Burning Wall had increased its compatibility to 9 after the slaughter of slimes, something that had also filled the mana stone. For that reason, he put it in the inventory and took out another one. He placed it inside one of his pockets, since from the inventory it couldn’t absorb mana.

He continued going through those tunnels, finding some slimes, but few. Probably, it was because most of them had been gathered in the cavern, and, for that reason, in the future they would be distributed again throughout the dungeon.

Some tunnels simply ended, while others led to new tunnels or the cavern. So, for a few hours, he only got fatigue, some mushrooms and a few monsters kills.

“Mmmm, it’s a magic copper vein. How could I mine it?” he said to himself as he read the information about the ore.

“Maybe I should not be surprised…,” he muttered again when a new assistant with a pickaxe began to get it.

It was not copper directly, but a mineral from which the metal can be extracted. Having been exposed to the mana of the dungeon for centuries, it had absorbed part of it, and now magic copper could be extracted instead of normal one. It works similar to common copper, but the results are much better, getting higher quality weapons for the same level.

The assistant seemed to be able to come and go without getting lost in the tunnels, picking up the ore and taking it to Eldi until it finished with that small vein, so he kept walking.

Finally, after exploring all the tunnels, with the frustrated hope that there would be treasures like in the game, he went through the wider tunnel that came out of the slimes’ cavern. He looked once more at the tombs and closed his eyes for a moment, before turning and heading towards what could be the end of the floor.

He found some slimes along the way, more than he had found in the other tunnels, but not too many. In all, he may have killed within two or three dozen of them after the cavern’s slaughter. And it was at the end of the road that he found a two-meter-tall slime, the floor boss.

He stepped back as a precaution, but that slime moved at the same slow speed as the rest. It had the skill Spit, which throw acid towards its enemy, but which is easy to counteract with Mill. And, given its size, it was even more vulnerable than the smaller ones to Burning Wall. He cast four of them to cover it completely, being the battle against that boss rather disappointing, because the fire killed it easily.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The experience gained was the same as twenty of the normal ones, and there was no treasure, so, somewhat unsatisfied, he crossed the hole that the boss have been protecting and went down to the next floor.

Shortly after stepping on the second floor, a beam of light hit his shoulder. There wasn’t much damage, but he used Magic against me? to avoid further damage while searching for his attacker. It didn’t take long to find it, for it shone in the darkness of the tunnel. It was a spark, a kind of bright sphere that attacks from a distance. It is immune to physical damage and very mobile, so it always tries to stay in range and attack from afar, the worst enemy for Eldi.

The spark isn’t a monster with a lot of health or attack power, but it is quite annoying for a battle mage. His arrows didn’t hit the target unless he could get close, which made them very inefficient, since many times he wasted the fire imbued in them.

The walls of fire or ice were simply dodged, while skills like Javelin required it to be relatively close, and did no more damage than a simple arrow, because it only was affected by the fire. To kill one of them, two levels below his, took a lot of effort and a disproportionate waste of energy and mana.

Luckily, the rest area was near the entrance, so he didn’t hesitate to enter. He ate something and fell asleep in the tent, not really knowing what time it was. He was tired, more mentally than physically, and not just because of his battle with the spark.

When the next morning, or he thought so despite not being able to see the sun, Eldi left the rest area, he had a couple of plans to fight against those luminous spheres.

The first was put it into practice shortly after leaving, as one of them attacked him. He cast Magic Mirror to give it back some of its damage, and Regenerate to recover. Eldi had more health and the damage he received was smaller, due to the magical resistance. The method was effective and had the advantage of leveling up the spell, which rose to 6. However, it was somewhat painful, damaged his leather armor and drained a lot of mana. He couldn’t defeat more than four or five every half hour with that method, which is how long it took to recover the mana.

So, he tried the second method. As soon as another of them appeared, he created an Earthen Wall and hid behind it. As expected from beings with hardly any intelligence, the spark approached to continue attacking him, recklessness that paid dearly. Already in melee range and with his axe covered in fire, it didn’t take long to finish it, being Magic against me? enough to counter its attacks.

With that second strategy, he advanced through the tunnels, facing up to three of them at a time, and, from time to time, also using the Magic Mirror. Unlike the previous floor, encounters were frequent, and he didn’t find large crowds of those monsters. And discovered up to three veins of magical copper, in addition to a greater number and variety of fungi.

When he left the tunnels and arrived at a spacious cavern, he had killed a hundred of those monsters and had risen Magic to me? up to 8, in addition to advancing a bit more than half level.

And there, in that cavern, he found a sphere of light considerably larger and whose attack was much more damaging. It not only destroyed the earth walls with its attack, but it didn’t follow him and stayed at a distance, fulfilling its mission to guard the entrance to the next floor