A Soldier's Life

Chapter 145: The Feast

I tightened my grip on the bear pelt and stepped through the portal. My senses were on alert, but I was not prepared to walk straight into Brutus. “What in Pluto’s realm!” He barked at me. “Eryk? You’re alive?” He turned around, and Felix was right behind him. “Eryk’s back! Move back and let him out.” There was someone behind Felix as well, a small train of men.

It was a little bit of a cluster getting everyone to turn around and exit the narrow snow tunnel in full, now ill fitted, armor. I don’t think they saw what I was pulling behind me. The company men were excited to see me alive as I entered the tavern. Mateo cheerfully said, “Told you he was still alive. Eryk could go to bed with a medusa in a brothel and come back satisfied with a smile.”

The bear hide behind me was dragged into the room, and everyone’s eyes suddenly became fixed on the harvest. Everyone was silent. Benito rubbed his eyes with his good hand, “Tell me that is real. Please, someone! Tell me that is real!”

Maveith’s large body moved forward and poked the meat with his hammer. His deep voice echoed, “It is real.” But he let out a long sigh in disappointment. “Eryk, you didn’t scrape the hide properly. You have forgotten everyone I taught you when we harvested the manticore. Don’t worry, luckily, we can still save it.”

The men didn’t wait any longer and started to sort through the leg quarters, chunks of meat and mushrooms. Konstantin warned everyone, as he held a mushroom in hand, “The mushrooms are not poisonous but still need to be cooked. If you eat them raw, you will regret your life decisions.” Konstantin, with his arm in a sling, nodded at me. Was this recognition for doing a good job? I think I was momentarily stunned by the small sign of recognition.

Castile and Adrian stood smiling nearby, “Eryk, come and report.” I sat at a table while everyone else began to process the meat using practiced efficiency.

Lirkin yelled to our table, “Where is the liver, Eryk? Don’t tell me you didn’t get the liver! No kidneys here either? If you had brought the intestines, we could have smoked some sausage.” His tone was not completely serious, but he was upset. Adrian gave Lirkin a hard stare, stopping his complaints about my animal processing skills. “I’ll make sure to learn more from Maveith in the future.” I replied back at Lirkin. He gave a nod of approval in return.

Castile’s own smile slowly faded, “Well done. We were sending in teams to look for you.”

“Teams?” I said, confused.

Adrian warmed his hands and cracked his knuckles, “Yes, we figured out how the dungeon worked. You need to be in contact with the others as you enter the portal. Up to four people can enter together this way. There is one team of four already inside the dungeon, but they should be back soon as they were not to leave the entry room. We started a mapping effort after you did not return.”

Castile looked over at the men and asked curiously, “What kind of meat is that? How did you kill it?”

Adrian added, “Whatever it is, it looks tastier than spider legs.” Castile gave him a sidelong sour glance as she had provided the spider legs.

“It was a large gray bear. At the end of a corridor was a room with a pool and just one bear. I distracted the bear and got a good strike on the head. My attack was so sudden the bear had trouble using its head to fight back.” I couldn’t help but smirk at my play on words. Rather than go into details, I gave as little information as possible. “It wasn’t easy. The rest of my time was spent cutting up the beast,” I indicated the meat. Castile and Adrian looked over at the excited company. I think their mouths were watering as well.

I decided to continue with the good news. “I found this in the reward chest after killing the bear.” The small potion vial was on the table. Castile’s eyes popped and she snatched it and looked at the runes.

Adrian already knew what it was, “A healing potion? Who gets it?”

Castile confirmed, “A greater healing potion.” Adrian and Castile had a lot of discussions as they went through the injuries in the company. There was a lot of frostbite, but the only real use of the potion would be getting someone combat-effective again. That meant Konstantin was the most likely candidate.

Their discussion narrowed it down to Konstantin or Maveith. Castile looked at me, “Maveith is in some pain but should be fine, especially if we can claim more of these.” She hadn’t released the potion from her grip. “Konstantin will heal with time, but if we are going to explore the dungeon, having our best scout capable would be the best use of it.”

The decision was made. Adrian addressed me, “Go give it to him.” Castile reluctantly placed it on the table, and I could see why. Her fingertips were black, and she had been hiding the advanced frostbite from us.

Lirkin rushed over to our table, “Can we start a fire? I know it is not dark yet, but the men might start eating the meat raw if I don’t cook it soon and bear needs to be cooked properly to be eaten safely. It is incredibly tough and greasy if not cooked properly!” I was about to produce the thermal stone but paused. I had stuffed the box in my dimensional space with fish.

Castile was considering the request. I decided to show my last ace, “I have some fish, too,” I announced.

Three sets of eyes turned to me, and I dumped the fish on the table. The pile of fish was the shape of my legion box and quickly spread out across the table as the fish slid across each other. Instead of praise from Lirkin, he scolded me, “You cut off the heads and tails! Eryk, those are the best parts for making soup!” He slapped me on the back in jest much harder than I appreciated, “Next time, just bring me the entire fish.”

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Castile was smirking at my consternation at being criticized for failures. I leaned back to look Lirkin in the eyes to reply to him, “Next time, Lirkin, you can fight the bear solo and wiggle your toes in the water to attract and catch the fish! My space is only so big.” I didn’t know if that was a thing, but I remembered noodling was a way to catch catfish using just your hands by wiggling your fingers.

Lirkin got serious and apologized as my tone had been somewhat harsh, “I am sorry, Eryk. I appreciate your incredible effort. There is enough here to feed the company for seven or eight days. We might actually start putting back on some weight.”

