Dust Devils, unlike the name implied, were not demons. They were air spirits whose material bodies were composed only of air. They had that name because when they moved, they lifted a lot of dust from the ground in small whirlwinds. They were very hard to defeat because physical attacks barely damaged them. You’d need to cast elemental spells like fire or ice that could damage their bodies made of gases.
This meant that only Paula, within Matthew’s party, could damage them using ice magic she drew from Lumi with the Spirit Magic skill. However, Dust Devils were artful creatures. Even their dungeon simulacrums could easily hide and trick their enemies.
Therefore, Matthew’s party had a lot of trouble dealing with them. It was the next day and they were already back inside the Labyrinth. They had been attacked by dust devils the whole day. As Paula was the only one who could harm them and as the creatures had a hit and run strategy, dealing with them took a long time.
Paula concentrated and imprisoned the last one they were fighting and, with anger on her face, froze it to death making a small mana crystal appear. Despite being hard to handle, Dust Devils were weak creatures and didn’t give much experience, just about twice of that of a goblin.
"I’m fucking sick of fighting these fuckers." Paula cursed in anger with a vein visible on her forehead. "They come, lift my skirt and run away. It pisses me off!" She groaned frustrated.
"The party in front must be ignoring them and just rushing forward." Vanessa commented.
"Is that wise?" Matthew asked collecting the mana crystal.
"Not much. Even if they are weak, you don’t know how hurt you’ll be when you go back to the entrance. They could kill you on the way back. I think they were counting on some party hyenaing like us." Michael explained.
"At least they’re increasing our profit." Vanessa shrugged.
At some point ahead, they hit a bifurcation on the path. Traces of battle on the right path made it clear that the party in front of them took the path to the right. They then decided to take the left path to increase their chances to find a treasure.
Now that they didn’t have a party in front of them, they were walking with greater care. The chance of finding more powerful monsters was now much more likely. Also, there was no one in front of them to fall on traps difficult to find.
And not long after they went left on the bifurcation, Vanessa signaled for them to stop. A pitfall trap was skillfully disarmed by her revealing a huge pit that seemed bottomless.
"What do you think is in the bottom?" Michael asked Matthew throwing a stone in.
"No idea." Matthew said waiting for the sound of the stone hitting the bottom, but the sound never came.
"The Tower must’ve explored it. But they don’t like to make their findings public." Vanessa said urging the others to press forward with her hand.
A couple of corridors ahead, they found a pair of Lightning Lions. Big feline monsters that looked like normal lions, but with black fur and a mane made of dark clouds which made them able to cast lightning magic from them.
Vanessa was the first one to attack shooting with her gun and soon being followed by Matthew. While they concentrated fire on one of the lions, the other shuddered and shot them with a lightning bolt that hit both of them.
The pain was great, but both of their Vital Shields held most of the damage.
Michael shot an arrow on the second lion as soon as it cast the lightning bolt making it recoil and not cast it a second time. The first lion took the opportunity when the pair stopped shooting their guns and charged forward trying to bite Vanessa. But she managed to dodge the attack and stab it on the neck with a knife. However, as soon as her hand entered the cloud surrounding the lion’s neck, she got hit with an electric jolt making her pull back her hand.
Matthew stepped forward while Paula cast Agility up on the three others. When his sword made contact with the lion’s cloud mane, he too was jolted with electricity that traveled through the metal of his blade to his hand.
The second lion had two arrows embedded on its shoulder when it reached Michael, who drew his saber and engaged in melee combat dodging its claws and taking an eye from the monster.
"Don’t touch the mane!" Matthew warned Michael dodging a claw attack himself.
However, he tripped when dodging a second claw. On a quick movement, the first lion managed to get on top of him, pinning him to the floor with its weight, and tried to bite his neck. Luckily for him, Paula was already preparing an icicle attack that she managed to pierce the lion’s mouth with killing it.
