Chapter 49

My arrow drilled its way straight through the giant spider clinging to the ceiling. It dissolved before even falling to the ground. The arrow and a stone fell to the ground. I picked them both up and examined the stone carefully..

I threw the stone at the wall, causing it to shatter. Another fucking dud! I hate this damn floor and I hate these damn spiders. I’m supposed to be looking for one that is much faster than the others, but how do I know which one that is when I kill them all immediately! I’m stuck just hoping the next I kill is the correct choice that will drop the stone with white marks, which is necessary to open the weird magic field up to the next floor. The previous floor was so much easier since I just had to find a boar like monster and it was the only one of its kind on the entire floor.

The size of the floors have definitely been increasing though. The outside of the tower was maybe fifty meters wide, but I swear these floors must be multiple kilometers of walls and passages. Some weird kind of magic shenanigans going on in here. Other than the mist, at least that forest seemed normal.

I really didn’t expect to get stuck at the 7th floor like this. On the bright side, Hunter had reached level 26 and gotten me some more stats. Also an absolutely amazing new bonus! I mean a perception bonus is definitely something I couldn’t live without!

Damn class and it’s worthless bonuses. First a detection skill and now this. I leaned my back against the wall. I pulled out my device to check the time and saw that it was now almost mid afternoon. I was already running out of time for the day. If I could just get past this floor the next two or three shouldn’t be a problem. I’d really like to get to the 11th floor at the very least since it’s after the first boss.

I slid down to the floor and stretched out my legs. I placed my bow beside me. I might as well take a small snack break. I pulled out a package of jerky from my bag. After tearing open the bag, I gave a piece to Coa and then starting eating my own. I felt Coa slither down from my neck.

She stuck her head in the bag and was currently gobbling up all the jerky. “Coa, I know you’re a growing girl and all, but you might end up needing to go on a diet with all this food consumption.” She froze and pulled her head out of the bag and gave me a perfect puppy dog look. Impressive for a serpent! I had to bow down to the power of those sparkly, upturned eyes. “Take them all! I’m warning you, if you get fat, the diet will be rigorous!”

She crooned and dove back into the bag. Within a minute all my jerky was gone. Coa slid back out, letting out a soft burp, before returning to her customary perch. At least that was what I expected. She crawled all the way up my head and buried her face into my hair before hanging down and swiveling around back and forth in front of my eyes. “Coa, what are you doing now?” She spun around and trilled. I got the message that she was going to help. “Coa, if you stay there you’ll get in the way.” She nodded before going back atop my head. She was still swinging her head around every which way. It probably made an amusing sight with her tail still wrapped around my neck and her head sticking out of my hair. Not sure what she thinks she’s doing though. Oh well, I’ll let her do what she wants for now.

I put the trash back into my pack and I resumed my idling. Hmm? A couple presences coming closer? From opposite directions at that. Let’s see, two people from my right and it seemed like one of those horned beetle things from the left. It wasn’t an exact method of determining, with how weird the monsters inside the dungeon felt to my psi, but based on how it was moving, I was pretty confident that was what it was. If it was one of the spiders it wouldn’t be moving along the ground.

Given the speed of both parties, they’ll get here about the same time? I don’t feel like getting back up, so they can just deal with the monster. Well, they could just ignore the monster like I’m doing and let it attack me. Depends on how charitable they are. Just in case they confronted me too, I attached one of my plasma knives’ sheaths to my belt.

Coa started flapping her wings and crying aloud. I noticed she was trying to make me turn my head toward the direction the beetle was coming from. I guess she decided she could contribute by being on watch. So cute! I had to reward this kind of good behavior, so I started rubbing the spot on her head between the two small horn nubs. She started purring and relaxing before realizing that I wasn’t taking action despite her warning which caused her to kick up even more of a fuss.

The beetle was now hurtling toward me upon picking up my own presence. Its large horn was angled to gouge me. From the other direction, the two people were close enough to see me and also see the monster barreling down on me.

“Oi! Get up you moron!” A shout from one of them was directed at myself. Coa buried her head back into my hair to hide. I glanced that way. One older human and a younger, possibly mid to late teenage, one. The older of the duo assumed a stance and in the next moment launched a small spear. It hit the beetle head on and pierced it, staggering it from the force. Its shell was cracked around the spear, but it seemed otherwise still fine. The pause gave the other person enough time to run past me and reach it though. He swung down a large hammer and the beetle’s head was smashed to pieces.

