34 Chapter 35: Death Knigh

"So this is the 9th floor... I'm not able to feel a hint of life from anywhere ahead of us with deprehendre" I muttered

We had entered the 9th floor after Ariel defeated the boss. Even I didn't see that Wind Spear coming, and from the looks of it, Serena has also developed a similar spell.

"Concept magic is so fun to learn, once you completely understand an element, you can create different forms of a spell with it. But it takes training, dedication and magic power which the 3 of us are fortunate to have." I Said

"Yeah, yeah, don't forget the knowledge which is something only you have. Sometimes I wish I could see what goes on inside of your head." Serena said

"Haha... I wish you wouldn't do that, Mind reading magic doesn't exist right?" I asked

"It does, Most royals have at least one servant who can use it, however, you have to be thinking of it out loud for them to be able to read it. In other words, they can't just read your concepts but they can make it so you think of them and they can read that." Said, Serena

"Then that means... That king could have used it on me... No wonder he tried to kidnap me..." I muttered

"Did you just say, king!?" Asked Serena

"Yeah, He wanted john to work for him so we left," Ariel said

Wow, she just made that seem a lot simpler than I could imagine with no effort.

"Wow, I can imagine that... But how were you able to get away?" Serena asked

"Like this, Furtim," I said

"Oh, I see... Yeah, I suppose that would work." Serena Said

"But that won't work against those guys," I said as I pointed at the piece of armour that laid on the floor

"Why not?" Serena asked

We had been walking for a while and we finally encountered the first monster

"That is... I'm not sure, I didn't test it out since Rose was with us back then. But I have a feeling they can feel us even through Furtim. Let's find out." I said

The two girls nodded and we quietly walked passed the armour

"It worke-?"

Before Serena could finish, another Armour which was behind her got up and swung its sword at her. Seeing this, I pulled her towards me and it missed her.

"Looks like it won't work. What sucks, even more, is we're going to have to physically break the armour, magic won't be very effective. What the hell is wrong with this dungeon, why is magic becoming less effective over the floors!?" I asked

"T-Thank you," Said Serena as she moved away from me, with a slightly reddened cheeks

Hm... Why does she look embarrassed?

We were surrounded, 2 armours were blocking where we came from and 2 armours blocking our path forward.

"Tch, I'll handle the two at the back, you handle the two at the front," I said

"Yes!" They replied

Instead of parrying them, I ended up cutting through the gaps within their armour. But thanks to that I got to see where their core was.

It took that moment to swing at me while I was still in the air. Without any way to dodge I cast

"Velox"

And propelled myself backwards, barely avoiding its swing. As I was sent back, before I bumped into Ariel and Serena, I cast Velox again, midair and propelled myself back to the armour who missed its swing at me.

I used my momentum to pierce the middle of it's chest-plate with my left dagger and muttered

"ignis iecit"

In that moment, A ball of flame which was formed from my magic travelled through the tip of the sword to the inside of the armour and hit the core directly

After that, the core of the Unanimated Armour broke and the armour broke down to just pieces of good looking armour

While my dagger was still stuck inside of the broken armour, the Other armour beside it swung its sword at me. It wasn't fast but it looked like it could hit hard. I dodged it by stepping back to Ariel and Serena's side to see how they were doing.

"How's it going on your end?" I asked as I forcefully separated my dagger from the broken chest plate

"It 's resistant to ignis and Ventus... I don't want to waste energy using higher-level spells... Any idea on how to beat them?" Serena asked

"Yeah, the armour is resistant but the core isn't if you can find a way to get the spell through the gap..."

"Where's the core?" Ariel asked

"In the middle of the chest-plate," I replied

"Leave it to me," Serena said before casting a new fire spell

10... No, 15 Fire arrows were formed in front of the two girls and with a flick of the staff, they showed down on the armour. Most arrows were deflected by their armour, however, thanks to the angles some managed to get in through the gaps and pierced the core

With just one hit to the core, it ended up breaking and both armours broke down

"That's pretty strong, is that one of the spells you came up with during those 7 days?" I asked

"More like, the only one, aside from Ariel's Combo Move," Serena replied

"Oh yeah, the one you used against me. That was really strong." I said

"Wasn't it!? Was that all of them?" Serena asked

"No, there's still one more," I said as I pointed at the one watching us

"Why isn't it moving? Is it scared?" Serena asked

"No I just happened to cast, gravitas on it, ahead of time so I could take care of the other one first," I said

"How can you say these things so casually? And why didn't you just cast Gravitas on both?" Serena asked

"It takes a lot of energy to use it on even just one object, imagine using it on two," I replied

"Fair enough, aren't you going to finish it?" Serena asked

"Right," I said as I walked towards it

I increased the amount of magic being supplied to my blade, around 3x more than usual and swung my blade horizontally at it.

Before my blade hit I muttered "Tonde flamma"

In a swift motion, as if it were cutting through butter, my blade cut the armour vertically in half. There was a burn effect remaining on the area where the armour had been cut, thanks to my spell

"J-John... What was that? You just cut through a special type of armour which is resistant to offensive magic..." Serena asked while trying to hide her shock

"This ore is a good thermal conductor, so when we were training, I tried increasing the temperature of the blade by mixing it with Ignis, thanks I was able to cut through things a lot easier than before."

