What Lies off the Beaten Path

"Kenaz.”

John drew on the wall his first rune, lighting up the old hallway rather well. While the entire barrow was in ruins, as it had been left alone for the past hundred years or so, this area clearly had sat unexplored even longer than the other rooms. Dust caked the room, with cobwebs tangled in each and every corner. They had found some buried dead, but they had deteriorated to fragile skeletons rather than mummified draugr. Even the weapons the dead had been buried with were frail and rusted, crumbling apart when John and Talia tried to pick them up.

The advantage to this was that they were fairly certain there would be no combat for a short stint. The disadvantage was that the traps had not been activated in millennia and thus were very, very well hidden. It was nearly impossible to see if the dust ahead was hiding some sort of pressure sensor or just a pebble that hadn’t been moved in years.

“What I would give for a pet rat.”

Talia turned to John, giving him a puzzled look. “Since I am not able to read the context of your mind, that statement seemed extremely nonsensical. Care to clue me in why you would want a pet rat?”

John shrugged. “Firstly, I’ve always wanted a pet. But more importantly, I could send him forward to trigger any of the traps while using his small rat body to avoid **** by the traps.”

Talia looked ahead, cocking her head to the side. “What if it’s one of those traps that has a whole section of the floor rise up to crush you between the ceiling and floor?”

John held up a hand to respond, but after a moment of nothing good coming to mind, he merely shrugged. “Touché. I rescind my wish for a rat for trap checking.”

Talia gave a soft chuckle, reaching out with the tip of her sword to tap irregularities in the dust covered stone. They had yet to find any traps aside from one involving wooden spikes, but the spikes had been so rotted they broke to pieces the moment the trap had been activated. John was able to loot the broken trap, strangely enough, adding one piece of wood and some iron to his inventory. What he was to do with this he didn’t quite know, but there had been the option to fix the door back in the statue room. If he came across another door similar to that one, and he actually had the supplies on him, maybe he could skip a few puzzles by simply fixing the door.

It was a hope, anyway. If not that, maybe his powers would let him tap into some sort of crafting system. He might be able to repair his current gear or make something new, and if he found an area for it, maybe build himself a cool base of operations. If this world was as real as the one he came from (and for the sake of his sanity, he was choosing to think of it that way, that he just managed to find a branch of Yggdrasil that connected his world and Alfheim), maybe there were other worlds out there he could tap into. Ones that he could easily build a small base of operations to stay in while XP farming or practicing his magic. Or in the event that this one was created (which he didn’t like to think about, but it was still a possibility till he found evidence of the Ljósálfr being in his world), he might be able to create one that would suit his needs. Maybe with some time dilation, dungeon creation, study, training ground, and a nice big bed for him and Talia to share so the nights wouldn’t get cold. Plus, it would be a great way to level up a few of his… choice skills.

He did always wonder what 69ing someone was like.

Just then a small jab in his belly broke him out of his NSFW thoughts. Talia stood in front of him, the butt of her sword in his stomach and her free hand pointing to the room ahead of them. Her lips were pursed, her eyes wide, and John could almost swear there was a slight tremor in her hand. He figured she wanted him to stay quiet, and peeked into the next room.

John understood what she was scared about.

The next room looked to be the chamber of a king. John doubted it was Beowulf’s, more likely a chamber of some lesser king that followed Beowulf’s reign as this one was in a similar state to the halls. However, one major distinction between the room and the hall was the fact that the denizens of the room were not decayed to nothing but brittle bone. Instead, John could see around a dozen or so draugr sitting in chairs along the two side walls, like council members slumped moments after ****. Each draugr was armed with either a sword or a bow, and John figured the second they entered the draugr would awaken.

However, that was not even the worst part. The worst part was across from them, sitting on a stone throne that John imagined was once ornate but had lost its luster to age. Sitting directly across them on the other side of the room was another draugr, this one wearing armor, a crown of horns, and some various necklaces. In addition, in his hand was a giant broadsword about as tall as John. Unlike the other draugr who had no light in their eyes, his eyes glowed a brilliant bright blue, and stared right at John and Talia.

“Maybe he didn’t see us,” John whispered. “It looks like his head is just resting in that position, and maybe he can’t see that far.”

“Yeah, but if we go in there, I am sure as Helheim he will see us.”

“Okay… Um... “

“John, there was no other way we saw through the hallway and we cannot go through the original doorway.”

John sighed and turned to look at her. “You’re right. Looks like it’s time for our first boss battle.”

John grabbed her hand and quickly traced out the Uruz rune on its back. “If we start to lose, I want you to run. I might have some Gamer 1-Up system in place or something, so I probably have a better chance to survive if things look bad.”

