Spinner easily scaled (pun intended… maybe) the wall of the elevator shaft, making his way down and finding a second level, less than fifteen meters beneath the first one. Which wasn’t far, but the place was absolutely pitch black and they couldn’t just… drop a torch down the shaft to illuminate side passages.
Or, to be exact, they could, but it would definitely warn any potential enemies that there was someone coming from above. And they’re trying to be stealthy.
The lower level seems to be completely dark, at least the entrance to it. No visible light. Spinner has a very good night vision, but despite that, he can only see the elevator hall, mirroring the one that was placed a level above them. And even that he can see only barely.
There is something else, though. By the wall. Is that…
Is that some sort of smelter?
Reminds me of the Skyrim ones
What’s Skyrim?
…
My expectations for you were non-existent and yet you still managed to disappoint me
They relay the message from Spinner to the group waiting above, telling them where to find the lower level. Uraraka and Kirishima help set up the rope, and they then climb the shaft down to the second level, one by one.
With a torch.
That lets them confirm that there was, indeed, a larger smelter installed into the wall of the hallway. This immediately confused Yaoyorozu.
“That makes no sense.” She says quietly, they aren’t sure if they are alone on the level. “It’s too small to be able to smelt significant amounts of ore, its design is all wrong, and doing the smelting underground is just inviting smoke poisoning.”
“It might be some magic-boosted smelting.” Uraraka doesn’t seem to be very invested in that conundrum. “We’ll figure it out later, we need to secure this place first. I can smell blood.” She sniffs loudly. “A lot of blood. And it’s fresh.”
They all grip their weapons tighter. Looks like it was going to be a fight.
Are you going to howl again?
“No, I don’t want to alert everyone down here.” Uraraka replies. Looks like the spider maiden incident has… taught her something about stealth. “Monoma-kun, please ring your bells. Without any magic put into it.”
“Sure.” Monoma nods. Somehow he doesn’t find it in himself to object to being ordered around by not only a former 1-A member but also a wolf person. And, he obediently rings the bell, the sound reverberating through the halls of the mine.
They could have as well not bother. Because the first response to the bell ring was nothing else than a loud, distorted howling erupting from a deeper section of the mine.
And then, there are more of them. And more. And more.
“Well…” Uraraka says dryly. “... at least we won’t have to waste time searching for the enemies. Monoma, cast it.”
Another ring, this time quieter. Neither Izuku nor Tomura feel it, but they can immediately see the results. In an instant, everyone’s angry, frowns erupting on their faces, Uraraka grinding her teeth together as she was waiting for a fight to start.
The things that emerge from the darkness, stepping into the dim light of their torches, are the stuff of nightmares.
From the neck below, they seem to be miners, former workers of this mine. The clothes are similar to the ones that they’ve seen on some corpses the level above, although torn and dilapidated, with signs of recent bites seen on many parts of the exposed skin.
But above the necks? That’s where the normalcy ended. Their necks and heads were replaced with those of dogs. Rabid, starving dogs of various breeds (but always large ones), the creatures glaring at the intruders with nothing but hunger in their eyes.
They were horrible creatures… and most definitely not beastkin. In fact, it was hard to even consider them to be sapients. They had to be something unnatural, just had to be.
But they don’t have a lot of time to get scared (or, more like, get angry ) before the nearest creatures begin to charge at them, pickaxes, shovels and other tools in their hands, letting out howls that were strange for dogs and completely impossible for humans.
KILL THOSE FUCKING ABOMINATION WITH FUCKING FIREEEE
HOW DARE THEY DO THAT TO THE BEAUTIFUL THINGS THAT ARE DOGS
Yaoyorozu fires a [Lesser Firebolt] between Kirishima and Uraraka, the bolt hitting one of the charging creatures straight in the face. Spinner has the time to fire a single arrow that lands squarely in the chest of the very same creature a second later, when it became clear that the flame didn’t stop it.
Uraraka dodges a frantic swing of a pickaxe before slamming the creature attacking her in the face with a [Shield Bash], pushing its weapon to the side and leaving it exposed for a [Lesser Thrust]. The tip of her spear pierced the creature’s abdomen almost all the way through.
A second later she barely avoided serious injury when the creature ignored the injury and pushed forward, its head (somewhat resembling that of a German Shepherd) lunging forward towards her throat. Its jaws instead close on the upper verge of her shield and begin to try to grind through the wood.
With the corner of her eyes she can see two more dogheaded creatures lunging at Kirishima, the man managing to swing sideways at one of them with a [Heavy Blow] that sends the creature flying into the pile of crates by his side.
The other gets past it, its jaw closing on Kirishima’s shoulder. Judging from limited damage, Kirishima managed to use [Fortify Flesh], which might be why the creature didn’t just tore most of his skin and flesh off the bones.
