Taking a long break and getting fed a healing potion, I managed to use some water to clean my visor, putting it back on after a meal.

“So, what happened? Why are you here?” I asked casually to the clingy man as I pulled my helmet back on, standing and stretching. My body cracked in several places, and I sighed.

“The… they asked me to, um, join. I refused, but… After a presidential order I was forcefully enlisted,” Lawrence managed, seeming distracted by something. Glancing to the side, I saw the medic—what was her name? Did I ever get it?—walking around.

I stared at my phone, slowly scrolling through it. Playing some music, I wandered around until I found the commander.

So six people was a bit too little to destroy a single room.

“How many people do we have to work with?” I asked, “Uninjured and ready-for-combat.”

“About sixty,” The leader of the military unit said, glancing around, “You plan to leave soon?”

An odd question. We had to do this. Or at least I did, and I would happily use the military to help me out.

“I mean I hate this place. The sooner we can get out of here the better,” I agreed, thinking for a moment.

Sixty was too much. The rooms were quite big… Maybe ten melee, four shooters? That way we’d only have to kill forty-five gargoyles each, an easy feat compared to the over one-hundred of before.

“Okay. In order to easily clear a room we should try ten melee and four shooters,” I said after a moment.

The commander—Derrick, I think his name was?—held up his hand, “Before you say anything, we do have a tent for battle plans. I think we should take this there, sir.”

“Huh? Yeah, okay,” I agreed, nodding.

Derrick led me to the tent that was next to the healing tent. In there was Lawrence, Alec, and a few others I didn’t really recognize.

On a table was a paper with the information of each room. I read through it.

Four waves of zombies pouring from each hall, 450 ghouls gargoyles aerial attacks. One person collapsing leads to a swarm flying down and attacking both the downed and those standing.

This was all next to the square drawing of the room.

“Uh, cool. What I was thinking was having ten melee for the gargoyles and four people with guns,” I said, gesturing, “That would have two people in front of each exit and two in the center, spaced with enough distance that they won’t hit each other but could help each other if one needs it. The ones on the opposite side of the gunners—“ that sounded better than shooters, should I use that instead? “—would have to deal with both zombies and gargoyles, but I don’t think it’s really an issue, since the gargoyles only seem to attack after the zombies? At least I didn’t get hit by any when I was fighting the zombies. We did fine with four melee and three sho—gunners, but uh… yeah. It’ll probably be easier with ten people. This way we can deal with more rooms at once.”

It was silent a long moment as the man stared at the map.

“I would suggest putting the people that went with me in the other groups, since they could see what we did and use the same strategies. At the moment we have…” I did the math, “Four open rooms. I don’t know how many rooms there are in this dungeon, but let’s plan for all of them to look like this, and have the soldiers return if the room looks different.”

More silence.

“… Yes? No?”

Lawrence spoke quietly, “You really think fourteen people can defeat everything? That one room took all sixty of us in rotation.”

I hesitated, “I mean, I cleared a room with six people, I don’t think the extra people will make it harder, and it wasn’t really all that difficult, just annoying as hell…”

Alec scoffed, shaking his head even as he adjusted his gloves, “We don’t have enough bullets to go through every room like that if there’s more than twenty rooms.”

Humming, I shrugged, “Then the eight on the outside will focus on the zombies, the gunners will focus on the imps and their hall, and the ones in the center will be support for anyone that needs it, be it calling out a gargoyle attack or pulling zombies off of a downed soldier. Think that’ll last?”

The inside of the tent was quite nice, and the quiet music playing in my helmet was great. It was well-lit enough that the square table with the paper on it was able to be read clearly even with everyone crowding it.

“I don’t feel comfortable risking my men like that,” Derrick said, shaking his head, “We should retreat so I can speak with my commanding officer about this.”

My lips thinned, but I didn’t complain, remaining silent. Fighting the swarms alone would be impossible. It wasn’t like a day had passed outside, though, even though I’d slept and got up to continue the hunt.

If a minute was three hours in here… How long did it take the magical creatures to respawn? Would they respawn? Maybe I was just too used to video games where all progress was lost once you left. While it didn’t feel like it, this was real life. This was reality, I doubted all our hard work would just be undone.

Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

“Just you and a select few, or everyone?” I asked.

Would they take all of their items out of the dungeon, too? It might be dangerous to leave it all here, since zombie hoards pounded at the doors frequently.

“Yes, I think so,” Derrick agreed as if I hadn’t asked him a multiple-choice question, seeming more certain in his decision, “We’ll pack up and leave to report to the staff sergeant.”

That definitely sounded like a rank above sergeant. Were they the same thing? Maybe not… were those two people staff sergeants? The ones who were under that old man? The blond and brunette?

I sighed. Maybe I was too violent and impatient. While time was quickly running out, there was still ninety days left. Or eighty-nine or something. That was more than enough time for the military to mobilize on a national scale and dive into these time-dilated dungeons.

Wait, were all dungeons time-dilated? The time dilation was vastly different between the skeleton’s dungeon and this one…

I guess I’d find out later.