Talia shook her head. “We are facing this together. I’m not running if things look bad, I’ll just fight even harder.”

John gave her a small smile and kissed her cheek. “Thanks.” With that, the both of them turned and slowly walked into the room. As they both crossed the threshold, they heard the groaning of gears and sliding of stone before the door behind them slammed shut.

Talia gulped. “No turning back anyway.”

John nodded, turning to face the boss. They took slow, tentative steps into the room, heartbeats ringing in their ears and their hands tightly gripping the hilts of their respective blades. John kept licking his lips out of nervousness, his hands trembling as they walked closer to the center of the room. The room was built like an arena, in its center a pit about 10 feet by 20 feet. The sides of the pit were easily 6 feet tall, maybe even higher. The dead draugr on the side almost seemed to watch them as they descended the stairs into the pit, despite the fact that their lifeless corpses didn’t move a muscle. The leader, however, was clearly watching them as his gaze followed them into the pit. He didn’t move anything other than his head, his eyes blazing brightly in the otherwise darkened room.

Just as they passed the halfway point in the arena pit, the sudden sound of a blast caused them to stop. They quickly looked around, seeing nothing coming for them and nothing seemingly affected by the sound other than them.

Then, the king slowly arose.

John could hear the joints of the king cracking and popping, as John fathomed that the draugr had not moved from that spot in millenna. He used the throne and his sword to help him rise to his feet, displaying to both John and Talia how tall he really was. They knew that he looked big from across the room, but seeing him stand they understood just how tall he truly was as he seemed to stand around 8 or 9 feet tall.

The king slowly raised his hand, more joints cracking and popping. John swore he saw cobwebs clinging to the giant king, but in such low lighting it was nearly impossible to tell. Once the king’s arm was stretched out straight ahead, John saw something he had been told was impossible.

Very slowly, John watched as blue tendrils traveled along the inside of the draugr’s arm, the veins of mana traveling to the nordic zombie’s hand. He watched as the king slowly traced a familiar shape in front of him, the symbol glowing the same bright blue as his eyes. Then, the king’s jaw slowly opened up and a single word emerged from the millenia dead creature.

“KENAZ.”

The rune burst, small balls of fire shooting out across the room and landing perfectly in the various braziers and torches near the walls. The room was instantly lit up, blue flames bringing the room to life and giving John his first real good look at the king.

The Draugr King was certainly an impressive specimen. His skin was an ashen grey, with a slight blue tint due to the mana John could see flowing through the king’s body. It had been drawn tightly over his skeleton, giving the draugr a very thin spindly look. However, John could guess that this draugr was anything but. His armor was still rather sturdy looking, forged from some sort of blackened metal. He wore a chest plate and shoulder pads, as well as arm bands and a belt that held up tattered cloth to become a loin cloth. He had boots made of the same material, but while the rest of the armor was a stark black, the boots had orange-brown stains covering them, probably what was left of the Draugr King’s last opponents.

While his face was somewhat illuminated initially by his glowing eyes, the addition of the other light sources gave John a much better look at the king’s face. The skin had been drawn tight there too, causing the king to have no lips and show off his yellowed teeth. He had a thick, full beard, the hair as black as spider legs. Honestly, his face bore more resemblance to that of a skull, with the only difference being the ashen skin that connected everything and the existence of hair. The top of his head had just as thick and full hair as his beard, tied back to what looked like a small ponytail. Slowly the draugr wrapped his bony fingers around his broadsword, keeping his gaze locked on John and Talia. He slowly raised the weapon, pointing it at them. John and Talia both raised their own weapons, the runes on John’s sword and Talia’s hand glowing a bright yellow to the king’s blue. The king gave pause, cocking his head as he stared at the runes. Then, the fire in his eyes glowed brighter as he turned to the draugr sitting in the various chairs. He opened his mouth again, these words causing a booming echo in the chamber.

“"I to! Angrib!"

As the echo died down, John and Talia heard more cracking of joints coming from the sides. They turned to see one draugr on each side slowly getting up, their eyes glowing the same, if dimmer, blue as their king’s. The draugr then both drew swords before advancing to the edge of the pit and jumping in.

John turned himself to be back to back with Talia, both of them staring a draugr straight in the undead eyes. Before anyone could move, a small window ignored John’s messaging service and popped up in his view.

King Agviðr’s **** Arena
Wave 1/4
Rewards Upon Completion
300 xp
The Horned Crown of King Agviðr
One Random Rare Armor Piece

Just as John finished reading this, it blipped out of existence. ‘Wonderful’ John thought ‘I do so love wave based assaults.’ He raised his sword a bit higher, adjusted his stance, and prepared himself for the fight(s) of his life.

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