Drinking another potion and offering more to the twins, Nia tried to calm down from nearly dying.
In the space between realms they would be safe for the moment, however sooner or later they would have to leave as the life-sustaining mana was missing.
Nia forced herself out of those idle thoughts. She could only evade the issue so long.
“So what are your plans now?”
“We could visit the Spri-” Sera was about to repeat her old answer, but got quickly cut off by the assassin. “No! No, we don’t! I got into enough dangerous situations for the time being. Are you insane, trying to explore a new realm who’s owner nearly killed us moments ago?”
“Well, technically-” The sword user tried to explain, but was again cut off.
“No, i don’t want an answer to that question.” Sighing Nia continued. “So, any other suggestions?”
After a short moment of silence Sarah took the word reluctantly. “What exactly is a divine realm in the first place?”
“Normal realms have level restrictions. They are mainly enforced through Eas, but it’s all a matter of the mana density of a realm. If the mana density is too high it will start to destroy weaker materials. At our current level mostly organic stuff like dead bodies, but in realms with a higher required level also normal stone, iron and more. The mana flow of living beings can counteract those forces, as can special enchantments mostly used by hunters, cooks, tailors and similar classes, but those can be overpowered as you have seen just moments ago. Mana poisoning would be the result, destroying whatever it is affecting. In the end the level restrictions prevent low level individuals from simply dying because they wandered in the wrong realm, while also keeping high level powerhouses out of hunting grounds they have long since outgrown.”
Searching through her memory for a moment, Nia went on. “Divine realms are different since they don’t have level restrictions. Why? Because the mana density in them can vary from one location to the next. Usually a reason why a lot of people are trying to get a residency in them. One can get easier in touch with high level individuals and they are the only place where one can spawn children without issues. However, a god has complete control over the realm and can shape it as they see fit. A thriving city on the top of a mountain above the clouds? No problem. An infernal hellscape killing everyone not prepared for it? Sure. A deep jungle with wild beasts lurking in every shadow? If they so desire. It all depends on the whims of the god. And even if the realm doesn’t kill you on your first step, one wrong turn and you can end up in an area with high mana density and your health vanishes faster than you can regret your decision.
Anyway, what i want to express is that visiting a divine realm isn’t impossible, but being the first to do it would result in many unnecessary dangers.”
Quietly she also complained, “sometimes i wish Eas was a bit more open with information, but i guess it wants us to work for infos we don’t need to survive…”
“But back to the initial question, what now? Since my potion supply is running a bit low, we could look for another town. Otherwise we could revisit the earlier idea of going into a dungeon and staying there for some time. You two still need to learn the language and a few more levels are never bad.”
A few short checks of their inventory later, they decided on their next goal and headed towards another dungeon. Revisiting the one they cleared earlier had been an option, yet with the inflated stats of the twins Nia had suggested a new one.
She had already made plans to visit it at some point in the future, once she had a few more levels or a more reliable team, the latter not that easily achieved with the mostly temporary parties below level 100.
The twins had technically solved the team issue, yet with the events from earlier in the city, whether they were reliable was again up for debate.
[You have entered the Flame Sea Shore.]
Exiting the portal the three girls were immediately assaulted by the heat.
Surrounded on three sides by flames, the small peninsula the party landed on didn’t waste any time to make it clear that the “Flame” part of the name was meant literally. Black sand and a dark sky with only a few lonely stars helped to frame the red burning sea. Though while it would have made a stunning picture, standing in its center felt more like a steak on a grill. Fortunately not quite to the point where they were losing health already or getting a status condition. The fire was distance enough, but still annoying.
“Sarah, you did create ice in the dungeon. Do you think you can set up a cooling system for us?” Maybe she had underestimated the heat a bit… However the dungeon was far closer to the black crack in space than the one they visited in the Forest of eternal Twilight, so even if the ice idea doesn’t work, it wasn’t an impossible distance.
No verbal reply followed, however the mage did start to take out her arrowheads.
A few minutes later streams of cold water were flowing around them and Sarah’s giant mana construct was active again. Her mana had also started to decline slowly, yet with all the spells in use even all three soul rings together shouldn’t be able to sustain the magic. Nia was getting a bit curious how it all worked, yet she had a suspicion that souls were involved, most likely those of the beasts of the last dungeon. In the end, she decided that it was better for her mental health to just ignore it. Should she think of it as an ingenious new way to alleviate a common issue of mages, their limited mana pool, or was it despicable that souls were used as resources? She wasn’t sure. So staying ignorant and simply forgetting about the possibility was the best solution.
Traveling through the sand, they soon reached a more rocky area which improved their speed. The soft ground had caused some issues, especially so for Sera with her metal plates and various heavy weapons, though Sarah didn’t fare much better with her low physical attributes.
Also they had managed to get a bit more distance between them and the source of the heat, further reducing the temperature.
More time passed before they reached the dungeon with Nia used to brief her team about the enemies they could expect to encounter.
She would have liked to meet some of them along the way to give a more hands-on lesson, though for some reason aside from one elemental which quickly fled, once it noticed them, no one approached. Probably an advantage of having a water affinity mage with active ice magic in a fire and earth inclined realm.
Or a drawback once one tried to venture off the common paths and got into the areas with higher level beasts.
Finally a cliff side rose before them. Similar to the last dungeon a chasm created a cave in it and a haze was visible at its entrance. It was hard to discern with all the fire and heat around, though once one looked closely differences from normal heat shimmers were notable.
After a quick exchange of some of their potions, they entered the cave with drawn weapons.
[You have entered the Obsidian Labyrinth on the Flame Sea Shore.]
The temperature in the dungeon was only somewhat hotter than normal, so Sarah removed her ice water again and preserved her mana. She had used quite a bit, yet with her massive mana pool and quick recovery it wouldn’t take long to reclaim her expenditures.
Walking down the first corridor of the dungeon Nia soon had to signal the twins to stop. It was hard to notice, if one didn’t know what to look for, but a thin translucent thread was tautened between the two walls near the floor. The additional light of flickering torches didn’t make it easier and the same could be said about the parallel lines carved into the man-made seeming floor, walls and ceiling.
Informing her party about the trap, they carefully looked for any secondary ones before stepping over the potential trigger and went on. Or they would have, if Sera hadn’t pulled out her scythe and carefully from some distance cut the thread. In the next moment three black shards impacted the walls near the trigger and shattered.
“Hey! Don’t carelessly trigger traps! It shouldn’t be an issue this close to the entrance in a low level dungeon, but once you get deeper they can cause many problems distance alone can’t solve, like attracting more beasts, letting the floor collapse, changing the layout of the labyrinth and more. If you are that curious about what kind of traps exist, search for a book about it and don’t endanger the party! We already nearly died often enough thanks to you!” Nia admonished the girl.
“Yes, yes…” Sera replied quietly.
The assassin wasn’t quite convinced by the answer, but she also doubted that additional lectures would help. Sighing, she continued to lead the party, looking for enemies and traps.
And enemies they found. Reaching the end of the corridor the path split into three. Unfortunately they weren’t the only ones present. Six fire elementals quickly noticed the intruders and readied themselves to strike.
“Why do i only run into weird dungeons lately?!”
