Floor two is a lot more exciting.
Small groups here range in numbers from 6-9 and can include a wingless imp that can use fire magic, my main reason for switching to water magic.
As for large groups, it can range from as little as eighteen with two magic users to 50 with around 7 magic users.
Thankfully it's easy to spot the magic user because its horns are larger being around 10 cm high while normal ones barely have 1cm. On this floor it's a lot easier to get your hands of larger sized horns which means better income but it also mean you at least need a tank at your back.
Numbers here are a big factor. For me I have no problem with that. But I think I might eventually need a real party. For now five vanguard robot drone and two shields was enough.
Anyway like the first floor the room with the stairs was done like with man doors so we just choose one and go in. The caves, which had much more twists and turns on this floor when compared to the first, was still lit by the luminous stones making the cave blue in color.
The first group we spotted was about 30 meters into the cavern we choose. To our luck the group was full with 9 imps and a leader which was taller by about 20 cm with horns. We could spot them from the turn we were at and could hear their strange talk.
"Hold on, it will be bad if we don't take out the mage first. The area level high up the ranks. The ones on this floor take up different basic classes. This one seems to be a mage so let me do this." I tell Tony who backs all the drones away to give me space.
I did notice that outside of the dungeon he is a lot more compliant so at least my dungeon diving will be easier.
I load a full 30 points into. The gun and crouch before breathing out deeply.
[Hyper sense]
I activate a marksman class skill that increases my perception by three times for 30 seconds. I turn the corner and lock my eyes on the target and support my body on my left leg and quickly lift the gun to eye level.
This all happened slower in my eyes because of the skill.
As my gun hits eye level I quickly follow the movement of the imps head which was clearly above the others and after a long breath I shoot.
[Pressure shot]
Being set to a single thirty point shot a thin powerful high speed water jet shot came from the barrel. Unlike the flashy fire bolt, the water bullet was silent and didn't cause light.
In less than a second the bullet pierced the imps head. The entrance was clean but the exit wasn't so nice. As the water pierces the skin it spreads out in all directions causing massive internal damage and blowing many small holes on the opposite side of the head.
Without even noticing us the imps just watch as their leaders head is turned to mush. The next moment the drones come out and advance on them shooting at the legs or head. I recharge the gun and set it for three shots of 10 points and aim at the closest imps.
I wait for a support shot to fire before I shoot all three shots simultaneously at three separate imps.
The bullet is less intense but still enough to break the skull and with pinpoint accuracy and the imps being mid dodge they had little hope to win in such a small group.
Each shot hit but didn’t kill. Still it dazed them and they fell seeing stars before they were turned to swiss by the drones.
The remaining group was quickly subdued in such a manner and they were gathered.
The drops for this made me happy. It was only two and from the leader. Both his horns. It’s is awesome for first drop against a mage.
“OI BITCH!! What was that thing you did?! That Hyper whatever thing?!” Tony asked.
“That was a skill. it uses up Mana to cause an effect on my body or be an attack. In this case, it made me see things three times slower and I could aim and see things better.” I tell him as I pocketed the drops.
“So real fantasy like huh...Such a boring skill. Why only three times. Can’t you do like 10 or 20 times?” He asked strangely annoyed.
“I’m not some master mage. Also at that point for a single second would start to overload my brain if I wasn’t trained enough. Even two seconds under 20 times slower would cause physical damage to me as I am.” I tell him.
“OH SO THERE IS REAL BACKLASHES!! At least I'm not living in some fucking VR game.” He shouted first before saying bored.
Sometimes I don’t know if he is angry, excited or bored and here I thought a woman’s monthly outbursts were bad.
I sigh as I gather the imp bodies.
We start moving staying quiet as we go. We spot a small 6 goblin group and take them out quick since there was no leader. Small groups were not enough for our group.
Soon we see a brighter area up ahead which meant it was a room and we heard fighting in there. I charge up and get ready and we moved on.
At the entrance we look in and find a swarm of over 40 goblins with five leaders. Two were warriors, one mage, an archer type which is uncommon and the last a blue colored imp. The blue one was worrisome because it was a variant that was born by the effect of the blue moon.