“Well, okay. It would make sense, this dungeon seems more difficult and much bigger than the previous two dungeons I’ve dived into.”

Derrick nodded once, his straight shoulders relaxing slightly as he turned.

“If you would excuse me,” He said, saluting before leaving.

I glanced around, seeing that I was the only one on this side of the table. Did he just salute me? What did I do to deserve that?

Sighing, I shrugged, “Well, let’s go, Lawrence.”

Lawrence and I walked out, heading to the entrance to wait for Derrick and his miniature army. I took the moment to look at myself, seeing that my armor was warped with heat and there were scratches I don’t recall getting littering my form.

They weren’t as deep as the goblin’s claws, but they were everywhere, the fabric shredded and the armor looking like it had gone through a shredder. The only parts that didn’t look shredded were the warped pieces that I realized were keeping the entire ensemble together.

Huh.

Had I fought again, I probably would have ended up fighting nude. Oops, maybe I should pay more attention to my outfit. Even my gloves looked like they were struggling to stay together, though they looked to be in much better shape than my body armor. They were frayed and splitting apart, strands of fabric barely clinging to the metal plates now visible, the black paint stripped from the knuckles.

Lawrence was next to me looking just as ragged, still wearing the blood-stained suit he’d been wearing since before the goblin dungeon. It was frayed and torn, and all of the scratches and tears made some of his skin visible, though it was all covered in blood and filth.

Soon enough, Derrick appeared, the soldiers all bustling around and efficiently packing up the small camp they’d made.

“We’ll be ready to head out in ten minutes,” Derrick reported.

I nodded, waiting. Reaching up, I turned up my music slightly. Background noise became audible enough to hear even the quietest of lyrics, still quiet enough that I’d hear what everyone was saying as long as they intended to speak to me.

“So…” Lawrence managed.

I glanced up and to the left, staring at the ragged man.

“What did you do before? Did you also lose your job?”

“Yes, a dungeon destroyed the building I worked at,” I agreed, “Some dude almost died.”

Lawrence nodded, looking away awkwardly. I stared at him for a long few moments before looking forward, too. Well, okay, then.

Was it something I said?

Derrick walked up again, his soldiers behind him.

“Ready?” I asked.

He nodded.

“Cool, let’s go.”

Turning, I walked out, immediately moving to the side. Reaching out, I dragged Lawrence to the side, too, and we watched as the marching men stumbled into each other because of the time dilation.

It was a loud commotion, and I couldn’t help but grin. Yeah, maybe I should have seen this coming earlier and warned Derrick.

Flushed and harried, it took much more than twenty minutes to get his men up and on their feet.

“Soldier, report!” A familiar voice called out.

“What the hell is going on here?” An equally familiar, if more casual, voice demanded.

Derrick stood to attention, saluting the blond and brunette, “Sirs!”

“Where are the others, Sergeant Paul?” The brunette demanded, his blue eyes looking fierce.

The blond was frowning at me, his eyes scouring my form.

“KIA, Staff Sergeant Johnson, sir,” Derrick said solemnly.

The blond’s gaze darted to Derrick, looking severe, “Sergeant Murphy?”

Derrick looked more solemn, “Sorry, Jones. I am the only Sergeant left.”

Jones? Was he related to the female Jones? Gross. He didn’t look old enough to be her father, though… Was it good DNA or did she have a brother? Or, well, Jones was a common last name, did they just share the last name without any relation?

“Son of a bitch,” Jones muttered.

Johnson gave Jones an annoyed look, clearly holding his tongue to prevent from scolding the other man.

“That dumbfuck Moron Maron should be fired,” Jones snapped, a hand running through his hair, “What the hell was he thinking?”

“Jones,” Johnson snapped, “Enough. Insulting your lieutenant won’t bring back the dead.”

“If he’d done his goddamned job we would have been in there! We could’ve prevented this!” Jones argued, shaking his head as he turned and stormed off, “I’m getting that stupid bastard fired with full dishonors.”

I rose my eyebrows, humming quietly to myself. Well then.

…

People died…

Determination filled me.

A lot more would die if we didn’t do this. They knew what they signed up for, though if the blond guy was right then it shouldn’t have happened the way it did.

Incompetence is a very dangerous weapon to wield.

“Blood,” Johnson said sharply, focusing down on me, “With me. Sergeant Paul, take your men and get some rest.”

Derrick saluted as Johnson turned and walked away. I followed him, noting that Lawrence chased after me. When I arrived to where Johnson was leading me, I found myself face-to-screen with a few people. I tilted my head at the sight of the President of America.

Oh.

…

Shit, why was I involved with this? I thought they were treating me like some sort of shitty no-subs influencer, why the hell was the president on the screen? Why was I brought here? Did Johnson walk into the wrong room?

“Blood! Excellent, we can begin our meeting, now,” The old man in green I saw the other day with a few stars on his collar and a lot of colorful things on his chest said.

You motherfucker! It was you, wasn’t it?