-A few days before the mutation-
-Liz’s POV-
It’s been a few months since the meeting with Reinard, about the whole system thing. Both of our plans were going well, although there were a few issues on Reinard’s side, he had handled them as carefully as possible without alerting the government.
I look at the stack of papers on my desk. These were the reports of everything Reinard has done until now. They included the properties of some Underworld Organizations, then the deals he had made, the accounts that are loaded with the money he had earned ( obviously through the means that I won’t be mentioning ).
My contract with the Guild has also been going well. I have earned myself a good reputation among the adventurers of L.A. and helped The Cuties Guild rise up to the Top 10 list too, which left Luna no choice but to give me special privileges. I am their star candidate now, although I did not want any of this because my plans would go awry, I had to keep doing it for now at least.
But as I was going through the reports, my phone rang, it was a call from Luna.
“What happened GUILD MASTER, what was so important that you had to call this lowly guild member of yours” I asked her in a voice that sounded too sweet, which might be giving her goosebumps right now.
“Fuck !!! Lily, how many times do I have to tell you, cut that crappy line of yours” Luna said obviously seething in anger.
“Oh… I’m truly sorry GUILD MASTER, if this lowly member of yours had stepped over the line”I said which irritates her even more because I can hear some crashing noises on the other side of the line.
“Ughhhh….fine, I’ll just tell you. We have recently found an A Rank dungeon, east of L.A. I had sent some of the A Rankers and B Rankers to it. They have found that the Dungeon which should have been only a 10 floor dungeon is not what it appears to be. I told them to explore further but they denied saying that it was too dangerous for them, even with some A Rankers.” Luna just starts rambling on about the dungeon that they've found.
“So what do you want me to do with this information? Sell it to some spies so that they can take the dungeons all to themselves” I tell her in a sweet voice and there she goes again smashing something in her office because the line she was calling from was her office number.
“You shitty woman, can’t you speak normally, this is a serious matter. I want you to investigate what is happening there and explore beyond the 10th floor of the dungeon. I’ll give you 1 million dollars, if you find something worth it.” Luna says after calming a bit but still speaking in an angered tone.
“Sure, make it 1.5 mil and I’ll do it” What !!!, you think I’ll work for a million dollars, heck, I would not even work for her even if she offered me all of her assets. It’s just that I needed the money for a few side projects of mine.
“Fine you greedy woman, I’ll send you the location” Luna having completely lost all her patience cuts the call after saying this.
It’s been like this for a month now but I have been enjoying all of her reactions so far. ‘It’s fun to irritate your boss, knowing that you are their star employee and the boss can’t fire you for no reason at all’.
I took a look at the location she had just sent me. It’s about 10 miles from the gates of L.A. ‘Hmm.. so an A Ranked dungeon, I wonder what I’ll find there, as it probably has more floors beyond the 10th floor’.
-An Hour Later-
‘So this is the dungeon huh, it looks normal’. I can see the five adventurers Luna had sent, camping right outside the dungeon entrance. ‘They probably want this dungeon all to themselves but can’t because of Luna’.
“Hey there fellas, I’m your friendly neighborhood guardian, Lily, it’s nice to meet you all” I say to the adventurers sitting around the meat they are cooking. They are startled by my sudden appearance and immediately take out their weapons and point them at me.
“Who the hell are you?” says a woman donned in silver armor.
‘Are they stupid? They don’t even recognize the star candidate that I am?’ I let out a sigh while thinking about this. ‘Fucking retards !!’. And I’m back to cursing.
-Julie’s POV-
I was out camping with my teammates, right beside the dungeon we had discovered a few days ago. We had taken the rights to be the first one to delve inside the dungeon before making it public. Our Guild Master, Luna had agreed to it and now here we were, camping outside waiting for reinforcements to conquer this dungeon. The Guild Master had said that she’ll send someone today. I look at my teammates, Sophie, Harley, Linda and Miranda who were cooking the meat we had purchased before and take a seat among them.
As I was about to eat with them, I heard a person’s voice right behind me saying “Hey there fellas, I’m your friendly neighborhood guardian, Lily, it’s nice to meet you all”. Startling me and immediately sending my thoughts into a panic mode. ‘Who is she? We didn’t tell anyone our locations, so how come a person is here?’
