Like a sick joke, the next room was massively harder to plan for. A dungeon had two types. First, were realm dungeons. Like this dungeon that seemingly had no reality. For whatever reason, it was possible for people to enter what appeared to be an infinite amount of times. Each would be given their own place inside this dungeon. Never would two groups meet. The boss at the end of the dungeon was also copied and could be fought multiple times at the very same time. Maybe because of this, when a boss is defeated in a realm dungeon, it takes far longer to come back.
There are many theories of this existence. Leading the pack is that realm dungeons are not real. The distance between entrance and exit of said dungeon is unknown. With just a few steps, one is removed from the known world. Therefore, it leads to an absurd thought that maybe reality and imagination were being intertwined. It could explain why it was seemingly impossible to see others outside the party. That is also why the thought-provoking theory met a dead end. Many things were impossible to explain in the world. Very few were so complicated that even a guess couldn’t be made. To make even remotely a lick of sense, as if all that was true, how convoluted was it when a party entered?
Easier to explain were field dungeons. With a static layout and progression, this was a dungeon in which one entered and were met with open skies. From a sun and moon all the way to a singular boss that was isolated to its own encounter. Once engaged, the encounter would, in one way or another, close itself to everyone else. Also meaning once engaged if one wanted to leave it was an impossibility.
Jessica only wanted to engage a bit, as time passed she was starting to get ready for reaching Grade E. In terms of overall status she was in a delicate situation. Dungeons had larger sources of mana as one traveled deeper inside. While this could put stress on the individual, there were no safe rooms. One needed to fight down to the lowest parts before continuously clearing out a favorite room. From there they were given a period of time to do whatever they desired. After a period of time, new creatures would loom.
It was unknown how creatures were created. The reverse was easily watched as physically they disintegrated. Sensing the mana it was possible to feel a monstrous existence swallow the mana the physical form changed into through disintegration. The creation process was similar, only comparable to having a veil covering the eyes. Never has the processes been witness, instead a creature appears mysteriously. Almost as if they had existed before, and what changed was you.
In front of her stood three goblins. Dungeons were always fair, or possibly unfair. Being treated equal, could be considered as being unfair. Anywhere from one to five goblins could appear on the first floor at any given time. That was, to say it, similar to a field dungeon. What was, would be. It didn’t matter if you were alone or with a party. Making this saying appear in her head, she had no choice but to sit down at the entryway.
The front was flanked by a goblin with a thicker frame. This meant more weight in its blocks and attacks. Only for a situation like this, appearance could also tell you what it meant for a goblin to be holding a piece of wood bark and club, similar to last room.
Dissimilar to the previous room, was the size. Since Jessica was on the same floor, the goblin wouldn’t suddenly learn battle tactics. Nor would there be some amazing feats of intelligence. The size showed that, with the already more powerful physique. This goblin wouldn’t be as easy to deal with. Wild instincts were easy to deal with calmly. That wasn’t to say it had no advantages. It could be tricked into swinging wildly, only with the shield it would take a more defensive approach.
Behind the first by a step or two were two similar in nature to the last room. Small green children with two wooden sticks, this time the ends were sharpened. It wasn’t to say it would be overly difficult. However, her attention was mainly focused on the shield goblin. The biggest issue was that this was a Grade F dungeon. Grade F, dungeon and person in comparison were similar. They were weak. With the larger frame, the goblin should be slower. Emphasize on should.
Because they were all Grade F, their abilities regardless of this were not much different. The higher the grade, the more abilities, and even physical abilities they had. If they were Grade D she could create distance between the two groups. With a heavy sigh, she could feel the interest of the boy from the mark. Still, he intelligently kept his mouth shut and didn’t bother her. Standing up, she focused her mana before she started to release a unique aura.
As her mana manifested on the skin of her arm, she started to chant a cryptic series of words. Once started, the mana leaking from her arms fell without dissipating. Just in front of her arm appeared a small magic circle with cryptic but simply symbols. As she was standing at the door, she was concentrating as hard as she could as she took a step forward, reaching the inside of the second room. Without needing to look around, the mana she was releasing was able to quickly be identified without much effort.
