Michael stepped into the dungeon. They were in a dark corridor, but none of them had any issue seeing in the dark. Among them, though, Michael had the best vision.

“Huh?” Liara looked behind Michael. “THE GATE!”

They turned to see the portal freeze.

“What?!” Michael shouted.

“Attention. The Demon-Lord has entered the Dungeon. Welcome Demon-Lord. This Dungeon shall seal off the entrance to prevent additional interlopers. The Demon-Lord is welcome to attempt to subjugate this Dungeon. Dungeon shall double in difficulty. Good luck, Demon-Lord.” A voice around them announced.

“You’ve got to be kidding me….” Liara stated.

“Are we going to be okay?” Rana was becoming worried while holding Lily close to her.

“I’m… sorry…” Michael lamented at first but quickly became angry.

This was the fault of that damn goddess! She dropped him into the world without knowledge and made him the Demon-Lord. All he wanted was to go back home or live a peaceful life.

“Damn you, Sylfaerune.” Michael spat.

Liara finished her inspection of the frozen gateway. “No way we’re getting out. Looks like we need to follow what was said. We have to subjugate the Dungeon.”

“Will we be okay, Liara? It said the difficulty would be doubled.” Rana asked.

Liara thought for a bit. “We should not proceed too quickly. I’m sure Michael could bullrush his way through the dungeon, but we must let Lily get stronger. Let’s spend a few days on the first floor before proceeding to the next. Lily’s growth will be the pacesetter.” Liara concluded.

“Do you think the announcement happened outside too?” Lily asked.

“I think it would be best to assume so. Which means they know you’re in here, Cael.” Liara said, turning to Michael.

“I’m sorry.” Michael knew this was not his fault. How could any of them have known?

The three comforted him.

“Now, I’m going to go over the basics once more. Dungeons are fast learners, so they probably picked up several tricks already. The first five floors should not be bad. That is how they set it up. The difficulty jumps every five floors, and a boss monster blocks the path to the next floor. The best rule of thumb is that the monsters of the next leg will be one-quarter as strong as the boss. The boss is typically ten times stronger than the strongest monster on the floor. A problem for us with the change is going to be that we are now the only ones in here. This means that the dungeon will adjust things based on how we progress. Since it is still a new dungeon, its options will, thankfully, be limited. So Cael, you need to hang back and let me and Lily handle the mobs. You will be needed for the bosses.” Liara finished her explanation.

Lily, with her two daggers, took point. Liara was right beside her, Rana was behind them, and Michael took up the rear. Steeling themselves, they proceeded into uncertainty.

The first monster they ran into was a slow-moving clay golem. Liara explained that they were typically an easy opponent as their attacks were extremely slow. Pushing one over even had the risk of breaking them into pieces.

“I’ll be right here with you, Lily. Take your time, and don’t be nervous.” Liara comforted the young girl.

The four-foot-tall clay golem slowly made its way toward them.

“See how it is dry? That tells you that this is an easy-to-beat one. If it has a glossy or wet look, those ones can be difficult to defeat. You have to pummel its torso or pierce its golem core.” Liara added.

Lily stepped forward with her daggers in hand.

The golem took a long time to wind up its punch, giving Lily plenty of time to slash and poke it a couple of times before Liara had her back off.

The golem still swung even though Lily had been clear for a few seconds.

“Aim for the shoulder joint and sever the arm!” Liara ordered.

Lily quickly made her way to the off-balance golem and stabbed her daggers into the joint.

“Like I showed you!” Liara ordered.

Using a reversed scissoring motion, the arm nearly came loose. Liara told Lily to hit it with the butt of her dagger. Lily did as instructed, and the arm fell to the ground.

Moving back to Liara’s side, Lily watched the golem stand up straight and begin to close the distance slowly, not even phased by its missing arm.

Liara had Lily repeat the same trick on the other arm, making it difficult for the golem to attack at all.

“Now it will try to fall on you. So be careful. Remember, aim for the core.” Liara patted Lily’s shoulder, assuring the girl that she had the encounter in the bag.

Lily rushed up to it and readied herself.

The golem leaned back and attempted to fall on Lily, but the girl easily dodged to the side.

The golem struck the ground and broke into a bunch of pieces.

