Dungeon Corp- Crypts of Phanos Read online

  Dungeon Corps

  Crypts of Phanos

  Jaxon Reed

  Contents

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Copyright

  Dungeon Corps: Crypts of Phanos

  Copyright © 2019 by Jaxon Reed

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Cover by Jacqueline Sweet Design

  Editing and formatting by edbok.com

  jaxonreed.com

  Dedication

  Many thanks to author Jada Ryker and other Patreon subscribers, as well as my newsletter subscribers who provided great feedback on early drafts.

  Chapter 1

  “Careful. Watch your step.”

  Missan waved her hand gently in front of her group and ghostly runes floated in the air, suddenly visible. They formed a pattern in the narrowest part of the hall facing them, obstacle wraiths promising death for those touching them.

  Missan carefully walked between the runes, making certain her dark purple robe and hood did not touch any.

  She turned when she made it to the other side, and waited for her team. Jeffers the ranger came next, easily walking between the traps. He was followed by Deena, their archer and cleric.

  Dratchet the half-dwarf was clumsiest, for all his abilities with a battle-axe. Everyone held their breath while he worked his way laboriously through the traps.

  Finally Choster walked through, after giving a final look back at the passage they had just passed.

  Choster was a vampire, and a swordmaster. Many Dungeon Corps groups shunned his kind, but Missan and the others accepted him. He had saved them more than once with his unique set of skills

  Choster jumped into high speed and blurred through the traps in the blink of an eye.

  Missan said, “Someday I need you to teach me how to do that, Choster.”

  He smiled at her, fangs showing between his pale red lips.

  He said, “You know my price.”

  She shuddered involuntarily, then turned to lead the way forward as the passageway grew wider.

  Deena sidled up next to her and confided in a low voice.

  “He doesn’t take much blood. He just likes a sip to see what you taste like.”

  Missan shuddered again. She said, “Was it worth it for what he taught you?”

  The other woman nodded firmly.

  “Yes. It’s a different kind of invisibility. It’s like . . . becoming a shadow. You merge into the surrounding darkness. And it’s undetectable by other mages who are on the lookout for Invisibility.”

  Missan grunted in acknowledgment. The Shadow spell did sound interesting, and useful. But she really wanted Choster’s quickness spell. What did he call it? Enhanced Motion? Whatever it was, he had assured her she had the capability to learn it. All he asked in return was a taste of her blood. So far, her revulsion had kept her from acquiescing to his deal. But when he showed it off in front of her, it seemed so useful. She had to admit, she was tempted.

  They came to set of large double doors. They were at least 12 feet tall and half again as wide. Two large brass rings nestled together in the center.

  Missan and Choster exchanged glances. He raised a dark eyebrow at her, questioning.

  She said, “Wait. Let me see if I can sense anything, first.”

  Dratchet moved to her right and pulled his axe from the sling on his back. He bent his knees, crouching into a fighting position.

  Choster moved to her left and held his palms out, preparing a defensive spell. Jeffers pulled out his enchanted sword, activating a group shield, while Deena stayed in the back, preparing a healing spell for all of them.

  The simple act of “looking” into a room could trigger a variety of traps, alert monsters or let enemies know of their presence.

  But Missan’s group had fought together for years with the Dungeon Corps. Choster was the newest member, and he had been with them several months. The team moved smoothly, anticipating one another’s actions.

  Missan held her hands out and cast the spell while the others tensed. If whatever was behind the door could detect the spell, it might well burst through and attack.

  Missan said, “I sense . . . a large room, 1000 feet square. Tall ceiling, 30 feet high. Several corridors branching off in other directions. And in the center of the room . . . a little boy?”

  Deena frowned behind her, her protection spell forgotten.

  She said, “A little boy? Are you sure?”

  Missan nodded, concentrating. She said, “He seems . . . he seems to be waiting for us. He’s looking right at the door.”

  “What in the world is a little boy doing down here?” Jeffers said, turning his scarred face toward her. “Is he human? Elven?”

  “He’s human. I don’t know what he’s doing here. It doesn’t make sense. This is a newly discovered dungeon, there shouldn’t be anybody here, much less children.”

  “He’s a gheist,” Dratchet said, confidently. He set the huge axe on the floor head first, holding the handle’s end lightly.

  Missan shook her head. “I don’t sense a spirit. This is a boy. In the flesh.”

  Choster said, “I’ll go take a look.”

  Before anyone could object he turned into black mist and quickly flowed to the floor, then under the doors.

  The other four looked at one another. Dratchet picked up his axe again and the spell casters resumed preparing to cast.

  The doors opened suddenly, screeching on unoiled hinges, making them jump. Choster smiled at them, flashing his fangs.

  “Come on in. It’s safe, I think.”

  They approached the door with trepidation. Inside, in the center of the large room, a young boy of perhaps ten or eleven years of age stared at them. He wore bronze chainmail that had been made for dwarves, and carried a shield painted green with a white boss in the middle. At his side he carried a steel short sword.