"C-Conductor?" Muttered Ariel with a confused expression

"W-Well... I'll teach you two when we get back..."

Should I have not used it?

The two silently nodded and moved on. Their reaction was a bit weird.

***

We moved through the floor, either running past the armours or engaging them in fights in cases where we weren't able to get through and wasted a moderate amount of energy.

Finally, we reached the bosses room after another hour of taking the wrong turns and reaching a dead-end

"Why are these dungeons designed as mazes? Why!?" I shouted as I punched the ground

When we reached the door entrance, Our adrenaline ran out and all the hunger we had been holding back, came crashing down at once. So we decided to have our very first meal in a while.

"Mn! This is really good! John, who taught you how to cook?" Serena asked

We were eating a packed lunch of sandwiches which I had made before we entered the dungeon. I had made around 20 boxes so it should be able to last us 5 days, if we ration it, it will last longer. I know that just eating sandwiches isn't healthy so I added chicken to some of them and rice balls.

"Life experience," I said with a hollow expression

"Wha-?"

Before ariel could finish, I repeated "Life experience."

"O-Okay..." Serena muttered.

The sandwiches were made with butter and ham. I was really surprised when they didn't know what cheese was, but that's fine. If I ever become a merchant I'll create ingredients and dishes they've never heard about.

I know how to process cheese thanks to all the tutorials I watched online. I was also a decent cook because my uncle would teach me and tell me that cooking is something one should learn from a young age.

Although I wasn't as good as modern-day chefs, I knew how to make sauces and omelette rice or tuna rice. On second thought I might not become a cook, but I still know how to make Sauces and cheese, If I can sell them, I should be able to make good revenue.

"John, what are you thinking about? You have the creepy looking grin on your face... Could it be? Puberty's finally catching up to you? Are you starting to show interest in that?" Serena said as she teased me

"Funny coming from someone who clearly hasn't shown any signs of development despite going through puberty," I said with an annoyed expression

"W-What did you just say! I'm still growing!" Said Serena with an annoyed expression

"I know, It was a joke," I said as I chuckled

Having fun like this, Tends to make us feel less nervous before we head in to fight the boss, I'm sure that's the case

"Is everyone ready?" I said as I placed my hands on the door

"Yeah, Let's go." Said, Ariel

Serena remained quiet, Looks like she was still mad about that joke earlier.

"Well, then. Stick to the formation." I said as I opened the door

The doors opened and inside stood a single figure. The Darkness and bloodthirsty being emanated from that single Armoured being was insane, It was even stronger than the spider queens.

"Is this the 9th floor?" I asked as I walked in

"That's!?" Serena said

"Serena, do you recognise that?" I asked

In the middle of the boss room, stood a being who wore armour which covered its entire body. Its hands were pure skeleton and it's helmet covered its face. We could only see it's bright red eyes through the helmet.

It wore a purple robe and carried a sheath containing a longsword on it's back. With deprehendre, I couldn't feel an ounce of life coming from it.

"That's... A death knight... An undead formed from the deep hate of a knight before he dies. Its Strength is on par with A-Rank monsters, It doesn't die no matter how many times you kill it, and it is definitely Stronger than that spider on the 10th floor." Serena replied

"So what's it doing here?" I asked

"While it's strength is high, it's considered a B-Class monster. Despite being immortal, since it's extremely disadvantageous against priests, After they have been killed, before they can resurrect themselves a priest can purify it, So their immortality won't work." Said, Serena

But in our case...

"Do you get it? He's the worst enemy for us, a party who doesn't have a single mage who can use the holy element..." Serena continued

"Crap... I never expected us to meet an undead this soon. Well, I guess the armours are undead... Looks like we're in trouble." I said as I tried to hide my worry

"Now isn't the time to play around, Even if we beat him, he'll just keep coming back..." Serena said

"Do we retreat?" Ariel asked

"I'll Think of something, For now, let's-"

Before I could finish, The Knight stretched out its arms and cast a Fire orb at us. The orb was Small, but I could tell it was dangerous.

"Glacies" I muttered

The size of the Ice spike was twice the amount, as usual, I aimed at the orb and propelled it towards it before the orb hit us. The orb was fast, but the room was big so I had enough time to counter.

Steam was formed when the two spells clashed but my Glacies Had completely Evaporated. I cast another glacies at the orb and during that moment I Grabbed on to Serena and Ariel and used Velox and Levite to bring us to the sky.

My 2nd Glacies managed to weaken the fire orb but it wasn't enough. Despite being weakened, Once it made contact with where we were standing, the fire orb caused a small explosion but we managed to avoid it since I had already brought us up to the Air

Once it noticed that we were in the air, it began to charge another fire orb to fire at us

"Oi... Are you serious? A Death knight who can use magic?!"

Come on Dungeon, Can't you balance your System!?! Why is the 9th Floor boss stronger than the 10th!?!