Lorine was stuck in her lab, the large femur of the giant still lying on her magic-enchanted table. Ever since coming over here from the dean’s tower, she herself had become captivated, almost obsessed with the sturdy bone.
Even though she should have trained her mana control to keep it from deteriorating, she didn’t feel like it. No, rather, it was more so of an affirmation of herself. Despite the recent setbacks in training and the seeking of newer, stronger methods to control mana, Lorine liked her new lifestyle of a proper witch that indulged in research.
And somehow, her mana control remained the same even though she didn’t try anymore. Actually, after finally meeting her parents, the said ability of hers increased all of a sudden.
So for now, she would lay low with the excessive training she used to perform. Instead, she turned her attention to the temporarily useless giant femur.
At the very least, it was useless to the dean and Einna, however, to Lorine, it was something to reconsider, especially for all the times he had helped her.
She promised him a reward for helping the dean, yet with the recent events, she didn’t feel like anything could suffice for what he did for her. That didn’t matter she wouldn’t try and give it a shot, of course.
Pulsing mana through the bone, she imagined the insides of the bone as though they were in front of her. A blue, transparent replica that could be coordinated in any way appeared in her head, with no need of closing her eyes.
There was literally nothing inside other than bone. The top and bottom of the femur had been almost fully fossilized with stone and other minerals, but the long and straight middle was simply bone. However, because of the sheer size of it, there was a lot of it.
Judging from Conall’s size and probable mass, just the bone here was most likely as heavy as his whole, empty skeleton.
Nonetheless, she quickly dropped the thoughts before inspecting the rest of the bone. There naturally was no bone marrow nor any veins or vessels that would have connected the blood flow. Anything else that Lorine had found inside the bone other than the hard, white material was the bodily information left behind by the giant.
Of course, for her idea to become fruitful, she needed to get rid of it, but she already had another idea how.
Just as she was pondering about it, something stopped her. The doors to her classroom were knocked on, and the sounds intensified inside her lab, letting her know.
Seeing the red-haired boy on the large screen, she quickly let him inside. Putting the femur away to a safe place, she watched as the doors of the lab opened.
With a smile stuck to his face, he asked politely.
“Would it be a good morning, afternoon, or evening for you?”
“I haven’t really ever thought about it. Right now, afternoon, I guess?”
“I see. Good afternoon in that case, Madam Lorine.”
“It is a rather pleasant one, Sir Conall.”
Dropping the random formalities, Conall looked her in the eyes.
“How are you feeling?”
With a shallow, yet definitive smile, she eased his worries.
“Better than ever.”
“That’s great to hear, then. Have you prepared yourself? We won't be in there for too long, but the fights are going to be quite tough, especially the boss.”
“I did. Though, I hadn’t expected the dean to actually allow you to go.”
“I made a deal with him in the past.”
“I see. Let’s talk on the way, then.”
She had everything already on herself. The cloak she got from him was used as her new main attire while her weapons were the magic circles. Other than that, she had her inventory ring to help her.
Conall, on the other hand, needed nothing more other than his fang and the Rune of Invincibility, which he would use once inside the dungeon only.
Without the boy ever fully stepping inside the lab, they once again left the academy’s main building, heading for the dean’s tower, because the dungeon was directly underneath it. Kept hidden from the curious eyes, it was only accessible to the very best of the Grade B students.
Although slightly different, it was just like Zineall’s domain, a unique dungeon.
Already expecting them, Lurius swiftly led the duo to the cellar of the tower where a blazing, scarlet portal awaited.
Pouring out furious and dense mana, the portal easily deterred the uncourageous ones while lured in the greedy, idiotic, and brave souls. Whether Conall was either of the three, the dungeon didn’t care, as long as the boy went inside together with the girl.
Holding hands to inform the portal, it only closed off from the world after they both went inside.
Although Lorine couldn’t see it, the brilliance coming off of the golden windows illuminated Conall’s eyes as he read through the text.
[You have entered a dungeon for a recommended party of five Grade B delvers.]
[You have entered a special dungeon that far exceeds your powers. The difficulty won’t bend under your premise.]
[You can’t forcefully leave this dungeon.]
‘I already knew that.’
He mused before turning around, looking at the open, spacious hallway they found themselves inside. The soft, crimson velvet carpet they stood on, decorated with silver fringes gave off a regal feel. The walls of the large corridor themselves were lavish, painted a pale yellow and inscribed with white, intricate lines along the dark wood on the bottom of them.
Standing and wall candelabras could be seen around every twenty meters, along with crystal chandeliers that fully illuminated the space from above.
“So this is the famous Kreon Palace.”
Lorine said under her breath. She had read many documents of the past, ones which described the previous dynasty and their famous royal palace named after the king’s name, but it was nothing like seeing it in person. Looking at the beautiful paintings filling the walls, as well as the armors that occasionally stood around them, she couldn’t help but stare at them and bask in their light.
Even though they were nothing special and she had seen mansions and art like them, just the fact that it was ancient gave it a whole different meaning.
