80 Dungeon Reward: ****?

We walk forward into the darkness. I light the way with a few spheres of light. It's a very easy spell. 

The tunnel is relatively broad and leads us at a steady angle down into the earth. From the left to the right wall, there are about ten metres. 

The walls look like they were scratched out of the stone by claws. It gives me shivers if I think about hundreds or thousands of those creatures digging this tunnel with their claws. 

After a few minutes of walking the tunnel splits into two. "Great. Now we can choose to split up." Celes's complain is right. 

I don't really want to split the group down here. 

"What disturbs me more is that there is nobody down here. Just those things at the entrance." -Nicosar 

After looking down both tunnels, I think about the smartest possible solution. 

"Psst. You hear that?" Celes points a finger down the tunnel to our right. I concentrate and after everyone is silent, I can hear it too. Are those screams? Of people? 

I start to walk into the direction. "The right tunnel it is." The others follow me without objections. 

We walk for another five minutes when I suddenly see demons coming out of the darkness. I ready my staff and send a fireball into them as a greeting. 

But they just strive forward undisturbed by the death of two of their comrades. It's an unending wall of claws and teeth! 

The others make a stance beside me and seconds later those things are all around us. I strike one of the things to the ground while another starts to gnaw at my shoulder. But the armour is protecting me. 

I cover my left hand in magical energy and strike it into the thing where the heart should be. It lets go of my shoulder and starts to wriggle on the ground. But it's still alive. 

One of the guards gets torn to the ground by five of the monsters at the same time and I jump to his aide. Luckily the armour is protecting him from any serious injuries. It's enforced by mana crystals and shouldn't be penetrated that easily. 

Swinging my staff, I wipe one of the monster off of him. He kicks another away and casts an ice lance spell at a third, nailing it to a wall. 

I try to invade the mind of the things, but I slip off like from a solid wall of glass. Either they aren't thinking at all or their magical resistance is extraordinary. 

Kicking the fourth demon, his chest dents in with an unhealthy crack. Having just one opponent left, the guard grabs the demons head in a contest of strength and twists it off like plucking a flower 

Something jumps at me from the side and I go down. A huge jaw is suddenly in front of my face and I grab it in order to stop the thing from biting my head off. 

Then I realize the hole in it's chest. It's the same one I skewered just moments ago! They heal that quickly? 

"Try to dismember them or they will get up again immediately!" Tanja's voice echoes through the tunnel. 

Great! I redirect the flow of my mana to empower my muscles and tear the jaw of the monster apart.  That done, I start to twist it's head off like the guard did seconds ago. 

"Arrgh!" A scream from Nicosar echoes through the hall but I have problems of my own. Another three of the things are before me. I don't have a clue if they are new ones or if they are injured ones that healed up already. 

They jump simultaneously and I grab all three of them out of the air simultaneously. It should be an easy task, but it feels like a huge effort. 

Activating my mana sight, I realize that those things feed off the mana around them. Every ounce of mana I use to hold them in place just adds to their food. They themselves are gleaming brightly in all possibly shades of mana. 

I grab my staff tighter and instruct the runes on it to rearrange. The staff doesn't use it's mana offensive now. Instead it will use it's passive function of the mana crystal and absorb mana. 

Swinging it in a wide arc, I behead all three demons, which are still immobilized by my telekinesis. 

Letting go of them, they drop to the ground. I eye the dead bodies suspiciously but it doesn't look like they regenerate. 

The absorb function of my staff robbed them of their mana. "Switch your weapons to mana absorption instead of using it offensively! We are just feeding them the energy to repair themselves!" 

Then I get jumped by a new pack of demons and the fight continues. 

A few moments later there are no demons left and I look around to check on our state. One injured guard, an injured Nicosar and an almost dead guard is the price we had to pay in order to learn a lesson against the demons. 

I kneel down beside the guard who got jumped by multiple enemies earlier. The things had time to find some weak points in his armour and bit and stabbed into them. I try to cast healing magic on him but it doesn't work. 

The wounds inflicted by those things seem to directly affect the soul. "Doesn't look good for me eh?" The guard tries to smile but spurts out blood instead. 

"You don't have to worry. We won't leave your soul in a place like this." I concentrate and anchor his soul to his body. 

Then I wave to the other injured guard. "Take him back to the Nomad and report the current situation. They can only use the weapons which have nothing to do with mana. Just pure physics! Everything else just feeds those things!" 

The guard nods and grabs the heavily injured one to teleport away. 

Then I take a look at Nicosar who is curiously eyeing the evil looking cut on his left thigh. One of the demons managed to break through the armour. Luckily it seems to be just a flesh wound. The demon didn't get deep enough. 

"It isn't healing?" Nicosar stabs a finger into the wound like not believing it really exists. 

"No way! The immortal geezer got damage by a critter!" Tanja smirks at him. 

I purse my lips at the sight. "I suggest you are more careful with those things. They injure not only the physical world with their claws. You need to go back too?" 

Nicosar shakes his head. "It just looks nasty. The armour did it's job, it's just a surface wound. It just surprised me because it hurt so much. I never felt pain like that before." 

"Then we go on and conquer this stupid tunnel. Now that we know how to keep them down it will be easier." Celes walks forward and we follow her. 

