We were surprised to find ourselves in a big city when we went out from the third area of this dungeon.

The sky was clear blue. The roads were empty and clean. The buildings were big and dense. There was a long road in front of us that lead to large storage.

We investigated everything around us. The buildings had no entrance. Large walls closed the small roads between them, so we only had the storage at the end of the road to check.

“This is weird. In all the years I’ve been a warrior raiding dungeons, I’ve never heard of a city-like area.” Said Brian.

“I’ve heard some instances where they found something like this before, but only in random dungeons where the floors are always in constant change.” Replied James.

When we have reached the storage, we only found one big truck stationed inside.

We have looked around, but there was nothing apart from the entrance, exit, and truck.

We approached the truck and a message popped up:

“Two minutes after the appearance of this message, the participants need to protect this truck until it reaches the outskirts of the city.”

“So it is a protection mission this time.” Stated Kamui.

“Does someone need to drive it?” Asked Mary.

“I don’t think so. There is no seat at the front.” Replied Mika.

We’ve climbed the truck and it started moving by itself and exited the storage.

We needed to protect it from all the sides, so we decided to split up into four teams, each team was charged with the protection of one side. James the guardian and Edward the fighter protected the front. Mika and I were in charge of the back. Larry the triple-element mage took the left side and Brian the gunner and Kamui were on the right.

As soon as the truck went out from the storage, many hobgoblins jumped at us from above the near buildings.

We used our ranged attacks to kill them before they were on the truck and the others were killed by the impact of their fall.

The truck turned to the right and we saw more hobgoblins blocking the road with large wooden pillars.

Kamui and I killed the hobgoblins with a series of ‘Air Slashes’. Larry burned the pillars, while Mika and James protected the truck.

So far, we avoided all the ambushes and the truck was undamaged.

The truck turned around a roundabout and took the second exit that led to a bridge.

When we crossed it, something big jumped next to us from the bottom of it. It was a chief orc riding a big long-headed one-horned wolf. He was the boss of this area.

He was holding a big axe, swung it quickly, and hit the truck on the side.

Edward blocked another hit with his mana-enhanced leg and pushed the monster away with a series of kicks. Meanwhile, James tried to use ‘Taunt’, but it did not work.

Larry used a ‘Wind Gust’ spell to push away the orc, but his wolf jumped in front of the truck to dodge the attack, and then kicked the truck with his back legs.

James was there to protect the truck from the attack and Brian moved to the front and shot the boss monster with three consecutive bullets from his shotgun.

The orc blocked the shots using his axe and the wolf jumped again to the side.

Larry shot a fireball to the sky that exploded and smaller fireballs rained down around the truck, hitting the monster in the process.

Mika used a ‘Light Screen’ spell to block the road for the pursuing monster, but he jumped to the opposite side, where he found Kamui and me waiting for him with a double ‘Crescent Cut’ that destroyed a building near the road and fell over him.

He didn’t stand up from the last hit and the truck was near the exit of the city.

Suddenly, a big shadow was cast over the truck. When we looked upward, we saw the orc jumping on us from the sky ready to smash his axe on the truck.

James extended his shield to protect the truck from above, and Mika made a multi-layered light barrier to enhance the protection.

The orc could not penetrate the barriers and fell to the ground. He stood up again, rode his wolf, and kept pursuing us.

Mika blinded the pursuing monster with a ‘Flash’ spell; Larry pushed Brian with his wind spell and the latter shot the monster with a devastating bullet right between his eyes and chattered his brain.

Because of the last triple combination attack from Mika, Larry and Brian, we managed to fend off the boss monster of this area and reach the exit of the city.

***

The outskirt of the city was a desert. The truck didn’t stop and kept going through the sandy road. Then a message popped up:

“Welcome to the fifth floor. You have to continue protecting the truck until its final destination.”

With no time to rest, a sandstorm appeared behind us and followed us. At the top of it appeared a monstrous snake with arms and a golden long hair. The muscles of the monster were apparent to the naked eye.

The monster was one creature with the sandstorm, with the latter moving his main upper body and working as his legs.

Larry used a ‘Gust’ spell at the sandstorm to see if he could disperse it, but it wasn’t enough.

The monster tried to punch the track, and Edward blocked his attack with a leg attack.

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Brian shot the monster with several consecutive bullets that were blocked by the sandstorm beneath the snake.

The monster opened his mouth and shot a strong sand breath at the truck. Kamui jumped and tried to block it using a ‘Crescent Cut’ but was taken down by the sheer force of the breath.

Larry cushioned the fall of Kamui using his wind and he put him aside to get the proper healing. Then, he shot a water bomb at the monster using what was left of his mana.

The water bomb exploded on the monster, the sandstorm hardened, and the monster stopped moving.

Mika used a ‘Light Beam’ and broke the hardened sandstorm and the monster fell.

***

The truck kept going on for a while, and suddenly it started vibrating.

Andrew sensed an upcoming attack and told James about it. The latter told Mika to make for him a light hoverboard that he rode and used his shield to push the truck away from the sudden attack.

Just when James pushed the truck with his shield, a sandstorm emerged from the ground and took down James.

