9 Dungeons Below: Old Library

Ano- ly- det- ted- fore- items

Merrick froze.

The announcement seemed to have glitched out but it was enough for him to know that the golem had scanned the contents of his clothing bundle. Fortunately, the Golem Operator tapped the golem twice on the top of its shell. "See what I mean, these things are at the end of their rope."

Merrick nodded one last time and then started down the stairs before either of the guards could ask him a question or the golem had a second try at speaking.

Prisoner floor fifteen was nothing like those above it. The map that Merrick had copied had already given him that idea but it did nothing to prepare him for what he saw when he reached the bottom of the steps. Rather than a hallway linking small cells together, the floor was mostly just one large open room.

Around the edges Merrick could see that there were still individual cells but just as the dragon-like prisoner had told him, the prisoners were roaming free and openly conversing with each other. They clustered at tables around the room. Some were playing games, others were reading, and there were a few that were just staring into the distance in a different seat than the one in their cell.

While he was taking in the sight, a group of Riot Guards headed for the stairs came close by. One of them stopped. "First time down here?"

Merrick nodded.

"Relax. This is an easy post. Who were you to report to?"

"Gustav." Merrick forced out the name that he had just heard.

"The Lieutenant? Ah, you just missed him. He went up to make his report for the day. If you head out now, you can probably catch him before he ascends." The guard pointed at one of the walls that did not have any prisoner cells, instead there was just a solid wooden door. "Out that door, you might have seen it listed as the garden but we call it the library now. He'll be headed up any minute, so I wouldn't delay if I were you."

"Thank you."

"It's not a problem. If you're still down here when we get back from our rounds, we can ride up together and we'll grab a drink in the barracks."

Merrick offered a quick nod as the helpful guard hurried off to catch up with his partners. There was more to this floor than met the eye. Once Merrick was mostly on his own, he moved over to one of the empty tables and set down the bundle he had been carrying. He quickly checked the map that he had copied down.

The door that the guard had pointed at was, in fact, listed as a garden. There was also a marking for some kind of portal or gateway within the garden that led to the upper floors. If Gustav, who was some form of Lieutenant, was in fact out there, Merrick was in no hurry to explore that particular part of the floor.

The portal marked on the map and the comment the helpful guard had made about riding up together did throw a slight wrench into Merrick's mental plan though. He had assumed the other Adventurers had come down to this floor because of the dungeon, but what if they had come down here because of its connection to the higher floors. He could find out in time.

First, the rest of the floor needed to be explored. According to his map, there were three other areas on this floor. The first was listed as the commissary and by looking in its direction, Merrick assumed it was where the prisoners received their meals. A line of prisoners stood at one archway and eventually one would leave the neighboring arch with a tray full of food.

The second area was near the commissary. It had two labels on the map: Restricted and Storage. As he stood watching, Merrick saw someone in a guard's uniform, without much armor on, leave through the commissary arch and head into the storage area after unlocking it with a key. Unlike on his floor, Merrick knew that he could not simply blast open the door without causing a scene. If he needed to go there, he would need to get a copy of that key.

As for the last one, just like the commissary storage area, it also had two labels: Restricted and Library. Merrick thought back to what the helpful guard had said about the garden being used as a library. If the room was unused now, it would serve as a better place to prepare for his search than the completely exposed table he was at now.

Merrick packed up the clothing bundle and tucked it back under his shield arm. The door to the library was on the far side of the floor's main room. With each painfully slow step, Merrick made sure to walk in a loose orbit around the clusters of prisoners.

If they were as privileged as they seemed, they might realize that he was not one of their usual guards. Also, at the end of the day, they were prisoners. If they saw how encumbered he was by the armor, they might try to change their circumstances.

As he got closer to his destination, Merrick realized that he needed a plan if the door was locked. There was not much that he could do physically to force the door open. The disguise was completed by a stolen sword. He could probably lever the door open with it but that would draw as much, if not more, attention than a quick spell. As he reached the door and found that it was locked, Merrick decided to risk the attention by letting off a quick blast of energy.

While trying to block what he was doing with his back, Merrick pressed his palm against the door's frame, right next to the knob. As he released the Arcane Blast, he used his other hand to twist the doorknob in a hope that the force would help it bump the lock out of place. The spell was weakened, Merrick assumed due to the armor he wore. The blast was little more than a forceful push of energy but it worked.

However, Merrick nearly slumped forward from exhaustion as the door opened for him. If anyone had been watching, they would have assumed a drunken guard was trying to sneak into the library to sleep off their mistake and pass their shift quickly. The lock survived Merrick's spell, so once he was inside the library, he locked himself in and sat down with his back to the door to catch his breath.

If he was going to blend into this floor, and still be able to react, Merrick needed to pass himself off as a prisoner. If the Arcane Blast was any indication, it would be more difficult than he thought to summon Crudle back to his side while encumbered. Without even standing up, Merrick set the clothing bundle down to his side and started to take off his stolen armor.

It made a heavy pile in front of the door when he was done. Even if someone had the key and came to investigate, they would need to push the armor out of the way for the door to open enough. Once he was back in his own clothes, Merrick inspected the library that he found.

As he took his first proper step into the old library, a notification popped up:

Discovered an Abandoned Library within the Elemental Cage. Would you like to change your Respawn Location from Starting Position to the Abandoned Library? Yes / No

Another indicator that he was on the right track, Merrick hit yes and got another notification.

The Abandoned Library has been selected as the Respawn Location. Place one of the Starting Items on the shelf next to the door to bind it to this room and remove it from the hidden cache in the Starting Position. The bound item will respawn on the shelf upon your death regardless if it was used, destroyed, or lost. To bind an item, it must be left on the shelf for a full day.