Conall looked around the place for a few seconds before mapping the part in his head. The dungeon’s layout was a bit tricky, but just like anything, it had an order to itself, so he understood in which part they were currently in.
“The window behind us is completely blacked out.”
Lorine said to him after turning behind. It was a literal dead end, with the black window only adding eeriness to the place.
“Yeah, let’s move forward a bit, unless you want to get swallowed by the void.”
“Okay.”
Moving towards the painting they could just barely see in the front, they quickly encountered their first standing armor, as well as the doors that they protected.
Suddenly stopping Lorine in her tracks, he gestured towards the four armors standing parallel to each other near both walls.
There were two doors they were protecting, brown oak with no symbols on them. They were simple rooms protected by simple guards.
“These are the enemies.”
“The armor? Are they also ghosts?”
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“No, take a closer look.”
However, she didn’t need to. Moving abruptly, the armors revealed their gruesome faces, moving rigidly like robots.
Since they had full armor that covered almost every spot of their body except for a few nooks in their helmets, they couldn’t really see anything when the enemies stood side by side.
Now, however, they saw four fearsome faces stuck behind the helmets. Flakes of rotting skin and flesh were falling off their heads, parts of the mouth visible through the holes in cheeks. Looking at the dead, cloudy eyes, they witnessed as the knight ghouls looked at them with hatred.
Four shrieks came out of them, spreading quickly through the hallway and assaulting Conall and Lorines’ ears.
Two handed swords were in their hands as they slowly ran through the corridor, however, before they could truly do anything, four blue magical missiles targeted their chests, sending the ghouls flying backwards.
Despite their status as Grade B, they were still relatively fresh inside the first gate. With Lorine, who almost entered the second gate, her basic magic was enough to almost dismantle them.
Roughly sliding through the marble floor and red carpet, the monster couldn’t even gather up before a large magic circle around them exploded, leaving dark blood and blue crystals on the floors.
Conall looked at the scene with an awkward smile, while Lorine simply voiced her thoughts.
“Shall we check the rooms? Maybe there are some books inside.”
“Ah. Sure, we can.”
Opening the light doors, however, what they saw was only old, barely kept-together beds and deteriorating, wooden furniture. Most likely, it was the rooms where servants slept or something of the sort. Completely disinterested, Lorine couldn’t find anything of value, so they moved forward.
Passing by many chandeliers, they finally met the end of this corridor, with a portrait of an old royal figure they couldn’t figure out the name of.
However, what perplexed them, or at least Lorine the most, was when they left the first hallway. Standing under the painting, the duo finally looked to the sides, only to witness that the previous path had been closed off, another painting on a wall covering it.
“I heard something about this before, but it’s still confusing.”
Lorine looked at him with slightly furrowed brows. Visualizing the labyrinth-like palace and actually experiencing it was starkly different.
However, before she could think any further of it, she heard something coming from behind. A sound of metallic clatter resounded inside this new corridor before they quickly saw what it actually was.
Coming at them with great speed, a metal cart filled with large cloches on top of it, bouncing around from the extreme speeds the fleshy golem was moving it with.
The kitchen garment on its body had been tainted with dark red blood, torn apart almost everywhere because of the chef’s bodacious frame.
Long and deep gashes scattered across the golem, tearing further apart the more he used his strength and brutish force.
The cart full of food went at Lorine and Conall, cutting through the air like an arrow. Dodging the whistle of the wind with a jump, the two watched as the chef ran at them, almost unable to fit his frame in the corridor.
On top of Lorine’s right palm, a bright magic circle lit up in less than a second, and a mighty spear created out of magic came out of the circle, accelerating mid-air.
In the middle of the monster’s chest, a large hole appeared, showing them what was behind the flesh golem.
Immediately losing all of its strength, the golem plummeted down to the ground, spilling blood from the area of the lethal strike.
Using her magic to extract the beast crystal, Lorine smiled to herself slightly. Truthfully, she hadn’t experienced that much fun in a while, and they had just entered the dungeon. Usually, she would be brought to dungeons by other professors because of her extensive knowledge in plants and magical resources. She was never the main artillery.
Storing the crystal, she went after Conall, who seemed confident in walking around this place.
After a while of walking only forward, she suddenly asked him.
“Are we not checking what’s behind? We can see the next hallway already.”
“There was only a dead end there, and there weren’t any doors to inspect either.”
“I see.”
A lot of their journey around the dungeon consisted of walking and letting Lorine clear up the monsters while Conall persuaded her to walk in a certain direction, getting the most important stuff from the dungeon.
Unlike Zineall’s domain, this wasn’t a recurring dimension, but rather, a separate one that was always there in the world. Anything that was here could be taken out, though there were rules. Any part of the building, decorations or furniture couldn’t be taken away, no matter what.
Books, jewelry, or other, similar stuff, didn’t fall under the rule. The first instance of such they could see inside some of a higher servant’s room. When they entered, they saw a bookshelf, however, there was only dust there and small grooves left behind by the books the people of the past took away.
