When morning came, Toley woke the group and they broke down camp quickly. After doing one last check on their individual supplies and equipment, they all approached the gate entrance of the world dungeon. Now that they were closer, the stone statues looked almost oppressing. As if they warned of nearly guaranteed death upon entry. The gates themselves were relatively plain stone.

As the party approached the entrance, the gates swung open on their own, revealing a well-lit cobblestone staircase leading downward. The automated door made everyone hesitate, except for Sheeron and Rox. Both of whom walked in without missing a beat until they realized everyone else had stopped.

Sheeron turned to face everyone as Rox continued on ahead, presumably to scout. “Don't worry, all world dungeons open automatically if the doors sense someone with higher than level two abilities in front of the gate. It's unknown how and it's not widely known, but that's how it works.”

After being reassured, the rest of the party follow. While traveling down the stairs they readied their weapons. They were now in enemy territory and had to be ready for the unexpected. If they were lucky, they would not have to travel very far into the dungeon to find the kidnapped princeling. Even if Rox and Kara planned to somehow work a miracle and clear the entire dungeon, Sheeron knew it was nigh impossible. Feera, although she had shown excitement about it, knew from her experiences that the idea of clearing a world dungeon was beyond them as well. Toley, however, had no idea the sort of a hellish place he had been dragged into.

“What type of dungeon do you think this is?” Asked Rox, directed at Sheeron. “The only one attempted in the past millennium has been the maze dungeon closest to the capital, so that's the only information I have right now.”

“If we're lucky, this will be a 'puzzle' or a 'corridor' type, like the first two were,” Sheeron said, voicing their two most optimistic choices. “Worst case scenario, it's a boss dungeon, like the third.”

The world dungeons were known to have different types of challenges within them. People referred to their types based on the sort of challenges that someone would find within them. A maze dungeon, like in the capital, has an expansive maze within it with several rooms inside that can contain a multitude of things from monsters to treasure.

“That might be the worst case, but I like the sound of that kind of challenge.” He said with a wry smile.

“Don't jinx us. Clearing this place and rescuing the hostage would be impossible if it's that difficult. I'd prefer a puzzle dungeon, personally.” Kara chimed in with interest.

“Oh, I hope it's some sort of acrobatics dungeon!” Feera threw her hat in as well.

Sheeron sighed, exasperated already, “Not even five minutes and I want to get as far away from this nonsense as possible.”

“Spoilsport.” Rox teased him.

“I'll kill you,” Sheeron said dryly.

Rox smirked and spoke in a high-pitched, taunting tone, “You can try.”

Before Sheeron could make a rebuttal, Toley, being too excited to restrain himself anymore, ran down the stairs past the rest of the party. He ignored their calls to wait or to come back, foolishly. As his footsteps faded into the darkness, everyone turned to look at Sheeron, as if it were his fault that his apprentice could not restrain himself. In response, Sheeron rubbed the back of his head sheepishly and quickened his pace to catch up. The party did the same.

As they neared the bottom of the stairs they also found Toley, standing still. Sheeron was the first to reach him and smacked the back of his head hard enough to send him to his knees. “You idiot!” He said loudly, “Don't you realize what kind of place we're in? Running ahead can get you, as well as the rest of us, killed! What if you had run into a monster?!”

Toley rubbed the back of his head and stood back up, barely acknowledging the lecture. After he had stood up, he took his battle stance. Sheeron was about to hit him again and start another lecture, but he finally noticed what had put Toley on edge. The rest of the party quickly followed Toley's example. Various complaints were raised from the group while they had the chance.

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

“You jinxed us,” Kara said.

“I hate rematches.” Rox groaned.

In front of the party stood the true beginning of the boss-type dungeon. A giant, from the looks of it, a powerful one. He stood on the far end of the room, conveniently waiting for the party to notice him before he took action. Beating the cobblestone floor of the dungeon with a wooden club, the giant let out an ear-splitting roar, challenging the intruders to a fight.

As if on cue, the party spread themselves out. Rox, Toley, and Feera all rushed forward at full speed while also putting distance between each other to give the giant more targets to focus on. Kara remained near the entrance to begin gathering mana for a powerful spell while Sheeron stood a bit in front of her to act as a guard.

[https://i.imgur.com/FF5kcmz.jpg]

As the three forward attackers reached the giant, he seemed to decide to target Rox first. The monster turned to face him and Rox stopped in his tracks, keeping himself ready to dodge at any moment and ready to counter-attack. The other two circled around behind the giant and looked for an opportunity, not wanting to risk being wrong about the giant's focus. They did not have to wait long, however, as the giant vertically swung his club at Rox only a moment later.