This time we advance more carefully. Getting jumped by such a large group of demons wasn't funny even though they were individually weak. There were about five or six of them for everyone of us. 

And they don't have the good manners to wait for you to finish the fight with the first demon. They just came at us like a pack of rabid dogs. Or would starving be a more fitting term? 

After another curve of the tunnel, we arrive in a big open cavern. There are dozens of demons and in the middle of it is a shiny spinning sphere. 

Multiple elves, dryads and other mortals are held in stone prisons at the walls of the cavern. An elven male is lying twitching under the sphere while spikes and claws break through his skin and he slowly turns into one of the demons. 

Probably we heard his screams earlier when we had to decide for a direction. 

"By the gods! -Nicosar 

"That's a second Sphere of Sight!?" Tanja exclaims flabbergasted. 

I ready my staff with a grim resolve and walk forward while I ready my spells. "They connect to the Calamity through the sphere to create those monsters in order to gather souls!" 

As we enter the cavern, the demons start to rush us and Celes jumps into a group of them. Waving her open palm two monsters are blown apart by the shockwave. 

I don't waste time and throw my staff at the new Sphere like a spear. It impacts and the Sphere is blown apart into thousands of shards. 

For a second the demons waver like they just lost something important. At a gesture the staff returns to my hand and the remaining demons continue their charge. 

Another wild melee fight evolves. But this time we already know how to keep our enemies down. 

Celes jumps into the centre of the action and I support her with assisting magic. Then I realize that Tanja is in a tight situation with multiple demons surrounding her. 

At a gesture of my hand a blue arc of lightning lashes out at three of the demons. I know that this wont kill them but it will paralyse them long enough for Tanja to solve the situation. 

Another demon jumps at me but gets cleanly cut in half by the guard with the two handed sword. I nod at him while I concentrate to clean the area with a wind cutting spell. 

This time the fight isn't as tight as before. The demons may have superior numbers but now they don't get up like stand up dolls any more. 

The fight concludes with a cavern of minced demons and a few mortals staring at us with big eyes. 

There are about twenty prisoners left. Though the cells throughout the cavern should give enough space for hundreds of people. 

"Thank you so much for saving us lord." An elven male bows to us. 

"What happened here." -Celes 

"I did my everyday work, when I suddenly found myself in that cell. And then this nightmare started. People were turned into monsters by that sphere and left the cavern. From time to time the monsters would bring new prisoners. At some point no new prisoners were brought and our numbers started to dwindle." An almost naked dryad gives us her story. 

"Probably they couldn't bring in fresh material when we started our bombardment, my lord." One of the guards gives his assessment of the situation. 

I kneel down beside one of the dead demons, but I feel nothing from it. It's like earlier just an empty shell. Probably they really are just agents for the Calamity to gather souls. 

"Fair maiden! Could I hear the names of our saviours." The elven male from earlier turns his attention to Celes with a sweet voice. She almost bursts out into laughter. 

Fair maiden.... I guess it's normal for mortals to mistake us. Celes stopped her ageing process somewhere at twenty five. Nicosar preferred to keep his geezer appearance even as a god. 

The elven male gets disgusted looks by the female prisoners. 

"Don't even try. You aren't even worth the dirt on my shoes little mortal." Celes waves at the guy. 

"Only the high god Evenguar would call an elf a mortal. From which race are you guys by the way. I have never heard of people with horns before." The dryad raises her voice again. 

"We are gods like Evenguar. He begged us for help in order to save this puny world." One of our guards lets his tongue loose again and the prisoners eyes go round. 

"Let's get going, I don't want to camp down here over night." Tanja urges the group towards the entrance we came through. 

On our way to the surface the mortals keep pestering Celes with their gazes. Even the female prisoners join the fray. 

Half way to the surface Celes can't keep calm any more and snaps at the mortals. "What's up with you!? Never seen a woman before!?" 

One of the women blushes and apologizes to Celes. "We are sorry. But you are all so different from what we always imagined about gods. And you look so beautiful!" 

"Yes! I would actually like to go out with you! You are the finest woman I have ever seen." One of the male prisoners joins the fray." 

…. 

*Blleeergh* 

After three seconds of watching the guy, Celes turned towards a wall and barfed at the floor. 

All prisoners watch her stunned. 

"What? Never seen a pregnant woman before?" After her retching had stopped, she threw another shocking comment at the mortals. 

Just that it wasn't only shocking for the mortals. 

I jump at her side. "What are you saying honey!? Why didn't you tell me? And why do you go down here in that state?" 

"Shut up and carry me, husband. I only found out recently and being pregnant isn't a sickness, where you have to refrain from moving and stay inside!" Celes snaps at me. 

I know better than to object to her and take her piggyback. 

"Pregnant?" One of the disillusioned prisoners breaks their silence. 

"A God?" 

"Husband?…." 

"Sush! Idiots! Where do you think little gods come from! Did you think they just pop into existence! Stupid mortals!" Celes starts a tirade at them. 

Actually they really do just pop into existence. It's just recently that gods are born like that. But I don't care to explain that to the shocked prisoners. 

Evenguar will have quite some explaining to do after this. Based on how complex his religion is. 

I carry my wife with watery eyes towards the surface.