Moving first was the shield goblin. His stride was longer, even when he was slower, the longer strides with the already advantageous positioning allowed it to keep in line with the other two. What might have been expected was there to be a large gap, but since they sensed a dangerous aura from the magic circle they didn’t leave the side of the large convenient meat shield. While it could be seen as intelligence, it didn’t take much intelligence to know that hiding behind an object could help protect you.
That was to say that the goblins didn’t see each other as allies but moving objects that could be used to save itself. Contributing why generally the multiple existences didn’t attack each other even when frustrated by the others. Currently, she had both daggers in her hand, what changed was their position and what they were doing. She wasn’t moving, as just that one step took great effort to not disrupt the simple magic she was casting. One arm was stretched out in front of her as she pointed the dagger in front of her as a stabilizer for the direction.
What was interesting was her other hand. The wired wrapped leather guards weren’t the only thing she bought. She didn’t have a large bag on her back. Instead, she only had a few pouches and pants with a lot of pockets. In her other hand was a water balloon. Holding the tied end with her fingers, she could feel the mana becoming weaker as it searched for the medium. If she used the moister in the air, the attack would do basically nothing and consume large amounts of mana. Moisture was a medium that was incredibly difficult to use because of its size.
Using nearly all her concentration to keep the magic stable as the goblins drew closer. Using all her effort, she was able to complete the magic before panic set in and ruined the spell. The balloon burst as the water floated in the air as it started to take a spiked shape as it flew forward. With its target being the front leg of the shield goblin, Jessica watched as the water spike shot forward and missed the leg as the goblin stopped. Once the water hit the floor, it quickly froze over, becoming a now decently sized ice sheet on the floor.
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With her efforts going into a fruitless attack, the distance between them was enough that the two that had hidden behind the shield, were able to peek around. Thrusting their spears out at her. With little else to do, she could only jump lightly and tilt enough to kick off the wall of the door. Before rolling on the ground as she tumbled to the side. Even standing back up became a bit of an issue as she was forced to continue rolling as the shield goblin brought its club down as a spear thrust was aimed at her.
With one last dodge, Jessica was able to position herself so she could kick off the ground and use her arms to prop herself up enough that she did an ugly backflip. This motion allowed her to get to her knuckles and knees as she picked pushed off the ground before being forced back as the goblins saw a fish in a barrel. It was only after her back hit the wall was she finally able to stabilize herself. Finally being back on her feet, Jessica was finally able to calm down to a certain extent.
Unfamiliar to her previous actions, she couldn’t lure the goblins around by the nose. Not only were there three, the three were very different. The two with offensive weapons were thrusting, this made it impossible to deflect them into the others. The shield goblin was the most annoying, as it was just slow enough that it couldn’t be used to block the others. They also actively used it, similar in fashion to the way she used the line defense in the previous room. Even still, the times the two spears were front to back it was still possible to attack her as their thrusts were compact swings unlike the wild actions of the club that required a wide swing.
Even with the superiority of her weapon. She was barely getting swings in as there were a few pieces of the wood that were being chunked near the edge with the tip. Because of the number and their ability to attack in quick succession of each other. Jessica was forced into backpedaling as she dodged and deflected the thrusts with wide motions, leaving her unable to retaliate at the spears or their wielders. Moving around, Jessica never stopped looking around to observe her surroundings to look for anything useful and not get pushed into a corner.
While before it was a game of cat and mouse until they tired themselves out, the thrusts took less effort and when they got tired. There was a fat goblin slightly behind to cover and continue the attack. Having to do so much at once she wasn’t in the advantageous position. She was already doing considerable well. Reaching the opposite end of the room, she was near the exit. As she peeked at the door she had thoughts of leaving. If she couldn’t find an opening, she was likely to leave.
Finally making it to the door, she was about to make a decision, suddenly the opening she had been looking for had arrived. Seeing it happen in real time, she shifted her position in. Normally when the fat goblin swung she would ignore it as deflecting it wasted energy and left her open. Cutting to the inside track, she met the swing as she used the flat end of the blade to take the blow as she braced with the back of her other arm.