The moons possess a lot of mana related to its elements and it causes effects on the planet and occasionally someone or something is born with effects like this. Sometimes from one moon or, like me, all three.
“Oi? What is with the blue Imp.” Tony ask quietly.
Seems he knows when he needs to keep his trap shut.
“It’s a variant. A few rare monsters and people are born with more affinity towards magic caused by the effect of one of the moon. That one got its affinity from the blue moon. This dungeon has a natural affinity to the red one but blue imps are seen higher up because water magic has great effects in here.” I explain.
“So the moon's change affinities? That explains yours and a lot of other people's strange hair color I saw.” He says.
“I’ll explain later for now be quiet.” I tell him.
I look back in at the center of the circle in the room to see why they were gathered and what I saw were two people in the room.
One was a young Goblin-kin girl who should be too young to enter the dungeon and should even be in training. The other was a Hobgoblin-kin girl that looks around 16. In her right hand was a basic recruit level enchanted magic swordsman long sword.
The older girl was breathing heavily while staying with her back near the wall just in front of the young Goblin-kin. As I look I activate my skill again and my eyes become sharper again. My view goes to their neck.
The swordswoman had her crystal but when I looked at the fear stricken Goblin-kin I didn’t spot a crystal.
I pale seeing that. “We need to save them! The goblin-kin girl doesn’t have a crystal necklace! If she dies she will die for good.” I said frantically.
I quickly switch to the fire crystal and load with a full charge changing the color to yellow. I then load the wand with 30 points as well and prepare my mystic magic. I aim the gun and fire.
[Chain Snake]
The lightning bolt shot out and hit one imp and hoped through seven others.
I quickly point the wand out and feel out loose pebbles in the cave and pull them towards me. I pull them quick hurting several Imps and once they were near I aimed it back and flicked my wrist making all the rocks launch forward again.
In this first assault 15 Imp’s fell.
“GYAHAHAHA!! What else do you expect from the DPS!! GET SHOOTING YOU MOBS!!” Tony shouts as his drones fly out.
Two of them move forward and activate the shields as always planned.
This gives me time to get the shots ready. I quickly switch the gem and load it up but it isn’t quick enough before the Imps reach the shields and start punching.
The shields are made in hexagon grids and would only break each block.
I quickly aim at the imps and fire. From my side things still pass so the bullets exit without resistance hitting each on that was aimed at in the head or eye.
Each shot was 5 mana so it didn’t kill but the pain was more than enough.
A quick loading and I shot in the second row making them dodge and the bullets hit those further back making an opening for the drones to kill those that were hit.
One drone came from the right and shot down the imps.
Suddenly I heard an explosion and when I looked I saw the blue imp leader on the burning carcass of one of my drones.
“It's bad to leave him alive for any longer.” I say to myself and point my wand.”
[Telekinesis]
Using 20 points charged in the wand I use a spell used to grab an being or object.
The spell takes hold of him and I hold him in the air. On queue I hear that infernal laughing as the drones turn to the blue Imp and open heavy fire.
“GYAHAHAHAHAHA!! BURN BITCHES!!” Tony shouted as he filled the Imp with holes.
I turned to the mage and saw him preparing magic. I turn the gun towards him and activate [Hyper Sense] and snipe him down by shooting into the left side of his head as he was distracted looking up at Tony’s main drone.
He fell lifeless just before his magic could activate. Suddenly I heard a whistling sound and when I looked I saw a drone being hit by arrows.
I look at the archer and finding its location in the middle of a group of imps with one of the warrior leaders protecting it with a makeshift shield.
I find a pebble within my magic range and target with my wand.
After the quick chant I take control of it and with a flick of my wrist towards the direction of the archer the pebble finds itself embedded inside the head of the imp and it falls over dead distracting the warrior that gets shot from behind.
The last warrior was fighting the swordswoman who sees the action and gets motivated and began fighting back hard and soon kills the leader while huffing and puffing.
I change to the fire gem again and charge and shoot two more rounds of the [Chain Snake] further reducing the number of Imps and the rest is cleaned up by the drones.