“Who the hell are you?” I ask her but instead of a reply, I get a long sigh from her and a look that says ‘Stupid’.
“I am the reinforcement, you idiots !” She says while making some strange signs.
“What’s your name?” I asked her as my teammates had left their meals and were standing right beside me also pointing their weapons like me at the person in front of us all. I was an A Ranker and Miranda was also an A Ranker, we had nothing to fear from an unarmed person. Lina, Harley and Sophie were B Rankers, we were what you’d call a perfect team. We had nothing to fear but this woman in front of us was at level 110, she was an S Ranker.
"I just told you guys, my name is Lily, Luna sent me here as reinforcement for you people. Now, can we just go inside the dungeon. I have lots of things to do and wasting time is not one of them." Lily said to the frightened adventurers.
"Wait right there and let me confirm it with the Guild Master." I tell her and look at my teammates who take a defensive stance while still pointing weapons at Lily.
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
I take out my phone and call the Guild Master. She picks up after a few rings.
"What is it?" Luna says in an annoyed tone, still having not calmed down after the conversation between her and Lily.
"It's about reinforcement, did you send someone named Lily because there is a woman standing in our campsite" I ask her only to be yelled at by her.
"Yes you dumb ass, I sent Lily as a reinforcement to you. You should check your messages you idiot"
"I'm sorry Miss Luna, this will not happen again" I tell her in an apologetic tone because I did not want to face her wrath. Who knows what angered her so much that the sweet Miss Luna turned into her devil mode. The line cuts right after I finish apologising to her.
I go back at the campsite only to find Lily who had an impatient expression on her face.
"Miss Lily, I'm truly sorry for having doubted you but it was necessary. Miss Luna did not want anyone to find out about this dungeon, so I had to make sure that no one discovered it." I tell Lily only to find her at the dungeon entrance, the next moment and crossing right through it without waiting for us.
-Liz's POV-
'Fucking retards, have to confirm my identity? Bullshit !' It must be because of my level, that they are seeing. I had created an illusion spell around me that let's people see my fake level because I didn't want to deal with the same thing, that happened on my first dungeon run.
I observe the four women still pointing their weapons at me and the last one talking on the call, apologising to Luna. Having had enough of this, I see the woman taking with Luna, come back to me and apologise but I ignore her and walk over to the entrance of the dungeon and cross the portal.
I find myself in what appears to be a labyrinth, I spread my mana sense and find out that this place is huge. 'It's like those towers of mages back on Elanoir.'
The dungeon had more than 10 floors, it was a 100 floor dungeon, filled with monsters beyond what the people of Earth can even handle. 'Maybe I can take advantage of this dungeon. I'll have to make sure these people don't know more about this dungeon.' I looked at the group who followed me right after I had entered the dungeon.
"Alright girls, leave this to me, you can go back and relax for 2 days after that, tell Luna that I had cleared the dungeon and it only had 15 floors to it with an S Rank boss on the last floor" I tell the Adventurers who give me a confused look. It was an honest reaction, like why would you believe someone who had just entered the dungeon and said to you that 'Go tell your boss that I have cleared this dungeon'.
But what I said was not just words, I had used a spell on them and just altered their memories. I made them believe that we had cleared this dungeon, while they all helped me until the last floor, where I had defeated the boss all on my own, having earned their respect which led them to go and tell Luna about this adventure of ours. It was a mind spell which even the mages on Elanoir had difficulties mastering.
The group nodded their heads and left through the portal. I gave them a last look and turned towards the labyrinth which was empty. The same pattern followed till the 50th floor with each and every floor being a labyrinth. After the 50th floor, the rest were just open spaces with boss type monsters with the habitats beneficial to them and their mobs mostly S Ranks and A Ranks. This was the information I had gotten after spreading my mana sense throughout the dungeon.
"This will be a long day, sigh..."
I teleported to the 11th floor directly and came face to face with a monster that looked like a mix between wolf and a panther, it had jet black fur, golden eyes and it was growling at me.