Kirishima’s log falls to the ground as the man grabs the creature by its neck and head and begins to strangle and tear it off himself at the same time. His sisyphean task is made possible a moment later when Yaoyorozu casts [Float] on the creature, breaking its footing. A moment later, Kirishima has the being in a chokehold.
Another creature tries to lunge at him (not the one he smacked with a log, that was still trying to stand up despite its grievous injuries), but ends up giving Spinner a straight shot, the arrow hitting it in the shoulder, making it drop the handle of the shovel it was carrying.
A moment later Toga gets to it, slitting its throat from behind it.
Uraraka is still struggling with the creature she partially pierced with her spear when she hears the bell ring. She can feel the power of the [Enraged Blow] flowing through her, and in a moment she thrusts her spear further while slamming her shield into the creature’s face with a [Shield Blow].
With its mouth being locked onto said shield, not only did it lose a lot of teeth but also had its neck broken by the impact. Uraraka immediately kicks it off her spear, the body falling backward, only for another creature to charge at her, jumping off a nearby pile of crates, howling loudly and swinging its shovel down.
Jump attack, huh? She responds by raising her shield and absorbing the impact with a [Barricade Shield] (the blow still making her shield arm go numb for a second), the creature falling to the ground straight onto her risen spear, impaling itself onto it, pushing its handle all the way down to the floor.
Kirishima strangles the creature that he was holding, only to have his shoulder dislocated by a downward pickaxe blow from one more creature that charged at him. There’s a ring of a bell in the background, Monoma realizing what happened and casting [Ignore Injury]. That gave Kirishima enough of a boost to throw the corpse that he was holding at his new attacker, pushing it back and giving himself the time he needed to pick his log from the ground.
He doesn’t have the time to swing it when two more creatures jump at him from the nearby crate piles. He raises the log in front of him, which is just enough to push them slightly away from him and stop them from biting his throat.
The one he threw a corpse at earlier recovers, only to get hit by Spinner’s arrow and Yaoyorozu’s [Lesser Firebolt]. That pushes it back, giving Kirishima the time he needed to deal with his own attacks.
Not alone. Yaoyorozu immediately switches to casting [Float] at one of them, while Toga attacks the other one from behind. As she struggles with him, Kirishima sends the other one flying back with a push of his log.
Uraraka doesn’t have the time to even try to get the last creature off her spear before another one attacks her, swinging a pickaxe, grabbing the edge of her shield from above and pulling it down, before his dog’s head lunges straight from her throat.
Uraraka headbutts it, stunning the creature for the time she needed to push its pickaxe back and [Shield Bash] the creature in the face. That gives her just enough time to pull a javelin out of the small quiver on her back and throw it right at the creature, nailing it to the pile of crates.
She has one more javelin left. Looks like she’ll have to use it as a replacement spear. Especially as more creatures are coming. Many more, at least judging from the intensity of howling that they can hear from the deeper part of the level.
Ochako, you have to retreat, there’s too many of them!
She would have wanted to disagree with those words, but Izuku is right. The howls that those creatures were making were bringing more and more of them, which announced their soon-to-be arrival by more howls, bringing even more creatures.
How many were there on the level? How many more could they defeat before being overrun?
“Spinner!” Uraraka yells as another creature charges at her over the corpses of its compatriot, the one she just [Shield Bashed] starting to recover from the blow. “Grab one of the corpses and climb up the shaft, now !”
“Y-yes!” Spinner shouts back, either deciding not to fight her over it or realizing what the plan was. He quickly grabs the nearest dogheaded corpse (they need to bring something back to the Dungeon for the expedition to be worth it).
Toga jumps back at the pile of crates, the creature she attack earlier being finished, only to immediately be thrown down from it when a creature armed with what looked like a chisel leaps at her from the side, both of them disappearing behind the pile, with sounds of struggle and some screams coming from there.
Creature charges at her with a shovel carried like a lance, hitting her straight in the center of the shield. She sidesteps it at the moment, letting the creature fall to the ground and then break its neck by slamming the edge of her shield into the back of it.
“WE’RE RETREATING!” She yells while starting to do that herself. With the corner of her eyes she can see Kirishima struggling with three dogheaded creatures, one of which was biting him in the leg, the other two keeping his arms occupied so he couldn’t free himself. “YAOYOROZU, CLIMB UP FIRST!”
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She’s on her way, Himiko managed to kill the one that tried to wrestle her but she’s badly injured and she’s retreating after Yaoyorozu. Monoma’s helping her.
She would absolutely kiss him for having the combat awareness to relay such crucial information to her. Then again, she would kiss him for any reason whatsoever, and this definitely wasn’t the time to think about it.
