The Gift of Loot Chapter 12: Chapter 12: Looting The Mantis Queen

Read chapter 12 of The Gift of Loot by Jack_Golightly on NovelPedia.

Thomas brought the mana crystal up for a closer look and saw that it had iridescent shimmers. In fact, it seemed to be changing from green to a rosy color, but not exactly like a healing mana crystal. As it changed, iridescent shimmers of brown raced across the surface of the crystal. What the heck was he holding? Whatever this was, it was special. Thomas had to resist the urge to absorb the thing right then and there. The only thing that held him back was caution. He was in a dungeon filled with enemy monsters lurking around every corner, and frankly, while every sense told him that this was a mana crystal, he had never seen or read about anything like it. It was special, but how special? And did he want to add something to his soul when he didn't know what it would do? Maybe it was a higher-level mana crystal type. It had started green. Was it poison? Toxicity? Radiation? All would be cool against his enemies, but he didn't exactly want to start absorbing that into himself. With reluctance, he tucked the crystal away in one of the side pockets of his backpack. Then he pulled out his printed guide, glanced it over for what to expect next, and moved on. So far, the guide had been accurate at every step, and he felt better and better about spending good crystals on it. It occurred to him that he had a piece of information that could be added to the guide. Ralph, the guidemaster—Thomas decided he was just going to assign him that name in his head—had mentioned he would pay for additional information. Well, now he had it: mantis eyes were harvestable. Too bad Thomas didn't exactly know how to do the actual harvesting. On his next stop, he took out two more mantises. He saved one of the heads, but the other was destroyed in the fight. Along the way, he gained a couple more C-grade browns and added them to his backpack. Then he came to his first trap, and unfortunately, this one was a doozy. The path came to a sort of cliff with a drop-off on one side and a very thin trail he was obviously meant to follow on the other. The cliff face was smooth and lacking handholds, with the exception of a single tree root that stuck out of the wall in the middle. According to the guide, if he brushed that root, the entire thin pathway would collapse, taking the dungeon diver and their party down with it. It wasn't instantly fatal, but apparently, it was a long drop that could easily cause injury. Getting back up practically meant scaling the other side of the cliff barehanded. All in all, it was something Thomas would rather avoid, especially since he was not the biggest fan of heights. The pathway itself was just thin enough to walk along single file. He moved carefully, taking his time and keeping an eye on the root that was the trigger. It stuck out only a couple of inches and wasn't extremely visible, being only a bit darker brown than the cliff face itself—easy to miss and easier to snag a piece of loose clothing on. He made a very exaggerated step around the root, holding his backpack in front of him and pulling his shirt tight to make sure nothing came close to touching it. He only breathed easier on the other side when the cliff face did not fall out from under him. Thomas continued on and slaughtered three mantises around the next corner. There was no way he could take on all three at the same time by himself, so he baited the one out in front into the open and dealt with it. Meanwhile, the other two mantises were seemingly content to wait, since Thomas had not technically stepped into their territory. These level one dungeon monsters were pretty mindless, more like machines than actual creatures. He assumed that would change with higher-level dungeons and wondered how long it would take for them to be able to think and plan. On the other hand, the loot would be better. The third mantis he killed in that room dropped a higher-grade crystal. It was a darker brown than the previous ones, more of a rich chocolate color. It also called to hi