I was flipping pancakes, the scent of batter and butter filling the air, when Al strolled into the kitchen. He stood beside me, his hands casually clasped behind his back, before suggesting, “Considering the simplicity of the spider dungeon, what do you think about tackling some more?”
I shot him a sidelong glance, flipping a pancake with a satisfying sizzle. “I thought you were busy in your lab?”
“Yes,” he admitted, adjusting his posture slightly, “but it can wait. I inquired about the number of cores Mahya intends to collect, and she informed me that she requires at least one hundred. Extensive delays between clearing operations and neglecting dungeon clusters, such as the one here and the one in the ruined city, may significantly prolong our stay. This world is too bleak to endure for long.”
I froze mid-flip and turned to stare at him. “She wants a hundred?!”
“Yes,” he said matter-of-factly. “I agree with her estimate. Of course, we could gather additional cores in higher mana worlds, but the difficulty and danger levels there will be considerably higher. Here, we have a rare situation: relatively easy dungeons that no one monitors. It is a golden opportunity.”
As if to emphasize his point, he plucked a pancake off the plate next to me and took a bite.
“Hey!” I swatted at him with the spatula. “You can’t just steal that!”
He chewed leisurely, raising a single eyebrow. “I believe I just did.”
I sighed, flipping another pancake with a dramatic flourish. “Fine. But if we’re tackling more dungeons, you’re taking the lead on the next one.”
Al’s lips curved into a small, smug smile. “I believe it was promised to Rue.”
From his beanbag in the living room, Rue lifted his head, his ears perking up. “Yes! Next dungeon is Rue’s. John promise!” he shouted, his tail thumping against the floor for emphasis.
“Yeah, buddy,” I said with a chuckle, shaking my head as I flipped another pancake. “It’s yours. Don’t worry.”
The next thing I knew, the pancake I’d just flipped floated off the pan. I blinked as it drifted lazily through the air before landing squarely in Rue’s waiting mouth. He munched happily, his eyes sparkling with mischief.
“Rue!” I groaned. “Seriously?”
“Rue learn from Al!” he said proudly, his tail wagging even harder.
I turned to see Al casually leaning against the counter, munching another pancake. His expression was one of pure, unrepentant satisfaction.
“Both of you,” I growled, brandishing the spatula like a weapon, “out of my kitchen!”
Al raised his hands in mock surrender, his smirk firmly in place. Meanwhile, Rue flopped his head back down onto his beanbag, radiating a wave of smugness so intense I almost felt it physically.
The second dungeon in the aircraft area was only a few hundred meters from the house, nestled against a hangar wall. At first glance, it seemed like any other dungeon, but one thing about it was off. The portal of doom—that ominous, swirling gateway—was unusually low. The opening was barely one and a half meters tall.
I paused, tilting my head. “That’s… inconvenient.”
“I agree,” Al said, staring at the portal with mild disdain. “Clearly not designed with practicality in mind.”
I stepped forward, bending awkwardly to estimate the height. “I can manage, but you’re going to have to crouch.”
“Wonderful,” he muttered.
Behind us, Rue let out a dramatic sigh. “Rue not fit. Too low.”
“Yeah, looks like it,” I said, stifling a laugh.
Al crouched and shuffled through the portal with as much dignity as he could muster, which wasn’t much. Rue followed, flattening himself to the ground and wriggling forward on his stomach like a worm. The sight of him, paws outstretched and tail dragging, was too much—I couldn’t hold back a snort.
Rue’s telepathic grumble echoed in my mind. “John laugh? Not funny!”
“Sorry, buddy,” I said, as I ducked to follow them. “But it kind of is.”
On the other side, we found ourselves in a stone dome. The walls arched smoothly, forming a perfect curve, and the entire space was about thirty meters across. No tunnels or passages led elsewhere—just the dome, and the walls were riddled with holes like Swiss cheese. Some holes were tiny, barely five centimeters wide, while others were large enough to fit a basketball, maybe fifty centimeters across.
Al scanned the area with a raised brow. “If the dungeon thinks I am going to crawl through one of those holes, it is very mistaken,” he declared, folding his arms.
I snorted, about to comment, when the holes suddenly became alive with movement. Small, round creatures began hopping out of them in erratic bursts. I froze, my mouth slightly open.
“What in the—”
The creatures looked like potatoes. Literally, potatoes. They varied in size, from fist-sized ones to some as big as a football, but their shapes were all the same—round, lumpy, and featureless. They had no eyes, no faces, no hands, nothing. Except legs.
And what legs they were. The smaller ones had three or four zigzagging knees, their legs bending in bizarre angles, while the larger ones sported up to ten knees. They bounced on those spindly limbs like springs, vaulting themselves high into the air before landing in erratic hops.
