Chapter 27

Gods above, so many spiders. I'm just glad we could eliminate them before they became a problem. Although, we had problems trying to get the skeletons off the trees. The upper part was full of webbing and Choco didn't want to fly up there. So, we were limited to the ones nearest to us. There were two that we pulled off the tree. Searching whatever containers they had yielded some gold pieces, a few gems and a pair of glasses. They had dark-green lenses. Nice, we might have something magical here, though we have no idea if they are or not.

After all that, we backtracked and tried going around the web lair. Thanks to Matsuri, it was easily done. Although, I'm starting to think we were heading the wrong way. I was confirmed when we got out of the forest at evening time and found the Lake of Dusk. As usual, it was really beautiful to look at in the evening, but we were way off course. Thankfully, we were right next to a path. Going north, we could see a city there. I must be honest. I wanted to check out the city. I think Choco noticed because she suggested it immediately. Of course, I jumped at the chance. Hi, hi.

The city of Merkath was astounding. Built right into the mountain itself, it was a city of dwarven make.

"Mostly dwarves, but there are a lot of other races living here as well," informed Choco, "Merkath mostly relies on mining to fund the city, so they have to trade for food. Hunting helps but not by much."

"You think we can find someone to identify this?" asked Subaru, fiddling with the eyeglasses.

"I'm sure we can."

"Maybe find an inn first before making plans in the middle of the street," snarked Towa.

"Fair enough," agreed the fighter.

After getting directions from a guard, they entered the rather homely building.

"Welcome to the Whetstone. How many rooms do ya need?" greeted a jovial dwarf with a red beard.

"One with two beds and one with three, please," requested Choco.

"Alright, here ya are. A gold piece for the rooms. If your group wants dinner, that'll be another piece, " said the dwarf as he handed over two keys.

"Good enough, sir," she replied as she handed over two gold pieces.

"Right, I'll be sending ya food up soon," he said as he waved them on.

"Right, Subaru and Rushia take this one. We can share the other," decided the tiefling as they walked upstairs to their rooms.

"Aww, let me share one room with Rushia," pleaded Matsuri.

"No," the young necromancer said immediately.

"Aww, come on..."

"No."

"I think you should let it go, Matsuri," chided Subaru, "I doubt she would change her mind."

Amidst the chuckles and grumblings, they went to their rooms. They settled in for the night after partaking their dinner.

Relief could not be imagined. I was honestly worried that we would be too drained to get into another fight. Thankfully, the spiders weren't too hard. It could have been harder. Call us lucky. Back to the city though, we quickly found buyers for the gems we found. The armor... the plate armor, when fully reassembled, impressed the smith quite a bit. Since it hasn't been used at all, we got a lot of gold for it. Using some for repairing our stuff was a given. Matsuri bought more arrows. Then, we sought out someone who could check the glasses out.

"Hmm, interestin' item ya got 'ere," muttered the dwarven jeweler as he examined it with his own pair of eyeglasses, "Where di'ya find it?"

"Well, it was on a corpse near an ettercap nest?" answered Subaru, not really knowing what to call that monster's home, "Do you know what does it do?"

"Aye, I do," he replied as he laid it down on the counter, "These lenses help ya' see in the dark. Dinae why they put it on a flimsy frame like this. Why, it'd snap in half if ya 'ply any pressure init."

"So… can you put them on something else?" she asked, wondering if he could do anything else with it. Maybe in a helm or…

"Well, I can put in a betta' frame and put a tight strap on it to kip in ya 'ead," he suggested, "A tougher, more sturdy frame wou' do it."

"Oooh… that sounds expensive though… how much would it cost?" she asked.

"Well… we kin' make 'em frames with mithral. Tough and light.," he mused, "Good quality leather for straps. I say… eight hundred gold."

"Eh, that's a lot," she muttered, "What goes into this?"

"Ma' brother's a blacksmith. I kin get some stuff from 'im, but I'd 'ave ya know that making the mould and using mithral is expensive but worth the price. It'll be hard to bend or break and lasts longer than yer armor, I rekin'. This wi' also take some time ta' get right." He paused and then suggested, "If ya find it too much, mehbe ya kin do somethin' fer the fella's at the mine. "

"Well, we can pay, no worries," she assured him, though curious about what he said, "And, we wouldn't mind helping out with any problems the mine might have."

"Aye! Mighty kind of ya," he replied with a grin, "Right, ya go to the mine an' tell the foreman Ragnar Emberheart sent ya. He'll tell ya what's up."

