Seras had decided to just toss the Death essence into her pocket space. She didn’t want to deal with whatever trouble absorbing it would cause her, but also couldn’t part with anything they might give her an advantage. Further into the hall she found a fourth or maybe fifth set of bones. This one looked like it had tried to flee and was run down by something.

Seras noted how this one’s bones looked finer, and more delicate than what she was used to seeing in humans. Maybe some sort of congenital bone disease? Odd that they out of everyone here hadn’t gone in for at least plastic polymer bones. Odder still that they had come somewhere so obviously dangerous.

Around this one Seras found something she was in desperate need of, a weapon.

Around its body were the shattered remnants of a large stick, or maybe it was a staff at this point given its size. And in a rotting leather holster around its pelvis was a small dagger. The blade was leaf shaped and it had some intricate swirling designs on the blood-soaked hilt. The metal was a silvery blue color and had little wave like patterns in the metal from the forging process.

She held it out in front of her and read the meta text.

Sylvin silver dagger, iron rank. Enchanted to prevent corrosion, and dulling.

Nothing special, so long as Seras ignored the fact that she was holding a magic weapon.

She tested the weight of the blade, tossing it into the air twice before she was satisfied. It was quite literally better than nothing.

She spent the rest of her time searching the ‘adventurer society branch, but other than some more dark quintessence, she found nothing of note.

She gave the skeletons one last glance before she left, idly wondering if she should toss their bones in the pocket space as well. But decided against it. She had no problem with robbing the dead given her current state, but drew the line at trying to use their bodies as weapons or tools.

She’d leave that to the chop shops.

She left the massive doors at the front of the atrium and entered the streets of the ruined city. Glancing around Seras saw broken buildings to the left and right of her, each looking about as decrepit as the other. With no better options she walked to the left.

The road was made entirely of hexagonally cut stone bricks. She saw more evidence of previous fights; the hexagonal bricks were torn up and some were even shattered in crater patterns. She didn’t see any more corpses, so she didn’t loiter around the battle damage.

She had checked her street view map and was walking towards a main boulevard that began at one of the pyramids corners and lead to the city’s edge, cutting through three of the seven ring roads. The street patterns were pretty, but Seras wasn’t sure how efficient they were for traffic flow. Out of curiosity, and boredom, she zoomed her map out to better study the strange city.

At the center of the city was the massive square pyramid with seven concentric ring roads centered around it. At the corners of the central pyramid diagonal roads began and cut through three of the ring roads. The fourth ring was then divided into two halves', with the break beginning and the exact front and back of the pyramid then from there the last three rings were broken into sevenths, with none of their connecting roads lined up. Just getting from the outside to the center would have been a monumental chore.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Why would someone make a city like this?

Maybe that was why no one ever moved in.

Seras was pulled out of her thoughts by the sound of scuffing stone. She closed her map and looked up to see a massive form strut onto the same road she was on. It was a massive beast with two large tusks poking out of its mouth, its body covered in sharp looking bristles, and six hooved legs.

Tunnel Charger, bronze rank.

The Cavern lurkers had been listed as Iron rank, same as her new dagger. This big boy was bronze, did that make it weaker since bronze was a weaker metal?

Either way she had handled the Caven lurkers six on one while naked and unarmed. Now there was only one and she had a weapon.

The creature noticed her and bellowed. Its feet tore at the ground and began to charge.

Seras was readying herself to dodge and slash at its side as it passed when the feeling of a lead lined blanket landed on her shoulders.

Bronze rank aura from Tunnel charger has suppressed your normal rank aura. All damage is reduced. Speed is reduced. Mobility is reduced.

Seras read the pop up with fear. She didn’t need it to tell her that her speed and mobility had been affected because she could feel the effects hampering her dodge. The beast had run far faster than she would have thought possible for something of its size, and the weight on her shoulders had slowed her down, meaning she wasn’t fast enough to move out of the way.

She pulled up her right arm to absorb the blow, and saw the metal bend and warp as the force crumpled it in. But that wasn’t the end of it, the power of the beast had thrown her from her feet and sent her skittering down the road. Falling ass overhead.

With her left arm she pushed herself up and she saw how fucked her right arm was. The metal of her forearm had caved in, and the fall had broken her elbow joint forcing the arm into an odd angle.

Realignment is required for auto repair to begin.

A popup stated.

Gritting her teeth Seras grabbed her right arm with her left and forced it back into place.

Auto repair in progress time to full functionality 26 hours and 42 minutes. Consume bronze rank monster cores to speed up process.

“OVER A WHOLE DAY!” Seras shouted at the screen.

Thankfully the screen did not respond. That would be too weird even for today.

The Tunnel Charger wasn’t satisfied with just breaking her arm. It had arrested its speed and turned back around and charged.

Seras jumped to her feet, and then, knowing that it was too fast for her to dodge leapt over its head.

At first, she had been patting her own back at the idea. Her hyper elastic tendons were surely superior. But just as she was at the apex of her arc the beast hind legs rose up to kick her midair.

Not fair!

Thankfully nothing broke this time, but the kick did send her onto the ledge of a nearby building.

Again, the beast skidded to a stop and glared baleful black eyes at her. It patted the ground twice and charged the building.

Seras had almost made the mistake of thinking she was safe high above the beast. But the idea that nowhere was safe was finally sinking in. So instead of being caught flat footed as the beast blew through the lower levels of the ruined building, Seras had been ready to jump.

The black bricks of the building rumbled as the upper levels and remaining walls collapsed inward. Seras just had time to see the beast get buried before she had to tuck into a roll on the ground.

Seras got up and squinted through the dust, waiting with bated breath to see if it was dead.

The rubble shifted, and the Tunnel charger stood up.

Okay, fuuuck this.

Like hell she was sticking around to fight this stupid thing.

Rule number two of Survivability, if you can’t avoid detection avoid confrontation.

Buuut, she looked at the repair timer again. Missing an arm for over a day was too much. Presumably and bronze rank monster cores would come from a bronze rank monster.

She could always hunt a less terrifying one later, but that was an uncertain possibility. It was a conundrum of a known quantity versus an unknown one.

Seras gritted her teeth. This thing broke her arm, the least it could do was help her fix it.

The Tunnel charger was up, but she could see through the dust and rubble that it wasn’t unscathed. Its breathing was heavy, and it wasn’t putting any weight on one of its six legs.

It had the power to blow through brick walls, but was it durable enough to continue tanking the hits?

Seras ran across the ground, her legs pumping like pistons. She wasn’t fast enough to outrun the beast, but she wasn’t trying to. In a blind rage the Charger lived up to its namesake and charged after her. But right as it was about to skewer Seras to a thick wall she jumped.

Unable to arrest its momentum it plowed straight into the structural wall holding the building up. And once again several tons of black bricks fell onto it. But unlike before it didn’t get right back up.

Seras watched as it struggled under the weight of the concrete pillar it was wedged against. The Charger was in a bad position and couldn’t properly push it off. But Seras knew that with enough time it eventually would.

Not that she would give it the chance.

Climbing over the rubble Seras unsheathed the knife and began to stalk towards the beast. It saw her approached and bellowed menacingly, or at least it would have been menacing if Seras didn’t know that it was at her nonexistent mercy.

She buried the blade into the shoulders just behind its head. It roared in pain, and she stabbed again.

And again.

And again.

And again.

She would stab it as many times as it took to put it down.