Day ~76~

Rea quickly ascended from the cold ground in all her glory... looking up at the frozen wall she cocked her head sideways, It wasn't melting... Pondering that she decided to examine her glaciate ability, every rank up would cause the frost to last longer, become stronger. Rea was pretty glad that it would last three hours now... not so happy she'd only slept for less than that. Deciding that glaciate mastery should be her first order of business Rea set about melting out the crates and barrels. She then emptied all of them before throwing it all back on the door. Our nude ophidian was now conjuring water and using glaciate while gnawing on some roasted bunny.

As Rea finished her piece of meat she opened her pack to take account of provisions. Knowing that she may be stuck here for a while as she thought up a plan of escape, Rea decided that she should freeze her provisions in the ice and only melt some out when she got really hungry. She had taken a few days to hunt and was now very glad that Saul had tried to starve her to death once. Level six satiety mastery just may save her life now.

All that Rea did for nearly three days with barely any sleep was melt and freeze ice over and over again while occasionally munching on bunny...

Ability [Glaciate Rank Up].

Ability [Fireball Rank Up].

Ability [Conjure Water Rank Up].

Ability [Glaciate Rank Up].

[Job-High Mage] Level 16!

Ability [Mana Capacity Lv. 3] learned.

Ability [Glaciate Rank Up].

Ability [Conjure Fire Rank Up].

Ability [Glaciate Rank Up].

Ability [Elemental Power Rank Up].

Ability [Lantern Rank Up].

Ability [Glaciate Rank Up].

[Job-High Mage] Level 24!

Ability [Mana Capacity Lv. 4] learned.

Ability [Glaciate Rank Up].

Ability [Glaciate Lv. X] altered, [Permafrost] learned.

Rea decided to reward her efforts, that had payed off by gaining what seemed to be perpetual ice. While sauntering towards her bath Rea tested permafrost to make sure she could still dispel it. Once Rea had arrived at her bath she frowned, turned around, and plopped down on the earlier tossed aside mattress.

Day ~79~

Rea woke up well rested, unfroze a bit of meat, then set about a dirty task. Her bath had gotten muddy over the past few days, but before she could cover it up and make a new one she needed to get her fire spirit stones back. When Rea lowered herself in, still not wearing anything at this point, she let out a startled gasp. In a single moment she realized why people in her old world had found mud wrestling so erotic. Sifting through the warm mud Rea went about collecting her fire spirit stones. Through some surprisingly limber movements she had managed to get all of her stones without dunking her head in. As Rea rose out of the mud bath she looked down at herself and was quickly reminded that the evolution had taken into account her own personal tastes. Rea slowly ran both hands along her hips as mud continued to ooze off her lithe body.

One hour later Rea was gathering up her stones and leaving the mud pit be... yes, she had dropped them back in to relax for a while. Moving a few feet away and cleansing her body of mud she began to dig again. This time, when the hole was finished she went about lining it with stone slabs, she then used some permafrosted water as grout, it was... pretty. About thirty minutes later she had filled the tub and found that there wouldn't be a problem keeping water warm with fire spirit stones. Quickly hopping in the bath, Rea's derriere was the first part of her body to painfully realize a huge problem. With her rear having gotten a shockingly cold touch of the permafrosted water grout she nearly jumped out. It would seem that for now Rea had to float in her bath.

Feeling thoroughly refreshed Rea sat on a mattress while gazing at the ice wall, she wasn't really sure that there was any better way to survive now than train as much as she could in here before making a run for it. Rea was afraid that once she began to explore the abandoned dwarven city she wouldn't be able to find a way out... or rather, all the exits may have collapsed over the years. Also, she was afraid that those lukars were just the first of what had been down here waiting to eat her. Rea decided to work on her biggest problem first, there were so many of those things... She could very well not have the mana to handle all of them with magic, and her spear wasn't really suited to fighting multiple enemies at once. Even if she could somehow manage, if their numbers were greater than she could handle it would simply mean death. Rea decided to work on her swordsmanship a bit for now, thinking wasn't getting her anywhere... The ophidian spotted a bookcase...

In an attempt to get her mind off of things for a little while Rea had started to fumble through every book she could get her hands on. Survival still being a priority the first thing she did while tossing around hundreds of rare, priceless books, was look for anything she could use. Rea was not disappointed with the dwarves.

