Chapter Ten

The Inner Circle

“Come along Wraith,” Devouring said. “I would like to speak with you.” He led me to the side of the ballroom pulled aside a red curtain into an alcove. Inside was a wooden table and gilded chairs cushioned with red velvet. “Have a seat, I must congratulate you and thank you for removing that irksome, little dungeon.”

“It was my pleasure,” Wraith said with a bow. “What is it you wished to speak to me about?”

“Your, position on certain matters,” Devouring said, pausing between his words as he poured two glasses of an electric blue liquid. “Here, have a drink, don’t worry, a lack of taste buds are not required to enjoy this drink.”

Wraith took the glass and placed it on his lips, he took a sip and a shock went through his body, it was, ecstasy, a feeling that nothing he had experienced before could compare to.

“Delightful isn’t it, pure condensed mana not some minor potion either. A real humanoid would die from consuming that sip but to us, it’s merely a taste of power,” Devouring said with a smile. “Now onto business. You would not be aware of it, but there are two factions among our kind. We call them the Old Ones and the Noble Order we differ on perspectives on how we should conduct ourselves. The Old Ones believe we exist to create adventure and tension in the world, they are convinced the manifestations created us to bring amusement to them and that we should only kill an adventurer here or there or else we risk destruction. They have been corrupted by compassion and sympathy for the humanoid races.”

“We of the Noble Order take a different view of things, however, we are not here as amusement, we are created by the pure energy of the world, we are the apex of all life and the pinnacle of the sentient races! Why should we limit ourselves to the lives of a few mortals here or there? We are here for us! and the benefit of our race! and it is up to us to keep those of our kind who have been corrupted by humanoid emotions from creating laws among our order that would keep us from living as we will!” Devouring said his voice going heated and his pointed teeth snapping with the words.

“I see your point, I too believe that we should not bow to the week minded or sympathize with the lesser beings,” Wraith said taking his seat across from him.

“Excellent, I am glad. You are a celebrity now and your support even though you are new will help to sway the votes we make this Conclave. As a member of the Circle, you must continue to keep striving to achieve, I would be happy to assist you,” Devouring said with a wave of his hand and a drawer rolled open revealing some slivers of metal and a sheet of paper. “This is all I can do without unbalancing the system of trade between the younger dungeons, but these will be very helpful to you in killing more adventures. These metals are mithril, dark-steel, and platinum and this is a spell that will allow you to create circles of teleportation in your dungeon. Very effective for moving minions around your dungeon.”

“You are most gracious, elder,” Wraith said standing and bowing.

“Think nothing of it, welcome to the Conclave enjoy your stay let me know personally if you require anything,” Devouring said giving a fraction of a bow with his head and left.

Wraith waited a minute and then pulled aside the curtain and entered the chaos of the ballroom once more. Dungeons flocked to him introducing themselves and asking to trade. Wraith could tell they wanted to trade out of a desire to gain some attention from associating with him rather than a need for anything he possessed. Wraith agreed to some of the trades getting some samples of rare woods, seeds, liquors and blueprints of weapons and traps designs and even a few minor spells. He was in the middle of a conversation with a dungeon possessing the body of an insectoid humanoid with a steel shell he was offering Wraith a chunk of carapace that was as strong as steel yet infinitely lighter.

“You Wraith!” Wraith heard and turned to see Screaming standing behind him, his body livid with a female in silver plate armor with snake hair and two scimitars. “I challenge you for the insult to my reputation fight me or be named a coward.”

“I agree to your price,” Wraith said to the dungeon he was trading with ignoring Screaming and handing over two different potions to the dungeon Wraith had been conversing with concluding our deal, then he turned and whispered to Ruin. “I thought we were forbidden from hurting each other?”

“He doesn’t mean between the two of you personally your Lord Sparks will fight it out in your place,” Ruin whispered back.

“Well, Wraith what is it going to be?” Screaming asked.

“I accept your challenge, someone please find my Lord Spark I suspect you’ll find him balls deep in one of your Ladies, probably already had yours Screaming,” Wraith said, and chuckles broke out in the crowd and Screaming’s face turned an even brighter shade of red.

Five minutes later Ember strode forward his face set in a snarl his scimitar and spear in either hand. A circle cleared, and the two Lord Sparks entered the ring. Ruin stepped forward and cleared his throat.

“You two know the rules, you to fight until your master calls it off or one you gives up,” Ruin said, “commence the duel.”