Al squinted at one of the larger ones, his expression a mix of incredulity and disdain. “Are those supposed to be monsters?”
I shrugged, keeping my eyes on the bouncing potatoes as more poured out. “I don’t know what they’re supposed to be, but they’re definitely giving me ‘jumping toy’ vibes.”
Rue tilted his head, his ears twitching as one of the smaller ones landed near him. “Potatoes?” he asked, his voice tinged with confusion. “Monsters are potatoes now?”
“Apparently,” I muttered, reaching for a lightning bolt. “Guess we’ll find out what they can do soon enough.”
I fired a lightning bolt at the bouncing creatures, but it did absolutely nothing. Or rather, it didn’t damage them, but it definitely pissed them off. In a flash, I was surrounded, potatoes hurtling at me from every direction.
I slapped a few away with telekinesis, sending them spinning into the walls, but three more slammed into me for every one I knocked aside. After a handful—or maybe ten, who could tell in the chaos—collided with my mana shield, it shattered. At least, the backlash was more manageable this time. That was when I discovered the truth: they weren’t potatoes. They were solid rocks, rough and heavy.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
Behind me, Rue let out a sharp whine, his distress cutting through the din. The rattle of an automatic submachine gun roared to life, and I turned to see Al at my right, his shield up. Every time one of the rock-creatures struck his mithril shield, it rang out like a gunshot.
I cast Protective Shield, extending it to meet the edge of Al’s shield, creating a barrier for Rue to duck behind. He curled up behind us, his tone filled with worry. "John fix! Too many rocks!"
“I’m working on it!” I shouted, though I wasn’t sure if I was trying to reassure him or myself.
I fired another bolt of lightning into the swarm. Nothing. Not even a crack. I tried Wind Blades next. The rocks kept bouncing, unfazed. Blazing Orb. Useless. The fire hit them and spread harmlessly to the sides. Stone Shard. While the spell shattered on impact, it at least deflected one creature—a tiny victory, if you could call it that.
The only saving grace was that their blows at my shield didn’t drain a lot of mana.
Al swung his sword at a cluster of them. Instead of slicing through, his blade batted them aside like a baseball bat. He grimaced, his grip tightening.
We locked eyes from behind the thin protection of our shields.
“Ideas?” I asked telepathically to cut through the relentless clatter of stone against metal.
“We have plenty of crystals back home. Dissipate them.”
I cast Exude Mana, hoping to dissolve the rocky bastards. They resisted. The smaller ones took at least three casts to disappear, and the larger ones clung to existence stubbornly, soaking up my mana like sponges.
“This’ll take hours. I’m not sure I have enough mana to keep this shield up while we clear them all.”
Al cast Verdant Grasp, and two thin, pathetic roots wriggled up from the stone floor like they’d been summoned from a dying garden.
“There’s not enough nature here for it to take hold!” he shouted, his voice barely carrying over the relentless barrage of rocks pounding against his shield.
“Retreat?” I asked, my telepathic voice full of hope.
"I have an idea," Al sent, his tone sharp and urgent. "Can you increase your shield?"
"Yes.”
"Do it."
I poured mana into my shield, expanding it to its maximum size. The shimmering barrier grew, but it began guzzling mana like a starving beast. Al leaped behind me, and I adjusted the shield to cover the three of us as best I could.
From behind the barrier’s safety, Al pulled out a scroll, channeled his mana into it, and ripped it apart. A foul-smelling green mist materialized above the rock monsters, condensing into droplets before raining down. The acid hissed and bubbled as it struck them, dissolving their surfaces with grotesque efficiency.
"Good idea," I muttered, more to myself than anyone else, as the acidic rain thinned the horde.
The process dragged on for what felt like an eternity. Al tore through scroll after scroll for half an hour, releasing more acid rain every minute or two. Meanwhile, I kept the shield up, my mana reserves draining steadily. Sweat trickled down my temple as I struggled to maintain the barrier.
Finally, I turned to Rue, huddled behind us, growling softly at the creatures. "Rue, get out. I don’t have enough mana to protect all three of us. Al and I will finish clearing this."
He sent a powerful wave of dissatisfaction, laced with resignation, but listened. He crawled backward out of the dome with one last grumble, leaving us behind.
I adjusted the shield to cover just Al and me. The mana drain eased slightly, giving me some breathing room.
For the next twenty minutes, Al continued his methodical work, tearing scroll after scroll while I maintained the shield. The acid rain hissed and bubbled as it ate away at the remaining rock monsters, reducing them to sludge puddles. By the time we finished, my mana reserves were running on fumes, and Al’s usually pale complexion had turned ashen.
“How’s your mana looking?” I asked, my voice strained.
“Low,” he admitted, his tone clipped but steady. “If we have only the final guardian left, it will suffice. If we encounter another wave of those rocks, I recommend a tactical retreat.”
