He was under the townhouse, standing in the flickering lights of the darkness. The basement was a large hold filled with rotting boxes, unopened containers, and rusty shelves of tools long forgotten from the past. Suffice to say, the spiders had really taken a liking to the place.
The cobwebs reminded Quill of his homebase back in the abandoned village far north of Saltstone. He lived in a basement similar to this one, but he wasn't one to leave the place dirty. He was a lich, but he wasn't a dirty one by any means.
“What’s taking you so long?” Rhena pressed his arm, squeezing tight with her fingers trembling. “Open the lock already.”
“Don't tell me you're afraid of the dark.” Quill winced at the strength of her grip. Despite being a woman, she was a mage in the end, and the lithe muscles under her leather gear did that justice.
“It's the spiders.” Rhena said.
“What exactly is wrong with spiders?”
A large house spider then crept on the wooden boards, running from the light stemming from the lantern. Quill bent and picked it up before showing it to Rhena, who only frowned in disgust. He then guided it back to a safe corner.
On Rhena's orders, Quill swayed the lantern to scare off the other critters hiding in the nooks and crannies before he then fixed his eyes on the wooden latch on the far wall of the basement. It was protruding like a sore thumb from the rest of the ornaments here. That was it.
Haref had asked him for a small favor. He was an alchemist mage, a non-combat type that specialized in alchemy. He was tinkering with his potions in his office before he called then Quill, asking him to fetch a certain ingredient. A Ghoulshroom, to be precise, the type of fungi that Quill had been acquainted with before.
Quill agreed immediately when he was promised a reward. If he were able to get Haref the Ghoulshroom, then he would make sure to reward him with another Binding item like the Register.
To that end, Haref had given him the keys to the basement leading to the undercity tunnels.
Quill unlocked the latch with a before he started down the dilapidated staircase. He gestured for Rhena to follow close behind him, otherwise the spiders she was so afraid of would render her even more useless than she already was.
Rhena was there due to Haref’s insistence, but Quill would’ve rather gone alone given her current circumstance. She could hardly let go of his arm, and it was going to be hard to cast spells with only one to work with.
. The tunnel was as narrow and as cold as it ever was when he first arrived here. The lantern allowed him scant meters of light to see where he was going, but the light’s edge was eaten fast by the shadows. Thankfully, it was enough for him to avoid the dirty water of the canal running down the center of the tunnel.
Quill pivoted his gaze. Even in the shadows of the tunnels, it wasn't hard to make his way back to the area where he had met the Sporeghoul. The best place to start looking for Ghoulshrooms was to go straight to where he had last seen its influence.
With a step and hand over his nose, he then started.
“Despite the smell, it's fairly easy to navigate these tunnels.” Rhena’s hand muffled her voice behind Quill. “How often do you think the nobles used this place?”
“More often than you think.” Quill continued down the path before turning at an intersection. “Pigs always find a way.”
“That's one way to say it.”
Quill only nodded.
This tunnel was used by the previous nobles of Fen as an escape route. Back then, Haref’s townhouse was inhabited by a noble family that was exceptionally good at pissing off the common people. Because of that, they resorted to connecting their basement to the underground system, just in case the people had enough.
It was one thing to be arrogant, but it was another thing not to have the courage to back up those words. Quill couldn't care less for the nobles–they were only cowards who turned and fled the moment consequences came knocking at their door.
Quill and Rhena arrived at the boundary separating the Fen tunnels and the outer Gren tunnels. There was a trap set up by Scribe mages, with Scripts dotting the walls on the walls. It was a spell that prevented the entry of unwanted visitors. If Quill had to guess, this was put in place to stop Gren smugglers from finding an easy way into the inner city.
Quill pressed a hand against one of the Scripts before manually deactivating the spell trap. All he had to do was push a portion of his mana to one of the Scripts, cancelling out the flow of mana. It was much easier to do on this side than the other side, though.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
Quill nodded to Rhena before they continued in the Gren tunnels. It took a long while of walking and turning at intersections before they finally arrived back to where it all started.
There was still the same stain of dried blood splattered on the wall.
Quill still had no idea what happened to Fenith. It was likely that he was mauled to death by the Sporeghoul, but it didn't really matter now. Fenith's body was his, and as far as he knew, Fenith never died in the first place.
Quill shook his head before stopping. He asked Rhena for a minute, sitting down at the edge of the walls before writing Scripts in the air to summon the Marble Puppets. He could've cast them before coming down here, but the constant drain from the Mana Links was too much for his Iron Core to handle.
He started on the Scripts. He’d hoped to find an enemy to test his Puppets on, and it was hardly a challenge for Pen and Notebook to beat up the wooden mannequins in the training hall. That was one of the reasons why Quill took up Haref’s offer, to see how well his Constructs could perform against a Sporeghoul.
