As predicted, the rats arrived shortly after, filling the shaft before the anthill. Twenty-five rats stood in neat lines and stared straight towards the army of thousands of ants with the Queen, laying on the edge of the crevice.

King Ratam, surrounded with powerful translucent mana-shield and his four pack-leaders, proclaimed, “you have attacked us and killed three of our leaders! Today, your nest will be destroyed!”

“It was the previous Queen! I am the new one! Can we make peace yet again?” The Queen Ant tried to negotiate, already knowing it was for naught.

“Peace?! Peace?!! You broke it! You!” King Ratam yelled, spit flying from his mouth. A weak gust of mana escaping his control in his moment of fury, washed over his army, making them tremble.

King Ratam’s eyes glowed red with fury and a few tendrils of flames encircled him.

Nearby pack leaders shivered in fear. They knew that in this state the King would kill them if they even dared to squeak.

“I did not. It was the previous Queen! She is dead now!”

The King derisively snorted and menacingly asked, “why should I care? You are a mere ants! I didn’t destroy you before because there was no merit for me!”

“Partner, I hear the voice, but can’t see him,” Stone, who acted as the throne, told Partner, who was worried he would lose the host again. The shame of it would be unbearable.

“So expand your sphere again…”

“Oh, I forgot,” Stone flatly replied.

He expanded his perception sphere to 4.1 metres. Now, he could ‘see’ the army of rats and King Ratam in their full glory.

Stone could feel an immense amount of mana that could swallow him whole from the Rat-King. Too bad that Stone did not know what fear was.

On the other hand, the Partner did know. He gazed at the towering Rat-King and his swirling, fire-attuned mana and figuratively gulped, “their King is mighty; even novice adventurers could have some problem with him. His mana should be around 150 to 180 points. That's almost five times your reserves. Even if I count refined mana, he is still stronger…”

“Partner?” Stone cut in the Partner’s ranting.

“What?!”

“There is something strange under us. It’s swirling, and I feel weird. Hmm… what's the word… Dizzy! I feel dizzy. It’s full of mana, even more than what that big rat has.”

“Does it have a colour?”

“Hmm, flame red with the occasional streak of deep blue.”

“Well, that would explain why there are several monsters with elemental attunements…” Partner went deep into his thoughts as he was searching how to use the new discovery to their advantage.

☁☁☁☁☁☁

The Queen Ant was in a dilemma. The rats could attack at any moment. Even if she would be able to fend off the first wave, the King could easily wipe them off with his fire-imbued spells. “He will send his pack leaders first. He won’t weaken himself before them,” She calmed herself down.

"Charge!” Rat-King Ratam commanded from behind his lines and the first six rats on the front leapt towards the ants.

They fell directly into the hidden ditch, squeaking, and hundreds of ants swarmed them. They crawled inside of their bodies and slowly tore them apart.

The leaders began to charge their mana bubbles imbued with weak flames but were countered by the Queen and stealthily, Stone.

“Didn’t think you are so strong, Queen! Or did you find something interesting?” King Ratam squinted at her as his pack leaders’ spells were seemingly effortlessly fended off and his rats swarmed.

Three of them already horrifically died, taking with them hundreds of ants by crushing them.

The army of ants was thinning at an increased pace.

Queen studied the battlefield and the dying ants, recognizing she truly did not have a single chance. She can’t outrun the enemy and she can’t fight properly also. Her mana was quickly depleting.

She was forced to make a decision she did not like, but Anthill came first.

“Yes! I found something! It gave me the powers I have today! I will tell you about it but stop the assault!” She shouted back as she countered the enemy bubbles with her last drops of mana. Now she had just enough to not collapse. She would have already lost if not for Stone. It dawned on her, it was like he had an endless supply of mana...

<Heat at 90% of maximum capacity>

“Partner! I can’t attack, but my heat is accumulating more and more!” Stone was fully concentrating on countering the enemy and could not create mana points with heat.

