The quest roster looked something like this: Two postings asking for a Minotaur’s horn, one calling for Hellhound fangs, another for Almiraj fur, another for Crystal Mantis wings, and a final for a mineral called “Blood Onyx”. Laid out, they might look like this:
Quests
1. Need, Minotaur’s Horn x1. Owned x0. Reward: 85,000 val
2. Need, Minotaur’s Horn x1. Own x0. Reward: 75,000 val
3. Need, Hellhound’s Fang x3. Own x0. Reward: 90,000 val
4. Need, Almiraj Fur x4. Own x0. Reward: 110,000 val
5. Need, C. Mantis Wing x2. Own x0. Reward: 225,000 val
6. Need, Blood Onyx x1. Own x0. Reward: 90,000 val
Reward for full completion: 675,000 val
It was a ridiculous amount of money, enough to take an enormous chunk out of his debt on the house, even with his inevitable expenses. Adama had given Lilli the day off tomorrow, and he brought some extra supplies, so he had given himself the night and a full day to complete these quests. He wasn’t sure exactly of how he would find the Blood Onyx, but he had a plan for everything else. The Crystal Mantis wings contract was the only monster contract he expected to give him trouble, but he had something special in mind for that. He did have one place he wanted to go to first, though.
The upper floors naturally gave Adama no trouble at all, and he soon found himself at the threshold of the 13th floor once again. He was greeted by a band of Almiraj and Hellhounds, who tried to tear him apart, but he butchered them with little difficulty. The fire-resistant nature of his dragon’s hide tunic truly did turn the Hellhounds into a bit of a joke and the Almiraj were technically only high Level 1 threats individually. Adama got lucky and picked up a piece of Almiraj fur from just this first conflict, but he wasn’t planning on focusing on that contract just yet. He tossed the fur into his anyways pack, of course.
Moving on, he began his journey deeper into the darkness of the underground labyrinth. Impatient to make his way downwards faster, he ran around the 13th floor, killing anything in his path, until he found what he was looking for. It didn’t take long for him to stumble upon a small room with a hole in the floor. It was wide and cylindrical and when he looked down into it, all he could see was an inky blackness. Just to verify, he tossed a stone down and waited for the faint echo that sounded out when the rock hit the unseen floor below. Now that he had ensured he wasn’t about to kill himself, he took a deep inhale and jumped into the hole.
The wind whistled through his ears and hair as he free fell through the Dungeon’s Middle floors. When he determined that he was picking up too much speed, he jammed his sword into the wall in order to slow his descent. But Hearthblade cut the rock a little too well, presumably thanks to his more recent growth, and his fall was only somewhat slowed before he hit the floor. Hard. Adama’s knees buckled, and rock shattered as his leather boots struck the ground. The adventurer soon righted himself and began to peer through the murk of his nearby surroundings.
He estimated himself to be on the 15th or 16th floors at the very least, as that was a long fall. He certainly didn’t get the time to determine where he was before he was greeted by a welcome party. A great cacophony of deep throated roars and booming footsteps was all he heard before a group of enormous burly figures came charging into the room where he had landed. Red eyes gleamed and muscles bulged as enormous horned beasts trampled their way towards the lone swordsman, raising menacing rock weapons to bash his skull in.
Their assault was so brutal and unexpected that Adama was nearly run into the ground in their initial charge. He parried the first few blows, but he was forced to take one of the overhead attacks directly on his sword. The force of the blow sent a shockwave through his body, but he held firm in the face of the hit. The problem was a second Minotaur, following up on the strike by its fellow, swinging its club right into his exposed right side with perfect timing. Unable to dodge, Adama swiftly struck out a clawed right palm to catch the blow before it hit. The contact sent shivers all through his body and he felt his right arm scream in protest, but he blocked the strike and held back the natural weapon with one hand.
Thinking quickly, Adama broke the deadlock with a shouted “Rippling Sword”. The beam of energy he emitted helped Hearthblade cleaved right through the hardened stone club and left the monster stupidly clutching its now useless weapon. That freed his sword up to drag across the belly of the beast, cutting through its tough hide and disemboweling the creature. Even one-handed, Hearthblade cut deep enough that he accidentally cut the magic stone in the beast’s midsection, causing the beast to instantly transform into ash.
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The remaining three beasts only roared louder at the death of their comrade. After the failure of their sneak attack, they began to fight in a more coordinated fashion, spreading out more so they didn’t get in each other’s way. Adama fended off attacks from three sides as they danced around the room in a deadly game of blood and sweat. He managed shallow cuts on their torsos and arms, but nothing close to the decisive hit he managed on the first enemy. His right arm throbbed from catching that earlier hit and he accumulated smaller cuts from flying debris kicked up from his enemies missed swings making contact with the ground. Unwilling to take any further risks, he began to chant.
