Matizu Writes

B2 Chapter 2 - Collapse

Vivi sat up. The pain and exhaustion seemed to disappear. It was all replaced by a sweeping wave of shock and confusion.

“W—” Vivi stuttered, mouth hanging open. Her voice was frail, coming out as a whisper. “What do you mean? Who’s dead?”

“Do you remember when I said your grandpa was imprisoned in Frievania?” Andre said. “A storm hit the city two days ago. Citizens were evacuated to the second level. The prisoners, however…”

“No…” Vivi said. “I...

B2 Chapter 1 - Pain

It felt as if a thousand steel plates were stacked on top of her, crushing her against a hard surface. Her limbs were strapped and nailed to the ground. Her head pounded, panicked from the absurd amount of pain in every part of her body. Her insides felt like a rampant factory about to self-destruct—throat squeezed shut and dry as a desert, stomach about to explode from the inside, lungs throbbing for seemingly no reason at all.

“Oh, you’re awake!” an enthusias...

Chapter 105: Book 1 Epilogue

Vivi was out for what felt like an eternity. She didn’t believe she’d ever wake up. The exhaustion, the fighting… She’d abused ether far beyond what human bodies could withstand. She’d already been groggy from her runesmithing spree, when she abused ether for a few hours to finish a sword. Back then, she spent a few hundred wisps, and she didn’t take any blows or damages.

This time, Vivi had spent thousands of wisps of ether, forcing herself awake well beyond exhaus...

Chapter 104: Void Ether

Upon activation, the purple skill wisp disappeared from Vivi’s core. It didn’t dim out like Shadow Swipe or other regular skills. Death Sense disappeared completely, breaking apart. Her second skill slot was freed, as if nothing had ever been there.

Vivi was prepared for explosions. Nothing seemed to happen. Vivi’s sword didn’t gain a coating, and nothing crumbled to bits around her. She didn’t ascend, and she didn’t gain flying daggers around her. Nothing ...

Chapter 103: The Gutters

“I see that you two have been hard at work ruining my facility,” Uundref said. “You especially, young woman.”

Alarm bells rang in Vivi’s head. Why did Uundref have her sword? Was Ven dead?

“You’ve made a fool of me,” Uundref said. “And now you’ve cleared my dungeon. Runesmith. This sword… You made it.”

Uundref wasn’t grinning like he usually was. His usual nonchalance was creepy. When he was actually mad, Vivi felt a threat to her life, and Uundref�...

Chapter 102: Surprise

“Eem!” Vivi shouted.

Bwern’s expression only got more disgusting. “You want this fiend? I hear you two are quite attached.”

Vivi’s throat was dry. She studied her opponents. Their swords were hidden beneath their clothes. Vivi wouldn’t have been surprised if they were equipped with runeswords. The hub was in chaos, after all. Each one of her enemies was clearly maxed out. They were surrounded by nimrods, but Bwern didn’t seem to care.

Vivi was strong enough t...

Chapter 101: Chaos

Vivi exited the dungeon, walking only with the power of ether.

The main dungeon had transformed. The hellish castle had turned into an ordinary ancient castle. The lava had turned to water, and the ethereal magma turned to daylight gems, lighting the paths dimly. All monsters, including the Skeleton King, had disappeared, leaving nothing behind. The oppressive ether in the air had calmed down. Vivi barely felt any ether at all.

The dungeon really was cleared. Nothing would be resp...

Chapter 100: Death Sense

Vivi waited for death to come.

The death tyrant’s minions inched toward her. The scarlet claws had killed everything in her immediate surroundings, but the remaining skeletons advanced. Flying skulls filled the air, most floating aimlessly above, but several plunged her way.

Soon, she would be mauled alive. She had no idea where Aang was—he wouldn’t save her this time. Vivi had nothing more to use. Without ether, she was useless.

This was the life of an ether hunter. F...

Chapter 99: Scarlet Claws

Vivi’s jump landed on the death tyrant’s rib. Each rib was as broad as a human torso.

The hammer collided with bone before getting stuck awkwardly between ribs. It left a slight crack in the bones. Her hammer did damage… but it was inconsequential. She didn’t even cut open one section of the ribs. Vivi held onto the handle of her hammer, legs dangling over the fall below. She was afraid of glancing down, praying that her hammer held on.

Flying skulls approached fr...

Chapter 98: Death Tyrant

The death tyrant examined its playing field. The upper half of the giant skeleton’s body poked out from the hole in the ground. Just its upper body was over forty feet tall, towering over Vivi. The weight of its limbs would be enough to crush a building.

And that was without considering the tens of thousands of ether empowering its bones.

