“With the imperial fleet on once again at the doorstep of Proxima and Epsilon Centauri, the darkest and the brightest star of the Centaurus constellation was about to feel the full might of the imperial fleet.

The push into the Proxima system was swift and almost anticlimactic. A small force was left to connect the gate to Alpha Centauri as the main part of the forces were to join the attack on Centauri. The twin stars were to be the only access point to Sol.

At the outskirts of Epsilon Centauri gravity field, the imperial fleet was engaged with the same enemy who once had driven them back. With the improved implementation of AI and biological enchantment becoming more available to the masses, what the enemy faced this time was a completely different beast than when we first entered the star system.

The coordination and enhanced skill of the thousands of captains, pilots and breaching crews were seamless as nanotechnology and artificial intelligence helped not only implement the tactics and strategies of human command but, in some areas, take over the calculation needed to achieve a successful mission.

Space in the bright star system lit up with the armaments of countless weapon systems, sending their payload into the almost endless wave of monsters summoned by those that claimed to be deities.

Before the relentless will of mankind that would not be enough this time, the first of the planets in the system soon found itself within striking distance of the planetary assault forces and the Legions of mankind.

The second legion would have the honor of first touchdown in this engagement.

We would later learn that it would be humanity's first meeting with another species native to our universe, the insectoid Ze`nadar.

At the time, it was sadly considered just another of the tyrant's minions.

- Elistar Iscariot, Grand Magister during the second Kingfisher dynasty.

In a frenzied charge, the horde thundered down the tunnel, their bloodlust propelling them forward with reckless abandon. No mercy would be shown! Only the promise of blood and death awaited the unfortunate enemy of these formidable warriors, their weapons raised high and their screams echoing with fury and rage in a terrifying display of wrath.

“Oh, come on. Isn't that the cutest thing you have ever seen?”

“They are rats, Alucard! Rats!”

“But look at him! That one, with those orange pants and the green vest, desperately trying to contain his little chubby belly. He's even got a tiny spear that he's waving about, and look at how his nose twitches before he squeaks. How can you not claim that's cute?”

“Well, you ain't gonna try to make a pet of any of these. I think your last attempt would have shown you that.”

“Poor Pierre. He really shouldn't have misbehaved like that.”

“You splattered him against the wall. I'm no expert on training animals, but I don't think that's how you do it.”

“He touched the feather. I told him he could ride on my hat but not to touch the feather. He made for such a good mascot.”

“Can we please just get done with this? I hate rats. Besides, I can see the exit for the next level just behind them. Maybe the next one will have something nicer, like spiders or soul-sucking demons from Tartarus.”

“Fine, damn it, but Im bringing one with me when we leave this dungeon. Look at that one! It's got an eye patch and a bandanna!”

With a heavy heart, I took one long step towards the walking rats and kicked, sending dozens of them bouncing off walls and each other with wide swipe kicks. Mostly, I tried to scatter and immobilize them so Mira, who walked behind me, could stab them while they were dazed or unconscious. Something she seemed to do with absolute delight.

When we first entered the dungeon, we were surprised by a party of five dressed rats walking on their hind legs, trying to attack us. Not so much that there were rats, the booklet I had brought about the dungeon said it would be, but it failed to mention anything extraordinary.

Either they were as surprised as we were or were just contemplating the meaning of life, but in my shock, I had drawn my sword and slashed through two of them, stabbed a third, and flickered the sharp tip through a fourth, almost slicing through it from bottom to top.

When four wisps of spirit with almost no power entered me, I stopped and stared at the last rat. It stood, about to screech on the top of its lunges but frozen.

Taking in a breath, I reached down and watched as the little guy proceeded to gnaw viciously on my knuckles. It didn't have the power to really generate any pushback from my barrier, much less actually cause any damage, but it was most certainly giving it its best attempt.

It wore a little black hat and a brown open shirt. Its black pants ended just under its knees, letting a bit of brown fur show. I name you Pierre.

