Dakota Krout - Dungeon Born (The Divine Dungeon Book 1)

<���…Huh?>

“Nothing. Explain.”

If she had a jaw, it would have dropped. “ Cal ! I don’t know if you will be able to activate this Rune, how would you possibly activate one so large?”

I quickly laid my plan out to slow her tirade.

“I... guess.” She doubtfully allowed. “Seriously though, you should try activating just this one soon. We don’t want you too weak to join in fights when people get here if it fails.”

I braced myself and followed her advice. I reached out and touched the activation sequence, beginning to funnel Essence into it. Faster than a chubby kid eating cake, the energy began to flow out of me. Faster and faster it poured and soon the loss began straining my reserves. This is the way of Runes; if you activate one, it will try to take every drop of needed Essence out of the person activating it. If you did not have the necessary Essence, it would drain you - to death. Quickly, I reached out for the Cores I had filled to the brim with Essence, draining them dry as I channeled the potent power though myself.

Too quickly they ran out, shattering as I took even the Essence binding them together. One after another the cores around me fell to pieces, making me hope I would not soon be among them. As the last one broke and my internal light began to dim, the Rune flared to life! With a rush like wind in a thunderstorm, loose Essence in the dungeon began flowing into the Boss chamber. The huge Rune that began at the door of the room began to glow! Slowly at first, but then with increasing light and speed. As the shining power became too bright for the human eye to see, like a blacksmith's welding tool, the Rune found an outlet for its stored power.

The next Rune in the link activated under the power of the first and pulled Essence of the heavens and earth to itself. The first Rune had now absorbed all of the loose Essence in the room and was still pulling from the hallway. I felt parched, as though I had a throat had not had a sip of water in decades. I held the Essence in myself as closely as I could, shepherding it in its pattern as even it reacted to the potent Runescript.

One after another, the linked Runes activated. The Light of their combined patterns formed fully around the room - a spiral around me - when the light suddenly stopped, an imperfect Rune in the sequence suddenly exploding into an unintentional activation! I watched in horror to see what would happen when it became fully active. The Essence was still pouring into the Rune from those before it, the failed Rune taking in a terrifying amount of power as it began to activate.

I squeaked, fear pouring off of me in waves. I quickly formed a large amount of acid on the Rune in an attempt to destroy it. The acid began its work, but it was too late.

The room shuddered and a black disc grew upward from the broken Rune. A powerful leg stepped through a newborn hole in reality almost... tentatively. The black, fur covered paw extended claws which dug deep into the floor; the unknown creature began to pull itself into the room. The disk didn’t get larger, but the form was able to slink through the opening.

The paw alone was nearly twenty inches wide, the claws lengthened that by seven inches when fully extended. The leg revealed that it was connected to a large cat-like form. The powerful body was half again as large as a tiger, and pitch black. A tail twitched back and forth in anticipation, the creature obviously excited by this new hunting ground. Along its back four tentacles extended from each of its leg joints, each of them had its own mouth and was tipped with a sharp claw-like stinger which dripped venom.

Its head was very similar to a mountain lion, but had no mouth. Instead, it had an extra eye in the center of its forehead, the only bright spot on its body. It moved around the room sniffing at the new scents and enjoying the scenery. A hiss of acid made it flinch, whipping its tentacles with their gaping maws into an attack position. The Rune was finally destroyed and the black disk vanished silently. The Essence slowed its travel through my dungeon as the other Runes slowed their collection with nowhere to deposit what was already gathered. Dani was huddling in my puddle near me, both of us terrified as to what we had unleashed into the heart of my being.

It padded toward us sniffing the air, like there was a great delicacy nearby. It looked right at the area under the Silverwood tree where we were quietly hiding. From the tentacles, tongues flicked out, licking their sorry excuse for lips. It crouched; silently stalking us, getting closer an inch at a time. Thundering noise made it halt as Raile exploded onto the scene. Raile ran directly at the creature while shadows filled the room, collecting heavily within a ten-foot perimeter of the cat.

Lucky for Raile, I knew where everything in my dungeon was at any given time. He charged unerringly at the cat, who lightly leapt over Raile, casually whipping him with one of its tentacles as it spiraled in the air. Raile was slammed to the wall with enough force to shatter several feet of it from that light strike, but doggedly returned to his feet. He charged again, this time following my attack pattern, jumping as the cat jumped. It seemed surprised as they both flew at the wall, but recovered fast enough to wriggle itself around Raile’s body. It pushed off his back to double the force of Raile’s jump, slamming him into the wall hard enough to fully shatter his armor.

The cat attacked, two limbs pinning Raile to the wall as he whimpered for a moment. Obviously savoring Raile’s helplessness, the pointed stingers on the great cat’s tentacles pierced my Boss’s body repeatedly, perforating him five times each in two seconds. Effectively pin cushioned, Raile died, still held against the wall as the cat disemboweled him. The cat ate a bit of meat, then dropped the body in disinterest, turning back toward Dani and me.

It hissed at us, ignoring the chance for a massive meal. I realized this was a creature that killed for sport. Obviously hating all other creatures, it didn’t even bother to eat its kills beyond what it wanted at any given point. It stalked back to our position and started to slither a tentacle down to where we cowered. For some reason it had completely ignored the Silverwood tree, a poor judgement call. As its tentacle brushed a root, a line of fire raced out from the long-dormant enchantment the Elf had placed on the tree many months ago. The fire sliced the tentacle clean off, making the cat yowl and sprint away, vanishing into the tunnels of my dungeon.

“C-c-c-cal.” Dani stammered, fear invoking a physical reaction, “I-I-is it still moving? Away, I mean?”

I didn’t answer her right away; I was far too focused on a dark mass. The sliced off tentacle was still writhing toward us, intent on finishing us before it perished. Luckily for us both, before it could perform its dark deed I felt a small burst of Essence as it expired. Information on the animal flooded my mind with its death.

I soothed her as best I was able. I was tracking the Cat as it moved along my dungeon, slaying Bashers and leaving their corpses to rot, though I quickly reabsorbed them. Actually, I was glad to regain some Essence, I was far closer to empty than I was comfortable with.

“What was that?! What just happened?!” She cried out hysterically.

I thought of everything I now knew about the animal.

I kept up my flood of information to give her something to focus on. amazing hunter. When it feels threatened it thickens the darkness in the area to hide. If it is too bright, it distorts the light - bending it around itself, effectively becoming invisible while an illusion forms a few feet away. Then it attacks with its tentacles, the illusion and real thing hit the same spot to lend credence to the illusion being the real Beast.>