“What to do, what to do…” as Partner was pondering, he heard through Stone’s sphere the Queen’s proposal to the Rat King.

“Don’t tell me… oh damn… Stone!”

“Stop the attack!” King Ratam commanded. The rats hastily retreated, shaking off the confused ants.

“Ants! Stop!” Queen Ant stopped them too. The beaten ants, many of them injured, retreated also.

“Talk!” King Ratam arrogantly stated as he was curious.

“Ants! Pick Stone and bring him towards King Ratam!” She climbed down from the pebble. Ants picked Stone up and brought him to the middle of the battlefield without hesitation.

She told him everything she knew about Stone. King Ratam examined Stone with a mixture of interest and anger.

The pebble, 124 millimetres in size, with white, smooth crust, sat there in silence. However, he was conversing with Partner.

“Partner? What are they doing?”

“That’s called betrayal, little pebble,” he flatly replied.

“Betrayal?” To Stone, it was something completely new.

“Yes. It’s an action when one gives up someone for their own benefit. Get used to it. The universe is a brutal place…”

Stone felt something like never before. It was as if something ferocious banged inside of his mind.

“Partner, I feel strange. Not good. Something wants to get out of me and kill everything in sight. ”

“That’s wrath, Stone,” Partner explained. He too was feeling it. In his case, it was like some old memory. He could almost… Before he could properly remember it, it was gone.

“What should I do about it?” Stone innocently asked, confused.

Partner finally snapped. After hundreds of years of humiliation, he was forced to live in a stupid pebble… So many hosts, so many deaths… Still, he had endured! Humiliation, loss, constant hurt... but this was that imaginary last drop, “you know what? As a hero helper, I should help you process anger and steer you towards a better path... But fuck this! I have enough! First, I got caged inside of you; the most abnormal entity in the universe, then spent months teaching you to even think and talk like a living being and when I finally start to move forward, I get betrayed by the fucking ants! Ants! So… Go nuts! Kill, murder, steal… Anything to survive!” Partner ranted, an elation washed over him. He never felt this good.

“How?”

“Kill. Everything,” Partner hissed.

“Really? I remember one of your lectures that something like this is a bad thing to do.”

“There will be new lectures. First, massacre the rats,” Partner sensed something changing within him. Something cracked and disappeared. The last connection he had with his source was no longer in place. No longer was he the good olde’ hero helper. If Stone would ever die, he would die with him. But he was free. That made it all worth it.

And boy, Stone went nuts. He conjured a bubble with all of his refined mana and compressed it with heat to a point above the rats.

King Ratam cast a powerful shield above the four pack-leaders and himself.

‘BANG!’

A powerful blast resounded in the shaft. Five of the remaining normal rats were seared to charcoal. The pack leaders, even though protected by Ratam’s shield, were slightly wounded by the pressure wave. However, the King Ratam was completely fine; not a single hair was touched.

<Your spell Mana Point gained a level>
<You have killed 5 rats. You have gained 103% experience points>
<Resistance: Heat gained a level>

“What an interesting pebble!” He carefully stepped near the pebble. “Fine! Gift accepted! RATS! ATTACK! Destroy the anthill!”

Rats yet again pounced towards the army of ants.

‘Peng! Bang! Peng! Squeak!’

The explosions bombarded the army of rats and ants. Ant Queen was thrown back onto the wall by one of the blasts.

King Ratam impassively watched the massacre while throwing one or two mana bubbles around. As the battle slowly concluded and the rats played around with the leaderless ants, he curiously glanced at the enlarged pebble and questioned, “what is this pebble? Is it alive? Or a tool?” He conjured the most powerful <Mana Shield> he could and smelled to Stone.

“MY KING! DWARFS!” He was interrupted in his investigation of the anomaly and rapidly turned towards the voice.

There he saw three dwarfs.

