Chapter 63: Into the fire
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'Torch'

There's almost no light in these caverns, so in order to see where I'm going, I have been using the only fire spell that I know.

By using magic in creative ways I can reproduce the effects of other elements while using only darkness. But there's one thing that dark magic can never do, no matter how ingenious you are, and that's making light. There's a spell that could let me see in the dark, but it requires some concentration which would make it slightly more difficult to do other stuff at the same time. 'Torch' is a basic spell and is much easier to use, even if it's from an element I'm not good at.

"So I should go that way next?"

Longleg has been sending me in the right direction this entire time. I don't really know how he does it, being good at mazes is one thing, but how can he tell where to go when he's never been here before? Well, it's convenient so I won't complain.

"Oh, it's another one of those monsters."

So far I have not seen any strong monsters at all. Mostly I've encountered dogs with glowing red eyes, large lizards covered in spikes that curl into a ball and roll to attack, and some floating rocks with a single eye that keep trying to bash my head. Nothing out of the ordinary.

All of them have been below level 50. Well, the monsters are supposed to get stronger the deeper one goes into these caverns and I'm still close to the entrance, so in order to save my mana, I've been fighting without using magic. It turns out that a single slap is enough to send any of these low-level monsters flying and kill them instantly.

However, just a bit further ahead I see something that catches my interest.

"Is that lava?"

There's a small river of lava. I had never seen lava before, and this is different from how I imagined it, this is a lot more gray and viscous looking. Rather than lava, this looks like a bunch of liquefied rocks... which is exactly what lava is so I don't know what I was expecting.

'Heat void'

Dark magic has no 'real' protection spell, but it can accomplish something similar with a spell that nullifies certain things. For example, nullifying the heat that comes at me is, in practice, the same as a spell that protects from heat and fire.

This way I should be able to touch the lava without burning myself... yeah, it doesn't feel hot at all, I should be able to do that thing...

"Longleg, wait here a moment."

I leave Longleg on top of a rock and start taking off my clothes. I've read plenty of books that show how tough a powerful monster or demon is by having them take baths in lava and it always makes them seem so cool. I'm sure that my cool factor will also increase if I do it myself, and this is the perfect chance.

As expected, I'm not getting burned, but... this does not feel like being submerged in liquid at all, it's more like moving around some really thick mud, and each movement causes flames to come out and hit me in the face. It's also really sticky.

"Uh... this is actually rather unpleasant..."

I need to stay inside for at least a few seconds to be able to call this a bath, but I'm not staying any more time than it's necessary. Also, I'll need to clean the bits that got stuck to my skin, my clothes will probably catch fire if I put them on right now...

"Well, at least from now on I'll be able to say that I took a bath in lava once, and at the end that's the most important thing. Hey! Don't look at me like that!"

Longleg is sitting there staring at me. He's just standing still not doing anything, and his spider face cannot make any specific expressions, but I still cannot help but feel that he's judging me...


 

'Shadow lance'

"That rock monster was really strong, it says level 131."

Well, everything is still dying after only one attack, so I wouldn't be able to tell how strong they are if I was not using an appraisal stone to check them. But 131 is the level of an elite fighter by normal standards. I don't think that I'm even one-third of the way there yet, if the monsters continue to get stronger at this pace I might actually end up encountering something that's actually dangerous...

"Bzz"

"Huh?"

Speaking of dangerous things, isn't that a swarm of mana mosquitoes? Each one of them is only just over level 20, but they are known to be one of the most dangerous monsters to mages. Just by being nearby, they can suck all of your mana, in fact, I can feel them doing that to me just now.

Magic does not work well against them and they are too numerous and small for physical attacks to be effective either. So they'll just continue to swarm around you until you are unable to use any magic at all, which can be a death sentence for a mage if there are any other monsters around. And this swarm around me is particularly big, if I don't do anything I might end up getting in trouble.

Unfortunately for them, there's one particular trick I came up with recently that I've been wanting to try, and it should be a perfect counter to them.