“I really hate rematches,” Rox said as he dodged sideways to avoid the club while attempting to cut the giant's wrist before it could pull away. The giant was too quick, though.

The two behind him took their chance to attack the giant's Achilles tendon in each leg, but the giant seemed to expect it and did something none of them ever expected a giant could do. The giant jumped backward, back-flipping twice before landing perfectly on its feet. Before they could recover, the giant kicked the ground and flew at the three with an incredible step-in speed.

Rox, the only one able to react quick enough, ran to the front and barely managed to deflect the giant's attack by diverting the force into the ground. The force of the blow made the entire room shake and yet the floor and club showed no physical signs of damage, suggesting magical protection of dungeon objects inside. The giant used the club as a pivot, using the momentum of its diverted attack to attempt a round-house kick at Rox, who had barely recovered from deflecting the blow and was unable to do anything about it.

Before the kick landed, however, the giant was blown away by a powerful torrent of water. The water washed it against a wall near where he had been standing, quite violently, and he collapsed to the ground coughing. Kara had managed to finish gathering her maximum mana and was now in the fight as well. Sheeron rushed forward to join the attackers now that he no longer had to protect her.

“I'll continually gather mana between spells to support you with magic, go wild everyone!” Kara called, assuring everyone that she would keep them safe with her water and healing magic.

Sheeron and Rox looked at one another and nodded, running forward together to see if they could strike before the monster recovered. They reached him just as he was standing up and were attacked by a dazed horizontal club swing, far slower than it had been previously. Sheeron slid underneath it and kept up his running momentum while Rox jumped up and landed on the club.

Once the club came close to the giant, Rox jumped upwards and prepared a downward strike while Sheeron rushed forward to use the chance to cut the artery located in the giant's leg with his axe.

The giant, having recovered, avoided Sheeron's attempt by jumping high in the air towards Rox to swat him out of the air like a fly. Rox prepared to attempt an aerial maneuver to dodge, but Feera called to him to keep going. Trusting his life in her hands, he kept his downward strike prepared as the giant rapidly approached him from the ground.

Just as the giant was about to hit Rox with his club, a shadow flew up instantly from the floor of the dungeon and latched onto Rox's body. It pulled him towards the ground hard, accelerating his downward attack more quickly than the giant expected, causing Rox's attack to land.

The giant fell out of the air and crashed into the ground hard as Rox landed safely. He did not have long to get his wits back, however, as the giant stood up again immediately with a large gash from its right shoulder to the middle of his torso.

He let out another roar of challenge, in his anger, not noticing Toley jumping up from behind him.

“That's more than enough out of you!” Toley shouted as he attacked with his claws while activating their unique enchantment. Unseen and unexpected, the attack landed perfectly.

As Toley landed he dodged out of the way, but everyone quickly saw that this was unnecessary, as the giant began to scream in anguish. He fell to the ground, belly-first, showing the party the terrible wound caused by Toley's weapon. A three-pronged gash down the left side of the giant’s back, sizzling as if it were being cooked and melting after a few moments. It began to spread out further from the source, like an infection spreading.

However, before it could fester any further, Rox ended the giant's life by quickly running up and beheading the creature. The light quickly left its eyes and the horrifying enchantment attack stopped at the same time, suggesting that the effect was linked to the life-force of the victim.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief as Rox gave the 'okay', showing the giant was dead for certain and would not be coming back. It was then that everyone present looked at Toley, more specifically, his weapon. The claws were glowing blue, a fire weapon that inflicted a cursed wound that would slowly burn the flesh of the victim until death. A devastating effect.

“As terrifying as it is, I'm glad we have it,” Sheeron said, voicing the mixed-feelings that everyone in the room had. Toley included.

“I think I'll only use the effect when a situation is serious.” The boy said, possibly to himself, while looking sick to his stomach.

Everyone nodded, agreeing with the idea. Rox could not help but look at his new sword, worried whether it would have a similarly terrifying effect. He shook his head at the thought, no, this was officially a boss dungeon. He had to use any ability he could to get them through this. He would not dispute Toley's choice, it was the boy's to make and was also an understandable one. Rox, however, did not have that kind of humanity or mercy within him. Especially when the first creature they came across was a giant that had unprecedented dexterity and strength.

The party sat near the entrance to the next room to take a break. Luckily, in a dungeon like this, after beating a boss they could rest as long as they'd like before entering the next room. If they left the dungeon, the giant would reappear when they came back and they would not be able to leave the next room until they killed the boss or were killed. So they opted to rest before moving on.

Only now did it sink in just how challenging the quest that Kara had accepted was.