced around the clearing. “Jokes aside, that really wasn’t too hard at all. This dungeon was E ranked, wasn’t it?”

“You’re a former C rank,” Belmont said. “Of course it was easy – but I see what you’re saying. Even the fishman dungeon was harder than this. Perhaps a lot of the danger is further on. We can’t let our guards down.”

“Agreed,” Arek said. He summoned his guandao once more and stepped past the plants. “Shall we continue?”

Everyone fell in behind him and Arek cut through the vines at the other side of the clearing, pushing forward once more.

They traveled for several minutes, cutting through the jungle and making their way toward the center of the island. It quickly turned to an uphill trek that slowed their progress considerably.

The air was hot and moist, and it didn’t take long before all of the Happy Sunflowers were completely soaked in sweat. Buzzing insects flew by them and perched on leaves, watching them pass.

Ming squashed a few of them, but that didn’t seem to do much to dissuade the others. Arek’s eye twitched as a mosquito landed on his armor. It tried to poke its nose through the cracks and he smacked it, squishing the bug.

“I take it back,” he grunted. “This dungeon is awful. It’s the worst one we’ve ever gone through.”

Belmont swatted a bug on his arm and growled in agreement. “I hate this place.”

“You’re one to complain,” Malissa grumbled, waving some of the buzzing bastards away. “You’ve got a magic bubble spell. Just use it.”

“No. That would be a waste of magic. What if we need it later?”

“If you just eat a bunch of food, you’ll have more magic,” Ming said. “Say…”

“Don’t eat the bugs.”

“Never mind.”

Ming dug through her bag and pulled out some jerky, munching on it as they walked. Arek tried to keep himself alert, but the constant droning of the insects surrounding them was starting to get on his nerves.

It was difficult to remain focused when there were bugs trying to crawl into places that no bug should have ever been allowed entrance to. He growled, pouring a little extra energy into his armor. That only seemed to attract more of the annoying creatures to him.

“Bugs like light,” Malissa said helpfully. “You might want to turn the glow off.”

“It does not turn off. It’s magic,” Arek grumbled. “Unlike Belmont, I do not have any invisible powers. Just glowing green energy. And punches. Those work too.”

“Are punches really magic?” Ming asked. “I don’t think those count.”

“We can ask someone I’ve punched and see what they say,” Arek suggested. He smushed a group of the flying annoyances with a single blow and shook them off his gauntlet with a grimace.

Malissa went to respond, but Arek didn’t get a chance to hear what she said. Something slammed into him, throwing the orc to the ground as his armor flared in protest. He hit it hard, his head ringing and spinning for an instant.

A blast of magic sailed over his head and there was a crash amongst the trees before them. Arek staggered to his feet with a roar, red and green hues creeping over his vison. He pushed them back, refusing to let the battle rage take over.

Tendrils of pure magic stretched past him, pinning a huge jaguar to the trees in front of Arek. Malissa dashed past him as the cat hissed and struggled against its bindings, trying to break free.

She vaulted over the creature, streamers of daggers whipping around her. One of them struck a tree buried into it, throwing the rest of the flying steel off and turning what would have been a deadly spin into a series of disappointing clinks as her weapons struck each other.

Belmont erected a shield around Malissa instants before the jaguar lunged at her. Its teeth scraped across the pink disk with a screech. Belmont thrust his staff into the staff bared his teeth, shrinking the shield and forcing it into the cat’s mouth.

“I can’t let the tendrils drop to cast another spell!” Ming warned. “It’s too fast.”

Arek shook his head, trying to get the world to stop spinning in front of him. He narrowed his eyes and reared back, launching the guandao at the cat. The large weapon sailed through the air and struck the monster in the side, punching clean into it.

Malissa launched herself at the cat while it was distracted. She swung herself onto its back and drove blades into both of its ears. It yowled in pain and Arek bounded up to it, grabbing the guandao and ripping it free.

The cat whipped its body and Ming’s restraints shattered. It lunged for Malissa, but Arek’s fist caught it in the face on the way. He felt bone shatter under the force of the blow and the jaguar’s head slammed into the tree.

He didn’t let up and unleashed several more strikes into the monster’s head. His armor flared with each blow, and the wood behind the cat cracked and splintered from the force of the strikes.

“It’s dead, Arek,” Ming said.

Arek paused. Blood was dripping from his gauntlets. The jaguar was still and unmoving, its head pulverized. He shoved himself to his feet with disgust.

“Is everyone okay?”

“You’re the only one that got hit,” Malissa said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “It looked like you fell pretty hard. Are you okay?”

“Should be. Belmont, want to give me a dose of healing just in case? The world is spinning a little.”

Belmont nodded, walking up and placing his staff on Arek’s chest. A course of warmth rushed into the orc and he let out a relieved sigh, shaking his head. “That hurt considerably more than I thought it was. That thing came out of nowhere.”

“Was that battle rage?” Belmont asked. “You were wailing on it for quite a while there.”

“No,” Arek replied, but it took him a moment to answer. “At least, I don’t think it was. I didn’t feel like I was lost in the rage. I was just a little disoriented and angry. Battle rage feels different.”

“Even with the modification from the Blessed One curse?”

“I… I’m not sure,” Arek admitted. “It’s been strange recently, but I don’t think I lost control of my actions there. We should definitely keep an eye on it for now, though. I don’t know what’s going on.”

“I will,” Belmont promised. “And Ming, speaking of the curse, have you felt anything at all? You’re affected, but you still haven’t shown any signs of the symptoms.”

“Nope. Nothing is different,” Ming replied with a shrug. “That feels like it should be relevant, but I don’t know why its like this. Do you think it’s got something to do with the amount of magic I’ve got?”

“It’s possible,” Belmont mused. “But if that were the case, why wouldn’t Malissa have been affected? If anything, it looks like the curse targeted people with stronger magic. You and Arek both got it, but yours is… different, somehow.”

“What if it did?” Arek rubbed his chin but didn’t stop scanning the area for more predators. If there was one jaguar, there could be another. “If it went for the strongest magic, my runes are fairly strong and Ming’s magic is the strongest here. But maybe Ming’s magic was so strong that the curse couldn’t overwhelm it, so it’s just latent?”

“That could be a possibility,” Belmont said. “No real way to confirm it, though. And that also means that, if there’s some way to strengthen the Blessed One curse, Ming could fall under it as well. That would be very bad.”

“Very bad would be an understatement.” Malissa shuddered. A bug whizzed past her face and she clapped, squashing it. “Let’s focus on dealing with the dungeon for now. We can’t afford any more distractions.”