Chương 13: Sewer Gators

Havlo's questions at breakfast had really caught Amberlin by surprise. How had he noticed she'd snuck out last night? She thought she'd taken all the necessary precautions to muffle all her noise. It was only afterward that she remembered that Boots had escaped through the window, which had been wide open when she got back. That must have made a lot of noise and tipped him off. By then it was too late to change her response. But she was touched by how much Havlo was looking out for her safety.

She wished there was a way to put his mind at ease. But she couldn't just come out and tell him that she was immortal. This was a problem she would have to think about, but that could wait until later. Right now she was looking for the sewers. She never got around to finding them last night because of all the excitement with Boots. This morning she'd left him back at the inn again, only this time after making doubly sure to check that the windows were locked properly.

She thought she'd locked them last night before she left, but evidently that had only been her imagination. By the time she'd caught him and got him back to the inn, too much of the night had already passed, so she just went to sleep. But now it was a bright new day. And best of all, there were people out and about who she could ask for directions. Discovering new places was so much easier during daytime. It didn't take her long at all to find a sewer entrance. There were many of them, right under her feet.

She opened the manhole cover and climbed down the ladder, taking care to close the cover behind her. She wouldn't want anyone to fall in by accident. It was less smelly than she expected, but she wouldn't want to live down here. She cast a simple light spell and started exploring. After a few twists and turns, she was thoroughly lost. You didn't forget that about Amberlin, did you? The sewers beneath Lorelark weren't just a simple drainage system, they were a network of tunnels with a long and storied history.

There was some lore that she hadn't bothered reading, back when this world was a game, but many different groups of people had added to the tunnels over the years. She hoped she wouldn't soon be meeting any of them. In her brother's game, the animal abductors hadn't been too hard to find. And when she came across a tunnel that had been cut haphazardly into the wall, it made sense to follow it. Someone conducting an illegal smuggling operation wouldn't be doing it out in the main pathways, after all.

The tunnel was poorly cut and shaped like a large oval. There weren't any pathways built into it, which made it difficult to avoid stepping into the stagnant sewer water that had settled along the entire length. Amberlin decided that after today's adventure, she was going to burn her boots. After a couple of curves, the long tunnel opened out into a large chamber. The chamber was completely flooded except for an island in the center where a giant alligator rested.

She cast a muffle spell and approached the chamber for a closer look. The water wasn't too deep, but if she tried to wade across, she would have to burn more than just her boots. As for the alligator, at first she thought it was asleep, but it turned out to be observing something up on a narrow ledge on the other side of the room, which was why it had its back to her. She shined her light over to see what had caught its interest and saw four people frantically waving at her. She waved back.

They started shaking their heads and pointing back the way she came. The silver guild badges on their clothes glinted in her light. They were adventurers! They appeared to be stuck on that ledge, and she guessed it had something to do with the giant alligator. Hoping to create a diversion for them to escape, she searched around and found a loose rock. There were many more lying around, as whoever dug the tunnel hadn't done a very good job of cleaning up.

It was lying beneath the water, but she picked it up anyway, deciding that the lives of four people were worth more than having to replace her gloves. She tossed the rock to the side of the room, in the direction of another tunnel leading somewhere deeper. The splash got the alligator to briefly turn its head before it went back to staring hungrily at the adventurers. Since one rock didn't work, this time she picked up two, both larger than a brick.

She heaved them in the same direction, trying to lure the alligator down the other tunnel. This time instead of looking toward the splashes, it turned its entire body around, moving at a surprising speed, until its eyes were fixed on hers. And then it charged, its massive legs splashing dirty sewer water all over the place as it went. She reacted immediately. Her goal with the bricks had been to lure the alligator into the other tunnel to open an escape path for the adventurers.

And while that hadn't worked, she had an obvious way to achieve the same result now. Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. She ran into the watery chamber and turned off to the side, intending to use herself as bait to lead the alligator where she needed it to go. She hoped that the adventurers would use the opportunity to get away. But when she got to the tunnel, she saw that it shortly led into a second chamber, where there were two more giant alligators lazing about.

Only they weren't lazing anymore now that all this noise had attracted their attention, and they were headed this way. With the first alligator blocking her way back into the first tunnel, she did the only sensible thing and scrambled up the wall, using the uneven stone as hand-holds, and pulled herself up to the ledge next to the adventurers. She looked down to see all three alligators staring up at her. The four adventurers were also staring at her. One of them ventured a comment.

"What the hell was that?"

"I was trying to save you," she explained.

"You ran toward the alligator!"

"If I ran away, you'd still be stuck here." The adventurer, who she guessed was an archer by the fact that he was carrying a bow, though the ledges were too narrow for him to use it, waved his hands toward the predators below.

"We are still stuck here, but now the situation is three times worse." She looked down at the alligators again. They weren't making any attempts to snap at them, and instead seemed ready to patiently wait them out.