"Hey there little guy !" The only response I got was a claw aiming right for my face. So I had to respond in kind. I swiped with my right hand which beheaded the monster instantly.
"Alright let's get this done with" I declared to myself and quickly started cleaning all the floors from 11th to 50th floor.
Standing at the entrance of the 50 floor. I decided that it was time to implement one of my plans.
I started spreading my mana throughout the dungeon but not in much quantity as even five percent of my mana would blow up this whole dungeon. I had only spread one percent that too only for a few seconds, covering the whole dungeon with my mana.
There were some things that I had recently learned in this world. Every monster has a core inside them, this core starts developing inside them when they reach A Rank, from there the monsters feed on the mana in the surroundings constantly and gain levels, which should be against the system but I don't know how they could still do it. The mana fills their cores and makes them rise up in levels and also in Rank. But there is a time when these monsters mutate, by having excess mana filled in their cores and eventually they become unimaginable abominations and horrors.
That is what I was trying to do here. As the saying goes 'A hero will sacrifice the person they love to save everyone'. But I was not a hero and I don't care if a few thousand people died. As long as there were even a hundred left alive, a civilization can be remade.
-Present Time-
-Liz's POV-
I knew what I was doing by putting the whole continent's life in jeopardy but it had to be done.
Luna had just called me, informing me about the mutated S Rank dungeon break. It was the same dungeon that I had used to implement my plans for today.
You might think, how does Luna not doubt me because I let her know that I had cleared this dungeon with the help of a group of adventurers. Well, I had a hunch that Luna might discover my trick with the group of adventurers so I made all of them forget that there was even a dungeon to the east of L.A. I had altered all the people's memories who knew about that dungeon.
So Luna had not doubted me, when she had called me earlier.
Using a teleportation spell I appeared on top of The Cuties Guild. A few minutes later I was sitting at the table in the oval office of The Cuties Guild. At the head of the table was Luna, followed by the new S Rankers of the Cuties and a few A Rankers sitting at the table and B Rankers standing behind their respective leaders. Everyone had a team, except for the S Rankers. There were only four S Rankers including me. You might think that, how come a guild sitting at #8 of the Leaderboard has four S Rankers. It's not that the rank of the guilds depends on how many S Rankers they have. The Leaderboard defines how these particular guilds have helped humanity.
I look at Luna, who gives me a nod and goes on to explain the current situation.
The dungeon break had happened 30 minutes ago. The city has already been evacuated and is currently being guarded by every adventurer in the city. L.A. being the city with the main branch of The Cuties has put a lot of pressure on us. The other Guilds have already sent their S Rankers and were currently on their way here. Until the other S Rankers arrive, the Cuties will have to hold the monsters from running rampant in the city. The battle will be taking place outside the walls of the city. The main goal being, killing each and every last one of the monsters.The monsters will be ranging from A Rank to S Rank. Only two ranks but having mutated, even the A Ranked monsters will be difficult to take down not to mention the mutated S Ranked monsters who have the power to level the whole continent.
After Luna explained all these things, we quickly moved out and headed towards the walls.
-Five Minutes Later-
'This will be one hell of a show' I look at all the adventurers standing above the walls of an empty city. The explanation that Luna gave was an accurate one because in the distance I could see the A Ranked monsters destroying everything in their way. These A Ranked monsters were about 40-60 meters in height and the S Ranked monsters were not less than the Scorpion that I had killed after arriving in this world. They were still half an hour away from the city, by the current pace at which they were heading here.
"Lily, do you think we can even save this continent from these monstrosities?" Luna asks me in a dejected tone. Although she had displayed a courageous front to others. In front of me she acted like a frightened little girl. Some may not see it but this Guild Master was playing two roles, from the time her fame had risen, giving her the responsibilities she was not ready for.
"I don't know, maybe some miracle will happen and we'll be saved" I answer her while gazing at the sky of this world.
"I hope that would come true, I don't want to go through this experience" Luna says in a sad tone that no one would have noticed, like she had faced the same situation before. Although I know about it already because I had to alter her memories of the dungeon.
"Let's hope, that we will get to see the day of the light tomorrow" It was already the time for sunset and the monsters were approaching the city at high speed.