Monster Mansion 2 by Dante King (most interesting books to read TXT) 📕

“Is… is Todd all right?” gasped Sarah, staggering toward the two of them, but Josh didn’t answer. His face and beard were blue and coated with ice crystals. He dropped his guns and collapsed sideways onto the ground.

Chapter 14

Sarah dragged herself to her feet and staggered toward her two half-ogre companions. The three Frostbreath cougars had been nearly more than they could handle, and now she was afraid for her friends.

“Damn it,” she muttered through gritted teeth as she staggered and nearly fell. She had taken a blast of the cougar’s Frostbreath spell to her chest, and despite the deflection power in her armor, the residual effect of the attack was making her feel as if she was half-encased in ice. If new enemies appeared now, they would be in trouble, she thought, but thankfully nothing of the sort happened.

“Josh,” she said, shaking the big guy by the shoulder. There was no response. He was blue, frozen, his beard a mess of ice crystals and his skin freezing to the touch. His eyes stared blankly up at the ceiling.

When she put her hand to his throat, she could feel the pulse there beating slowly, and his breath hissed raggedly in and out.

“At least he doesn’t seem likely to die immediately,” she said out loud, though no one was there to hear.

Hauling up, Sarah went over and looked at Todd. The younger of the two brothers, he was smaller and less experienced than Josh. Now he lay on his back, arms spread, eyes staring up at the ceiling sightlessly.

He was in a bad way. The cougar had gone for his throat, and only Todd’s metal gorget had saved him from having his life torn out by the monster.

“Fuck, I didn’t think this would happen,” Sarah said, but of course she’d known what she was signing up for when she’d decided to challenge the dungeon. This was no game.

Todd was still breathing, but blood seeped from three ragged cuts to his face. As she watched, Sarah saw that the blood was soaking into the stone floor, as if into a sand rather than granite.

She looked up, realizing what was happening. The dungeon was feeding. Every drop of Todd’s blood that soaked into the stone would be feeding mana and power to the dungeon spirit.

Todd, the healer of the group, had come to the adventure well-equipped with healing potions. These were the best ones that money could buy, but even then they were still not particularly good. Back in old Eosor before the fall, it was said that there were healing potions so powerful that a lost limb could be regrown, a blinded eye made to see again, or even— though Sarah found this heard to believe—potions that could raise a recently-deceased warrior from the dead.

Because of the government’s restrictions on higher level magical items, an adventurer team like Sarah’s could have access to nothing like that, but still Todd’s potion belts were well supplied.

Sarah grabbed a couple of pale red vials from the belt across Todd’s chest. Traditionally, potions were carried in vials of crystal or even thick glass, but these were too breakable. The modern dungeon adventurer preferred vials made of high-strength polymer compounds with quick-release caps.

Sarah pulled three of these out and snapped the tops off one by one. She poured the first one into Todd’s mouth, and he sat up, spluttering and swallowing. Light shone out from his cuts for a moment, and then they stopped bleeding. They did not heal up, but they clotted quickly.

Todd sat, blinking and grimacing in pain as Sarah went over and poured a potion down Josh’s throat. He groaned, but the blue sheen didn’t leave his skin.

“Here,” said Todd, pulling a fat round container from his belt. “Give him this.”

“What is it?” she asked, taking it from him. She popped the cap and sniffed it. It smelled like cinnamon.

“It’s a heat stim,” Todd said. “Gives a boost to warmth and energy. It should drive the effect of the cold from him.”

Sarah nodded and began to pour the stimulant potion down Josh’s throat. This must have been an expensive potion, but the gold they would carry out of the chamber would cover the costs of everything they used here today and more.

To her great relief, the color began to come back to Josh’s face. The ice crystals in his beard evaporated, and the snowy deposit that covered his armor melted away.

He sat up, coughing, and Sarah grinned at him. She popped the cap off the third healing potion and swallowed it herself, feeling the restorative effects spread through her body immediately in a satisfying rush.

“That was fucking heavy,” said Josh, then broke into a fit of coughing. The others laughed shakily.

“Yeah,” said Sarah. “I think we were having a bit too much fun.”

At that moment, the sound of voices floated through the chamber. All three adventurers looked up. There was no one there, but they all heard it: a man and a woman, who sounded like they were bickering. Their voices floated in and out like voices on an old radio that was losing reception.

“…not my job to do it!” said the woman’s voice. “It’s up to you to make sure there are enough potions in place!”

“Just as well they had some of their own!” said the man’s voice. “That could have been… anyway, can’t we put some in now?”

“Too risky to the integrity of the chamber,” said the woman, sounding exasperated. “We’ll just have to make sure that next time we don’t do such a…”

Then the voices were gone.

“What in the hells was that?” Josh said, scratching his head in confusion.

Todd had taken a second healing potion from his belt and swallowed it. His wounds began to heal, the swelling going down around them. Then