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Helga decided to lead us to the nearby low ranked dungeons we planned to both explore and use to level up Root as much as we could before going out tomorrow. She and her group were all quite experienced in everything regarding this country's dungeons, as they had lived here ever since they were born, obviously. As we walked towards the nearest D Rank Dungeon, which is the Dungeon I decided to go to, as going to an E Rank one might be too slow and going a Rank higher than Root is still possible, Helga explained us about these dungeons.
"Around the entire city there's around five dungeons up to C+ Rank. The hardest one has a B Rank Boss Monster, but that's about it. The only dungeon of higher difficulty was the Sealed Dungeon, but that one's underground and into even deeper areas." Said Helga.
"These five dungeons are owned by different guilds and are the major source of our resources and food as well. There's the Mushroom Cave Dungeon where Mushroom Monsters appear, which is also where we grow mushrooms and harvest them to eat them." Said Blackard.
"A few others such as the Lizard's Nest are filled with lizard-type monsters, their meat's is what we eat most of the time. Or at least commoners do. I've already eaten pork several times at Miss Aquamarine's residence!" Laughed Helga.
"I'll make sure to improve everyone's pay with all the money we'll yield from the crops inside the dungeon I conquered. You guys are all part of the guild after all, and if you'll be going to work there frequently, paying you is normal." I said, trying to cheer them up. Eating the same thing over and over was sure tiring, I had experienced it with my Giant Rat Cattle… At this point most people just want to eat anything else than giant rats.
I had already brought them hundreds of Moles and Birds Monster meat, which was of incredible quality and flavor compared to our Giant Rat Cattle, so everyone must be eating way better meat.
"The Mushroom Cave Dungeon is a nice place as it is an E+ Rank Dungeon, but most of the time it is being cleansed daily by employees and mushrooms are cultivated in there all day, so there's little space for people to go leveling or anything of the sort. That dungeon has completely been privatized." Sighed Helga.
"However, the dungeon where we are going should suffice!"
"Yeah, that one dungeon's a bit of a mess, but it is easy enough for the small tree lass."
"Can someone remind me again why we are bothering so much for that walking tree?"
The dwarves began rambling as usual.
"Oi you lot! If Lady Maria asks our help, we give her our help! Don't go around questioning her now! She already said this thing was special!" Helga said angrily, reprimanding them.
Though did she had to call little Root as "this thing"?!
"Anyways, which dungeon are we visiting that you guys babble so much about?" I asked.
"Gyugyuh…" Root was sitting over my head while looking around the city.
"Muh…" Nyx was taking a look at Root as if he was her new toy. The reason he was on top of my head was because it was the farthest place from Nyx's little claws.
"This one!"
Helga and the dwarves quickly showed us the dungeon we were coming to visit. It was a rather busy entrance, there were a dozen of people entering and walking outside, all of them wearing armors and holding weapons. Some bringing enormous backpacks with themselves.
They were this country's equivalent of adventurers, often named Explorers or Dungeon Raiders. Some even just went to mine ores that grow inside, bringing sacks with ores and pickaxes with themselves.
"It looks pretty full! Will we even get to find any monster here?" Partner wondered while crossing her arms.
"Of course, this dungeon's enormously vast. It is the biggest of the four. It is named the Endless Swamps for a reason after all!" Said Helga.
"It has eight floors, all of them of a massive size which are all underground swamps and lakes. A variety of monsters appear here, alongside special magical herbs, ores, and other materials which grow naturally due to the dungeon's magic." Said Blackard.
"This place's where most of our activities were done before we decided to go to the other mountain…"
"Man, getting here sure is nostalgic."
"Makes me remember that time you tripped over a turtle that resembled a rock and fell into the swamp, and then came back covered on leeches all over your face, Blackard!"
"Hahahaha! I remember that too!"
"Gahahahaha! That was such a good time!"
"You better not fall again you black bearded bastard!"
"Tch! Cut it out!" Blackard crossed his burly arms. "Anyways, let's go. With the VIP passes we have we can enter easily into the most monster filled areas right away."
"Yeah, let's go!" Helga quickly guided us, all of us showed our VIP Cards. Even Takeshi and Laura got themselves one some time ago in a little exam they had to do, where they completely demolished the tests.
As for Root and Nyx, we hid them inside my shadows for a tiny bit. Nyx had yet to get herself a license so we had to sneak her inside without being seen. Root was literally monster so he might cause a fuss and I wasn't in the mood to explain things.
The reason why nothing happened outside was because, most likely, people thought he was a very weird hat made of wood rather than a walking tree monster. In this place where there are no trees at all, people has never seen Treants before, so they couldn't recognize him.
We entered the dungeon right away, walking down the straight path alongside many other Explorers. Helga and the team of dwarves knew all these passages while we were racking our brains where to go next. My Map Skill showed me an immense maze of interconnected caves everywhere…
"Here we are!"
Helga quickly led us to an almost empty place, in front of an enormous underground swamp covered by gigantic floating lily pads and enormous frogs hopping around leisurely.
"This is our favorite spot, Swamp 8! Not many come all the way down here because it is a pain to walk all the stairs up after we are done." Laughed Blackard.
"Oh, so that's why we went down so many stairs…" I sighed.
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