The shield wall skidded back a few steps, deep furrows in the ground marking where their feet tried in vain to resist the force of a dozen dogs charging. Yet none of them toppled over, their shields were still unbroken, while their arms still very much able to give back a ruthless counterattack.

The road was narrow enough for the five shield clones to comfortably hold their positions and restrict any dogs from bypassing them, though even with that advantage, a few hounds and dogs did sneak through the sides. Those monsters got peppered with arrows, and even with the clones' rather bad aim, their hides were insufficient to resist against the soldier weaponry.

A clone, who was relieved from the pressure after slamming his sword through a dog’s snout, instinctively lowered his shield to his left. He blocked a hound who had been aiming towards his brother’s ankle. Another instinctive step back later and he dodged two dogs who exploited his momentary inattention. The flow of the battle, an undercurrent influenced not solely by battle prowess but also by morale, was tipping towards the humans.

The clones could feel it, how the monsters even so close to a dungeon, felt fear. There was hesitance in every attack, and slowly that hesitance transformed into attacking after a dozen or so of their pack got slaughtered for little damage onto the clones. The dogs began to bark and growl at them, no longer confident in any attack.

A uniform step forward from all the clones got the dogs to break and flee. And from then, it was only a slaughter as the clones pursued the disorganised pack with sword and arrow. A couple dozen dog bodies bleed over the street, painting it a black-ish red.

No clone had died, due to the aid granted by [Battle Flow] in predicting attacks. Although no one had died, many had suffered minor injuries, lucky gashes and bites that had gotten through the weak points of the armor.

The injured ones were told to run back to the bell tower to respawn, while the ones who were fine got on their knees and began the bloody task of extracting monster cores from all of the dogs.

Some of these monsters didn't have monster cores or the clones couldn't find them, yet even if a percentage didn't yield anything, over 36 monster cores were harvested. It was an insane sum, and would have made him happy if he had a way to spend it all.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

The clones dumped the corpses of the dogs into an alleyway just to make sure they wouldn't trip over them if they were fleeing. A long while later, a new batch of clones came back from the tower, all bright faced and unblooded. They packed their equipment, looted arrows from the bodies of soldiers on the abandoned palisades, and went on deeper into the city.

The architecture changed the moment they passed through the inner city wall. What once was houses of stone, inhabited by the artisans and merchants, turned into manors and villas. Homes that were made of what once was tasteful wood and white marble.

Their designs were not to be appreciated by Alex's eyes, the houses were wrecked and their servants dead. Through the wreckage he saw the odd maid or butler under rubble or bits and pieces of people who had been torn apart by monsters. Curiously, not one of the bodies around were those of nobles.

And he had a really good hunch on why. Awakening gems weren't as pricey as he originally thought they were, and it would be reasonable to assume that any sane family would awaken their family. Granted, the nobles who knew no hard work were probably still in the single digits of their skills or stuck with a stupid class.

It was a good looting opportunity overall. Now that there were no soldiers around, the clones merrily went down on each household to plunder it of its riches. It gave him great vindication when he swiped away the jewellery from a lady's box or when he stole their ornamental swords.

Those happy feelings abruptly stopped when he found the majority of these noble riches locked away in secure basement vaults. No amount of kicking or punching or generally hitting did anything to disturb the locked steel doors.

Whatever they had in there would make him instantly rich and get him a one way express ticket to the capital and a chance to get the ingredients list. The clones satisfied themselves with the ornate chess set they had found in perfect condition.

They gave a clone who was tasked with ferrying back the winnings the chess set.

The clones were silent as they entered a square with a statue of Galikan the Hero. The statue was surrounded with a fountain, a magical contraption that utilised water enchantments to do useless stuff. They snorted at the decadence of it all.

The clones motioned for one of their own to walk into the open space, testing if there were any ambushes. When the clone whistled code that meant safe, they entered the public square and rounded on the statue.

At its feet was a plaque that read 'There are no gods in war.' It was a quote from a war hero of the succession crisis that had happened in the empire before he was even born. Nothing interesting, might as well continue.

Suddenly, the earth shook and split. Red light bloomed from the center of the city, and congregated over the square. In the sky, the light of Skorn intensified, and it all focused on the statue.

"Oh I know exactly where this is going!" A clone suddenly pipped up. "We are going to have to fight the statue."

It turned out his premonition was correct, as the statue stony featured morphed from human to monstrous in second, and the two hoofs that had taken the place of the human legs moved.

The inhuman statue jumped from its pedestal and landed, shaking the earth around it and would have knocked over the clones if not for [Solid Footwork]

"This dungeon really doesn't want us to get close does it?"