I was leaning against the wall by now after expending so much mana. I pull out a small straight glass of blue liquid and gulp down the entire vial.
What I drank was a mana potion. It helps increase my recovery rate of my magic power and helps alleviate the effects of using too much mana. Effects of using so to much mana is dizziness, a small bit of nausea, exhaustion and in really bad cases fainting.
After a few deep breaths I get up and walk around and over the bodies towards the two girls. “What’s going on? Why is someone underaged in the dungeon? And more importantly why is she without a crystal necklace?!” I ask with hints of irritation.
“She lost it in the attack. How else would she lose it. Anyway I am a her sister and volunteered for her school to chaperone her to get hands on combat training.” The Hobgoblin girl said.
I looked around and saw the bodies.
“We can talk more once we leave.” I tell her which is returned as a nod. “So how will we divide the loot and body count?” I ask.
“We were in a pinch and you saved us so keep the loot and bodies if you want.” The hob said.
I nod and with acknowledgment I look at Tony. He already understood and began to control the remaining drones and began to push the bodies into a pile.
Those nearby I began storing. The two girls help to get this done quickly. As a pile I could store in larger numbers so that was good.
In a quick 5 minutes we made a pile with about half the bodies since I went storing the strays and then I quickly stored them in the storage ring and let out a sigh of relief.
“Let's go you two, on the way tell me what happened.” I tell them and they nod.
On the way back we met small groups only on the second floor and a few large and small groups on the first floor.
The story of the two is like they said. The Academy asked for her to train her sister that was falling behind. The girl seems to be a have started as swordsmen training but she can’t build the proper mentality.
When we heard this the one I least expected to say anything spoke.
“Well DUH!!! Of course the brat doesn’t have the mentality of a swordsman. First of she is as much of a coward as me. If I had to guess, why not trying to put a wrench in her hands and let her get her hands on heavy fire arms. A single look at her makes me feel like I am looking at a psycho pyrotechnician.” Tony said in a bored voice.
The two looked at me and I simply shrug and said it was the AI. They let it slide but it didn’t go unnoticed. The girl flinched when she heard what Tony said.
“So, do you want to by a mechanic?” the hob asked.
The goblin just looked away blushing brightly turning the green skin into a greenish red.
“I guess I will tell the academy to switch you then. Anyway thank you, I forgot to ask your name.” The hob goblin girl asked. “My name Mirella Cannes and as you can see, I'm from the Hobgoblin-kin race.” The older one says.
“I’m Leah Binoli and I'm a human. That annoyance is named Stuss but likes to be called Tony.” I said.
She looked at the floating annoyance with a curious look.
“What bitch!” He said as he “glared” back.
“He sure has an interesting personality.” she said. I could see she wanted to cut him to pieces.
“So are you part of a crew?” Mirella asked.
“No, but I own my own ship so I guess I'm making my own crew.” I tell her.
Her eyes suddenly shine. “So you have a crew?!” She asked.
“No, I just bought the ship so...no I'm...the only crew.” I tell her.
“PERFECT!!” She says. “This is PERFECT!!” She said with her eyes burning with determination.
“Eh?!” I said surprised.
“I’ve been looking for over a year now for a “new” crew with few people. I don’t want to depend on people that are better then me, I want to join a crew at my own level and grow with them.” She said grabbing my hands and looking passionately into my eyes.
“Oi, ground zero to lesbian Hobgoblin and weirdo human bitch!! We are inside a fucking dungeon. Why not wait until we leave before you rent a room.” Tony said as bluntly as possible.
The girl blinks a bit and finally notices she was holding my hands and blushed brightly before letting go and taking a few stops back.
I could only smile wryly at her and scowl at Stuss. “Let’s talk outside.” I tell them and both girls nod.
We leave and before we talk it over we cash in the drops. With 60 fangs, 30 claws, 10 hearts, 6 weak Imp horns and 4 leader imp horns which sell for 150 each. We earn 2500 credits for the drops.
The total number of bodies was estimated to be over 200 but no exact number was given since the blood drips out. We pay 100 credit to remove them out and then leave.