Lucius returned to Vivi’s core and flooded ether back to her muscles. Her sixth sense returned, and she suddenly had the urge to puke. Suffo...

Chapter 97: The Seal

Everything around Vivi seemed to move faster now. The fight in the middle of the room looked like a blurry mess of flashes of light. She couldn’t make out Aang from within the fray. Without ether empowering her, Vivi turned back to a lost child. She was a useless pawn that required protection.

Luckily, she received just that.

Aang grabbed her from the waist, dragging her away from the balls of ether. Vivi was in shock for a second, close to fainting from the lack of ether.

Chapter 96: Skeleton King

“Lucius!” Vivi shouted. The spirit’s red translucent figure was carried from the tail deeper into the castle. He flailed with his claws, but the captor didn’t seem to take damage. It was a jester of sorts, its colorful hat jingling as it ran upstairs. 

Endless thoughts raced in Vivi’s head all at once. The portcullis wasn’t opening, and it was too tough to break through. The jester was too nimble to hit with a throwing weapon.

Her spirit was captured! What was she...

Chapter 95: Puzzle

Fifteen skeletons powered by thirteen thousand ether each.

One ally—a demon who Vivi barely trusted—and a closed door behind them.

“Aang, take this!” Vivi said through gritted teeth. She summoned her new two-runed greatsword and handed it to Aang. They wouldn’t live if Aang fought with his sloppy outside-carved sword. Now wasn’t the time to worry about betrayals or useless nonsense. They had to win.

Vivi summoned Abyss Destroyer and activated he...

Chapter 94: Hell Castle

The stairway to the third level was made up of the glowing bricks. This time, they were colored a bright red. Stepping onto them, the bricks hissed like a hot stove under Vivi’s boots. With each step, the lines on the ground blinked, the ether within reacting. The whole dungeon felt alive, as if feeling every step the invaders made. Vivi had to protect the soles of her boots with ether.

“There’s still a lot to clear on the second level,” Aang said. “There’s probably another ...

Chapter 93: Allies

The waterfall tossed Vivi from collision to collision just as violently as it had before. She held her breath and kept her eyes closed. Instead of fighting the current, Vivi hugged Eem and protected herself with ether. Lucius, being a spirit, had a better view of their surroundings. He focused ether to the spots Vivi was about to get hit in.

The strategy worked well. Vivi felt each impact, but she didn’t sustain wounds. A coating of ether worked like armor and a cushion combined. Even...

Chapter 92: Calamity Level Monster

Ven’s warning turned out to be true. The hidden dungeon was filled with guards.

Monsters were killed all across the cavern. Host-bones were left laying around. Vivi walked slowly, listening to her surroundings, feeling ether around her. Footsteps sounded from a cavern below. Vivi turned around, deciding she needed to take a different path.

Just as she turned, footsteps approached from the upper tunnel as well. Vivi heard loud talking. She quickly hid behind a column.

“Th...

Chapter 91: Investigation

“She’s the one who killed the guards, isn’t she?” Ven said the moment Vivi exited the tavern.

“It’s possible,” Aang said.

“The news of a guard going missing came out a day ago,” Ven said. “Vivi was in the smithy. Unless she can teleport, there is no way she heard the news. But she didn’t seem surprised.”

“She’s a human,” Lomir, the bartender, said. “Her mannerisms are strange all around. Her human origin might make her react oddly.”

�...

Chapter 90: Hammer

Author note:

Publishing 15 chapters today to get Patreon 50 chapters ahead of RR >:)

Vivi woke up with her forehead resting on her anvil.

She’d never been as groggy as she was now. Lifting her head, a wave of nausea nearly made her puke. She didn’t see straight. Her mind felt dried of all water, as if it’d been poked empty with a sharp stick.

“Eem?” Vivi asked. The fiend’s blurry figure stood in the corner of the room, snarling at something.

Chapter 89: Crave To Work

Vivi crafted a new two-runed greatsword for herself as a warm-up.

The sword was nothing special. She used a cheap iron root and a green mithril root, shaping simple but effective veins. For the runes, she chose a swiftness and a strength rune. For the metal, she used red hardsteel again. It was quick to forge. Nothing was impressive about the metal, but there wasn’t anything wrong with it either.

This was the type of sword Vivi could easily mass-produce if need...

Chapter 88: Favor

With collection day out of the way, Vivi headed into the public dungeon. The entrance was crowded with shouts and conflict. Nimrods were fighting for whoever would gain access to hunting grounds for the next week. Gangs protected their entrances from attacks. A few smaller men were already knocked out on the ground, unconscious.

Vivi weaved past traffic, into the Union’s tunnel. Gangs squabbled around her, but nobody was fighting for access into the Union’s territory. The Union was ...