  The Dungeon Corps team looked at him in astonishment.

  Jeffers said, “I did not expect him to be armed.”

  “Who are you?” Deena said.

  Missan said, “What are you doing here?”

  The little boy addressed them, showing not an ounce of fear or concern.

  He said, “I’m looking for the Prince. Have you seen him?”

  Missan and Deena looked at one another in confusion.

  Missan said, “This is not one of Prince Synthan’s Children Soldiers . . . is it?”

  “Can’t be,” Deena said. “That was fifty years ago.”

  “He’s a gheist,” Dratchet said.

  Deena glared at him and said, “Will you quit saying that?”

  “Please,” the little boy said. “If you’ll tell me where the Prince is, I need to find my way back to him. I’m . . . I’m lost down here.”

  Missan said, “Are you looking for . . . Prince Synthan?”

  He nodded, his eyes lighting up.

  “Yes! Have you seen him? Do you know where he is?”

  Everyone on the team looked troubled now, even Choster.

  Jeffers said, “Could it be a sleep spell of some kind? Kept the lad dormant d
own here all these years?”

  Missan said, “We’re not even near Melody. It’s 30 miles from here!”

  Choster said, “There’s a vast network of tunnels and caves underneath the sunken city of Melody. I’ve heard about it. Several teams have tried exploring parts of it. No one has ever been through it all. They say deep below, an underground river flows. It’s entirely possible this dungeon is connected with Melody Hall.”

  “That would certainly explain why he’s lost,” Deena said. “But it doesn’t account for the fact that the Children Soldiers went down into Melody Hall with the Prince five decades ago.”

  Dratchet spat to one side and said, “Still say he’s a gheist.”

  “Will you shut up?”

  Jeffers interrupted the brewing row between Deena and Dratchet. He said, “Somebody needs to tell him,” nodding toward the boy who remained in the middle of the room, watching them.

  Missan sighed and said, “I’ll do it.”

  She walked slowly toward the room’s middle, drawing nearer to the boy. He stared at her now, giving her his full attention. She stopped a few paces away.

  “Hi. Uh, yeah. So, Prince Synthan is dead. He, uh . . . he died a long time ago.”

  The boy’s mouth dropped open in shock. Then his eyes narrowed to slits.

  “You’re lying.”

  “No. No, I’m not. It happened a long, long time ago. Prince Synthan was killed in Melody and—”

  “No!”

  The boy’s voice changed, growing deeper and echoing throughout the chamber. His body changed, too, swelling larger. White, aethereal arms sprouted out of the body, along with a monstrous head.

  Dratchet yelled, “I believe I’m owed an apology!”

  Deena said, “Shut up, Dratchet! Everyone, ready!”

  “I’ve never seen a gheist like this, though,” Choster said.

  The thing attacked. Its white ghostly arms swept toward Dratchet, his axe swinging and connecting with . . . nothing. But when the long pale arms reached Dratchet’s flesh, his spirit ripped out of his body.

  Deena saw the half-dwarf’s spirit struggling to pull up, then something sucked it down to the floor. She watched in horror as his ghostly hands slipped below the surface.

  She lit up her protective dome and ducked as one of the huge white arms swung through the spell, disintegrating it. Deena jumped out of the way and nocked an arrow, loosed, then nocked and loosed another one. The arrows sailed through the aethereal form.

  She took careful aim with her third arrow and loosed it at the boy’s face. It poofed into dust before hitting him.

  Missan fired Lightning at the boy, then Fireball and Radiance. Nothing happened. The aethereal figure surrounding the child seemed to soak in all the spells.

  Jeffers ran forward with his enchanted sword and swung at one of the large arms. His sword whiffed through air. The arm came back and slapped him in the chest, sucking out his spirit. His lifeless body fell to the ground.

  “Choster! Nothing is working!”

  Choster heard Missan, but he was too busy flitting around the child and the aethereal form, trying to score a hit. One of the ghostly armed slapped into him, and Choster popped away like a bubble.

  Missan backed up, lobbing spell after spell into the monster. Nothing she could think to sling at him had any effect. Deena cast a protective dome around them again, but the huge arms poked through it. She cast a healing spell on Missan, even though the woman did not need one . . . yet.

  Missan said, “Go.”

  “What? I can’t leave you! At least come with me. We can run for it!”

  They retreated to the huge double doors. The little boy in chain mail advanced on them, his face snarling in hate. The giant ghostly body loomed out of him, long white arms swinging toward the women.

  “He’ll chase us. You go. I’ll give you some time.”

  Missan flung more spells at the creature. Deena opened her mouth to protest and watched as the spells were simply absorbed by . . . whatever that was.

  She turned and fled through the doors. At the chokepoint she felt very grateful that Missan’s spells still displayed the hidden runes floating in the air. She quickly but carefully weaved her way through them. Behind her she heard Missan scream . . . then silence.

