Rune Seeker

Hiral’s feet stretched for the ground speeding by. He pulled on both ropes, trying to drop those last few inches, but he still passed the fourth person. The wall wasn’t more than ten feet in front of the fifth and final person, but they’d had twice that distance to land and get their momentum under control. Out of options, he pulled down hard on both ropes. The edges of the parachute collapsed in, and he dropped like a rock.

Feet churning, he hit the ground at practically a sprint—far too close to the wall—and hop-skipped from one stone to the next while trying to slow down. If it’d been flat ground, he could’ve done it no problem, but the lay of the rocks meant he had to keep aiming for the next secure foothold, or he’d faceplant.

One step, two steps, three… He wasn’t going to stop in time…

Something yanked hard on his back, so much so that one of his feet kept going so that the sole of his boot hit the stone wall and helped absorb the last of his forward inertia. But thankfully, that was the worst of it, and he settled his leg under himself while he turned around to catch of glimpse of Seena and Nivian holding on to the back of his wingsuit before his parachute dropped down to envelop them.

A minute of struggling with the fabric to free them, and then everybody sort of just looked at him.

“Thanks,” he said. “Landing was harder than it looked.”

Two of the five in the back gave each other a look, but it was Nivian who spoke. “You sure you’ve never used a wingsuit before?”

“Never,” Hiral said. “Couldn’t you tell by the landing that almost involved me being smeared on the rock?” He thumbed over his shoulder.

“You must’ve put points in Int and Wis to pick it up that quickly. You were practically a natural.”

Hiral considered the words while the others slid their parachute-packs off their shoulders and began to take off the wingsuits. “Wait,” he said to Nivian. “You expected me to do worse than that?”

“Much worse,” Nivian said.

Hiral opened his mouth to ask just how much worse, but Seena shook her head and pointed at his tangled parachute on the ground.

“The wingsuit and the parachute should fit in the pack, even if it’s messy,” she said. “Get it in and make sure it’s closed well. We’ll store them nearby to get picked up next rotation.”

“If we leave them here, how will we get back to the islands?” Hiral asked.

“We store wingsuits at all the jump points,” Seena said. “Now, pack.”

“Sure,” Hiral said, following the instructions. He took off the wingsuit, careful to keep his tattoos covered. Since he couldn’t use them, he just didn’t want to deal with the questions, and that wasn’t even including Nivian’s opinion of the Shapers. With the suit off, he then went to work on getting it all in the pack. It was a tight fit, all bunched up like it was, but he got it all in only a minute after Seena finished hers. “What now?”

“Now we go find my sister and her party,” Seena said, pulling out three pieces of wood from another small pack and assembling them into some kind of staff about as tall as she was.

The only other person who seemed to have a weapon was one guy with a spear, though the guy next to him looked like he had small blades on his joints. Nivian and the other guy don’t seem to have weapons. Wait… that other guy…

Hiral paused, looking at the fifth member of the Nomad party, then back to Nivian again. A second Nivian?Did I hit my head on the way down…?

“Wule is my twin brother,” Nivian said, the confusion on Hiral’s face evident.

“The good-looking twin,” Wule added.

“More like the scrawny one,” Nivian said, and the man had a point. While their faces were almost identical, their actual bodies couldn’t be more different, with Nivian solid and Wule… average?

“How did I not notice this before?” Hiral asked.

“Not enough points in attunement?” Wule joked.

“I… My attunement is decent…” Hiral started.

“More likely the whole jumping-off-an-island-again thing,” Nivian said.

“Guys, not important right now,” Seena snapped, both Wule and Nivian jerking upright and the grins vanishing from their faces like they’d never been there. “You can debate who has the bigger nose later. You all ready?”

“Just about,” Nivian mumbled with a small bob of his head.

She’s definitely the party leader, just like she said.

Then she looked at Hiral, one eyebrow slowly climbing toward her hairline.

“Ready!” he said, grabbing his harness from his pack and slinging it over his shoulders.

His two short-swords went in the sheaths, the hilts just barely poking up above his shoulders, and he did a couple of quick checks to make sure they drew smoothly.

“What sort of merchant’s apprentice carries swords?” asked one of the Nomads Hiral didn’t know—the one with the spear.

“Technically not his apprentice,” Hiral said. “Guard. And appraiser, I guess.”

“Appraiser?” the man asked.

“For the quills,” Hiral answered while Nivian stuffed the packs in a small nearby cleft in the rocks.

Deep enough to keep the rain out, but narrow enough nothing too big would call it home. Actually, that brought up the question of what else besides Quillbacks lived on the surface.