“Great job! Congratulations on your first win.” Liara approached and pulled out the visible golem core.

“Here’s your prize. A fully intact golem core. Granted, they don’t sell for much but keep it as a memento.” Liara handed the core to Lily.

“Thanks, Liara.” Lily had a happy smile on her face as her short tail wagged.

Using the auto-mapping function of her Crys-Link, Rana kept track of their movements as they searched for the path to the next floor. They found it after thirty minutes, but Liara kept them on the first floor. The seasoned merc had Lily taking down clay golems for another hour until they completely mapped out the floor.

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Their group didn’t find any treasure but did find a few low-rank mana stones.

They took a meal break at the stairway entrance before proceeding. Liara felt she had a good gauge of what to expect and thought they could safely head to the next level.

Thanks to Michael’s Void Space, Rana had plenty of ingredients and magic appliances to cook.

“On the next floor, we should start seeing new monsters. The clay golems will probably be a bit more challenging. We should also only have singular encounters, at least until the third floor. Normally dual encounters happen after the boss, but I guess we will run into them sooner.” Liara said as they headed down the staircase.

The next floor was just like the last one. A packed dirt cave that was slightly lit with a glowing source of light from the corners.

They proceeded down the first tunnel and came across another clay golem. They could see that this one moved slightly better than the first-floor ones, but Lily easily defeated it.

Liara inspected the clay after Lily pulled the intact core. “The clay is moist on the inside.”

“How bad will it look next floor?” Michael asked.

“We may want to spend the rest of the day on this floor for Lily. What time is it?” Liara asked.

“Three P.M.,” Michael answered after checking his pocket watch.

Nodding, Liara said they would spend three hours on the second floor to let Lily get as much experience as she could. They would find the staircase to the next floor and camp there for the night.

Agreeing to Liara’s choice of caution, they proceeded through the floor.

The second type of monster they came across was a hard-shell insect. It moved at double the speed of the clay golems, which wasn’t much.

Liara decided to test Lily a bit with the new opponent. “What’s your initial assessment?”

Lily looked it over. “It moves faster than a golem. The ridges on its shell look sharp. Does it try to corner people and ram them with their shells?” She asked.

“Correct. Near full marks. The ridge bug can’t build enough speed to ram a person. They try to corner you and grind you into a paste like a cat rubbing on a leg.” Liara answered.

Lily moved over to the ridge bug and attempted a few stabs at the shell, but her daggers just bounced off. The bug pursued Lily relentlessly, but she nimbly kept a safe distance. Lily noticed that the bug was very slow at turning and would often lose track of her if she moved around it. She was confident that she could avoid being cornered by it, but its shell was too hard. Lily tried getting her dagger between the ridges to pry off the carapace piece by piece, but it didn’t work.

Lily backed away. “Liara, I’m sorry. I can’t figure out how to beat it.”

Liara laughed. “It’s okay, Lily. Cael, any ideas?” She decided to test him.

After thinking for a bit, he remembered the carriage accident. “Tip it over? It looks pretty top-heavy.”

“What do you think, Lily? Does he get a passing mark?” Liara asked with a smile.

Lily decided to try his theory. She quickly got to the side of it and kicked it with the reinforced bottoms of her boot. It didn’t tip over, but Lily felt it give way a little.

The ridge bug started into a turn, causing its top to lean out. Noticing, Lily kicked at the top once more, and the ridge bug fell over. It screeched in protest as it was now stuck on its side.

“Good job, you two.” Liara giggled a bit.

The woman joined Lily and showed her that the stomach of the ridge bugs could easily be sliced open. The bug screeched out one final time as it died.

“Ew… It stinks.” Lily complained.

“Yeah, these things mostly eat things on the ground like… fecal matter. So when you kill one, aim for the brain and STAY away from the stomach and intestine. Seriously, you don’t want to smell half-digested goblin crap.” Liara warned.

They mapped out the rest of the floor for the following hours, only finding a few cheap loots. When they decided to camp at the staircase down for the night, Liara felt that Lily was prepared enough for the next floor.

Thanks to all of their traveling in the dungeon, Michael was not tired in the least bit, thanks to Master of Travel. He took on the night watch while the girls slept.

A ridge bug rounded the corner and came toward them.

