SB: Chapter 269 – Hidden Settlement (Patreon)

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There was a large settlement of beastkin in a canyon, where the dungeon entrance was located. I had spotted the illusion over the top of the canyon once I got close enough. It was remarkably well designed with how well it blended into the terrain on either side of the canyon.

I had Ozy make a cave home next to the canyon and then tunnel in a small viewing port below their illusion at the top to get a better sense of how dangerous things were.

The canyon was insanely deep, at least a kilometer, going past the ice sheet and into the bedrock below. I called it a canyon, but it was more a massive crack or crevice in the landscape, with ends that came back together.

Unless someone was trying to get here deliberately, they would never find this place. As for not having any observation up top, that made sense. Any structure or being above their barrier, would be easily detected.

From what I could make out of the barrier, it had anti-divination and Mana dispersal properties. As for the settlement itself, it was dense and built into the rock below the ice about half a kilometer below the illusion barrier. Best estimate, there had to be at least a quarter million beastkin below.

I could see greenery, magical lighting, and an actual functioning civilization. Being so far from the ice and the wind, meant they didn’t have as many problems with heat. With no demons or other beastkin knowing about this place, it could easily go undiscovered.

With a dungeon entrance, they could get all the cores they wanted to power their settlement. A quarter of a million was based on what I could see and how dense they were all packed together. I didn’t think I was off by more than 25,000.

That meant they would have legends and likely be hostile to anyone finding them. The dungeon entrance was undoubtedly heavily protected as well. If it were just Ozy and myself, I had no doubt we could sneak into the dungeon. But with Boris, it would be far harder.

I didn’t want to become a tunnel fiend again, since legends would probably be able to detect such activity so close to their settlement. I had never considered there would be a beastkin settlement like this hidden out here. At worst I figured a demon, possibly a super monster. But a settlement gave me some hope of getting into the dungeon, while also being annoyingly difficult.

A place this large probably had at least 25 active legends. A good rule to follow was one legend for every 10,000 people or beastkin in this case. This was far less than the Eldarin continent estimate. Their entire society was martially focused and they didn’t appear to have that many other industries. So instead of the 1 legend per 100,000, 1 per 10,000 for the beastkin was a more reasonable estimate based on what I knew.

It could be a bit more or less, and highly likely several legends were in the dungeon, but it was a good guideline to determine the number of legends in comparison to the population. One of the many studies the College had done over the years and one they used to advertise how obvious things weren’t obvious unless you paid for their research.

Fighting was out. I might be decently strong and might surprise one legend with my sword, but I would be harassed to death and brought down at range. It was an interesting discovery, but one that I couldn’t do anything about.

There was no desperate need like the time we had to escape the Wolf Clan settlement that was being besieged by demons. Better to find another dungeon entrance. The one I had used to get off this continent the last time in that ruined city would be a good choice. I focused on the city, not the dungeon entrance and my Compass Of Desire pointed in another direction.

It wasn’t horribly far. I would guess around 500 to 700 kilometers, but it would take time and it was annoying. I had Ozy seal up the observation port and had us leave. No point in staying right next to their settlement.

After leaving the ice cave we started to walk away, when my Danger Sense rose slightly. “Who are you?” a young male beastkin asked us. He was covered in heavy clothing, but I could tell he was young due to his height.

“Just travelers leaving, we want nothing to do with your settlement,” I replied.

“There are no travelers around here. There is nothing around here. I just come up to train my skills. Where are you from?”

“Far away, which we are headed towards now, sorry for disturbing you.” Our hoods were up and our faces partially covered to block out the wind and cold.

I turned away and we began walking again. My Danger Sense began to rise. I stopped and looked about carefully with my sensory and vision skills. Nearest beastkin, I asked Compass Of Desire, and it was pointing in a direction off to the side of the beastkin child. I turned in that direction and placed my hand on my blade.

“I suggest you let us leave peacefully. We want no trouble,” I declared.

An older beastkin emerged, shimmering into view. “Gramps! What are you doing out here?” the child asked while his grandfather kept looking at us.

“Keeping an eye on you and your training. Stay behind me and be ready to run if I tell you to,” the old beastkin said.

“You planning to fight me?” I asked calmly.