But Stone did not sit there, doing nothing and even if he wanted to revel in his exquisite level-up feeling, Partner started to shout at him “do something, you silly stone! Or you will end up as some rat’s ornament!”

“Is that bad?”

“No more levels for you!”

“Oh, that's bad!” Stone exclaimed in horror.

"Wait, dwarfs?!" Partner finally calmed down and registered the new arrivals.

At that moment, King Ratam turned to ash as one of the dwarfs threw a fiery arrow at him. “Swish! Swish! Swish! Swish!” The four leaders followed the example of their King by becoming small piles of ash too.

"Oh, goddammit! If they have seen you use refined mana..." A horror intensified in Partner. He thought that it could not get worse, but… Well...

“CRACK!” The ground cracked in the place where the Stone’s last Mana Point was conjured.

“For Perditio’s sake! Now what?” Partner cried out. He hated being immaterial in that moment as he had no tears to shed.

“Loud!” Stone complained as the ground under them broke.

☁☁☁☁☁☁

Meanwhile, the sobering drunken dwarfs incredulously watched the unfolding battle from behind the corner.

“Eriv, do ya see that too?” Breadbeard could not believe it. He thought that someone had to spike his beer.

“Yea! Do ya think the beer was spiked too?”

“If yea, someone will suffer! I’ll bury them under the craphous!”

Around two meters before them, a cluster of ants and rats were battling over a little white pebble. Small mana bubbles filled with fire were conjured and countered left and right.

Thousands of ants swarmed over the rats that were jumping around.

"Gross!" Eriv exclaimed, disgusted. She gagged when she saw a small cluster of bloody ants squirmed from a rat with chunks of its meat in their mandibles.

“What's happenin?” Dafur had sobered quite a while ago, and when he glanced upon the battle, with two elementally attuned Monsters, he murmured, “somethin must goin on her.”

A short, flashy explosion echoed over the shaft. Even the dwarfs had to blink several times to clear their eyes.

“What was that?” Breadbeard asked while rubbing his eyes.

“Refined mana?! Here!?” Dafur was even more bewildered. “Where woulda refined mana came from? Mixed with a heat to boot," he wondered. As his master advanced to the 4th-rank runemaster a long time ago, he could refine a tiny amount of mana. He proudly boasted to his apprentices about it whenever he could.

The battle came to a halt as everyone was trying to gather their bearings.

After a rapid squeaking of the rats’ leader, the fierce battle resumed. The battle was decided already. The rats were winning in a landslide. Unless...

Dafur finally gathered his wits and conjured a rune. Mana gathered before him and shaped into a rune with a tongues of flames coiling around it.

A few fiery arrows later, King Ratam and his pack leaders ceased to exist. Only a handful of ash remained of them.

But before he could go over to the pebble, he was stopped by Eriv’s hand.

"Do ya feel it?!" she fearfully asked as the ground vibrated.

‘CRACK!’

Cracks appeared in the ground under them. Translucent mana leaked from the fissures with fire-red and occasional azure coloured ray streaks.

Then, the ground billowed.

“Dornus dammit! Attuned mana crystal deposit!” Dafur and Breadbeard shouted in unison, astonished.

Eriv watched in disbelief as more and more mana leaked and filled the shaft. The fissures rapidly reached them, and they staggered, barely able to stand.

'Boom!'

The ground first exploded, throwing them all into air.

It revealed a rift, leading to a darkness.

“FUUUUUUUUUU…!” Screams of dwarfs were drowned by the collapsing shaft.

Three dwarfs, Stone, and the remaining army of ants and rats commenced their fall into unknown.

☁☁☁☁☁☁

As Stone was falling down, he felt a new sensation. Flying, or falling in this case, was a very... unusual. It was wrong. His insticts screamed at him.

After quite some hard pondering, he decided that flight wasn't something for him. In the end, stones belonged to the ground, not in the air.

“Partner?” Stone calmly seeked to gain attention.

“YEAH!?” Partner shouted back, the panic in his voice was apparent.