“Back off if you know what’s good for you,” Michael ordered, using the Intimidate ability.

During those hours of seeing Lily fight the bugs, it was the first time he had seen one skitter away that fast. He chuckled and continued his watch.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The god Orbus appeared before Io. For once, he was the last god to their meeting.

“Sorry. I rushed here as quick as I could.” Orbus sat in his seat.

“At least you didn’t make a big deal out of it,” Tilra commented, giving Sylfaerune a side glance.

“Now that we are all here, the world has had its first sighting of the Demon-Lord,” Io reported.

“Seriously? What was it like?” Orbus asked.

“Sadly, no one saw it, so we don’t know.” Nanduun sighed.

“It somehow snuck past a bunch of soldiers and mercenaries and got into a dungeon.” Tilra threw her hands up.

“Syl, you chose the Demon-Lord. Do you really not have any details?” Io asked her sister.

“I told you before. It is a tanned-winged demon. But I don’t know how it may have changed during the awakening ceremony.” Sylfaerune replied. She didn’t see Michael destroy her idol but heard what he said through it. It scared her that he still had his mind. She needed him to die before the others could figure out what she had done. If it was reported to the Omni-Gods, she might be removed from her position, demoted, or even forbidden from ever taking part in world management.

“That’s not enough to go on. What an aged godde-.”

Sylfaerune slammed her hands onto the table while standing. “Who’s a garbage goddess!?” She yelled.

Tilra was taken aback in confused surprise at the outburst.

The other gods looked at her in concern.

“Is something going on, Syl?” Io asked.

“N-Nothing. Don’t worry about me.” Sylfaerune, embarrassed, left the meeting early.

“Something is definitely happening,” Tilra stated flatly.

“Most assuredly. Io, do you know anything?” Nanduun asked.

Io seemed a bit hesitant to speak up, but she did. “Lately, support for her has been on the wane. Her hero has not been doing her any favors.”

Tilra laughed. “So, a garbage hero for a garbage goddess! That’s rich!”

“Tilra.” Orbus tried scolding her, but he did agree with her to a point. He had heard of some of the things the hero had done.

“Even I have heard some things since the coalition was formed. The demons are disgusted with him.” Nanduun added.

“For now, the Demon-Lord is in the process of subjugating a dungeon. We will have to wait and hope for now.” Io stated.

The other gods thanked her and went back to their temples.

“Thank you for coming, Lord Tulsen,” Io said, setting up a drink for the now-present man.

“Ah, thank you.” Lord Tulsen took a drink while handing a file to Io. “That is everything I was able to gather. I have to agree with Tilra. Your sister is pretty garbage.” He gave her a wicked smile.

Io looked through the file while divining some snacks for Tulsen. She finished reading the report and placed it on the table.

She closed her eyes and let out a sad and disappointed sigh. “Dammit, Syl.”

Lord Tulsen looked at the goddess in surprise before laughing. “Now, that is rare to hear you lightly curse. Though she did screw up badly, so I understand.” He grinned.

Io didn’t want to have to report the situation to the Omni-Gods. It would mean the end of Sylfaerune’s future.

“What do you think, Lord Tulsen. Should I report this?” Io asked.

Lord Tulsen laughed. “You’ve got to be kidding me. You are asking me, a well-known killer of gods, what I think?”

Io looked into his dark eyes. Specks of silver and gold sparkled like stars within them.

Noticing the sadness in her eyes, he sighed. “I swear my wife is right that I have gone soft.” He complained. “Look, it is clear you want to give her a chance to change her ways. I know you’re helping that Michael guy, so keep doing that. Since she has been so irresponsible with her choices, I say help Michael take his revenge on her to a point.”

“Like what?” Io asked.

“I heard he destroyed one of her idols. Try to set him on a track to reduce her influence in the world. If her pride breaks, then she might repent. She will continue on the path if she tries to maintain her pride.” Lord Tulsen recommended.

Io didn’t like the idea, but it was better than the former. She agreed to guide Michael to that choice.

Lord Tulsen stood and opened a gateway to leave. “Oh, I will check around for another possible path. Discreetly, of course.” The man waved, and he was gone.

Io never imagined working with the perceived enemy of their world, the Demon-Lord, but it seemed to her it was her best choice for now.