Jonathan poked at the creature with his spear, gradually growing more adept at controlling it. Soon he was able to control the explosion somewhat, using up only the tip of the spear, using the rest as a channel for his mana. This greatly increased his power, and the monster was soon dead, in a heap of jelly like liquid.
Essence entered him and Edgar, propelling Edgar up another level. Unfortunately, Jonathan did not gain one. However, both men were coming closer and closer to Tier 2, which would be a huge boost to their power. Jonathan banished his spear, letting the ichor on it fall to the ground. Edgar dropped from the sky, his wings disappearing. The two men were finished with the first section of the dungeon, eager to discover the rest of its secrets.
The next section of the dungeon was the same as it had been before, a tunnel that sloped down to a massive lake of lava, populated by monsters. However, the lake was larger this time, and in the very center there was a small island with a tree on it, a tree that glowed with a faint light. However, far more shapes circled under the lava around the lake. In addition, the series of islands that crossed the lake came nowhere near the island. This was not the same layout as it had been, in many ways harder than it had been when Jonathan had plumbed the depths of this dungeon.
He told Edgar as much, prompting a look of suspicion from the man at the dungeon’s irregular behavior. In any case, the tree at the center burned brightly to his spiritual sense, and he could sense that whatever was there was valuable. There was no indication of what it was, but it seemed like something that would be worthwhile to pursue. Jonathan started towards the edge of the lake, and then realized that he had an easy cheat for this section of the dungeon.
“Edgar, can’t you just fly us over?” Jonathan asked, turning to the other man.
“I mean, I can try. I am sure that the System would not make it that easy though.”
Edgar began to rise into the air, but almost immediately a pressure descended on him, forcing him to the ground. He shook his head, and gave Jonathan a disappointed look. “As I suspected. We cannot evade the purpose of this zone that easily.”
Jonathan nodded grimly and stared ahead at the lava. It looked like they were going to have to do this the old fashioned way. With a shake of his head, Jonathan leaped towards the first island in the lava, landing securely. Edgar followed a moment later, landing by Jonathan. The monsters stirred in the deep, but none surfaced.
However, over the next hour, they did not have such luck, and soon Edgar was covered in burns, the result of not having any armor. Jonathan was far better off, but he had taken the brunt of the physical damage, having blocked the monsters from directly striking his companion. Jonathan could take the hits, but Edgar could not. Still, they were making a good run of it, and they were already a quarter of the way across the lake, having paused periodically for Edgar to regain his stamina. In return, he sped up their passage with various Air elemental skills that increased their speed. Soon there would be too little land for them to leap though, which would necessitate for Edgar to ride on Jonathan’s back across the lava, an experience that neither of them were looking forward to.
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As they crossed over onto a ridiculously small lip of rock protruding up from the lava, they found that it was time for them to enact their plan. With a grunt, Jonathan dove into the lava, surfacing a moment later. Compared to when he had done this before, he was far stronger, and the lava didn't even bother him at all. It just felt like warm water to his skin, perhaps even in a pleasant manner if he thought about it.
Edgar lowered himself down slowly with his control over the air onto Jonathan’s shoulders, and stood there as Jonathan began to paddle out into the lake. Edgar kept an eye out for monsters, and would alert Jonathan if any of them came close enough to harm them. The central island was about five hundred feet away from their current position, which was not that far admittedly, but considering their situation, it might as well have been miles.
The first monster surfaced barely ten seconds later, a brute of a lava eel that was covered in spines. The creature hissed at the duo and expelled a cloud of fiery vapors from its mouth, rolling across the lava towards them. Jonathan sent out a field of Void mana towards the monster, using every ounce of his mastery to do such a thing. The two clouds of energy met each other, and Jonathan’s one siphoned away the power from the cloud, allowing Edgar to dispel it a moment later with a gust of mana enhanced wind.
The eel hissed again and then sank under the lava, heading towards Jonathan underneath the surface of the lake. Jonathan gathered energy to his hands, causing the mana around him to smoke as it was superheated by his skills, and waited until he could sense the monster coming towards him. With his superior senses, he could detect almost anything within a ten feet radius around himself, and as soon as the monster passed into that area, Jonathan elongated his mana and thrust it into the monster’s eyes, which he could feel based on the slightly altered passage of the lava over them.
There was a muffled scream and the lava boiled upwards, revealing a seriously angry monster, with bright red blood streaming from its left eye. Jonathan kicked forwards, and ducked under a swipe from its massive head, causing Edgar to exclaim angrily, and hunker down. Droplets of lava were thrown up onto Edgar, but if they hurt him, the man did not show any indication. Instead, he threw a spear of wind into the already wounded eye of the monster, causing it to howl again as the energy bored through the side of its head. With one final attack from Jonathan in the same spot, they broke through to its brain, killing the monster.
Its corpse sank beneath the placid surface of the lava lake, and Jonathan continued onwards. They had many other encounters like this along a similar vein, but they made it to the central island eventually, hauling themselves up onto it with sighs of relief.