A week after his [Idle Progression] perk had reached [E] rank, Peter was being led by Sadi far from the usual trio of dungeons that the man alternated between each day.
Initially Peter had found this sudden change in plans suspicious, but just judging by the fact he had seen other adventurer parties heading in the same direction as they were – something big had happened, and for some reason they were heading right towards its location.
Peter’s interest was peaked but thought better than to ask the man directly as though he had largely refrained from beating Peter half to death for the tiniest mistakes, it wasn’t as though his personality had gotten much nicer over the months Peter had known him – so it honestly wasn’t worth risking.
Further, the man had been visibly more angry in recent days, though it seemed today was an exception – which did heighten Peter’s suspicion.
At least 3 hours after their walk had started, it came into view. In the middle of what looked to be a former graveyard, a grand copper door the size of a large building came into view.
Peter’s jaw dropped to the floor in awe of the massive dungeon entrance – as that had to be what it was. Peter’s knowledge of dungeons mostly came from his own experience, and the small amount of information that Katie had reluctantly shared with him, but he had never heard of a dungeon with such a big entryway before.
A massive group of about 150 adventurers stood gathered in front of the door in a makeshift camp – all 150 of them seemed to look up from whatever it was they were doing to stare at Sadi warily. It seemed Peter wasn’t the only one afraid of the monstrous barbarian who led him, which made sense given the man’s repulsive personality.
None dared openly look at Peter, though he could have sworn he felt at least a couple sympathetic eyes look upon him momentarily before hastily averting their gaze back to what they had been doing before he and Sadi had arrived.
An Amazonian bodied woman noticed Sadi approaching the door, and she smirked before making her way towards him.
“I see you chose to join the raid party after all, what happened? You break that precious club of yours.” The woman said, openly insulting the brute – to Peter’s great astonishment.
Peter swore he heard the man growl in response, followed by a quick verbal retort, “Unlike your man, Elizabeth, my stick works just fine again after heavy use with the aid of some tender ministrations.”
The woman didn’t visibly react to the comment, and simply decided to move the conversation along.
“The dungeon has a ‘party’ limit of 250 but we’ll be running it with only the 198 of us. It’s a [Copper+] ranked raid dungeon, so I recommend you leave your baggage boy outside with the rest of the deadweight and useless people.”
Peter almost recoiled from the sudden and uncalled for insult, but just about manage to reign himself in enough to simply let the comment go – something about the lady in front of him felt off. Plus, Peter really wouldn’t mind some extra time off.
However, Sadi had other plans for him it seemed. Sadi snorted before saying, “He’s coming in with me – after all, aren’t raid dungeons famous for giving out impressive loot once defeated – if anything, the boy’s presence is thus even more important. I sure as hell ain’t going to be carrying my own loot for weeks through this damn dungeon.”
‘Weeks?!’ Peter’s mind raced with pure terror at the idea of spending more than just a few hours with the man beside him.
Elizabeth gave Sadi a stare as cold as ice, but the cruel bastard held her glare and won out as she relented and said, “Fine. But, considering his low level, are you even certain the kid can handle the dungeon’s time distortion?”
The man laughed, “No, of course I am not certain. But if he isn’t then I guess I’ll just have to have you carry all my stuff for me. Back like how it was in the good old days.”
Elizabeth rolled her eyes and then said in a voice that left no room for argument, “Jared, since you’re being so demanding, and you’re probably one of the only people in this group who has cleared a raid dungeon in the past, why don’t you go and inform the others of some handy tips in return for my generosity in allowing you to bring an extra mouth to feed along to our raid.”
Sadi/Jared simply grunted in response before he turned to face the camp of 100+ adventurers and smirked as he began to shout out a lecture on the particulars of raid dungeons.
Most of the impromptu speech was not heard by the majority of the camp, but unfortunately for Peter, he got to hear all of it. It was unfortunate only because most of the speech was just the man uselessly swearing and making lewd jokes, however, there were a few crumbs of knowledge that Peter could extract from the man’s chaotic and otherwise barbaric words.
Raid dungeons were seemingly dungeons that allowed for parties who size was greater than 100 members to enter them. They were like regular dungeons in so far as they were usually full of legions of deadly monsters.
However, unlike regular dungeons, depending on the rank of the raid dungeon, and the number of people who entered it, a raid dungeon could be far more deadly than the average dungeon for a single reason: [Boss] monster waves.
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From what little information Sadi included in his speech, at some point during the dungeon run, there would be a wave containing an overwhelming number of powerful monsters led by a monster in the rank above the dungeon’s own rank.
Such a thing was an impossibility in regular dungeons, but due to the system expecting more from a large group of people, raid dungeons allowed there to be superior ranked monsters charging at a horde of lesser ranked people.
However, the upside of this risking this danger was immense as if one of the party’s members managed to kill the superior beast in a solo-fight and or landed a decisive killing blow on said beast then they would almost certainly ascend to the [Bronze] rank if they were already at the peak of [Copper] – even without having been given a formal trial by the system mages.
