The Arcane Archer - Chapter 24 Dwarves

Compared to the estimated time of 1 week to get to the dwarven group from the System, it only took 2 days in total, almost 3 as it was starting to become dark once I finally got to the estimated area,

There was still 2 more days till my evolution finished so I still at the moment had to constantly shove my face full of food just to keep up with the amount of calories/nutrients. Most of it was fruits and stuff as I haven’t finished cooking all of the meat I have in my inventory, but I was slowly cooking all of it as time passed.

Seeing as it was getting dark as well, I looked for an area to set up for the night and once I did, I started cooking.

At the moment, I was in an open area with a lot of mountains and hills. One could easily see why the dwarves decided to live here as they were pretty much free space to dig and build whatever they wanted.
for visiting.

Currently I couldn’t see anything dwarven but if I went around looking for a cave or something, I’d probably be able to find them.

So after finishing up the rest of the uncooked meat and shoving it back into my inventory before giving it a chance to cool, I watched the sun slowly set on the horizon and enjoyed the nice views of this world before finally cozying myself up in my sleeping bag from the system.

~~~~~8 Hours Later~~~~~

[DING DING DING. You’ve slept a total of 8 hours, it’s time to wake up.]

[Thanks to {Apex Body}, you’ve gained 8 points in {Strength}. Total is now at {50 Strength}]

Slowly I opened my eyes and slowly used the ground to push myself up into a sitting position. Doing the quick morning stretch to wake up the body a bit more, I tried looking for the rising sun to enjoy a good morning view.

Instead, all I saw was a stone wall.

Turning to my right and left, all I saw once again were more stone walls. Finally, turning all the way around, I saw a metal door that seemed to be a bit smaller than it should be normally.

“Uh, hello?” I called out.

I waited for a bit but got no reply.

I looked around to see if any of my gear that I left on the floor where I slept was left but sadly it seemed as if I only had my sleeping bag and the stuff in my inventory but it was only a few arrows, throwing knives, books, and my old bow.

Getting out of my sleeping bag, coldness instantly hit me as there was nothing heating up the room. I shivered slightly but was good for now thanks to my high constitution.

Going to the door, I crouched down slightly to see if there was anything, I could see through the bars on the front of it. Through them, I saw a bunch of other metal doors going down a long hallway.

“Hello!?” I called out once again.

This continued on for a couple of minutes before some rough voice yelled back, “Shut up will ya!?”

“Yeah I will but can you first help me out for a couple of seconds? I just woke up and don’t know where I am. The last thing I remember is that I went to sleep near the mountains and that’s it!”

I now started hearing some heavy footsteps making their way to me. A couple of seconds later I saw a short red hair dwarf with both his beard and regular hair almost touching the ground.

“You know why you’re in here human. Don’t try to play me like a fool! You were trespassing on our here land and now your behind bars.” He said before smacking the metals bars on the door once to emphasize what he was saying.

Mentally upon hearing this, I complained how it was almost exactly like the scenarios with the elves but unlike them, I wasn’t offered to be trained and given the opportunity to help them.

“Would it be possible to talk to someone about my case?” I asked hopefully. “There’s some things I would like to talk about and hopefully work out with you folk.”

The dwarf eyed me down for a couple of seconds before breaking down in a fit of laughter.

“That was one of the best jokes I’ve heard in a while! You, a human, want to work with us Dwarfs? You despise us and we despise you!”

“Look I know this may sound weird but I’m different from other humans ok? Is there away way to convince you about that?”

The dwarf continued laughing for a bit before leaving and returning a moment later with a chair made out of stone.

“How about this. Tell me your tale so that you and help me pass the time till my shift is done. And let’s say supposedly your tale sways my heart, then maybe I’ll talk to one of my higher ups about you.” He said jokingly.

With a sigh, I started recapping the last few days without telling him about my powers and what not. About how I helped a place being attacked by bandits, to meeting the 3 adventurers, eventually almost being killed by the one cleric, and finally how I decided the best thing to do was seek out the other races for help and how I was told that the dwarves were somewhere around here.

He stayed silent the entire time before asking one simple question, “What did you say the human’s god’s name was?”

I raised a questioning eyebrow. “His name was Aetius, why?”

He groaned slightly. “He’s the supposed “God” of humans, or so he liked to say. All he really is, is an Aasimar who has permanent wings and lots of divine power thanks to his parents. So basically, a demi-god who thinks himself to be a full god.”

He continued to talk but I had questions, so I raised my hand for him to notice. Eventually he did and all he had was a look of confusion on his face.

“What’re you raising your hand for?” He asked simply