With the last of the Scripts finished, he pushed mana to the symbols before chunks of White mana solidified in the air and consolidated into the two Marble Puppets. When the fire behind their eyes gleamed, Quill then stood up to stand.
“They look good.” Rhena leaned to one of them, running her fingers over the Marble Armor. “Were you a sculptor in a past life or something?”
“Maybe,” Quill said. “Do you believe in the concept of reincarnation?”
“Don't tell me you believe in the Hundred Old Gods?” Rhena said.
“I don't.” Quill stretched his fingers. “But you do know that reincarnation doesn't only exist in religion? Magic always has a way of making things possible.”
“You sound like Haref.”
“He’s smart.”
Quill then turned down, staring at a mushroom sprouting on the edge of the tunnel walkway. He then called his Puppets to his side, their greaves and spears clanking like stones against the stone bricks before gesturing for Rhena to follow.
There was no doubt about it. This part of the underground tunnels was overrun with Ghoulshrooms. His eyes fixed on the mycelium running down the walkway, following the twisting roots before it eventually led him to a smaller tunnel.
It spewed a certain kind of black water. This place stank enough already, but the air inside this round passage was oozing with decay. Quill nodded to Rhena before climbing inside, bowing his head against the low ceiling. He continued following the roots, growing with every step forward, twisting and digging like vines on bricks the more they dug deeper.
Small mushrooms sprouted from the shallow waters. These things looked to be common and normal mushrooms, but most fungi shared the same love for darkness and moisture. Even Ghoulshrooms.
A screech resounded through the walls. The sound was all too familiar to Quill, a cry from a Sporeghoul.
They were close now.
Quill ordered his Puppets to lead the way up front, their spears outstretched a couple of meters in front of them like teeth. Staying behind summons was the oldest trick in the summoner's manual, and it was going to serve him well.
Another screech resounded in the air. It was only a few meters ahead now. The smell of death was growing stronger with each step, and even Quill had a hard time swallowing the bile piling in his throat. Rhena wasn't doing any better, and it almost seemed like she was going to hurl any second.
Then, there was the opening.
The tunnel had led them to a dark, square tank. The Puppets dropped first, the black water reaching up to their knees, before Quill followed right behind them.
Quill raised the lantern in his hand, illuminating the space in firelight. The flames glimmered against the moist outline of giant Ghoulshrooms, dotting the edges and walls as mycelium roots carved into the bricks.
That was it. The Ghoulshrooms were as large as heads, having a smell to them easily perceived as the rotting smell of a dead body. That was because they only blossom on decaying matter, and most of the gunk here was nothing but rotten things.
Quill waded through the water and stared at one of the Ghoulshrooms. It was ugly and rancid, almost as if the gore of corpses were condensed in a single living . It was weird, but it was fascinating to say the least, how it was able to raise an undead capable of chasing him through the tunnels before.
“This shit is definitely not worth it.” Rhena wiped her wet hand on Quill's shoulder before starting towards the Ghoulshroom.
“You’re going to regret that.” Quill glared at the stain on his shoulder.
Rhena then pulled a knife from her belt. Just before she took hold of the hilt and swung, a loud screech then reverberated in one of the tank’s four tunnels, stopping them in their tracks. Quill tried to search for the source, but it was all the same in the echo.
The screech was desperate and hungry, the same cry Quill had been acquainted with before. They could only continue, and the moment Rhena's dagger struck one of the Ghoulshrooms, the three tunnels then echoed with a cry of pain. The Ghoulshroom was calling for help.
“Get ready!” Quill shouted, his command striking Rhena and his Constructs. At once, the Marble Puppets stirred, barring the entrances of the two flank tunnels, spears outstretched like barricades. Rhena moved herself, smart enough to take the hint and ready both her daggers at the far tunnel.
From the number of echoes ringing in the tunnels, there wasn’t only one Sporeghoul here. That shouldn't have been the case a few weeks ago, but the Ghoulshrooms must’ve mustered their numbers while Quill had been up on the surface.
Where did they even get the bodies in the first place? Quill only shook his head before one after another, rotten hands climbed out one by one around them.
They were now here.
Thanks for reading!
LitRPG Cultivation Weak to Strong Isekai
When Death Magic collides with Immortality.
Mo Fan transmigrated to the Cultivation World with a broken body and "Trash Spirit Roots." He has no future in traditional cultivation.
However, he brought a unique cheat: The power to command death. Armed with his System, he will start from zero and shock the world.
What to Expect
Smart MC Ruthless World No Harem Optimistic
- From bottom of the food chain to apex predator
- Unique fusion of Necromancy & Dao
- Modern tactics crushing ancient traditions