Rea has obtained [Book] "First Volume (of three) of “Dwarven Runesmithing".

Rea has obtained [Book] "Second Volume (of three) of “Dwarven Runesmithing".

Rea has obtained [Book] "Third Volume (of three) of “Dwarven Runesmithing".

Rea has obtained [Book] "Why dwarves can't use magic".

Rea has obtained [Book] "Telur'thal'mir chronicles, the founding of our great mountain empire".

Rea has obtained [Book] "Tirli's Diary".

Rea has obtained [Book] "Kilthala's Journal, This is NOT A DIARY!"

Rea thought why dwarves couldn't use magic might be entertaining. The journals may give her some clue as to what happened here, and the founding of this city may also help her navigate it. However, the treasure here was smith books. When Rea had first found them she quickly took stock of her surrounding, between the bunks, weapons, and armor in these barracks she could very easily make a forge, Rea let out an audible sigh when she realized just how much effort that would take. On the bright side she was glad they had plenty of hammers to choose from. So before she even began reading the books Rea started to think of designs from her old world. She wasn't sure if she could control the temperature of her flames, even if she sat here trying, so Rea decided to go with tried and true designs, methods.

Most of the bunks were in disrepair so they easily broke apart. Rea did leave one standing in case she needed to hang something again... not wanting to begin metalworking in the buff she began to use her garb apparatus, but just before muttering the phrase to put her armor back on she caught another glance of herself... the evolution really had paid attention to her own preferences. Rea enjoyed the time spent putting her armor on manually before she sauntered back to the pile of metal with a kick in her step. Rea wasn't sure what to think as she looked down, not having been able to tie her bustier on without a partner she was staring at her favorite supple mountains, clearly visible through see through stocking material... Ten minutes later Rea's pants were off as she curled her toes and howled for Sereda in the echoing chamber. As she laid there gasping for breath Rea's expression saddened a bit before she packed away her armor and pulled out a ceremonial garb to wear instead.

Getting back to the task at hand Rea took her time engraving a rather large stone with the shape of an ingot. Before the night was over Rea had all four of the stones, that were large enough, engraved with a small foot long ingot template. Realizing that she didn't really need ingots first Rea smacked her forehead and returned to her mattress mountain for sleep... When Rea first hopped on the mountain she remembered Selene's fluffy amalgamation of fluffy goodness. The hopeless ophidian proceeded to dump all of her rabbit furs out on top of the mountain before burrowing in to get some much needed sleep.

Day ~80~

Waking up alone didn't please Rea at all, looking down at her loosely tied garb on the other hand...

Thirty minutes later Rea was getting back to work. Today it took her all freaking day to properly assemble a moderately sized furnace that would allow her to melt down sizable amounts of metal.

Day ~81~

Rea still wasn't happy waking up alone, when she looked down at a heaving chest as it slid her garb aside... Rea realized that this was about to become a daily ritual.

An hour later Rea was sniffing a small pouch of spice that reminded her of the bronze woman while she began to set up an impromptu anvil. The thing wasn't a pretty one, it was more like a hastily arranged block of metal. Using a few practice swing with one small hammer she nodded in approval at its flatness and width. With that out of the way Rea engraved a template for half a pair of tongs, and a bolt that she'd have to turn into a screw by hand. Rea knew that was gonna take her forever to do but she really needed a set of tongs.

Day ~82~

Rea spent this morning covered in mud...

After Rea had gotten herself cleaned up she absently sniffed her spices while flipping through the Telur'thal'mir chronicles. Rea actually found most of what she read boring and skimmed through the pages. From what she could figure out Rea knew that there was no way someone with her sense of direction would be able to properly navigate this city. Cursing under her breath and finally admitting the she may have a bad sense of direction, Rea began to read more about the city's history. From what she could tell it sounded like the dwarves who ran this city were jerks. They had never allowed any dwarf that left the city to return, if you left once that was it, you were an exile. They had also used some sort of ritual to strip the knowledge of their sacred smithing techniques from the minds of exiles. Rea laughed a bit when she realized that sitting on her lap were three books about these sacred arts. The fact that Corn hadn't mentioned rune smithing, being the avid blacksmithing fan he was, probably meant that this was a very tightly kept secret... right up until the end.

