A lot of things happened at, effectively, the same time. First, there was a loud pinging noise from the Smith's shield. At the same time as the ping, James realized that he had seen what looked like a large spear of water shoot out from the lake's surface. Immediately following the ping, there was a loud boom as the spear of water shot back into the lake, the impact causing a huge geyser of water to shoot up. He stumbled back, tripping on the loose pebbles of the beach and falling on his behind, still holding the shield, and then he felt a wave of exhaustion sweep over him.

His mana was depleted.

Fighting past the fatigue, he stood up and checked his surroundings. Large waves rocked the lake's surface, with gibbets of something floating in the water, a red stain now mixing with the blue swirls of undine mana.

It was perhaps fortunate that James was so mentally drained, because it meant he didn't have the wherewithal to panic and fall into terror entirely. With practiced movements, still holding up his shield, he backed away from the lake as quickly as he could while maintaining his footing, until he reached the foot of the stairs. Once the lake was out of sight, he turned and began the long climb back to the first floor, but part way through he stopped. The fatigue was just too much. He desperately wanted to take his helmet off but he wasn't willing to do that until he was all the way back in his camp.

Breathing heavily, his thoughts spun. What in the world was that? Some kind of ranged attack from the lake, clearly, but other than the loud noises, he had emerged unharmed.

He turned his shield around to check the face. He thought he remembered the water spear hitting his shield, but he hadn't felt any physical impact.

The shield looked the same as always, reflective with a green tint in the dim light of the staircase. He [Appraised] it to be sure.

[Appraisal]: Green Iron Tower Shield, Quality: Very Low, Durability: 13/14, Enchantment: Reflect (Overloaded)]

Wait, 'Overloaded'? Hadn't it been '10' before?

James realized that, from the appraisal result and symptoms of mana depletion, the enchantment had probably activated, and reflected the magical attack back to the monster it came from.

The [Reflect] enchantment had probably saved his life, judging by the state of the monster after taking its own attack back.

James replayed the moment over and over in his mind, hands trembling as he stared at his armor-clad reflection in the shield's surface.

He forced himself to take long, deep breaths, if for nothing else than to catch his breath. His armor was lighter, being made of Green Iron, but it still wasn't light. And he had a lot of stairs to climb.

Thinking of the climb ahead got his mind off the attack from the lake, and got him thinking about what was going to happen next. He was going to climb the stairs, and go back to camp. Wait, he hadn't done anything with the monster from before, the armored mole thing. Although it didn't really look anything like the moles… At any rate, he should get the magic crystal…

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James stopped his focused breathing. He had calmed down enough by this point, and resumed climbing the stairs. He stopped periodically to catch his breath, not wanting to be caught flat-footed if monsters showed up, but he reached the upper floor without further incident.

The chamber was the same as before. Dimly lit by mushrooms glowing and blazing, with the carcass of the monster lying at the far end where he had left it. It was difficult to make out, but it seemed the door was also still open.

James carefully made his way across the chamber, trying to stay in the path the monster had rolled down in case there were traps anywhere else.

Reaching the monster's carcass, he pulled out his warding stakes from his bag, intending to set up a ward while he worked.

But he only had two stakes with him.

Frustrated, James spat and cursed. What had he been thinking, coming all this way without warding stakes? What good were the stakes back in the cavern, not even protecting his camp, if he was over here?

Driven to impatience by his frustration, James simply got to work and periodically check his surroundings. He was already tired, and didn't want to make several trips to collect the warding stakes and start work after all that.

In the end, he managed to break down the monster carcass without disturbance. Rather than a magic crystal, the monster had had a brownish-yellow jewel embedded in its heart. And what he had thought was a hide was in fact scales covering the monster.

[Material Identification: Earth Jewel]

[Material Identification: Pangolin Scales (Earth)]

The jewel was brimming with Earth Essence, seemingly trapped within, and the Pangolin Scales also contained a large amount of Earth Essence, but spread evenly throughout the material. That [Material Identification] recognized the items suggested that he could make something with them, but James wasn't sure what. Maybe attach the scales to his armor somehow?

The monster's blood also contained large amounts of Earth Essence, and James let it drain onto the flat cavern floor. Now de-scaled and drained of blood, the monster was barely light enough to drag around, but James had no interest in trying to drag it up the stairs.

He would just come back for the meat later.

He put his collected materials in the magic bag and made his way back to camp. The bat carcasses remained in their pile, and there were no mole monsters wandering around.

James realized with a start that he had probably spent less than a couple of hours since he discovered and opened the door. It felt like it had been days, considering how drained he was.

He made it back to his wards by the cavern entrance, deactivated them, collected the stakes, and continued on through the small room to the first cavern, finally reaching his camp. It was the same as always, with the ever present soft breeze dispersing the smoke from the smoldering embers in his forge.

Finally safe back in his wards, before anything else, he attempted to top up the magic power in the wards.

And he promptly passed out, collapsing onto his side, still fully armored. Fully drained of mana.

Some time later he awoke, ravenous. He couldn't remember ever being so hungry. He sat up, removed his helmet, and immediately pulled some of the good smoked monster meat from his bag and tore into it. After several bites he mustered the strength to stand and continued to chew on monster meat while preparing some porridge.

As he ate, he thought. He needed more warding stakes. He needed to try to repair his shield's enchantment. He needed a way to survive that water attack without overloading his shield's enchantment, or possibly extra shields he could swap out. And he needed to move his camp.

First, he wanted to fix his shield and enchant his armor. The [Water Resistance] enchantment was suddenly much more interesting than he had thought before.

And for that, he needed Water Magic Crystals.

And he knew where he could get them.

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