I stood, took the potion, and walked across the tavern to Konstantin. The aged scout was watching a table where four men were thinly slicing some meat and hanging it on a spear shaft to be dried and smoked. Standing next to Konstantin, I asked casually, “Konstantin, how is the arm?”

“Collarbone is still broken, and fortunately, no infection has set in, unlike Firth” he replied grumpily.

“Well, you just won the lottery.” I produced and held out the potion. His eyes held confusion as he puzzled out what I held in my outstretched hand.

“You found a dungeon healing potion?” He muttered loud enough for almost everyone to hear. Everyone stopped working and focused on the magical vial of life. There was probably not a single person here who couldn’t benefit from the healing potion.

“Castile decided you were the best person to consume it. I don’t know why,” I said with some snark, letting everyone know it was Castile’s decision, not mine. Konstantin didn’t object to being selected and took the vial, broke the dungeon seal, and drained the small vial. He winced, and an audible pop could be heard in the room from his shoulder as the magic aligned the bone. Seconds passed as Konstantin waited for the potion to finish its work.

Konstantin windmilled his arm, testing his arm while his armor clattered from the movement. He looked around at the envious men, “Don’t worry. Now that I am healthy, Eryk and I will go and claim more healing potions inside the dungeon.” A few men nodded, and soon everyone was back to processing the meat, fish, and mushrooms.

My mind was racing, though. If I had to explore the dungeon with three others, how was I going to use the collector? I could still probably use my dimensional kill, but losing so many essences was already starting to tug at my greedy nature. Maybe it was time to reveal I had the collector?

The snow tunnel erupted as the group of four returned from exploring the dungeon entrance room. Blaze, Linus, Lucien, and Kolm emerged to see everyone cheerfully preparing the meat and starting a fire. The men in the room were all smirks at their surprise. Mateo pointed at me, “Eryk is alive and brought us dinner!” Their vision broke from the food preparation and turned to me.

I was sitting across from Maveith as he prepared the checkers board. I waved, and Blaze walked over to me, hugged me, and cried. It was not a sobbing cry, just tears of joy at the feast being prepared. Kolm, Linus, and Lucien just patted my pauldrons in appreciation as they made to help.

Kolm handed the Scholar a piece of paper, and I assumed the Scholar was responsible for mapping the dungeon. The activity in the room got more lively as the fire grew to heat the room. Lirkin was lively as he went from prep station to station to guide the company. Most of the work focused on preserving as much food as possible. Most of the fish were shoved into the snow in the tunnel. Lirkin had focused on getting as much fat from the meat I cut as possible so he could fry the mushrooms and cubes of meat together.

Each man was given a plate stacked with braised meat cubes and sauteed mushrooms. Lirkin had his cauldron simmering with fish bones after he had cut the fillets away and stuffed them in the snow. The fish soup was going to be the next meal. Everyone in the company stopped by at my table to thank me, and it felt good to be recognized.

The meal was interrupted a few times by wandering specters, a stark reminder of where we were and that we were still in danger. Konstantin ate with Castile and Adrian, and I already knew he was trying to convince them to let him in the dungeon. The sun was setting, and suddenly, someone shouted, “Bird in the window.” There was a single window in the tavern that the snow had not covered. A small white owl had landed on the snow and was staring into the tavern, watching us eat.

Adrian spoke, “Maybe it was not sent by the summoner.” Blaze released an arrow, striking the glass and bouncing back into the room, not even cracking the glass. “Use a runic arrow!” Adrian yelled, but it was too late. The owl took to the air and flew away.

The mood in the tavern suddenly turned somber. Castile broke the melancholy, “The summoner would have found us eventually. Now that we know we can enter the dungeon in groups of four, we can always retreat into the dungeon. Now that the summoner knows where we are, we can keep the fire going during the day.”

Someone started pounding the table like he was challenging the summoner to come. Others quickly joined him until all of us pounded the stone tables in unison. The beat built to a crescendo, and everyone cheered and then continued to eat. Everyone slept that night with a full stomach and contented smiles. Castile used her nightmare spell on a third of the men.

In the morning, Castile sent seven men, led by Konstantin, to the wine vault. I sat with Castile and Adrian. Castile was not as optimistic, “The storm elementals were not over the city this morning.” Her tone was heavy.

“How long do we have?” Adrian asked.

“He is preparing a large summoning circle just outside the city. My guess is a wyvern or some other large flying beast. The city is too deep in snow and has too many specters for anything on the ground to reach us in the city’s center,” Castile noted.

Adrian thought on it, “He might have seen the dungeon entrance as well. The tree canopy shielded it, but that owl was close.”

“Are we going to send everyone into the dungeon?” I asked after a period of silence.

Castile nodded, “I asked Konstantin to get as much wine as possible.” The weight of command on her, she announced, “We need to decide what the groups of four will be.” There were twenty-three of us. Meaning there would be five groups of four and one group of three.

Castile wanted me in her group with Adrian and Konstantin, but I didn’t want to leave Maveith. I felt I owed him something for influencing him to come with us. Castile conceded, and we assigned everyone to a team over the next hour. The goal for the company is to reunite inside the dungeon. We would spend the next year living in the dungeon and then exit together in the hope the summoner had abandoned his pursuit.

I looked at the groups and hoped I made a good choice in lobbying for my entry team.

Castile, Adrian, Konstantin, Blaze

Firth, Wylie, Mateo, Felix

Eryk, Maveith, Scholar Favian, Brutus

Lucien, Benito, Pavel, Lirkin

Kolm, Linus, Donte, Flavius

Cyrus, Soren, Remus

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