Holding him up proudly towards Mira, I said, “This is Pierre. He is one of us now. Ain't that right, little fellow.” Trying to tickle his stomach didn't stop the attempts at gnawing my knuckles, but he would hopefully grow out of that phase soon.

“You're nuts. Certified bonkers. You do see that he's trying to bite you to death, right?”

“He just doesn't know better. Just give him some time, and he will be fine…I did just slaughter all his friends, so I can't blame him too much for being a bit spirited.”

Looking at the little fellow again, I tried tickling his belly again, making his legs kick furiously and shaking his head with each bite.

“See, he's laughing.”

Why is she hiding her face?

From behind her palms, a sound suspiciously like a growl emerged followed by. “Let's just keep going, okay?”

“Sure. Come on, little buddy, it's time to explore the world… dungeon. Wait, you live here, don't you? Why don't you give us a tour? Still into the biting thing, I see.”

The tunnel gradually changed from hewn rock to a more polished look, as if we were walking in on a new cave being excavated, but from the wrong direction.

The glow coming off the rock was still enough for Mira to navigate by without a torch, but I don't think that would last much longer, and since the tunnel curved slightly to the right, I couldn't really see all that much either.

After a few minutes of walking in silence, we found ourselves at a split in the tunnel.

“What do you think, Mira.`Left or right?”

“Been told to always follow the left wall by every Hunter I have met.”

“So right it is then.”

“Why did you even bother asking then, numbskull and give me a moment to get the glow stone out.”

“If they all went left, any loot should be to the right, and what the hell, Pierre, stop sucking on my knuckles! Oh, you have poor teeth. What did you do to yourself? I'm going to let you ride on my hat for a bit, alright? Don't touch the feather.”

Placing the toothless rodent on my hat, I turned to watch Mira rub a stone a couple of times until it glowed, then she lifted it over her shoulder and tapped it three times. To my amazement, when she let go of it, it stayed floating over her shoulder.

“Nice, right?`Five silver and should be good for a month. The merchant said any Awakened should be able to recharge it for silver. Oh, and your rodent is trying to rip your feather to pieces.”

I guess that solved the torch problems, I thought, flicking my wrist at where Pierre had moved to on the hat. What I didn't intend for was Pierre's to launch from my hat and splatter all across the right-hand side of the tunnel.

For a moment, my world froze.

“Pierre!”

In hindsight, shouting at the top of my lungs was perhaps not the wisest thing I have done to date.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Small sections of the wall opened along the tunnel floor, and at first, a few rats stuck their heads out, looking at us as if curious about what we were doing there. Then one started squeaking, and more chimed in until hundreds and hundreds of rats squeaked in union. If it hadn't been so adorable, I would have started getting worried around now.

Drawing my sword, the sound of metal chiming up and down the tunnel cut the squeaks short.

“Here, stick the pointy end in the rats, but don't try to stick too hard. I damn hate straightening out the tip. Start walking backward towards the exit and deal with any of them that make it past me. Oh, and hand me your shield.”

To my surprise, she didn't argue, but she definitely didn't appreciate it when I also handed her my backpack. Yeah, she's not going to get far with both of the packs.

“I can't move this shit, you gobtard! How do you even carry this thing?”

“Don't worry, just protect it from the ratlings that make it past me. Just stabby, stabby.”

With my round shield in the right hand and Mira`s teardrop shield in the left, I waited until the tunnel was crawling with rats. They stood around, switching between staring at me with those red beady eyes or squealing and squeaking at each other, the walls, me or whatever else they deemed necessary to squeal at.

Watching as the crowd parted for a particularly round large rat wearing a fancy hat and an embroidered vest, I couldn't tell what sort of pants he had on because of the amount of belly and back fat hanging all over the place. I waited as he made his way to the front.

