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Ch 35 - The Goddess Hiding Behind The Veil
🕑 Added 2025-06-05 20:49:48 +0000 UTCI wasn’t as interested in the result of the fight anymore.
Whatever the spell was meant to do - kill the spiders, vaporize the tunnel, summon something worse - I didn’t care. Not right now.
All I wanted was to know what that staff was. So I activated Guidance.
A familiar blue window flashed before my eyes, surprising me that it actually worked.
Forged by the Goddess of Elves? Not the Goddess of Velmoryns?
Even the very first sentence was confusing. I might’ve thought the staff was created by a different god, but my memory was perfect. There was no way I could confuse divine energy signatures, especially not hers.
Maybe it says Goddess of Elves because that’s what she was… back when she forged it?
The timeline still made no sense. If the memory I saw showed her death, then she couldn’t have become the Velmoryn Goddess after losing that war. Which meant she must’ve been both, the Goddess of Elves and Velmoryns at the same time.
Whatever… I’ll figure it out eventually.
My gaze landed on the staff again. It wasn’t something Avenor could wield, as its active effect was fueled by divine energy, which Hollow Core rejected, but I still wanted it. I was confident that I could extract divinity points from it, and considering the aura radiating from the staff, it probably held quite a lot.
Just as I was scheming how to obtain the enchanted weapon, the robed mage finished her chant as the air above her shifted. A massive fireball took shape, large enough to match the green spider in size. Then it dropped, descending toward the creatures below, glaring up at it with unmistakable panic.
The mage didn’t go after the giant green spider. That wasn’t her aim. She targeted the smaller ones, cutting down their numbers before they could scatter. The fireball struck the ground like a crashing wave, flames racing across the forest floor, swallowing the weaker spiders before they could react. They didn’t even have time to scream.
The blaze kept roaring, but it abruptly stopped spreading. Because of that most of the spiders were untouched, just outside its reach. After witnessing the others’ deaths and the fire cutting their path forward, they were frozen in their spot, waiting, like deactivated toys left for someone else to turn back on.
And then their leader screamed.
That one sound was all it took. The swarm charged, pushing through the fire, smothering the flames with their own bodies. The blaze struggled, burning for as long as it could until it finally died under the weight of their blood.
Did she guide the fire after casting it… or was that just the boundary of the spell?
The way the flames had stopped didn’t feel natural, like the fire had been afraid to step past some invisible line.
I turned toward the mage again and zoomed in Window. Her face remained hidden beneath the hood, but I caught the motion of her lips - she was casting again. This time, the spell didn’t seem to need much effort. The cyan gem at the top of her staff flared sharply, and a stream of pale silver magic curled out, wrapping itself around the green spider’s head.
The moment it touched, the monster fell silent.
The quiet that followed didn’t last long.
Without warning, the giant spider rushed forward. But it didn’t try to climb the tree - it charged toward its own kind. As it drew close, it spat a thick mass of green liquid toward the nearest cluster. One unlucky spider took the full hit and collapsed instantly, melting away like ice under a torch. The splash struck several others, burning deep holes into their chitin.
Then it spat again. And again.
The acid tore through the smaller group easily, and when they were reduced to a steaming heap, the creature turned toward another cluster.
But the rest of the swarm had caught on.
They shrieked, likely trying to communicate with their leader, but it didn’t answer.
And so they turned on it.
Impressive!
I couldn’t look away. One mage had brought the whole swarm into disarray. Compared to her, even the Crimson Guardian’s earlier display felt barely above average.
My eyes drifted back to her.
She was slumped to the ground now, the Velmoryn leader supporting her with one arm. Her hood hadn’t fallen, and the staff was still gripped in both hands, held like something sacred.
I need to send Avenor here. See what we can learn. The staff, at the very least, is worth the trouble.
…
After returning to the circular hall, I didn’t waste time. Physically, I felt fine, just a growing sense of hunger that had started to gnaw at me. I needed to find the chamber that held food.
Wait, why didn’t I just check the inscriptions beside each arch? I could’ve entered the one that matched the green room’s script.
I felt stupid for not thinking of it earlier. It would’ve spared me from that entire trial. Even now, the mark left by that snake still burned against my skin, or at least it did whenever the memory surfaced.
I searched for the archway marked ⴑⴄⴈⴔ ⴆⴍⴓⴌ, but it was nowhere to be found. I even tried matching individual characters, hoping to catch something familiar. Nothing worked.
Fine. Blind it is, again.
With a sigh, I stepped forward and pressed my palm to the center of one of the arches, picking at random this time. Trying to act clever and entering the arch next to the one where I’d encountered the dragon had only gotten me in trouble.
I glanced at the inscription, etched next to the stone arch, as the doorway turned transparent, granting me passage.
ⴑⴈⴊⴅⴄⴐ ⴐⴄⴌⴕ ⴃⴈⴔⴈⴕⴓⴊⴇⴈ
The room was cloaked in a faint mist, though to call it mist wasn’t quite right. It was warm against the skin, more like steam rising from heated stone than any cold fog. I stepped into the chamber slowly, eyes scanning my surroundings. My blade was already drawn, held firm as I advanced with cautious steps.
