Passing through the boundary between floors… typical that my senses cannot scout at all until I pass through.

Why is that? I can clearly see through the tunnel itself but that’s it. No sounds or smell or anything…

Oh well. Once I passed through the tunnel I could already feel the relative surroundings and mana sources all around me.

This floor has a jungle biome. I can tell right away. That’s nice. A lot of trees and all that, even the tunnels are covered quite a bit in moss.

For whatever reason the mana in this floor seems lower than in the underwater floor.

Despite going up from floor four to floor five the mana density is actually lesser.

I think the mana is more concentrated in the spawn points itself that I can feel so far. There are five of them relatively short distance from the entrance. But many more are scattered across the floor. At least what I can sense so far.

I also can still feel the human party… they seem to be camping quite a bit distance away from me. I should check them out.

I am especially interested in the mana beacon person. I can tell that there is something that draws me towards her. I have a hunch I might get more info the closer I get.

First things first. I have to make sure I don’t die randomly stepping on a poisonous mushroom or some shit like that. After all this floor I don’t have the luxury to tank whatever and survive because there is just nowhere near enough mana in the surroundings for that.

I am making my way through the floor towards the human party. I can see the monsters clearly. Mostly I can even tell from the shape of their mana flow…

I can clearly tell that there is no boss monster on this floor.

Wouldn’t be that surprised if it got dealt with by the human party or just wasn’t present at all.

It is quite similar to what I would assume is normal jungle… monkeys, cats, spiders, snakes… yea basically a normal jungle. There was also this elusive monster that constantly moved at great speed but I just couldn’t tell what it was.

Was relatively small and in distance anyways so who cares.

I was quite close to the humans now. I could see them with my eyes. I can see for quite a distance and many things such as even mana floating around.

I must admit that my eyes went from absolute garbage to insanely precise and god damn perfect. I can even notice the small shifts of bodily movements before something moves if I really focus enough. That’s so cool.

I think seeing mana is just a bonus. Honestly I wouldn’t need to see that shit because of all other senses. Especially the whiskers.

Besides on lower floors mana so thick regular eye sight can see it… well mine can pierce through it even though… its just awesome.

I am about a kilometer from the human party and I can already see them clearly camping around some circle in the middle. It might be a huge rune…

They also have barrier around the camp. I am pretty sure the camp is just temporary so it seems all the more impressive that they just setup camp like this so quickly. We are in middle of jungle filled with monsters and they casually set up a camp… yeah.

Oh well. Still… I am not close enough to the person that I conveniently call mana beacon. There is something that really draws me to her. I just cannot put my finger on it. I feel the need to investigate even further.

Lets hope they cannot sense me around. I wouldn’t be crazy enough to try to pass the barrier or even touch it but maybe if I am close enough I can get the info my guts are so much desiring to get.

To my surprise I had heard them talk and all that but it was just weird mumbling… well that’s changing slowly but surely. I can hear few words there and there. Laughter isn’t really hard to translate obviously but the words are quite complicated.

Before I even closed the gap I already could translate whatever the humans were talking about. I guess hearing twenty or so people talk at once sped up the process. Good that I could actually comprehend all that nonsense shit.

The talks were all bullshit anyways. Mostly some weird flex stories that even translated I had no idea what they meant or what I would assume attempts to pick up some chick. There was however a talk nearby the beacon person that piqued my interest.

¨So we searched five floors. There is no way that rat could’ve passed all of these especially the underwater floor and despite all that it was nowhere to be seen…¨

¨Are you sure the rat was small black rat? Our mages switched to track any rats and even then no irregular rat was found amongst them so far¨

¨Not to mention that they usually stick to floor one anyways… we found few rats on this floor but they were murdered even before we approached them¨

At this point I was a bit more focusing at filtering the bullshit talks from the talk I want to hear properly. There were two men talking to two women. One was the mana beacon and the other seemed like a mage currently linked to the barrier. The dude talking seemed as someone in leading position and the other dude just stood there. Maybe a guard?

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

¨Listen I didn’t even wanted to be there. Just because that rat saved me doesn’t mean it even managed to survive the damn floor one. It was a stupid rat. Who knows what reason it had. Maybe it was scared of me and tried to suck up to me so I wouldn’t kill it. Really who cares!!!¨

Well mana beacon now I know you are the knockers girl that almost murdered me despite saving her life…. That’s not nice of you to talk about me like this.

I have absolutely no idea how she got so strong in such short time but I don’t think I am one to talk about that…

¨Yeah that rat was totally scared of you… so much in fact that it would approach an apex predator to then murder that apex predator and proceed to save your ass while you were still immobilized. I totally see why that rat would be scared of you...¨

That’s some nice talk guard person. I love that guy already. He gets me… haha…

¨Listen I really don’t know but as we can clearly see the rat is gone. There is no way it would even pass floor two… not when terror spider was even there!!!¨

Oho? They call Candace terror spider? Well makes sense that they wouldn’t know her true name… doubt they speak vibrations haha.

¨Alright, alright… we will now go to the deep city. To restock, sell some materials and get you a proper gear. Then we will increase the search area and scout until floor ten. If we don’t find it until then its dead and we don’t need to care about it¨

Oh leader spoke and the deep city? Is that what I think it is? So the circle is teleportation rune? Awesome.

