Maria continued roaming around the dungeon for a long while but she couldn’t find the boss room nor the way out. Time seemed endless in the darkness and she almost went mad from the constant skittering of the monsters and their screeches whenever she put them out of their misery.
“Dammit, just where is the exit?!”
Maria had been looking high and low but couldn’t find anything besides the long passages that she’s previously moved through. She even tried smashing apart the dungeon walls but she found out that they were indestructible. This was an instance dungeon so breaking through barriers wasn’t allowed by the system. The walls were the instance’s barrier so they couldn’t be broken. Maria didn’t know this so she continued to do this for a couple of hours but eventually stopped after seeing that it was futile. She didn’t know that at the end of the dungeon, there was actually a small hole where all of the rat monsters came out of and the boss room was past this hole.
It was too small for a person to fit and she couldn’t see it so naturally, she couldn’t locate where it was. At her wit's end, Maria was about to log off and ask for help but when she summoned Alexa to watch over her, she suddenly had a brilliant idea.
“Alexa!”
“Yes, big sis?”
“You can see in this dungeon, right?”
“Yes, though my vision is partially hindered by some unknown force, I can still see.”
“That’s great! I know I didn’t want to ask for help but my training’s over so I need to get out of here. I can’t find the entrance because I’m blinded by something right now so please help,” Maria explained before asking for help.
“O-Of course, big sis!” Alexa eagerly replied.
She was always ready to help the big sister who had taken her in when she was at her lowest and brought her up into the young lady that she was now. Alexa was one of Maria's most devout followers, her zeal was comparable to Ash’s or even better. Her fanaticism may seem strange to others but everyone in the Dire had a similar mindset as her so it wasn’t strange. With Alexa’s help, Maria scoured the dungeon one more time and finally, she found the small hole where the rats were moving in and out of.
“Big sis...I can hear the rats moving in and out of this hole. They probably spawn from here,” Alexa said.
“That means the boss room is past this hole.”
“It’s too small for you to fit in, big sis. With your wings and everything...not to mention that the rats are moving through this hole. They’d likely start attacking you once you try to crawl through.”
“Hmm…”
Maria frowned when she heard Alexa’s words but she was reminded of what happened last time when she yelled inside of this cave. Her scream had hurt herself as well as the rats that were nearby.
“Let’s try something else. I want you to stand back, Alexa,” Maria said as she ordered Alexa to take a few steps back.
Alexa did as she was told while Maria moved close to the hole before using [Terra] to form a cone around it. She then activated her [Scream of Pain], a skill she rarely used now, and directed it into the hole the rats were moving in and out of.
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“KYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!”
Maria let loose an ear-piercing shout that even shook the entire cave. The only part of the dungeon walls that were fragile enough to be taken down by one of her attacks was actually the wall around the hole so when she released her [Scream of Pain], the dungeon walls began to shake before they crumbled down in front of her. However, that wasn’t the only result of her [Scream of Pain] that was amplified by the dungeon. A string of messages appeared on her [Log] that showed Maria that she had killed a few rat monsters and injured the rat king.
-10,249
-50,698
-100,396!
-10,585
-60,195
-10,680
-20,110!
You have killed a Mesutri! +100029 EXP You have killed a Mesutri! +100029 EXP You have killed a Mesutri! +100029 EXP
From witnessing too many of its offspring being killed, the Mesutri Queen has entered Rage Mode
“Hehe, there you are,” Maria said with a wicked smile.
There was a final message in her log that caught her attention since it lifted the blindness and restored her vision.
The Mesutri Queen’s relic has been damaged. The [Veil of Darkness] has been temporarily lifted!
“Oh, my vision’s back! So it wasn’t a bug but the boss monster’s magic!”
Maria nodded and took note of this before passing through the broken dungeon wall along with Alexa who followed closely behind her. Maria didn’t know this, but Alexa was quietly observing her and making mental notes to herself. The young vampire lady adored and admired her big sister so she wanted to try and be more like her. The person she was trying to copy wasn’t aware that the way she began dressing and acting as of late was resembling her more and more as the days went by. Alexa was slowly getting stronger and learning from Maria that she was starting to become Maria 2.0.
Her original battle style that used a great ax and recklessly pushed forward with pure strength and a variety of magic, Alexa was becoming more and more like the old Maria by the day and she was seriously practicing this style of battle with her uncle and auntie’s help.
Ash thought that it was a bit worrying since he didn’t know how Maria would take this. Whether she found it acceptable or treated it as an act of mockery to her character, he didn’t know. Unfortunately, for Ash, no matter how long he’s been serving his queen, he still couldn’t quite grasp what her real character was like. One thing was for certain, Maria wouldn’t reprimand or get angry at Alexa for trying to copy her. She always wanted a little sister so she had long since treated the young Alexa as her sister, constantly looking out for her and taking care of her. If her little sister tried to imitate her, she wouldn’t mind at all and instead, let her be since she would find the act quite cute.
Only Carmilla saw this so she was supporting Alexa and training her in the ways of blood magic while Ash taught her how to use a variety of weapons, though Alexa only focused on the ax training. Alexa had been doing her best to train so it came as a surprise to her when she saw Maria suddenly pull out her new weapons and dual-wielded them.
“Oh!”
Alexa’s eyes widened when she saw Maria hold two long blades akimbo and suddenly rushed forward after enchanting her weapons with a [Fire] spell. The boss monster Maria was facing was the Mesutri Queen and it was a bit surprising to her because what she saw wasn’t a normal rat monster but a young woman, a little bit older than her...with mouse ears and a tail.
“Woah...you sure aren’t what I imagined!” Maria suddenly exclaimed after she saw the injured Mesutri Queen stand up.
Her eyes were glowing red and her body had an ominous aura raging around her. It was a clear indicator that she was in her Rage Mode right now, a common feature of most dungeon bosses.
“I pictured you to be an ugly rat but this is quite the pleasant surprise. Too bad I’m gonna have to ruin your face!”
Maria quickly arrived right in front of the Mesutri Rat Queen and slashed one of her blades down on its head. This wasn’t a boss monster whose stats were above hers so with her high strength, Maria slammed the monster who had tried to block her sword into the ground before she followed it up by twisting her body and sending her other sword down on its defenseless back. She spun around again and smashed her foot into the Mesutri Queen’s face when it was trying to get back up and pushed it deeper into the dungeon floor with a [Scream of Pain].
“I’m going to enjoy this.”
The Mesutri Queen was a peculiar boss that had entered its enraged mode even before it fell to half health or red health. It should have been a difficult boss monster to battle because it had the relic that caused the [Veil of Darkness] that blinded the players raiding it but Maria had preemptively damaged the relic before the battle so she was able to fight the boss monster with her vision restored. The relic would appear in the darkness of the veil to the players and if an attack so much as hit the relic, it would immediately damage the item and lift the [Veil of Darkness].
However, in doing so, this would trigger the Mesutri Queen’s [Rage Mode]. The dungeon diving team needed to have overwhelming stats to overpower the boss monster or fight it in the [Veil of Darkness]. Either way, it would be a tough fight but for Maria, it didn't matter which method she took the battle. Even if she was fighting the monster blind, she’d still beat it with her [Intuition] talent and completely overwhelm it as she was doing now even in the Mesutri Queen’s [Rage Mode].
“You’re lucky that I don’t have a [Rage Mode] or else I would trash you even harder than I am right now!”