Vanessa had changed targets while that was happening and was aiding Michael who was having trouble with his opponent. She sneaked behind the second lion and stabbed it with both hands where its kidneys were drawing a huge painful roar from it. Thɪs chapter is updated by N()velFire.net
Michael finished it with a slash to the face hitting its brain and killing it.
Both lions dissolved into a mist of light leaving behind yellow mana crystals.
Matthew picked one up and examined it.
"That’s a topaz mana crystal." Vanessa explained. "It condensates electric mana."
"I know." Matthew said giving it to her that gave it to Paula to put on her inventory bag. "It’s just the first Mana Gem I ever saw."
"How long do we have?" Michael asked getting closer to the others sheathing his saber.
"Two hours." Paula said looking at her watch. "We should go back."
"Just when we found an unexplored corridor." Matthew lamented.
They went out the Labyrinth soon after without finding any treasure. Finding treasures there was already rare. And it only got harder to find any if the party was hyenaing. But even knowing that, it was a bit disheartening not to find anything.
As soon as they went out of the dungeon, a staff member ran towards them saying that Claudio wanted to talk to them and was waiting in the meeting room in the administrative building. Vanessa tried to ignore the request, but when she meant to go away the atmosphere suddenly changed. The staff took a step back and some men in suits got near. They felt they couldn’t refuse.
Claudio met them with a huge smile like he was meeting old friends. Invited them to sit down and offered tea and biscuits. Then he sat across them in another couch and crossed his legs moving his glasses on his face and examining each of them.
"Did you find another Shedu for me?" He asked finally.
"Not this time." Vanessa smirked.
"That a pity." Claudio pouted. "But that’s not why I called you all here."
They all looked at each other trying to see if anyone had any idea what the director of the tower wanted. No one showed any sign of knowing.
"The reason I called you here, is this." Claudio said putting a gold snake statuette on the coffee table between them. The snake had the same runes as the gold tiara they found before.
"What is this?" Vanessa asked fast to keep Matthew shut. He was a horrible liar.
"That party that found the Shedu the other day... They found this in the chamber it was in." Claudio explained. "You didn’t find anything like it, did you?" He asked already knowing the answer.
Vanessa was searching for an appraiser for the tiara and it was pretty easy for a man with Claudio’s resources to find out about it.
"We didn’t find anything." Vanessa tried to hide it.
Claudio only sighed and shook his head.
"I want it." He said decisive showing her he already knew she had something.
Vanessa looked at Matthew and then back at Claudio thinking. But then simply said:
Claudio took out his phone and, this time, sent her a contract.
"That much. You’ll find I’m being very generous." He said with his words carrying a subtle threat.
Vanessa chuckled while reading the contract. He even knew it was a gold tiara. She signed without discussing it with Matthew and said that the tiara was safely stored at Eric’s guild hall.
"Valhalla Riders." Vanessa said the guild name. "I’ll let you know that the Tower will send someone there to collect it." She added typing a message to Eric.
"It’s always a pleasure making business with you." Claudio said picking the snake statuette back and shoving it in his inner jacket pocket.
When they all got inside the car, Matthew asked a bit angry:
"Why did you sell it? We still had no idea of what it does."
"Because he didn’t gave her a choice." Paula said from the backseat. "Didn’t you hear his tone?"
Matthew looked back at Paula surprised.
"You don’t want to make an enemy of the Tower, Matt." Michael complemented.
"He already knew we had it, where it was hidden and everything. It was either sell him or he would take it by force." Vanessa explained.
Matthew nodded in understanding.
"Shame we don’t get to see what it does." He commented.
"But he told the truth when he said he was being generous." Vanessa said showing Matthew the contract on her phone that was soon passed to the back seat.
"We’re rich." Matthew laughed. "Divided by four..." He started to do the math.
"By two." Paula corrected him. "Michael and I weren’t there when you two got it. It’s only yours."
Matthew rehearsed a disagreement, but Paula’s face already told him she didn’t want any of that money. He was in a great party, he thought.