“Kirishima!” She then yells at their team’s tank, before the one bashed earlier charges at her, forcing her to fend it back with her javelin. Fighting retreat was really damn hard, that’s just one more reason not to retreat if possible.
“RETREAT, I’LL HOLD THEM BACK!” Kirishima shouts back some of the manliest words a man (or woman) could say.
She jumps back, her shield enduring another pickaxe swing and begging to crack. The creature that tried it gets a javelin’s tip to the throat in response and takes a step back, blood gushing from its injury.
Himiko, Monoma and Yaoyorozu are up, it’s your turn now!
The injured creature lashes at her again, only to get [Shield Bash] in the face which makes her shield approach the end of its usefulness, solid half of it cracking and missing parts. Uraraka has the time to quickly glance at Kirishima (who took that moment to disappear under the pile of enemies, though she can still see one of his hands latched onto the throat of a creature and holding it with all the strength he could muster) before turning around and jumping, grabbing the rope and starting to climb as quickly as she could.
She isn’t even surprised when one of the creatures manages to jump back after her and bites her in the calf. She does her best to kick it off, but all she does is make her own injury worse. It grabs her leg above and beneath the calf and does its best to bite a whole chunk of her flesh out.
She then feels herself suddenly feel lighter as Yaoyorozu casts [Float] at her, which is enough to let her drag herself up the rope, despite the creature still holding onto her. She can see Spinner up above, firing an arrow at the creature holding onto her, but with its position he can’t hit it in the head.
Instead, the arrow lodges itself into its shoulder.
Spinner fires another arrow a moment later, and hits it in the side of its chest. Despite that, the creature is still holding onto her.
He doesn’t have the time to fire the arrow for the third time, as Uraraka has managed to lift herself up to the first level by then, Yaoyorozu helping her get onto the solid ground just as Monoma sunk his dagger into the creature’s head, Spinner helping him get it off her.
They’ve ended up getting two corpses instead of one, at the cost of Kirishima dying, Toga getting bit a few times and receiving a very nasty pickaxe blow to the shoulder, and Uraraka having one of her legs be taken out of commission.
It was definitely a fun and heart-pumping combat experience, but… yeah, it didn’t exactly count as a success. Or a victory.
Uraraka feels… disappointment, and a distinct lack of satisfaction from it. The fight itself was cool, but the outcome was…
Sigh.
They’ll have their revenge next time.
Because there is going to be next time. She is certain of that.
“So, what are we doing now?” Yaoyorozu asks. Spinner was observing the corridor to make sure that those things weren’t going to try to climb up (after cutting off the rope, of course), while Monoma was busy finishing applying first aid to Himiko.
Yaoyorozu, in the meantime, was patching up Uraraka’s leg, forcing Ochako to lie down, face-down. On the cold stone. Not the most enjoyable thing, even if most of your body was covered in thin fur.
“We’re going back to the Dungeon, of course.” Uraraka sighs. She would love getting her sweet revenge for Kirishima on those creatures, but right now the hall beneath them was likely tightly packed with them. “Let’s carry both of those creatures with us. They might be daemons.”
***
She turned out to be right, although this was something that they discovered only after they finally limped back to the Dungeon, Yaoyorozu repeatedly draining herself to cast [Float] in order to make them move slightly faster.
The System lists them as [Cynocephalus], ETL 13. According to Yaoyorozu, the word itself means ‘Dog-headedness’ in Latin, and used to refer to ancient tales about dog-headed people supposedly living in some distant parts of the Antique world.
They were a part of a previously unknown pantheon called [Rapturous Ecstasy]. From the name alone, they can infer a lot about it.
Big horni
Finding it was a matter of time
The creatures we encountered don’t appear to be very horny.
Thank all the gods for that.
Yeah, well, big surprise: There is more to hedonism than just horni
You can also snort things, drink things, smoke things and, importantly enough, eat things
Oh.
They were very intent on biting everyone, and one of them has nearly bitten Ochako’s calf off.
Ding dong, you realized the truth
congratulations
But you know what that means, right?
Huh?
There is a probably a literal high god of big horni among the Ecstasy, and it, too, has its own supernatural servants in this world
And probably priests and priestesses
and temples with some interesting decorations and rituals
…………..
I’m going to do with that information what I initially did with the knowledge that All for One exists.
That being?
I’ll ignore it and focus on my personal growth, hoping that someone (read: All Might) punches that problem away from my life before it becomes relevant
… I can’t even laugh at that
As All Might did punch that problem away from your life, even if slightly after it became relevant
Yes
It worked back then and maybe it’ll work this time.
Good luck with that.
Izuku decides to share Tomura’s theory about the subject with Yaoyorozu, together with the part about the possibility of there being some sort of ‘sex deity’, whose servants they can encounter sooner or later.
