We finally came across a floor guardian after finding the entrance room to the sixth floor. The floor guardians are unique monsters who roam their particular level on the labyrinths, moving from room to room. Every time they’re killed, they respawn within a month, just like the rest of the monsters spawning within an hour of dying.
Right now, we’re still on the fifth floor—Rather, we’re in the last room on the fifth floor, and now, with the floor guardian appearing, we’ll need to kill it before advancing.
I briefly considered helping bringing the guardian down, but decided that it wouldn’t be worth it. The floor guardian wasn’t weak, but we had the escort adventurers after all, and Hogvir if things were to go bad.
I could see that the adventurers knew what they were doing from how they approached the guardian, who was a human-sized knight wearing rusted armor and wielding a sword comparable in size to Hogvir’s. They surrounded it on all sides, and slowly chipped away at the armor, aiming for the weak points, particularly the joints at the elbows, shoulders, knees, and hip. It took a while, and quite a bit of effort, as the adventurers had to also avoid the swings from the knight’s sword. One of them was only just clipped due to carelessness, and went flying, breaking at least two ribs from the fall alone. I cringed to think about what a direct hit would do.
After some time, the rust knight lost his left arm, exposing what was underneath the armor. Nothing. It was empty. I could barely see some faint glowing runes etched inside the metal, but other than that, the armor was filled with empty space. Unfortunately, that meant that the rust knight would never tire, while his opponents would gradually weaken through exhaustion.
Realizing this, the adventurers made a final push using all their effort and abilities. The two mages expended all their remaining mana to cast powerful spells, and the warriors channelled all their energy into one more strike. The only archer in the group drew back one arrow, and filled it to the brim with explosive energy. The warrior who was hit earlier could only watch, injured as he was.
The warriors struck first. Their strikes threw the rust knight off kilter, forcing it into a bad position, the weakened left side of the armor presenting a good target to the mages. A fire spell bombarded the armor, charring it badly, while an ice spell rapidly cooled the heated area, making the armor more prone to shattering. The archer struck the last blow, sending her arrow spinning into the armor, and by inside, I mean that it passed through the small opening where the arm had been, and exploded inside the armor, sending bits of metal flying all over the place. I shielded my masked face just moments before the remaining gauntlet struck my arm. Interested in it, I picked it up, and looked at the metal from its inside. Those glowing runes were there too. I wondered if that was what had been powering the empty armor, and making it move as if alive. I put it in my small knapsack for later study, before throwing the sack back over my shoulder.
We all regrouped, and gave the wounded warrior some medicine that should have him back in top form tomorrow. Everyone was congratulating the archer, a human girl named Samith, for her earlier shot.
Well, I say girl, but she’s physically older than me by about five years.
After making sure that everyone was okay, some of the smiths went and brought the mules back. They had fled to the opposite side of the room from where the fighting was happening, just as they had been trained to do, so it didn’t take long before we were ready to advance to the sixth floor.
This was done in much the same way as when we had entered the labyrinth in the first place. We entered the next room, and once we were in the center of the room, the door behind us faded, and one appeared in front of us. However, unlike that time, there was also a large glowing rune off to one side of the room, which would bring us back the the labyrinth entrance, so that we didn’t have to make to climb back up, floor by floor. These teleportation runes were put in place by some mages a few hundred years ago, to reduce the number of casualties in the labyrinth.
As we didn’t want to return to the surface yet—All the semi-good smithing materials are located at least on the tenth floor—We continued on, into the room beyond the next door, and onto the sixth floor.
Once we passed through, though, the adventurers immediately started spewing every single curse word they knew.
In the center of the first room of the sixth floor, a large amount of black gas was rapidly condensing to form a somewhat large and fearsome figure. Slowly, one semi-gaseous leg reached out from the fog, followed by two more. These legs quickly became solid, displaying the razor sharp barbs running along them, and the chitin armored segments split only by the slim joints. The fog completely condensed into a large, nightmare inducing spider vaguely reminiscent of a really, really big tarantula.
We knew what it meant that it had appeared from within black fog.
We had just beat an enemy which had appeared in the same way—The rust knight.
The adventurer’s had exhausted themselves on one floor guardian, only to have another spawn in the very next room, this one being the much stronger, and scarier, floor guardian of the sixth floor.
The adventurers were panicking, not ready to fight another floor guardian so soon. The smiths had an odd light in their eyes, almost like they were going to enjoy watching what was going to happen. They looked at Hogvir with anticipation, and excitement.
Hogvir, in turn, grinned wildly, and unsheathed his greatsword, throwing the scabbard behind him. He turned to me and spoke, offering cooperation.
(Hogvir) “You going to join in? I know what that sword on your back is made of, and I know you’ve wanted to test it.”
I grinned back at him, even though he couldn’t see it under the mask.
(Kai) “Sure. I’ll take the left, you the right?”
(Hogvir) “Right, Go!”
Hogvir shot off at a surprising speed, compared to his bulk. I dropped the sack on my back, leaving it where it fell, and shrugged Twilight’s sheath off my shoulder. I drew the blade, and the sheath fell on top of the sack.
