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A tick crawled through the otherside entrance. It was slightly larger than normal and was composed of glowing aquamarine energy. The pest ward had failed to keep the tick out of the dungeon for several reasons, the main one being that the tick was not actually a tick. The System noticed the tick but had difficulty analyzing it. Eventually, the System informed the dungeon core about the intruder.
_ Intruder Detected: Elven Construct _
_ Quest System (Rare) Unlocked. Description: A quest is a System-assigned task outside the normal operations for an entity. A quest may or may not involve risk to the entity. In exchange for completing a quest, the System will reward the entity according to several factors including: performance, sacrifice, completion speed. Reliably completing quests may lead to additional rewards _
_ Quest: Destroy the Elven Construct Intruder _
_ Beware: Elven artifacts are unpredictable and extremely dangerous, even when they are not actively malicious. Do not attempt to keep or dissect elven artifacts _
The tick crept across the ground very slowly. After an hour, it began to climb a stalk of blood grass. Ten minutes later, it reached a leg up and touched a dragonfly that had perched on the stalk. The tick disappeared and the dragonfly’s eyes began to glow aquamarine. The dragonfly zipped over to the portal to the captured space and through.
The dragonfly returned a few seconds later. It flew so slowly that it couldn’t stay in the air and slowly crashed to the ground. A layer of frost melted from its wings. When it warmed up completely, it flew up and perched on a leaf of the dungeon vine from which it observed the worldlet.
Yrryth arrived to retrieve the payment plants and carry them to her garden in the fields worldlet. The dragonfly saw the stone door in the ground that she had left open. It zipped down through the door and through the portal to the underworld. The dragonfly spent some time bumping into vines, leaves, walls, and tunnel ceilings before a bat swooped down and ate it.
The bats eyes turned to a glowing aquamarine. It flew in a tight circle to map the immediate area. It was in the cavern immediately beneath the otherside worldlet. The tick-bat picked a tunnel at random and flew away. The tick-bat worked its way through the tunnels, drawing closer to the signal that had enticed it to re-enter the dungeon after its carrying container was jettisoned by the fairy. When the tick-bat arrived in the main worldlet, it landed on the side of the main vine body. The tick exited the bat and dove through the plant flesh as though it were water. It crawled across the floor and up the vine pedestal, touched a leg to the dungeon core, and vanished.Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.
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“Something is wrong with those birds.” Chaney said to his younger sister. The two of them were part of the harvesting group today, filling in for a neighbor who had fallen ill. Chaney was looking up at the vine-tree-thing that grew up from the middle of the dungeon floor. A pair of woodlarks perched on a branch and stared down at the harvesters. They stared down with green eyes. “I swear their eyes are glowing.”
Chaney’s sister wasn’t listening, she was poking at a red jellyfish with a long stick to keep it away from the group. “Uh-huh.” She said absently.
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Birds were following Galbran. He ranged from floor to floor, on a routine check for new portals or creatures. It was normal enough for dungeon monsters to watch you from the shadows—they acted the same as normal creatures when they weren’t attacking mindlessly—but Galbran was certain that the birds that watched him on each dungeon floor were the same birds. More worrisome, Galbran thought there might be more birds than when he started.
The birds had green eyes. That didn’t seem right to Galbran. Birds eyes should be black or brown, maybe yellow on a hawk. Galbran nearly jumped out of his skin when he looked up into an apricot tree and saw two of the birds looking right at him. The birds blinked in unison, gave a ‘lülülülü’ in unison, then flew to a tree further away, flapping in unison. Galbran shook his head back and forth, trying to relieve some of the nervous energy he felt.
Galbran had another shock while in the dark dungeon floor. When he turned around to leave, several pairs of green eyes glowed out of the darkness near the ground. He kicked at the eyes to scare them off, but they just calmly hopped backwards through the portal.
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Hana stood outside the entrance to the Terse Elements dungeon. They would not go back in that particular dungeon unless a dying hill lord commanded it while dragons burned all the land around. Hana had only come to track entry and exit of the harvesters and take any reports of anomalies.
The first report came from Oz’s friend, Chaney. “Birds with glowing eyes.” As the harvester group filed out, several other people mentioned odd behavior from birds. Some birds were singing strangely, some birds didn’t react when someone threw a stone, some birds “blinked wrong”. Hana rubbed at their eyes in dread and exasperation after the harvesters all left. They waited for the scout to exit the dungeon, then they could all go home and let the hill lord figure it out.
“Hana, there were some birds-“ Galbran started to say. Hana threw their hands up in the air and walked quickly away from the dungeon entrance.
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Hill Lord Andebert frowned down at the report on his desk. A dozen mentions of green-eyed birds, possibly woodlarks, harassing harvesters. Well, not harassing. He thought. Stalking, maybe. Observing. The green eyes is strange, could it be a recently added element? The acid and water creatures’ coloring is changed all over, so this doesn’t match. He had just about decided to enter the dungeon and see for himself when a runner burst through the door with a report that drove all thoughts of birds from his mind.