  Deena stopped to catch her breath. She looked behind her and heard the boy moving out of the doors and into the corridor.

  She turned to run, then stopped to cast a message spell.

  “Dungeon Corps, this is Deena Marceaux with Sergeant Missan’s team. We have found one of the Children, but he’s a monster! He—”

  She looked behind her and . . . there he stood. A little boy looking up at her.

  He said, “Boo.”

  The ghostly form sprang from the child, huge arms reaching toward her like scythes. It sucked her spirit out of her body.

  -+-

  Erik smiled as he drew closer to the city walls, now plainly visible in the distance. He could make out individual guards on the battlements, armored helmets sticking up between crenellations, some manning ballista with deadly bolts aimed out toward the road and beyond.

  The walls were tall, taller than any he’d ever seen. His home, the village of Norvold, had no walls, its residents trusting that clear fields surrounding their huts and simple houses could be held by archers and Gustaf, the old mage.

  Holden, the town nearest his village and the source of most of their commerce, had a wall 30 feet high made from tree trunks sharpened to a point with scaffolding behind it. This usually sufficed to keep monsters and bandits out. Erik saw their wall the first time as a bairn. He remembered walking through the gates on his father’s shoulders, neck stretching up to stare at the sharp points so high above.

  But now he gazed upon Phanos, a city far larger than Holden Township. And it looked glorious.

  The gray walls caught the afternoon sun and Erik could make out runes carved into the stones, glowing faintly as if reflecting back the sunlight. Maybe they did. Erik knew little of magic. He turned to ask someone walking nearby if they knew, but the farmers and merchants nearest him were all preoccupied in their own conversations. It would be rude for a country bumpkin to ask a bunch of questions, he decided.

  So he marched forward with the crowd headed toward the giant metal and wooden gate that the road went through. Right now, both parts of the gate stood wide open, like two inviting arms on either side of the road, inviting one and all to come inside and find safety.

  On either side of the gate, giant torches blazed with unquenching magical fire. This, Erik knew, was in homage to the city’s name, which meant “Torch” in the Old Tongue.

  The sun dipped lower as people approached, the sound of their steps mingling with the jangle of harness and clatter from wagon wheels. The road had been paved with crushed stone since leaving Holden, and the last few miles with cobblestones. This was another engineering marvel that seemed new and interesting to the strapping young man.

  Even here, where traffic increased as they neared the city wall, he noticed how repairs were kept up so that potholes remained almost non-existent. The roadbed was maintained well so it could bear the flow of people, draft animals and wagons.

  Erik smiled as he looked up again, his blue eyes drinking in sights as the stream of humanity and animals finally slowed. Now they joined the long queue on the right side of the road, waiting their turns to speak with the city guard and pay the entry toll.

  On the cusp of manhood, Erik stood six feet tall and had a farm boy physique, muscles rippling inside his simple cotton shirt and breeches. Fine blond hair flowed down to his shoulders, waving gently in the late afternoon breeze. A simple iron short sword hung at his belt.

  Erik’s hands were calloused but his eyes sparkled with a sharp intellect, and they burned bright with ambition. Here was a boy looking to make himself into something. Here was a boy looking to become a man in the city looming before him.

  In seemingly no time at all, Erik found himself
standing before two bored city guards, their bronze chainmail and helmets glinting in the fading sun. Someone up on the wall blew a horn.

  One of them cupped his hands and shouted at the people in line.

  “Half an hour before the gates close! Anyone not through at that time can camp outside until morning!”

  A collective groan went down the line, but most seemed not surprised. Erik smiled, silently thanking the Creator he had made it in time.

  “What’s your name, where are you from, and state your business in Phanos.”

  The guard said it by rote, as he must no doubt say it time and again, Erik thought.

  “I’m Erik of Norvold, lieged with Lord Finn of Holden Township. I seek to join the Dungeon Corps.”

  The last statement sparked a bit of life in the guard, who focused his eyes on the fit young man before him.

  “Hm. You hear that, Karl? Fresh meat for the crypts.”

  “Good. Don’t scare him off, Gunter. We need all the recruits who are willing.”

  “Right. Entry fee is fi’ copper, Erik Norvold. Once you’re accepted into the corps, you’ll receive a signet medallion which will gain you entrance to any city in the Queen’s Land. Alas, today you’ll have to pay like everyone else.”

  Erik smiled and handed over the coin, a thick one worth five small coppers.

  “You’ll find Dungeon Corps Headquarters one block from Allred Platz, on Bassinger Strasse,” Karl said. “They’ll give you a bunk and something to eat while you train up for your first run.”

  Gunter smiled at him. “Let us be the first to welcome you to Phanos, Erik Norvold. May the Creator go with you.”

  Erik thanked him and strode through the gates of his first big city. He could not stop looking around. So many buildings! Everywhere he stared, stone and wood were shifted and shaped to serve the needs of man. Already the tall buildings and city wall blocked the light of the setting sun, casting the streets in shadow.