Sofia made her way back to the entrance of the dungeon and took a one hour break there. With no ambient mana, she needed that much time to restore it all, not to mention Bookie needing to restock his fog.

Her bone shield was re-built and re-blessed, Bookie was summoned again with the high-priest form, and the group was ready to get back to exploring the dungeon.

Scripture really gave me a huge boon with that high-priest skeleton. It’s been consistently the best out of Bookie’s summons. Just so many useful spells in his kit. The templars are nice too.

It’s a bit of a shame the best skeletons are the ones from people with good classes.

I know grave-robbing the dragons is a bad idea but maybe I should look into the old legends more, see what bones I can find…

Well, I should focus on the trial for now.

Sofia and the skeletons carefully advanced through the large winding corridor. It was surprisingly empty. They found nothing at all all the way until the corridor ended in a new set of huge doors looking exactly like the dungeon’s previous entrance.

Is that the exit? Was the double amalgam the boss after all?

She closed her eyes and focused on her mana senses. Feeling nothing besides herself, Pareth and Bookie.

Still nothing. Maybe it really is the exit?

Touching the door, it did not react like the entrance. It didn’t really move at all. Sofia first tried sending some mana into them, to no avail. Teleporting through also did not work, so she took a few steps back.

Go ahead Pareth, open ‘em.

Pareth walked up to the doors and with his two huge hands, his fingers slotted in the small groove between the doors, slowly tried to force them open. Despite his best efforts, the two huge doors did not show any sign of moving.

Is this a trial of strength or something now? Is there a secret lever to pull somewhere? What is this?

And of course the graveyard doesn’t work…

Maybe these aren’t like the entrance, they push open instead of sliding to the side?

Pareth changed to pushing, and again, the doors did not budge.

They must really be sliding doors again. Just tougher.

“Change of plan, Pareth, you pull on the left, I pull on the right.”

Sofia pulled on the door with all her strength, and with Pareth pulling on the opposite one, the doors actually started to open ever so slightly. Just a few millimeters. Then Sofia’s grip slipped, and the doors slammed back together with a bang.

“Really? With a bit more strength we can get there, but I don’t want to waste mana on a damned door…”

Come help on my side, Bookie, let’s do it again, I have a plan.

At her signal, they pulled on the doors again, slowly, they opened. The doors were clearly pushing back against them, trying to close back up, the more they opened, the more strength they pushed back with, as if held closed by giant hidden springs.

When the two doors were separated by about ten centimeters, it was starting to get too hard. As Sofia was about to let go again, she rammed her right arm into the opening, and the doors slammed shut on her arm.

The Dragon-scale arm took the hit. Sofia felt nothing. The doors couldn’t crush the dragon-arm, it was not even close.

With the doors held slightly open by her arm, Sofia’s senses could now pick up the area beyond it. Some kind of huge circular arena. Empty. Another set of doors on the other side.

Let’s get in there.

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Pareth and Bookie hopped into Sofia’s bone storage and reappeared on the other side of the door. Now that there was a direct connection to the next room, she could also teleport in with [Summon Self]. The doors slammed shut behind her.

No turning back, I guess. There was nothing left to do in the corridor anyway. Pareth, prepare the sanctified grounds, just in case.

I wonder if the key could have just cut through the door… Well, this was faster anyway.

Sofia looked around, scanning the arena with her eyes and mana senses. Finding it to be really nothing more than a big round room with rows of empty spectator seats lining the walls.

Just like Valeure’s arena and the one in Brighthall. This is a popular design, I guess.

Now that I think about it, that hidden room with the avian ghosts where Pareth fought alone looked like this too. Really a popular design.

What now, though?

An Arena is for fighting but where is the opponent?

Sofia’s group walked a bit further into the arena, they stopped when the opposite doors started opening.

There it is.

Another Sunless?

But what came from beyond doors wasn’t another amalgam like Sofia thought it might. It was more like… A tall, full-black human silhouette. From the outline of his oily black figure, Sofia could make out that he was wearing a suit and a short flat hat like Aphenoreth’s. Unlike the other Sunless creatures until now, there were more colors to him. Around his hat was a single white band, he wore a white glove on his left hand, and most importantly, there was a big white cross shape on his otherwise blank black face. Sofia considered channeling a piercing bolt right away, but she held back.

Most of his mana is gathered in the white parts.

[Sunless Warrior]

I wish I still had the cheater title equipped…

Sofia and her group were getting ready to start the fight any second, while the Sunless man calmly entered the arena.

I have many questions.

But I suppose now is not the time.

The Sunless man stopped right outside of [THE GLORIOUS]’s range. A glowing blue sword of energy slowly formed within his gloved hand.

Bastard sword, no shield.

Sofia readied her staff and shield. Despite the context, she was still reluctant to attack first as long as the other side showed no sign of doing anything. He had readied his blade but Sofia could tell his mana was calm and he was not in any kind of battle stance yet.

Bookie, Templars.

The book appeared before Sofia, she ripped the page without even looking at it, her eyes not leaving the Sunless warrior. The three skeleton templars formed from Bookie’s mist, and the Sunless warrior silently watched from the other side.

I let him form his energy sword so he let me summon my skeletons.

“I’m ready,” Sofia called out.

The Sunless warrior nodded. Sticking his sword into the ground next to him to indicate he was not attacking, he bowed.

When have I ever fought a Boss ‘monster’ so polite? This is clearly just a person…

Sofia and Pareth copied the bowing gesture. The warrior seemed satisfied with that, the white cross shape on his face constricted into a smaller, brighter X, and he grabbed his sword back, getting into a classical sword fighting stance with a two-handed low guard.

Pareth’s [Sanctified Grounds] flared up, and the warrior flexed his legs. He shot forward with a bang, breaking the ground he had been standing on. Pareth teleported to Sofia, and as he appeared in front of her, his Sword met the Sunless warrior’s.

Sofia tried to flash some rot onto the warrior, but her light was stopped by a translucent blue magic shield, and the rot only covered some of the floor. She felt a strange mana disturbance behind her, and had the instinct to turn around, right in time to see the Sunless warrior appear there and strike at her with an upward cut which she barely managed to deflect with her shield. Sofia took a step back as her Templars jumped at the Sunless and Pareth turned to cover her with his own massive shield.

The warrior effortlessly parried all the hits from the Templars and disappeared again when Pareth’s sword struck. Starting to charge up a Piercing bolt, Sofia summoned the skull choir in a circle formation around her with boar skulls. She only summoned five skulls, just enough to give her some defense without eating at her mana too much. The boar skulls were great at catching swords with their fangs and Sofia had had ample training in using them against Astelia.

Sofia felt some of her mana disappear and go to Bookie, who had just fused himself with the Archer Skeleton, and quickly readied his bow.

The Sunless Warrior reappeared behind Sofia again, and his Sword was caught by a boar skull, which cracked but did not break, while Sofia struck at him with her barely-formed piercing bolt, which he escaped with another quick teleportation.

I’m more than used to fighting against space-mages.

Sofia followed the mana trail of the Warrior’s teleportation, and Pareth struck at his exit point as he appeared there.

The sword hit was clean, and Pareth’s weapon of light cut the Sunless warrior in half from the shoulder to the waist before hitting the ground.

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