“Ok, we have everything, do you two want to go to your home or my ship?” I ask.
“Let’s take her home then we can talk there while we are at it.” Mirella said.
We nod and then follow her down the main road before taking a left after five blocks. We walk about a half kilometer before stopping before a two story building with a big sign saying “Sword magi GYM”.
She walks in and pushes the door open and walked in followed by the goblin girl.
We go behind her and on the inside we find a large gym with many young goblins, Hobgoblins and the older ogres training the sword, hammer, spear and many types of weapons.
In the center ring was a very large ogre even by normal standards and he was unique as well.
His skin was bright red which would mark him as not an Ogre but as a variant called a Red Oni. Oni are stronger because of their affinity. They are super heavy drinkers and have the strength that would be as high as their trained tolerance towards alcohol.
“Daddy we are back!” the little goblin said as she ran to the side of the ring.
“Oh?! You’re back kids? That was rather quick. Was the third floor to much?” He asked.
The two looked away while biting their lower lips.
“GYAHAHAH!!! THIRD FLOOR MY ASS!!! SECOND FLOOR THE BRAT LOST THE CRYSTAL THING!! GYAHAHAH!!” Tony said.
I face palmed myself. The next moment there was a large crashed as the massive body was on the ground.
“ARE YOU BOTH ALRIGHT!! YOU'RE NOT HURT!!!” Their father suddenly shouted.
In an instant a much smaller human sized body appeared next to his 270 cm tall body. It was a small blue blur that instantly connected to the head of the red oni and sent him flying all the way across the room and into the wall.
My eyes were nearly popping out with my jaw dangling. My eyes were glued on the knocked out red Oni and slowly my eyes shifted to the one responsible.
Standing where the red oni was a 185 cm tall with a full curvy womans body and excellent assets and beauty equal to elves, navy blue skinned woman. With long black hair the person before us was a Blue Oni which was nearly the exact opposite of Red Oni.
While Red ones were aggressive and could even be called meat heads. Blue Oni were strategists and cold blooded at times. The worse part about blue oni is that they are even stronger the Red Oni’s. By how far of a margin? Some people say that naturally they are at least twice as strong but since it's an individual thing we can’t be sure.
“GYAHAHAHAHAHA!!! THAT WAS RICH!! GYAHAHAHAHA!!” Tony laughed and even his biggest drone was rolling around the ground while he laughed.
“Mom…” Mirella said looking down.
The woman turned showing the small rectangle glasses over her beautiful face over her sky blue eyes.
The woman walked over and drew both girls into a strong hug.
“I’m glad my two babies are ok.” She says in a mature tone while expressing her happiness.
“We will take about what happened later ok.” She said receiving nods from the girls. Her eyes then rest on me and the drones. “So you are the girls that saved my babies?” She asked while staring intensely at me as if looking into my soul.
I just nod. The pressure from her stare was intense. As I stood there trembling I was surprised when two arms suddenly hugged me.
“Thank you so much for saving my babies. I don’t know what I would have done if I heard one of them died for real.” She said and pulling back. “Are you the only person in your party?” The oni asked looking around and looking at the drones.
“I am still a newbie forming a crew. I just bought a ship and came here to train and gather up mana to improve it.” I tell him.
The previously calm eyes of the Blue Oni shined just as brightly as her daughters. “A new crew. Ara! My little baby has so much luck, maybe it was fate!” The woman says passionately.
“OI LADY! Whats this about fate shit!” Tony says.
I really hate how he gets confident in small spaces.
“Huh? That kind of tone?? Miss did you purchase a trained core that overpowered your ship's AI?” Mirella’s mother asked while looking at the biggest drone.
“Huh? How do you know?” I say.
“It’s rare but it happened quite a few times actually. The crew my husband and I joined in our youth was like that. The captain got lucky with some really quick money and bought a ship to make a crew and at the same time he hand enough money for a trained core. Tell me have you heard of the starship, Herculi?” She asked.
My jaw dropped hearing the name. The ship she just mentioned was one of the top 100 starships best known ship in the Galaxy. It gained fame some 30 years ago with its quick evolution from a small explorer ship to a massive fleet cruiser ship. It boasts the greatest shield technology capable of taking a full blast of three other starships laser barrage without breaking.