"Loud!" Stone complained out of reflex, "I don't think I like flying."

“We. Are. Falling!” Partner was fully immersed in terror. He finally felt good about himself after so long... And now he was about to die.

As they were falling, Stone calmly observed plenty of odd rocks. He wanted to ask about them, but Partner was fully absorbed by the long fall, "I curse you, gods!” After a moment of deliberation, he corrected himself, “I don’t! Please, help!”

Then Stone said something that forced him to focus on him; “Partner, I don’t feel too good. I think I might die.”

“WHAT?!” Partner examined Stone’s body and his panic swelled to new measures. He saw cracks and flickering mana veins.

“Lifeforce,” Stone wished and the tablet materialized with its classical ‘thud’.

Stone repeated the number.

“GOD FUCKIN DAAAA..!”

“Loud! Too loud!” Stone was in distress, not from the falling but from the yelling in his mind.

Stone saw with his sphere the three falling dwarfs that were loudly screaming too, but he successfully ignored them. Loud voices were truly annoying. The only thing that unnerved him was the broken stones falling alongside them. That was not nice.

“AAAAAAAA!” Eriv and Breadbeard screamed in horror, hugging each other, fully sobered.

On the other hand, Dafur’s instincts kicked in and he recovered quickly, thanks to his harsh training.

He cast a watery rune this time. The atmospheric water concentrated around it and with a pulse of mana, it grew larger, creating a water shield under the four of them (five, if you count Partner).

“Splash!” The shield was shredded apart when it hit the ground, but it was strong enough to save all of their asses and whatever equivalent Stone had.

The dwarfs rolled on the ground and fell unconscious. Their typical hard dwarven constitution saved them from broken bones. Still, the fall through an area filled with radiation from attuned mana crystals, the stress and alcohol were too much, even for them.

"You are the luckiest piece of rock in the whole universe," Partner shakily stated and if he could, he would collapse on the ground. Sometimes he hated being ethereal. "Thank you, gods. But I still hate you," he added inwardly.

<Hehe>

"Fuck..."

Rats were exploding as they rained on the ground, but the remaining ants were fine. They ran around in confusion as they could not feel their Queen.

“ANTS!” Stone yelled and all of them turned to him. He was not the Queen, but as the Guardian, he had a certain level of authority too. “Gather!” Stone ordered and ants listened.

“Stone, order them to find some food,” the Partner proposed, happy he was not dead, realizing that these ants were their only option to move. “What about those dwarfs? They are unconscious. Seems they won’t wake up any moment soon, at least from what I can see from their snoring," he thought to himself, elated that at least something was going well.

“Collect some food and gather it here,” Stone commanded and added, remembering something important, “oh, and gather as much of talc as you can.”

“Good idea,” the Partner praised Stone. He would feel elated if not for the constant risk of death. Partner could already see a tiny, translucent figure, wearing a black robe, holding a sharp scythe.

Soon, around two hundred ants gathered a nice pile of talc gravel around Stone. He ground it into dust and activated the spell <Healing Bath for stones> with freshly refined mana and talc dust. A bubble materialized around him and he began savouring the good feeling as he rapidly regrew.

☁☁☁☁☁☁

A few hours went by in a flash. Ants gathered the meat from the exploded rats around; enough for them to survive for days.

The trio of dwarfs still happily napped on the ground, as if nothing happened.

<Your spell Stone Healing Bath gained level two times>
<Your technique Ambient Mana Refinement gained a level>
<You are completely healed>
<Your spell Healing Bath for stones gained a level 3 times>

Meanwhile, while Stone regrew his missing parts, Partner patiently explained to him more about dwarfs and flickering mana crystals around.

Still, something was bothering the Partner the whole time. He ignored it and concentrated on the lecture. When he was done, he still ignored the feeling of something wrong and kept quiet, watching Stone regrow.