After thanking him, the party headed straight for the mining office. The large dwarf got up and shook hands with Subaru after she told him about what Ragnar said.

"Ah, that old man, ha, ha," he said jovially as he sat down again, "Right, nice to see some young 'uns doing something useful to help."

"So, do you need help with anything?" she asked.

"Aye, I do. We have run into a little problem in one of the newer branches we opened up," he informed them as he unfurled a map, "Only recently, we found signs of an umber hulk burrowing around that area. While some of the miners think that this is a good thing, but those are the risk-takers. I don't want to lose miners to an overgrown bug."

"Hmm, I don't think we ever fought one before," muttered the fighter.

"I wouldn't imagine you would. These things won't be walking around in the sun. Too bright, you see," he continued to explain, "I remember an earlier time where we found an umber hulk nest at the younger days of the mine. So many miners dead... and we had to hire a group of adventurers to help us. So, we need to get on top of this before it gets worse."

"Anything we need to know?"

"Honestly, I don't know. A lot of the surviving miners talk about suddenly losing their minds when they looked at it," he stated as he kept the map away, "I asked the party… what was left of them, they talked about random bouts of suddenly running away or running towards the beast. I dinae what happened, but it sounds like some mind trickery going on."

"Well, I'm not sure what we could do to fight that, but we'll try our best," admitted Subaru.

"Thank you. A'ight, follow me. I'll show you to the branch in the mine," he stated as he got up from his table and walked out of the office. Then, he led them down into the mines.

The tunnels were lit up with torches. The wooden beams looked old, with the newer branches having newer-looking beams. Eventually, they reached the intended branch. The foreman approached a hastily made set of double-doors and unlocked it.

"Right, this is where we part," the foreman informed them, "I'll lock you in and wait for all of you here. There are several hulk-made tunnels up ahead. Be careful. If you can't find it… well, we can always come back tomorrow."

"Alright, sir. Take care," wished the fighter as the door closed behind them. Up ahead, torches also lined the walls, but the intervals between them were wider.

"Let's get prepared for this," Choco told them, "Then, we keep a sharp eye for anything strange."

"As long as there aren't any spiders, I'm fine with it," muttered Towa with a shudder.

The first day was tiring, to be honest. We randomly chose one tunnel and trekked all the way to the end. The tunnels were quite large and spacious for us to walk through. Not as fortified or well made like the other side though. Still, it showed the size of the thing we had to hunt down. After not having much luck, we trekked all the way back. We continued this for several days.

Matsuri confessed she had some difficulty tracking it. She could tell it was there but she says sometimes, the tracks just disappear into a dead-end. I have a sneaking feeling that it was collapsing its own tunnels to stop us from tracking it. Somehow, it knew we were there… then again, who am I kidding? It probably does know we are here right now. I just hope we can beat it in a straight-up fight and none of the mind trickery nonsense.

They trudged down another tunnel with the scout taking the lead. They kept a careful ear out for any strange noises that might be a signal for an umber hulk attack. It suddenly opened up to a small cavern.

"Huh, did it sleep here?" asked Subaru.

"I don't see any bones," muttered Matsuri, "Does it know how to clean up after itself?"

"That would imply it is clever enough to do so," commented Towa.

"Shh, listen," hushed Choco. Silence interspersed with... faint digging sounds?

"Is it near or is it something else?" whispered the warlock, worry showing on her face.

"I think-"

Before the scout could say anything, the umber hulk suddenly burst through the cavern wall, charging straight at them while taking a few of them by surprise. Almost immediately after locking eyes with it, Subaru could feel a strange sensation traveling through her head. Her mind went blank.

Matsuri blinked. "Why am I facing the wall?" she wondered inwardly. Thinking back, the last thing she remembered was the umber hulk that they had been hunting burst out of the wall… wait a minute...

"Back to whence you came!"

She quickly spun around, catching sight of the large umber hulk disappearing and fading from sight. Choco was raising her shield against it, her whole body aglow with power. Then, everyone started looking around in confusion.

"That… we have to close our eyes. It needs to lock eyes with us to mess with our minds," the tiefling informed them, then she motioned at the place where it was standing, "It was here. When my spell ends, it will be back in this spot."

"Alright, I'll be in front," said Subaru quickly, ""Choco behind me and behind her, everyone else."

Everyone nodded and took their positions immediately.