“Ah. Makes sense since that’s the main thing he trades for,” the man said before tapping himself on the chest. “I’m Yanily, by the way. You can use those? The swords, I mean.”

“Only ever used them in training. Against people. Not against… What…what exactly are we going to run into down here?”

“Hopefully nothing, if we keep quiet and move quickly,” Seena said, joining the pair. “As soon as Nivian is…”

“Done,” Nivian said, joining them.

“Okay, let’s get a couple of things straight before we move. First off, since you actually survived the jump… Everybody, this is Hiral. You all saw him save Favela, which is why I agreed to let him come.”

“Really didn’t think I was going to make it, did you?” Hiral asked.

“She had odds set at eighty-twenty against,” Yanily said. “Don’t worry, I bet on you making it. And now I’m going to clean up when we get back. Woo, drinks on me.”

The other four glared at Yanily—which meant they’d all actually bet against him surviving. Great start.

“Moving on,” Seena said quickly. “First off, everything I tell you falls within the bounds of the agreement with Arty and bringing you to the dungeon. Meaning, you can’t share anything you learn.”

“You sure we can trust him? Just because we know he survived the jump doesn’t mean anybody up above does,” Wule said.

“Uh…” Hiral started and took a step back, but it was Seena who spoke up.

“I’ve chosen to trust him.” She didn’t even bat an eyelash at the casual murder conversation.

“Okay, just making sure,” Wule said.

“Now, where was I? Right. The goal is to avoid fighting if we can. Normally, we fight for the class experience and to improve our PIM

, but…”

“PIM?” Hiral interrupted.

“Personal Interface Magic,” Seena said. “Your tattoo line things. We have something similar, but it takes the form of roots that run through our body. From what we know, they function the same way. Enhance our stats, let us use abilities like how your Shapers turn their tattoos into objects. Can you do anything like that?”

Hiral just shook his head.

“No problem. We move in six-person teams because our ancestors said something about dungeons only letting six people in. We’ve never run into the issue, but that’s still how we build our teams. Because of this, we’ve got roles to make our parties more efficient. With me so far?”

“Where’s your usual sixth?” Hiral asked.

“Wife was in labor. I couldn’t ask him to come on such a risky mission with a little one on the way.” Seena waited for Hiral to nod before continuing. “Nivian is our tank. Means he gets our enemy’s attention and keeps it on him. Wule”—she pointed at the man who’d suggested murdering Hiral and lying about it—“who you’ve been introduced to, is our healer. Pretty self-explanatory, that one.”

Note to self: Don’t get injured.

“Yanily and Vix are our heavy hitters. Dungeon terminology would be damager dealers, which is fitting.”

Yanily had his spear, which had been assembled similarly to Seena’s staff, while the one named Vix was the last member. He strapped on a pair of clawed knuckles to go along with the short blades on his knees, elbows, and heels.

“I got classified as support,” Seena continued. “Our sixth was a scout and damage dealer, but I’m not expecting you to do that. Like I said, we’re avoiding fights…”

“But I’m so close to hitting level nineteen,” Yanily whined, tapping the butt of his spear on the ground.

“Avoiding fights. That said, if we don’t have a choice, just let us handle it. I’m sure you’d like the experience and all, but more likely than not, you’d get in the way,” Seena told Hiral bluntly.

…Everfail…

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Hiral said, forcing himself not to wince at the implication. She was likely correct, though. If their—what did she call it?—PIM was similar to his Meridian Lines, Yanily at level 18 would have 54 more attribute points to distribute. Sure, Hiral’s base stats were high because of his training, but he just couldn’t compete with PIM-enhanced stats on top of base attributes if they trained like he did. “But, if I see an opportunity to help, or if one of you needs me… I’m not standing by and doing nothing.”

“Only a few things around this dungeon pose much of a threat to us—it’s only E-Rank, after all—and anything we can’t tackle, we avoid or run from,” Seena said with a shrug.

“How far is the dungeon from here?” Hiral asked, moving on.

“Less than a mile, and there’s a path straight there. Won’t take long. Anybody else have any questions? Did I forget anything?”

“Did you bring lunch, Nivian?” Yanily asked.

“Anything important?” Seena asked flatly.

“Sandwiches in my pack,” Nivian said quietly, and Yanily gave him a not-so-subtle thumbs-up.

“Anything else?” Seena asked, staring at Yanily like she was daring him to speak again.

Five heads shook in the negative, and Seena pointed down the path with her staff. “Nivian, take the lead. Without Julka here, keep your eyes open. Usual order. Hiral, you’re in the back.”

“Watch and learn, Mr. Appraiser,” Yanily said good-naturedly.