The Minotaurs began to redouble their efforts, sensing the danger presented by the threatening song. But Adama held them for long enough to complete his concurrent casting and let loose his signature move:
“Skill of a Sage, the Endless Sword”
The bodies and the weapons of the foes around him were quickly littered with a matrix of long cuts. He had been facing one of the creatures in particular, and while the others were wounded and off balance, this particular Minotaur was cut to ribbons in the epicenter of an explosion of sword energy. Its arms fell away in pieces, and it dropped to its knees, allowing him to easily finish it off with a blow to the throat. The others weren’t in much better shape, so the fight didn’t last much longer. Tim cut through their feeble resistance and soon he was alone in the underground chamber. He gulped down a potion, feeling the bones in his arm stop throbbing and his cuts smoothly close, and set about extracting his earnings. After their bodies disintegrated, he noticed a large brown object sitting in the dust of one of their corpses. Stooping down, he fished out the Minotaur’s horn.
“Must be my lucky day.” He thought to himself sardonically, pocketing the precious material and moving on.
He eventually verified that he was indeed on the 16th floor, and, after checking the map and backtracking a little, he began his journey downward to the 17th. He ran into a plethora of hellhounds on his little trek, but he mostly yawned as he fought his way through the persistent nuisances. He also duked it out with a few more Minotaurs he ran across, though they proved less threatening without the element of surprise. The Minotaurs typically threatened adventurers with their tough hides and physically powerful attacks. However, Hearthblade was sharp enough that their hides were no obstacle, and Strong Body meant that his crushing physical strength was even superior to theirs. With both of their advantages neutered or outmatched, Adama found that he could handle several of the Level 2 threats at once with no serious issue, despite the fact that most of his stats were still in the Hs. The only regrettable part of his fights was that none of these enemies dropped any items.
Between countering the Hellhounds and the Minotaurs, Tim was the Middle floors’ kryptonite, and he cruised through the 16th floors with relative ease. Most adventurer who could see this would probably sob at the unfairness of it all. Normally, it took a high level 2 adventurer of exceptional skill to advance solo through the Middle floors. Even then, they would likely be seriously challenged by the regular threats that appeared there. But besides his initial scuffle, Adama strolled through like he owned the place. The only additional novelty he encountered was just after he entered the 17th floor.
He only received a half second’s worth of warning before he threw himself forward into the room in front of him. With little to no warning, a great crimson river of fire erupted from the passageway perpendicular to the path that he had just been passing through. Even with his fire-resistant garments, that kind of flame would have engulfed him entirely and threatened his unprotected head. Whirling around, he turned to greet the predator that had obviously been lying in wait for him.
Bounding down the passageway and closing in on his position was a giant pink lizard, perhaps 5 meters in length. The beginnings of wings could be seen on its back and its red eyes flashed with malice as it closed in on what it believed to be just somewhat elusive prey. Pinkish grey claws flashing even in the dim light, the Wyvern came down on Adama with an eager vigor.
It was soon taught that it was the true prey after all.
Tim squared up and caught the descending claw firmly on his blade. Before the creature could even reel in shock, Adama struck out with a kick towards its other front leg as he held the other claw in check. The crack of bones splintering sent the beast reeling backwards in pain. It opened its mouth reflexively in order to unleash its fiery breath once again but all it achieved was the reception of a Rippling Sword right in the mouth. The wasn’t enough to kill the creature outright, but it was wounded enough now that Adama soon put the creature out of its misery by lopping its head off.
The creature had been tough by the standards of the Middle floors, but not much more problematic than a Minotaur. He only realized the true damage of the fight in the aftermath. With some chagrin, he looked down and saw that his cloak was on fire. Moving quickly, he took off his pack and realized that it was burning as well. He worked to snuff out that fire first, then moved to save his poor cloak, but he was a little late. The black material had been sturdy and largely brand new but now it was all tattered at the edges. It had taken a Hellhound’s breath, but it seemed a Wyvern’s flames were too much. At least he managed to save his pack before any serious damage had been done there.
Shaking his head with a wry smile, he donned his tattered cloak and singed pack and continued moving forward. Little did he know, the Dungeon had a lot more in store for him than a badly burned cloak. As he moved deeper and deeper into the underground labyrinth, the mockery of the Dungeon’s efforts to kill him continued. And the Dungeon despised being mocked.