The dungeon threw everything it had at Caeldaemos, but he easily obliterated everything. No traps, status effects, or barriers could slow his casual stroll through each floor. By the end of the fifteenth day, they stood before the final boss room door.

“Ah! The final battle! Truly this has been a blessing to travel with my lord!” Orelia’s faith seemed even more substantial.

In truth, Caeldaemos noticed that all of them seemed stronger. He had garnered some understanding of Divine Reverence by discussing it with the girls.

Orelia had gained the Apostle of the Demon-Lord Special, and her class had also changed to it. Most of her skills changed, and she now had the Bringer of Light and One with Darkness skills, giving her access to many powerful abilities. But unlike Caeldaemos, her ranks were not maxed.

The rest of the girls gained the Faithful of the Demon-Lord Special. The Special title upgraded any of their skills to ones that Caeldaemos had if they had one related.

Melee Weaponry, Martial Combat, One with Darkness, Bringer of Light, Mana Mastery, and Survivalist were granted to each girl. Listamati even learned that her natural regeneration had been upgraded to Rapid Regeneration.

All of them, even Orelia, the human, gained the Demon-Eyes ability that allowed them to see perfectly in darkness.

“This is it, Cael. We’ll be able to get out of here after two weeks. A world record.” Liara commented jokingly.

“But then the army outside….” Rana was worried.

“I doubt they could stop, master.” Mari calmly added.

“Daddy’s going to wreck those heroes!” Lily cheered.

Caeldaemos smiled warmly over their faith in him. But he didn’t quite agree with Lily’s comment. He didn’t feel like beating up the heroes, though he would defend himself and those he loved if they came at him.

Pushing on the door. “Let’s finish this.” Caeldaemos pushed open the final boss door.

They moved into the massive room.

[Ho? Someone actually made it down here?] A deep voice bemused.

The room lit up and revealed a large man sitting on a throne.

Caeldaemos was surprised. Of all the bosses and monsters in the dungeon, this was the first one to speak.

“Who are you?” Caeldaemos asked.

[A fragment. Yuteralis the Warlord.] The large man replied.

“Rana, does the name Yuteralis ring any bells?” Caeldaemos called out.

“Impossible… That’s… He’s a Demon-Lord!” Rana trembled in fear.

[Hmm? I sense a large fragment within you.] Yuteralis commented.

“Probably because I ate the part that tried to take me over,” Caeldaemos replied.

The final boss laughed aloud. [Good! Excellent! I vaguely remember when I ascended. I enjoyed fighting, and the last Demon-Lords capitalized on that. Corrupted me. Twisted me. Turned me into a machine of war. Heh, heh, heh. Yet, you stayed yourself.]

Yuteralis stood from his throne. [How about it? One-on-one? The winner takes all. You win. You get my fragment. I win. I get what is yours.]

“You can’t have what is mine, nor do I want your fragment. But I will agree to one-on-one.” Caeldaemos replied.

The fragment laughed. [Excellent. This shall be my final battle in this dungeon! One way or another!]

Yuteralis summoned a giant axe and shield and charged Caeldaemos.

Caeldaemos blocked the axe with his shield, the force of the blow blew the girls back, and the ground beneath his feet cracked.

Swinging his jager mace, Yuteralis was blasted back by the heavy force.

[Hah! Hah! Hah! Phenomenal! This will be fun!] Yuteralis charged back in.

Caeldaemos and Yuteralis traded blows and defenses over and over.

[More! More! Stand against me more Demon-Lord!] Yuteralis shouted excitedly.

Caeldaemos’ blood pumped with excitement. This was the best fight he had had since arriving in the world. He was wildly smiling as much as Yuteralis.

But before long, the intensity of the battle broke Caeldaemos’ jager mace. Using Ruler of Darkness, he blinked backward out of danger.

[Hah! Poor craftsmanship!] Yuteralis set his axe down and used his power to create a new jager mace for Caeldaemos, tossing it to him.

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With a wild smile. [Shall we continue?]

Caeldaemos picked it up. “Of course!”

The two Demon-Lords battled for hours, going through set after set of weapons and shields. Most of the girls were relaxing in a corner while Orelia watched the epic battle, offering praise and worship to Caeldaemos.

The two Demon-Lords separated again, their weapons broken, shields destroyed, sweating and breathing heavily.

“Come on. I ain’t… done yet.” Caeldaemos said.

[Heh… heh… I’m sorry, my friend… But I cannot…] Yuteralis fell to a knee.

“You out of mana?’ Caeldaemos asked.

[Not just me. The dungeon is out of mana. It put everything into this battle. I never learned your name.] Yuteralis’ form began to fade.

Caeldaemos’ heart sank. “Caeldaemos. Caeldaemos the Benevolent.”

[Caeldaemos the Benevolent? Heh, heh. Hah, hah, hah. HAHAHAHAHAH! Farewell, my friend! Use my fragment well! Perhaps you can help the others! HAHAHAHAH!] Yuteralis’ form faded away in joyous laughter, leaving a purified fragment of the Demon-Lord Yuteralis.

Caeldaemos touched it, and it absorbed into his body, giving him a new ability, Create Item.

But there was something that Yuteralis said that caught Caeldaemos’ attention. ‘Perhaps you can help the others.’ He wondered if it meant that fragments of the previous Demon-Lords still existed in the world. If they did, he wanted to help free them as he did with Yuteralis. The title of Demon-Lord and the ritual to become one was like a curse, and he would do what he could to lift it.

