Miri and Anne continued travelling deeper into the keep, trying to explore as much of the area as they could in order to figure out where the valuable runes were. From what they’d seen so far, the interior surroundings were dark and damp with just a hint of musty odor lingering in the air.
Given how dark the surroundings were, Miri casted Magelight, a spell that created a small, floating orb of pale-blue light to illuminate their path forward. Magelight was a fairly inexpensive spell rune that they got from Madame Laveau’s shop and was relatively mana-efficient, allowing even a mage like Miri to cast it for several continuous days before draining their mana completely.
After a bit of walking, the two had arrived at what appeared to be a courtyard with a stone statue at its center. The stone statue appeared to be that of a woman donned mage robes and wielding a staff while standing in a majestic pose—or at least it would had been if not for the missing head that broke off from the statue’s body, accompanied by several claw marks on the body itself.
“By the goddess…look at these claw marks,” Anne commented, noticing just how large the claw marks were, as though they were made by a particularly large feline beast with claws as sharp as steel, ones that could scrape across stone with ease.
“Yep, definitely wasn’t made by a house cat, that’s for sure,” Miri deduced. Moving her staff around to guide the orb of light to illuminate the statue’s surroundings, she noticed all the wreckage left behind from the rampaging monster incident that supposedly got this place shut down—destroyed wooden furniture, piles of skeletons in scholarly robes, and…fresh blood? “Hey, Anne. Come take a look at this.”
Anne moved towards the spot Miri had indicated—some trails and splatters of bloodstains that seemed way too red to be from a century ago. Anne tapped her fingers on some of the blood and rubbed it against her fingers. “The blood is still wet. It must have been spilled recently, probably less than a day ago.”
Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!
Miri let out a nervous chuckle. “You don’t suppose that it’s just left over from the Chimeragon’s most recent hunt, do you? Maybe that thing enjoys a deer or an elk that happens to wander nearby every now and again. I reckon that he probably needs to eat somehow, you know.”
“I wouldn't be so sure about that. Look,” Anne said, picking up something from the floor near the bloodstains and showing it to Miri. It’s a piece of tan linen cloth stained with the same freshly spilt blood, one that’s likely ripped from some human-worn attire.
“Ahh, shit. Looks like we aren’t the only ones looking for these runes,” Miri deciphered from the clues present. “Or maybe it’s just an unlucky hunter or scavenger who happened to get snatched by the monster, perhaps?”
“Whoever they are, they’d probably been grabbed by the Chimeragon,” Anne added.
“Yeah, or maybe they might have looted the runes already and left this place by now,” Miri said.
“Miri!”
“What? I’m just saying that’s also a possibility.”
“Miri, if there’s even a slight chance that someone could still be alive down there, we’ll need to rescue them.”
“Aww man, I wasn’t expecting for this to turn into a rescue mission. Trying to hunt for these runes while staying alive was already difficult enough as is. Adding another objective to our plate is only going to make this more dangerous.”
“I know this is unprecedented. Regardless, if there is even the slightest opportunity to save them, it is our duty to do so. Besides, you did save me once, didn’t you?”
“Well, that was different. I was basically mostly done with the dungeon when I found you…” Miri tried to reason with the cleric but Anne ended up giving her the puppy-eye treatment again, weakening her resolve and eventually causing her to relent with a sigh. “Alright, fine. We’ll try to save whoever’s alive down there to the best of our abilities. But I’m not making any guarantees.”
Anne smiled. “Thank you, Miri. That’s all I ask.”