Standing there defiant and proud. The leader of these hundred or two hundred rats raised what looked like a sharpened teaspoon and started squeaking and screeching as he alternated, pointing at the amassed rats and then at me.

Wait, was I the bad guy here? Did this make me the invading monster from the deep? Well, better act it then.

Unleashing what I considered a ferocious roar, I jumped into the tightly packed rat's shields first.

The squish, crunch and squelching were far from pleasant, but I did manage to kill a good fourth of them in one attack, including the leader. Getting up on one elbow, I used the boss on my shield to help spin me around sideways along the floor. My legs and Mira`s shield are being used as flails.

Speaking of Mira, she had managed to drag my backpack a good ten steps before she had to start stabbing the occasional little ratling that was flung her way. I winced every time I heard the tip of my sword hitting the rock.

Slightly dizzy and very dirty, I eventually got up on one knee before standing up. Looking around, I thought for a moment that I was on a boat, but then I realized it was my head playing games with me.

The ground was covered in rat blood, broken bodies and intestines. Ratling insides had splotched the walls as they bounced off them. Looking up, I could tell the sealing wasn't faring any better. Madness, I thought, mostly feeling proud of my innovative fighting technique. I should get it registered as something I was willing to teach at the guild when I had refined it a bit.

The few remaining rattlings that had been outside my reach were scrambling along walls and disappearing in hidden entrances to wherever they spent their time.

“Do you know if there is a bounty on the rattlings? I would check, but I would rather avoid touching the dungeon book until I am less bloody.”

When she didn't answer after a few seconds, I turned around to see Mira, one arm holding her up by the wall and the other wrapped around her stomach while she was dry-heaving like a champ.

Yeah…It did look rather macabre. I blamed Pierre.

When she felt well enough to talk to me again after I had used a shield to scrape the dead rats and bits in a pile and doused myself in water, I learned that a bundle of ten rat tails paid a copper.

Mira continued dry heaving as I started cutting off tails in the pile of rat bits. Ended up with a 107. That was almost eleven copper, damn it, I grunted while thinking about the four bodies by the entrance. Hopefully, they wouldn't disappear, as I had read some that happened to both Hunters and monster bodies in some dungeons

.Rat tails stashed in a bag. I went over to see if little Miss's upset tummy was feeling okay enough to continue.

“So, you done being useless?”

“Screw you, sideways. Did you have to go bathe in a river of rat blood?”

“Have to? No. Was it an efficient way to deal with a swarm of tiny critters trying to sink their teeth into your pretty ankles? It bloody well was. Makes me consider how other Hunters deal with more than a handful at a time. Stomp them? The rats would have swarmed them and tried popping out their eyeballs long before they could stomp a swarm like that.”

“They don't normally. Only five or six attacks a group at the same time in level one, from what I have heard and read.”

“Hmmm, Interesting. Makes me wonder what brought them out like that.”

Feeling the last of the minuscule wisps of power entering me, I almost missed what she said next as something started flashing in my spirit. It was the Ability crystal deciding that it had integrated enough, despite me not having spent much of the power from my domain. Actually, when looking around, I didn't see much of the power from the domain; it was only clear power without any affinity.

Is that what you are doing? I sent the smug little sparrow egg a nudge with my mind. It chose to ignore me, but in my spirit, it looked to have taken on even more colorful hues as its pearlescent shell.

The flickering from the Ability crystal was stabilizing. I almost wanted to take it out and implant it at once, but I had no idea what would happen when I did, so it was better to wait until the busybody was sleeping or away.

It didn't seem like I was likely to need to use any abilities during this part of the dungeon delve anyway. No point in hanging around here anymore.

With my sword returned and backpack strapped in place, we continued to brave the dangers of the dungeon together again.

“Right, was it?”

“You said something about loot.”

“Right, right it is. Know any marching songs?”

“No, Alucard. Just no. We are not singing while we walk down a dark dungeon after you just summoned half the rats in the kingdom.”