Well the mermaids told me they also have shortcuts.

Wonder how pissed would the humans be if I destroyed the shortcuts I can find… or at least the one there so they cannot easily go back and follow me…

Nah… destroying would be too much obvious sign I was there if they would be able to link it with me destroying the runes at floor one.

I think the safe bet would be to just hide from then and until the floor ten then they will give up even searching for me.

Not to mention I don’t really think they will move at the same pace as me. There is no way such big group can go through the dungeon faster than me. No matter how strong they are…

Actually I am dumb. They might because I can waste a lot of time getting stronger somewhere… damn.

¨I have a better idea. Instead of blindly searching we should find a good oracle or a prophet. There should be quite a few in the deep city¨

Oh no barrier mage chick… why you got to do this to me. That’s playing dirty. I think the leader is just ready to agree…

¨They are expensive and flimsy. They wouldn’t really think wasting their “divine gifts” on finding a small rat would be worth it… but it is a better idea than just trying to find one rat in the dungeon. I think it evolved by this time at least once. Doubt we will have that much time left until it might actually become a problem¨

Leader… just stick to your own plans damn man. I don’t think I can hide myself from some divine search or whatever bullshit oracles and prophets operate on.

Fuck.

Well past this point I wasn’t really listening what they were saying. Maybe I should’ve but there is just this something that keeps pestering me inside.

This huge weird feeling. Something really draws me insanely much towards the mana beacon girl. I just want to go as close to her as possible.

Now… I know it’s the girl I saved but that’s hardly the reason. I don’t even think the fact she got stronger is the reason. I mean maybe to eat her? No.

There is something more to this. I know if I get a bit closer I can get my answers but the barrier is already quite close to me.

That’s some big barrier woman.

I also have relatively short time. I don’t know when but any minute they might start going to the deep city and then I would lose my chance to find out.

No way around it. I have to take some risk there. I am going to go crazy if I don’t know what the fuck is happening. I just know I have to go towards the girl.

I have tried to think about it really hard and got this idea to make the weird bubble around me. I knew very well the barrier isn’t some sort of alarm but a solid defense. So I have made a barrier of no presence around me. I have essentially deleted space around me and past the barrier.

It seems the magic chick didn’t noticed anything so far. So I have then manipulated the barrier at the exact spot where my bubble was touching to allow me to pass.

I think I succeeded in both being sneaky and not breaking the barrier enough for the magic chick to notice. Nice.

I am slowly in. That was quite nerve wracking.

Once I was there I just erased my presence and collapsed my bubble. I wouldn’t want anyone being touched by it on random. They would know immediately that something is weird.

The leading group stopped their talks so I knew I had only few short moments.

I have made my way towards the beacon girl. I think calling her that way is a bit more respectful than making it seems as the only thing important about her is the size of her boobs.

Don’t know how much time we have left but the people are certainly getting ready. I can already see mages preparing the circle.

Obviously I made sure to not bump into anyone.

I was standing right behind the girl.

I didn’t know what to do but I did what my hunch was telling me.

I was focusing on whatever it was that was drawing me towards the girl. I wish I didn’t. I could feel so many things that didn’t made any sense and all of the information I have gotten was overwhelming to me. I don’t even know what I did but I somehow looked past all the flesh and mana and all that crap into something that felt like her core or so. Maybe a soul. The whole experience was confusing af.

However I know. In that instance I could tell. She killed Candace. I could feel the hatred of Candace being deep inside of this girl. I could also tell that she killed four hundred and eight other spiders. I don’t know why but I know there is something from Candace in this girl. I also feel like Candace calling my name. It is super tiny and super freaking quiet. But I can damn feel it.

It all makes zero sense. No. There is no way some fucking humans would kill that spider. She wouldn’t let that happen. She could run at any moment as well. Even if she was there to protect her children and maybe stop the passage of humans she surely wouldn’t have stayed until she dropped dead. I know she would run. She could teleport freely between her webs. There is just no way. And yet. Yet I know it happened.

The people around me are already passing through a small portal that activated in middle of the circle.

I don’t know what to do. I am pissed but does that make me in the right to do anything? Candace was a monster… who knows how long she was alive and what monstrosities she did to people…. But still despite not really knowing each other that long she was the first contact I made in this world. Yes I saved this girl first and yes I don’t want to kill her despite what she did.

However… I wasn’t even able to talk to her and her reward was almost killing me. There is also this feeling of insane frustration. As if I was so close and so far to help Candace. I don’t know how possibly I can feel that I can help her despite her being dead.

Despite all that I feel like I can help her. Something is telling me that this girl is key for that.

I was too slow to think it all through. She was the last about to pass through the portal and I could maybe stop her and collapse it. Then destroy the circle but then what? Should I kill her? I have about three seconds to decide what am I going to do. I just don’t fucking know.

I wish someone would help me decide right now. Three seconds. How much can a rat think through that time…

Probably a lot if I speed up my thoughts to the maximum. Fuck the presence control. Fuck everything. Lets use all of my mana to speed up my thoughts and figure out what to do. In the worst case scenario I will just tackle her into the portal and collapse it.

THOUGHTS OVERDRIVE GOGOGO!!!!!!