Of course, nearly all of the possible stuff was taken away, and if any student found something, they first needed to show it to the dean for inspection. If it was an important document with history inside, it would be taken away. Skill tomes and other books, on the other hand, were free to be taken by the students.
Standing inside the small room, Lorine searched through it with her mana sense, only to be disappointed by the lack of potential knowledge stored within.
“Everything was plundered, even in such an unimportant room.”
Looking at the slightly dejected face, he smiled before trying to solace her.
“This is just the ground floor and the mansion is too ostentatious to not have something still hidden inside.”
“You’re right. Let’s keep on going.”
Although he said that, it wasn’t really ‘just’ the ground floor. There was a certain hidden skill tome that he wanted to take, on the floor they currently were in, inside the Great Library.
But, there were still a couple hundred rooms and hallways they needed to go through. The Kreon Palace wasn’t called Mansion of the Labyrinth for nothing.
Quickly, they also met another group of four knight ghouls, however, this time, Lorine only dealt with three instead. It was at the request of Conall, who wanted to battle a Grade B warrior.
Standing before the growling monster, on the neverending carpet, Conall prepared himself whilst the witch watched from the side. Preparing a magic circle in case something happened, the girl leaned against the luxurious wood inside the wall.
Aura started flowing around his arm and sword, unlike before, when he shyly used it. Since the healing factor inside his spirit wanted him to use it up for recovery, he no longer worried about hurting the already gentle soul and used it as much as he could.
Obviously, the pain was still there, but he was slowly building up resistance to it, so he didn’t care.
Grabbing fang with both of his hands all of a sudden, Conall saw the monster move in a flash, its speed great even inside that heavy armor of his.
Even though he could have dodged the incoming strike from above, he didn’t move, with the intent to test his current possibilities.
Both he and his sword didn’t like dodging, and they only did it when necessary, but the boy felt powerful enough to finally deal with a Grade B monster with his might and technique alone.
However, once he felt the brunt of the sword, he started to reconsider his confidence.
Sliding across the carpet, his body was moved back from the strike that carried particles of mana. Imbued with the energy, the ghoul seemed to remember its moves from the past, at least somewhat.
Quickly taking away the heavy and long sword of his, the knight released a shriek while swinging to the side, making a shallow cut in the walls before they instantly regenerated.
Aiming directly at the human’s neck, the ghoul stood in a stance reminiscent of a broken mannequin, unable to correctly use up its limbs. Yet, the attack was just as deadly.
Still, thanks to the push back he gave him a second prior, all he needed to survive was just a step backwards.
The zweihander wasn’t able to reach his skin, but Conall still felt the fierce wind that followed after it. Nonetheless, he didn’t back away. With the attack missing, he quickly stepped inside, to close the distance.
Fueling his sword with aura, the human aimed at just where the shoulder and arm was connected, at the pauldron. Hoping that some dent would come from the attack, he was disappointed to see that the monster hadn’t even stepped back.
‘Even though they’re low knights, they’re still at the royal palace.’
Conall mused while feeling the hard material making up the corroded, silvery armor. The enchants on the armors were still standing strong, despite the countless years of neglect here.
Taking back fang, he saw as the ghoul was moving in to perform a sudden thrust, swiftly.
With the blade upright, he slid across the atack, negating any chances of it swinging sideways. At the same time, he saw an opening inside its helmet, so he used it.
Fuelling the weapon and his right arm with spirit, Conall pierced through the helmet instantly, going through its head and reaching the soft material inside the skull. Only a soft growl could be heard from the ghoul before he tried to kick the human away.
It didn’t really do anything to the undead, as they didn’t need brains to fight. Already being blind, it also didn’t matter that Conall destroyed its eyes.
Releasing a sigh after going back a few steps, the knight ghoul was once again charging at him, swinging the zweihander like a shortsword with one arm.
Five clangs spread through the corridor as the boy reflected his strikes time after time, being slowly overwhelmed by the velocity and frequency of the swings. However, he had never given up once.
When the sixth swing was coming from above, Conall let the large sword slide across his own blade, deflected down into the hard ground. Looking plainly at the opening left behind, he mustered up all of his strength and aura to slice the chest.
In spite of that, only a scratch appeared on the armor, but it was enough to satisfy him. Making a step forward with his right leg, the boy thrust with all of his strength at the same spot, all while the ghoul was still gathering up.
Maybe it hadn’t done much, but there was a minimal dent in the place where the middle of his chest was.
Unable to utter another strike because of the gruesome pain, as well as the fact that the ghoul knight gathered himself, Conall stepped to the side and observed the enemy with a keen eye.
A large amount of mana coalesced at the tip of the ghoul’s sword, threatening to shred the air around it. The chaotic movement of the blue energy didn’t ease the feeling, only adding to its already ominous presence.
A strange sensation arose deep inside the boy. Looking at the almost fire-like energy that coated the sword, he noticed something as the ghoul started doing certain movements, unlike before.