“Show him no mercy Sauna,” Screaming ordered, and the female warrior nodded. She leaped at Ember with both swords. he spun his spear parrying her attacks and then launched an attack of his own with his scimitar, but the blow only scraped along her flexible plate armor. She jumped back avoiding a thrust from his spear and rolled to the side scoring a hit on the back of his thigh with her scimitar.

“Raugh!” Ember roared and the turned igniting the flaming runes along his sword kicking her in the chest and cauterizing a line across her cheek.

She screamed and came at him and their weapons crashed back and forth but she was obviously better equipped and more skilled. She cut various wounds across his body and left him leaving drops of blood along the floor.

“You must think of a clever strategy,” Wraith said to Ember, then whispered as he walked past him, “Use your necklace.”

Ember looked puzzled but then he smiled. He stepped in front of Screaming and waited for Sacna to make her attack she lunged at him and he moved to let her score a wound on his bicep. Then he backhanded her across the face spinning her around. She spun around swords raised and froze as she looked at two Screaming. Ember acted in her moment of hesitation striking her full in the chest with his spear, the blade went through her armor into her shoulder and he pinned her to the floor kicking away her swords.

“I surrender,” she gasped, and the crowd applauded.

Ember removed his spear and stepped back. Wraith stepped forward and handed him a healing potion. “Return to your revelry,” Wraith ordered. “Well, Screaming does your honor feel satisfied?” Wraith asked the snickers from the crowd. Screaming turned red then turned and fled from the ballroom, his Lord Spark limping behind him.

The rest of the day and the next past uneventfully. Wraith traded and listened to conversations but was interrupted when Devouring’s voice came from all around them.

“I apologize for the interruption, but a dungeon has just failed the Truth Circle,” Devouring informed everyone, and gasps filled the ballroom.

“Horned Nest has been discovered and the adventurers have learned of our existence. The elder dungeons and I are calling up the Wild Hunt to kill the adventures and anyone they have spoken to or evidence they have of us, it is up to the rest of you, younger dungeons, to go with your Lord Sparks and launch an attack on Horned Nest, be warned he is a sixth-ranked dungeon. Good hunting to you all I’m afraid we will not be able to gather a proper council meeting this conclave I will see you all at Plague Castle at the winter solstice,” Devouring said.

There was a hiss from the conclave as everyone turned to the exit and began to march out of Devouring’s Dungeon. Wraith saw Ruin in the crowd and pushed his way over to him. He nodded to me and a feminine female with and a scorpion lower body and a bow in hand followed behind him. Ember pushed his way to his side his sword sheathed and his spear in hand.

“Where is this dungeon?” Wraith asked Ruin.

“Not far,” Ruin said with a fierce grin, “This Conclave sure has been interesting since you’ve come, you must be lucky. Come on its time to loot and destroy.”

We mounted up on various beasts some took to the air and others ran along the ground. There was a roar as a green dragon and a hundred other gigantic flying beasts leaped off the ground and flew to the east as we headed west. We ran full speed for ten hours until a gaping hole in the side of a foothill against the edge of the Spear Peaks came into view. We pulled up to a halt and dismounted from our minions.

“All right, you all know what to do,” said a dungeon with the body of a green-skinned woman with leaves in her hair.

“No, not really,” someone said and there was a general chorus of agreement.

“I don’t want to get driven insane….”-

“How are we deciding loot….”-

“Invading dungeons is an adventure’s job!” Someone else shouted.

The green skinned dungeon looked flustered at this development, but I stood on the rock she was standing on then pushed her off getting everyone’s attention and earning a glare of intense hatred and loathing from her.

“It seems to me we should send our sparks in groups like an adventuring party to wipe out the minions while we follow behind,” Wraith said loudly, and others began to nod.

Ember joined Ruin’s lord spark and others three sparks. They stood in robes and armor and waited in line as other lord sparks entered the dungeon. I noticed some dungeons carrying cages made of a variety of materials.

“What are those?” Wraith asked Ruin pointing to the cages.

Ruin looked at the cages almost drooling, “Soul Cages, way out of our level. Dungeons use them when we feud with each other they let you steal someone’s minions. Then they can erase their memories back in their dungeon and have their lord spark reprint them with their own memories.”

“And that’s allowed?” Wraith asked surprised.