“Partner, can I use those crystals?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want to explode. Again,” Partner flatly replied while thinking what the hell he did so horrible to end like this. “Well… he told me that there are mana crystals. I should have told him that they are reacting with refined mana. If I knew about their existence, I would forbid him to use it from the start... What is wrong with this pebble?” He internally sighed.

“Partner, I have healed way faster and my hardness improved too.”

“Yeah, your proficiency rises, you freaking stone.”

“What now?” Stone asked as he was getting used to the rapid changes.

“Hmm, hard to say… Where are we anyway?” Partner scanned the surroundings. While Stone was regrowing, Partner was mulling over his newly gained not-so-freedom. He did not know his source, but now that he was completely cut off, he felt…

“We fell, so somewhere down,” yet again, his thoughts were interrupted by Stone stating the obvious.

“… Sometimes, I really wish I could…” Partner got a little taken aback; these thoughts were not typical for Partners.

“What?”

“… nothing…” he muttered and pondered over his growing feeling that something was wrong. “Something changed… I…” Partner lost consciousness in the middle of realization of what he had done.

“Partner?”

Stone sat there, trying to wake up his friend, ignoring the dwarfs who slowly woke up. Though, he still heard them, to his dismay. He would complain, if he wouldn't be so spooked by Partner's sudden silence. That never happened before as he was constantly talking or lecturing him.

“Uaaargh,” rousing Dafur slowly sat up, yawned and stretched. His head was banging like a pack of Karna-Kuls. “Where, in the Dornus ass, am I?” He asked himself in the hangover haze. With his blurred vision, he saw many fully grown mana crystals attuned to two elements: lightning and fire.

The cavern was approximately four metres in diameter, the ground covered in chunks of rats and hundreds of swarming ants.

His eyes rapidly opened and the dwarven greed, amplified by the lack of resources as a runemaster apprentice, got the better of him. His hand slowly rose towards the crystals. Unfortunately, or fortunately, he was interrupted.

“Dornus dammit! Mae head! And ass!” Breadbeard woke up. “Holy Dornus! We’re rich!” A strange glint appeared on his eyes. It was the same as you could find in Dafur’s eyes a moment ago.

“Keep it down, will ya boys?” Eriv, still resting on the ground with closed eyes, reprimanded them.

“Eriv! Wake up! We’re in the middle of a freakin mana crystal deposit!” Breadbeard excitedly jumped towards her and fervently shook her.

The sound of knuckles hitting bone echoed around the cavern as Eriv punched Breadbeard right on his jaw.

“Ahhh! Dornus dammit, woman!” Breadbeard staggered back, falling on his ass.

“Breadbeard, never wake me like that, ever,” Eriv hissed. “Daaamn, mae head hurts so much, I’m dreamin'. I see a ton of mana attuned crystals.”

“Nae dream, Eriv,” Dafur said with a greedy glint in his eyes. They could not sense it, but the greed and blight was slowly consuming them.

Meanwhile, Stone was metaphorically shaking Partner with no result.

“Partner!” Stone yelled for the last time. Partner just did not repspond.

A new feeling swelled in him. It was so strong he could not even properly think. Different from the wrath he felt when Queen Ant betrayed him, but maybe even more powerful; a feeling of loneliness.

His still-young mind was not able to cope with it.

However, he was a stone. A mineral. He began to ignore the new feelings he did not like. In the end, he did not care much about where he was. How he was.

Before long, without Partner constantly pushing him around, he began to slip into an un-alive, normal-stone-like state.

He felt strange again.

Sleepy.

Nothing mattered to him.

A few hours went like that; balancing on the edge between sapience and the eternal darkness.

Until, his raised intelligence, emotions, growing mind and soul he gained over these few months fought against this drowsiness.

The battle was fast, yet brutal. It left him tired.

Still his memories and emotions won.

“Partner?” He tried again,

Still no answer. Stone was disoriented as never before. Even more than when he was nothing but a little pebble, barely able to speak or perceive.