Being brought to her knee, she ignored the discomfort in her arms and knee as she spun on it to position herself behind the shield bearer. The two spear goblins were both in motion. The one to the right was thrusting at her, as his path forward had been blocked by the shield during the resulting wind up and swing of the club in the left hand of the shield goblin. As one could easily imagine, the ice that was meant to seal or trip the shield goblin to let her deal with at least one of the spear goblins at the start had finally done its job.
With the other two busy, the falling goblin thrust the spear out with one hand as it panicked. Already being at the perfect angle to the thrust, she had to put in effort to deflect the spear. This time she didn’t use the flat end as she was tilting to one side as she also fell from the resulting action. Once the two fell. She was on her butt as she had been pushed back and barely managed to not fall on her side, using the spear to force herself back enough to not completely fall over.
Having no stable stance, she could only hope for the best as she used mana to stab at the goblin. Completely releasing the spear, the goblin brought its hand up to grab the dagger. By this point, she could see in her peripheral that the other spear goblin was getting in position to stab at her, as the shield bearer wasn’t far behind. With the idea already put in her head, she also released her dagger. With a pathetic throwing motion she released the dagger before making a makeshift fist and swinging at the outstretched hand.
When her fist met the green hand, there was blood covering the green palm as blood leaked from her fist. With a burst of mana she was forced to roll very awkwardly, a second spear discarded the first and stabbed through the hand as it was able to clip her arm. Because of the lack of a blade, the end was only able to tear into her arm as she felt a pain in her neck. The tear was bad, but the position she was in was not one she could roll away. She had to force herself to awkwardly roll sideways, causing a terrible strain to her neck.
Luck was in her favor as the spear had clipped the goblin hand. This caused the goblin to use much greater force than usual. This caused it to block the path of the shield bearer. With a short outburst, the two moved back into chasing after her. The goblin that was on the ground was unmoving and the two didn’t seem to care about it. Peeking at her hand, she was able to see a deep gash. A bloody line that ran from near her wrist to in between her middle and ring finger.
Looking around Jessica was able to kill one of the goblins, she was now down a dagger that was currently embedded into the skull. As she moved back, Jessica was able to see that the arm was bleeding, however there wasn’t a lot and the wound didn’t appear to be serious. The strain in her neck made it difficult to turn her head. Worse was that the door was now covered, as she had drawn the two close in her escape.
Frustration, finally breaking the point it could control. The shield goblin uncharacteristically ran at her in rage as it brought the shield up. She made a difficult decision to meet it head on. Using the most of her remaining mana she jumped as she kicked at the lifted shield. With the lack of intelligence, this action seemed to bypass its ability to understand as it paused as it braced itself. Having been playing with something in her hand, she was able to take out all the wire from the wrist guard.
She could feel the clip holding it to the wrist guard start to dig into her skin as she was only able to wrap the wire around the shield bearer twist before being forced back and tightening it. With little time to waste, she threw the dagger at the wall behind the goblin. It was a very lopsided throw. Using the wind up, she clapped her arm on her wrist that was now bleeding as the contraption that held the wire in was now twisting the leather around as all suction was being cut from her arm as it dug into her skin, drawing blood.
At some unknown time, the shield goblin had been able to bring the club between the wire and itself. Not knowing if by intent or luck the goblin had tried to use the club to cut or push the wire away, it caused it to dig into the side of its face on the other end. When she brought a leg up against the shield, she pulled as tightly as she could.
Watching helplessly as the second goblin came into view as it was about to attack before the wire finally met its end as it started to swing around and as if sensing the mana the spear wielder tried to knock the dagger away and missed. Finally, believing in a god, she watched with startling expression as the dagger and wire meant to mangle the second completely cut through the neck of the goblin as the wire got stuck on its spine. Slowly tightened until it cut off the head as it fell away, leaving a sharp white bone now in place of its fallen head.