"Most races which possess superior senses to your average human, rarely wear metal head coverings due to the loud and painful echo created inside such type of helmets. This often allows even a simple human peasant taken straight from his field to be able to wound or even kill a centuries-old elven knight mounted on a magnificent reiter. Because of this almost universal flaw of powerful beings not being able fully protect themselves, ward spells are the most well-researched form of magic throughout the aeons.

Extract from "Notes on Battle"

 

---

 

"Mom, please... I am so sorry." Iris heard a muttered voice coming from a bush. She moved the green branches out of the way and saw a dying human laying on his stomach. Broken arrow shaft stuck out from his back, his light leather armour wasn't enough to protect him from range enemies. The man frantically repeated the sorrow mantra, tightly gripping some kind of amulet hanging from his neck.

 

"Are you there?" Iris coldly asked, calculating the benefits of saving the human.

 

The man's body appeared to react to the undead's voice but his constant muttering hasn't stopped. The elf looked at the necromancer beside her, guarded by a new undead servant.

 

"Do you have anything to heal him?" Iris asked the girl.

 

"I don't know but why would we help him anyway?" The blood-covered mage looked up at the risen with a puzzled expression, as expected of an undead she showed little pity to the human about to join the dead.

 

"There is a reason." Iris answered, not wanting to discuss it with the potentially eavesdropping soldier beside them. "Could you look through bodies and bring over any type of bottle you find." She pointed at the human soldiers laying dead behind them.

 

"Sure?" The undead mage gave the risen a skeptical glance before shuffling to the dead soldiers using the dark elf's body as support.

 

As Kia searched the corpses, Iris stepped down to kneel beside the wounded soldier. She cut off the arrow's shaft as close to the body as she could using her nails before tearing off the man's sleeves and applying pressure to the wounds. The man winced in pain at the elf's touch but she ignored his cries, using her knee to pin him down. Kia came back with three small vials with colourful liquid inside them. To Iris's great disappointment the vial with dark red liquid inside was cracked with barely any of it left inside.

 

"That was all." The girl sat down beside Iris quietly observing what the risen was doing to the stranger. For a moment the words free expiration points flew through the elf's mind as she looked down but before she could catch the murderous though it disappeared.

 

Under Kia's watchful gaze the risen pulled out the cork with a quick pull and twist of the string attached to the vial. She turned the soldier over and pressed the small vial to his lips while holding his head in her hand. The barely lucid human greedily drank the red liquid flowing into his mouth. Iris suspected if the necromancer behind her mana to spare, the young human in her hands would not leave the dungeon alive but to her surprise, Kia made no audible fuss about the situation content with just supervising Iris's work and starring daggers at the soldier.

 

"Ohhh, so that's how this works." Kia said as if recalling something as the human's body attempted to push the arrowhead out. Iris turned to the girl whose eyes brightly shined in the dimly light forest while helping to pull the arrowhead from the soldier's body.

 

"Kia." She pointed her finger at the obediently standing undead behind her.

 

"...oh." Kia finally understood what the elf meant. Her hand reached towards the undead causing the resurrected dungeon spawn to fall onto the ground like a puppet having its strings suddenly cut.

 

"A-are you Corin?" The brown-haired soldier looked up at the risen with hazed grey eyes and uttered the name of Aspect of Life. "Is this it?"

 

"You are still in the realm of mortals."

 

The man slowly sat up and patted his body. Iris could tell the small dose of the health potion didn't heal him fully as he winced with each movement of his shoulder blade.

 

"D-did you save us?" The human looked like the memories of what happened finally hit him.

 

"No, you are the only survivor," The tall undead elf calmly explained. "We have to go before the dungeon sends more monsters at us." She stood up, dropping the partially healed soldier and motioned to Kia and the human to follow her.

 

Kia gave the man last look before her eyes dimmed and she walked to Iris's side. The young human hesitantly stood up.

 

"No!" He shrieked at the sight of his companions' bodies. "Why was I..." He kneeled beside a human corpse, taking off the metal helmet covering its face. He held another man's body in his arms begging the bloody carcass to wake up.

 

This annoyed Iris as she wanted to depart the dungeon as fast as she could as she glanced at the exhausted mage beside her.

 

"We have to help them." The young man begged the elf with tears running down his cheeks to do the impossible.

 

In an unceremonious fashion, the hoplite yanked the man by his collar and dragged him away with Kia holding the hem of her jacket. The three reached about halfway point before the human spoke again, his voice still slightly trembling.

