Once again, I made it through the night without dying. I didn’t sleep well, obviously — I can’t imagine most people would enjoy the damp coldness, not to mention that dusty old smell. But I slept a lot better than I thought I would. I was just so tired from all the previous day’s killing. I probably should have taken a personal day rather than charging right into a dungeon, but…well, I don’t really have a good excuse. And I know it was stupid to sleep in those ruins, where more bandits could have shown up, or even worse things from the tombs. I don’t really have an excuse for that either, except that I was just so tired. I was probably safer inside the ruins than out in the open where I could have been eaten by a bear. Besides, nothing horrible happened.

I’m a fairly new adventurer, but I’m going to have to get used to all this fighting and sleeping in dungeons and stuff, diary. There’s really no way around it.

It’s like I have my own Sphere Recorder Bob to take photos of my adventures now!

I trekked back to the Imperial City to sell the stuff I had collected. Naturally, it was raining again. There’s nothing like running around in soggy fur and leather armor. I’m sure Squally would know all about the perils of that particular material combination. I had the bandits to thank for the fur helmet, gauntlets, and greaves. I know, I’m really fearsome. But at least my head is protected now.

I sold my stuff to Jensine, just because I wanted more money from her. I may have been able to haggle a better price elsewhere, but honestly, I just wasn’t in the mood to visit every store in the vicinity and compare prices. Even so, just selling the poor quality weapons and armor I found in the ruins earned me much more than 100 Gold. Suck it, Jensine.

After another back-and-forth journey from the ruins to the Imperial City to sell merchandise I couldn’t carry the first time around, I realized I didn’t feel like doing that a third time. No, it was time for me to face my fears and just explore the damn tombs already. Surely there must be a valuable treasure lurking down there. That’s the way it always goes, right?

Well, the tombs were not all that creepy. Not at first, anyway. I mean, they were creepy, but not in the “rotting zombies humping my head” kind of way. I kept expecting something to jump out at me, but nothing did. There was only some dumbass furry bandit skulking about. A single fireball took care of him. Not scary.

Then I found the secret passageway. I guess I wouldn’t call it “secret” exactly, not when the method of opening it involved a giant, conspicuous button in the center of the floor. But it did open up a new passageway, a stone tunnel with blood on the floor. This time I did “eep” a bit. Sure, I’m all tough when I’m flailing around with my magic sword, but this was a little too Silent Hill for my tastes.

Noooooooope

Speaking of Silent Hill, in the center of the next chamber was a dead furry bandit laid out across a pedestal. This must be the bandit that disappeared. At first, I was all, “What could have done this?” But then I realized that I had similarly murdered a ton of these guys upstairs. So yeah, whatever did this was at least as scary as I am.

Eventually, I discovered several rooms containing skeletons and/or zombies. I was completely desensitized to skeletons by this point, thanks to the bumbling Bonehead, but zombies still freak me out. Especially the ones I could hear moaning in the walls. Oh, and the one that fucking snuck up on me while I was shooting fireballs at a skeleton. I’m not ashamed to say I ran like a little girl, shrieking and shooting more fireballs.

I know this sounds weird coming from someone who regularly summons the undead, but I fucking hate zombies. They’re gross to look at, they smell terrible, their skeevy moans make them sound like sex offenders, and when they were alive, they were probably assholes. They are by far the worst things I’ve encountered thus far, and knowing my luck, I’ll probably discover much worse eventually.

Am I in Eternal Darkness all of a sudden? What is with the ten thousand blade traps?

I did discover one pretty awesome thing, however. When I kill something with my magic, it flies into the air dramatically before it hits the ground. I did this with a bunch of skeletons, and I admit, it amused me greatly to see bony limbs and skulls sailing through the air. Bone explosion!

Just as I was getting into this whole dungeon-exploring thing again, some jackass in a black robe attacked me for no reason! I think he was a necromancer. I took all his clothes — I thought I’d try the necromancer look later, just to see if it suits me — and left his nearly naked body lying on the floor, as one does. When I inspected the chamber, I found that this weirdo was actually living down here. He was probably responsible for all the zombies and skeletons, too. I don’t think I’ve ever been so thrilled to have murdered someone. I kicked his corpse a few times for good measure.

That’ll teach you to try to murder the shit out of a recapper.

In addition to the usual disgusting crap you’d expect from a necromancer — bones, dead flesh, a shovel — there were also some alchemical ingredients (score!) and a mysterious letter. The letter writer was the guy I just killed, whose name was apparently Jalbert. He was writing to a secret vampire friend named, of all things, Captain Aluc Cardius. Get it?! Because Alucard is Dracula backwards?! Maybe if he wants to keep his nasty sparkly pedophilia a secret, he should call himself something like Bill Smith. Also, he and Jalbert are probably doing it. Why the fuck else would they bother writing letters to each other?

The letter also indicated that Jalbert the Jizzmopping Jerkwad was responsible for killing the bandits. Whew, mystery solved! — at least that’s what I would say if I gave a shit about any of those dead dickholes. I left the chamber, winding my way back to the entrance. There were a couple of rooms I hadn’t explored, but my bulging sack was begging me to go unload it. I had uncovered a few interesting items, such as a strange pointy statue, and a pointy, glowing Varla Stone. I guess the Ayleids liked pointy (or POONTY, if you prefer) things.

It was past 1AM, but I refused to spend another night in or near those ruins. For an hour and a half, I slogged through the rain in the dark until I stumbled into the Merchants’ Inn, located in the Market District of the Imperial City. At this point, I was not concerned about the accommodations, as long as there were no moaning, pervy zombies anywhere in the vicinity. So here I am, about to crash for the night. Tomorrow, I continue my quest for cash.

Jeanne Recapiere
Heartfire 1
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