“It breaks none of our laws,” Ruin said with a shrug, “the process causes no harm to the sparks or the dungeon, powerful dungeons often use it to cripple or humiliate a rival or a younger dungeon in their territory. Getting your hands on the blueprints to one of those is incredibly hard, no one wants to hand out a weapon that could be used against them. Usually, a dungeon must gather enough magic and learn to create them on their own and that doesn’t happen until they’ve killed a tenth ranked adventurer.”

It came to Wraith and Ember’s turn in line and we entered the dungeon through a door carved with primordial runes. There were many branches to the tunnels, and Wraith followed Ember and the rest of the Lord Sparks. Wraith looked back and saw that Ruin and the others were hanging back a dozen yards. He shook his head and turned back to the fight. Ember led the party and entered a round chamber. He held up his hand and the rest of the party stopped.

The dust on the ground stirred and began to whirl around creating a vortex of earth and wind in the crude shape of a humanoid. It lashed out and struck Ember knocking him into the wall as another spark rushed forward with a great-sword only to enveloped by the elemental and began to choke as the air was ripped from his lungs.

“Fucking elemental!” Ember spat and lunged forward with his spear igniting the fire runes upon it. The fire struck the elemental and the flames flared as the wind strived to blow them out. Wraith looked at the elemental and cast a spell he had recently bought that allowed him to see the weavings of magic. Wraith studied the pattern of the elemental and could see the soul spark inside it as it operated the elemental.

Wraith found it fascinating how it did this, he could only get his soul sparks to operate bodies with a physical structure, even skeletons were pushing this with their lack of connecting joins. But this creature operated on pure elemental force and was made of thousands of particles of earth held together by wind. Wraith began making sketches of the pattern, but the elemental was quickly worn down by the five Lord Sparks. Wraith looked at the notes he had made trying to piece together how he would use this in his own dungeon and was soon joined by Ruin.

“You like to get a little close to combat, don’t you?” he asked with a note of disapproval.

“I have faith in our Lord Sparks, besides this is an excellent opportunity to discover how a sixth-ranked dungeon operates,” Wraith replied.

“Suit yourself I’m going to focus on protecting my sanity,” Ruin said and fell back again as they moved forward.

The lord sparks fought through dozens of chambers and drank potions as required. They looted weapons and runes we came across but most of the loot was useless to them, what need do they who can create gold need of it?

They finally came out of their branch of the dungeon and came across a massive pitched battle. They stood behind a group of dungeons which lounged around chatting as the battle raged, some of them carried cages with tiny glowing sparks trapped inside that bounced off a magical barrier whenever they tried to escape through the bars. Ember and the others joined the battle and the clang of spells and the thunder of magic made conversation difficult as we stood apart from the battle in the cavern.

Wraith wondered if this would be him one day and resolved to install measures to instantly kill any heroes who discovered him, there would be no holding back only instant obliteration.

Ember and the other Lord Sparks surrounded the higher ranked Lord Spark in the form of a titan Elemental thirty feet tall of burning magma. Chunks were carved out, ice and water spells weakened it and eventually the boss was brought down. The other dungeons stood up and approached a section of floor. The ground was pummeled with spells and shattered revealing a hidden chamber with multi-colored dungeon core three feet in diameter.

They blasted the core with ever spell we had. A horrible physic scream ripped the air and some Dungeons who were closer doubled over and fell to their knees and the ground from the pain. Once the pain had abated they gathered the loot of the dungeon’s hoard. They cast lots and grabbed items and coins. Most picked up enchanted weapons covered in runes or pieces of armor, but Wraith grabbed two books instead. He turned around and came face to face with green skinned dungeon with leaves in her hair that he had humiliated earlier.

“Don’t think I have forgotten your insult Wraith!” she hissed low so that only he could hear her, “I am also one of the Inner Circle and have been where you are standing. I moved onto other achievements and have kept my place but thanks to your little stunt this is as far as you are going. I am going to do everything in my power to humiliate you before everyone and remove you from the inner circle!”

“Go ahead,” Wraith whispered back, “but remember this I defeated a group of adventures a rank above what you did and I didn’t just straight up kill him either, I broke him and caused his god to reject him and turned him into a monster. If you are prepared to deal with that then, by all means, come at me.”

“Do you think that’s supposed to scare me?” She asked taking a step back placing her hands on her hips. Her hands caressed a belt were cages made of twigs swung filled with soul sparks.

“It should,” Wraith replied and then turned and left heading back home.