“He sure is taking his time… Maybe I put too many seasonings in the meat.”

There were some frozen rocks in the area that Nimir could use to finish his business, and I didn’t want to bother him by asking if he was sick or something. Checking on him in an embarrassed position would be traumatizing for both of us.

Still, eventually, I noticed that something was off. Spending half an hour taking a dump was simply too much. When I went to check the places where we used to take a leak, I confirmed that he wasn't there.

“... That idiot,”

Once I focused my senses after finding that spot empty and clean, and I was able to tell that he wasn't around. I wasn't good at that like Nimir, but I could do a bit. In any case, to think that he would do such a thing… I guess I was expecting too much logical thinking from a kid.

I stopped to think for a moment instead of immediately following him. Nimir was strong enough to face the monsters for a while, even if they came in pairs, but his stamina wouldn't last long. The fugitives, depending on their numbers, could be camping in front of the boss' chamber and defeating the creature periodically in order to gain strength… I probably could reach him in time before he reaches them if I can find his traces. That was easier said than done…

In the end, I headed to the next floor after taking some pages from my notebook and then applying them to my arms. After that, I applied some magic ink on them. On my forearm, there was the tattoo of the face of an Electric Wolf, and above my elbow, I put the tattoo of the face of an Alpha Eagle. With both of those, I increased my movement speed by five meters and my dexterity by twenty points. My mana began to be drained pretty fast, so I dashed to look for Nimir.

The monsters take a bit of time to dissolve inside the dungeon when they are left alone, so I soon found traces of the monsters that Nimir got rid of. They had these wounds in their arms and necks that fit his fighting style. It seemed that even the most powerful monsters in a chimeric type of dungeon wasn’t really a problem to him. I wondered if all those who had beastkin blood or even the beastkin could become that stupidly strong so fast.

In any case, it didn't take long before I was forced to stop since the path split and I had no idea which path he chose… my senses and parameters were sharp since it was nighttime, but it still took a bit of time to find traces of the path he followed.

Eventually, some Frost Lizards tried to get in my way, but they had their heads smashed by my earth-enchanted bolts. I didn't try to dismantle them or look for mana cores in order to reach that moron as soon as possible. Still, after one hour of doing that, and after crossing two floors, I couldn't help but furrow my eyebrows.

‘Did he transform and gain more speed?’

Soon enough, I was getting tired and I was supposed to be able to find him a long time ago… that didn't make any sense. My mana was empty after using those tattoos of high-quality several times in a row. Then I recalled that I gave him some camouflage scrolls earlier… he probably used them to avoid some fights.

I felt like sighing when I realized that I had caused those problems myself… at this point in time, I couldn't help but wonder if doing all this was still worth the hassle. Helping a kid was fine and all, but putting myself at risk for someone who refused to listen to me when it mattered the most was basically a waste of time.

‘Well, in one way or the other, I had to confirm this… perhaps this will be a good way to end our partnership. Just sending him away alone would probably make him face some problems, but this can be a good arrangement.’

We benefited from this together, so I didn't have that much reason to feel bothered. At the same time, I thought that I would have to look after him for months, but only three weeks had passed. I considered that as a win, my plans weren't delayed at all.

Since I needed to recover, I decided to take my time dealing with the dungeon. Instead of rushing ahead, I just blew their heads open with my hand crossbow. If things get dicey, I would need all the strength I could get, after all. Better to conserve it while I could.

I had planned to reach the end of the dungeon before morning, but three Frost Lizards began to block my path when I reached the seventh floor. Disposing of them was easy, but recovering my bolts took a bit of time from their heads. When the debuffs of the day began to affect me, I was at the end of the eighth floor.

Instead of going down, I decided to camp there until night and keep killing the monsters that might spawn and come to me. I was a bit worried about Nimir, but at that point in time, I could confirm that he did everything possible to fall into the fugitives' hands. Still, in no time, I heard the sound of footsteps coming from the previous floor… I got ready to use my hand cannon and hand crossbow, but soon I relaxed a bit.

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“Regulus! It is me! Don’t attack!”

I could hear more than one pair of footsteps and I felt like I might have an aneurysm… I told him not to use my name, but it seemed that I overestimated Nimir’s intelligence. I still kept pointing my weapons at the entrance to the next floor, but they still came. They had confidence in their skills of dealing with me, that much was obvious.