“If I never heard of it, I should be digging my own grave and kill myself. How could no one not know such a huge and powerful ship.” I tell her.
She smiles seeing how I react.
“Good, guess you know. Anyway, as you might have already seen. My little baby wants to follow a similar path as me by joining a new crew and grow with it instead of living in the shadow of an older member.” She says.
“Well...I just bought the ship yesterday so it’s still really new.” I tell her.
“REALLY!! YES!! This is so cool! PLEASE LET ME JOIN!!” Mirella looks at me with shining eyes.
“Um...what will you do with your sister?” I asked.
“Oh right! Mom, the AI...wait you said it was a core mom, how did you tell an AI from a core?” She suddenly realized.
“AI don’t talk like that so it’s simple.” she said.
“Oh.” She said and looked embarrassed at how easier she believed it to be an AI. “Anyway, the core said sis looked better for something like a mechanic.” Mirella told her mother.
“Oh? Really? Is that true, do you like tinkering?” The blue oni asked the small goblin that looked away.
She was blushing fiercely but still got a small nod in.
Her mother smiled and picked her up.
“Finally you tell momma what you wanted. You don’t need to do the same thing your big sister does. You are you and Mirella is Mirella.” She said.
The goblin brightened up. “Really?” She asked
Mirella mother nodded and hugged her. “I’ll switch your classes at the Academy so you can change to a mechanic’s course.” She said.
“As for you missy, be more careful. Though with your sister with you in the dungeon you could have gone to the third floor if you were careful but you got careless.” She said scolding Mirella. “As punishment, your will spar against three of the boys.” her mother said.
“Okay...but Leah can I please join your crew! Together with those flying things we can go all the way to the third floor.” She says.
“I’m fine with it but the core is an annoying retard so you will have to deal with his annoying in the ship where he is most confident.” I tell her.
“Sure thing, I already have these other retards around here trying to peep on me in the bathroom or trying to get a feel when we train but I'm quicker so a stupid core that has system blocks like privacy blocks is really easy to deal with.” She says and starts laughing.
“OI!!” all the boys around here shouted blushing. The girls in the room stare at the boys with death glares making them flinch.
“OI OI BITCH!! YOU COMPARING ME TO THESE IDIOTS HUH!!” The main drone said getting up close only to be kicked away.
“Gross, not only is he stupid but a punk as well. We may need to discipline him a bit when we have the time.” She tells me.
I nod agreeing wholeheartedly.
“Now then, Leah right, please come inside for a drink some food and a rest. Mirella take your sister and go take a bath.” Mirella mother says.
“Oh no please I should get back to the ship and unload the catch.” I tell her.
“If you says so. Oh please officially add my daughter to your crew so she can get into the ship so we can move her things into her room.” She said.
I open the “Menu” of the wrist pc and open the “Crew” option and “Add member”. A small scanner light came from my module straight up and Mirella put her own Wrist module over it and let it scan.
When the green light shined it confirmed the registering and a message appeared from the hologram.
You have accepted a Mirella Cannes into your crew. She has been set to First mate and sub captain.
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Rights she has over the ship.
Can give command orders Core.
Can give command orders to AI.
Can access upgrade menu to visualise only.
Is considered ally by core and is safe from any possible attacks from it.
“Okay done, I believe your module should tell you which ship is mine. If not just message me and we can meet at the gate.” I tell her.
She nods and take her sister upstairs. As I leave with the drones her mother came out.
“Take good care of my baby ok. You can set up that crystal necklace for your dungeon so it can protect you from danger. Just a warning you should know and take to mind.” She tells me and goes back inside.
I smile at how nice she was but as I look inside I see her grabbing the right arm of the huge Red Oni she calls her husband and dragging him away.
“GYAHAHAH I wonder if that bitch will be more interesting than you. She sure is MUCH hotter than you! GYAHAHAH!”
“Shut up useless core.” I shout and start walking towards the gate angry.
Time to see if we can do some upgrades.