Guardian core (Book 1 of: potentially many)

The first party*

(*Rockers in the house tonight~)

(Stephan)

As we descended into the dungeon, I felt a faint chill, as if the magic in the air were growing a bit stronger suddenly- normally I would've felt this when I first entered the dungeons territory instead of only knowing thanks to all the ambient mana. Really he was an incredibly wasteful dungeon, and... it was almost eery how worried that made me. Why would this dungeon act so differently from every other modern dungeon?

I looked at Val, and she raised an eyebrow at me. I was about to relay my concerns, when she spoke up. "No clue. It doesn't matter, since we can't do anything about it. If you need too, ask again later, when we aren't in a potentially deadly dungeon." She continued looking around, and I blushed, looking away. Alcor chuckled, shaking his head.

"Do not worry- this dungeon is young, and it is not as cruel as most." I looked at him, glancing around to see that the other two were doing the same- all of us looking at him in utter bewilderment.

He stayed quiet for a minute before he realized we were staring at him, and he sighed. "Think. The stones for the steps, they are too rough to be old, right? They have not been worn down. and the walls are too smooth- there are no stalagmites like most caves develop. Then, the forest is young, and very new. Then this water at our feet, it has almost no algae in it, yet there are no fish or insects eating it. How could this be unless the dungeon was very young?"

The others blinked, and I spent a full minute going over his points. "Well... dang. You're right... so, how'd you figure that out?" He shrugged, looking around again and frowning.

"Orcs have much wisdom, though we aren't the smartest. I notice things with my ranger class that you don't. So I can understand much, even if I don't know too many magical things." He paused for a minute. "Besides, there are no traps, this is not a normal, or developed dungeon."

Val was the first one to fully recover from her surprise. "Er... yeah. Okay... Then, how'd a magic orb get here? Especially one that has a quest on it? I mean, most dungeons can't and don't need to make quests for their dungeons this early on."

This time, Alcor stayed quiet, seemingly deep in thought. I sighed. "You think about it, and tell us if you puzzle it out. Come on guys... we need to keep going." We started moving again, and Auriel seemed to be fairly annoyed.

I continued to look around, humming to myself as I activated my blind-sight skill so I'd know if anything was hidden or invisible. I wasn't seeing anything, but I remained wary. Normally, the most deadly traps were almost impossible to find. My trap-finding skill was relatively high, almost three times my total level. It had taken me close to three years of almost constantly practicing in order to manage that. My dodging skills and lock-picking abilities were the second highest in my age group, and I could handle a knife better than most rangers.

This didn't make me feel any better about not seeing traps. We kept going, and took almost an hour to reach the first room. I tensed, steadying myself as I readied to fight our first monsters- it was probably just a few goblins, but with how weird this dungeon was, it could be anything. I took a deep breath, and nodded to Alcor. We entered first together, weapons ready as a battle-cry grew in our throats.

... It was empty.

Me and Alcor felt the war-cry die, and looked around. "Ghosts? No... Auriel would've warned us. Then... what the heck?" I was so confused that I didn't even search for traps. I just started running, looking everywhere to try and figure out where our first fight. The room was truly empty though- which made me begin to freak out.