Mika controlled the light hoverboard and pulled James away from within the sandstorm, then the monster emerged and shot another storm breath that hit the truck at the side.

Smoke came out from the truck after the last attack.

“If we get hit one more time, we are doomed.” Said, Andrew.

Larry was out of mana. Kamui and James were still recovering and under the healers spells. Brian was out of bullets and needed to recharge and Edward was useless unless the monster used physical attacks. Therefore, only Mika and I were the ones with the strength left to fend off the upcoming attack of the boss monster.

The buffy snake threw out another sand breath like the one that took down Kamui. Mika used a multi-layered light barrier to protect us from the breath, that was shattered but it managed to weaken the upcoming attack.

I used a ‘Crescent Cut’ to counter the attack and upon contact, a brief flash of lightning came out from my mana attack and dissipated inside the sand breath.

“What’s that…?” I muttered.

Mika concentrated the rest of her mana on her orb and created five-light spheres around. She shot one at my mana attack that was still pushing the sand breath, helped in completely blocking it, and even hit the monster on its head.

At that moment, I felt a throbbing within my Dragon Sword. I sent out a mental message to Raimeiryuu to see what was happening.

“You will find out soon…” Those were the only words he said to me.

I shrugged off my current worries and concentrated on the foe in front of me.

“I can fight again.” Said Kamui who recovered from the damage he took.

“I’m ready too.” Added Larry. “I’ll gamble everything on this next spell.”

“Sorry for the wait.” Brian brought out a bazooka from his inventory. “I was trying to prepare this bad boy here.”

Larry managed to recover most of his mana. He used one of his strongest wind spells ‘Tornado shot’ at the bottom of the sandstorm, and dispersed it, making the monster lose his pursuit momentum, and his upper body started falling.

Kamui and I used all our mana to launch a combined ‘Disaster Typhoon’ at the monstrous snake, and Mika followed with the last four-light spheres that exploded on contact with the body of the monster.

Finally, Brian fired off a missile from his bazooka at the monster and dealt devastating damage.

“That was a really hard battle.” Stated Kamui.

“I don’t think that monster was a B-rank. He is too strong.” Said Brian.

“Maybe there was another way of clearing this floor without a head-on fight, but we managed to beat a high-rank monster, so it’s an amazing feat.” Replied Mika.

“We’ll have to take a long rest when we reach the goal to be able to tackle the following floors.” James stood up on his feet.

“How many are left by the way?” Asked Brian.

“I don’t know. Maybe one, maybe many.” I replied.

“Guys, I have some good news for you. We are approaching our destination. We will be there in less than three minutes.” Said, Andrew.

When we heard that, we all lowered our guards and took a breather.

“Guys, I think I have some bad news for you. Look behind.” Kamui sounded frightened.

When we saw what was coming from behind the truck, we were in awe.

The sandstorm monster was regenerating and slowly catching up to us.

“Is he immortal?” Mika sounded helpless.

“We need to keep him at bay for a few minutes. We can do it.” Assured James.

“Leave it to me.” The healer went out from the truck and cast her reverse-heal spell on the monster.

The boss monster started crippling and nothing remained of him in an instant.

The truck stopped at the entrance of some ruins and a message popped up:

“Welcome to the 6th area. Find your way through this place.”

Since there was no time limit. We took this chance to rest and recover.

***

The next day, we were all ready to continue this raid.

This area took the shape of the ruins of a small city with old architecture.

While moving, I saw some writings on the walls. “I saw this type of writing before,” I muttered.

I kept looking around me for any potential ambush and noticed that the orb floating around Mika had some writings on it.

I approached her and secretly enhanced my vision with mana to concentrate on what was written, and saw the same type of writing on the buildings around us.

“Everything about her weapon is strange,” I affirmed.

“Guys, stop there.” Andrew, who was ahead of us, told us to halt our movements. “A big hoard of monsters is approaching us from all directions.”

We took our stances and as he said, a big hoard of horned wolves, mounted hobgoblins, and long head hyenas surrounded us from all directions.

We split up to fight the monsters, and I used this chance to split up from the team.

***

I fought my way out through the monsters hoard, slipped away through a tight alley, and found myself in front of a plaza.

“This is the place that Vladimir mentioned in his letter…” I went near the mentioned wall where some scribing was written on it, the same as what Vladimir mentioned, and put my hand on a hole at the center of it. At first glance, it appeared as a broken part, but in reality, it was a hidden mechanism to open an underground passage.

The door opened and I went down the stairs that appeared.

I kept going through a dark tunnel until I reached a dead-end, or what seemed to be a dead-end.

I touched the wall in front of me and found another hole where I put my hand and I heard some creaking next to me.

I turned and saw that another passage appeared.

The next time I reached a dead-end, a different mechanism was in place.

As Vladimir instructed, I had to knock on the wall ten times and move three steps to the back. When I did that, my foot pushed a button installed on the ground and another door opened to my right. I took that road and reached a room.

Suddenly, a light mechanism was triggered and everything in the room became visible. It was a small prison room with chains all over the walls.

“It seems we have another interesting fellow who managed to find his way to this place.” I heard a deep voice coming from the opposite side of the room.

“No way…” I froze in place and was surprised at what I had just witnessed.