He grasped something important; he was alive! With emotions, memories, and personality. He liked that feeling. He wanted more of it, more than those good feelings when he levelled up.

Something broke in him. It was like a curtain of fog cleared from his mind.

<Your Talent: Sapient fully unlocked! Congratulations! A true, fully sapient rock… Who did that again?> (*Author innocently whistling in the background*)

“Partner?!” He wanted to ask so many questions, but he could not.

Stone sensed with his perception sphere as mana with streaks of red and blue flowed around. He instictivelly wanted to connect to it with his technique <Ambient Mana Refinement>, but it did not work. Something blocked him.

“PARTNER!” He inwardly yelled—still nothing. It was worth to be loud for his friend.

Stone sighed and observed the dwarfs as they gathered in the middle. He carefully moved closer so he could see them all and listened to them with renewed interest.

“Well, that was quite some drop,” Breadbeard rubbed his eyes after the punch, “Eriv, what do ya say? Twelve metres?”

“Looks like it,” Eriv answered, still in a daze. “Dafur, Breadbeard! What now?” She asked with worry as her head cleared.

“What do ya mean? We wait,” Breadbeard answered before Dafur could react.

“For who? Mine is collapsed, ya old fart!”

“Shove it, ass-prentice.”

“Both of ye, leave it. We need to get out of her’,” Eriv rebuked them. “Dafur, do ya have some runa to help us go up?”

“Nae,” Dafur shook his head while trying not to look at Breadbeard.

“Hmph! Runemae’str woulda already got us out!” Breadbeard's voice was full of derision.

“Keep it, Breadbeard,” Eriv berated him, annoyed, “we need to work together.”

“Have ye ever been in mana crystal deposit?” Dafur asked.

“Nae,” both of them replied. Breadbeard continued, “but dur guild has policies in place. Don’t enter without protection and with at least 3rd-rank runemae’str apprentice or priest.”

“Don’t touch the crystals, otherwise ye coulda get blight,” Dafur warned them in a worried tone, “we need to leave. Even small deposit radiation can hurt ye without protection.”

Dafur conjured three watery runes and sent them above their heads. A thin, translucent water shield surrounded them.

“Blight…” Breadbeard whispered. A shiver ran through his spine, remembering what had occurred three years ago.

They searched around and discovered a slightly tilted down natural shaft around a meter in diameter, leading into the darkness with an occasional streak of light from mana crystals showing the path.

“Well, some torches would come in handy,” Breadbeard murmured.

“Well, let’s go,” Dafur took the first step to the shaft.

Eriv shrugged her shoulders and followed him. Breadbeard peered around for the last time with a greedy glint in his eyes and muttered under his thick beard, “I’m rich, rich, rich.”

Stone watched them to leave and was feeling lost. He never had to decide for himself before and Partner still did not answer. A persisten notion forced him to do something.

After pondering over it, he succumbed and ordered ants to pick him up and to follow the dwarfs. The persistent, annoying feeling still did not go away, but at least it was not so loud.

Two dozen of the strongest ants picked him up. The rest of the hundreds of ants gathered their meat and aligned into three lines right behind.

“Status.” His stone tablet always put him in a better mood. With a soft ‘thud’ his status screen took shape in his mind.

Ants with Stone in the lead moved to catch up with the last dwarf. The dwarfs stopped and said something, but luckily, they overlooked their small, inconspicuous stalkers.

Stone was right behind them. He easily caught up with them as they carefully marched forward. One of his ants audibly shifted a gravel.

“Did ye note? Somethin follows us,” Eriv calmly spoke to the two dwarfs. After all, what kind of dwarf would fear underground or their inhabitants. They stopped and turned, seeing an empty shaft.

“I see nothin,” Breadbeard absentmindedly replied, his mind still on the crystals.

“Let’s go. We need to find an exit soon. Thankfully, I can conjure some water and fire with mae runas, but the food is a problem.”