“Can't blame me for Pierre defecting like that. Broke my heart.”

“I wonder if this is how people get driven to drink…”

The rock walls became brick walls and floors. I couldn't insert anything into the seams; however hard I tried, some liberties were taken with reality in this place.

The natural smell of a cave was replaced with the stale air of a cellar, so it was not what I would call an improvement.

Step after step, we took until we almost agreed on turning around and taking the other tunnel. Then, it opened up into a cellar. A wine cellar, to be exact. Sadly, the wine happened to be missing, as far as I could see.

“Well, that's just dumb.”

I couldn't help but feel disappointed in the long trek, which was for nothing.

“I'll agree for once. This wasn't what I had imagined when I saw the tunnel split. Shouldn't there be some sort of monster layer or something here?”

I started walking around the room, looking for anything out of the ordinary. Mira did the same from the opposite direction.

After a few minutes, I was about to give it up when Mira said.

“Alucard, does it give off a different sound when you knock on the wall here?”

Turning around, I saw her leaning against the wall while knocking on it, then doing the same to an area a bit further along.

Hurting over, I had to agree. The sound was different, and to our delight, sticking something in between the bricks actually worked.

Nothing looked like a button or a leaver that we could see, so I decided just to try kicking it. As my boot went through the strange section of the wall, followed by a cascade of bricks landing on my leg. I stood there in a less-than-pleasant position, wondering where I went wrong in life. Then I remember my life until now and decided this wasn't all that bad.

“Mira, some help?”

“I don't know, I'm feeling a bit peckish. You can always try the magic word.” Her smile was far too predatory at the moment.

“Help move bricks off my leg, and I won't gut you.”

“Hmmm, that doesn't sound very magical.”

“Fine! Will you please help me by removing some of the bricks on my leg so I can sit up and reach the rest of them myself? Pretty please?”

“I'm not very sincere about the delivery there, but I'll take it for now. Now you just lay there and let Mira take care of the big problem for you.”

Holding my tongue has never been more difficult as I watched her push bricks off my leg, only to stop halfway.

“There are two skeletons and a purse in here.”

Crawling over me, I am sure the pain would have been excruciating if my body hadn't gone through the enhancements it had recently.

“Nothing special but the purse. Wonder who they were or if they were placed here by the dungeon.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see her opening the purse and taking out a handful of silver, but these looked larger than the ones I had on me.

“Looks old, maybe imperial from one of the periods they ruled this area. We should have them looked at by an expert when we get to Murktwon. I heard people collect and pay good money for old stuff.”

“That's great. Now, about that help…”

“Oh right, stop whining.”

Minutes later, I stood inspecting the same coins and had to agree they looked strange. The writing was too archaic for me to guess what was written on it, but I could see the profile of someone on one side of it, and the other one had a person riding a horse or a horseman. It was a bit difficult to make out.

Mira claimed finders keepers on the bag and put it in her backpack, but eventually agreed on a fifty-fifty split since we were a team. I think she only did it to annoy me. No, I know she did it only to annoy me, going by her shit-eating smile.

Trekking back to the split in the tunnel was less fun than going to the brick room and seemed to take forever, but we hadn't come back completely empty-handed, and silver is silver. It was good loot.

Walking down the left-hand split this time, I was considering calling for a halt and a quick bite to eat when suddenly what looked like an exit appeared in the distance. The horde of rattlings between us and the exit was at least something to break up the monotony of the walk.

“Shield,” I said, holding out my sword behind my back after unstrapping my backpack. When neither my sword taken nor her shield was given, I turned around to see Mira just looking at me with a raised eyebrow.

Damn it.”Shield, please.”

“Fine, but no pets this time.”

We will see how you like pets when I slip a couple of ratlings down the back of your shirt later. I thought while turning to the rats who were now running towards us.

Not wanting to be left out, I started running towards them. Let's see how far I can slide.