Chapter 241: Wind Chimes

The necrotic parasite held up a black cube in its narrow jaws.

Its undead, green, beady eyes seemed to say ‘thank you for waiting. I missed you’ – from what Jay could tell anyway.

Jay bent down and grabbed the black cube out of his necrotic parasite’s mouth.

“Come.” he said as he tapped his chest with a loving smile.

The helminth snapped its jaws happily and sprung at Jay, its body reassembling into a necklace around his neck while its invisible ethereal body rested itself around his neck, scanning for enemies – victims for its necrotic bolts.

Jay glanced at Asra, still wrapped in the noon-leather blanket.

“Ah… don’t attack the vampire.” Jay thought, and his parasite squeezed his neck a little, as if to say ‘yes, master.’.

Still holding the black cube in his hand, Jay tried to analyse it – yet nothing happened.

“Huh, maybe it’s just a weird rock?” Jay wondered, considering throwing it away.

Jay pulled his arm back, about to launch it into the valley below – though just before he ripped his arm forward, he paused.

Jay sighed, and then decided to keep it, to remember Viladore by.

Viladore had always been helpful to Jay, and even gave him a free goblin wand and a free room – he was perhaps the only person Jay knew who had done something so caring and generous for him, expecting nothing in return.

In all of Losla, Jay thought Viladore was one of the few generous people there.

Of course, Jay was ignorant and naive, having no idea of anything Viladore did.

As Jay held the cube, he wasn’t sure why, but somehow it felt familiar to him. Similar to his skeletons, but slightly different.

Jay decided he would study it later, once he had a more permanent camp.

He added it to his inventory – or at least tried to.

“Huh. Not just a rock I suppose. Typical Viladore.”

But the problem became: how would he keep it, and take it with him. It was simply a burden to have to carry it.

Using one hand to hold something useless in a fight was a major disadvantage after all, and Jay really didn’t seem himself bashing a beasts head inwards with the black cube.

With a sigh, Jay took out something he thought he would never need again: his bag.

He had kept it in his inventory since learning about the inventory utility skill, and was glad he had not actually thrown it out.

“Hmm…” he thought, remembering another object he had in there – one he told himself to check on, yet completely forgot about.

He took out the [?].

“Wh-?”

It was, at first, an oval stone.

Over time, it seemed to get bigger – though Jay couldn’t be sure since he rarely checked on it.

Now however, there definitely was a change. Three bumps appeared on its smooth surface, going down one side in a line.

“I guess this isn’t just some weird rock either…?” Jay thought, now holding both of them.

As Jay traced his fingers over the bumps, it seemed all too familiar.

Suddenly, Jay realised something, and even got annoyed at himself as he didn’t realise it sooner.

“…I got this from a silt-wolf variant corpse. Don’t fucking tell me, this is a silt-wolf egg?” his eyes widened as he held it in his hands.

It all made perfect sense.

He pulled it from a silt-wolf which was different from the others, and was protected by the other types.

Jay just assumed the normal wolves wanted to protect it since it used magic pulse attacks and seemed to be blind.

Jay put the cube down and gently held the oval stone in both hands.

“Ah… how am I going to care for this. Wait… why should I even care for it? Would it even be loyal? Maybe it will be like a dog?” he wondered.

“Hmm, I guess it would be good to have a pet… though I won’t get attached. It’ll probably die at some point.”

“Hope it doesn’t hatch in an awkward situation. If it even is meant to hatch?” he gazed at it.

He hoped that it wouldn’t hatch infront of Asra, as she would probably steal it or do something crazy like throw it off a cliff – Jay still didn’t know what her personality was like, he just knew she wasn’t human – not that being human would make Jay more trusting or any less wary anyway.

“Well, at least it can be stored in my inventory.” he shrugged, adding the [?] oval stone back into his inventory, then picked up the cube again and placed that into his backpack.

“Gosh, what a weird day.” Jay thought, “yesterday I was alone in the forest, but now I have a vampire, an egg, a black cube and a bird stalker.” he shook his head.

“Can’t I just be left alone with my skeletons…” he frowned.

Jay glanced across the valley into the black cave on the other side.

“Well, maybe a little bit of killing will make me feel normal again.”

“Wait, what am I even saying? Killing isn’t normal.”

“…I just enjoy it.”

Jay ascended back onto his throne and with the vampire Asra still tucked away in the blanket he made his way to the cave.

The valley was particularly troublesome to cross, as he had to store his throne away and descend using vines – though climbing up on the other side was another matter entirely.

There were no vines on the other side, so climbing up was much harder.

The wall was simply too steep to ascend it without getting his hands dirty.

Basically it was just a slippery wall of moss and soft dirt, and each time he grabbed a chunk of dirt or moss came out.

It was also dotted with silk-covered holes hiding deadly spiders, burrows hiding snakes or some other poisonous reptile or plant.

Fungus bulbs filled with some milky sap hid within different parts of the dirt, and after bursting one, Jay quickly learnt that these damn things could eat away this skin, turning it to water through some magical means.

Unfortunately for Jay, it didn’t burst onto the parasite-filled boil on his arm. He was not yet free from this looming burden just yet.

Despite all of this, he soon managed to make it up to the top of the steep part – of course, with the help of his skeletons.

Each of them keenly dug one of their arms into the soil and turned themselves into living foothold’s, each using their free arm to help push and pull Jay up the side of the steep valley.

After doing this, Jay didn’t even need to use his hands to pull himself up anymore. The skeletons were almost like ants hauling a piece of food, Jay, up to their nest.

Asra similarly went up, still kept hidden under the blanket.

She probably woke up from this, but Jay didn’t care as he simply had to. Later on, she could complain to his back while he slept soundly for all he cared.

Soon enough, the party finally made it in front of the cave.

It was much bigger than he anticipated, and each step he took or each clink of the skeletons seemed to echo almost endlessly into the depths of the cave.

Around the entrance were spider webs, six-legged worms which looked poisonous, tiny mud elementals in the forms of brown snakes, and even some wind chimes which were another type of elemental – but just a few steps deeper into the cave, having been lit up with a luminous orb, and there was no life at all.

Just empty, lifeless rocks in endless bleak darkness.

“Damn, maybe just a cave?” Jay wondered, “or something’s burrow…”

A shiver went up his spine as he thought of some gargantuan creature creating this – though he soon realised that it wasn’t a burrow, as when he turned to leave and stashed away his luminous orb, he received a notification.

[Enter Savage Lands – Level 4 dungeon?]

[Instanced][Locked]

[Yes/No]

“Ah, finally.” Jay smiled excitedly, happy to find what he was looking for.

“Hmm… locked? My first locked dungeon? I wonder what it means.” he raised a brow.

“Well, it’s only level four. It shouldn’t be too dangerous.”

Jay was level twelve, so he really felt like he could have free reign in this dungeon. Locked or unlocked, it didn’t matter.

Finally he could gain some exp again.

“Yes. Enter.” he smiled, and the world went into darkness.