“Well, that’s… lovely .” Yaoyorozu doesn’t seem to be feeling much better about it than he does. “Hopefully it has no presence anywhere around us, it’s probably at least as bad as Occasa is.”
Probably.
What do you think about the creatures we’ve encountered?
Why were they there?
“I don’t know.” Yaoyorozu replies. She was heading to her own quarters to rest and recharge when he spoke to her. “Although… perhaps I do, even if it’s not what I’d consider… tasteful . And definitely some nightmare fuel material.”
That being?
“Cannibalism.” Yaoyorozu states flatly. Izuku immediately realizes that it, indeed, isn’t a tasteful subject. “My theory is that something happened in the mine which trapped the miners inside. When they ended up running out of food, they resorted to the unthinkable.”
Leading to them receiving some… unwanted attention from the daemons associated with the concept.
“That’s the closest thing I have to a theory about it, yes.” Yaoyorozu replies. “It, however, is merely a theory, as I know nothing about how the daemons and other spirits can cross into the Physical World. Still, those things were clearly eating each other down there, judging from the bites and torn clothes on them.”
And they didn’t kill each other?
“They might have been healing themselves while eating, resulting in a perpetual feast of formerly elven meat.” Yaoyorozu replies, the look on her face being… rather disgusted . And for a good measure. “Once again, I don’t know how those creatures work. But they remind me of wendigos from the Native American folklore, just weaker but more numerous.”
They’re definitely dangerous, yeah.
We’ll probably end up having to fight them again if we want to clear that level. And that sounds like the only way of getting that smelter, which will make the [Basic Refining] skill useful.
Yes, they could always create metals themselves, with high enough levels. But with some smelting equipment, they could create (and thus unlock) alloys from the ore they found. Of course, getting there was going to take them a long while.
And, once they would become officially ‘civilized’, they could post it somewhere on the higher levels, allowing people to smelt the ore they mined in them.
“It’s probably best not to hurry with that.” Yaoyorozu decides to point it out. “If those things are as hungry as we think them to be, they’ll likely crowd around the entrance in hopes of the meat coming back to them. I think it’s best to give them a week or so to calm down and spread through the level in search of food.”
Good point, I’ll bring it up to Shigaraki later on.
Go and rest.
***
Spinner, my man, how was your first foray into the isekai world?
“Well…” Spinner scratches the side of his head. He just finished helping Toga back to her bed (where she would, hopefully, heal quickly thanks to the Dungeon’s ambient mana) and was off to his own bed. “... I have to issue a complaint there, boss.”
Let me guess
You’ve met some dog-eared folks
but not only were they all men, they also were straight from a horror movie and freaked you the fuck out
“Yes.” Spinner nods. It’s nice to have a boss that understands you. Shigaraki really did change for the better. “Other than that, it was pretty cool, if bloodier than the usual villain work time. Aside from, you know, the CRC thing.”
Yeah, that was pretty bloody
but the loot was trash
Then again, the one from this trip wasn’t super good either
One that they are always losing because we didn’t give them any weapons
Spinner freezes for a moment, considers the idea and then comes to a decision.
“I’d quickly get fat with popcorn if you did that.” He says. Still, it’s such a cool idea that he’ll probably be imagining it while drifting off to sleep.
***
So, no offerings today, Ochako?
Ochako sighs loudly. She was back in her bed (Monoma helped her limp back to it) and was now waiting for her calf to heal.
While she loved to hear Izuku’s voice, it just… wasn’t the best time. Or subject. Still, she was his friend and if he wanted to talk, she was all ears.
“I really don’t feel like doing it after losing a fight.” She replies. The bed she was lying on wasn’t the most comfortable one. Pretty rough, really. But she got used to it by now. She was always trying to live pretty cheap. “It was… a great fight, but what exactly do I have to celebrate? Losing? Nah, I’ll pass.”
Being cool?
That’s something to celebrate.
You were really cutting through them, slaying them left and right!
All while commanding the others!
That was awesome!
“E-eh?” She manages not to blush, but it’s not easy. Izuku was just… so earnest with his praise! This is her weak spot, and she hopes that it’ll always remain her weak spot. “Ww-well, thank you! You helped me greatly, too!”
I was just doing my best.
“Your best is usually going way too far and breaking most of your bones.” Uraraka decides to tease him a little in retaliation for how… naturally smooth and cute he was (and with zero awareness of himself being like this). “I’d say that was an improvement.”
Ochaaako!
Don’t be like this!
She lets herself chuckle a bit, completely forgetting about her injury, at least for now. She can only imagine the sort of face that he’d make if he was standing in front of her. Definitely a super adorable one.
She can’t wait for the 5th Floor to finally come to existence. In the meantime, she’ll tease him for a while and then go check up on Himiko, because she’s actually feeling kinda bad about her injuries.