The metal marble tore through the air and ripped into the blighted elf he had been aiming for. A hole opened up in the unsuspecting elf, who took a moment to stare down at the fresh breathing hole in their chest.

A spurt of blood burst from his chest as he fell to his knees a second later in confusion. This was not something they had run into during their time in the dungeon. This was an actual attack, not a simple trap, and it caught the entire group unawares.

It was an opportunity that Aura took full advantage of. Her red tail began to glow as she accessed one of the techniques the element had let her learn. One of the things Nate had learned about Aura’s Kitsune race pertained to her tails, more specifically, why each of them was a different color.

It turned out to be because each tail corresponded with a different element when it was formed. Moreover, there was a limit to how many techniques they could learn for each element depending on the tail. If it was the first tail, then they could learn nine techniques. The second tail was eight, and so on until the ninth tail, where they were limited to just the one technique.

However, each tail gained a little more power than the last as well. So, while the first might have the most techniques, it was also the weakest. The last tail, the one with a single technique, was the strongest. Those technique numbers only pertained to how many they could formally learn. They could still free-cast as much as they wanted with each of their elements if they had the proper control. Something that she had admitted, few ever accomplished, due to how dangerous the training for it was.

Not that she had to worry about that anymore. It was only a matter of time and painful practice before she became proficient in that coveted skill herself.

That was what he had learned from her.

The tail she used now was her third one. At first glance, the tail could be mistaken as simply another fire affinity and somewhat dismissed. Doing that would be at your own peril though. The tail wasn’t fire red, instead; it was a darker red, with hints of black, and the spear of fire she summoned overhead had pieces of dark black matter mixed in as well. Her affinity wasn’t simply with fire, it was with magma, and the boiling glass known as obsidian when it cooled.

While he cocked the gun for the next shot, her spear of volcanic pain rocketed towards its chosen victim. The fire splashed over the elf’s chest, burning him. The flames were followed an instant later by liquid rock and boiling glass mixed together. The magma touched the existing burns and turned them into spots of barbeque as the molten mix clung to the screaming elf.

Nathan barely held back his wince at the sight of the ferocious and very painful-looking attack. It was not something that he wanted to be on the other end of.

The two attacks were all they managed to get off before the remaining three elves reacted. Techniques and items geared toward protection abounded over the next couple of seconds. Gauntlets with physical shields attached unfolded from two of the elves’ arms covering their fronts. While a more mystical-looking one appeared and sheltered them from above.

The blighted elf Aura had attacked quickly died as its face was burned off and the liquid magma entered its skull. A stream of energy that only Aura and Nate could see flowed out from the body and entered the four-tailed kitsune. There was also an orb on the ground for Nate that was left behind when the elf’s body disappeared.

It was something that freaked the others out, and one of them even tried to grab the orb. They failed at the task magnificently as their hand simply passed through it.

Behind the group, the elf Nate had shot in the beginning finally succumbed to his injuries and blood loss. A repeat of what had happened only moments earlier occurred as a stream of energy went towards Aura, and then another orb was left behind as the body was taken by the dungeon.

As long as they were fighting together, they would both get something. The rewards weren’t as great as when they fought alone, but it was safer, and they weren’t that much worse either.

Nate ducked back behind the corner of the corridor to hide. “Do you have anything that will go through their shields?” The metal marbles he was currently firing were nice and had a decent amount of power, but he didn’t think they would go through the shields.

She flicked her fourth tail; this one was the deep blue of a clear evening sky. “I do have something that might work, but I don’t have a lot of experience using it. I haven’t had my fourth element for very long after all, and I only managed to learn one technique for it before everything happened.”

The tail began to glow, brightening as she sent energy into it.

A broad scythe-shaped arc of cutting wind took form above Aura’s back. It was similar to the attack the gun fired when the hopper was loaded with a wind affinity beast core, only far more powerful. Something that was proven to him a second later as she let the attack fly.

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It zipped across the intervening space with a whoosh of wind and cut apart the enchanted metal shields as though they were nothing more than soggy paper. The blade of wind cut deeply into both of the elves’ arms, almost severing them, before finally running out of energy and disappearing.

With a thump of exhaustion, Aura collapsed onto the floor at his feet.

“Sorry about this,” He said, as he took hold of her back legs and dragged her back behind the cover of the corner in the corridor. Dragging your companion by their hind legs wasn’t exactly the most dignified thing to do. Not to mention Aura was a princess, or she had been, it was confusing. Either way, you never knew when you might accidentally do something really weird or awkward when it came to people from other areas. That concern was magnified several-fold when it came to separate species entirely.

