Jonathan told Edgar what the orb was, and then put it in his storage device. Perhaps he could find a use for it. In the meanwhile, he had a question for Edgar.
“So, what was that you were telling me about undead ranks?”
“Right. Undead are unique in that they, at least the sapient ones, were once humanoids. As such, they have additional rankings based on the power of their new form. Rank 1 undead are all of the ones that are merely dim brutes, unknowing of anything except for primal hunger. After that, you find sapients. The ranks loosely match the tiers, as there are ten ranks. Generally, one will not find Rank 5 undead until Tier 50 for example. Note that I mean in terms of prevalence. There are Rank 5 undead at much lower Tiers, but they are vanishingly rare.”
“What kinds of undead are there?” Jonathan asked.
“It generally matches with the ranking system for monsters. Basic, elite, etc. A Tier 10, Rank 5 undead would be much stronger than a Tier 10, Rank 2 undead, even if they were the same level. I can give you an example for each Rank, from what I learned. Rank 1 has skeletons and zombies. Rank 2 has liches and revenants. Rank 3 has vampires and some offshoots. Rank 4 has Elder Liches and Wight Lords. Rank 5 is where the gap really starts to get noticeable. You can find monsters like Corpse Kings and Spirit Sovereigns. Rank 6 includes Elder Vampires. Rank 7 has ancient liches and Corpse Emperors. After that, you start to run into semi-mythical monsters. Rank 8 is where you can find True Lich Dragons, beasts that sacrifice their lives for eternal power. Rank 9 has Necrotic Overlords, monsters that are capable of turning the world around themselves into a manifestation of undeath. There is only one type of undead at Rank 10. Corpse Demigods. Monsters that have been steeped in undeath for so long that they have attained the power of a minor god.”
Jonathan took this all in silence, thinking through what Edgar was telling him. It was similar to his own experience. He simply nodded in response, and after he was sure that they had collected everything worth collecting, he selected yes on the notification, and was transported to the next floor.
They were in the final stretch of the dungeon, passing through the final ten floors. As such, the fights grew harder and harder the further that they went. By the penultimate floor, the monsters were all over level 190, and were all at least Elite. The bosses ranged all the way to the lofty heights of level 195. With their natural advantages, such monsters almost claimed the lives of Jonathan and Edgar multiple times. If not for Jonathan’s supreme regeneration and durability, he would have been too gravely injured to continue multiple times over. Edgar meanwhile had taken little damage, the result of his fighting style.
This constant danger paid dividends however, and their levels had risen dramatically. Jonathan was standing on the cusp of level 195, almost at the peak of Tier 2. It was an amazing amount of progress, and it reminded him that the real treasure of Tartarus was this dungeon. He found himself thinking about Granath often.The monster no longer was such an unassailable adversary at this point. Instead, he simply seemed to be an incredibly tough opponent, rather than a god given flesh.
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The fiftieth floor was at odds with the rest of the floors. It seemed to be mostly untouched by the encroaching darkness that had corrupted the rest of the dungeon. It was the last bastion against the corruption in the entire place. Because of this, it looked more like a slice of Tartarus than anything else, a few dozen miles of lava and volcanic rock. A mountain stood in the very center of the floor, easily a mile in height, if not more. All around it, monsters roamed, sliding in and out of the lava and across the ground. All of them were high level, and seemed to be well adapted to this world.
In the center, periodic exhalations could be heard, as if some massive beast was breathing within the mountain. Knowing this dungeon, there probably was.
Jonathan paused, and started to scout out the land. The place was quite uniform, but there were hillocks of volcanic rock every now and again, and holes within them led to underground burrows filled with monsters. A lake of lava surrounded the central mountain, branching off into rivers of molten rock that coursed across the plain. The heat was staggering, and Jonathan noticed that Edgar was using a cocoon of wind to insulate himself from it.
“Having trouble there?” He asked light heartedly, jostling Edgar with his elbow.
“Yes,” the man replied with a glare. “I’m not a physically gifted brute like you. Your Resilience is that of a mountain.”
“Physically gifted?” Jonathan asked, raising his eyebrows. Only then did Edgar realize what that had sounded like.
“I didn’t mean-” Jonathan had already walked off, leaving Edgar to splutter.
The wind mage sighed and rose into the air on wings of wind, flitting off into the dungeon floor. Meanwhile, Jonathan headed towards the first group of monsters, a collection of reptiles basking in the glow of a lava river. They were not normal reptiles, as each was outfitted with over a dozen legs, each of which was tipped with vicious looking claws. They were not as dangerous as they looked however, and they would make a nice warmup to this stage of the dungeon.
Jonathan gave Edgar a nod and raced in, feeling his companion’s buff take effect. His speed increased sharply, and he almost lifted off the ground. With a roar, he crashed into the first of the monsters, his fist blasting through its flesh like a cannonball. The monster was turned into pulverized meat and bone within an instant. The others rose to their feet, hissing. Spikes of concentrated air pressure dropped down from above, slamming them into the ground.
Jonathan tore his way through the stunned reptiles, turning them into bloody jelly. His fists were so powerful that most monsters at his level could not resist even a normal punch. His power was hundreds of times greater than that of a normal human, and each of his strikes could break a hill in half, let alone a monster. Only bosses and monsters uniquely suited for durability could stand long before him.