Chapter 2
Dungeon Entrance
The dungeon entrance was a cave on a mountain.
Surrounding the entrance were trading caravans, carriages and adventurers.
Like most of the area in the Kingdom, the cave settled in a forested area.
Gathered in an area nearby, the class of heroes accompanied by knights were awaiting the orders of the commander.
The commander was a middle aged knight who had patches of white hair on his sides with a crop top haircut.
His most significant feature was a big scar across his face, signifying war experience.
His rank was Sergeant Major.
”Attention! First Sergeant Morris, is everyone here?" (Captain)
Next to him was his next in command whose age was the same as the commander.
He gave the commander a quick nod.
"Good. Alright, listen up! Tomorrow at dawn, we enter the dungeon. We have more than enough supplies for us to last us about two weeks. Our aim is to reach the 30th floor. If we deem it possible, we will continue to the next floors. Heroes, your mission is to amass as much battle experience here. Knights, you are to advise them during this and also aid at battle if needed. Everyone, is that clear?!" (Captain)
""""Haa!!!!""""
A cry of confirmation came from the platoon.
After that they had free time.
In this world the currency hierarchy is 10 bronze coins = 1 Silver coin, 100 silver coins = 1 gold coin, 1000 gold coins = 1 platinum. 1 bronze coin in this world was somewhat equal to one yen.
Some went to buy some things from the stalls set up.
Kenshin was not an exception.
He was currently at a stall for tools.
"Excuse me" (Kenshin)
"Oh, a customer. Sorry, the shop is closed for now, didn't you see the sign?"
He pointed at the sign on the counter.
"Oh. I wasn't looking to buy." (Kenshin)
He pointed at a crate behind the shopkeeper.
A look of surprise was displayed on the shopkeepers face.
"Oh, that. That's not for sale. They're failed products...... " (Keeper)
Though it could be his normal behaviour, for a moment his voice sounded a bit on guard when he saw what he was pointing at.
"Was it formed using sintering, powder metallurgy?" (Kenshin)
He said it in a low volume as if to keep it a secret.
The greying shopkeeper was wide eyed.
With squinted eyes, he asked in a serious voice.
"Boy, how do you know about that?" (Shopkeeper)
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The platoon set up camp in an empty area near the cave entrance.
There, they had dinner and went to sleep.
They didn't eat the supplies they had that was mainly preserved food like cured or salted meat. Instead they bought their food from the food stalls near the entrance.
Kenshin was not sleeping. He was sorting out all of his equipment that was commissioned to each of them. It was a footsoldiers backpack that contained some food, water, toiletries, cutlery, pills and potions with a sleeping bag on top. That was what everyone else was given. They could carry more if they wanted but it wasn’t advised.
Kenshin had more than the rest of his group which earned him a small lecture from the other soldiers who said the same thing, 'Try to be more light on your feet'.
He would need a bag three times the size of the bag they were given to carry the stuff he had. SO, he modified the pack so that it would be big enough to fit his stuff using a sewing kit.
The clothes that he was commissioned with from the palace were novice adventurer’s clothes that consisted of linen pants and shirt, leather boots, leather gloves, leather suspenders and a leather belt.
Kenshin modified them.
His leather belt now had pouches that circled around his belt. He also put pouches on his leather suspenders and some straps for things that required quick access like pills or weapons. Both suspenders and leather belt were modified to provide quick release function. His bag was a lot bigger now and the interior safely secured his equipment with straps and pouches.
They were departing tommorow.
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Inside the dungeon
All of the floors of the dungeon were the size of 10 football fields on average.
Adventurers who reached the fortieth floor were told to leave before time so only some adventurers were there.
The fifty floors had guide posts and lights to light the way.
”Easy, too easy, with our pace we can conquer all the floors. What do you think Commander? We got to the 50th floor in 5 days so we should move forward right?”(Hachiro)
Hachiro, who just finished another floor and was heading for the next one, proclaimed with a confident expression.
”You guys struggled getting here? These monsters are small fries!” (Arata)
”Hey Arata, you’re talking like you weren’t scared when we fought those giant wasp on the 29th floor, haha, you stood still when we encountered them, you thought you’re allergies were going to act up right?”(Honoka)
”Oi you know I have a phobia of bees right!? I was still suspicious when Ami told me that there was anti-allergy spell. I didn’t want my face swelling up while fighting.” (Arata)
”Even though we're in the vanguard you fight from our rear, don’t be such a pussy” (Honoka)
(Captain)”…….. I’ll have to discuss it with my sub ordinates. But let me warn you, don’t underestimate the unknown floors, you might be heroes but we’ve only prepared you for the fifty floors.”
Right now they were inside the dungeon on the 50th floor. In the beginning the first monster they encountered were giant ants, they were around half a meter long and nearly reached the height of their knees. They were told to have an exoskeleton similar to plywood, some were scared at first but the knight hero Hachiro with his extraordinary strength one shot it with his sword.
With that, the rest of the students gained some confidence and quickly found their way to their current floor.
Four days ago, some of the knights established the supply point on the 39th floor. The rest of the platoon advanced when the commander decided that the students could advance into the higher floors.
Kenshin was left to carry some of the supplies in the back with the rear-guard that consisted of a party of Haruna sensei and two knights. The reason for him being placed here was obviously due to being viewed as some sort of ball boy, something that Kenshin did not complain about or refuse.
Naturally, when a horde of monsters attacks the group, most would be finished off before they reached Kenshin.
Even if one were to get past the front group the knights or Haruna sensei would take care of it.