Think about their demise and her current circumstances Rea switched gears and opened up a journal. The first journal was of a young woman, this dwarf was definitely Rea's sort of dwarf. She had not only dreamed of the outside world but also snuck in and out of the city for weeks at a time on several occasions. Apparently she was known for getting lost in her mines often while prospecting. Rea had to laugh at one of her encounters where she had conquered an elf, then brought him to an inn and conquered him in an entirely different manner. Rea had skipped most of the diary because she wanted to know what happened near the end. The dwarven woman, Tirli, had grown afraid of what consequence she would face. Her liaison with the elven man hadn't ended with a single encounter, she had even been carrying his child for several months now. Rea was eagerly munching on a piece of bunny when while snuggling into her furs when the diary took a grim turn. "They are everywhere, the kar'soth are everywhere, they are coming and we cannot stop them, there are too many..." over and over, for days on end, the last entry of her journal spoke of a final stand, a last ditch effort to survive. Rea hoped that whatever kar'soth were she wouldn't stumble onto them.

Rea quickly skipped to the end of Kilthala's journal and let out a chuckle, it was definitely a diary. Anyways, Kilthala, despite being a pretty low ranking dwarf that still lived in a conscript barrack was related to a runemaster. Rea quickly dove back into the discarded pile of books and pulled out the one on runemasters. What she had read in the diary, *cough cough* journal, was that this last ditch effort had something to do with them. The more Rea read of the book on runemasters the more she realized exactly what runesmithing was. Runes were words of power granted strength by a god, one could only utilize the latent effect of these runes if they gained the divine protection of the god who had created them. Runemasters would inscribe them on parchment and tablets, while runesmiths engraved them by carving the desired rune into their own hammer, Rea wasn't too sure how that works but she was sure the runesmith books would elaborate. Which they did as Rea quickly skimmed through various sections of all three books, it wasn't terribly difficult to understand.

A downside was that using more than one rune type was very dangerous and more often than not, catastrophic, one such example was of a dwarf... the dwarf turned inside out, and then it exploded. Rea stopped at that point for a moment... she was pretty sure that this god wouldn't want their craft to die out so she knelt down and offered a half assed prayer...

Ability [Greater God of Rune's Divine Protection] learned.

Ability [Rune Affinity] learned.

Ability [Rune Affinity +] learned.

Rea quickly offered thanks and amended that half assed prayer to a full assed one. Returning to her book Rea continued to read about the runemasters. By the time she'd skimmed through most of it Rea let out a very long, very pained sigh. These dwarves must have done something insane, they must have gathered a ton of runes and poured power into them. Rea tried to make sense of everything she knew but quickly gave up, guessing what they had done would get her nowhere so she returned to the diary... and all was revealed. Some genius... Kilthala's uncle Thal, decided that they should inscribe massive multiple word rune to cause a freeze so powerful that it would seal the surviving dwarves within. The battle had been lost but if the dwarves were frozen, than perhaps someday they would be freed. It was the desperate gambit of a dying race. It hit her then that this god would likely take offense if she didn't at least try to investigate the claims in this diary... When Rea said out loud that there's no way the dwarves are alive and she's just gonna get outta here, well, she lost her divine protection. After a slight apology and promising to look for what she was now sure existed, Rea got the divine protection back.

Finishing her study of the runemaster book Rea came to the conclusion that dispelling the spell would be as simple as walking up and engraving the rune they had used, in reverse. Calling out the power of a rune was done through infusing it with what the dwarves referred to as runic power, disabling perpetual effects were done by cutting off or draining the power. Rea figured if she reversed the rune and infused it with her mana it ought to work... or turn her inside out. All Rea had to do now was figure out exactly what they had used to call upon such an insane power. Once again she was a bit daunted, with her sense of direction she'd be down here for years looking around... Realizing that she should really be worried about the creepy crawlies that wanna eat her tasty fleshy bits, Rea knew she should be returning to her blacksmithing studies, but it had been getting late and she was really tired now. So instead of studying more she decided to give the god a nice show and go to sleep, after all it was the first time in days she didn't feel completely alone down here.

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