As soon as she was hidden, Nate brought his gun back up into position, aimed, and fired. Taking one of the bleeding elves right in the sternum. He cocked the hammer, shifted his aim, and fired again before the last two could react. The speeding metal marble took the other injured elf in the chest, dropping him to the ground to wheeze out his last few breaths.

The last blighted elf screamed something at Nate, her words slowly losing their lyrical edge as they took on a more harsh tone. It all washed over him for the moment. He would have time to inspect his feelings over what he had done later. Right now, he had something to accomplish, and these blighted elves were standing in his way of that.

Besides, they were destined to die either way, either by his hands or by the traps in the dungeon. At least this way, their deaths would mean something more beyond just empowering the dungeon. It was slightly callous, but he didn’t know these elves. They meant nothing to him, just like those cultivators who attacked his dungeon.

They were one and the same in his mind. It turned out that he needn’t have been worried about whether or not the mental image he had of himself was correct. It was and knowing that brought him a small amount of peace, but also didn’t really change anything for him either.

The barrier above the final elf flickered as she began to lose concentration on the technique that maintained it. Not that it really mattered. Nate wasn’t planning to attack her from above anyway.

He cocked the hammer a final time, aimed and squeezed the trigger. The blighted elf woman was thrown backward as a gaping hole opened in her chest. He checked the cameras to make sure there were no other groups coming toward them and then entered the room to pick up his orbs.

Two of them were rainbow orbs that denoted they were filled with energy, or qi. He loved those, as they were particularly useful for his cultivation, especially at the moment, when he still hadn’t entirely worked through his meditation art.

Another two were blue, which was the color of weapon orbs. While the final orb was yellow, which he believed, based on the single time he had gotten it before, meant it was an accessory. The bracelet of basic health recovery he wore had come from a yellow orb, so it could also just mean that the item was enchanted. Either way, he’d find out in a second.

The first of the rainbow orbs sent a larger-than-normal jolt of energy into him. Confirming something that he had already suspected. He would get more energy from the orbs he received from stronger enemies in stronger dungeons. They weren’t static in any way. Even sharing the energy from each kill with Aura still resulted in him getting more energy than what he would have gotten from several of the beasts in the first dungeon.

Of course, by this point, they were easier to hunt en-masse, and he knew what to expect from them.

It was harder to fight the blighted elves, whereas he had finally gotten to the point where he could fight the beasts with his kukris.

The energy he received from the rainbow orbs was nice, but it was the other items that he was really looking forward to. They were the things that he couldn’t get from the first dungeon with just a little extra effort. At least he hoped that was the case. The first dungeon had given him nothing but items for himself, and even then, in limited amounts.

It was time to see if the second dungeon was any different.

It didn’t take him more than a second to confirm that it was indeed different. Touching the first of the blue orbs revealed a set of bladed tonfas, the likes of which he had never seen before. The blades were sharper and more refined than his father’s current version and there was also a small discreet trigger hidden next to the handles. There was no barrel that he could see, so he could assume it launched the deadly-looking knife at the front in some way. There were runic symbols running along the handle, support structure, and back of the blades.

If it was anything like his crossbow, then those would need to be hidden in some fashion. Which was a problem for a bladed weapon that was constantly being used to attack things. Then again, maybe it was less of a concern for his parents than it was for him. They were stronger than him after all, so it might not matter as much if they were seen with an enchanted weapon.

He put the tonfas into his storage and moved on to the second blue orb.

A recurve bow appeared on the floor when the orb had finished transforming. The inside of the bow was a dark blue inlaid with various symbols and runes that were different from the others in a light blue color. He would need to copy them all down into his notes later. The outside of the bow, the side that would be facing the enemy, was a flat black that gave it a menacing look. There was no method to remove the bowstring from the bow that he could see. It was meant to always be strung, which went against what he knew about proper recurve bows.

Then again, this was an enchanted bow. The rulebook had already been thrown out the window, so why not for this as well? The string itself almost seemed to be made out of some sort of metal-like cord. However, with it under tension like that, it was impossible to say for sure.

At the moment he couldn’t even pull it back, and he didn’t want to send qi into it lest it register the bow to him instead of his mother. You never knew what sort of functions might have been worked into these sorts of things after all.

Nate looked at the yellow orb and wondered what it might have for him. Strictly speaking, he had already gotten most of what he had wanted with just the weapons. Anything more would just be asking for all his luck to be blown at once.