The young man scooped up the stone and spear before coming back this way. The older man was carrying a longer spear as he came closer too. No hostility present in either of them, though the young one seemed quite annoyed at me. “Hey, are you stupid or something? You should know better than to sit down in a dungeon! You weren’t even paying the slightest attention! Did you want to die? Huh? Answer me you moron!” He was getting way too close, bending down to glare at me.

I was just giving him a blank stare in return. There was no need to respond to such silly provocations. Of course, the fact that I didn’t respond in anyway just made him more annoyed. He was almost face to face to me now. The old man was about to take action, but Coa beat him to the punch. She shot out of hiding, aimed directly at his face.

“Uwaah!” He tried to lean back, but his reaction was too slow. Coa latched right on his nose.

I hurriedly stood up and reached for Coa before he could retaliate. Once she felt my hands, she immediately loosened her clamp and let herself be cradled back to my body. The guy had nothing to show for her attention except a red mark on the tip of his nose. She hadn’t even managed to draw blood. She was shivering out of fear. Silly child. Taking action first and only thinking later. She’s pretty bold today. I soothed her with some focused petting and humming.

He was about to begin a new verbal assault when the old guy smacked him upside his head. “Ouch! What did you do that for you shitty old man!?”

Another smack. “You broke two rules, boy. You’re lucky you only got off with a play bite. Do you know which rules?” The old man asked.

“I wasn’t polite to another adventurer.” The young man mumbled.

“And the other?” The old man questioned.

“I wasn’t courteous to a woman.” Was the reply.

“That’s right! You broke two of the most important rules! You never know when you might offend a stronger person and as men we should always be afraid of an upset woman!” The old man expressed with a heartfelt nod.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

“You only say that because Mom-” The young man tried to retort, but was interrupted by another smack..

“We’re not bringing up your Mother right now!” The old man, I guess his Father, stated firmly. With his son sulking off to the side, he brought his attention back to bear on me. Coa had already returned to the land of dreams in my hands. “Sorry about my idiot-” “Hey!” “-giving you trouble.”

“It’s fine, he didn’t do anything. More importantly, what do you want?” I can tell by his thoughts that he has some other purpose than just apologizing.

“Ahh, you can tell? Well, you see, we found the key stone for getting up to the next level, but we haven’t had any luck locating the stairs. So I was wondering if you might have that information and would be interested in a trade.” He said.

“Basically, I show you to the stairs and then get to take advantage of your key’s opening of the barrier?” I don’t really see any disadvantages in that for me.

“That’s about the size of it. Deal?” He extended his hand, I clasped it and we shook.

I picked up my bow. “We need to go the direction you just came from.” I pointed that way and took the lead.

The old man calmly took the rear, but the young one rushed ahead of me. “I’ll take point.” He said with a glare as he passed by. I merely shrugged.

I let him walk past the right path without saying anything. I signalled that we were going to the side and the old man followed, but shouted for his ‘idiot’, causing the kid to run back with a red face. He didn’t take the lead again.

It didn’t take long to reach the stairs. I had been staying relatively near to it the whole time once I had found it, which in retrospect might have been why I couldn’t locate the right monster. On the way we ran into only a single monster, another beetle. This time my arrow bore into and killed it before either of my temporary companions could react to its appearance. That earned me a surprised gasp from the kid and an appreciative whistle from the old guy.

The shimmering barrier over the entrance to the stairs was quickly dispelled when the old guy held out the stone that had a white plus sign on it. “Both of you go through.” We walked onto the first few steps and he followed, the stone shattering and dissolving as soon as he passed the threshold. The barrier was instantly lit again.

“Is it possible to just leave that set up there to keep it open?” I asked. This wasn’t something covered by the book I had read.

“Nah. Once you use it, the stone will break when it is out of your grasp. The stone will also break after a few minutes of use, so you couldn’t just stand here all day letting people through.” The old man explained. I nodded in thanks.

We went up the spiraling stairs in silence. Our deal had already concluded and there was no reason to pursue further conversation. The eighth floor landing was different than the other floors so far. For one the stairs to the ninth floor were located here as well. Of course there was a barrier preventing access to this, but compared to the last floor’s challenge, this one was a lot simpler. I just had to find and touch a number of devices that were hidden somewhere on the floor.

The other main change was in the environment of the floor itself. Unlike the previous seven floors that were basically bare stone walls, this floor had a sort of overgrown with plants feel. Moss on the walls and vines hanging here and there. It increased the possibilities available for hiding things.