"Seems to me," she snapped back, "your situation is the same whether there's one alligator or one hundred. Only now you've got me."

"Yeah? And how's a bronze going to help us?"

"You're being rude, Buck," one of the archer's teammates said. It was a a pink-haired woman dressed as a mage. Peering around Buck's shoulder at Amberlin, she said, "My name's Jenny. We appreciate you trying to help out. It was very courageous."

"You can call me Amberlin. How'd you end up in this situation?" she asked.

"We took a quest to clear out the giant alligators," Jenny said.

"Yet you couldn't even defeat the first one?"

"We had a plan. You see how that tunnel you came through is very long? We were just going to kite it back to the entrance. Between the four of us, it would have dropped in no time." Then Jenny added sheepishly, "But we were careless and didn't spot the alligator before wandering into this chamber and it cut off our escape."

"How'd you manage to miss that great, big honking thing?" Jenny's face went red, and Amberlin felt bad about pressing the issue. It wasn't that important how they got here.

"Can't you just blast it with your spells?" she asked Jenny.

"The truth is, my mana pool isn't deep enough to kill it solo," Jenny said sheepishly.

"So I've been conserving my mana until we come up with a good plan.

"It can tank that many fireballs?"

"Firebolts for me. I'm still working my way up to the Tier 3 spells."

"Heck, there are golds who haven't learned fireball," Buck interjected.

"And unless I elevate my firebolt up to Tier 2, it would do little than tickle the alligator," Jenny continued.

"And elevating spells consumes more mana."

"In that case, how were you planning to fight it?" Amberlin asked.

"Usually I save my spells for when we really need them, and I just provide ranged support with my sling," Jenny explained.

"But there's no room up here for Buck to use his bow or me to use my sling, and both Duo and Keel are melee. So as you can see, we're kind of low on options." She knew it was up to her to get them out. The problem was how to do it without giving herself away. It would attract too much attention if a newcomer came along and singlehandedly defeated a bunch of beasts that four silvers couldn't.

"I have an idea," she said.

"You just need to get past the allilgators and into the tunnel to do your kiting thing, yeah? I'll distract them and you guys make a run for it."

"No way," Jenny said.

"That's too dangerous. You'll be trapped all alone."

"I just have to last while you pick them off one by one."

"You're being silly. Tell her she's being silly, Buck."

"She's pretty fast for a bronze," Buck said. Jenny looked at her teammate in disgust.

"You aren't seriously going to let Amberlin put herself in danger for us?"

"What's the alternative?" Buck said.

"The five of us remain stuck here until we get tired and slip off this ledge?"

"Then why don't you play distraction?"

"Have you ever seen me run?"

"It's all right," Amberlin said.

"You guys just get ready to go." And then without waiting to listen to their protests, she pushed off the ledge. The alligators moved swiftly to catch her in their jaws. But she dropped a fireball into the water, sending up a cloud of steam. The steam wasn't to hide herself from the alligators, which she believed had poor eyesight anyway. It was to conceal her actions from the silvers. The alligators posed no threat to her whatsoever.

Not only was she immortal, but she'd also defeated a rock troll, which was a high-level monster, while alligators were mid at best. They tried to snap her in their jaws, but she found purchase on their snouts and used that as a launchpad to make her escape. She ran toward the second tunnel, and the alligators chased after her. Behind her, she heard four splashes as the silvers dropped from their ledge, and then the sound of slings and arrows followed.

The tunnel opened out into a second chamber, where two of the alligators had originated. There was another tunnel leading out from here, but she ignored it, and instead ran laps along the wall of the partially submerged chamber. It was exhilarating. She had all the adrenaline without any of the fear or physical danger. This was fun.

The alligators tried to trap her, but she just scrambled diagonally up the wall like a parkour expert while they snapped at her from below, falling just inches short of snagging her thighs. Their attention switched away from her when a stream of firebolts came from the second tunnel and struck the alligators from behind. Amberlin looked over at the source to find Jenny preparing a second wave of spells.

"Get behind me!" Jenny shouted.

"I'm low on mana, but I can cover our retreat." Amberlin wasn't ready for the excitement to be over, but she didn't want to keep the adventurers in danger, so she dashed over to the tunnel and ran past Jenny. Buck was there too, helping out with his bow, and the other two team members were not far behind. One of them was a warrior, and his contribution was picking up the sewer rocks and throwing them with his powerful arms.

The last appeared to be a cleric, whose indistinct chanting was having some sort of unknown effect. Once Amberlin had run past them, the silvers pulled back. The alligators gave chase, but with all four team members covering for one another, even Buck was able to stay ahead of them. Seeing how much slower the creatures were moving, she guessed that this was somehow the work of the cleric. When they got back to the main sewer path, Amberlin followed the party, trusting them to know the way out.

The alligators continued their pursuit, but a mixture of exhaustion and the awkward size of the walkway had them fall further behind until they were no longer a threat. It wasn't long before the group reached a ladder and climbed up toward fresh air.