“Ther’ll be some mushrooms or some animals to hunt, town boy,” Eriv playfully replied and pushed him with a shoulder. However, she was still peeking over her shoulder.

“How long is this shaft?” Dafur was not used to this kind of natural underground. The furthest he ever was, was the second layer of Arn-Dul’s maze.

Breadbeard clapped, using his technique <Echolocation>, “I woulda say at least a kilometer,”. As an experienced miner, he had to have some tricks up his sleeve.

“When I think about it, I faintly remember you said refined mana…” Eriv said and shot a nervous glance behind over her shoulder.

Shields start to flicker, and the water drops to the ground as their mana runs out.

“Dafur! Shields are gone!” Eriv anxiously cried out.

“Noticed. Well, nothin I can do about it. I’m out of mana, but we’re out of the worst, so we shoulda be fine,” Dofur answered, but knew they probably were not ‘fine’. How long did they sleep there unprotected? He shivered and hoped that they got lucky.

“Hmph! Apprentice is still just an apprentice…” Breadbeard mocked him.

The group of three dwarfs entered from the side of a large cavern still secretly followed by the inconspicuous pebble.

The cavern had a perfectly flat ground and two lights illuminating a large gate made from white marble. The gate itself was an artistic marvel; on each door were protruding two half-sculptures of faceless dwarfs with a raised hand, meaning stop. The details were incredible; they could even see sculpted single hairs.

Breadbeard clapped again, activating his <Echolocation> skill. The two dwarfs glanced at him and shook their heads.

"There's no other way," Dafur whispered, "let's be careful, these ancient tombs are riddled with traps."

Eriv and Breadbeard nodded, mesmerized by the exquisite craftsmanship of the gate.

The cavern looked natural and artificial simultaneously. However, there was no way it could have been built by Dwarves, let alone any other mortals.

"That must be older than Arn'Dul itself," Breadbeard spoke as he examined the gate's craftsmanship.

"Yea… It's a real beauty," Eriv said, her voice dripping with reverence.

"Wait here, I'm goin to check it," Dafur firmly commanded. After all, it was his job to investigate and protect these miners.

"Hmpf!" Breadbeard snorted, disgruntled, and Eriv reacted by rolling her eyes. Still, they let him take the lead.

Dafur jumped on the platform, carefully observing it. He noticed four runes, with a white pebble on one of them.

"Seems familiar," he said under his breath, staring at the pebble. "What am I thinkin. Just a piece of rock,” he shook his head, focusing back at the runes, "these runas… Mae three runas are based on these ones."

"Can we go up?" Eriv disrupted Dafur's thoughts.

"What?” He jumped up from the squatting, “Oh, yea, sure," he answered, slightly embarrassed.

"Maybe not all breakers of stone are bad," a high-pitched voice echoed in the cavern.

They froze.

"What was that?" Breadbeard inquired, frantically turning around. While he searched for the source, he stepped on one of the tiles engraved with a rune.

"Sounded like a voice! Said somethin about breakers of stone?" Eriv was more curious than frightened. The voice did not seem angry or evil.

Dafur had his head full of other thoughts, not even registering Stone. After a moment, he said, "Eriv!"

"Yeah? What do ya want? Didn't ya hear that?"

"Go and stand on that runa," he pointed to the rune representing air, completely ignoring her question.

He moved on the rune representing water, but nothing happened.

"Eriv, move yar cute ass to that runa. Now!" He frowned at her. She did not know if she should be angry or blushing, but listened and walked over to the rune. She liked a dwarf that could take the lead.

"Oh… wait," Dafur pondered for a while and instructed, "Eriv, stand there and deeply inhale. Breadbeard, don't fret!" He mischievously smirked.

"What are ya tal…"

Dafur suddenly conjured his fiery rune before Breadbeard could finish. A small ball of flame lit up under Breadbeard's feet.