As if on cue, a deep grinding noise rumbled beneath us. A large, circular hole opened on the floor, and a massive rock rose gradually, its surface smooth and polished like marble.
“Guess that’s our final guardian,” I said.
We didn’t waste time talking. Without a word, we both pulled out scrolls of Acid Rain, channeled mana into them, and tore them apart simultaneously. Green droplets formed in the air, falling onto the guardian’s surface, but the effect was underwhelming. Instead of melting away like the smaller creatures, it barely lost a centimeter of its size.
The guardian let out a sound like the groaning creak of an ancient mill wheel, then lunged at us with surprising speed for something its size.
“Move!” I shouted, diving sideways.
Al mirrored the motion, rolling out of the way just as the massive rock slammed into the wall. Dust and debris exploded from the impact, but when the dust settled, the guardian looked no worse for wear.
I scrambled to my feet, gritting my teeth. “This is going to be a problem.”
Al tore another scroll, summoning Quicksand beneath the monster. For a moment, it seemed promising as the guardian sank about half a meter into the ground—but then it popped back out like it was nothing, its surface gleaming with barely a scratch.
The monster lunged. I shot into the air while Al dove to the side, narrowly avoiding the crushing impact. I channeled mana and tore Frostbite, a freezing wave coating frost on the guardian’s surface. It slowed down—a little. Barely noticeable.
The monster jumped high, its bizarre, jointed legs propelling it upward with terrifying speed. It nearly clipped me, and I swerved hard to avoid it. “Those legs are a pain in the ass!” I shouted.
Al didn’t reply. He tore a Hail Barrage scroll, raining icy shards down onto the guardian. The effect was minimal. The monster barely flinched, continuing its relentless assault. Al rolled out of the way just in time as the rock slammed into the ground where he’d stood a split second earlier.
I tore Stalactite Fall, summoning a massive spike that dropped straight onto the guardian. It chipped a small piece off its surface—the most damage we’d managed so far—but it was nowhere near enough.
The monster rebounded off a wall, leaping toward Al. He tore Sonic Piercer at the last second. A sharp vibration filled the air as the spell struck the guardian, creating a hole in its surface.
It was progress, but it had a cost. The guardian let out a grinding roar and moved faster, hurtling at us like a cannonball. I barely managed to avoid losing my legs as it rocketed past me.
Al dove again, rolling to the side with only millimeters to spare. “We need to slow it down!” he shouted.
I tore another Frostbite, casting it mid-air. The icy magic seeped into the guardian’s joints, and its movements faltered slightly. Al followed with a Briar Bind, thick, thorny vines shooting from the ground and coiling around its legs. It bucked violently, the vines creaking under the strain.
“Keep it pinned!” I yelled, tearing my own Briar Bind scroll to add to the restraint. The second set of vines tightened around the monster, locking its legs in place. Al followed with another one.
Al and I exchanged a glance, understanding passing between us without a word. We both drew sledgehammers from our Storage, gripping them tightly.
Together, we charged. The first blows landed with heavy thuds, splintering the monster’s surface. Three hits each, then a pause as one of us tore another scroll to keep the bindings strong. Another round of strikes—this time five hits each—reduced the guardian to seventy percent of its size.
Scroll, hammer, scroll, hammer. The cycle continued, our arms aching and mana reserves dwindling. At last, we reduced it to twenty percent of its original size.
One final scroll. More hits. Cracks spread across the guardian’s surface like a web until it finally crumbled, disintegrating into fragments of stone and sand. It was spread all over the place. There was no point trying to convert it into a crystal.
We both collapsed on our butts, panting heavily. My sledgehammer rested on the floor beside me, too heavy to lift again.
Al leaned back, sweat dripping from his brow. “Next time,” he said between gasps, “we bring explosives.”
I nodded, too exhausted to respond, but the image of Mahya’s smug face popped into my mind. She would probably say it should have been our first priority. And, annoyingly, she’d be right.
After I healed the bruises we collected, we touched the core, and both received ugly gauntlets. The gauntlets were heavy and clunky, with a rough surface that looked like it had been hastily chipped from raw stone. The texture was uneven, with jagged edges and cracks, and the dull gray color only made them look more like oversized rocks than an item.
Stoneforged Gauntlets
Heavy gauntlets made from the dungeon rock. The gauntlets boost strength for melee attacks or grant resistance to damage from heavy impacts.
They were utterly useless to me, but at least Al got something he could use.
“That is the most horrendous thing I have seen in my life,” he exclaimed, holding the gauntlets at arm’s length like they might infect him. “Who in their right mind would wear such a monstrosity?”
I glanced at him. Hmm, maybe not useful to Al—or his vanity.