Chapter 87: Suspicion

Vivi stood frozen for half a second before dashing after the demon. Hoss absolutely couldn’t escape. He’d seen Vivi. He knew she’d killed a guard. If even a slight investigation was launched, they’d know she was hunting in the main dungeon as well. She still needed to earn over seventy thousand ether. It was too early for her to get caught.

She burned Lucius’s reserves at a rapid pace, ascension skill active, running as fast as her legs took her.

Hoss disappeare...

Chapter 86: Patrol

Vivi stood before the descending stairway leading to the second level. A creepy feeling of ether oozed from the darkness beneath like a bad smell. Vivi couldn’t sense much down below, but what she did sense felt off.

“What do you think, Lucius?” Vivi asked.

“I can feel monsters,” Lucius said. “There’s a lot of ether.”

“And nothing else?”

“Well, I think we should see what’s below and try to kill whatever we can,” Lucius said. ...

Chapter 85: Giant

When Vivi could see again, the giant skeleton’s katar was aimed at her face. Vivi sprung to her feet and rolled to the side. The katar pierced the wall where she’d just sat.

The skeleton was slow to recover. The katar swung fast, easily at the same speed as Vivi’s strikes. But the skeleton still had a boulder stuck on its right hand. Its stance was off due to its unbalanced weight. The boulder in its right hand clumsily dragged along with its swings like a shackle keeping it away ...

Chapter 84: Progress

Vivi woke up instantly after the discharge killed her. She flinched and sat up.

The scent of rain was gone. Vivi was back in the dungeon. She breathed in musty cavern air and let out a long sigh.

“Well,” Vivi said. “The hunters are as nice as always.”

“Yeah…” Lucius said. “Paradise is usually a good place to practice alone, but that can sometimes happen. Another hunting party spawned on us. It’s rare, but it happened a few times with my old wielder...

Chapter 83: Runes

“What do you mean, you don’t know?” Vivi asked.

“My previous wielder was a bit of a genius at this,” Lucius said. “I don’t really know how this channeling thing works. I’m a spirit—I just need to shape ether. My wielder just always figured things out.”

“So you’re supposed to be my mentor, but you don’t even know what we’re supposed to be learning?”

“Of course I know what we’re learning,” Lucius said. “I wasn’t just sleeping wh...

Chapter 82: Treasure Hunter

Vivi spent the next six hours clearing the first level of the dungeon.

Progress slowed down after she switched to her two-runed katana. The sword was strong, but it wasn’t a total cheat of utter destruction like Abyss Destroyer. The katana couldn’t snap the skeletons’ swords, and it couldn’t kill the heavier skeletons in one hit.

But the katana didn’t poison Vivi with extended use, and it was still a two-runed sword. The blade was more than sharp enough to kill the skele...

Chapter 81: Hunt

“Ven’s map says that guard patrols check the main dungeon,” Vivi said. She stood in the middle of the stairway, where she didn’t yet activate the monsters below. “The guards check at least the entrance.”

“That would make sense,” Lucius said.

“I’m guessing that the guards peek into the first room to check that everything is in order,” Vivi said. “But I doubt they’ll look deeper than that. If the first room looks normal, they’ll assume that the rest of th...

Chapter 80: Map

Vivi added finishing touches to her swords in preparation for the next hunt.

She worked in the silent corner of Aang’s tavern while Ven and Rensfig drank ale by the counter. The demons talked quietly enough that Vivi couldn’t hear the specifics of the conversation, but she was fairly certain they were talking about her. The demons remained confused about what to do with her. Rensfig kept sneaking glances at her sword, as if Vivi had created some legendary artifact.

Grandpa had...

Chapter 79: Problems

“What do you mean?” Vivi asked. “The black masks shouldn’t be that strong. We can raid them.”

Aang’s expression barely changed. “Raiding them is too risky. My goal right now is to make sure my men survive. All of us want our ether back, but it’s not as simple as walking in and fighting for it. The Reapers are much stronger than the Hollows. Inside-carved runeswords will give you an advantage, but is the difference enough to defeat tens of maxed-out fighters? The Hollows ...

Chapter 78: Runesmith Of The Underworld

Ven’s brows furrowed. He watched Vivi’s expression before asking, “Why the question?”

“I fell into the main dungeon through the waterfalls,” Vivi said. “I barely managed to climb up the first level. How difficult is the second level?”

“Nobody hunts in the main dungeon,” Ven said. “If the boss is defeated, Zand is done. I don’t know what the lower levels contain. I’ve never gone past the first level. The boss is strong enough that the Stewards all combined...