While the ability to bind one of his Starting Items was appealing, it was also forcing him to choose one of the three. It was another sign that he was on the right track, after all the game assumed that he now had enough experience with the three starting items to know which one he wanted to keep.

It was not a difficult decision but Merrick would have preferred to keep all three. The key did not serve any further purpose, he had already tried it on several locks and the only one it worked on was the one to his original cell. He could easily leave it behind.

The vials that contained the sorcery boosting potion were harder to leave behind. While he had not been able to use them to their full effect, they had proved to be extremely useful. Though, if he played long enough, he would eventually come across better potions, plus there were only two of them.

The dagger, however, was a complete mystery. It was the kind of mystery that Merrick was known to take a gamble on. The dagger itself could be helpful if he ever needed to fight without magic, as pitiful as his skills may be, or if he needed to cut a rope. There were also the runes inscribed on the blade itself. In good conscience, Merrick could not leave it behind before discovering what it did.

The dagger had to be at least as helpful as the potions and the key had been. With the decision made, Merrick pulled the dagger from his belt and placed it on the shelf. A notification and a timer popped up, letting Merrick know exactly how long he needed to wait before he could take it with him.

Despite the name the system had given his new Respawn Location, there were still plenty of books leftover. Now that he could move easily and his dagger was binding to the room, Merrick moved about his new base of operations looking to uncover its secrets. The library itself reminded Merrick more of a small chapel devoted to knowledge.

There were two long bookshelves on either side of the room, nearly a dozen books still sat collecting dust on the shelves. In the center of the room there was a table with four chairs and several stacks of books piled high on top. Next to the table there was a pair of writing desks pressed up against each other with a divider between them.

However, the real reason Merrick felt like he had walked into a chapel was on the far end of the library. Beyond the bookshelves, the desks, and the table was a small shrine. At least, it felt like a shrine and slightly resembled one.

Inspecting it further, Merrick was certain that it served as a way to make an offering and receive a blessing. The shrine itself was held within an alcove on the wall and consisted of a small bowl atop a stone pedestal. In every game Merrick had ever played, such a shrine would have been adorned with religious text, sculpture, or dedication. However the one in the Abandoned Library was empty and simply sat waiting.

As a Mage, Merrick did not have the ability to use faith-based magic and he did not have any knowledge of how shrines worked in Dungeons Below. The only class change that he had been given as an option would have focused him more on the elemental side of arcane magic, which some would view as even further from the faith-based magic that he assumed was needed in this situation.

With nothing to learn about the shrine, Merrick turned to the stacks of books on the table. Even as it reminded him of his day job, he could not simply leave such a mess in his new base of operations. The table seemed like a good place to conduct research and, in time, Merrick knew he would make his own towering stacks of waiting books. To reach that though, he needed to reshelve the stacks that currently occupied the table.

Many hands make the work light, Merrick thought to himself as he called Crudle back to his side. Merrick picked up a book, after reading the title, he handed it to Crudle and gave the dust mephit an order on where to stack it on the shelves. It was his goal to repeat this process until the table had been cleared.

Unfortunately, as he got halfway through the first stack, he felt a surge of arcane energy. It crackled and popped in the same way his lightning bolt spell had felt. It was coming from the back of the book that Merrick had just started to skim the first few pages. Flipping to the end, Merrick found a small seal tucked away. It was similar to the one he had tucked away in his mage's journal, but this one was older and seemed to be fraying at the edges.

Merrick threw the seal forward and Crudle soared between him and the crackling energy. It released with a spark, several tomes were turned to ash, but Crudle caught the sparks that would have hit Merrick and easily shrugged them off.

When the dust settled, Merrick found himself facing off against a ball of lightning. It was an elemental, he was certain of that, and just by looking at it, Merrick could tell that it was about as strong as Crudle had been before Merrick enhanced the dust mephit. If they fought in the library, the sounds might draw attention but more importantly, the books themselves could be damaged. The ash was still settling from the small stack that had been destroyed.

The book that Merrick had in hand, as he had been about to send it with Crudle to a shelf, was called "Binding Spirits to your Will" and from what Merrick had learned while poking through the first few pages, the book itself was a tome of knowledge but also a sort of magical focus.

With it in hand, Merrick could feel the energy of both Crudle and the minor lightning elemental more easily. While it was not something he was trained in, or even had a skill in, Merrick wanted to force the new enemy back into the seal that it burst forth from. The paper seal was still faded and frayed, but it had floated softly down to the ground, undamaged by the lightning elemental's release.

Before the lightning ball could release another charge, Merrick took the steps he had learned to cast a spell as a Mage. He conjured an image in his mind of the lightning elemental being dragged back into its seal. He called on the latent energy of the Abandoned Library, focusing on what was left over from the blast when the seal broke.

Before he released the spell with a quick incantation, Merrick drank one of the potions. The surge of energy mixed with the power he had been gathering and Merrick was sure that it was enough. He focused the energy through the focus in his hand, the book of binding spirits, and then finally released it.

For a second, Merrick worried that his spell had failed. Just as the lightning ball was ready to release another blast, a soft glow came from the paper it had been sealed within. Merrick watched patiently as the minor lightning elemental was pulled down by invisible chains until it passed back through the seal.

The seal itself was still crackling with energy. Merrick inspected it closer now that the immediate threat was gone. The blood of the seal had faded and cracked in several places, which allowed the elemental to escape on its own. Using the book as a reference instead of a focus, Merrick flipped it open to a page about repairing elemental seals and performed a ritual.

As he finished the ritual, the blood of the seal was restored. The paper itself was still frayed but the seal itself would hold now. Finally, Merrick took a second to breath and was greeted by a notification:

Spark Sprite Seal has been crafted. Knowledge of Crafting Elemental Seals has been learned. Gaining further knowledge will unlock the Skill: Craft (Elemental Seal).