The space didn’t seem large. Or perhaps the steam made it feel smaller than it was - enclosed, almost comforting, like a private glade hidden behind a veil. The ground beneath my feet was soft grass, with no stones or trees in sight. Just the open meadow and silence.
Then came the sound of laughter, a feminine voice, light and amused, followed by the rhythmic splash of water, as though someone were gently toying with its surface.
Could it be Aria? Or Ninali?
I moved faster, though my grip on the blade never loosened. If this dungeon had proven anything, it was that nothing could be trusted - not the terrain, not my senses, and certainly not any assumptions. I wouldn’t have been surprised to find a spider mutant giggling in a towel, blowing kisses from across the beach.
What I saw was far better.
A pool of hot water lay ahead, steam rising thickest from its surface. Even with the heavy vapor, I could make out the figures within - two women, partially submerged, their forms clearly visible above the waist.
One stood with her back to me, the intricate tattoo of a snake devouring an apple wrapped around her right shoulder. Her skin was vibrant, not pale like the Velmoryns’, full of color. She was tall, her golden hair tied up with care, and though the water concealed much of her form, her figure left little room for doubt - she was shapely, more so than the other woman before her, who had already turned and met my gaze with a grin.
The second had dark brown hair and soft brown eyes, a narrower frame, and a rounder, younger face. Her round, soft-looking breasts greeted me next, but what caught my attention the most were her ears.
They were… normal.
She’s human.
I gasped, my feet moving forward without command. My heart began to race, and my mouth ran dry despite the air being thick and damp. That surge in my chest, in my gut - that wasn’t fear or concern. That was hunger of a different kind. I was alive. This body could still feel it.
And I felt relief.
The kind that reminded me there was still something to enjoy in this form.
I drew closer, nearly within reach, when the blonde turned.
She was stunning - ethereal, almost otherworldly. Her features carried the same divine shape I had seen once before, buried in the memory stone. The face of the Goddess.
It can't be!
My senses screamed at me, shattering the haze that had been clouding my mind. A shriek, not in my ears, but in my thoughts, cut through the comfort and forced me awake. I blinked hard, squeezing my eyes shut, pressing against the lids until the dizziness cleared.
And when I opened them, I froze.
The women were gone.
What stood before me now were twisted creatures, bloated and feverish in tone, their skin stretched and colored sickly green. Their eyes were uneven, misaligned across their faces. One had a nose slanted at a strange angle, the other none at all. And both had mouths that never closed, just open circles ringed with fangs, pulsing with breath they should not have drawn.
I shivered - not from fear, but from the weight of what I had nearly done. The dread clawed deeper than any illusion. I felt anger rise in its place, sharp and cold, bordering on fury as I surged forward, blade already raised before I was close enough to strike.
The creatures quickly realized that their little trick had failed. They moved to defend themselves, but whatever instinct guided them was slow, clumsy, and untrained. Their limbs twitched without coordination, no real form behind their motion. They stood no chance.
The first fell in a single stroke.
My blade carved clean through its neck, slicing through the foul flesh like a kitchen knife through warm butter. The head dropped without resistance. I stepped forward and drove the blade through the chest of the second. There was no struggle. It died before it could make a sound.
I didn’t bother checking their bodies.
I didn’t need to.
The moment the steel passed through them, I already knew. These were no illusions, just feeble things that had relied too heavily on trickery. Once that veil was torn away, there was nothing left to fear.
And the dungeon also confirmed it.
The chest appeared at once, right before me. If I’d missed the right spot, I might’ve had to search for it through the mist, but luck, if that word even applied, was on my side.
This time, I didn’t hurl any stones. I could tell the reward was safe in this place.
I knelt beside the wooden chest and lifted the lid. Inside were ten coins and a ring - small, unadorned, but clearly magical.
For a moment, I considered slipping it onto my finger, but quickly changed my mind. I would check its properties later, outside this place, where Guidance could assist me safely. Until then, it would stay in my Veilspace.
I moved the ring inside my personal space, rose and was about to look for an exit when my eyes landed on the two corpses.
Should I try using Crimson Rite on them?
The thought surfaced almost instinctively, but I hesitated. Wasting resources on creatures like those felt reckless. If I had food, if I could rest and let the mana recover naturally, then maybe. But I didn’t. The hunger had already begun to wear at me, and if I waited much longer, I’d start losing more than just focus.
No. They were too weak. Grotesque and malformed like the spiders, whatever essence they carried is likely corrupted. And even if it isn’t, faint-tier essence wouldn’t be worth the mana cost right now.
The real concern was what still lay ahead. If I ran into something stronger, I’d need Phantom Step more than anything else. Not a handful of the weakest essences from corpses that barely knew how to stand upright when alive.
I turned away from the bodies and resumed my search, pacing the perimeter of the chamber with my blade still in hand. My gaze swept across the steam, looking for any signs of an exit. Food would’ve been a welcome surprise, but more than anything, I didn’t want to return to the circular hall again. I hoped there might be another stone arch hidden beyond the veil of steam.
And there was.
But it didn’t resemble the others.
This one was black, the only one of its kind so far. Its inscription shimmered - not with silver, but with a deep crimson light.
ⴔⴐⴈⴆⴍⴌ
I paused, eyes fixed on the glow pulsing across the unfamiliar runes.
I already knew I was going to step through. The question was… would I regret it?