The two knights with him viewed him in low regard in fighting but an incident involving hidden giant black wolves that they hadn’t sensed caused them to change their mind.
That was a day ago at night when they were preparing to rest.
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Kenshin was at the back putting up the tents for the rear guard who were somewhere else.
“Arghhh!”
A painful shout was heard.
“Shit! We let our guards down! There’s a pack of black wolves!”
There were 6 wolves, as big as a tiger with black fur and red eyes that emitted a pale blue light if one look closely. They were surrounding the two knights, a female knight, who wore light armour called Jen was on the floor with a hand covering a bite wound on her thigh and was holding up a loaded cross bow at the wolves. Next to her was a cuisse, a piece of armour that had a part of it that seemed to be bitten off. The armour was 3mm thick steel it would normally need lots of strikes to even begin to pierce through it so seeing it like this meant that the culprit was extremely strong. In front of her was Mark, a knight who used a spear taking advantage of the spears length to keep the pack at bay.
”Oi Ken! Get the others, get the Ca-“ (Mark)
Without looking back, Mark who was guarding Jen shouted.
He cried from the tunnel that lead into the cave room that the rest of the group was in.
A wolf used that moment to sidestep and dashed, fangs out, white with drool coming out. Due to its black fur and fast speed, Mark was not able to see it go past his two meter spear.
Jumping, it tore through his throat.
This was what could have happened.
What happened was as the wolf was gaining momentum to jump, something flew past Mark and flew below the attacking wolf and a ‘thud’ resounded.
What caused it was a rope two meters in length tied around its legs.
It was a bola with three weights on each end of the rope.
For a moment the wolves was still from the unexpected occurrence.
Mark quickly used that opening to stab a wolf through its eye piercing its brain immediately killing it without giving it a chance to yelp.
Aggravated, the other wolves growled and went into attack mode, 1 wolf lunged at mark while the other 3 moved into his blind spot.
‘Scchwaaf!’
Jens shot the approaching wolf on the throat severing its vertebrae.
Mark knew that Jen would cover him while he tried to pry his spear from the wolf the he just slew, that’s why he didn’t pay the attacking wolf any heed and trusted in his comrade. Finally managing to take out his spear he turned to where the 3 wolves were but….
What came into view was two wolves dead on the ground; one had a rope tied around its jaw that was opened beyond its limits while on the other end of the rope was tied around the other wolfs left leg.
But the rope on its leg wasn’t what caused it to die. Looking at it, it had a knife with a blade the length of a hand but with a small area to grip, a throwing knife was stuck in its eye. Still, the throwing knife only had enough power to pierce its eye with the tip of it, something that would go in deeper if it was a normal wolf from earth.
What finished it off was a dagger stabbed through its mouth.
Following the path where the third one circled to, a figure came into view. The figure was on top of the third pack wolf in a runners starting form but with a dagger that was stabbed through its throat using both hands. Wearing dark brown linen clothes with a belt and suspender that was modified to hold throwing knives and a rope on the straps for ease of access. It was Kenshin.
A few moments before.
When he heard the cries of the two knights from the tunnel that lead to this area, he stopped what he was doing and dashed off to the source of the sound.
He saw a pack of giant black wolves the size of a tiger surrounding Mark who was protecting Jen on the floor.
Immediately, Kenshin pulled out a three weight bola on one hand.
At the same time he took out a throwing knife and put it on his mouth. Still running he judged that it was the right length between him and his target, he threw the bola at the wolf that began gaining momentum to attack mark.
‘Whop, whop, whop, whop’ then a ‘thud’ came afterwards.
With one wolf immobilized, Kenshin used his now empty hand to take a rope that hanged from his belt.
He threw the other rope with two loop knots at the two wolves that rushed to encircle him.
He timed it so one wolf’s leg was caught while at the same time the other end of the rope caught the other wolf’s jaw.
A louder thud was made and then a cracking sound.
The other wolf killed by a snapped jaw and the other wolf on the floor that unintentionally assist killed the other wolf by acting as an anchor for its jaw.
The one on the floor was going berserk yelping with the whites in its crimson eyes showing as it tried to get up to get revenge for making it unintentionally murder its pack mate, a knife was stuck in its left eye causing it to wail in pain.
Kenshin took this chance to speed up while pulling out a dagger the size of a humerus (arm bone) from his right belt sheath holding it, when he came at the right side of the wailing wolf he plunged it down its open mouth while still not stopping and heading straight to the other wolf.
The other wolf raged at having its pack mates killed in a short amount of time, it prioritized Kenshin as its main opponent.
It watched the boy cautiously while it stood its ground waiting for the right moment.
Seeing Kenshin throw something at it, it moved its head to dodge it.
Thinking that this was an opening after it dodged the projectile, it decided to attack only to close its eyes in pain from something that trailed off from the projectile.
From that moment it was game over.
Kenshin pulled out another dagger from his left side sheath with two hands.
He used his body weight to pierce its throat in a uppercut motion by jumping then using gravity to hook it and slam it down.
"Mark- san, please stay on watch. I'm going to see to Jen-san.” (Kenshin)
After saying so, he pulls out the dagger from the corpse.
On the way to Jen, he speedily killed the remaing wolf.
”….”(Jen)
”....”(Mark)
"Jen-san let me look at those wounds” (Kenshin)
He starts applying treatment immediately on Jen's wounds.
Grabbing Kenshin’s shoulders
“Ken, quick! Show me your Stats!” (Mark)