Walking up to the black spider, which was currently trying to defend against Hogvir’s brutal flaming greatsword, I held Twilight is a two handed grip, and brought it slightly back, keeping it at hip height to get the most power out of a single strike. I began channeling some of my mana into it, and the starsteel in the blade turned slightly translucent, like frosted over ice.
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The spider was now completely occupied with Hogvir, lashing out with its legs, and trying to hit him with its oversized fangs. It didn’t even notice me approaching, and gave me time to fully prepare the one and only strike needed to end the oversized arachnid.
Twisting my body, and dropping lower to the ground, I stored kinetic energy in Twilight before letting loose.
There was a flash, and ice appeared in a disturbingly straight line on the other side of the room, following Twilight’s arc. The spider jerked to a halt, and stood still for a solid few seconds, before it's bisected legs gave out, and it fell to the ground, the top half of it’s body sliding off the bottom, the wound coated in a shiny, frozen goo. Hogvir, who was standing in front of the spider’s fangs, was staring at it as I struck and thus could see the split second of panic flash through its eight eyes before they darkened in death.
I sighed in slight regret. The spider wasn’t even strong enough to last against one blow of mine. Granted, I had put all of my strength into that one blow, but a part of me was hoping that it would survive to give me a good fight.
The fire covering Hogvir’s greatsword went out with an abrupt *whoosh*, and he stared at me, mouth slightly open. I looked around, and as it turns out, his reaction was the most tame. Everyone else’s jaws had practically hit the floor. It was then that I realized that, perhaps, I had overdone it slightly. Formulating a quick plan to alleviate the shock somewhat, I pretend to faint form mana exhaustion, and directly stimulated it’s signs and symptoms. I used my mana to trigger sleepiness, and dispersed my remaining mana into the environment in an undetectable way.
Seeing me ‘faint’, Hogvir instantly snapped out of his thoughts, and yelled.
(Hogvir) “Pick up your jaws, and get over here! Check Kai, see what’s wrong!”
The adventurers and smiths rushed over to help, but before they could do anything, I ‘woke up’.
(Kai) “Ugh. Damn it, I still can’t do that move yet.”
(Hogvir) “Lad— What happened to you?! Are you alright?”
I groaned slightly to add some believability.
(Kai) “Yeah, I’ll be fine with a night’s rest. Just some mana exhaustion, I think.”
(Hogvir) “Mana exhaustion? Hmm, well, I don’t feel as much of a mana presence from you right now, so you’re probably right. But what was that move, to use up all of your mana instantly?”
(Kai) “It was something taught to me by my teacher. I thought that having this sword would allow me to use it, but I was wrong.”
I lied, motioning at Twilight, which had returned to looking like a sword made of normal steel now that I had stopped channeling mana into it.
(Hogvir) “So you’re saying that the move which instantly cut the floor guardian in two wasn’t fully used?!”
(Kai) “Well, That move was an all or nothing gambit. Either it was strong enough to cut the spider, or it doesn't work at all. It
looks like it was just strong enough.”
Everybody nodded in comprehension, though there was still some awe in their eyes. I’ll have to be careful next time. Maybe I shouldn’t pull out the big moves on these low floors anymore.
Hogvir, though, was still unsatisfied.
(Hogvir) “Kai, do you mind if I see your sword for a moment? I couldn’t help but notice that it has an...unusual design to it.”
(Kai) “Sure, go ahead.”
I wasn’t too worried about Hogvir looking at Twilight with〖Analyze〗, due to the fact that I likely had the highest level in that skill, and had hidden both my full name, and the〖Growth〗property of the sword in it’s item description. He would only be able to see it if his〖Analyze〗level was higher than mine. And that wasn’t very likely. It’s sort of like, when I look at Twilight, I see this;
Twilight’s ChimeA sword crafted by Katariah SilverProperties:Keen EdgeUnbrokenMana FocusIce Elemental BoostGrowth
But Hogvir would only see this;
Twilight’s ChimeProperties:Keen EdgeUnbrokenMana FocusIce Elemental Boost
He took the blade, and examined it. Every now and then, he would ask me questions about the forging process involved, and the reason for various features of the blade itself. Finally, he came to the big question.
(Hogvir) “So, Kai, how the hell did you learn how to forge such a blade? I’ve never seen it’s like from any of the countries I know of.”
(Kai) “Well, it was a family style, not something that was learned by a large group of people. I would have been very surprised if you had seen a blade like mine before.”
Of course, this was a bald faced lie. My birth family hadn’t involved themselves in smithing in the slightest. It was an interest I had cultivated and maintained myself.
Everyone accepted my answer without any reservations, though, just because it made the most sense.
They graciously set up my tent for me, as I had ‘mana exhaustion’, and could ‘barely move’. No, it’s not that I was taking advantage of them, but it was common knowledge that someone who had overused their mana would be weak for at least a few hours, and barely able to stay conscious let alone move around and set stuff up. The best way to get rid of mana exhaustion was to simply sleep it off, and recharge your mana reserves over the night. That’s why they set up my tent, to allow me some rest. I made it look like I spent a good portion of my remaining energy to drag myself to the tent, and I made sure to remind everyone to not enter while I was inside.
They knew that all I would need was a good night’s rest, and left me alone as I pulled off the mask and coat like usual, and was brought down by the very real sleepiness I felt, due to my actions, attempting to mimic the effects of mana exhaustion.
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