"Ya little, sorry ass-prentice! I'll break yar third leg!" Breadbeard skipped in place as his iron greaves rapidly warmed up. He tried to take them off while Eriv madly giggled, completely forgetting the high-pitched voice.

Dafur cast another rune with droplets of water floating around it and a small puddle spilt around him.

He gazed at the rune embodying earth, but there was already sitting that pebble with ants around. "Let's hope that it will be enough," he uttered and soon, the ancient runes began glowing.

Stale, dry air blew over them as the gate partially opened, uncovering what was behind them. The dwarfs’ gaped, mouths hanging, not able to grasp the sight.

“The legends were true!” They whispered in unison.

Behind the gate laid an enormous hall with a path around thirty metres long paved with white marble tiles, golden runes engraved upon them. The path was illuminated with the same light balls on pedestals as those before the gate. It was leading to a grand tomb, made from black marble, lined with carved mana crystals and precious stones.

Then the gate slowly closed as one of the runes stopped glowing. Their eyes filled with horror and they jumped forward, but were too slow. Their faces planted on the gate with loud bangs.

Then the gate was opening again. Eriv ran for it and was almost successful, but was not fast enough, and could only watch as it closed again.

"Dornus dammiiiiit!" Breadbeard shouted, irritated, at the closed gate and furiously banged at it. Eriv and Dafur joined him.

The dwarven greed can be a horrifying condition.

☁☁☁☁☁☁

Encyclopaedia Stonia

Blight
A sickness, a corruption if you wish, when too much relatively intense mana radiation corrodes any kind of lifeforms. Reactions are different for each ‘person’. Some may turn into another race, some turn undead… It’s highly unpredictable. The radiation starts a mutation that is always detrimental in some way, and sometimes it can give a nice perk alongside. Blight is incurable, at least for most people. High-tiered wizards could help you, but their fees are exorbitant.

A long time ago, when mana crystal deposits were plentiful, waves of corrupted Monsters were quite a regular occurrence. It was an age of strife and constant fear. But as they were mined, waves slowly faded. Now, it is rare that a corrupted being shows up. Their heads often serve as ornaments to kings and nobles. At least those that are not usable for research.

There are warlocks known as blight mages. But about them another time.

Dwarfs
About 1.4 metres tall and often very broad. Of course, there are many variations and mixed breeds. They are considered drunken buggers who can’t use spells for some unknown reason.

Most races find them cute, that is when they are under a year old. At the same age, as their first beard grows, the parents give them the first pint of beer. When a dwarf meets any kind of alcohol, the alcohol will mysteriously disappear—no matter where it is. An old legend is told: an old dwarf before his death wished to see all of the breweries and wineries, even elven, on the Nameless continent. When he was on a journey through all of the biggest breweries and wineries, the most prized flasks mysteriously disappeared. They were all locked up in treasuries and heavily guarded.

On the other hand, they are excellent blacksmiths, tinkerers, and architects. They are being hired by the rest of the races, even by underwater nations. Naturally, those are charged premium prices.

Beware of their greediness. They are such brutal merchants and negotiators that even Earth's capitalists would cower in fear. They always invent new ways of how to earn money as it’s a great motivation for them. Moral and immoral alike.

But there is one thing they hate the most. Well, two actually: one is slavery, and the second is a lack of alcohol for a prolonged time. If you ask them what they hate more out of the two, they will punch you in the guts with full power they can muster. You have been warned.

Mana crystal deposits
Quite rare on the Nameless continent and even a small deposit can make you incredibly wealthy. Many nations suffered quite a bit when they found a new deposit as neighbours would wage wars over them.

Warning! Warning! Do not use refined mana in its vicinity! Explosion imminent! Warning! Warning!

Karna-Kuls
Orange in colour cow-like creatures with two udders and half as big. Males have nasty nature, especially in mating season, and three horns are about 35 to 50 centimetres long. You can imagine what force they can generate when they start to fight.