Plus, the killing of a superior beast in one-on-one combat was a legally endorsed way of a person ascending through the ranks, or at least it was according to what Katie had told him, which made the palpable excitement that coursed through every adventurer present in the camp understandable.
This was an opportunity for the best of the [Copper] class in the city to prove themselves worthy of social advancement; to show their potential as warriors. Thus, the dungeon’s potential rewards couldn’t have been greater in the eyes of every adventurer, as further adding to the importance of this raid was that raid dungeons disappeared after being conquered, and almost never did they appear in the [Copper] rank.
However, the mind-blowing uniqueness of the opportunity combined with the strict conditions necessary to fully snatch it made Peter suspect that not everyone who entered the dungeon would leave it alive – and not all who would die will have fallen to the maws and or claws of a dungeon monster.
A few minutes after he had began his curse-laden speech, Sadi simply stopped shouting nonsense and began making his way over to the dungeon’s entrance. Peter followed behind him warily. However, once they were only a couple meters away, the man turned and look down at Peter with an unreadable expression on his face.
“You know what, rat, since I’m feeling generous - if you live through this dungeon wave – I’ll forgive all of your debt.”
Peter was momentarily stunned but quickly collected himself and thanked the man – though the other didn’t seem to enjoy being thanked very much. Peter had no idea why the man had decided not to continue hanging his debt over his head, but he honestly couldn’t be happier to hear that once the dungeon was complete – he would be free.
“Stay here, I’ve got to go speak to someone.” Sadi ordered Peter in a harsh voice, before running off in a direction that Peter couldn’t quite make out.
A few minutes later, a system prompt appeared in the periphery of his vision and a smile formed on his face.
However, before he could check it, a familiar female voice rung out from behind him.
“Hmm? What are you doing here?” Katie asked worriedly, causing Peter to turn around instantly to face her.
“What do you mean?” He asked, confused – he had suspected she knew about his arrangement so why would it be odd for him to be at a dungeon.
“You’re nowhere close to the peak of [Copper] rank in terms of level, and the plus is not included in the dungeon’s rank for nothing you know. If you join the raid as weak as you are now, you will almost certainly die in a matter of days if not minutes considering your abysmal physical stats.” She responded in her usual biting, lecturer tone.
Peter was about to defend himself, then suddenly, he realised that this situation was far more absurd than even he thought.
“You’re at the Peak of [Copper] rank?!” Peter wondered aloud, astonished by this information.
“Of course. And, after I easily dispatch with the dungeon’s main boss, I’ll raise my rank to the [Bronze] rank.” Katie replied smugly, her voice did not even hint at there being some doubt in her mind that she would succeed in doing the preposterous and defeating a monster a system rank above her.
Peter looked at her with some amount of wonder and amazement, and then a trickle of dread began to seep into his bones as he realised that in all likelihood his two taskmasters were aiming for the same prize and neither one would let the other have it easily.
He gulped as he realised that he would most likely get caught in the middle of any dispute between them, and so would very quickly have to pick a side and hope he picked right. And, honestly, though he despised her slavedriver work ethic, Katie’s education provided him the means to attain true power for himself and it wasn’t as if Sadi had done much to ingratiate himself with Peter.
So, he decided, if the two were to come to blows, he would have to tentatively side with the slave driver over the sadist. He shivered as he realised what he was essentially signing himself up for more of, but, in pursuit of ultimate power, what a pitiful price it was.
Then, in the corner of his vision he noticed a group of 4 approaching him with confused looks on their faces, and Peter felt his mind start to race as he wondered what the hell was going on.
However, before either he or the group of adventurers he lived with could interact, Elizabeth’s voice boomed throughout the entire area – her command was simple, and for some unknown reason no one felt able to disobey.
That command was: gather, and suddenly every adventurer in the nearby area gathered in a large circle around her central desk, and she smiled and waved – before she began giving a speech of sorts.
“Alright, listen up. For those of you who didn’t hear Jared’s pre-dungeon-dive tips, I’ll give you the basics of what you morons and weaklings need to know to not be a burden to those of us who are actually competent at what we do.”
She paused, implicitly daring anyone to whisper to those around them in response to her words – none did. Assured that no one would undermine her authority, she continued, “The dungeon we’re about to enter is a raid dungeon and that means it’s going to be tough. So tough in fact that most of you will regret ever stepping one foot inside, but even if you think you are going to die on the battlefield, you will fight on with full force otherwise you will be killed for insubordination and your families will receive no compensation due to your cowardice. This group, if anyone of us is to survive, we cannot waste our limited resources sustaining human dead weight, is that clear?!”
Everyone in the crowd nodded solemnly, and Elizabeth continued, “There will be serious time compression in the dungeon – probably in the range of 2-4x faster time though it will not feel that way for us. So be ready, we shall be in the dungeon for at least 2, possibly 4, months – and there shall be no exiting the dungeon until either we or the boss is dead. Does everyone understand my words?”
Everyone nodded again. Elizabeth’s serious expression turned into one of pure sadistic glee as she then gestured at the massive dungeon gateway and said, “Well then, it seems we’re all ready to get going – you have 30 seconds to get the door or we’re entering the dungeon without you.”
A massive mess of a scramble ensued.