“I have a question and it’s rude where I’m from not raise your hand. Anyways, what exactly is an Aasimar as you called him? And can you tell me more about him if possible?”

“Ah, you don’t know what an Aasimar is? Well an Aasimar is a human being with what we call a “Divine Soul”. This usually indicates that their parentage is of divine origin and because of this, they usually have some special powers or physical features. In Aetius’s case, he has a bit of both with permanent wings and a whole bunch of divine power.”

I nodded in understanding.

“Thanks to his divine energy, he’s been able to lives thousands upon thousands of years compared to the regular lifespan of humans. With his long lifespan, he’s been convincing other humans that the other races are not what he wanted and told them to get rid of us.

Humans then waged war after war believing that they were better in every aspect then us and continued to fuel their ambition which then allowed Aetius getting more and more power. With each war, the humans stole more of our techniques and learned how to do what we were able to.

Eventually, with the help of all the other races, we were able to put a stop to the constant wars. After the wars, all the races went to their own sides and decided to stay in isolation. Which now brings us to here.

If what you’re saying is true and Aetius is trying to kill you because of you helping the elves, we might have another war on our hands.”

He got out of his chair and sighed. “I’ll go tell my higher ups about this. This information will be very valuable to us.” And then left.

I was now left alone with just my thoughts and the system. My main thought was that I at least found some dwarves like I wanted to. However, know I also knew more about this Aetius guy, which made me worry slightly.

If this demi-god being was out to kill me just for helping some elves, what could this mean for the world? Someone being nice to someone else could get them killed sounds like a horrible world to live in.

I continued thinking about stuff like this for the next couple of minutes until I eventually heard a lot of walking coming from behind the door. Getting close to it, I knelt down once again to see what was happening and saw 4 armored dwarfs following a single female dwarf.

The female dwarf was wearing a golden crown on her head and a bunch of insignias on her clothing. The insignia looked like a hammer striking metal in a forge, which made sense since they were dwarfs.

After they were a couple of feet away from me, they all stopped except for two guards who continued making their way to me. Once one got close enough, he opened the door and allowed the other guard to come in and put some sort of hand cuffs around my wrists.

With them now on, he pushed me through the open door and hitting the back of my knees to force me to kneel down.

“Human” Said the female dwarf who I assumed to be the queen. “I have heard from the jailer here that you know something about Aetius. Is what he says true?”

“It is true your. Highness? I’m assuming you’re the queen or something.”

One of the guards that stopped with the rest moved forwards upon hearing me say and yelled, “WATCH YOUR TONE WITH THE QUEEN!”

I turned to him and look him directly in the face. “Dude, calm down. I’m just asking if she’s the queen. Jesus.”

The guard’s face scrunched up in rage and as he was about to do something, the queen stuck out her hand towards the guard and gave him a death stare. The guard seeing this, backed up before bowing and saying, “I-I’m sorry my Queen. It won’t happen again”

The queen turned back to me and gave me a quick look up and down.

“What is your name human?”

“I’m Leo, Leo Walter.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You’re royalty? What is royalty doing here on dwarven land? You royalty usually stay in the city and do what they want there.”

“Oh, I’m not royalty. From where I’m from, it’s actually pretty common for people to have a last name. Even beggars have last names.”

“And where are you from?”

“Uhh” I thought for a second for what I should say. “America?”

She didn’t say anything so that she could ponder where that was.

“I don’t think I know where that place is. However, we don’t have anymore time to waste, we need to talk about everything you know about Aetius and what has happened recently. We’ll decide your face from there.” She said before turning around and walking away.

All the guards followed her and one of the ones that opened the door and cuffed me pushed me from behind to indicate that I was supposed to follow.

I gave them the stink eye as they didn’t even help me up first, but I complied. Hoping that by doing so, I’d receive either some better treatment or something like that.

Following along for the next few minutes, we eventually got to a large open room with a large table in the center and a lot of dwarfs sitting along the side of it. The guards pushed me to the opposite end of where the Queen was and made me face all of the dwarfs.

If an outsider were to see this, it would be hilarious for them. A somewhat tall human that is almost 3 or so feet taller than everyone around him is being pushed around in a room that is very small for him.

“So.” Said the queen. “Please tell us everything you know, and we’ll decide your fate after what we learn.”

“Well,” I started. “It all started with this really angry person”