After calming down an overly excited Orelia, they gathered and headed to the very end of the dungeon.

The room was not large, but in the center was a giant, bluish-glowing orb that was secured into place by an upper and lower pedestal.

“We finally made it to the Dungeon Core!” Liara was relieved. She wanted to go home, take the longest bath of her life, and have a ton of ‘private time’ with Caeldaemos.

“Congratulations on such an epic win, Caeldaemos the Benevolent!” A feminine voice called through mana.

Looking around, they didn’t see anyone.

“Oh, come on, I know you all are smarter than that. It’s me!” The voice cheerily said.

They looked up at the Dungeon Core.

Inside the orb was a little girl around ten or eleven. She floated about on her stomach, looking down at them with a fulfilled smile. Her light blue hair flowed about airily.

“That was such an epic fight! I don’t think any other Dungeon Core could even hope to claim as such! Granted, circumstances being that they were, I am the first core to gain enough power to summon a fragment!” The Dungeon Core exclaimed excitedly.

“Hold on.” Caeldaemos was confused. “We are not on the same page as you. Could you maybe explain? Like, why is a little girl inside the core?”

“Oh wow. Do I have to start from there? Ah, granted, we cores don’t really like talking to people. Like, we put so much work into building our dungeons, and then some jerks come and start breaking them! I mean, slaying monsters and taking the supplies we leave out is one thing, but stupid people started mining dungeons! It should be impossible, but the jerks started hurting my friend!” The dungeon core cried out.

The little girl seemed all over the place, but Caeldaemos couldn’t ignore the last part she said.

“What is that about your friend and mining?” Caeldaemos asked.

The little girl teared up. “Can you help my friend?! Please! Pretty Please!?”

“Cael?” Liara asked worriedly, feeling her bath and ‘private time’ might be slipping away.

“Sorry, girls.” He apologized to his family. “Do you have a name?” Caeldaemos asked the core.

“Me? Um… Nope. No name. Since you beat me, though, I can reward you all! Since it is my first time being conquered, I can give you something special. And if you are willing to help my friend, I will give you something even MORE special!” The core announced.

“Could you please explain about your friend?” Caeldaemos tried directing the conversation.

“Oh, right, my friend. Some people developed some kind of tool to mine parts of the dungeon walls. It would be like someone harvesting your flesh. My friend is constantly in pain!” The core cried.

“Why are they harvesting the dungeon, though?” Rana asked.

“Us dungeons are basically masses of concentrated mana. A single fist-sized chunk of a wall would be 100 times more potent than the best mana stones you can find spawned in a dungeon. I am actually glad that you caused the emergency sealing.” The core answered.

Rana then followed up on the core’s answer. “Airships require at least a hundred of the highest grade to even be viable. I can see why they would want to mine the dungeon.”

“The question is, what is their purpose in doing it?” Listamati added.

“I don’t know. I can’t see inside or around his dungeon. I tried asking him… but he is in too much pain….” The core seemed on the verge of tears.

Caeldaemos could feel that the dungeon core was not lying. At first, he was unsure of how he knew, but then he remembered the Lord of Darkness’s skill. It allowed him to see within the darkness of others’ hearts, so he assumed he could now tell if someone was lying to him. All he could feel from the core was sadness and desperation.

“I’ll help your friend.” Caeldaemos gave the core his answer.

“Cael!” Liara and the others were hesitant to trust the dungeon core.

Caeldaemos smiled warmly at them. “Just trust me.”

The dungeon core burst out crying, thanking him for accepting to help her friend.

“Hey, Geon,” Lily called out to the core.

“Geon?” The core tilted her head in question.

“I felt you need a name! Dungeon ends in the letters G-E-O-N, so Gii-yon.” Lily offered.

Caeldaemos smiled. “I like it.”

The dungeon core accepted the name happily.

“Geon,” Rana spoke up. “You mentioned seeing around your friend’s dungeon. Can you see outside yours?”

“Yup! One second.” Geon’s form disappeared inside the depths of the core, and a live feed outside the dungeon came up.

“That’s a lot of soldiers,” Mari commented.

“They built a damn fortress,” Liara added.

“Do you think you can get past that, my lord?” Orelia asked.

The image changed to a room where Caeldaemos saw the Hero of Io, Hana.

“Damn, even the heroes are here. Getting out might be a problem since I don’t know how they might affect me.” Caeldaemos replied.

The live feed went away, and Geon returned. “I could teleport you far away, like to my friend’s dungeon! But I must recharge my mana to get all of you that far.”

“How long?” Liara asked.

“Hmm… A couple of weeks? I used up all my mana to power the fragment. I had to reclaim all kinds of bosses, monsters, and traps just to get enough mana to even summon it.” Geon answered.

“Wait, is that why you dropped us eleven floors!?” Liara yelled.

“That and you guys were moving too slow,” Geon replied.

They were flabbergasted by Geon’s response.

“Geon.” Caeldaemos felt like he was getting a migraine.

“Hmm?” Geon innocently looked at him.

“If you needed our help….” He sighed. “People die when they fall from great heights.”

“I know. I set up a safety spell near the bottom. But you guys never made it to it.” Geon replied.

“And. How were we supposed to know that?” Caeldaemos asked.

Geon tensed and looked away.

“If you could put signs down. Use a sign.” Caeldaemos sighed heavily.

“I’ll… remember that…” Geon guiltily replied.