“Depends if you answer my questions or not,” the old beastkin replied.

“You are what, level 80, an elite at best? Not even a legend,” I pushed back at his demand.

“And you are stronger?” he challenged.

“Yes. I did see through your stealth skill.” I used Danger Sense and an insanely powerful divination skill to counter him.

“Unity has remained hidden for a long time. No demons have escaped us once sighted.”

“And I am no demon. I am a human,” I countered and the old beastkin was shocked.

“What is a human, gramps?” the child asked.

“A race driven off this continent long ago. A very dangerous race. We have endured and have never forgotten what was done to us,” the old beastkin said.

“Wasn’t me and not my problem. I am leaving and don’t care about any of you to be honest,” I replied with a shrug.

“I am afraid, I can’t-”

“Slice. Slice.”

Ozy had caused the ice to surge up around both their feet. The old beastkin wasn’t ready for such a quick spell skill and lost his head along with his grandson. The ice and snow were dyed red with their lifeblood.

“Dispose of them,” I commanded Ozy. He flew over and began breaking apart their bodies into a slurry and sinking them into the ice. It took a minute before there was nothing but white snow and ice where two had been before. I pulled out a scent concealing potion and poured it over the area before we left.

“Let’s get moving. We need to get as much distance between us and this settlement as possible,” I ordered.

It was a sad ending, but the beastkin were too hostile. Any lie would be seen through. While I had the skill Deception, my appearance and that of Boris would quickly be revealed after a couple of questions asking us to show our faces.

The beastkin were just too hostile to other races. I understood why, but that also meant they had to accept hostility from me in return as I traveled about their continent. It was a shame and a bit sad, but ultimately necessary.

If I could have avoided fighting, I would have. But if I left them alive, they would have alerted the settlement and the legends present there. It was better to just kill them quickly and get it over with. I had mentioned being human to see their reactions and confirm what I had to do as well as knowing a lie wouldn’t work.

When we finally stopped, the stop was to only sleep and recover a bit before heading out again. After the minimum of 6 hours of sleep we were back up and moving.

If we could escape from pursuit that would be nice, but I wasn’t holding out hope. There would be a conflict, likely against a legend. It all depended on how important that old beastkin and his grandchild were. Also, the investigative and tracking skills of whomever looked into their deaths.

There were no bodies visible and the remains were frozen under the ice and any scent had been removed. We were also wearing scent concealing cloaks. Now was the moment to see how well these things truly worked.

While they had worked before, I hadn’t killed anyone. Now with two deaths, there was likely to be a strong response. It was also less the deaths than the location of where the two died. Such deaths would indicate that something had stopped by the settlement and knew its location.

They would probably think that I was a demon and that I was going to get more demons. Regardless, they would want to keep their location secret like the gnomes. That was why I was sure there would be a response.

The challenge would be to get to the dungeon entrance before they caught up with us. Pushing things, we could get there in about 20 days, since the temperature was warmer and we could go further each day. Also, Boris was adapting to the cold temperatures and the long treks.

I kept checking behind us regularly, but never noticed any pursuit. But I wasn’t going to be confident of escape until we were in the dungeon. Such a large settlement that had runes, probably had other legacies they had preserved. There was a good chance there were divination type skills.

While I used my anti-divination skills, it wasn’t like they would alert me if I was being tracked. They just reduced the traces of Mana that divination skills latched onto. Also, the anti-divination skills didn’t work well with other skills like Cold Immunity or while sleeping.

A big downside, but after my recent experiences, I saw them in a new light. They were best for countering passive sensory skills if a person had enough time. It was rare to find another use for a skill like that, but that required having a flexible mind and not rigidly putting skills into categories.

While the College and others put general labels on skills, those were labels to describe a group of skills, but some skills could cross over into other areas. Divination and sensory skills had a lot of overlap in that regard, like how Dancing could be used in combat for movement and as a social skill.

A person could have a System Priest group up their skills in a more segmented manner, but most people didn’t do that with their status. Rigid thinking wasn’t always a good thing. But I was considering doing that for spell skills, maybe. It wasn’t something urgent and I knew what skills I had. Breaking them up in a tier would just create more confusion. I just had a lot of skills and had to learn to deal with that.

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