"Ready?" asked the tiefling cleric once everyone was in place. Getting sounds of confirmation from everyone, she then mutters a few quiet words and motioned to the spot in front of the fighter. The umber hulk reappeared with a roar. Everyone quickly closed their eyes. She could hear Choco, Rushia, and then Towa chanting and unleashing their spells. She could hear Subaru's shield getting attacked, and then she could hear the retaliation swing of her longsword. She could hear the monster roar but it was quite loud. It sounded like it was everywhere at once. Nocking two arrows to her bows, she pulled back and let them loose. No roaring.

"Tch, I think I missed," she mused mentally. But, that was expected as she wasn't able to shoot with her eyes open.

She then heard Choco and Rushia chanting, followed by an extra loud cry from the umber hulk.

Silence.

Matsuri opened her right eye slightly, peeking through her eyelids. The hulk was flat on its back on the floor. It was unmoving. Not even a twitch from its antennae. "I think it's dead. We did it," she declared as her eyes opened fully.

The cavern echoed with sighs of relief. "I'm glad that was over with," stated Subaru, "I don't want my mind to be messed around with. Never again."

"Anyway… let's get back to the foreman," stated Towa, glancing at the dead monster, "Hmm, maybe get some reward while we're at it."

"We are helping them while waiting for the glasses," corrected the fighter.

"Sure, sure," waved off the half-devil.

"Ha, ha! Foreman's impressed wit' ya!" exclaimed the dwarven jeweler with a grin, "Ahm sure the rest of the miners are grateful to ya as well." He then handed off a pair of goggles, "Ere' ya go! One pair of night-vision goggles."

"Nice!" cheered Subaru as she looked it over. The smooth, silvery metal-framed the green lenses beautifully. The brown leather strap completed it with a more practical look. Then, the thought of who would be using this. She didn't really know who to give this too.

"Thanks for your help, sir," she finally said as she handed over the pouch of gold pieces.

"Aye, thank ye' very much," he replied, "Right, would ye' like anythin' else?"

"Well, you have quite the selection here," stated Choco, "What do most of these do?"

"Well, most o' these are resistance rings," he informed them, puffing himself up with pride, "Each stone ere' holds an enchantment to protect yer' against certain things, mostly magic o' the elements. Expensive stuff. Five thousand each."

"...That's a lot..." murmured Matsuri, suddenly feeling a little afraid to ask further.

"What about the cheaper rings and necklaces?" asked the tiefling.

"Well, some can help yer walk on water, unhindered swimmin', breathe in bad air, mind protection, utility stuff mostly," he explained further.

If Subaru had to be honest, they didn't really need any of the utility jewelry at that moment. The mind protection stuff would have been nice when fighting the umber hulk, but eventually, they made do without it. Still, she couldn't think of anything that could happen that would require the use of such things. So, she thanked the dwarven jeweler again and led her party to the inn.

"So, who do we give the goggles to?" she asked as they sat around the table, waiting for their food.

"Well, why not Rushia?" suggested Towa, much to everyone's surprise, "The times that we fought in the dark, you defended us pretty well and your reactions are as quick as Matsuri's. Both she and Rushia would be reliant on Choco, who can help target enemies in the dark. However, I think Rushia would work better taking down one enemy while those two took care of another."

Silence went around the table before Subaru said, "You really are a helpful person, you know?"

"Wh-wh-what? I'm not being nice!" she protested vehemently with a blush on her face, "I am just showing off my strategic brilliance! Now, praise me!"

"You are truly the nicest, most helpful person I've met," the tiefling immediately teased.

"What? T-take that back immediately!" the half-devil insisted amidst the laughter.

AN: Hello, readers. Today, Subaru and friends help out in a mining city while getting a set of useful goggles. I had thought that an umber hulk would be a useful distraction. Little did I know that the confusion gaze was... not kind And this was just one hulk. The first two rounds I simulated? Everyone had difficulty passing the Charisma save, even Towa and Choco. Those two are supposed to have proficiency in Charisma saves but the d20 just refused to give anything that helped to get past the DC15 gaze. Only in the 3rd round that Choco got past it and banished it. Only after getting their bearings could they get a handle on things. You just have bad rolls sometimes. Imagine the horror if it were a real game. Hell, Rushia was one multiattack away from getting downed.

Alright, this is it for this chapter. Next chapter, we journey back to the capital. Again. Thank you for reading and have a good day, dear readers.