"Elie!"

The young woman with serious mobility issues hurried to embrace her friend, who thankfully seemed well.

"Hmm, where am I? I was having a crazy dream, some strange skeleton was giving me orders, and Eric had died."

The young woman stared at Elie's face for several seconds before finally uttering a word.

"Well..."

As the young woman's vision gradually cleared, she was somewhat startled because right in front of her, what she had believed to be a mere shadow turned out to be, in fact, a skeleton. A skeleton dressed in a grandiose, entirely black hooded cloak. However, it appeared to be producing a terrifying appearance where its face should be.

"Hello."

...

Finally, out of sheer stress, she began to grip her head tightly. Everything she had thought was a lie and just a dream had turned out to be reality. Not only had Eric, a companion who had been with them for some time, died, but she, a paladin of the god of light, had been saved by a skeleton, a skeleton capable of communication.

What to do? What to do?

She couldn't really comprehend the situation. She was, in fact, a devout follower of the god of light, and a nefarious being was supposed to be quickly detected by her senses. But she couldn't sense anything at all from the skeleton in front of her, as if it didn't even exist, as it didn't seem to carry any karma.

After staring fixedly at the skeleton, almost ready for an inevitable battle, she finally said, "What... are you?"

David was getting irritated with these questions. He was a skeleton, wasn't it obvious? Having to answer this multiple times was becoming a bit tedious.

"I am... the one who saved your life, so you're welcome. PALADIN of justice who was about to seriously harm the ILLUMINATED being that appeared just in time to save you."

"Wait, I wasn't going to..."

"No more! Do you know how hard it is to be a skeleton? And when I perform some altruistic act, the very people I save suspect my true intentions. You see, if I wanted to kill you, I would have done it extremely easily, maybe along with the zombies or even when you were unconscious."

David was masterfully performing a grand act, which was much easier for him due to his lack of facial muscles. Even after a century without practice, he was still very good at acting. It wasn't surprising since he had always enjoyed participating in theater since childhood.

Now, using various bone gestures, he began to raise his arms, moving them like a truly stressed-out Italian descendant, all the while continuing to speak.

"I don't deserve to hear your accusations like this. I hope you can leave this dungeon safely. Have a nice day!" He had finished his act and, after turning his back on the young women, began to walk away from them furiously.

After a few moments, as he expected, he heard a loud, "Wait!"

If he could, David would be smiling right now.

Turning back to the young women, he simply waited for the tedious monologue that would probably follow from his act.

However, these young women seemed to be unfamiliar with the script David was following, and unlike what he had expected, they were deeply affected by what they had heard.

When David turned around, he only saw that the paladin, who seemed to carry dozens of pounds in her body just from her armor, was actually crying.

Damn.

"No... we're not talking about you like that. We just want to know why you are the way you are... but... we would never have hurt you."

What a disappointment. Why do I even bother, right? Are the people in this world more emotional? It doesn't make sense. Well, they lost a friend, so I guess it's natural.

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"Okay, okay, let's just forget about it then. In fact, I think it would be better if you check your friend's leg; it doesn't seem to be doing well."

When Elie finally turned back to her friend, she quickly panicked again when she realized that she had passed out.

After a while, she quickly assessed her friend's condition, and strangely, began chanting some incomprehensible words to David.

As she chanted, a strange aura formed in her hand, which she was using in a very peculiar way to heal her friend.

Fascinating. It doesn't make any sense, but it's fascinating.

As all of this was happening, David noticed that an ignorant and weak zombie was approaching, and seeing that not even the young woman cared about it, he waited for the creature to get as close as possible before throwing his weapon at it.

Afterward, and some more time, the young woman seemed to have stopped using her spell and appeared to be exhausted but not unconscious.

"Okay, I think... it would be best for you to get out of this dungeon as soon as possible. I have to get back to what I was doing before."

Hearing this, she quickly said, "No... by now, Eric's body has been absorbed by the dungeon... I think it will be easy to leave this place, but please, don't leave. Wait for a few hours, and we will come back with something to help you in this situation."

David didn't quite understand what she meant by that, but in the end, he accepted. He didn't think she would bring something to harm him. David was actually quite sure that she alone could do that.

Maybe she would bring him a new weapon? That would be very useful... or perhaps she would bring him several daggers? That would be really good. Should I have asked her for that?

Imagine, I clearly can't control more than one weapon right now, but it would be very interesting and powerful.

While waiting, David had to kill some zombies that passed through the area from time to time. Interestingly, he finally discovered where all these creatures were coming from unexpectedly.

They were coming from the ground.

Somehow, the dungeon itself seemed to produce these beings, and that was very... very strange because they weren't bodies or something that came to life. They were a strange black mass that, after completely emerging from the ground and walls, took on a random form.

This is problematic for higher floors, but on this floor, it didn't matter much.

After some more time, David was getting really tired of waiting. At this moment, he could be killing as many zombies as possible, especially now that he didn't know when he would encounter other adventurers again and needed to become as strong as possible.

However, before giving up waiting and starting to go his own way, he finally saw that young Eleanor was indeed back.

This time, she was alone; perhaps her friend was recovering. She held a large bag wrapped in brown paper.

"It's enlightening not to see furious adventurers coming my way. I guess I have to thank you for that."

"I would never do that. In fact, I'm an adventurer only by order of my superiors, and I don't want to stay in this role longer than necessary. There are many other ways to help people besides cleaning up this godforsaken place."

"Actually, I think you'll like what I brought you."

She stretched her arms as a clear sign for David to take the large paper bag she had brought, and when David tore it open to see what was inside, it wasn't really a weapon or anything like that.

They were clothes—a thick leather glove, a sturdy leather shirt and pants, a cloak, and what appeared to be a simple but beautiful black mask that could perfectly conceal David's identity.

"Why did you bring all this for me? Do you want me to go to civilization? Is that even possible? Wouldn't I be easily detected there?"

David was very intrigued by these clothes since they seemed to be perfect for him. If they were made of common fabrics, he would look like a stick figure, but these created an illusion that he was actually a human being. The best part was that they seemed to be as flexible as possible. It wouldn't be perfect, but he wasn't exactly a warrior and hoped not to have to make extremely complex movements in times of need.

"I can barely sense your presence, and to me, you're just... like anyone else. Of course, there are more powerful paladins and clerics who might discover your identity, but they're not in this city. Trust me, we're in a very remote location from real civilization."

"Besides, staying within these walls must be extremely depressing. I think if you want, we can help you with that. The apartment we rented is more than enough to accommodate one more person."

David didn't expect this situation to lead to this, of course. He expected some kind of reward, but clothes and shelter?

In his past life, these things were so frivolous to him, things he had never thought about when he was alive, and now they were definitely all he really needed, and he didn't even know it.

If he could, he would be crying right now.

"Okay, I really think I'll accept your offer. I just hope I can hide well enough. Dying after dying can't be too much fun." With a horrible expression on his face after trying to smile in this moment of happiness, he finally put on the clothes that had been given to him, the mask, and the cloak. Even without a mirror, he thought he looked pretty good.

After putting the mask on as securely as possible and hiding the other visible parts with the complex hooded cloak that the young woman had brought him, they finally began to walk out of the dungeon.

This would delay David's evolution a bit, but he didn't have a time limit, and he preferred to enjoy this time rather than endlessly defeat these dungeon beings.