'Poison cloud'

"Bzz?"

Magic poison wouldn't normally work against them, they would just suck the mana before inhaling the poison, that would break the spell before any of it got to them. However, I released my mana before I actually finished my spell. As a result, the mosquitoes absorb all of the mana which then turns into poison when it's already inside of their bodies, killing every single one of them.

I came up with this idea after seeing how Cureva made her crows absorb the mana from people, I wanted to have a counter against that in case I ever encounter her again. Also, I have to admit that this is based on the method she used to try to kill Nera's father...

Still, these infernal caverns are quite an interesting place, not only do the monsters here have a lot of variety, but the environment is also quite unique.

As I've been descending, the rock walls have been taking on a reddish hue. There are also some large arch-like structures everywhere that vaguely resemble doors, and in some places, it looks like there are even stairs... they're a bit too convenient to be natural but also not artificial enough to be manmade, I don't know what to make of this.

In addition to that, there's actually more light here than there was near the surface, and I keep encountering lava rivers and pits everywhere. It's starting to get really hot, so I'm using 'Heat void' the entire time now, it should also be useful against monsters that attack with fire, a very common form of attack around here, or if I accidentally fall into the lava.

"Woah!"

As always, the moment I think that something embarrassing could happen to me, it actually happens, I was distracted admiring the scenery and fell into a pit...

Wait, I think that I'm actually getting burned, my boots got incinerated in an instant, and now my feet are getting a bit charred. That's weird... I'm sure that I was using 'Heat void', is that spell still on? Yes, it's on... then why is this lava burning me? That didn't happen before... well, since having my skin burn like this is excruciatingly painful I should probably get out of here first.

At least I can heal myself easily, and now that I look at it more closely, this is not normal lava. First of all, it's hotter than the rest, but that's not the weird thing about it, there's also a large concentration of fire mana in here, that's what made it get through my defenses.

"Interesting..."

I put my arm inside to test it, and sure enough, it gets burned as well. It's clear that this is not just your average everyday lava, until I can come up with a better name I think that I shall refer to it as 'advanced lava'.

Actually, now that I think about it, this is technically underground, so perhaps I should have been calling it magma...

But now there's another thing that I'm curious about, when my skin gets burned I can feel intense pain, but for some reason, I don't really care much about it... I don't think that's normal.

It's as if my brain is properly receiving the pain signals but then interprets it as not being a big deal. Well, the truth is that it's not a big deal at all, I can heal in an instant after all, could that be the reason? But a lot of people can use healing magic, and I've never heard anything about them being more tolerant to pain...

Could it be because of one of my skills? Let me see... I do have two skills that could be related to this.

Focused mind
Allows one's mind to focus only on relevant matters

Self-control
Diminishes the effect on one's thoughts and actions caused by emotions such as anger or fear and protects from attacks against the mind

It could be that one or both of these skills is making my brain be more logical when interpreting the feeling of pain.

"I need to test this."

I place a curse on my arm to make it more difficult to heal and then I submerge it in the advanced magma one more time.

"Ouch! Hey! This time I actually cared about the pain. Which means that this experiment was a success!"

I heal my arm, which takes a small amount of effort this time, then I notice that Longleg is standing on top of a rock, watching me being happy about getting hurt.

"Just so you know, this was an important experiment."

He continues to stare at me motionless.

"It would be bad if one day I'm paralyzed by pain at a crucial time and it catches me off guard because I'm used to not being bothered by it. It's important to understand how these things work!"

I don't think that he gets it... I know that Arana said that he's 'linked' to me now, but I don't think that he understands me at all.

The start of Luna's sidequest, to be honest, this has nothing to do with the plot going on right now, but I wanted Luna to explore the infernal caverns so I came up with an excuse to make her want to get in here.

This is also the most dungeon-like place we've seen so far, but just to be clear, actual dungeons are not a thing in-universe in this world.

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