Before long, Nimir showed up while raising his arms… behind him, there were two tall and muscular warriors. They had their fists covered in chains, it made sense that they didn’t have weapons since they were covered in rags too. In any case, their appearance got me curious… I had imagined that they would be half-elves or half-dwarves, but one of them looked a bipedal wolf and another looked like a centaur.

‘What the heck… beastkin?’

I knew that their land didn’t have a border with the Bastion empire, so I wondered how they got this far… the lord of the town probably bought them, but he had the permission of other countries to bring them here, or maybe they were just smuggled.

“This smell… the smell of something that is alive but at the same time isn’t…”

The wolfman raised his guard while looking at me. Great… my ring of misinformation was useless against those who can use their noses to identify people. I never considered that I would find them at this point in time, so I was truly caught off guard.

“You look young… are you the half-human and half-vampire that people talk about?”

The centaur looked a bit less edgy, but I couldn’t drop my guard just yet. I already had planned for that kind of situation a bunch of times as well.

“No, you got the wrong person. My camp isn’t open for visitors today, so you can return where you came from.”

“It is okay, Regulus. You can trust them. They aren’t bad people.”

“If I were to trust the judgment of someone who acts without telling me anything and crosses half of a dungeon by themselves in the middle of the night… Well, I would be at least very stupid.”

Nimir forced a sad smile. He was supposed to know that half-humans weren’t supposed to be liked anywhere and here was him, being nice and naive in front of the first people that didn’t treat him with disgust. They were just being cautious in order to avoid trouble and making more enemies.

“It is okay, young adventurer. Nimir told us about your situation.”

“I am sure he did.”

“Hm?”

The centaur looked at me in confusion and the wolfman also looked puzzled for some reason and blinked at me several times. Before long, the centaur broke into laughter.

“Hahaha! So it is like that! You must have had a hard time with this fellow, Nimir.”

The centaur patted his head a few times and Nimir looked a lot troubled by it. In any case, the atmosphere took a weird turn, so I felt that my focus was waning.

Anyway, Nimir told us that you want to get the final class of the dungeon. We can help you with that, but you will also have to help us too.”

“What if I say no?”

“Then we will have to follow with our original plan and you won’t like it.”

“You guys might not like the end result either.”

“Calm down, it isn’t like that. What I meant is that we are planning to cause a dungeon break and use the chaos to escape.”

Cause a dungeon break… I was sure that such a thing was possible, but I had no idea how. In any case, considering that they were in a bind, it was a method that they wouldn’t hesitate to use, it was logical. As someone who wanted to clear the dungeon, that definitely wasn’t something I would like.

“Nimir told us that you can make weapons, we can help you deal with the boss if you help us with some weapons. If you enchant them, then we can give you the mana cores we got as well.”

That was a good proposal… I would earn a lot from it and the next class would come too easily. I couldn’t have asked for more. Still, I felt that it was too good to be true.

“Hey, you are telling too much…”

The wolfman was still on edge thanks to the fact that I was half-vampire. He looked at his companion with uncertain eyes, but the centaur looked not in the least worried.

“Well, it doesn’t matter, right? The plan is already finished, we just changed things a bit because of their arrival and that can help us without making us even more wanted.”

Causing a dungeon break would put the people in the town in danger, if that wasn’t enough, the neighboring countries could use that chance to invade and then a war might start… being the start of that fire wasn’t something that the fugitives wanted. That made sense since a lot more people would be after them… by not using such a method, they would only be chased by the lord of the town and his underlings.

“Well then, do you accept the deal?”

Truth be told, I wanted to avoid anything and anyone that might cause me problems. Still, I kind of threw away that idea when I decided to help Nimir. I didn’t know how much those guys could help me, but at least I would gain a lot and perhaps I could increase my rank in the guild as well. At the same time, if Nimir wanted to work with them, then I wouldn’t have to worry about his future.

“Alright, I accept your deal.”

I only did that because I knew that those guys didn’t have real weapons and I had a trick up my sleeve if they tried anything against my life. Besides, if they were willing not to go as far as to cause a dungeon break, then perhaps they could be trusted a bit. I decided to check their parameters and confirmed that if they wanted, they didn’t have to use roundabout ways to kill us…

Name: Vincent

Race: Centaur

Health: 820/820

Regen: 10.5 per hour

Mana: 220/220

Regen: 1.9 per minute

Stamina: 1250/1250

Regen: 15.0 per minute