“This is our stop. If you’re ever interested in joining up with an adventurer party, ours can always use a good archer. There’s six of us now, seven if you count my son here. Leave a message at the guild for the Iron Oath party if so.” The old man said before dragging his kid through the portal door. It rippled like water as they went in.

Yeah, that’s not going to happen.

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I stretched my arm to its limit and barely grazed the small box with my fingers. That was the eighth and final one I had to find on the ninth floor. This last one was very unfriendly to someone petite like myself, being down a small shaft in the floor. How would most people even reach that? The hole isn’t even that wide!

I pushed myself back up off the ground. That just leaves backtracking to the stairs and the boss floor. I walked over to the nearest wall, felt for the right spot at the bottom and tapped it twice. The wall slid away revealing another passage. This floor had been a bit annoying until I had gotten used to detecting those small switches. I had been searching for magic signals when instead they were pure mechanisms.

I traveled through the barrier and began the ascent. I was glad that pets weren’t required to hit the switches to go through these. It would really make a beastmaster totally useless in this dungeon if so due to the limitations it would add on what kind of beasts they could bring.

I was afflicted by a moment of intense vertigo between one step and another followed by a crashing slam behind me. I stopped and shook my head before glancing back. The stairs behind me were gone. There was only a solid wall with according to my senses, absolutely nothing behind it. The dungeon’s way of saying no turning back. The wall continued progressing as I climbed the steps. When I strode through the sinister looking gate at the end, there was a final impact, removing any sign of the stairway.

According to what I read, your initial start point is safe for a short period of time and I’m already pushing it on time, so some last minute extra preparations for this would probably be good. I decided to swap out Hunter, which had gotten to level 31 from the last two floors, for more of a powerhouse set up. Psion and Ranger should work. Ranger improving my endurance and Psion giving my psi that extra oomph if I should need it. I stored away my bow and pulled out my gun and knives. No one other than myself existed here to worry about. Dumb, screwy dungeon magic.

The labyrinth on this level looked to be in ruins. Broken walls, fallen pillars that created obstacles, and rubble littered the ground. Just to test, I pushed my psi against the nearest cracked wall, but it was just as solid as any of the other floor walls would have been. No give at all, which destroys any chance of making a path myself.

Alright, I’m ready. “Coa, hang on tight.” I shot off.

The challenge on this floor wasn’t to defeat the boss, it was to get past it somehow and get to the exit point. The book said the boss, a giant Minotaur, was unkillable. It would chase you relentlessly once it discovered you and it was guaranteed to do so once you got close to the goal. The trick was to get it to follow you, distract it with a variety of methods while leading it away from the exit, before you looped around and hauled your ass for the gateway. It sounded simple, but apparently the damn thing was a bulldozer.

My plan for getting past it was even more simple. I questioned its reported invincibility, so I was just going to meet force with force to push my way past it. That would definitely be the quickest way. There’s always following the normal strategy if it doesn’t succeed.

I dove through a small hole, rolled upon hitting the ground, and continued my sprint. My two knives were out and floating ahead of me. The rubble created dead ends where there shouldn’t be one, necessitating detours from a straight course, and while the pieces could be moved, destroying them outright didn’t work.

I heard the sound of a giant hoof before the creature was even in detection range. I angled my route to take me toward it. I rounded a corner and saw the five meter tall hulk of muscle. The thing was also just wide enough that it took up the whole passage. It noticed me as well, causing it to release a roar and charge me with its weapon that looked like someone took a spear and added a giant axe at the tip.

My knives launched forward and weaved around to sink themselves into its weapon arm, but the minotaur appeared to completely ignore them even as they sliced through the arm. I had expected some kind of reaction to that attack. I prepared my psi and when the monster stepped into swinging range, I lashed out with a furious strike of telekinesis. I doubted the monster’s vitality extended to its weapon, so I sent my strike to hit that first. After that I hit the monster dead on in the left side of its chest and pushed it as hard as I could against the wall. It went off balance, but caught itself with its hand before it could crash against the wall. It had stopped moving for a second and I didn’t waste the opening, I retracted my knives and prepared my gun and unloaded on the monster’s head. My knives were slicing madly at the neck. The assault combined with pressure from my psi, was enough that it kept the minotaur from regaining its stance.

I only ceased when the gun overheated. My enemy’s upper body had been reduced to tatters. Its head was gone and the body slumped to its knees. I guess it wasn’t really as tough as the document said. I collected my knives, slung my gun over my shoulder and trod around the corpse. I wonder why it left a corpse anyway? All the other dungeon monsters dissolved.

Fuck! You idiot!