 

"I think I can walk on my own." He announced, Iris instantly let go of his collar, allowing him to stand on his own two feet.

 

"That's good." The slightly more relaxed risen said as she observed her Hit Points and Mana gradually regenerate. She estimated about two bells for her HP to go back to normal and twice more of that for her mana to regenerate.

 

"I-I thank you very much for saving... me." He gave the two adventurers a small respectful bow wincing in pain as he did so. "White Ribbon Arms-Men Edan Edanson." He straightened himself as much as he could and saluted the two a hint of fear remained in his eyes as he stared at the elf's face.

 

"Don't open the wound when you do that. Now since you are back to normal, could you tell me what happened there?" Iris asked while resuming her walk.

 

"We were attacked by a strange knife ear, who appeared out of nowhere. Usually, Watchpost is just a couple of blueberries who would stalk you for a while before ambushing you. Our squad was training against ambushes in there for obvious reasons before the dungeon spawned a knife ear who ripped m-my commander in two..." The young human's voice drifted into silence as images of what happened must have remerged.

 

"Is that rare for this dungeon to spawn a powerful monster?" Iris asked a separate question.

 

"Yes, this dungeon had been conquered early on in its development when it suddenly appeared in the middle of our city and its mana usage is monitored." His last words trailed off into a short pause before speaking again. "From which unit are you from? This should be basic knowledge, have you not paid attention in your classes?"

 

"We are not from Firmusa." The elf replied.

 

"How did you even get here? This is a military installation... You must be the two adventurers everyone is talking about."

 

"And what are they talking about?" Iris frowned at the news.

 

"Ehhhh..." Edan hesitated, it was clear to Iris the word about them must not be too flattering.

 

"Didn't we just saved your life? You can tell us the truth I won't do anything to you." Iris could feel Edan's eyes flip from her back to Kia's back. "We." She corrected herself.

 

"Well, I don't like to gossip too much, Elva always did that...*sigh* but some things I heard about you revolve around you being spies for, well that depends on who is telling the story but the common opinion is you are here to spy on us from Sons of the Fallen." The young soldier said spitting on the ground after saying the name. "There is also rumour about you bringing the anger of the Court at the kingdom which will cause famine or terribly harsh winter. You two are also blamed for the murder of courtiers of a noble family who was butchered in here. In my personal opinion, it can't be you."

 

"Why do you think that?"

 

"Well you aren't a dirty knife ear or a foul beast-men are you?" He stated as they reached the cavern with the ladder leading outside.

 

---

 

POV Change

 

"I think you should use that." The hooded woman said, pointing at the spring of life beside the ladder. She quickly and fearlessly ascended the sketchy-looking ladder which always gave me the creeps.

 

"No matter what a person does..." I heard a fatigued whisper coming from her before she disappeared into the grey fog above.

 

Her silent companion who I didn't see the face-off followed closely behind her.

 

"Pffu" I let out a huge sigh of relief as the blood-soaked adventurers leave the dungeon, a strange buzz in my stomach which screamed at me to run away slowly calmed down leaving me with a feeling of dread creeping up my spine.

 

I had a feeling the Shorty was a sorcerer of some kind, she must had used a lot of mana back there. The way she heavily placed her feet in front of her resembling someone who worked in the mines all day or someone who had just finished a battle was a telltale sign.

I leaned over the spring and dipped my head in it, drinking a small amount of the cold blessed water. Aspects are truly fickle putting such a beautiful face on a butcher.

 

"Aaaau!" Why is healing a wound the most painful? I gritted my teeth while climbing up into the guard house above the fog layer. Leaving the dungeon behind.

 

"Thank you very much, your help is very appreciated." I saw the watch captain saluted the woman with all the honours of greeting own's superior and in return she simply turned and left, eventually disappearing behind a corner of a building. "Edanson you are alive." The Watch Captain approached me and patted my back.

 

You know I am still healing!

 

"Yea, unfortunately, I was the only one."

 

"At least you are alive to report back and you have something to talk about something very few people experienced in their life."

 

"Losing one's friend to a monster?" What was the captain talking about?

 

"No, being saved by a person who was given a royal gleit! And at the top of that, I think the two are elves."

 

"How could a knife ear even get a royal gleit? You are fucking joking aren't you?"

 

"No, so hopefully you haven't insulted her while running that foul mouth of yours. Edanson? Edanson!?"

 

*Thump*